Miscellaneous - March 2007

  by Admin

published: 11 / 3 / 2007

intro

Hello and welcome to the March edition of the Pennyblackmusic magazine.Our lead interview this month is with Colin Newman of the seminal group Wire. Wire are best known for their classic 70’s album ‘Pink Flag’, but in a career that has extended across 30 years have

Hello and welcome to the March edition of the Pennyblackmusic magazine. Our lead interview this month is with Colin Newman of the seminal group Wire. Wire are best known for their classic 70’s album ‘Pink Flag’, but in a career that has extended across 30 years have constantly pushed musical boundaries, shifting from their early punkish 70’s output to more electronic and melodic records in the 80’s to in recent times albums with a tense and brittle sound. Mark Rowland talks to Newman about Wire’s decision last year to re-release their 70’s back catalogue, and the band’s continued and abiding impact. In our other headline interviews this month Sarah Johnson speaks to Pam Berry, the former front woman with the indie pop cult acts Black Tambourine, Glo-worm and the Castaway Stones, and now singer with the Pines, about recent motherhood and her long career, while Chris O’ Toole chats to Tad Kubler from the massively acclaimed literary garage punk band the Hold Steady about their Jack Kerouac-inspired third album, ‘Boys and Girls in America’, and their recent dramatic surge in popularity. Dominic Simpson meanwhile talks to Michael Gibbons from the durable Philadelphia space rock act Bardo Pond about their recent album, ‘Ticket Crystals’ and their unique recording techniques, while Adrian Huggins chats to Stephen Brodsky from the post-hardcore act Cave In about his new band Stephen Brodsky’s Octasve Museum. There are interviews too with indie pop act turned alt country band Airport Girl about their second album ‘Slow Light’ which has taken five years to record ; former Television Personalities drummer and artist Mathew Sawyer about his band the Ghosts instantly classic punky Folk Country debut album 'Blue Bird's Blood', and American psychedelic/indie guitar band the Butterflies of Love about their just released third album, ‘Famous Problems’. We have interviews too with Glaswegian all girl punk band the Hedrons, Nottingham shoegazing band and Club AC30 signing Model Morning, and pop/soul singer Savannah Knight. In our profiles section we look at the reissues of influential Australian group the Triffids' 1986 and 1987 albums, 'In the Pines' and 'Calenture', Dominic Simpson looks back nostalgically on the last All Tomorrow’s Parties weekend in December, which was curated by Thurtson Moore from Sonic Youth. We also have a review of the new double DVD , ‘Orange Blossom Special’, which is about the 10th annual festival of the Glitterhouse label. In our live section, there are reviews of shows by former Pulp front man Jarvis Cocker ; Dinsoaur Jr ‘s J. Mascis ; the Gym Class Heroes, Camera Obscura and Essex Green ; Nina Nastasia ; Dan Sartain ; the Black Keys ; Seth Lakeman ; the Besnard Lakes ;the Hold Steady ; ex-Arab Strap guitarist Malcolm Middleton ; the Headlines : the Junior Boys ; Mr Hudson and the Library ; the Fischers and Future of the Left. In our features section we look back on the recent Pennyblackmusic Bands Night. In our ‘Soundtrack of Our Lives’ column, in which our writers write about the importance of music at memorable times in their lives, Chris Jones writes about falling in and out of love whilst playing tracks from Spiritualized's 'Lazer Guided Melodies' on his university campus radio show, while in his regular ‘Condemned to Rock ‘n’ Roll’ column Ben Howarth asks why it is so difficult to find music to relax to. There are also Photoscapes of shows by ex Suede star Brett Anderson and Hell is for Heroes In our ‘Re : View column, in which our writers reassess albums from the past, Andrew Hare examines the self-proclaimed founder of jazz Jelly Roll Morton's 'Complete Library of Congress Recordings' which was re-released as an 8 CD box set last year. Our Website of the Month column is meanwhile Ottawa-based music website (i) heart music. We are also running 26 new album and single reviews. We have done two review up-dates since our last full up-date at the end of January, and ran a further two 32 and 32 reviews consecutively then We have two new writers this month. Paul Raven is a Portsmouth-based music fan and both fiction and non-fiction writer. He has contributed the Gym Class Heroes and Mr Hudson and the Library live reviews, and also various album reviews. Sarah Mwangi is a London-based student of journalism and has contributed the Black Keys live review. Thank you to both Paul and Sarah Thank you as well to Andrew Carver, Daniel Cressey, Emma Dawson, Anthony Dhanendran, Dixie Ernill, Alex Halls, Andrew Hare, Ben Howarth, Adrian Huggins, Sarah Johnson, Chris Jones, Geraint Jones, Jonjo McNeill, Sarah Maybank, Chris O’ Toole, Neil Palmer, Jamie Rowland, Mark Rowland, Maarten Schiethart, Dominic Simpson, Olga Sladeckova, Anthony Strutt, Helen Tipping, Andy Vincent, and Denzil Watson all of whom have contributed articles and reviews to either this edition or the two reviews up-dates.. Thank you to also our regular photographers Anna Gudaniec who has contributed the Photoscape of Brett Anderson, and to Katie Anderson who photographed the one of Hell is for Heroes and has also taken for us the photos that accompany Paul’s Gym Class Heroes review. . Special thanks to Richard Banks at Pennyblackmusic HQ. We’re going back to normal after catching up on the Christmas backlog and will be doing our usual reviews up-date in the middle of the month and then our next full up-date at the beginning of April. We hope then to be running interviews with Alexisonfire, Sarah Nixey, Brian James, Rose Kemp, A Wilhelm Scream, Kelley Stoltz, Pssap, Maths and Physics Club, Pete Weiss and the Electric Cinema. There will be more from the Profile slot. We will also have another Re : View and Website of the Month and more features, live reviews and album and single reviews. Thank you as always for reading. John Clarkson Magazine Editor www.pennyblackmusic.co.uk www.pennyblackmusic.com