Kind: Listens

listening to audio; sometimes called a scrobble
Listened 1981 studio album by Yellow Magic Orchestra by Contributors to Wikimedia projects from Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.

BGM is the fourth studio album by Yellow Magic Orchestra, released on March 21, 1981. The title stands for “Background music“,[1] though Japanese TV and press advertising alternately used “Beautiful Grotesque Music”.[2] This album was produced by Haruomi Hosono. Recording started on January 15, 1981, in an effort to release the album by March 21, 1981. The album was the first of any kind to feature the Roland TR-808, one of the earliest programmable drum machines;[3] YMO had already been the first band to use the device, featuring it on-stage as early as 1980.[4][5] In addition to the TR-808, this was also their first studio album recorded with the Roland MC-4 Microcomposer.

Source: BGM (album) – Wikipedia

I am late to the party with Yellow Magic Orchestra. Dylan Jones touches on them in Sweet Dreams, placing them alongside Kraftwerk, but I had never consciously listened to their tracks. “Cue” (キュー) was shared with me on a playlist, which led me to BGM. I really enjoyed this album, its drive and textures. I assume YMO were an inspiration for Severed Heads and Lindstrøm. Also, pretty sure that Mark Ronson sampled “Ballet” (バレエ) in his track “True Blue”.

On a side note, I tried listen to some of the other albums, but was a bit confused by some of it.

Listened Debut, Self Titled Album, by Twinkle Digitz from Twinkle Digitz

Nine hot pop songs drawing influence from an 80s childhood, a 90s adolescence…. and beyond.

A heady mix of electro pop, synthwave and psychedelic ROCK delivered with post punk ‘tude and some ‘umour simmering beneath the surface. It’s a pretty nostalgic sounding record.

Recorded in the summer of 2024 at Sound Park Studios as it was being demolished (and rebuilt soon afterwards)…. I went in with lots of half cooked, home baked tracks and got Idge to run them all through his deluxe analog gear and make them sound delicious. I took in loads of snacks too, which really got the vibe going.

Mastered by Richard Stolz at Woodstock studios who ran it through some more deluxe analog gear, and brought it to a polished pop sheen. I’m really stoked with how it turned out!

Released February 18, 2025

Source: Debut, Self Titled Album, by Twinkle Digitz by @bandcamp

I wondered if I was ever going to hear Twinkle Digitz in full hi-fi, not just via a lockdown recording. I always joked that it was going to be some kind of Chinese Democracy? I wondered if pressing of the album was held up by Taylor Swift Industrial Complex. But really I wondered how many artists with the creativity condition aren’t given the permission, the time, the space and funds to complete work? I guess in the end what matters is being grateful that it is finally here.

There are some disparate albums that desperately try to sound whole, but end up sounding disjointed. Twinkle Digitz self-titled debut album is definitely disparate, with so many sounds and influences spread throughout. Rather than sound like a group of random songs with no sense of continuity (listen to Daniel Johns’ FutureNever for example), it feels like different sounds and ideas – robotic voice(s), syn tom-toms, spoken samples – are used to anchor the listener, while at the same time invite them into a wider cinematic universe. (I know Bat for Lashes wrote Lost Girls as a soundtrack to an imaginary film where a gang of biker women who roam the sunset streets of an eerie, make-believe vision of LA. There is a similar quality to this album, I am just not sure what the imaginary movie is.) I think this sense of continuity is what makes the album an improvement on the live set. I had heard the majority of the songs across the three times I have seen Twinkle Digitz live, but I believe the whole is greater than there parts. It truly feels like an album, especially with the Brian Wilsonesque slow jam Wait in the Future (Friendo) that it finishes with.

Another interesting element to this album is that even with all the pastiche references to the past with synths, drums and vocal treatment, I feel there is only ever one Twinkle Digitz. Reading a few books about post-punk lately (Rip It Up and Start Again, Talking with Girls About Duran Duran, and Sweet Dreams), I can’t help but hear a nod to Haysi Fantayzee in the music of Architecture in Helsinki or Scritti Politti in the music of Yeasayer. However, I feel it is harder to make such explicit through-lines with Twinkle Digitz. I remember reading a comment from Peter Walsh about the Go-Betweens in the early days and how you knew what records they had been listening to.

PETER WALSH: They’d never say it, but you could tell which part of the record collection he’d (Robert Forster) listened to in the two minutes it took for him to write that song.

Source: The Go-Betweens by David Nichols

Although there are clearly references throughout Twinkle Digitz’ album, they never take-over. Here I am reminded of Jon Hopkins point, made in a conversation with Jamie Lidell, that he wishes he could ‘choose’ the music he writes. Instead, Hopkins argued that we have no choice over what we do, the choice is about what our body gives energy for. All we can do is appreciate the outcome. Thinking about Twinkle Digitz, this means that even when he tries to make a 80’s synthpop track like Dancing In My Dreams, it sounds like everything and nothing all at once. A bricolage of ideas brought together to create something new. This is only extended further with the video clips. In addition to the sound, there is something to be said about the intended audience of this album.

I remember listening to an interview with David Byrne and Annie Clark about their collaboration. The first consideration about the music was what sort of venues they would be playing.

A lot of pop music originates in small, fairly intimate clubs, and then it finds itself in the unfortunate situation of, as the act gets more popular, being performed in school gymnasiums, and it sounds horrible. From there it goes from the frying pan into the fire, the act becomes even more successful and they’re playing in sports arenas where in many cases it also sounds terrible, although there’s plenty of technology to try and accommodate that as best as possible. So there’s kind of a sad example of music that really sounds great in a small space, but finds itself, when it does well, being rewarded by sounding horrible.

Source: The Inside Sleeve – David Byrne and St Vincent (ABC Radio)

This sense of starting small does not seem to be Twinkle Digitz approach (nor Damian Cowell’s Disco Machine). With so many different sounds and ideas it can be hard to work out what the ideal space or audience is (probably not necessarily The Thornbury Local nor a bath.) One of the things I was wondering about the recorded version was how the songs might differ from the live sound. As a one man band, I had imagined that many of the elements were sequenced, therefore laying these down on tape would be straightforward. A quasi-live recording. I think I was wrong. The recorded versions feel like they have taken the flesh and bones of the original tracks and built them out sonically, layering melodies and vocals, bringing in even more wacky effects, and somewhat controlling the chaos. I definitely cannot hear the interference between the glasses and the music equipment in these recordings.

All in all, Twinkle Digitz self-titled album is a pleasurable release, bringing the id to the forefront, and taking the edict of ‘treat them to an anchovy‘ to the point of sometimes forgetting the other toppings altogether.

Listened It’s Autonomous, Thomas, by Twinkle Digitz from Twinkle Digitz

track by Twinkle Digitz

“OH NO!!! SOMETHING’S GONE WRONG!!!!” 😉 A conversational narrative between an A.I. chat bot and a guy called Thomas (mainly for the rhymes available!)…

Seeing as everyone is a bit wary of A.I. suddenly appearing in all spheres of our lives, I thought I’d comment / capitalise on that!

I actually tried using an A.I. lyric generator to “collaborate” when I started writing this song – BUT I found all A.I.’s lyrical suggestions to be hilariously NAFF * (not in a good way either) , so I just wrote them myself!

*An example of an A.I. generated lyric “He drives like a car, just a filthy boy with eyes” ! That was one of the better ones !!!
Personally, I really like it when A.I. gets things wrong, when it’s in a creative way (eg. videos that look really wrong/ unreal /uncanny) – it’s the thought of A.I. getting things wrong in a destructive way which is the scary part hey!

Source: It’s Autonomous, Thomas, by Twinkle Digitz

The rolling arpeggios, the slow build, the conversation with technology, the littering of weird and wacky whoops and wizzes, is Twinkle Digitz the Man Disco Machine? I was also reminded of 80’s opera, but maybe like A.I. that was used to help write the song, I am hallucinating?

Listened Cover Story: Lay All Your Love On Me from ABC listen

Metal, marimbas, vampires and EDM: ABBA’s Lay All Your Love On Me as you’ve never heard it before, with producer Paul Mac and composer Alice Chance.

This is the first episode of Cover Story, a new series from The Music Show in which Andy and his guests take songs of the popular music canon and examine their cover versions, for better, worse, and weirder.

Source: Cover Story: Lay All Your Love On Me – ABC listen

In the first episode of a series discussing cover songs, Andrew Ford, Paul Mac and Alice Chance discuss ABBA’s Lay All Your Love On Me. I liked Paul Mac’s use of ‘Consumptionwave’ to describe the artists whose voices sound so thin and fragile it is as if they have consumption.

Listened 2024 soundtrack album by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross by Contributors to Wikimedia projects from Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross had previously worked with director Luca Guadagnino, scoring Guadagnino’s 2022 film Bones and All.[1] Guadagnino approached the pair to score Challengers by sending them an email that read, “Do you want to be on my next film? It’s going to be super sexy.”[2] Guadagnino wanted “very loud techno music” for the film,[3] taking inspiration from Berlin techno and ’90s rave music.[2] The end result was intended to amplify the pace and high-stakes nature of the film.[4]

Challengers (soundtrack) by Wikipedia

It is not very often that a soundtrack not only stands out, but rises above a movie, but this is one of them. The choice of music, slightly over-mixed, helped build the tension of the film. I thought that Atticus Ross captured it well in their acceptance speech for the Golden Globes, “we always thought we’d get the call to turn it down”:

Ross did give a short speech: “This really means a lot, particularly in this special moment. First I’d like to thank my best friend, my musical partner, the great Trent Reznor. The music never felt like a safe choice, but it always felt like the right one. I’d like to thank the maestro, the visionary director, our friend Luca Guadagnino.… To be honest, we always thought we’d get the call ‘Can you just turn it down a little?’ But it never came, and here we are.”

Source: Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross Win Best Original Score at Golden Globes 2025 for Challengers by Nina Corcoran

Listened Blackmail Boogie, by Twinkle Digitz from Twinkle Digitz

My attempt at the ultimate dance floor filling party hit. An open blackmail letter “inviting” all to dance…. or else!
Lead single from debut, self titled Twinkle Digitz album, out in Feb 2025,

Source: Blackmail Boogie, by Twinkle Digitz by @bandcamp

I got an alert from the ‘God Machine’ today announcing the release of the first single from Twinkle Digitz’ debut album, coming out in February. I no longer need to depend on the unofficial recording. Every time I hear this track, I imagine a Chris Cunningham-esque video (see Windowlicker) with a disco floor full of dancers with Twinkle Digitz’ head.

Listened Death To Art, by TISM from TISM

29 track album

Death to Art is the seventh studio album by Australian alternative rock band TISM, released on 4 October 2024 through their own label genre.b.goode and DRW Entertainment. It is the band’s first full-length album in 20 years, since The White Albun in 2004. It is also their first studio album to feature Vladimir Lenin-McCartney as lead guitarist, as their previous lead guitarist Tokin’ Blackman passed away from lung cancer back in 2008 (who was with the band from 1991 to the band’s split in 2004). At 80 minutes and 20 seconds, it is the band’s longest studio album.

Source: Death to Art (Wikipedia)

I was intrigued as to what expect on a new TISM album in 2024, especially after Damian Cowell suggested in an interview a few years ago that “it’d be shithouse.” I liked ‘I’m Going Hillsong’ when it came out last year, but the rest left me wondering. Well, all of the initial songs released last year, including the The “C” Word EP, are all here on the album and more.

In some respects there is the same silliness as before, with tracks such as Cnut the Dyslexic King, but then there are the more cutting tracks such as I Can’t Wait for My Generation to Die. Interestingly, no new Ron diatribes, although there were a couple released last year.

One thing that needs to be said, I feel they are as innovative as ever, tying all the tracks together with a number of muzak style songs listened on the drive to Springvale Cemetery. This also brings a sense of theatre to the album.

In the end, I was left thinking about what Andrew Stafford wrote in response to Custard’s comeback album and the challenge of recapturing the past:

A comeback record was always going to be a more difficult proposition for Custard than most. That’s because a key part of the band’s appeal was an innocence that often tripped over into a playful sense of anarchy. Their early recordings, especially, are full of the exuberance and abandon that marks one’s late teens and early 20s. And anyone who’s ever grown up knows how difficult that feeling is to recapture.

Source: CUSTARD: COME BACK, ALL IS FORGIVEN -Notes from Pig City by Andrew Stafford

I am not sure TISM have the same challenge, but I am left wondering how much is stuck in nostalgia? As Stafford touches on in his review of Death to Art.

Part of the visceral thrill of TISM was their ability to make the listener uncomfortable. Theirs was a comedy of manners aimed at the most hypersensitive of targets: earnest, university-educated and snobbish indie-rock fans. We should not miss TISM’s -isms. Now we’ve grown up a bit, we might look back on our secretly tasteless, vulgar and puerile youth with a certain nostalgia.

Source: TISM: Death to Art review – rock’s satirical provocateurs have lost their darker edge by Andrew Stafford (The Guardian)

I was left thinking about Damian Cowell’s recent work and the focus of TISM to recapture the past. I have not seen TISM live, but have seen my share of videos. They clearly attract an audience, but there is something about the daggy disco music that really did it for me, especially live. Or maybe I am just overthinking this all and should stick to Hemmingway?

Continue reading “🎵 Death to Art (TISM)”

Listened Brat and It’s Completely Different but Also Still Brat by Contributors to Wikimedia projects from Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
I was really intrigued by Charli XCX’s remix album, especially with all the names included. Although these tracks clearly reference the original tracks, as Kieran Press-Reynolds touches on, it is almost a whole new project.

Unlike those remix albums that tack on five DJ flips of the same tune or specific genre edits of a handful of hits, Brat and it’s completely different but also still brat is pretty much a whole new project. The guts of most songs—lyrics, structures, beats, even the feelings—have been rewired, but without completely erasing the essence of the originals.

Source: 5 Takeaways From Charli XCX’s New BRAT Remix Album by Kieran Press-Reynolds

Along with listening to The Bleachers reworking of Strange Desires with A Stranger Desired, I wonder what place the original serves? If Brat and It’s Completely Different but Also Still Brat came out first, would it still have the same impact?

Listened In Waves, by Jamie xx from Jamie xx

12 track album

In Waves feels like an album. It is not necessarily a DJ set on disc where tracks seemlessly flow into each other. However, it feels like it has intent to the choice of track that help it serve as an overall experience. In an intereview with Sterogum, Jamie xx discusses this intent:

It’s still very important to me that albums feel like albums, especially in this time of streaming and stuff. I always put that one in the middle of all my tracklists when I was trying to work it out. And then I played the album to Kieran Hebden, Four Tet. He told me, basically, to flip it all around — what is the first half used to be the second half. That was a great piece of advice. That was a big part of the puzzle in how to make the album work.

Source: The Story Behind Every Song On Jamie xx’s New Album In Waves by Margaret Farrell

Al Newstead explains the contrast to In Colour:

Whereas the sleeve of In Colour bursts with primary colours, In Waves is emblazoned with a black and white optical illusion, signalling a darker, less vivacious affair. But while the contents are indeed more complicated, they’re no less sumptuous.

Source: Jamie xx — In Waves by Al Newstead

In a review for Pitchfork, Jesse Dorris highlights the references to yesteryear with some of the tracks. I wonder if this is what attracts me to the album, the certain comfort of the familiar. In addition to references to 90’s house, I was reminded of the vocal chops of Telefon Tel Aviv’s ‘My Week Beats Your Year’.

Dorris wonders though, with all its spectacle, In Waves lacks the love and emotion of In Colour.

Waves is bigger than In Colour, in the spectacle of its sound and in the scope of possible audience. This is music that can be effortlessly slotted into mainstream house sets and diced into TikTok challenges, selected as soundtracks for your vacation Insta carousels and added to “memories of 2024” playlists. Nothing succeeds in dance music like dance music about dancing, and on that front, In Waves is the big time.
…
Dance music about dancing works when it inspires movement; dance music about love only works when you can’t help but sink in. Remember when the Idris Muhammad sample swells like a first, best kiss, in Romy’s “Loud Places”? You’ll never forget it, unlike a fair bit of In Waves, which is tasteful and slick, approachable and antiperspirant, less oceanic ecstasy than the pool party of the year.

Source: Jamie xx: In Waves by Jesse Dorris

It was interesting to contrast this with Jamie xx’s reflection upon the challenge of emotion in his music and the importance of finding balance.

The instrumental songs really allow the album to breathe. Were you very conscious about having those spaces throughout?

JAMIE XX: Yeah, definitely. In terms of as a listen as well, I was aware that I didn’t want it to feel too busy. But I wanted to keep the way it sounded because that was what was coming out of me naturally. And I felt like it was a bit of an anti- all of the sort of really popular dance music that’s in the world at the time, which is very spacious. Some of it is not as emotional as it intends to be. It feels a bit forced. There’s only so much of it that sort of busy stuff that I could put on the album that would work where it could still be listenable. It was very much a balancing act.

Source: The Story Behind Every Song On Jamie xx’s New Album In Waves by Margaret Farrell

The Sterogum interview also provides some other insights into the album, such as the hundreds of vocals that were not used in ‘Dafodil’. I am always intrigued by all of the “shit” that left on the chopping board when create any sort of art.

I asked people to do verses based on their memories from a summer in London. I’ve got a lot of versions of this song, and there could be like a 20-minute version somewhere down the line.

Source: The Story Behind Every Song On Jamie xx’s New Album In Waves by Margaret Farrell

I especially wondered about what was left out listening to Charli XCX’s Brat and whether the strength of an album is sometimes what is removed and left out.

Associated with what is ‘left out’, one of the things that intrigues me about the creative process is the way in which you end up with a final product, without any idea of the journey followed to get it to that stage. In particular, the serendipity, where choices are based on feel, rather than a particular technical choice as to what chord is right. This is something that Jon Hopkins has spoken about with regard to making something to break, while Kieren Hebden talks about chance. In Jamie xx’s case it is about making mistakes:

You’ve mentioned a couple times this process of making mistakes. I would love to hear more about what you mean by mistake?

JAMIE XX: It can be anything from hitting a bunch of notes on a synth that suddenly make you feel a certain way. Or, experimenting using software in a way that I’ve never used it before or it wasn’t intended to be used that makes something sonically catch your ear, but also has a certain feeling attached to it. The other chords in “Still Summer,” that are in the first break, that was another thing where I really liked the chords but when I made them it sounded like a very done thing — some nice synthy chords come in at a breakdown in a dance song. Then, I bounced them out and time-stretched them all and messed with them in a way that I would not normally mess with an already nice sounding set of synth chords. It ended up sounding more like a strummed guitar, I think, or something that you can’t quite put your finger on. I just love that. It made it a lot more organic. But all of this was done without knowing what it would end up sounding like.

Source: The Story Behind Every Song On Jamie xx’s New Album In Waves by Margaret Farrell

Jamie xx also discusses some of the more technical elements which is always insightful:

there’s like static running through it, right? I feel like it almost feels like you’re trying to make it seem kind of like a memory.

JAMIE XX: I like that. It’s actually technically a way of making the synths sound like that, where you have to play white noise essentially through a vocoder triggering a synth. But it makes that strange sound. I like that. I’ve never thought of it like that.

Source: The Story Behind Every Song On Jamie xx’s New Album In Waves by Margaret Farrell

Listened 2024 studio album by Charli XCX by Contributors to Wikimedia projects from Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.

I drink, I smoke, I use autotune

Source: TN:138 Charli XCX, George Daneil & A.G. Cook

Charli XCX’s comment on autotune on the Tape Notes podcast sums Brat up for me. On the one hand, Charli XCX cares, she cares enough to know that she wanted something other than her previous album, Crash, but she also does not seem to care enough to worry about how she might be perceived in supposedly turning from the mainstream. As Alexis Petridis suggests, Brat is something of a ‘palate cleanser’.

Satisfying the contract she signed with Atlantic as a teenager, 2022’s Crash was a conceptual go-for-broke by a pop star who had made her name as a refusenik, save a few uneasy youthful flirtations with the mainstream. She swapped her avant garde collaborators for blue-chip songwriters, mastered slick choreo and duly interpolated old dance bangers. It worked, becoming her most successful album yet. Having simply decided to be successful and then pulled it off, most artists in her position would surely keep at it. Not Charli, who has since admitted that she couldn’t even listen to some of Crash, nor stomach the rictus-grin promo. The sleazy grind of Brat, her superb sixth album, is the palate cleanser, albeit one that tastes like cigarettes, vodka and chemical afterburn.

Source: Charli XCX: Brat review | Laura Snapes’ album of the week by Alexis Petridis

I feel that there is an element of Ian Brown about it all. This is who I am, this is what you are going to get. I am sure there is more to it, but that is certainly how it feels.

Brat wears a prickly carapace as lure and defence. Unlike the crowdpleasing Crash, the textures here are defiantly underground – panel-beating, serrated, darkly bubbling with acid – made with the likes of Daniel, AG Cook, Easyfun, Hudson Mohawke and Gesaffelstein. It plots Charli’s history with dance music, from lifelong Aphex fan to bloghouse teen and PC Music doyenne with a sincere respect for trash.

Source: Charli XCX: Brat review | Laura Snapes’ album of the week by Alexis Petridis

As an album, Brat is rather lean, there really is no fat anywhere. Charli XCX manages to fit 15 tracks on one vinyl disc. I imagine there maybe some remixes drawn out produced from some of these tracks, as there are so many threads that feel that they could be teased out further, as was captured in the PARTYGIRL Boiler Room performance. However, as an album, everything feels like it is in its right place.

What was interesting was that the singles did not really lay out the narrative for me. I was circumspect on hearing ‘360’ and ‘Von Dutch’. I entered Brat as a ‘return to the club’ and wondered what that would mean.

i was born to make dance music.. i came from the clubs.. xcx6 is the album i’ve always wanted to make.

Source: Charli on Twitter, Feb 25, 2024

Yes, there is a clear palette 808’s and 909’s throughout, something discussed on the Tape Notes podcast by Charli XCX, ‘Alex’ Cook and George Daniel. However, as Jem Aswad suggests, “there’s a lot more more besides.”

The album changes moods surprisingly smoothly with nearly every track, not just musically but lyrically: The songs swerve between boastful swagger and shriveling insecurity and vulnerability, and are autobiographical in their conflicted feelings about fame, success and her own worth.
…
But “Brat” would be a masterful album even if all the lyrics were simply about clubbing — it’s melodically and musically sophisticated, with remarkably detailed production. As always, she’s a serial collaborator, and A-list coproducers here include Cirkut, George Daniel, El Guincho, Gesaffelstein, Hudson Mohawke, Finn Keane and others, and A.G. Cook is back in the copilot seat, bringing his shimmering arpeggios and countermelodies to a majority of the songs.

Source: Charli XCX Launches an Exhilarating New Chapter of Pop With the Innovative ‘Brat’: Album Review by Jem Aswad

In some ways, I wonder if ‘the return to the club’ is a distraction in the same way as St Vincent creating a ‘Toolesque’ album? Just as I was unsure about St Vincent’s initial singles, I too was not sure about Charli XCX’s initial releases, however in both cases hearing them as a part of a whole seemed to make more sense.

Charli XCX goes in and out of thoughts and experiences. One minutes she is talking about jealously, then regret, then her own ego. For me, it is an album album, with great tracks, made better as a whole. With this in mind, it is interesting listening to it alongside Taylor Swift’s Tortured Poets Department. I feel both grapple with life, but each in a different way. Petridis argues that Charli XCX grapples with being human.

Most of her superstar peers are busy making unrelatable music about how hard it is to be famous. Yet Charli has never lost sight of how hard it is to be human.

Source: Charli XCX: Brat review | Laura Snapes’ album of the week by Alexis Petridis

Brat though is more than just an album, it seems to be an attitude. There is talk of a ‘brat’ summer, whatever that actually means. For me, this attitude was something that started with George Daniel and Charli XCX’s remix (or reclamation) of Caroline Polachek’s ‘Welcome to my Island’. With Charli’s added “bitch” to the chorus hook, it feels like she is graffitiing a piece of art, making it her own. I cannot hear the original without hearing Charli XCX’s statement, what is heard cannot be unheard.

Place between AG Cook and Caroline Polachek

Continue reading “🎵 Brat (Charli XCX)”

Listened Chris Aldrich on Cybernetic Communications from theinformed.life

Chris Aldrich has the most multi-disciplinary resume I’ve ever seen, with a background that includes biomedics, electrical engineering, entertainment, genetics, theoretical mathematics, and more. Chris describes himself as a modern-day cybernetician, and in this conversation we discuss cybernetics and communications, differences between oral and literary cultures, and indigenous traditions and mnemonics, among many other things.

The Informed Life Chris Aldrich on Cybernetic Communications

This is a fascinating conversation about memory, history and the changing of practices over time. I am intrigued by the discussion of ‘memory palaces’. I often find myself remembering where I was when I was listening to a book or a podcast, I am assuming that the memory palace is this in reverse. I also feel that Aldrich is someone who could easily speak for hours on these matters, unpacking each thread. As he says in closing:

Always leave ‘em wanting more.

Listened Breaking With the Speed of the Internet by Written By Team Human from teamhuman.fm

Rushkoff discusses why he’s breaking from the preferred publishing schedules of advertisers and algorithms in favor of a more considerate approach.
🌍 You can support Team Human on Patreon to unlock access to a number of great perks including ad-free episodes of Team Human, access to the Team Hu…

Coming at the problem of social media, algorithms and the internet from the perspective of the creator, Douglas Rushkoff worries about the ever increasing speed and pressures placed by platforms that is creating a “perspective abundance.” He wonders if one of the challenges we face in being more “disciplined” is in choosing not to add our perspective to the mix.

Most ironically, perhaps, the more content we churn out for all of these platforms, the less valuable all of our content becomes. There’s simply too much stuff. The problem isn’t information overload so much as “perspective abundance.” We may need to redefine “discipline” from the ability to write and publish something every day to the ability hold back. What if people started to produce content when they had actually something to say, rather than coming up with something to say in order to fill another slot?

Source: Breaking from the Pace of the Net by Douglas Rushkoff

To me, this touches on Dave White’s idea of “elegant lurking”

The Elegant Lurker can be much more engaged than the noisy contributor and not being visible doesn’t mean you aren’t present.

Source: Elegant Lurking by Dave White

Continuing with his reflection on the challenges of creating, Rushkoff discusses using AI to help him with the creation of a story and wonders if AI is actually taking all the fun stuff?

I was becoming the servant to the AI and the AI was doing the most fun part of the whole process, the actual coming up with the stuff.

Source: Breaking from the Speed of the Net by Douglas Rushkoff

This is something that Scott Stephens and Waleed Aly discuss on The Mindfield podcast, with Stephens worried about what is lost when we no longer spend the time.

Rushkoff then discusses the realisation that maybe the best use of AI is to use the feedback to know where not to write, to know where you have sunk into cliche:

The real value is to use what the AI produced to know how not to write.

 

Listened All Born Screaming, by st. vincent from st. vincent

10 track album

“You’re either alive or you’re dead,” she tells Double J. “And if you’re alive you better live life to the fullest.”

Source: St. Vincent – All Born Screaming) by Al Newstead

I remember when Daddy’s Home was released reading a passing comment from St. Vincent about nearly making a Tool-inspired album, but instead going all 70’s.

Appearing on Radio.com’s New Arrivals show (via Uproxx), St. Vincent explained that she was “dead set” on creating a “heavy record” as the follow-up to 2017’s ‘Masseduction’). “Like just heavy the whole time – like, ‘Hey kids, you like Tool? Well, you’ll love the St. Vincent record’, you know?” she said.

Source: St. Vincent reveals she almost made a “heavy” Tool-inspired album)

I was intrigued what that would actually sound like. When I heard the first few singles, ‘Broken Man’ and ‘Flea’ I was a bit taken back. It was dark and brooding, but not the Tool-inspired album I expected. I was therefore unsure in listening to the album. I felt a bit lost.

I listened to a couple of interviews, one with Zane Lowe) and the other as a part of the Tape Notes podcast. Both spoke about the beginnings in playing industrial dance music, but this foundation was brought to the fore with Tape Notes, especially when she started remixing her tracks on the fly. After this I felt that Tool may have been a distraction in part and that the electrical modular underpinnings is what makes this album.

I was reading a BBC article) about the return of the album over singles. In it, there was a quote from Billie Eilish about why she is against singles:

“I don’t like singles from albums,” she admits. “Every single time an artist I love puts out a single without the context of the album, I’m just already prone to hating on it. I really don’t like when things are out of context. This album is like a family: I don’t want one little kid to be in the middle of the room alone.”

Source: Billie Eilish Would Like to Reintroduce Herself) by Angie Martoccio

I was left wondering if the initial singles associated with All Born Screaming where a help or a hindrance? I feel that this albums is definitely better as a whole.

Much like the album’s artwork, it’s a dark, fiery listening experience that will win you over with its sonic surprises and sense of raw urgency.

Source: Best new music to hear from St. Vincent, Ngaiire, Kamasi Washington and more) by Al Newstead

In an interview with Karen Leng, St Vincent talks about inventing an alphabet around electricity and chaos, with a balance between the raw and the perfect. I think that like all languages, St Vincent borrows from many places to make her own. Zooming into the different parts on the Tape It podcast, these influences are made clear, whether it be Massive Attack or Tool, however as a whole the album is definitely St Vincent.

All Born Screaming certainly lives up to that philosophy. It’s the sound of an artist rediscovering the most vital parts of themselves, a musical chameleon forging renewed purpose from primal instincts.

Source: St. Vincent – All Born Screaming) by Al Newstead

Also, a part of this new alphabet is an element of urgency.

Grief shaped much of the album, says the notoriously private Clark, who was rattled by an unspecified personal loss during the album’s making. But All Born Screaming is animated by a sense of urgency, not melancholy.

Source: St. Vincent – All Born Screaming) by Al Newstead

Listened Respect All Lifeforms, 2020 album by Australian band Custard by Contributors to Wikimedia projects from Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.

Respect All Lifeforms is the eighth studio album by Australian alternative rock band Custard “Custard (band)”), released on 22 May 2020 by ABC Music.[1]

The album was preceded by the release of the single “Funky Again”, which was accompanied by a video directed by longtime collaborator Andrew Lancaster.[2]

Source: Respect All Lifeforms by Wikipedia

Gone are the days when the band would painstakingly labour over the creation of the album, the basis for Respect All Lifeforms, was recorded one weekend at Poons Head Studio in Fremantle while the band were in Perth to play a festival. As Dave McCormick explained:

“This album was pretty easy, we were about to fly over to Perth to play a festival, and we went over the day before because we hate the three hour time difference in Perth. You end up feeling like it’s 4am in the morning by the time you play.

“We had a day to kill, and Glenn Thompson booked us a studio in Fremantle, and we went in and we recorded eight songs on the day, and six of them we used on the album, so it was a productive morning.”

…

“We were less prepared than we normally are,” he explains. “Traditionally, Matthew Strong, guitar and I would get together and write, we’d show each other some chord ideas, send it around and everyone would have a listen and have a think about it.

“This session, no one had heard anything that any of us were working on, so it was all ‘first listen’, ‘what can we play?’ I didn’t even know what my songs were, really. I was thinking, ‘Maybe there’s a chorus here, a guitar solo’, but it was all very much a work in progress.

“I think this album is very immediate, and that’s the way I like working now. In the ’90s, we’d spend weeks and weeks on tracking the album, and mixing the album, but I don’t want to do that anymore. I just want to keep it all in a sense of falling forward where no one quite knows what’s happening, and I like that energy.”

Source: Custard: Still Full of Surprises by Tyler Jenke

While Glenn Thompson spoke about the spontaneity associated with learning and recording at the same time.

“We hadn’t played the songs before recording, so it was learning and recording at the same time – which is great. That spontaneity helps to make something interesting.
“We’ve played together for so long that there’s just a feeling, you know the direction in which things are going to go, and you all go in a similar direction at a similar time.”

Source: Custard’s ‘Respect All Lifeforms’ Is One Of The Best Albums Of 2020… Trust by Bronwyn Thompson

Discussing the album with Lindsay McDougall, McCormick explained that what makes a “Custard” song is when a song is played and the band hear it and add their additions in return, the organic interchange.

Respect All Lifeforms feels like a return to the ebbs and flows of We Have the Technology and Loverama. Unlike the last two albums, which opened with slower more somber tracks and a touch of country, this albums kicks off with a bang with ‘Couples Fight’, making something of a statement. The album then bounces around from there. Gone is the lap steel and harmonica. It does not wear the criticism of ‘Adult Contemporary’ made against their last two albums so well.

One interesting aspect about this album is that McCormick, Thompson and Paul Medew each take writing responsibilities. This itself brings a point of difference. With Thompson providing his usual infectious whimsical observations of the world with ‘A Cat Called No’ and ‘Wishing’, Medew providing some pace with ‘Wishing’ and ‘Like People’, while McCormick fills out the rest with his usual mix. They also provide a cover of Camper Van Beethoven’s ‘Taking the Skinheads Bowling’.

It was interesting reading David Lowery’s thoughts on writing ‘Taking the Skinheads Bowling’, in which he described it as “weird non-sensical”.

So it should not surprise you that I never thought  that Take the Skinheads Bowling would become a Hit.  If someone had traveled from the future and told me we would have a hit on our first album I would not have picked this song as being the hit.  Not in a million years.  I would have more likely picked Where the Hell is Bill.

Why?  we regarded Take The Skinheads Bowling as just a weird non-sensical song.  The lyrics were purposely structured so that it would be devoid of meaning.  Each subsequent line would undermine any sort of meaning established by the last line.  It was the early 80’s and all our peers were writing songs that were full of meaning.  It was our way of rebelling.  BTW this is the most important fact about this song.  We wanted the words to lack any coherent meaning.  There is no story or deeper insight that I can give you about this song.

Source: #74 Hits are Black Swans-Take the Skinheads Bowling by David Lowery

This is probably a good way of describing a lot of Custard’s music.

Noel Mengel argues that what makes a Custard album is the ebb and flow throughout.

But what is so enjoyable about Custard’s music is not that it can be defined in any neat way but that it can’t. Pop-rock with guitars it might be, but there is a lot going on that rewards play after play. And it always sounds just like them.

Source: Respect All Lifeforms. Custard by Noel Mengel

He also summarises the album as follows:

A lovers’ tiff, ills ancient and modern, great records past and present, the lengthening shadows of loves, record shops, hangovers: it’s all fuel for Custard.

Source: Respect All Lifeforms. Custard by Noel Mengel

On a side note, the picture on the cover was taken during the recording session in Fremantle of a man called ‘Cowboy John’:

“At this Poons Head Studio in Fremantle, there was this character called Cowboy John who was hanging around the studio,” he recalls. “He looked about, maybe [in his] 60s, and he was known to the studio owner.

“He came into the studio, hung out with us a little bit, and then he bummed some of Matthew’s cigarettes, and then he was gone. And as he left, he said, ‘Respect all lifeforms’, and that was it; he just walked out of the studio. And we just looked at each other and said, ‘That’s the album name, Respect All Lifeforms‘.

“And the studio owner, Rob [Grant], said ‘I’ve got a photo here of Cowboy John playing this monophonic Roland synth thing, and he’s wearing a crown.’ And we said, ‘We need that photo, that has to be the cover of the album.’

“So it was a productive morning. We had the album cover done, we had the title of the album done, and we had six songs recorded.”

Source: Custard: Still Full of Surprises by Tyler Jenke

Tracklist

Couples Fight

The last two albums started off with slower more subdued tracks. Couples Fight feels like something of a statement. It has a Ballroom Blitz feel, before breaking out the synthesiser. I am left wondering about categorising Custard’s songs, I think that this fits into the category of ‘observations’, especially with the line “playing Blood on the Tracks … via bluetooth.” It tells a story, but not a specific story.

Funky Again

I asked AI to create me a song that combines The Cure’s Let’s Go To Bed, Britany Spears’ Toxic and Fatboy Slim’s Weapon of Choice. It responded that the song already exists in the form of Funky Again. After listening to Dave McCormick on Take 5 podcast, I can hear the influence of Britany Spears’ Toxic in this track with some of the guitar lines, while it would be fascinating to hear Funky Again mashed up with Weapon of Choice.

Harrlequin Records

Category: biographical, maybe auto? Love the line, “I’m so dumb, people think that I am smart.” It has the big feel that was a part of the previous album.

A Cat Called No

Glenn Thompson has the ability to write the quirkiest songs with the most infectious harmonies.

Wishing

Paul Medew starts this song hard and drives it all the way through. It has an Elvis Costello feel.

Take the Skinheads Bowling

This is a cover of Camper Van Beethoven’s track. Here is David Lowery discussing the song:

So it should not surprise you that I never thought  that Take the Skinheads Bowling would become a Hit.  If someone had traveled from the future and told me we would have a hit on our first album I would not have picked this song as being the hit.  Not in a million years.  I would have more likely picked Where the Hell is Bill.

Why?  we regarded Take The Skinheads Bowling as just a weird non-sensical song.  The lyrics were purposely structured so that it would be devoid of meaning.  Each subsequent line would undermine any sort of meaning established by the last line.  It was the early 80’s and all our peers were writing songs that were full of meaning.  It was our way of rebelling.  BTW this is the most important fact about this song.  We wanted the words to lack any coherent meaning.  There is no story or deeper insight that I can give you about this song.

Source: #74 Hits are Black Swans-Take the Skinheads Bowling by David Lowery

It was interesting to go back and listen to the original track and another cover by the Manic Street Preachers. I think that Custard capture the quirkiness of the track and really make it there own. I saw that Adalita, Phil Jamieson, Tex Perkins and Tim Rogers are touring The Rolling Stones Sticky FIngers, it made me wonder if McCormick could actually front his own covers band, similar to Billie Joe Armstrong’s The Coverups.

The Min Min Lights

This is a story song that focuses on ‘Veronica’, but it does not make completely clear why she is crying. This song is story without all the information, instead it is about the emotion.

Talkative Town

Another song by Glenn Thompson. It contains Thompson’s penchant for passing comments on the world around (‘We live up in the trees, Or where they used to be’ and ‘I buy all my stuff with my digital thumbprint’) and society in general (‘I think there’s a more equitable system, I don’t think it’s called capitalism’) all on top of a bed of infectious pop.

Like People

Another song by Paul Medew about a relationship that we are brought in on. Moments are pieced together to place us in the situation of wanting things to change. As with Wishing, the song flies through.

Watcha Waiting For

We are ‘here’, but never quite sure where ‘here’ actually is. The ambiguous nature and slow feel of this song make it feel like it could have been the closing track for the album.

Come Tuesday

Category: (Auto)Biography
Come Tuesday is a reflective track from McCormick about life on the road. It touches upon how ‘come Tuesday’ everything can change. It is a slower more somber track and really closes off the album.

Listened Mary Catherine Bateson Living as an Improvisational Art from onbeing.org

Krista Tippett speaks with Mary Catherine Bateson about her life, work and beliefs. The two discuss changes in our relationships over time and what ‘home’ means:

Creating an environment in which learning is possible, that is what a home is.

Maria Popova has also written a useful introduction to Mary Catherine Bateson and her book Composing a Life, in which she includes the following quote:

It is time now to explore the creative potential of interrupted and conflicted lives, where energies are not narrowly focused or permanently pointed toward a single ambition. These are not lives without commitment, but rather lives in which commitments are continually refocused and redefined. We must invest time and passion in specific goals and at the same time acknowledge that these are mutable. The circumstances of women’s lives now and in the past provide examples for new ways of thinking about the lives of both men and women. What are the possible transfers of learning when life is a collage of different tasks? How does creativity flourish on distraction? What insights arise from the experience of multiplicity and ambiguity? And at what point does desperate improvisation become significant achievement? These are important questions in a world in which we are all increasingly strangers and sojourners. The knight errant, who finds his challenges along the way, may be a better model for our times than the knight who is questing for the Grail.

Source: Composing a Life by Mary Catherine Bateson

ᔥ “Doug Belshaw” in TB872: MCB and ‘being what we are willing to learn’ – Open Thinkering ()

Listened The Common Touch, album by Custard by Contributors to Wikimedia projects from Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.

The Common Touch is the seventh studio album by Australian alternative rock band Custard “Custard (band)”), released on 6 October 2017 by ABC Music.[1]#citenote-NLACommon-1) It was supported by the singles “In the Grand Scheme of Things (None of This Really Matters)” and “2000 Woman”.

Source: The Common Touch) by Wikipedia

—

Some albums make you want move, I found The Common Touch a bit more subdued than some of their earlier albums, but it feels like this space gives the opportunities for the hooks and harmonies to really flourish. For me, it is one of those albums that the more I listened, the more I could not help sing along with.

“In the ’90s it was much more of an ongoing concern that we were a professional music group, so you had to constantly think about how to make people interested in you again. How could we get people to our gigs? How do we get songs on the radio? And none of those factors really come into the equation now. Now it’s like, ‘What’s the most interesting songs we can write and record and release?’ “

And there’s no shortage of those on The Common Touch, a varied and focused record that shows the band’s eagerness to move beyond their quirky slacker pop “golden days”.

“This is the first time I sat in my spare room in Bexley and just went, ‘Right, every day I’m going to sit down and make myself available to write songs.’ So for about three or four weeks, five days a week, I’d just sit in the room and make stuff up.”

Source: From the ’90s to now, Custard haven’t lost their common touch by Bronwyn Thompson

Sonically, The Common Touch is a mixture of the old and new. There is the familiar sounds, whether it be the lap steel and acoustic guitar, but there are also new ingredients (or old ingredients given more room), such as female harmonies, piano and harmonica. Interestingly, the mood of the music does not always match the songs.

Reading some of the interviews, one of the contrasts with The Common Touch was the speed it was recorded. Although the initial 30-40 ideas were carved out over weeks, the album itself was recorded on a weekend.

“Glenn also mixed the album and says it’s an old-school 70s retro album. You stick the headphones on at 10:30 at night, just before you go to sleep, and just cruise into it. All will be revealed with headphones – secrets and messages. It’s all very deep, like an onion.”

Source: Interview: Custard’s David McCormack sums up everything that’s ever happened in music with The Common Touch by Tim Byrnes

Tracklist

  1. In the Grand Scheme of Things (McCormack) – As with Come Back, All is Forgiven, The Common Touch too opens with a song beginning from the start. It also sets a similar slow groove. However, this is disrupted with the trumpet / harmonica solo.
  2. Hailey’s Comet (McCormack) – A slow groove reflecting on having a moment while watching Hailey’s Comet. It is another example of a song that tells a story, while captures odd moments.
  3. I’m not Well (McCormack) – This song introduces the big backing vocals, with the ‘ahhhs’ and ‘ohhhhs’ reminded me of Pink Floyd, although the song is not necessarily a Pink Floyd song. It maybe a soul thing, not quite sure. I also wonder how this song would sound mashed up with Tiffany’s I Think Were Along Now.
  4. Princess Highway (McCormack) – The slow beat, strings and lap steel help create a big airy feel that reminds me of Mercury Rev’s ‘Holes’. It creates a bed for McCormack to reflect and reminisce.
  5. Sinking Feeling (McCormack) – The introduction had me thinking of Blondie’s ‘Rapture’. I love the contrast between the driving bass in the verse and the chorus with its sing song lyrics. This is one of those songs that can be construed as both positive and negative, drowning or waving.
  6. You Always Knew (McCormack) – The loose talking lyrics reminded me of Robert Forster the Go-Betweens.
  7. Hands on Fire (G. Thompson) – Thompson with a song that gets your leg tapping away. Reminds me of Methyl Ethel’s talk louder the way in which it locks into the groove, but does not necessarily go anywhere.
  8. Armegeddon (McCormack) – just when you thought Custard could not rock out any more, that they have entered the world of ‘Adult Contemporary’ they crank it up just so you know.
  9. Dr Huxley Creeper (McCormack) – oh yeah and they can play up tempo pieces still too. 
  10. 2000 Woman (McCormack) – This could almost be an LCD Soundsystem song
  11. Police Cars (G. Thompson, Wintah Thompson, Nellie Pollard-Wharton) – The chorus synth reminds me of Bigger Than Tina or Regurgitator. I was left wondering about ‘my’ communism. Interesting how one word can change everything.
  12. Take It From Here (McCormack)
Listened Come Back, All is Forgiven, album by Custard by Contributors to Wikimedia projects from Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.

Come Back, All is Forgiven is the sixth album by Australian band Custard](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Custard(band)) “Custard (band)”), and their first new material in 16 years. It was released on 6 November 2015 through ABC Music “ABC Music”) on CD, vinyl, and digital.[1]) The album features the classic line-up of David McCormack “David McCormack”), Glenn Thompson](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/GlennThompson_(musician)) “Glenn Thompson (musician)”), Paul Medew and Matthew Strong. The songs were tracked at Horses Of Australia Studio on a weekend in February 2015. Overdubs were later added by David at Sonar Studio and Glenn at Horses Of Australia Studio. Glenn mixed it over the following couple of months.[2])

Source: Come Back, All Is Forgiven by Wikipedia

I was recently listening to the All Songs Considered podcast in which Stephen Thompson, Robin Hilton and Daoud Tyler-Ameen reflect on Green Day and their legacy. The question that they grappled with throughout is how does pop-punk grow up? I was left thinking about the same question thinking about Custard and what it means to come back after a hiatus. This is something that Andrew Stafford addresses in his review of Come Back, All is Forgiven:

A comeback record was always going to be a more difficult proposition for Custard than most. That’s because a key part of the band’s appeal was an innocence that often tripped over into a playful sense of anarchy. Their early recordings, especially, are full of the exuberance and abandon that marks one’s late teens and early 20s. And anyone who’s ever grown up knows how difficult that feeling is to recapture.

Source: CUSTARD: COME BACK, ALL IS FORGIVEN -Notes from Pig City by Andrew Stafford

In a conversation with Jamie Lidell, Jon Hopkins said that he wishes that he could ‘choose’ the music he writes. Instead, he argues that we have no choice over what we do, the choice is about what our body gives energy for. All we can do is appreciate the outcome. I thought this was pertinent listening to Custard. Their music often feels a little random, however maybe it is simply the music that their collective bodies gave energy for. Interestingly, this collective energy was actually recorded quickly and managed by Glenn Thompson.

“Glenn is too modest to tell you this, but Glenn recorded, produced and mixed this album,” McCormack says. “All Matthew, Paul and I did was go to his studio for one and a half days to record and then he sweated on it for weeks and months.”

Source: Dave McCormack’s Custard comes back (and all is forgiven)) by Craig Mathieson

Although the various musicians have done various things since Loverama, coming together again it feels that they have a particular sound. As Stafford suggests, things have changed.

Come Back, All Is Forgiven sounds exactly like what it is: four guys in their mid-40s, casually knocking out a bunch of songs most bands half their age would kill for. Just don’t expect to do the Wahooti Fandango to it.

Source: CUSTARD: COME BACK, ALL IS FORGIVEN -Notes from Pig City by Andrew Stafford

Come Back, All is Forgiven begins with a more laidback country rock feel, maybe it is country or western or Custard Goes Country. As is Custard’s way though, they often lull you in before throwing a spanner into the mix, that being the up tempo ‘If You Would Like To’. This stretch allows the album to pivot to ‘1990’s’, a track whose bass and drums groove makes way for a chorus that reminded me of Sonic Youth’s ‘Sunday’. The rest of the album then bounces around. Offering up Thompson’s ode to ‘Contemporary Art’ (“You want something new for your hall? Dude, I only do stuff that’s like 10 metres tall”), the stream of consciousness associated with ‘Queensland University’, and ‘Factual’ which sounds like Jarvis Cocker listening to the Carpenters. (For a different perspective, Leon Bambrick has written a lengthy commentary breaking down each track.)

I like how Craig Mathieson captures the album. Gone is the dream of world conquering success or a big record deal, instead we are left with a ‘welcome visit’:

Despite the title, for Custard the new album isn’t so much a career comeback as a welcome visit

Source: Dave McCormack’s Custard comes back (and all is forgiven)) by Craig Mathieson

Place between Bob Evans and Pulp

Tracklist:

  1. “Orchids in Water” 2:59
  2. “We Are the Parents (Our Parents Warned Us About)” 3:52
  3. “Warren Rd” 2:48
  4. “Record Machine” 3:03
  5. “If You Would Like To” 1:03
  6. “1990’s” 4:52 – Sonic Youth’s ‘Sunday’
  7. “Contemporary Art” 2:27 – Lou Reed / Jonathan Richman
  8. “Queensland University” 2:12
  9. “Rice & Beans” 4:11
  10. “Factual” 5:10 – Jarvis Cocker listening to The Carpenters.
  11. “Get in Your Car” 7:54
Listened Loverama, album by Custard by Contributors to Wikimedia projects from Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.

Loverama is the fifth studio album by the Australian band Custard “Custard (band)”). It was released in June 1999 and peaked at number 19 on the ARIA Charts; the band’s highest charting album.

Loverama was the band’s final release for 16 years, until 2015’s Come Back, All Is Forgiven. Some copies came as a two-CD set, with the companion disc called Custaro Musico.

“Girls Like That (Don’t Go For Guys Like Us) “Girls Like That (Don’t Go For Guys Like Us)”)”, “Ringo (I feel Like…)” and “Hit Song” all featured in a Hottest 100, with Girls… in 1998[2] and the other two in 1999.[3]

Source: Loverama by Wikipedia

Recently, when asked about album reviews and music criticism, Caroline Polachek suggested that:

Music criticism is not a review of the album you just made, its a review of your career up to that point. – Caroline Polachek

Source: This Generation’s Caroline Polachek by Switched on Pop

It is a strange experience slowly listening through a bands oeuvre one album at a time, I feel it is impossible by nature of the exercise not to judge each album against the previous. Sometimes I wonder if you start to hear ghosts after awhile. For example, I would find myself making assertions, such as this album is more straight-forward or has a different feel when it comes to instrumentation, only to then question myself as many of the ingredients are present in their earlier work.

It was interesting reading in ‘Preview for Loverama’ in Cuszine 2 that some of these ‘new’ songs were actually old rejects, such as Ringo. This left wondering about the difference made by Magoo as producer. I wondered if that although the same ingredients are present, whether it be distorted guitar, slide guitar, weird effects, quirky lyrics, that it was the placement of the drums and bass in the mix that actually hold these songs together and provide some sort of semblance of continuity? I fear though that if I went back to the past albums I would possibly hear the same pattern, however I feel that with Loverama whenever there is some sort of dalliance with some strange guitar line or even a harmony that it is the rhythm that grounds it all.

The other difference is that although the album is approximately the same length as say We Have the Technology, there are only 13 tracks, while some were instead included on a bonus disc Custaro Musico. I wondered if the extra length allowed the songs more time to hook listeners? Or maybe it is an example of a band that has come to grips with their potential.

Overall, this was the album that really grew on me the more I listened.

Loverama

  1. “Girls Like That (Don’t Go For Guys Like Us)” 3:11 – The warble bass used throughout this album reminded me of Bowie. Then I went and re-listened to Bowie and I could not hear it. Funny how when you follow up text-to-text connections that they can make a mockery of our memory.
  2. “Hit Song” 2:22 – Love the comment in Cuszine 2 “Soon Custard will be writing a song about writing songs that are about songs they are trying to write.”
  3. “Monkey” 2:26
  4. “The New Matthew” 4:18 – The chorus really makes this song, the harmonies and the way the guitars really fill out. The ending is only track on the album that goes off in a tangent. I was not sure if this saying something like even with all the new quiet ways, the old remains.
  5. “Ringo (I Feel Like)” 2:50 – Listening to Ringo, I felt it could have been a Disco Machine song. I was also reminded of Twinkle Digitz’ Blackmail Boogie.
  6. “Nervous Breakdance” 3:57 – It is interesting comparing the two versions of this song, this one and the electronic version on Custaro Musico. It highlights how their music could so easily be so different if they had made different choices.
  7. “Funny” 1:57 – classic Custard, the song feels over before it has even started
  8. “Pluto (Pts. 1 & 2)” 2:55 – This song ebbs and flows throughout, I feel it could sit in a playlist alongside Blur, Parklife era, but then again, I could be wrong.
  9. “Almost Like A Song” 3:57 – There is something about the idea of ‘hitting’ you with this song. The wall of distorted guitars and harmonies ‘hit’ you at the same time as the chorus.
  10. “Correctional Facility Of Love” 4:12 – I had no idea what this song was about when I first listened to it. I thought it was implying that being in a relationship was akin to being in jail, until I read that it was based on a Four Corner’s program about prisoners who swallowed objects so they had to be sent to hospital to avoid being raped.
  11. “Genius” 3:47 – Song by Glenn Thompson.
  12. “Kinder Whore” 2:50 – This song is driven by a really strong bass line which I feel prevents it from exploding.
  13. “Ladies And Gentlemen” 3:22 – The big dramatic strums have a Pulp feel. Magoo discusses this in Cuszine 2: “The highlight of recording this song was the violin. We decided to try and make the song as dramatic as possible, to suit the lyric. Strings were talked about and Glenn told me about this guy he knew. John Bone was his name. Everyone I spoke to about this guy said he was amazing. It’s pretty strange when people build someone up to be great You get a picture in you’re head that’s pretty hard to match. Anyway he came to do the track. He didn’t really even want to hear the song before he went in to record it. No one mentioned keys or the vibe required. He just did his thing and It was truly amazing.”

Custaro Musico

  1. “Umlaut” 2:59
  2. “No Te Escribi Ninguna Cancion” 2:18
  3. “Pablo Tiene Novia” 1:53
  4. “Gato De Nueve Colas” 1:14
  5. “Nervoisa Danzarota II” 5:00

Marginalia

Loverama is the fifth studio album by the Australian band Custard “Custard (band)”). It was released in June 1999 and peaked at number 19 on the ARIA Charts; the band’s highest charting album.

Loverama was the band’s final release for 16 years, until 2015’s Come Back, All Is Forgiven. Some copies came as a two-CD set, with the companion disc called Custaro Musico.

“Girls Like That (Don’t Go For Guys Like Us) “Girls Like That (Don’t Go For Guys Like Us)”)”, “Ringo (I feel Like…)” and “Hit Song” all featured in a Hottest 100, with Girls… in 1998[2] and the other two in 1999.[3]

Source: Loverama%20-%20Wikipedia by

Loverama, the fifth studio album by the renowned Australian band Custard, was released on June 14th, 1999, and marked a significant milestone in their career. The record achieved remarkable success, soaring to new heights and reaching a peak of number 19 on the ARIA Charts. It proudly stands as the band’s highest-charting album to date and has become a beloved favourite among fans.

Source: LOVERAMA%20%26%20%20CUSTARO%20MUSICO by

Recorded and produced by Magoo at The Dirty Room in Brisbane and Sing Sing Studios in Melbourne during the optimistic summer of October and November 1998. Assisted at The Dirty Room by Andrew Lancaster. Assisted at Sing Sing by Dave Davis. Mixed at Sing Sing by Magoo with Glenn Thompson and David McCormack. “We Wanna Party” recorded and mixed at 192 Musgrave Rd, Red Hill, Queensland. Artwork by Glenn Thompson withinterference from David McCormack.

Source: LOVERAMA%20%26%20%20CUSTARO%20MUSICO by

If something’s bad, that’s what they meant to do, it’s them having fun.

Source: Custard%20-%20Loverama%20(album%20review%20)%20%7C%20Sputnikmusic by

I think that this could probably read as “if something seems bad.” I think that you have two choices with Custard, you either accept them and their music and come to respect it for what it is or you do not.

“I was happy to do something that wasn’t as throwaway as some of the other ones [songs on earlier albums],” McCormack said, although he was aware his intentions might not land in the same way for listeners.

“I’m sure everyone else would think it’s an overtly happy and quirky Custard record. But I think for us, we could listen to it and go, ‘ah yeah that’s right, that was fucked when that happened.'”

Source: Classic%20Album%3A%20Custard%20%E2%80%93%20Loverama%20-%20ABC%20listen by

[Correctional Facility of Love] was inspired by a three-part ABC documentary series that revealed the stories of prisoners who would swallow contraptions made with rubber bands and paperclips that would cause terrible internal injuries so they would be taken to hospital, and in doing so, avoid being raped.

As chilling and horrific as that sounds, the fact that people are in a position of having to contemplate such actions is even more disturbing and makes one stop to reflect, something that McCormack explains that the band was ready to explore on Loverama.

Source: Classic%20Album%3A%20Custard%20%E2%80%93%20Loverama%20-%20ABC%20listen by

“It’s that whole realisation that people like The Go-Betweens can have on you,” he said. “On the balance of things, no one wants to hear a happy throwaway song. I don’t really. I wanna hear a sad, melancholy song that you could listen to a few times. That’s something we came to realise and therefore that’s what we wanted to do.”

Source: Classic%20Album%3A%20Custard%20%E2%80%93%20Loverama%20-%20ABC%20listen by

It would seem that there was a choice to include some of their quirky tracks as a bonus disc.

Listened We Have the Technology (Custard) by Contributors to Wikimedia projects from Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.

We Have the Technology is the fourth studio album by Australian band Custard. It was released in September 1997. Three singles were lifted from the album, “Nice Bird”, “Anatomically Correct”, which reached #48 in the fifth Hottest 100[1] and “Music Is Crap,” which reached #24 in the sixth Hottest 100.[2] The guitar riff from “Pinball Lez” has subsequently been used in the children’s TV show, Bluey, of which lead singer David McCormack is a cast member.

Growing up, I remember finding a copy of We Have the Technology at Cash Convertors. My guitar teacher was encouraging me to play the surf rock tune ‘Memory Man’ as a part of my Year 12 group music performance. I knew the singles, such as ‘Anatomically Correct’, ‘Nice Bird’ and ‘Music is Crap’ and probably skipped to those on my CD player or computer, but I fear that I never gave the album the patience it probably deserved or needed.

As an album, We Have The Technology seems to continue on from the other albums in forever bouncing between pop, surf, stoner, country and rock. The problem is that at times there were just too many flavours on the plate, balancing between genius, chaos and who cares. Although each track seems to make its own statement in themselves – a change from some of their earlier tracks – they feel like they are contrasted with how they are organised on the album. For example, ‘Scared of Skills’ gives the impression of a rock album, only to pivot to ‘Memory Man’, then quickly followed by ‘Very Biased’. It plays like a child with ADHD ready for their Ritalin.

It is interesting listening and hearing various sounds. At times, I feel like there are similarities to say Blur and their jangly pop. However, I have gone and listened to Pavement’s Wowee Zowee and can hear some of the influences. (Growing up in an era before streaming, it is interesting how some bands simply escaped your radar.) What I feel is probably the case is that I am missing the albums that influenced both bands and albums. Maybe I need to go and listen to Captain Beefheart maybe? Or Jonathan Richman? (Interestingly, in a recent interview for a book on the Velvet Underground, Dylan Jones suggested that Jonathan Richman has been largely forgotten. I would agree with this, until The Go-Betweens, I had not even heard of him.)

I have been left thinking that maybe the best way to describe Custard is ‘seriously silly’. Whimsical songs about guitar cases, alien’s thoughts on music and long roads leading to drugs all seem rather silly, but then I was left wondering if they were any more ridiculous than some songs written using cut up poetry or even say something like Powderfinger’s Double Allergic, another ‘Brisbane’ album released at roughly the same time. I think that Andrew Stafford captures this period best in Pig City with the quote that the band had possibly ‘disappeared up its own arse’:

We Have The Technology caught McCormack in an ornery mood. Heavily under the influence of Pavement’s Wowee Zowee, also made at Easley Studios, McCormack’s songs were growing ever more tangential and self-referential. And consequently, the music – as a review of another Brisbane band had earlier suggested – ‘disappeared up its own arse’.

David McCormack: I remember Eric Drew Feldman sitting me down in some diner saying, ‘Look, you’ve got to have a radio single, you’ve just got to have one . . . Go as crazy as you want, but you need three or four radio songs so the band can keep going, you can’t just ignore that stuff,’ and he was right. But I was just like, ‘No, man, we’re fucking artists!’ It’s maturity . . . If I could go back, there would be a lot of decisions I would make differently.
The release of Thompson’s Music Is Crap as a single in February 1998 painted the band into a corner.

Source: Pig City by Andrew Stafford

Although the same could be said about Powderfinger, at least they provided ‘Pick You Up’ as a somewhat accessible single. Yes ‘Anatomically Correct’ and ‘Nice Bird’ come close to this, but their feels like a refusal to play by the rules as personified by ‘Music is Crap’.

What remains is a certain catchiness that pervades throughout. I was watching Dylan Lewis’ interview with McCormack on Recovery in which McCormack was questioned about being perfectionists. It is interesting to consider the idea of silly music being perfect is sometimes lost, but after a few listens everything feels intentional. (I have had a similar thought listening to TISM.) For example, they never really drag out songs and the only one that they do on We Have the Technology is ‘Very Biased’, when it drifts off into a dream-like state. After listening through a few times, I found that the various hooks and melodies really sink in, often leaving me unintentionally tapping or humming along. Also, thinking about it now, I probably could have covered all the criteria for my group performance playing Custard songs.

Marginalia

Track listing

1. “Scared Of Skill” 1:25 – dirty distorted pop rock
2. “Memory Man” 1:25 – surf Rock instrumental. Same length as the first track. Feels like a statement. This is going to be another ride.
3. “Very Biased” 2:33 – back to rocking out again. Only to then washout like a lingering dream outro.
4. “Anatomically Correct” 2:43 – pop rock, reminds me of blur.
5. “Hello Machine” 2:46 – steel string slide back. I am reminded a little of Gomez, but wonder if one of the things about Custard is that not only do they never seem to settle, but their mix of sounds and genres within the one album is so novel.
6. “Totally Confused” 3:14 – slowed right down and stripped back, with rich harmonies in the chorus.
7. “Piece of Shit” 2:29 – bouncing vibe reminds me of Parklife.
8. “Pinball Lez” 2:22
9. “Sons and Daughters” 2:49
10. “Nice Bird” 3:01 – starts out like a Pixies track
11. “No Rock and Roll Record” 2:49 – self-referential song about being failed artist
12. “Sinatra Theory” 2:54 – the angular meets thr melodic
13. “Schtum” 3:50 – slide guitar back
14. “The Truth About Drugs” 2:39 – this is called the truth about drugs, that maybe that life is boring and mundane.
15. “Music Is Crap” 3:08 – quirky silliness takes everyone down
16. “The Drum” 3:43
17. “Eight Years of Rock and Roll Has Completely Destroyed My Memory*”

Listened Hardcore History 50 – Blueprint for Armageddon I from dancarlin.com

Publish Date:Tue, 29 Oct 2013
Duration: 03:07:20 minutes – 180.68mb
Buy from Apple Music

Blueprint for Armageddon is a 23 hour six-part podcast series by Dan Carlin exploring World War I.

Blueprint for Armageddon I

The planet hadn’t seen a major war between all the Great Powers since the downfall of Napoleon at Waterloo in 1815. But 99 years later the dam breaks and a Pandora’s Box of violence engulfs the planet.

In the first episode, Carlin begins with a reflection on Gavrilo Princip, the Serb national who assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Carlin suggests that Princip is the most important no one in the last 100 years. The focus is then turned towards the place of Germany, Bismarck and European alliance system. Military power is about who is the “firstest with the mostest”. Associated with this, Carlin discusses the argument that war was inevitable, instead he suggests that there was poor leadership and statesmanship more than anything else. The worst much mistake was the “Rape of Belgium”

Blueprint for Armageddon II

The Great Powers all come out swinging in the first round of the worst war the planet has ever seen. Millions of men in dozens of armies vie in the most deadly and complex opening moves of any conflict in world history.

Carlin begins the second episode with the question, “When do we have the power to destroy the world?” This leads to a discussion of the Russians attempts to stop technological development through arms agreement. The Germans answer to the war was the Schlieffen Plan, where they would hit France like a sledgehammer, before then addressing Russia.

The Schlieffen Plan (German: Schlieffen-Plan, pronounced [ʃliːfən plaːn]) is a name given after the First World War to German war plans, due to the influence of Field Marshal Alfred von Schlieffen and his thinking on an invasion of France and Belgium, which began on 4 August 1914. Schlieffen was Chief of the General Staff of the German Army from 1891 to 1906. In 1905 and 1906, Schlieffen devised an army deployment plan for a decisive (war-winning) offensive against the French Third Republic. German forces were to invade France through the Netherlands and Belgium rather than across the common border.

Source: Wikipedia

The rest of the episode explores the Battle of the Frontier. Carlin contrasts the initial British army led by French vs the French infantry in Napoleonic colours led by Joffra. The world has gone from Napoleon’s quip of “30000 deaths a month” to 30000 deaths a day at Battle of Mons and the Battle of the Marne.

Blueprint for Armageddon III

The war of maneuver that was supposed to be over quickly instead turns into a lingering bloody stalemate. Trench warfare begins, and with it, all the murderous efforts on both sides to overcome the static defenses.

Episode III begins with a story about Ernest Shackleton and his shock that the war was still going when he returned from Antarctica. Carlin uses this to highlight the length and complexity of the war. With the same amount of people killed in first month than were killed in the whole American Civil War.

Moving into 1915, Carlin discusses the blending of two eras, as captured through the Battle of Ainse and the Battle of Ypres. A particular change was with the development in technology, whether it be barbed wire, flamethrowers, zeppelins, submarines, gas and multilayer trench network. With these changes, Carlin argues that shellshock impacts everyone at some point.

Although it is easy to get bogged down on the Western Front, Carlin explains that there were also battlefronts in the East, Turkey and Pacific. Turkey and the Dardanelles was seen as a weak point in Central Powers, which turned out to be a mistake. Carlin then touches on the atrocities in war with the Turkish massacre of the Armenians.

Throughout, Carlin always tries to capture the human side, such as tropes stopping at 1914 Christmas.

Blueprint for Armageddon IV

Machine guns, barbed wire and millions upon millions of artillery shells create industrialized meat grinders at Verdun and the Somme. There’s never been a human experience like it…and it changes a generation.

As the war grinds on and more and more soldiers are killed, Carlin asks how you market hell as a travel destination, as that is what the war has become. Rather than touching on each and every battle, Carlin dives into a few examples, including the Battle of Verdun, where a battle is intentially designed to be a meatgrinder, the Battle of Jutland, where the English and Germans faced off at sea, the Brusilov Offensive, where Russians defeated Austrians but lost one million soldiers in the process, and the Battle of Somme.

On a side note, Carlin explained the way in which ‘gas’ was actually more of a solid that lay on top of everything and left everything dead.

The focus of the war progressively moved to home front and the civilian economy. The intent was the collapse and disintegration of a nation.

Blueprint for Armageddon V

Politics, diplomacy, revolution and mutiny take center stage at the start of this episode, but mud, blood, shells and tragedy drown all by the end.

Episode Five focuses on the changes to politics and the impact this had on the war. It begins with an exploration of US and Woodrow Wilson’s decision to go to war. This position of power is contrasted with Germany and the turnip winter of 1916/1917, as well as the struggles faced by Italy, Austria and Russia. Outside of this, there were changes in the governments of Britain and France.

With the Russian Revolution and Germany decision, under the leadership of Erich Ludendorff, to enter into total war, Carlin explains how things could have been different and that chance had so much to play. Total war for the Germans meant the development of the Hindenburg Line and dead zone behind the old front line to imped the spring offensive.

The Hindenburg Line, built behind the Noyon Salient “Salient (territory)”), was to replace the old front line as a precaution against a resumption of the Battle of the Somme in 1917. By devastating the intervening ground, the Germans could delay a spring offensive in 1917. A shortened front could be held with fewer troops and with tactical dispersal, reverse-slope positions, defence in depth and camouflage, German infantry could be conserved. Unrestricted submarine warfare and strategic bombing would weaken the Anglo-French as the German armies in the west (Westheer) recuperated. On 25 January 1917, the Germans had 133 divisions on the Western Front but this was insufficient to contemplate an offensive.

Source: Hindenburg%20Line%20-%20Wikipedia by

What ‘total war’ meant was captured in Carlin’s discussion of the creeping barrage associated with the Battle of Arras and the 3rd Battle of Ypres, where rain inundated Flanders’ fields.

Blueprint for Armageddon VI

The Americans are coming, but will the war be over by the time they get there? Germany throws everything into a last series of stupendous attacks in the West while hoping to avoid getting burned by a fire in the East they helped fan.

Episode Six is largely about the ramifications of World War One. It begins with the discussion of a ‘dangerous idea’ being worse than say a dangerous gas. Carlin explains how Vladmir Lenin, with the help of Germany, released the idea of Communism on the world.

With the collapse of Russia, the various treaties were made public. A particular part of this was the breakup of the Ottoman Empire and the Middle East, this included the Balfour Declaration and the establishment of a national home for the Jewish people.

With all this happening, Carlin explains how Germany had window of opportunity, as there was an increase in troops from Eastern front and such developments as the Paris Gun. The problem was that there was also a lower morale on the home front and eventually low morale on the war front, especially as troops went days without eating.

Allied Commander-in-Chief, Ferdinand Foch, held back troops to survive the battle of morale. This with aided by the addition of fast moving tanks and American support.

Overall, Carlin never promises to tell the story of World War I, instead he carves out a particular story that encapsulates many of the highs and lows. As he often states, he is not a ‘historian’, but a storyteller, what some describe as “the Michael Bay of history.” He captures the past from the high road, from the perspective of a reader, rather than a thorough researcher. This often sacrifices nuance to instead carve a clear path. With this in mind, he often builds situations up with suspense. It is interesting challenge given that we often know the end, but we do not always know how it unfolds. Therefore, he often addresses our desire to know.

Associated with this, he often goes off on tangents, jumps around making comparisons with previous historical events, whether it be Genghis Khan, The Civil War, The Battle of Hastings, Napoleonic War and World War II.