14th February 2025

Downloading & replaying is discontinued. However, tracks played on Friday evening were:

Clutter - Kraut
Finger Eleven - Paralyzer
Cigarettes After Sex - Tejano Blue
Kobrakasino - Armageddon
Cat Burns - Wish It Was Me
The Buoys - BDSM
Griff - Into The Walls
We Came As Romans - I Knew You Were Trouble
Luke Temple - I Can Dream
Cheekface - Next to Me (Yo Guy Version)
Megan Moroney - Am I Okay?
The Rumours - Cuntrol (U) Freak
Travis - Bus
CVC - The Lowrider (Just About Meant To Be)
Thee Sacred Souls - Live For You
The Smiths - Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want
Nina Nastasia - Underground

9th February 2025

Titus writes:

After a few weeks’ rest from blogging whilst Lex was in Casablanca, I am resuming  with a tale of four bands, all of which are very noisy, post punk and which collectively feature a dominance of girl power. I hate putting music into genres or ‘bags’ but I have to say they all have a similar message and style.
 
Hot Wax are an all girl trio from Hastings, East Sussex – a town in which  my close friend Anne tells me they serve wonderful fish’n’chips.  Hot Wax’s members are Tallulah Sim-Savage, Lola Sam, and Alfie Sayers.  This noisy bunch are due to release their eagerly awaited debut album ‘Hot Shock’ in March 2025. Tallulah (vocals and guitar) met Lola (bass) at secondary school in Hastings, when a music teacher placed them in a group together, and the two of them became close friends. Way back in 2017, they were both members of a band called The Kiffs, with Honor Wilson, who would later become Hot Wax’s initial drummer.  Sim-Savage and Sam later met current drummer Alfie Sayers at a Brighton Music College, and the band are referred to as “An alternative rock trio”.  Although so far missing out on Glastonbury, the girls have played at Leeds and Reading Festivals, in addition to others in the U.K. and abroad.  You may remember my blog an the Yeah Yeah Yeahs some time ago, and apparently Tallulah & Lola took inspiration from them when setting out their vision for Hot Wax.  I have never heard of this guy, but John Robb, of ‘Louder than War’ described Hot Wax as “ripping up the template and stages with a thrilling deconstruction of their grunge roots into a post-punk landscape”.
 
The Rumours, are a girl-fronted alternative rock band from Waterloo, Iowa, United States. They began as a straight forward rock band and have since befriended punk. Either way they are one of the hottest bands you’ll ever see.   They are Carla Foxx (vocals & guitar), Ela Rose (bass), Stu Thedew (guitar), Daniel Kluiter (drums).  Listening to them, it is quite apparent to me that they adore rock and roll, but they often drift into a kind of glam-punk and even bluesy stuff.  In the unlikely event of them reading this, that is only my opinion and perhaps not necessarily theirs!  One web site opines “The Rumours and their feisty attitudes are gonna rip your heart out and leave you beggin’ for more” and another “Their kick in the face sound........ the baddest goilz you’ll ever see”.  Their hell raising video – which I have spelt correctly -  ‘Cuntrol (U) Freak’ from their album ‘Kill or be killed’ is really worth a serious viewing, and reminds me very much of the early days of what was then called ‘Pub Rock’.
 
When I first saw the name Die Spitz, I thought that the band was German or even Austrian, but I was wrong – they hail from Austin, Texas.  Die Spitz actually means The Point.   They are described by Sonic Guild as “a mayhem inciting force who bombard their audiences with a wall of sound”.  Kate Halter plays bass and Ava Shrobilgen, Chloe Andrews and Ellie Livingston rotate vocals, guitar and drum duties in a dazzling display of multitalentness, if there is such a word as this. They remind me very much of L7 (remember them on The Word?) and Bikini Kill from all those years ago.  They played together most days during the Covid Pandemic, and Ellie insists that they conformed to social distancing in her garage.    Despite their cross genre experimentation, Die Spitz are still classed as a punk band, but the members of the group feel this diminishes their musicality and feel that they are writing music that has moved away from mainstream punk.
 
Amyl and the Sniffers are from Australia, and have been going the longest of the four bands I’m featuring. Their sound has been compared to early seventies punk rock such as The Damned and Iggy Pop. They are made up of Amy Taylor a.k.a, Amyl, Bryce Wilson, Declan Mehrtens and Gus Romer.  In October 2024 the band released its third album ‘Cartoon Darkness’, and also their fourth single ‘Jerkin’.  The video to this was released through the band’s web site, due to graphic full frontal nudity throughout, and only a censored version was released on YouTube.  Incidentally, amyl is Australian slang for amyl nitrite, also known as poppers.
 
So there we have 4 great alternative bands IMO, and if only I could request Lex to play one tune from each.  However I hope you enjoy just this one -  ‘Cuntrol (U ) Freak’ by The Rumours which can be found here.

7th February 2025

Downloading & replaying is discontinued. However, tracks played on Friday evening were:

DO not DO - Coeur de Verre (Heart of Glass)
Pink Floyd & Bee Gees via Wax Audio - Stayin' Alive In The Wall (Mashup)
Big Star - Thirteen
Tempt - Burn Me Down
Charli xcx feat. Bon Iver - I Think About It All The Time
Black Stone Cherry - Screamin At The Sky
Karmen x Bogdan DLP - Complicat
Fan Girl - eleveneleven
The Kinks - Nothin' In the World Can Stop Me Worryin' 'Bout That Girl
The Cars - Shake It Up
Weyes Blood - Andromeda
Pixies - Motoroller
Faux Real - Full Circle
Megadeth - Symphony Of Destruction (Radio Mix)
Sultans Of Ping F.C. - Veronica
Bon Iver - S P E Y S I D E

5th February 2025 - Trip to Casablanca

 

5th January 2025

Les Crêpes et les Galettes

Both king & queen are given paper crowns (sold along with the cake) and their health is drunk. Yet another reason to break out the champagne!

3rd January 2025

Downloading & replaying is discontinued. However, tracks played on Friday evening were:

Beach Riot - Meltdown
WitchDoktors - Before the War
Bedouine - One of These Days
Gramatik feat. Eric Krasno - Torture
The Marias - Real Life
Sweet Caroline - Neil Diamond Vs Hermes House Band
Ann Wilson & Tripsitter - This Is Now
Charli XCX feat. Billie Eilish - Guess
The Datsuns - MF From Hell
Twenty One Pilots x Stromae x Pomme [MASHUP] - Ma Meilleure Redecorate
Crumbs - Dear Deirdre
Holiday Ghosts - Today's Headlines
Bonny Light Horseman - Tumblin Down
Big Time Rush - Only One
Armia - Na Ulice
The Jesus And Mary Chain - Silver Strings
Andra Day - Where Do We Go

1st January 2025

Sleep Apnea

Last week in IRC we had a discussion about sleep apnea, a sleep disorder characterized by repeated interruptions in breathing during sleep, and also frequently waking up to urinate. This prompted me to use a smart watch to monitor my own sleeping record, and this is shown above. It looks like I only had about 3 hours or so of solid kip! Thoughts?