or, “How the Tories Taught Us to Dance by Taking Away Our Jobs…”  Well, maybe not.   Anyway, Hannah is back with another corker of a blog that she researched by talking to her Mum.  Your Mum must be pretty cool Hannah.  I hate to think what I would have to write about if I based it on conversations with my Mum.   Best not to think about it.  Over to you Hannah… 

So here goes the next instalment of my Mancunian musings:

This week, as I’m sure you’re all aware, Morrissey (the King of Mancs!), was described as ‘storming off stage’ after a bottle was thrown at him during a concert at the Liverpool Echo Arena. It made me think, this would never happen in his hometown. As a result, I’m dedicating this blog to all the Mancunians that have made us proud, and why the lyrics of Joy Division, The Stone Roses, The Inspiral Carpets, The Smiths; the list could go on, still resonate with me today, as a twenty year old who didn’t live through this era.

As I meandered down Oxford Road today, I popped into the Portland Bookshop. Admittedly, it was Peter Hook’s new book, ‘The Hacienda: How Not to Run a Club’, which stood proudly in the window that lured me in. The Hacienda was not just another swanky city centre club to blow your week’s earnings on during the drunken debauchery of a Friday night, it represented a lot more than this; it represented a new era for Manchester.

Manchester’s reputation as the industrial capital of the North was ruined by Thatcherite policies, and Manchester in the late seventies and eighties was bleak and miserable. The Smiths’ ‘Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now’, ‘Please Let Me Get What I Want’ and ‘This is How it Feels’ by The Inspiral Carpets encapsulate these feeling perfectly for me.

The Manchester music scene largely seemed to avoid overt politics and certainly did not compare to bands like The Clash or Gang of Four. The one exception possibly being Easterhouse, from Stretford; a band that supported The Smiths and were aligned to the far left.

In spite of this, there is little doubt that there were huge amounts of political, economic and social unrest in the North of England during Thatcher’s time as Prime Minister. It is because of this that the Hacienda came to represent a new age of hedonism, hope and overwhelming optimism for the people of Manchester.

Walking through today’s regenerated and gentrified Manchester, it’s almost impossible to recall how dark and depressing the city was in the late 70s. The home of the industrial revolution was at a low ebb and the only people who believed any kind of revolution was now possible were the romantic idealists behind Factory Records.

As Luke Bainbridge, a journalist for The Guardian observed: “emboldened by the spirit of punk and an excess of civic pride, Factory’s founders, in particular Tony Wilson and Robert Gretton, believed in Manchester more than they believed in themselves.”

The Hacienda club, launched in 1982, was the physical realisation of their vision; and a vision for the people of Manchester. During numerous conversations with my mum (one of the very first members of the Hacienda) about this period, I have come to realise that the hype and excitement surrounding the Hacienda in NME; a magazine which she read religiously, was phenomenal. Perhaps because it captured the spirit that was needed for Manchester to turn itself around.

Unfortunately as Peter Hook explains in his book, Manchester in 1982, wasn’t quite ready for a New York discotheque. In spite of this, the book recognizes that the Hacienda was an iconic piece of Mancunian history. It’s conversational, colloquial tone traces the club’s history from the early years when it opened every night, despite the fact that it was often empty, through the euphoric years when it brought acid house to the UK, to its demise, dogged by gang violence.

What else came to symbolise Thatcherite Manchester then? Well, the de-industrialisation of the city did seem to create a flurry of working class creativity. The one good thing about there being so many empty industrial buildings was that it gave the bands formed after the famous Sex Pistols concert in 1976 somewhere to practice and later provided space for venues.

Dave Haslam, in his book ‘Manchester, England: the story of a pop cult city’, cites the hedonism and creativity of the infamous ‘Madchester’ music scene as a response to deindustrialisation and rapid decline of Northern cities during Thatcher’s time as prime minister. This creativity and sense of bohemian values seemed to be attack on the Thatcherite mentality and celebrated Mancunian pride and dignity.

In spite of the chaos that pervaded Manchester in the 1970s and 1980s, Ian Curtis echoed the feeling that The Hacienda subtly represented in his haunting rendition of ‘Atmosphere’, in the lines “Life rebuilding, Don’t walk away”.

This isn’t to say that the ‘Madchester’ music scene was wholly an attack on the destruction of industry and songs like ’24 Hour Party People’, ‘Step On’ and ‘Waterfall’ are merely classic anthems that will undoubtedly live in the hearts of Mancunians forvever; not because they chart a specific period of history, but because they will continue to fill the dancefloors for years to come!

This has been a great blog to write, and one last thought: Get Well Soon Mozza!

Hannah

Brilliant!  Rather than a last word, here’s a picture that I pinched from somewhere taken in the Northern Quarter, where else.

¡Qué difícil es ser original cuando (casi) todo está inventado! Y si no, que se lo digan a Bernard Sumner y a su nuevo grupo Bad Lieutenant.

Pero no quiero que parezca que desprecio la carrera de Bernard Sumner, fundador de una de los grupos más influyentes de la historia, Joy Division y, tras el suicidio de Ian Curtis, líder de New Order, precursora del sonido Madchester.

Aunque también estuvo en proyectos como el supergroup Electronic, sobre el que ya me despaché a gusto hablando aquí. En fin, que la carrera de Sumner ¡Es un carrerón! Pero Bad Lieutenant era bastante prescindible en su hoja de servicios.

Sumner montó su nuevo combo este año junto a Phil Cunningham, ex New Order y el pasado 5 de octubre publicaron su primer LP, “Never Cry Another Tear”. La crítica musical dice que son un más-de-lo-mismo de New Order, pero para mí suenan más a Mónaco, el grupo de Peter Hook. Igual es porque el que fuera bajista de New Order era lo mejor de tenían los mancunianos.

Bad Lieutenant – “Sink Or Swim”

Monaco – “What Do You Want From Me”

Vanaf dit jaar wordt 1 november niet meer alleen geassocieerd met Aller-heiligen, vanaf nu vieren we Aller-zondaars en bijgevolg wordt zondag 1 november Sinner’s Day. Het wordt een festivaldag waarbij pioniers en ander zwaar geschut uit de hoogdagen van punk en new wave samentroepen in de Ethias Arena in Hasselt. De line-up van de allereerste editie van het festival Sinner’s Day is ronduit indrukwekkend met namen als The Neon Judgement, Lydia Lunch, The Human League, Front 242 en Anne Clark. Peter Hook – bekend van New Order & Joy Division – en Andy Rourke van The Smiths spelen dj, net als Remo Perrotti en Didi de Paris. Gang of Four komen Psychedelic Furs, die hun optreden annuleerden, vervangen.

Voor wie Pukkelpop nog heeft weten beginnen (of Seaside zien eindigen) is Sinner’s Day zonder twijfel hét festival van het najaar. 1 november wordt een zwarte dag voor de Ethias Arena. Zwart op het podium. Zwart van het volk. Hieronder vind je alvast de line-up, die mogelijk onderhevig kan zijn aan last minute changes.

doors open at 13u

14.00 – 14.30 u  THE NEON JUDGEMENT

14.45 – 15.30 u  LYDIA LUNCH

15.45 – 16.30 u  BOLLOCK BROTHERS

16.45 – 17.30 u  ANNE CLARK

17.30 – 18.00 u   ANDY ROURKE  (DJ set/ Part 1)

18.00 – 19.00 u  GANG OF FOUR

19.00 – 19.30 u  ANDY ROURKE (DJ Set/Part 2)

19.30 – 20.30 u  GARY NUMAN

20.30 – 21.00 u  PETER HOOK (DJ set/ Part 1)

21.00 – 22.00 u  THE HUMAN LEAGUE

22.00 – 22.30 u  PETER HOOK (DJ set/ Part 2)

22.30 – 23.30 u  FRONT 242

AFTERPARTY!  DJ Alex Trappeniers (Happy House / Belgisch Congo…)

UPDATE

Om maar meteen met de deur in huis te vallen: vergeet al die fakefeestjes genre ‘I Love the 80’s’ en ‘I Love the 90’s’ : Sinner’s Day is ‘the real deal’. Gisteren getuige geweest van een bijzonder knap festival, dat als het hier en daar organisatorisch wat bijstuurt, absoluut zal uitgroeien tot een blijvend evenement. In voorverkoop gingen al meer dan 8.000 tickets de deur uit, gisteren rondde men de kaap van 10.000 bezoekers wat lang niet slecht is voor een eerste editie. Vooral veel dertigers en veertigers gezien gisteren, het jongere publiek was minder talrijk opgedaagd.

Het begon al tijdens de heenrit, waar we flink moesten aanschuiven richting parking. Gelukkig geraakten we dan weer snel binnen. Het enige jammere was het feit dat onze vrouwelijke compagnon (Kim) in laatste instantie nog afzegde. Onderweg al wat vreemde new wave creaturen gespot, de toon voor het verdere verloop van de dag was meteen gezet.

Klokslag 14u deed Luc Janssen zijn eerste aankondiging, Dirk Da Davo en TB Frank betraden het strijdtoneel onder hun muzikale pseudoniem The Neon Judgement. ‘The Fashion Party’, Tomorrow in the papers’, ‘Chinese black’ en als afsluiter ‘TV-Treated’. In 1990 of 1991 (ik wil er vanaf zijn) zag ik TNJ nog live in The Ritz (tegenwoordig Atmoz, Ritz Building of iets anders) aan de Hasseltse Kanaalkom. Destijds vond ik het toch allemaal wat spectaculairder, laat het ons daar op houden.

Lydia Lunch & The Big Sexy Noise was de volgende in het rijtje. Hoewel de dame een indrukwekkende staat van dienst heeft, was ze voor mij de vreemde eend in de bijt. Ondanks het feit dat ze wat ziekjes was gaf ze er toch een flinke lap op. Hulde! Bollock Brothers blijft welbeschouwd toch meer een fungroepje. Zanger Jock McDonald blijkt naast Celticfan ook een dikke boon te hebben voor Anderlecht. Die man kan bij mij dus op voorhand niets fout meer doen. In zijn typisch Schots geruit pakje brengt hij ‘The faith healer’, ‘Harley David’, ‘Horror movies’, ‘Pretty vacant’ (Sex Pistols cover), ‘Beats of love’ (Nacht und Nebel cover) en ‘Jesus lived six years longer than Kurt Cobain’.

Het eerste hoogtepunt van de dag komt van Anne Clark. Vooral de combinatie van een dichtende Clark, de synthklanken en de projecties gaf een sublieme combinatie. ‘Killing time’, het fantastische ‘Full moon’, ‘Sleeper in Metropolis’ (met begeleidende filmbeelden uit ‘Metropolis’ van Fritz Lang) en als uitsmijter ‘Our darkness’. Tijdens de eerste dj-set van Andy Rourke maken we een eerste plaspauze. Lange wachtrijen aan het toilet, zodat we maar net op tijd terug zijn om te zien dat Gang of Four er meteen stevig inhakt. Ze molesteren ‘en passant’ nog een microgolfoven met een baseballbat. Slechts één bekend nummer gehoord: ‘I love a man in a uniform’.

Tijdens het tweede dj-intermezzo lang aanschuiven voor een hamburger aan de eetstand. We hebben geluk dat we tijdig terug zijn voor Gary Numan, die erg spaarzaam is met hits. Ik meen ‘Pure’ en ‘RIP’ te hebben herkend, ‘Are friends electric’ zat bijna op het eind. Aardig moment: een jongedame die haar t-shirt met dat van Gary wilde wisselen en hiervoor haar witte bh met volle boezem tentoonspreidde. Numan hapte echter niet toe.

The Human League zag ik al voor de derde keer (na Suikerrock en Genk on Stage), dus geen verrassingen meer in hun setlist. Net als bij de vorige doortochten gemerkt dat de twee zangeressen regelmatig een valse noot produceerden, die gelukkig werd gecamoufleerd door de goeie stem van Phil Oakey. ‘Seconds’, ‘The lebanon’, ‘The sound of the crowd’, ‘Don’t you want me’, ‘Love action’, ‘Mirror man’ en ‘Open your heart’ denderden voorbij. In de bisronde ‘Being boiled’ en het kitscherige ‘Together in electric dreams’. Nog even oerdegelijk als vroeger!

De mokerslag werd bewaard voor het einde. Front 242 raasde als gek door de hal. ‘Tragedy for you’, ‘No shuffle’, ‘Welcome to paradise’, ‘Funkahdafi’ en ‘Headhunter’ waren een regelrechte aanval op ieders oren. In de bisronde ‘Im Rhythmus bleiben’ en ‘Punish your machine’. Nog eventjes (tot 1u) op de afterparty blijven plakken en daarna moe maar tevreden naar huis. Volgend jaar is er trouwens een nieuwe editie van Sinner’s Day op 31 oktober 2010. Iedereen kan zijn favoriete acts alvast aan de organisatie briefen.

This Sunday Manchester’s Northern Quarter will be taken over by the Oxjam Festival to raise money for Oxfam and give a platform for some of the best new art and music and I heartily recommend you get involved. The event will be spread over the best venues in the Quarter, including: Night and Day, Mint Lounge, Matt and Phred’s, Odd, Common, Apotheca, Nexus, and Bluu. The full line-up can be found here

3 highlights for you to consider should be:

Deadly Brotherhood of the Gun at Night and Day

Louis Barrabas and the Bedlam Six at Matt and Phred’s

Peter Hook (New Order/Joy Division) at Mint Lounge  (also Hook’s new book ‘How not to run a Nightclub’ about the Hacienda has just come out its well worth a read)

The incomparable Peter Hook

There is also plenty of other events going on in the area, with Urbis teaming up with Oxjam to put on a 60’s magical mystery tour on the Sunday afternoon. There are also other events going on in the region in support of the event, with The Box in Crewe putting an event on next saturday and The New Tavern in Wigan tomorrow. If you live in Glossop then cheer up you can go to the events that are being put on all month in the town.

October has been a pretty good month for things going on in MCR and I’m sorry if I’ve missed anything out and just cherry picked what I like, but a) that’s my prerogative, and b) theres an awful lot going on!

I have been sailing through Peter Hook’s The Hacienda: How Not to Run a Club his account of the decline and fall of the Factory empire. Although he is not exactly Tom Wolfe or Nick Kent he tells his tale with some wit and much stoicism. The legendary club nearly ruined him and the rest of the band, as they sank in many millions of pounds to keep it going. Hooky reckons that for every person who came through the door of the Hacienda, it cost him and the rest of New Order around £10. So buy him a drink next time you see him.

The books full of anecdotes and quotes from many famous factory figures (Tony Wilson, Rob Gretton, Mike Pickering et al). Here’s the club’s former DJ Dave Haslam on the Hacienda’s wonderful music policy:

“Whereas music in clubs is now pigeion-holed and segregated, in those first years of acid house, the dance floor was open minded. In retrospect DJs have tried to convince us of thier purist underground credentials; that wasn’t really the case. In the acid-house era you would have heard hous, and techno, but also hip-hop records like ‘know How’ by Young MC, New Order and Euro-disco tracks by Italian production teams.”

Looking for a warm fuzzy feeling inside from support a worthy cause and the opportunity to throw some shapes to the ‘funky’ music? Oxjam Manchester is made for you.

Oxjam is a series of music related events that will be taking place across the country this month, with the aim of raising lots of wonga for Oxfam.

Leading the way in this mission is Manchester… with their main event the Oxjam Manchester Takeover (Saturday 25th October 1-11pm) – a small but perfectly formed festival in and around 8 venues across the Northern Quarter. The Takeover will include Manchester legend Peter Hook and a raft of other uber cool bands and artists are performing. Tickets are just £7 in advance and a quid more on the door.

Other events for Oxjam Manchester include a 60’s Magical Mystery Tour in conjunction with Urbis, Oxfam Originals Acoustic Takeover, at Oxjam Speed Dating at Rain Bar.

The moral of this story is… get gigging and start giving.

(POR BOB) –  Página Inicial

Peter Hook, Joy Division e New Order, disse em entrevista que ele acha o cantor Morrissey um “idiota” e admitiu que existia uma rivalidade entre a sua banda New Order e a banda de Morrissey The Smiths…(matéria completa)

So it appears that New Order’s legendarily low-slung  and grumpy bassist Peter Hook has written a book. I must admit I was pretty astonished when I heard the news as I’d never had Hooky down as the literary type, although I was less surprised when I heard what the book was about (of which, more below)….

Hooky’s authorial outpourings are just the latest installment in this year’s exciting episode of the continuing saga of the 80’s and 90’s Manchester music scene; a long-running and often quarrelsome saga that refuses to go away, despite the fact that many of its protagonists have long since produced their best material and should probably have sloped off into quiet rock legend retirement quite some time ago.

So far this year, we’ve had the latest set of  rumours of a Stone Roses reformation (please god, never! I’d rather remember them at their incandescent early best than as the meandering stoner rawkers they had become by the end), rumours which appear to have been finally and firmly squashed by the recent news that Ian Brown – who did, after all, get custody of the talent when the Roses split – is to form a supergroup with the equally legendary Smiths/Electronic/Modest Mouse guitarist Johnny Marr. In fact, the Roses have been positively blooming this year (sorry…), what with the 20th anniversary special edition re-release of their truly classic and nigh-on perfect self-titled debut album getting rave reviews in the music press all over again, and guitarist John Squire’s solo art exhibition receiving column inches galore (admittedly, mainly only after it was noticed that one of the installations stated in no uncertain terms that he would play no part in any Roses reformation).

On the down side, there was the slighty pointless and critically panned performance by the increasingly dubious and disappointing  Happy Mondays at this year’s V Festival; a performance which makes one wonder why they still bother – are they really that broke? And saddest of all – to this commentator anyway – New Order veterans Bernard Sumner and Stephen Morris’s new band Bad Lieutenant have been receiving lukewarm at best reviews for their debut album Never Cry Another Tear. I’m not surprised Hooky ended up writing a book….

Published today, The Haçienda: How Not To Run A Club is Hooky’s account of the money-draining chaos and drug-fuelled disorder that was Manchester’s most iconic nightspot. Ever. The Haç opened in 1982, the brainchild of Factory Records’ Rob Gretton and Tony Wilson, and was funded mostly by New Order.  Wilson’s famous ego soon took over, with the result that the club rapidly gained a reputation for complete craziness – in fact it was his ‘ironic’ idea to book Bernard Manning (yes, Bernard fucking Manning…) to compere the opening night. Manning, for all his many sins, saw straight through Wilson, Gretton and co, telling them that they should “fucking stick to your day jobs lads, you’re not cut out for clubs”. He had a fucking point.

Despite its well-deserved reputation as one of the greatest clubs of the acid house era, the Haç never made any money and, in later years, had serious security problems involving heavy drugs and several gangland shootings in the club. Any money (mostly money earned by New Order) invested in the club seemed to disappear into a mysterious black hole; in fact, Bernard Sumner once described the Haç’s funding process as basically recklessly throwing money at it “like a man with ten arms”. Hooky had long been unhappy with the amount of the band’s money that was being sucked up by the club (in fact, he still is), but the whole thing was totally out of control. Theft and pilfering among the staff were also rife, and the generally careless attitude to money is exemplified by the story of how an indoor firework once set an entire New Year’s Eve’s-worth of takings alight!

Despite all this negativity, the Haçienda most definitely deserves its notorious and legendary place in the annals of British music culture, and some of the less disturbing (and sillier) stories associated with it amply demonstrate the fabulous excess and complete chaos of one of the last great periods in youth culture; a period which remains hugely defining and influential even now – twenty seven years after the club opened and twelve years after it lost its license and finally closed its doors.

Tales of the Gallagher brothers working in the club as cleaners and Vera Duckworth from Coronation Street turning up at the 1987 Christmas party abound, as well as the story that Richard Branson nearly bought the place when its finances were at an all time low. Then there’s the night that Madonna (who played her first British gig at the Haç) told Rob Gretton to “fuck off” when he offered her fifty quid to play another set – and later that same night, Gretton is alleged to have informed Morrissey that “the trouble with you… is that you’ve never had the guts to kill yourself like Ian [Curtis]. You’re fucking jealous” (meow!). Or the infamous night, sometime in 1985, when the Jesus and Mary Chain played a notorious thirteen minute set during which they faced an absolutely constant, continuous barrage of thrown pint glasses.

And then there’s my favourite story of all, which involves a small (and probably heavily psychedelically scarred) furry animal and the infamous Factory Records obsession with giving everything that didn’t move – and a fair few things that did – a catalogue number. Yep, the Haç employed its own pest control in the shape of a cat, name unknown, but catalogued as FAC 191*…

Personally, I never made it to the Haç, but the music of Madchester was a huge part of my teenage years. In fact, I credit the Stone Roses with changing my life. Twenty years on, I can still clearly remember the first time I heard Fool’s Gold, and the reaction it provoked in me. I soon realised that there was a whole world of amazing music out there, outside of and very different to the chart crap I had previously been listening to.  This was powerful stuff for an impressionable thirteen year old mind.

Even now, if you forced me to sit down and write a list of my ten favourite bands of all time (an almost impossible task…), I can guarantee that the Roses and New Order would be on that list. And, as grumpy as Hooky will always be about the Haç, it will always be an icon of that lost era. Without Madchester, without Factory Records, without New Order, without Tony Wilson, without the Haçienda, without all these, much of my music collection would not exist – and I would not have had so much of the pleasure and enjoyment I associate with the music of Manchester.

* This obsession with FAC numbers got a little bit silly in the end. The Haç itself was FAC 51, and various other random things including parties and a lawsuit also had their own FAC numbers. The last one ever allocated was in 2007  – FAC 501 is the catalogue number of the late Tony Wilson’s coffin. No, seriously….

With guest Peter Hook.

29th September 2009

Tracklisting:

Kaiser Chiefs — Everyday I Love You Less And Less
Nerina Pallot — Real Late Starter
The Dixie Cups — Iko Iko
The Low Anthem — Charlie Darwin
The Associates — Party Fears Two
The Voluntary Butler Scheme — Trading Things In
R.E.M. — Finest Work Song
Kings of Leon — Molly’s Chambers
VV Brown — Game Over
Heavy Trash — Bumble Bee
Neil Young — Rockin’ In The Free World
Cerys Matthews — Arlington Way
The Source — You Got the Love
Kenny Rogers — Ruby Don’t Take Your Love To Town
Foo Fighters — Wheels
Four Tops — 7 Rooms Of Gloom
The Cribs — We Share The Same Skies
The Welcome Wagon — Up On A Mountain

Intronautas regresa después del pertinente descanso estival, con las pilas cargadas y dispuestos a ofrecerte toda la actualidad de la música independiente.

Comenzamos una nueva temporada que va a estar marcada por importantes novedades, la primera de ellas es la incorporación del programa a “Popmyradio”, emisora en la que podrás escuchar el programa todos los jueves de 20 a 21:30 horas, también lo podrás descargar a través de su servicio de podcast.

A lo largo de la temporada os iremos informando de las novedades que acontezcan.

Gracias por estar ahí, comenzamos con el programa #119!!

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

En el programa primer programa de la temporada:

El disco importante lo ocupa el nuevo álbum de nombre homónimo de los belgas “Das Pop”.

Las novedades discográficas de: Dorian, Black Poets, Air, The Clientele, Rufus Wainwright o Brian Hut (componente de Half Foot Outside y Templeton) nos devuelven a la actualidad musical.

Elephant Stone será el sello discográfico que nos acompañará durante el mes de Septiembre y esta semana seleccionamos a dos de sus bandas: Dora Flood y Smashing Orange.

Disfrutamos de la reedición de “We Love The City” uno de los mejores trabajos de Hefner. Damos un primer repaso al “Barcelona Acció Musical” (BAM) con la música de Boat Beam y Dirty Proyectors como banda sonora.

Y en la agenda musical para el fin de semana destacamos el festival Ebrovisión 09, y damos buena cuenta de algunas bandas que este fin de semana se van a dar cita en Miranda de  Ebro como: The Right Ons, The Red Crayon Aristocrat Club o Templeton.

ESCUCHAR EL PROGRAMA #119:

DESCARGAR EL PROGRAMA #119 EN PODCAST:

The festival of reading and writing (10-31 October 2009)

Two of the city’s biggest cultural festivals return this autumn and by the look of the programmes, the line-ups this year are better than ever.

Off the shelf is 18 years old and features the usual selection of readings, workshops, exhibitions, storytelling, talks, walks and poetry. Looking over the festival programme, I’d defy anyone to find something that wasn’t of interest. Here are my picks:

• Martin Bedford – an illustrated talk from the artist behind the iconic Leadmill poster artwork of the 1980s and 1990s, plus highly-tipped Sheffield band the Crookes are also playing
• Vic Reeves – an insight into the mind of the comedian as he takes you through his latest book, a surreal encyclopaedia called Vic Reeves’ vast book of world knowledge
• Peter Hook – Hooky, whose distinctive basslines were at the heart of both New order and Joy division’s distinctive sound tells the story of infamous Manchester nightclub the Hacienda. He is DJing afterwards too (hopefully not just pretending)
• Stuart Maconie – broadcaster and writer who passed through Sheffield for his Pies and prejudice: in search of the north book and may further expand on his evaluation of the city, which was basically that we produce great pop music but bad pop music museums
• Tony Benn – even if you don’t agree with his politics, you can be sure that the former Chesterfield MP will spark plenty of debate and perhaps offer insight into how Sheffield has changed from the socialist stronghold that it was for so long
• Marina Lewycka – local author and Sheffield Hallam university who shot to fame with her debut novel A short history of tractors in Ukranian and I expect will be reading from her new book, We are all made of glue

The festival website is much improved this year (compared to last year’s token putting the festival programme online as a PDF) and there is a Twitter feed for the event, @otsfestival.

I’ll look at the picks from Grin up north in my next post.

Ultimamente ando ouvindo muito Joy Division – eu já conhecia antes, mas só fui realmente parar para ouvir recentemente – e acho que é uma banda maravilhosa para mim e o marco do rock depressivo para todos os fãs fiéis que idolatram a figura inimitável e mártir da esquizofrenia Ian Curtis, vocalista e front man do grupo. Muitos odeiam quando se transforma uma pessoa na imagem da banda, mas a história do Joy Division não pode começar de outro jeito senão pela conturbada vida de Ian.

• Adolescência

Ian Curtis sempre foi uma pessoa isolada e um tanto exótica, também era muito inteligente e sempre o melhor da sala e tinha basicamente um amigo, Tony Nuttall, o qual estava sempre ao seu lado. Viviam a tomar remédios controlados para se drogar e ouviam Rolling Stones e David Bowie, mas nada se comparava ao amor de Ian pelos cigarros e seu outro vicio de se maquiar e passar tardes e tardes trancado no quarto ouvindo seus artistas favoritos.

• Joy Division

Ian nasceu no Memorial Hospital, Old Trafford, em Manchester, em 15 de Julho de 1956 e sempre sonhou em ser um rebelde sem causa e morrer jovem, igual seus maiores ídolos. Logo que conheceu Deborah [namorada de Tony na época], Ian se apaixonou, a conquistou e casaram ainda jovens e se mudaram e então Ian pensou seriamente em uma carreira musical, mesmo tendo um ótimo emprego como assistente social e após um show dos Sex Pistols, ele conheceu os outros integrantes do que viria a ser Warsaw e posteriormente, Joy Division – o nome vem de um antigo hábito nazista: Joy Division era o nome dos estabelecimentos em campos de concentração onde ficavam as mulheres judias esperando serem estupradas o dia inteiro pelos soldados.

• Fim

Após todo o caos, o Joy Division se despontou como uma grande banda e chegou a tocar com gigantes como The Cure… Mas as crises financeiras [o contrato do grupo rendia miseras 12 libras por semana] e pessoas [como o caso extraconjugal de Ian com Annik levando ao fim de seu casamento com Deborah] fizeram com que o vocalista caísse em depressão profunda estimulada pelo desespero de criar sua filha e lidar com dois amores e a banda. Outro fator marcante foram seus ataques epilépticos que o assombravam desde a adolescência e no dia 17 de Maio, após ouvir The Idiot de Iggy Pop, olhar fotos de sua filha Natalie e escrever uma carta dizendo o quanto amava Deborah e odiava Annik e assistir um filme chamado Stroszek de Herzog, Ian Curtis se suicida enforcado na sua cozinha aos 23 anos de idade se tornando aquilo que ele sempre quis ser; preferiu ser um mito a um símbolo vivo.

Aqui para download o primeiro EP do grupo, An Ideal For Living      Download

1 – Warsaw

FAIRY TALES

.easy to find, is it easy to find?

.i am probably the only one who thinks of the pied piper of hamelin when i hear this but with the wind instrument and considering the title no one can really blame me.not even you copywriters.

Still mourning the (final?) split of New Order I decided to see what they are all up to. Barney has his new project Bad Lieutenant and is doing some gigs in October.

www.myspace.com/badlieutenantmusic

Hooky seems to be DJing in South America, but has been messing around with remixes of LWTUA if his myspace page is anything to go by (including MUFC inspired Giggs Will Tear You Apart). All this can be forgiven however for he has produced a truly kick-ass remix of the Killer’s All these things that I have done, which is a Killers vs NO mash up, complete with the baseline from Let’s Go. Better than the original.

Apart or together these guys still have talent

It was sad. Peter Hook posting on his MySpace that New Order were done, kaput and over. It was disheartening to read but at the same time, one almost felt a certain sigh of relief. Let’s be honest. The band was purely running on fumes on the last couple of records Get Ready & Waiting For The Siren’s Call. The magic never quite seemed to come back and one could argue the absence of Gillian Gilbert may have cast a pall over the band as well. Whatever the case may have been, it ended with the band going their seperate ways. Peter Hook to his DJ gigs and the supergroup, Freebass and Bernard Sumner to…Bad Lieutenant!

Bad Lieutenant is Barney’s new band featuring himself on guitar and vox, Gillian’s New Order “replacement”, Phil Cunningham (ex-Marion), Jake Evans, Tom Chapman and…Stephen Morris from…you guessed it, New Order. The band has just begun playing some preliminary UK dates to promote their forthcoming debut record Never Cry Another Tear. The first fruits of the record arrives with the debut single Sink Or Swim. A simple, somewhat mellow track that would not sound out of place on New Order’s Technique album. Think songs like Love Less or to a lesser extent, Run.

Say what you will about Bernard’s voice about having always been the weak link in New Order’s sound, he sounds in fine form here. To be honest, the song does a great job of showcasing the subtle qualities of his voice making the song a pleasure to listen to.

“Sink Or Swim” by Bad Lieutenant taken from the forthcoming Triple Echo release, “Never Cry Another Tear”

Bad Lieutenant on MySpace
Bad Lieutenant on Facebook
Bad Lieutenant on Twitter

Spent this weekend catching up on some CDs that I’d recently bought. I also looked through some of the vinyl that I have out here. The vinyl I have in Dubai falls into two categories; vinyl I’ve bought from Dubai, and vinyl I brought to Dubai. The second set contains some interesting releases; there’s the Fetish “Last Testament” compilation, “Revolutionary Spirit” 12″ by The Wild Swans, all my A Certain Ratio albums and early singles, ditto for 23 Skidoo and a fairly anonymous, but highly significant compilation; “Different For Domeheads”.

I decided to give “Domeheads” a spin, it has been a while since I’d last listened to it. Those opening guitar chimes at the start of “Why Does The Rain” still has the desired effect – gives me me the shivers. (Just like the bass that propels you into “Destroy The Heart”). Ok, so I’m jumping ahead. But that compilation goes a long way to defining 1986 for me.

1986. I’ve heard many of my friends say that the mid-80s were a desolate period for British music. I disagree. The mid-80s were a swirling mass of so many different styles it’s hard to see a theme, but everything exploded out of this period. My musical tastes had started to spin out of control from about 1984 onwards. I was still loyal to my Factory Records and 4AD obsessions, but I’d started to pick up 7″ singles from lots of new bands, all with differing styles. I’d tune in to Tony “The Greek” on his Sunday evening Piccadilly Radio show and listen to the usual run of Manchester bands; The Fall, The Chameleons, the Factory groups, fledgling The Stone Roses, but he was also slipping in the odd surprise. “New Day Rising” and “Candy Apple Grey” – I heard both first on “The Last Radio Programme”, Husker Du prepared me for the coming deluge; Pixies.

1986 was the Festival Of The Tenth Summer. There was a stunning James/Bodines double-bill at the Russell Club and of course the massive GMex event; The Fall, ACR, New Order, Pete Shelley, The Smiths and others..

Different for Domeheads. A showcase of all that was good back then; The Loft, The Jasmine Minks, Primal Scream, The Pastels, Biff Bang Pow!, Slaughter Joe, The Bodines and The Weather Prophets. I had secured my copy of C86 and was trying to grow my small collection of Creation records. My favourites at the time were The Pastels and The Loft. (Peter Astor later turned up on 4AD with Heidi Berry – most odd). 1986 saw a few great singles releases by; Primal Scream “Crystal Crescent”, Weather Prophets “Almost Prayed” and of course the mighty “Therese” by The Bodines (where did they go?). In Warrington it seemed that everyone was spinning around with flowers sprouting out of their arses, and growing monumental quiffs (“The Queen Is Dead” had just been released). I tried to avoid it as much as possible. I was listening to “Sound Of Confusion” that August, it offered me much more than Morrissey/Marr ever could.

1986 was the year I went to Newcastle Polytechnic. Just before I headed up to Newcastle I listened to an interview with Bernard Sumner and Peter Hook on “The Last Radio Programme”. They talked about a new signing to Factory. Bernard had produced their second single – “Freaky Dancing”. (That day-glo cover and indie-dancefloor-funk-crossover rhythm certainly spoke of things to come!).

1986. I certainly don’t think it was a bad year. I’d say it was the year things started to move again. We had House Of Love and My Bloody Valentine within a year. And by April 88 I was packed into the Newcastle Polytechnic SU to watch the Pixies open for Throwing Muses. Madchester was kicking by 1988.

(Oh, and in the middle of all that I saw The Wild Swans!)

Para quem ainda não conhece, Monaco foi o projeto paralelo que Peter Hook, baixista do New Order fez em parceria do David Potts, após a primeira separação do New Order.

Ouvindo o album Music For Pleasure, percebi fortes influências de Joy Division e do próprio New Order (a música Temptation por exemplo), sendo um álbum bastante experimental. Vale a pena conferir!

E o clipe de hoje, a música de maior sucesso de Monaco.

ENJOY!

Tracklist – Music for Pleasure (1996) – Monaco

01 What do you want from me?
02 Shine
03 Sweet lips
04 Buzz gum
05 Blue
06 Junk
07 Billy bones
08 Happy Jack
09 Tender
10 Sedona

NOTA: 9,0

Bjs e Abraços

Quick, how many New Order wannabes can you name? This mixtape seeems to have all of ‘em, many of them featured at this year’s Seaport Music Festival. If the original wasn’t enough for you, here are the sons and daughters of Bernard, Gillian and Steve (Peter deserves better than most of this because he’s a good musician whose personal taste in music runs far afield of this catchy but mostly derivative stuff). Let’s see what we have here:

Black Moth Super Rainbow – Tooth Decay. Vocoder vox, hypnotic 80s synth, New Order meets Midnight Starr – catchy and simple. They’re playing South St. Seaport on 7/24.

Blank Dogs – Waiting (mix 2). Uptight, untight drums, early New Order i.e. circa Movement, when they were a guitar band but with a late 80s shoegaze edge. Could be better, but it has some promise.

Casiokids – Verdens Storste Land demo. Closer to the synthy stuff New Order were doing on Brotherhood and afterward

Dan Friel – Ghost Town Pt. 1. New Order as played on a dollar-store imitation Casio through the bottom-of-the-line Guitar Center brand amp

Here We Go Magic – Fangela. Less New Order than 60s psychedelic pop done demo-style with a drum machine and barely demo-quality vocals. A good guitar band like the Motion Sick could have a field day with this.

Obits – Two-Headed Coin. Catchy 60s bass riff, reverb-drenched 60s garage guitar, kinda noir. Best track on the cd so far. Hmmm…ought to check this band out sometime. They’re at South St. Seaport on 7/31 opening for Polvo, supposedly sometime around 7.

The Pains of Being Pure at Heart – Come Saturday. Total Teenage Fanclub ripoff, i.e. middle-period Jesus & Mary Chain without any balls. The first real dud here. How come of all these bands so far, only the Obits have ever heard of a minor key?

Polvo – Beggar’s Bowl. Now this kicks ass! Hypnotic swirling intro, evil growling leads, a stomping rhythm section and then some eerie slightly Middle Eastern flourishes. And how about that flameout at the end, damn! Were these guys the best guitar band of the 90s or what? Sounds nothing like New Order either. They’re at South St. Seaport on 7/31.

Ribbons – Inclusion. OK, back to the New Order wannabes, at least this has some passion and some percussive guitars. New Order play Television maybe.

School of Seven Bells - Face to Face on High Places. Arty, kinda 4AD, ornate synth giving way to trebly, minimal Bernard-style guitar, then the synth comes back. So unoriginal. At least they’re not ripping off Pearl Jam.

Slow Club – It Doesn’t Have to Be Beautiful. Rich white kids with a drum machine taking a pitiful stab at bluegrass. Barf.

Superchunk – Misfits and Mistakes. Yawn, booooring. Strictly for 35-and-overs who miss hearing this garbage at college parties in the 90s.

Versus - Eskimo. Not their best song (Fontaine wrote most of their real good ones) – this is just a simple poppy riff over and over again until suddenly the eeriness kicks in. But then it’s gone. Fast forward…

The Wave Pictures – Just Like a Drummer. Oh jeeeezus…a 30-year-old guy singing like he’s 13. And he uses the word “hipster” in a way that might not be a slur. Puke. Next…

Zaza – Sooner or Later. OK, back to the New Order…or maybe Clan of Xymox. This is nice – swoopy, minor-key synth, incisive electric piano and now a little rhythm guitar.      

So here’s what you get for free (download it here for the next week): three solid hits, a bunch of ok-to-good stuff and only three real duds. Plus you can dance to most of this. Burn the best of this for your kid sister to help wean her off the Jonas Bros.

Peter Hook (ex Joy Division, ex New Order) is one of the real characters in the music world – renowned for his dry wit and distinctive bass sound.  I’ve been waiting for his book about the famous music venue The Hacienda and was a mite disappointed when my hold on the library’s copy was cancelled.

But, as there often is,  there was a story behind this cancelled reserve. The story, as I found out from music website Pitchfork,  is Peter Hook’s  book is possibly too hot for the presses. The defamation issues described reveal some very Spinal Tap moments :

How can the author prove this about the xxxxxxx? Particularly, how is it proved that they wanted a pirate ship built at this cost and that they cost this amount of money? I am not sure one can say literally about six people turned up when it seems from the appendix it was 190. I would suggest changing to something more along the lines of “pitifully few turned up” and I would also suggest taking out “we were pillaged by bloody pirates”. May not xxxxxx complain about the reference to his stash

So let’s hope it Hooky’s book does make it to the presses.

In the meantime all you ‘anoraks’ can console yourself with:

• The upcoming book The north will rise again : Manchester music city 1978-1996  by John Robb
• Other (sometimes lawyer troubling) music biographies – like Hammer of the Gods (Led Zeppelin), The Dirt (Motley Crue)
• Music by Joy Division, New Order, Happy Mondays, Stone Roses …

Muchos conocerán los proyectos y ondas de este dude llamado Carlos Fernández a.k.a Golden Line el cual es un dude dj/productor/músico y que se encuentra en 3 grandes proyectos, claro unos mas conocidos que otros pero los 3 muy buenos.

Empiezo por comentarles por su proyecto individual llamado Golden Line en el cual hace varios remixes muy en onda popera cotorra para echar el buen dance muestra de ello son estos dos remixes que acá les dejo, cabe mencionar que nos rolo su remix mas nuevo el cual es el de Moenia escúchenlo.

Get Get Down (Golden Line RMX) – Paul Johnson

Dejame Entrar (Golden Line RMX) – Moenia 

Ahora va el proyecto mas conocido de los 3 y el cual ya muchos hemos escuchado, visto y demás, este proyecto se trata de Golden Dead Boyz, que como hace mucho cuando apenas se formo les informe es la fusión de nombres y dj`s de Golden Line y Francisco Lozano a.k.a Dead White Boy Storage si aun no los topan que lo dudo aqui les dejo su mas nuevo remix que le hicieron a Bufi.

Endless (Golden Dead Boyz RMX) – Bufi

Por ultimo vamos con el proyecto que puede llegar hacer el mas pretencioso de todos que es Roborant nombre de la agrupación en la cual participa este dude. De esta agrupación no puedo hablar tanto, pero de lo poco que he podido escucharles se me hace fabuloso su sonido, sino es tan nuevo si es algo que esta en la onda de la gran mezcla de rock con música electrónica que en la fusión da como resultado un new wave aunque con cierta peculiaridad de mas pounch, todo esto lo componen grandiosas secuencias, synthes, guitarras y voces pero en la fase de mejorar aun mas el sonido, darle un cambio y meterle aun mas pounch al asunto se suman batería y bajo al proyecto.

Muy influenciados por bandas como New Order, Ladytron, Soulwax etc, en especial por New Order no solo por darme cuenta que en su top de amigos de myspace tienen a Peter Hook sino el sonido y la voz tan parecida en mi punto de vista es lo que los identifica muchísimo con esa banda, en fin este es un gran proyecto el cual espero ya pronto poder apreciar y juzgar aun mejor por mientras les informo que se encuentran grabando su 1er EP que espero con ansias chutarmelo y de esta banda no tengo rolas pero pueden escuchar algunas en su myspace que aqui se los dejo.

www.myspace.com/roborantband

Por el momento estos son los 3 proyectos en los que este dude anda espero y para los que no los conozcan aun les lata y para los que ya los conocen sigan apreciando lo que hace.