Christmas Card

Best things in life

Are free. But not cheap.

Best book: M Train by Patti Smith

Best film: Inherent Vice by Paul Thomas Anderson

Best album: Songs To Play by Robert Forster 

And with that, I sign off. For now.

Year by year: 2015

Destroyer – POISON SEASON

Destroyer*, as you can easily guess from the name, is a heavy metal band. In fact, they have to be one of the 3 or 4 heaviest heavy metal bands in existence. They are that heavy. These Canadian motherfuckers certainly put ‘bang’ back in Bangkok (incidentally, that’s the name of one of this album’s more guttural and uncompromising numbers).

Overall, Poison Season is punishing hardcore. And with song titles like “Hell” and “Girl In A Sling” (released as a single, my God!) – what else do you expect?? Dan Bejar (a Mexican mafia man with a glass of El Diablo in his hand, you would think) sings his guts out on this one. By the second half, my ears bled more than after standing for three hours in the first row of a Swans gig.

A Swans gig makes me think of a Destroyer show. Never been to one, but I guess it’s about as bruising an experience as listening to Chuck Palahniuk read one of his more… challenging stories (side note: Palahniuk is badly overrated, and Fight Club sucks balls).

Where were we? Ah, Destroyer. The leader of the band is also a member of a group of Canadian hardcore pornographers frequently performing live and occasionally even recording studio albums (Christ knows what could be on those). With Destroyer, though, Mr. Bejar shows his other side. One that is, quite clearly, not for the most faint-hearted of us. 

Fucking hell, “Forces From Above” is BRUTAL. 

*This review was written in a Cambridge bar while drunk on Cuban Old-Fashioned.

Carol

- Richard wants me to marry him.

- Do you want to marry Richard?

- I barely know what to order for lunch.

One imperfect thing about Carol is that at some point early in the film Cate Blanchett lights her mother-in-law’s cigarette a second longer than necessary. Everything else about it is pure perfection. 

Blanchett just oozes class and the subdued intensity behind Rooney Mara’s eyes is something to behold. Oh, and Carter Burwell is a genius. 

The Forbidden Room

There is precisely one cinema in London not showing Star Wars. Not much surprise, then, that it’s the place where you can see Guy Maddin’s newest. The Forbidden Room, which you just have to see on the big screen. Not surprising, too, that this cinema belongs to the Institute of Contemporary Arts.

The Institute of Contemporary Arts is the sort of place where you can get books with titles like The Internet Does Not Exist, I Love Dick and How To Talk About Video Games. In other words, a brilliantly worthless place. One, however, where you can get complete poems of Philip Larkin for 25 quid.

Really, they could not not show The Forbidden Room. There were fifteen of us. Brave, insane weirdos. Not everyone passed the test: just ten were left by the end of it.

There are things in life for which you can never prepare yourself. Like death or the pain in the cabinet of a dentist. And one of these things is the sheer mind-fucking bizarreness of Guy Maddin’s films. Watching his older works like The Saddest Music In The World (a brilliant, brilliant film) could help a little, but I wouldn’t be so sure.

The Forbidden Room is an inspired pastiche of films from the 20s and the 30s. Also, it’s a bit like Lynch’s Inland Empire in that you get it without understanding how or why you got it. Without being able to explain to anyone else what it is that you got. 

Let’s put it this way. I got to my place late at night and this is the dream I had: I was explaining to a dwarf why I think Philip Larkin is the greatest poet of all time. I think I managed to convince him in the end.

Carry On

Ethan says it depends on how you look at it. Which side. What angle.

I wait for a nondescript flight attendant to pour us a measly glass of red wine (Joyce was right, drinking red wine is like drinking meat) and tell him it’s awful whichever angle you choose.

But Ethan is a righteous American. He is stubborn. I have to go through it again, convinced that I can crack him this time. I say, picture this. Your plane goes down in flames, everyone dies. It’s all over the news, and they all wake up in the morning and go ‘ah well’. And that’s it, Ethan, that’s it. They carry on. Two minutes later, three at best, it’s business as usual. They carry the fuck on. There’s an important phone call they have to make, another flight they have to catch, or some other bullshit.

Ethan does not look convinced. He asks for some more red wine and tells me that the world keeps going round. He actually makes it sound like it’s a good thing. Like it’s a fucking consolation prize. You want it to stop? he asks me (completely missing the point). Everyone’s on strike, supermarkets close, governments shut down?

I say I want some respect. Or rather - I shout. We both shout at this point, trying to outdo a five-year old girl demanding the toilet line to dissolve (which it does, reluctantly). I want some moment of reflection, I scream hysterically, not this damning indifference. 

Another nondescript flight attendant walks past us with an expression we had never seen before. Ethan drags me by the hand and whispers a curse or a prayer. But I say we’ll be fine. I say he imagined it. We are jetlagged and we are no longer sober. We’ll be okay. It’s just the red wine.

Year by year: 2014

John Moore - LO-FI LULLABIES

My love for this hasn't waned one bit, and so the words won't change either. As written on the 12th of August, 2014:

Lo-Fi Lullabies is a special album, I don’t think it’s physically possible not to hear that. It’s literally soaked through: in painfully honest lyrics, intimate atmosphere, subtle melodies, John’s delicately frail vocals. There’s a word ‘depression’ hanging over these 10 songs like a wet cobweb. But somehow this is not a depressing album. On Lo-Fi Lullabies, depression is merely a musical language. And an art form.

I first heard John Moore on Black Box Recorder’s “The Art Of Driving”, which he provocatively half-whispered in duet with Sarah Nixey. Cofounded with Luke Haines, the band played the kind of witty, cynical pop (‘pop’ as in actually ‘popular’, what with the unlikely but highly calculated success of “The Facts Of Life”) that is like a wet dream for any intelligent music lover. It’s only later that I found out about John Moore’s career in The Jesus And Mary Chain and a couple of largely (I’m being generous) unknown solo albums.

The songs that make up Lo-Fi Lullabies were written in dismal, crisis-fuelled mid-90s, prior to Black Box Recorder. And Christ are they good. The sound and the vibe wouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone familiar with John’s music. It’s elegant and stripped-down and it never gets monotonous because of the sheer quality of songwriting. There’s a little Leonard Cohen here (I can very much imagine hearing the waltzy “Path Of Least Resistance” somewhere between “Suzanne” and “Master Song”), a little of that intimate feel you could hear on latest album by Peter Astor (I can’t recommend Songbox enough). However, the reference points will not get you anywhere: this is simply too sincere and personal not to be unique.

Lyrics might be the first thing you notice (try the final verse of “When I’m Dead” or the chorus of “Kisses And Scars” or just about anything else here), but I wouldn’t separate them from the melodies or John’s vocal performances. Lo-Fi Lullabies is basically its own world. To the extent that I almost don’t want to talk about individual songs. Let’s just mention that vocals rarely get any more honest and heartbreaking than on “Clouds Roll By”, as well as the fact that John certainly knows his way around a clever one-line chorus. As for the sound – it is, like I say, very stripped down. There’s a raw but romantic bedroom quality to these songs (check out the album title again) that, thankfully, does not disappear when John adds strings or a bass line or even a touch of harmonica. 

Oh and the final four-song stretch is frankly phenomenal. Etc., etc. Lo-Fi Lullabies is a masterclass in thoughtful, articulate songwriting. I’m really gasping for superlatives here. So far it’s my favourite album of the year by roughly a country mile. If I considered this album andFloral Tributes as a single-package release, I’d give it a ten. But then it’s art, so who cares about fucking numbers anyway.

Year by year: 2013

of Montreal – LOUSY WITH SYLVIANBRIAR

Well, I’ll be damned: Lousy With Sylvianbriar is just as good as I remember. I may have overreacted with my rating back when it was released, but what an entertaining onslaught of melodies and ideas (not least lyrical, though that’s a topic for a separate article) this album is.

All the more surprising because I’m not even an of Montreal fan. Up to 2013, they’d been patchy at best, but then along came “Fugitive Air”, and something clicked. I’m still agnostic about Kevin Barnes’s earlier records (colourful and mad though they are), but everything about Lousy With Sylvianbriar smacks of demented brilliance.  

“Amphibian Days” has the sort of seductive vocal tune that is like one prolonged orgasm. Barnes sings it that way, too. “Obsidian Currents” doesn’t quite reach the same heights, but the vitriolic lyrics more than make up for that. And it all hits the climax, both melodic and lyrical, on the head-spinning “Belle Glade Missionaries” that has this lovely middle-eight to blow you away:

I have a sense you want to be the female Henry Miller

Cynically referring to your lovers as your pricks 

And exploiting other people’s madness.

Peep Show

This week has seen the release of the most anticipated film of the year. The final episode of Peep Show. It will be a miserable world without it. I guess TV is now well and truly fucked.

Year by year: 2012

Spiritualized – SWEET HEART SWEET LIGHT

I thought I should do the postmodern thing and put The North Sea Scrolls in here (one of the most memorable concerts of my life – in the nippy atmosphere of St. Pancras Church in London), but that would be, what, Luke Haines’s fourth appearance in this series. No way am I doing that.

Speaking of Spiritualized, Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space is unquestionably their peak (either that or the famed Royal Albert Hall concert). But it wasn’t released in 2012, and besides, Sweet Heart Sweet Light is bloody wonderful.

Jason Pierce is the king of a two-chord melody, and this is as much a space rock album as it is a pop album. Racket (“Heading For The Top”) mixed with almost excessive sweetness (“Freedom” is frankly teetering on the edge). “Too Late” may be Pachelbel all over again, but Jason can do that better than anyone else. “Hey Jane” is phenomenal and “So Long You Pretty Thing” is nearly Wagnerian in its Gargantuan scope. 

Great cover, too.

Sorry, but no

Stevie Wonder

Maybe it’s the childhood trauma of hearing “I Just ###### To ### I #### You” at the age of seven (cheesy even if you’re two), but I’ve never cared for Stevie Wonder. Amazing people have played Innervisions and Talking Book and Songs In The Key Of Life to me, and I got the soulful vocals and optimistic vibes. I just didn’t get the songwriting which frankly doesn’t stretch too far.

Prince

Funk my feet. I guess Prince is a very talented musician (and suitably annoying person), but as far as I’m concerned “Manic Monday” by The Bangles was the best thing he has ever done. I’ve tried Purple Rain multiple times (among a few of his other albums), and while it wasn’t bad per se, let’s face it: you can have this stuff so much more powerful in half a dozen other places.

Bjork 

When she is accessible, she is bland. When she is inaccessible, she is, well, inaccessible. 

Year by year: 2011

PJ Harvey – LET ENGLAND SHAKE

Admittedly it was a deliberately contrarian move – to say The Waterboys’ An Appointment With Mr. Yeats was the best album of 2011. Mike Scott’s guts are not in doubt, but in the face of such reckless charm – what chance did anybody have?

White Chalk was a low-key Gothic triumph, but Let England Shake was PJ Harvey’s greatest reinvention yet. A war poet – dark, brutally honest and full of great verses. And great tunes, too, in spite of her modesty. “England” may not always be an easy listen, but once you discover how beautiful that vocal melody really is, you have to give in. And then there’s also powerful immediacy about songs like “The Last Living Rose” and “In The Dark Places”.

However, my absolute favourite moment on this album, and one rock music offers only on rare occasion, comes at the beginning of “The Glorious Land”. That unsettling trumpet jumping literally out of nowhere, is sheer inspirational genius. In fact, it was that trumpet that made it obvious to me, on my first listen to Let England Shake, that this was destined to be special.

There has always been something imperfect and intriguing (these two things could be connected) about PJ Harvey. Rid Of Me was overrated and the hugely celebrated Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea was, I thought, generic modern rock. And even when she was good, she was inconsistent. “A Perfect Day Elise” sitting side by side with “My Beautiful Leah”. 

To Bring You My Love was the one, of course, bruising and intense from start to finish. Now, after 2011, I’m not too sure. Until I hear that trumpet in “The Glorious Land”, that is. 

Year by year: 2010

Arcade Fire – THE SUBURBS

I don’t care too much about the concept. I don’t know if this was better than Funeral or not. I never asked myself how pretentious this band is. I just think this is a brilliant collection of songs. And, five years later, the wishy-washy “Wasted Hours” is the only one I could live without. 

The Suburbs is the sort of album you should listen to on long journeys. I’ve done that a few times now, and it has never let me down. The scope of this thing. The melodies and the moods you can live a hundred times or more. My favourite moment is when the gorgeous, wistful “Suburban War” gives way to the punkish energy rush of “Month Of May”. Or perhaps it is the way they keep changing the tempo throughout “Modern Man”? Or the biting lyrics of “Rococo”?.. 

It’s driving, anthemic sound, and these are driving, anthemic songs. Good songs. I don’t think there are many bands around who can rival them for arrangements and songwriting chops. Maybe The New Pornographers. Maybe… Honestly, I don’t know who else.

Year by year: 2009

Luke Haines – 21^st CENTURY MAN

In 2015, 21^st Century Man sounds old-school. Luke Haines writings songs about Klaus Kinski, married couples leaving London for English countryside, Russian futurists and Peter Hammill. No concept, just songs. I miss that. I enjoyed the one about Kendo Nagasaki and I enjoyed the one about Nick the Badger, but the annoying “Lou Reed Lou Reed” single was a lazy excuse for primitive rock’n’roll and this year’s messy Mark E. Smith related EP was not too hot either. I’m all for an artist going places and self-indulgent whimsy can be fun, but somehow it has felt slight. Hit and miss, too, Luke in the full Twitter mode. Too many sycophantic followers praising every line, perhaps? British Nuclear Bunkers is either ridiculous or fantastic (probably both), but there’s just not too much songwriting thought going on. Or is it that I’m like NBA’s Gregg Popovich dismissing 3-point shots as circus stuff and preferring the old-school brand of ball-moving basketball? The one that involved more effort and more deliberation? Also, in 2015, 21^st Century Man sounds like Luke Haines’ last great album – if you forget about The North Sea Scrolls for a second. Stretching from glam-rock (“Wot A Rotter”) to acoustic semi-ballads (“Love Letter To London”). I do not want to be stuck in the past and reinforce my sentimental tendencies, but come on now: a melody doesn’t lie. So just give “Klaus Kinski” another listen. A songwriting masterclass if there ever was one.  

An Invitation

With age comes the realization that you can take on any type of horror. Ghosts, blood, you can work it all out. You can deconstruct it. These days, the effect of The Conjuring would not be nearly as powerful as it was a few years ago. It would wear off soon and perhaps even make me smile.

But ever since I watched Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby… 

Suffice it to say that the final scene is still with me. To this day, I won’t take on horror remotely revolving around religious sects or cults. This year’s fantastic documentary Going Clear proved yet again what organized religion can stand for, and I really should have backed away from going to a late night screening of An Invitation. An American thriller so unsettling and so disgusting (and probably brilliant) that the terrorist attacks on Paris I read about in a taxi, on my way home, at 5 a.m., seemed merely a continuation of what came before.  

A postcard

Occasionally you come across a thing so beautiful and sentimental that you find it hard to write about anything else.

Really, mock him all you want (and I admit I do my fair bit), but the man is brilliant. Above is a postcard he sent to a disabled fan in 1984. From Penny Pepper.

Year by year: 2008

Robert Forster – THE EVANGELIST

Initially, the idea of The Evangelist sounded unbearable. Would you be able to live with it, to take it all in, to get away from the horrible thoughts of what might have been had Grant not died so tragically and so soon, had The Go-Betweens released another album, had Oceans Apart been but a taste of things to come?

But then the tunes poured in, first slowly (“If It Rains”), then rising in intensity (“Let Your Light In, Babe”), then gorgeously dying down (“From Ghost Town”). Robert’s tunes, Grant’s tunes, and you almost forgot all. Melodies of such striking charisma and poetic genius – The Evangelist was both a healing process and the single most powerful, emotional musical statement of the decade. 

And you know what? Seven years have passed since its release. 16 Lovers Lane and Danger In The Past, Tallulah and Horsebreaker Star. I love those records dearly, I probably know them by heart, but The Evangelist remains the one Go-Betweens-related album I come back to again and again. 

Best things are created with the thought that it’s all over and this is your last chance. Thankfully, this was not, not for Robert Forster. But God knows it sounds that way.

Year by year: 2007

Angels Of Light - WE ARE HIM

If I’m in a particularly cruel mood, I start thinking about writing a book of non-fiction. The title of this book is Playing the Music of Michael Gira to Girls. I envision this work as a world-wide bestseller containing detailed descriptions of girls slowly but assuredly falling under the spell of “Lunacy” and especially “You Fucking People Make Me Sick”.

But of course I’m not being serious. Like I’ve said numerous times already, the girl who likes Swans is not the girl you want to date. Period.

As for We Are Him (which may or may not be Angels Of Light’s best album; I’m drawn to How I Loved You on a mental level), I would love to see the face of a self-styled ‘true’ fan of Swans who hears the second part of “Sunflower’s Here To Stay” for the first time. After all, it’s a sunny pop song, and I’ve just deleted the word ‘almost’ from this sentence. Remember those humourless creatures thinking My Father Will Guide Me Up A Rope To The Sky was a fake Swans comeback? Or, worse, a sellout?

We Are Him was the final album by Angels Of Light, and they went out with a bang. It’s intense and pretty in the sort of brutal, depressing way only Michael Gira can do. You really have to marvel at the manner in which a song as elegiac and beautiful as “Sometimes I Dream I’m Hurting You” will make you feel positively suicidal. The song is also typical of this album in the sense that it has two equally brilliant parts which are seamlessly connected with each other. You can’t deny the songwriting roll Gira was on at the time; to this day, the man has not written a song better than “Not Here/Not Now”.

It’s also fairly diverse – if you can get past the fact that anything created by Michael Gira sounds like Michael Gira. Even the speedy, insane, foul-mouthed, circus-like country of “Goodbye Mary Lou”. Also, I admire the consistency. “The Visitor” may lack a certain edge, but as long as it all ends with the backing vocals of “Star Chaser” – I’m all right. 

Finally, I will say that an Angels Of Light live concert remains one of my unrealized dreams. Swans crashing my eardrums during The Seer tour was an interesting experience, but seeing Gira with an acoustic guitar, doing “Untitled Love Song”… Jesus, my knees are getting weak. 

Year by year: 2006

John Callahan – PURPLE WINOS IN THE RAIN

Broken noses, broken veins…

If any other album in this series demands a proper review, it’s this. Because face it – your chances of having heard John Callahan’s music are minimal to say the least.

I first read about this album in 2008, and it was Jim James, of all people, who praised it to the extent you could not ignore. I never cared for Jim James and his overtly second-rate band, but something drew me to an album he so ardently recommended. The album was not easy to track down, but Christ was it ever worth it.

Purple Winos In The Rain was not connected with any special (or specific, for the matter) moment in my life. Rather, it created its own moment. Rain poured to “Lost In The City”, autumn ended to “Suicide In The Fall”. You come across such albums once in a while and wonder just how obscure great things can get.

And it’s great in a quiet, humble but absolutely unequivocal way. Seventeen songs (plus a guest appearance from Tom Waits, who gets to sing the stunning “Touch Me Someplace I Can Feel”) of strummed guitars, affecting piano notes and occasional harmonica. John’s beautifully understated and moving vocals coupled with the kind of tunes that make you go ‘Jesus this is fucking amazing’. Seventeen times. And the lyrics, of course. Morbid, ominous – against all that melodic prettiness (“Portland Girl” is just unbelievable).

This album’s influences could be numerous, but you won’t hear them. John Callahan’s personality is all over these songs, whether it’s the one-minute “Yesler Street” or the straightforwardly waltzy “Bullet Through The Heart”. Shamefully (I had an excuse: I loved the music), it was somewhat later that I found out more about the art of John Callahan. His brilliant but hopelessly dark cartoons were a perfect match for the music on Purple Winos In The Rain. Sadly, the only album he managed in his lifetime (he died in 2010, at the age of 59). 

I’m listening to it right now. It’s something about Charlie Manson saving The Beatles… And just like Jim James all those years ago, I can’t recommend this enough. By any standard and for any taste, Purple Winos In The Rain is achingly special. 

Mulled wine

White, never red.

It’s a form of art. In fact, preparing mulled wine is not unlike writing a short story where it’s all about the right details and how you place them to make one coherent piece. 

Rather importantly, it has to be honey instead of sugar, the water must never boil and you should not forget a pinch of cloves. Also, it’s never red, it has to be white. And then any writer’s block will go way. Together with a headache and a dead end of another plot.

The Bazaar Of Bad Dreams

I would love to have some more Nocturnes from Kazuo Ishiguro, certain stories from Heavy Water are among the best things Martin Amis has written, and Will Self’s Grey Area has never left my writing desk (lest I forget just how good “Between The Conceits” is). It’s a shame that a short story is merely a distraction for an established author. 

So much so that you really have to be a dreamer. Thankfully, there’s one such dreamer in America, and his new collection of stories (published a month ago) is as good a book as I’ve read this year. The man knows a short cut to a nightmare you wish to see. And when he writes like Raymond Carver (no shame in that; there isn’t a better short story writer than Raymond Carver), he still ends up writing like Stephen King. Which pays off: The Bazaar Of Bad Dreams is escapism of the highest order. 

Year by year: 2005

The New Pornographers – TWIN CINEMA

A.C. Newman.

Dan Bejar.

Neko Case.

In one band.

***

There's not much left to say really. God knows power pop should not be this inventive. In fact, there’s more going on in “Bleeding Heart Show” than in the whole discography of your favourite band.

Listen to this and weep:

Those drums.

Year by year: 2004

Nina Nastasia – DOGS

Nina Nastasia is special. She is one of the most intriguing, genuinely exciting songwriters of past decade. I would say ‘these days’, but she hasn’t recorded an album in five years and God knows when this hiatus will end.

Also, Nina Nastasia is not the sort of artist where you could say ‘she should be a lot more popular than she is’. I would not be too sure. Many will recognise “Ugly Face” from Carriers, some will recognise “Bird Of Cuzco” from a John Peel tribute record, but she is simply not cut out for anything remotely resembling fame. She’s been endorsed by Steve Albini, for Christ’s sake. 

She doesn’t make that kind of music. She makes the kind of music that her talent would allow. Striking, original, clever melodies that may not always overwhelm, but when they do work – you get things like “Judy’s In The Sandbox”, “Underground”, “A Dog’s Life”, “Stormy Weather”, “All Your Life”. These are some of the best songs I’ve ever heard. 

P.S. Dogs originally came out in 2000, but the record was rereleased in 2004. And it's too bloody good, so fuck the dates.

Year by year: 2003

Gillian Welch – SOUL JOURNEY

If I start sleeping in the gutter, drunk at the age of 40, Soul Journey would be my album of choice. Not that it’s depressing and not that it’s uplifting – it’s both. But a bad streak is perfect for it. Lying off the beaten track, abandoned by all, somewhere in Nashville.  

An album heard at a special moment in life, under special circumstances, but while many albums like that (Bon Iver’s For Emma is one) are later revealed as weak and ‘what on Earth was I thinking’, Soul Journey has never let me down. Not once.

You can tell me about the transcendental alt. country beauty of “One More Dollar” all you want, but I never liked Gillian Welch when she was trying to be perfect. It just sounded smooth. Sterile. So in that sense Soul Journey was a true gift. It’s like she wasn’t trying too hard – and for some people, it works best. 

Jeff Tweedy has never done a song better than “He’s a Dick”. Likewise, “One Monkey” is the best thing Gillian Welch has ever done. But Soul Journey is so much more than that. And Christ it’s hard to stay away from a pathetic dive into this album’s title.

Year by year: 2002

Beth Gibbons & Rustin Man – OUT OF SEASON

Funny I should write this on the first day of winter. Funny – because Out Of Season could be the ultimate autumn album. Everything about it, from Beth Gibbons’ morbidly soulful vocals to the cold, slightly surreal vibe, everything screams wet shoes and windy streets.

It’s that same Beth Gibbons of Portishead – but this is bleak jazz rather than chilling trip-hop. A sense of abandoned hope runs through “Mysteries” and “Show” and the incredible “Tom The Model” like cold, cold blood – but, crucially, the effect is beautiful rather than oppressive. 

The centrepiece is “Funny Time Of Year” which shares the atmosphere with Nico’s version of “My Funny Valentine”. Desolation mixed with sadness, and the feeling that 30 years from now you will cry listening to these songs. Odd how both have ‘funny’ in their title. A less appropriate word would be hard to find.