George Best
This is the time of year I call the summer radio doldrums. Indie or college radio wise - the stuff I've listened to the last 25 years - few bands release new material in the summer. It seems a good moment to review highlights from the spring. First of these was Ted Leo's improv performance of "A Bottle of Buckie" during the WFMU marathon. Thinking about it more than the previous times I've heard that song. I thought "I have the rough idea here, but what is a bottle of Buckie?" Buckfast Tonic Wine! Made by monks, drunk by Scots. A cure for all what ails you. Seemingly not available here in the USA. At some point subsequent to that I happened across a description of something called Bovril. Not even remotely similar
Bovril - Wikipedia. But somehow it struck me as a product in an allied catogory: Tonics and health foods that aren't. Bovril nearly as I can make out is a salt beef extract in a nice liquid yeast suspension. Beef Tea they call it. Good in a mug, good on your toast. It was developed by John Lawson Johnston, a Scotsman, for the French Army during the Franco-Prussian wars, liquid beef they called it. By 1890 it was incorported as the Bovril company and was based mainly in Argentina. The name was from Bovine + Vril. The latter taken from an elixer in a novel. Johnston's son and thereafter, became the Lord Luke Johnstons of Pavenham, a hereditory peerage, for their contribution to civilization. The 2nd Lord Johnston merged Bovril with the Marmite company. Both were sold to Unilever sometime in the 1990's. Vril was the mysterious liquid in Bulwer-Lytton's 1870 novel The Coming Race. Edward Bulwer-Lytton may be best known as the originator of the phrase "It was a dark and stormy night"; the opening line of his novel, Paul Clifford. Vril was the bath, tonic medicine and food of the Vril-Ya, superhuman beings living in chambers beneath the surface of the earth. It was one of first science fiction books predating many of Verne's, and has a bit of a history to it . The whole subject is a real rabbit warren of weird. If only Buckie and Bovril were sold at my local Safeway, I'd buy them every week. A tonic for the troops.
Another high point of spring time radio was when WFMU dj Joe Belock played one Count Five song three times during a single show. Reminding me only of a time back probably in 1976 or 1977 when I heard a dj on WBCN (a commercial station) played Aerosmith's "Dream On" three times in a row. I quote: "Oh Wow... I think I need to play that one more time..." That was album rock radio back when it meant something.
My fall-back, if radio goes down the tubes, is TV commercial music. Sometimes this sort of thing sticks with me sometimes it doesn't There's good music all over TV commercials and very diverse too. The trick is to identify it know it and who does it, and complete the Re-Conquest of Cool. Tangentially I wish that Jamie Lamm TV show "Fearless Music" aired in DC. I only get to see it at the beach. I've heard the Clash for Nissan, their cover of Toots and the Maytals "Pressure Drop". Sometime ago if I'm not mistaken Wilco was selling Volkswagen. Kings of Leon, who used to sell Volkswagens, I think are selling Fords now with their song "Red Morning Light" which, I admit I like. I can't fully recall the car commerical (morphing dessert landscape etc.) that had some lovely ambient electronica going on. I wasn't paying attention. Now, if they had been advertising bicycles... I see that the Wedding Present have a new album out. Now there's a reason to listen to the radio - I'd like to see somebody play that. There are plenty of reasons to listen to the radio. Back at the beginning of the year I heard a couple of good songs by a band called Starlight Desperation. I liked what I heard, then people stopped playing them. Same thing with the Los Angeles outfit Dengue Fever albeit a different style: worldbeat jazz and 60's Cambodian pop rock. Really nice song crafting. I heard a song called Caroline. "Holy Yard Truama", I thought, "now that's some genuine psych garage rock right there". Turned out to be a band called Pierced Arrows. This band more or less used to be the band Dead Moon. The guitarist, Fred Cole, was in the 60's garage band the Lollipop Shoppe. Some might remember their song "You must be a Witch" (was that on the Savage Seven soundtrack). I used to play that when I was a college radio dj. One that I missed getting on my end of year list last year was Caribou's "Melody Day" I was reminded of it through the FourTet remix. I like the video for that song; possibly the most Canadian thing I've ever seen. You can find your own link to that, but I'll give you this one - I believe this is the singer's father:
Results for 'au:V P Snaith' [WorldCat.org]. What ground me up a little was that people are not playing more Thao Nguyen (and the GetDownStayDown Band), a Falls church VA native who has a new record out on Kill Rock Stars. Her songs compare well with Laura Veirs and people play plenty of that. At least I have it in my iTunes. See the video's up at KRS killrockstars (she was the subject of a KRS vodcast also). See them live this summer in Boston New York and DC, 12, 13 and 14 August respectively, begining of the month tour dates for Southern California. Be carefull though, she has a Bag of Hammers. Another pleasant surprise this spring was the new album "Liars and Prayers" from the Thalia Zedek band who has been in indie bands such as Uzi and the Dangerous Birds since the early '80s. It's good, better than good. its crunchy. I admit an attempt to look up any performance on youtube, led to me spending an hour watching Thalia Sodi videos. I believe, due to the current high cost of aviation fuel, all scheduled live performances of the Helicopter Quartet by Karl Stockhausen
Helikopter-Streichquartett - Wikipedia are grounded. Best sit back with a Bovril bagel a Buckie, comfort food for your inner hooligan, and read a couple of chapters of Borstal Boy (with the TV on in the background).
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