Blacked Out

Black Bones, a Belfast duo, released a six track album last year that took nightclub music- techno, dub, disco, whatever else gets people dancing- and lit a fire under it. Tough beats, wonky experimental sonics, a dark Balearic feel, more than a little influenced by various points in Andrew Weatherall's back catalogue- the noir feel of Sabres, the basement beats of 2000 era Two Lone Swordsmen, the adventurism of his solo work from the 2010s. 

Black Bones have followed that album with a new 10" single, two more slices from Belfast. The A- side, Barrios And Barricades is an urban trip with voices, a banging bassline, a rattling snare, shrieks and cries, the thump in the chest you get when music is played through a big soundsystem and the staccato flash of the strobe. Full blooded music that makes you feel alive and in the moment. Listen and buy at Bandcamp. 

On the flip is Cruising, a Black Bones- Autumns collaboration. Cruising drives in with the same four four thud, the drum sound pushed to the edge and a bassline that would chew up the carpet at parties. Swirling around those two elements there are crashes and FX, echoed shouts, metal on metal and at two minutes forty seven seconds a breakdown, a brief pause before the tension and the rhythm returns. 

Forty Five Minutes Of Beth Orton

A couple of weeks ago I was crate digging in Altrincham, flicking through a box of records that even though it was outdoors smelt like it had been recently recovered from a damp garage. In among the finds and the rejects was a Beth Orton 10" single, Touch Me With Your Love, from 1996. Weirdly while the sleeve was in bits, water damaged and splitting at the seams, the record was in really good condition and though there was no inner sleeve around the disc the free postcard (a black and white photo of Beth) was inside with the record. The 10" single had four songs, the title track (from her debut album Trailer Park), an instrumental version, the B-side song Pedestal and a live version of the epically beautiful Galaxy Of Emptiness recorded at the Shepherd's Bush Empire in November 1996. I took it along with a copy of Bruce Hornsby And The Range's The Way It Is on 12", a compilation of Pentangle on Pickwick Records from the late 1960s and Warm Leatherette by Grace Jones, paid my tenner and shuffled off. 

As a result, a Beth Orton Sunday mix seemed to be a good idea. 

Forty Five Minutes Of Beth Orton

• Galaxy Of Emptiness
• It's This I Find I Am
• Bobby Gentry
• Touch Me With Your Love
• Anywhere (Two Lone Swordsmen Remix)
• Water On A Vine Leaf (Underworld Mix Part 1)

Galaxy Of Emptiness is the ten minute closer from Beth's debut Trailer Park, an Andrew Weatherall produced epic, with Red Snapper's Rich Thair and Ali Friend on brushed drums and stand up double bass. It's one of Weatherall's greatest 90s productions, full of space and atmosphere.

It's This I Find I Am was the B-side to the Someone's Daughter single from 1997, another Weatherall production and a bit of a lost gem. 

Bobby Gentry, named after the singer of 60s classic Ode To Billie Joe, came out a 2003 compilation that followed her Daybreaker album called The Other Side Of Daybreak. It's been a favourite of mine since I first heard it twenty years ago, a cinematic beauty with strings and heartbreak lyrics including this piece of poetry- 'Collecting dead rainbows/ From puddles and mires/ Taking them home to warm by the fire'.

Touch Me With Your Love was a 1996 single as mentioned above, CD and 10" vinyl on Heavenly. 

Anywhere was remixed by Two Lone Swordsmen, with some superb Keith Tenniswood programming, Beth sent into electro heaven, TLS remix gold. Anywhere was on Daybreaker, Beth's third album from 2002. There were Adrian Sherwood and Photek remixes too.

Water On A Vine Leaf was one of Beth's first vocal appearances, the result of studio time with William Orbit. This single from 1993 is one of the year's and William Orbit's best. Some of the songs Beth and William worked on resurfaced on Trailer Park under different names. There are several remixes that are right up there in terms of 90s acid house/ progressive house brilliance, three from Underworld and the Xylem Flow remix by Spooky. I could have chosen any and went for Underworld's Part 1 mix. 

Monday's Long Song

Nick Cave and Warren Ellis have a new mini- album out, on 10" vinyl available from Nick's Cave Things website. Seven Psalms is seven short spoken word meditations set to semi- ambient, dreamlike music. They flow one into the other and deal with the big questions and big issues Nick Cave has been asking and grappling with for decades now- God, love, loss. They were written during lockdown, one a day for seven days, and recorded at the same time as Carnage but there's not the same level of drama and tension and outright hilarity that Carnage's songs contain. These are straight and honest, directly from him. On Such Things Should Never Happen two mothers lose their children- 'such things should never happen... but they do'- and when I first heard that line it took my breath away. On I Have Wandered All My Unending Days he asks for entrance to 'the mansion in the sky'. 

On the B-side is a twelve minute instrumental, the music from the A-side, Psalm Instrumental, as one long piece. Washes of synths, piano, reverb, a choir fading in and out, some violin, chanting, music from a ceremony. Five minutes in Nick is heard speaking the line about the mansion in the sky. It's a long way from The Birthday Party and The Bad Seeds, Stagger Lee and Deanna but it's a moving piece of work. 

Miss Lonely Hearts

I was sent a link to this earlier this week, a technicolour riot of samples, surf guitar, synths, repetitive beats and sounds from 1950 science fiction films (something of a theme this week). The source material is Miss Lonely Hearts by The Pink Diamond Revue, an electro- punk duo from Reading, guitars and drums with vocals piped in from samples and a mannequin centre stage when performing live. This remix is five minutes forty five seconds of fun from the hands of South London's Rude Audio who have graced these pages before. Out soon on 10" vinyl, the forgotten child of the vinyl revival.

Harlem Motorcycle Club

Two Andrew Weatherall mixes in three days? That's just the way I roll. Weatherall back at the controls in that funny shack thing NTS Radio operate out of for his monthly Music's Not For Everyone show, two hours of musical goodness including- and here is a word I did not expect to type at Bagging Area- Kasabian (admittedly it's a rather brilliant Richard fearless mix from a 10" single release in 2009 but Kasabian nonetheless). In fact, the whole show is played and mixed live using only 10" records. The full tracklist is here. There's another new Woodleigh Research Facility track right at the end too.



If anyone's going to the Art Car Boot Fair in London today, let us know how you get on. Andrew and Nina Walsh are selling the various bits and pieces below out of the back of a van. I am 200 miles north and as Mick Hucknall once put it, money's too tight to mention.

127 To Facility 4" Vinyl album with linocut hand stamped label and 200 gram textured paper insert.
Every sleeve will feature a different photograph and will be individually signed and numbered in an
edition of 100. £ 50

Woodleigh Research Facility "Facility 4" T-shirt. Organic cotton in S,M,L,XL and ladies M and L.
Limited edition of 40. £ 30

Woodleigh Research Facility "Facility 4" tote bag. Organic cotton.
Limited edition of 50 £10

Andrew Weatherall print. Two colour giclee print based on a photograph by Nina Walsh.
A2 308 gsm Hahnnemuhle paper with certificate of authenticity.
Limited edition of 50. £75

The Deep Hum At The Heart Of It All

There was a lovely Andrew Weatherall package that came out some time back- a special edition of author Michael Smith's Unreal City, with a 6 track cd soundtrack, a 10" record and the book itself loose-leaf, with Weatherall's hand written annotations around the text. A really nicely put together thing, from Faber. It was priced at £35, which I thought was a bit steep, but I got one for £20 from a popular internet auction site. The soundtrack is all low key, ambient noises and circular acoustic guitar patterns and Michael Smith reading parts of the book- not the sort of thing to listen to everyday but something to immerse yourself into and enjoy. You should definitely find yourself a copy, if they haven't already sold out.The one-sided 10" record was a remix of one of the tracks. Consider this as a taster.

The Deep Hum At the Heart Of It All (Weatherall Remix)

And many thanks to reader Jim from New Zealand who got in touch from the other side of the world regarding this matter.

Down For You Is Up

A couple of weeks ago, partly on Drew's advice, a copy of the latest Kills single (on lovely 10" vinyl) dropped through my door. The ep has four songs, The Kills song The Last Goodbye and three covers. Their cover version of The Velvet Underground's Pale Blue Eyes is a stunner, Alison's vocal and the guitar sound especially. I thought about posting it but it's still available to buy and decided against it. Listen to it at youtube.

I went back to the Velvet's third album as a result, probably my favourite of theirs with it's smoky, after hours feeling and warm fuzz, nine out of the ten tracks being superb- including this one.

What Goes On

Saturday Morning Is Weatherall Remix Of Friday Night Is Rockabilly Night

Here it is, the Weatherall remix of yesterday's V.V. Brown track from 2008, Stripped back to mainly bass, drums and funny noises and bought on 10" vinyl, one of my favourite novelty formats.

Crying Blood - Weatherall Remix.mp3 - 4shared.com - online file sharing and storage - download

Death In Vegas 'One More Time'

That Death In Vegas 10" single I mentioned the other day, one sided with an etched B side picture of a girl's face, and on red vinyl. Could it have any more collectible features?

One More Time is a nice organ led, retro funky thing, and features Bobby Gillespie. He turns up at the end and says 'yeah yeah yeah yeah' a few times. Guess he forgot his lyric book when he went to the studio.

05 One More Time.wma

Crispy Ambulance 'Deaf'

Crispy Ambulance were on Factory, allegedly signed because they were Joy Division sound-a-likes and dismissed by many because they were Joy Division sound-a-likes. Which wasn't always true. This track Deaf sounds nothing like JD, and is all the better for it, being more rough and ready, scratchy, shouty, post-punk, building and falling away. Good stuff this one.

I can't listen to Crispy Ambulance without thinking of the Half Man Half Biscuit song Running Order Squabble Fest, which details bad gig experiences (Half past four? Half past four? You said half past ten to us,... CND? CND? We're not going on after Chas 'n' Dave etc etc). In the middle it breaks down 'Hello boys there's a change of plan- You're going on after Crispy Ambulance' to the tune of the popular football song 'You're going home in a fucking ambulance'. It's better on record than being described. I'll post it at some point.

Also, I've got this record on 10" vinyl, which is a funny format, neither one thing or the other. Perfect for the e.p. and mini-lp, but also for the promo/collector gimmick trap. My 10" collection is pretty random- a Beastie Boys single with them as Action Men on the cover, a Green On Red 8 track live album, a Death In Vegas one sided single with Bobby Gillespie saying yeahyeahyeah a few times and an etching on the B-side, a Primal Scream remix e.p. with a rubbish poster, two singles by Doves, Richard Hell reading the first two chapters of his novel (played once), a Dinosaur Jr single, an Arctic Monkeys e.p., Bug In The Bssbin by Innerzone Orchestra, a Rancid record, Super Black Market Clash spread over three 10" discs, a Cowboy Junkies e.p with a fold-out poster bag, Weatherall's remix of VV Brown, the DFA remix of Clinic, a Folk Implosion film tie-in, Good Life by Inner City live (!), three Jesus and Mary Chain e.p.s, and a remix of Theme by Sabres Of Paradise. I mean, there's some good songs there but I wouldn't want to wake up in a dj booth with just my 10" records. I think they saw me coming.

19 Deaf.wma