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- Amy Winehouse (and Mark Ronson) – It's My Party
The singer and the über-producer have been working together again and the results are, ahem, 'interesting'
In April we reported that Amy Winehouse and Mark Ronson were working together again, on three tracks for a Quincy Jones tribute album. Well, this is apparently a leaked version of one of their tracks, a cover of It's My Party (Jones's first big hit when he produced the Lesley Gore original in 1963).It's not – how can we say this? – the most coherent vocal ever laid to tape, although if there's ever a song where you can let it all go a bit runny-mascara-and-10-Bacardi-Breezers then this is it. Having said that, if you really wanted to hear the original sung in this style you could just stagger into any random hen night at 3am, right?
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsПереслать - My Membranes song featured in the Mark Saunders police report
When I heard that inquest evidence into the shooting of a barrister had been littered with song references, I didn't expect a track I wrote in 1987 to be included next to Chris de Burgh
The police report into the shooting of Mark Saunders should have been another sad story of our times. That was until yesterday's bizarre news about the placing of various song titles into official inquest evidence.
It was especially strange for me, because in the frankly weird selection featuring Chris de Burgh, Journey, Donna Summer and Buzzcocks was a track from my band, the Membranes. The track, Fuck My Old Boots, was tucked away on a 1987 album called Kiss Ass Godhead. It was a popular live number at the time for chemically imbalanced crazies, but not something I expected to think about 23 years later, certainly not in this context. Somehow the song title had, along with other tracks, been worked into a transcript of the inquest. The passage in which the song features runs: "I switched the light on, he turned towards me and I thought, 'Fuck my old boots, I've got a gun trained on me.'"
An afternoon of intense Twitter debate followed. Some thought the story was a hoax while others pointed out that dropping song titles into reports is pretty common. Insiders told me this is not the first time they've heard pop culture references in official documents. They say it's a way to let off steam in a tense work environment – and although rarely picked up on, it's backfired this time.
Many people were baffled by how someone could like such a bizarre ruckus of music. My guess is this was probably a pooled effort, although Donna Summer and noisy post-punk were always bedfellows in my world. Duran Duran's Point of No Return fits in there somewhere, but it's Chris de Burgh that really confuses me – it's not even Lady in Red, but Quiet Moments, a track that surely nobody outside of the WI has ever heard of. Elsewhere, Journey's Line of Fire is sat next to Kicking Myself by As Tall As Lions. It certainly makes for a confused compilation album.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsПереслать - Mr Scruff unruffled by clearing of the Technics decks
Panasonic says it will stop making its famous Technics SL-1200 turntables. Mr Scruff discusses the end of a DJing era
I'm a little bit sceptical about the announcement, because there have been so many suggestions previously that Technics are going to stop making turntables. It stirs up a bit of debate, people panic-buy – and then nothing happens.
Even if it is true, I don't think it's an issue, as there are so many pairs of SL-1200s around and they're very durable. If someone buys a Technics this week and looks after it well, they'll still be using it in 2035. The Technics SL-1200s are obviously a very important part of modern DJ history, but there are other turntable manufacturers, and now the turntable is only one of a range of controllers that includes CDJs and software-based DJing setups.
It's the same with the "vinyl is dead" debate, which has been going on since the late 80s, when CDs came about. Everyone said: "You can put jam on your CDs, you can put peanut butter on them," because they were supposedly so durable (although you could fit far more jam on a record!). I have a real problem with these "one format v another format" debates. It's like books v newspapers, or a plate v a cup. I quite like to use both.
Saying that, one aspect I've noticed with software-based DJing on programs like Serato and Traktor is that, because you can carry so many, you tend to play whole tunes much less. People are playing 30 seconds of a track and skipping to another one. It almost seems like people get attention deficit disorder when they're DJing. It's very old school but I'm a firm believer that, if something's good quality, I want to experience all of it – whether it's a good meal, a good film or a good piece of music. I think if a record's good, it should be listened to all the way through.
There are a lot of modern DJs and producers – people like Floating Point and Mala from DMZ – who play exclusively on vinyl. You've got a new breed of people who are vehemently pro-turntable and wouldn't be seen dead with a CD, never mind an MP3. It's a funny one: for every indicator that vinyl is on the wane, there'll be another generation of kids who are buying it again, or kids who are a bit sick of having a computer full of anonymous MP3s.
If you face facts, vinyl still sounds a lot better than CD or digital. If you listen to a lot of modern music like dubstep many times on CD – a lot of the UK funky stuff, a lot of harsh, very bottom-heavy, very percussive, very dynamic music – it sounds quite brittle and two-dimensional. You cut the same thing on to vinyl and, when you listen to it in a club, the bass has real depth to it. It's not like a flat wall of sound that's beating you down, it's almost like you can "get inside" the music a lot better.
There is something magical about vinyl. I love the way music sounds on it. Part of the reason I love it is that I don't quite know why it sounds that way. There's alchemy to the process of putting sound on vinyl that engineers still don't understand to this day, but somehow it works. I've been DJing and collecting music for about 25 years now, and it's still my favourite way of listening to music.
• Mr Scruff was speaking to Abbas Ali.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsПереслать - Ask the indie professor: The dos and don'ts of touring
Touring is so much fun! Well, as long as you never complain. Or go to the toilet. Or eat. Here are the prof's 10 golden rules
My band is about to go on tour. Do you have any advice for us?
Anonymous, via emailHere are 10 pieces of advice. This list is by no means comprehensive, but it will undoubtedly be useful.
1) Pack light, but bring entertainment, as boredom is the true bane of touring. Have two books ready: one to impress journalists when they ask what you're reading (perhaps Proust or the winner of some recent prize for fiction), another that you really want to read, like Harry Potter or a band biography.
2) Use your phone wisely. Phones don't have breathalysers, so think before you dial. For you, 4am might be fine, but your loved ones who are about to go to work will not be amused. Never make a phone call on a hotel phone (unless you're in someone else's room): it'll cost more than most bands' collective monthly wage.
3) Speaking of wage, you'll be living on your per diem (which is Latin for "per day"). Usually it's just enough for a round of drinks or a meal. Choose wisely.
4) Tour bus etiquette. One: greet the driver politely and then minimise all contact with him. By now, he thinks of you and your ilk as zoo animals, and you want to keep it that way. He sees his job as making sure you follow his few rules and, if you do, your tour bus might just become that happy den of debauchery you've always dreamed of. The most important commandment of the tour bus is: "Thou shalt not shit on the tour bus." I've been told the rationale of this, which is really not that relevant, but this prohibition is sacrosanct. Never do this, even if it is an emergency. Better to go on the side of the road than deal with the wrath of someone who has descended into madness due to bad smells. Your other responsibility is to make it back to your bunk. Falling asleep or passing out in public space is taken as provocation to prank you, so if you don't want photos of you dressed as an alien circulating on the internet, get back to your own berth.
5) Don't get left behind. I know you think you're essential, but as you start to look the same as everyone else to certain professionals, you need to make sure you're not left at a hotel, a venue, a truckstop or at the side of a highway as you're adhering to the aforementioned sacred rule. If you do leave the bus, place something on the driver's seat so he knows someone has moved. An explicit note would be best – something like: "One of your charges has temporarily left the enclosure but will return shortly." This has the added benefit of being polite and irritating simultaneously – a coup!
6) Dressing rooms are never secure, so hide anything you don't want stolen. Opportunists and drug dealers tend to take anything shiny. Fans want relatively valueless items. And everyone wants your booze.
7) Hotels. Choose up front how you are going to do this. Are you planning to have this be the most expensive hotel bill of all time, or are you not paying for anything? If you choose the latter, don't have the afterparty in your room. This is a rookie mistake. In the party room, guess who's paying for the drinks and the holes in the wall? If you've chosen the expensive route, try and do it when the press are around. This is like blowing up a car in a film: the expense of the destruction is made up for by the entertainment value it provides for the greatest number of people.
8) What happens on the road never stays on the road. Touring is not Las Vegas. Everything you do will, without fail, eventually get back home. A girlfriend might look at a blog where someone mentions that you were seen leaving the bar with a blonde in a tartan skirt and black boots. Also, if you cheat, your friends will know – and if one of them likes your missus he will take this as an invitation to sleep with her. You've read your rock books – now you know why all those musicians stole each other's girls.
9) Always be nice to the crew. Bands come and go but the crew go on forever. They'll be there on your way up and there on your way down. Also, you're at their mercy on stage. You don't want to end up with bodily secretions in your beer, profanity in your monitor mix or a private part rubbed on your melodica.
10) Don't complain. Everyone will eventually drive everyone crazy, but you'll be the first if you start moaning about the size of the seats on the aeroplane, how cramped you are from sleeping on a guitar case, or how bad the food is. The only things you can complain about are fellow musicians or the fact that there wasn't enough alcohol. Otherwise, keep it to yourself. Touring is like being in a marriage with people you don't (usually) have sex with. Sex will make you put up with a lot of things that would otherwise make you kill someone. The way to cope with this tension is to creatively express your hostility through pranks – such as, when your singer expresses his antipathy to Rodrigo y Gabriela, getting the soundman to play their record before the start of every show. If you see the humour in this, you're ready for your tour to start.
• Ask the indie professor a question in the comments below or email it to theindieprofessor@gmail.com
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsПереслать - New music: TV Girl – It's Not Something
Lo-fi pop from a San Diego duo with perilously little going on in the 'friend' department
Confession time: I know very little about San Diego's TV Girl (apart from the fact they're from San Diego). By the looks of their fairly empty Myspace page there are two of them and they only have 25 friends, which in cyber-friend terms is practically dying of loneliness. What I do know is that they make shimmering, lo-fi dream pop with a slightly racy undercurrent. It's Not Something may waft about like it's too dreamy to raise anyone's blood pressure, but the lyrics read like an R&B Lothario's diary entry: "You can touch me all you wanna/ I ain't gonna try to stop ya." The come-on seems to work and by the chorus it's all happening but with a warning that it's not really going to mean anything. Who said this whole chillwave scene was for lonely bedroom-bound geeks?You can download the rather ace TV Girl EP for free from here.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsПереслать - Exclusive video: Manic Street Preachers feat Ian McCulloch – Some Kind of Nothingness
Watch the video for the Manics' new single, with a guest spot from the Echo and the Bunnymen singer
According to James Dean Bradfield, his first ever gig was Echo and the Bunnymen at Bristol's Colston Hall. "Given that it was James, Richey and Sean's first gig," says Manics bassist Nicky Wire, "I think there's something resplendent about the fact that he's there singing on our 10th album. It's about loss and the importance of grief." Some Kind of Nothingness is out on 6 December.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More FeedsПереслать
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