Miscellaneous - August 2007

  by Admin

published: 13 / 8 / 2007

intro

Hello and welcome to the August edition of the Pennyblackmusic magazine.Our lead interview this month is with the Chatham-based singer-songwriter Billy Childish. A painter,

Hello and welcome to the August edition of the Pennyblackmusic magazine. Our lead interview this month is with the Chatham-based singer-songwriter Billy Childish. A painter, an author, a teetotal yoga fanatic and a member of the Greenpeace for the past 25 years, Childish has played in various bands since 1977 including most famously Thee Headcoatees and the Buff Medways, all taking their influences from punk, rock 'n' roll, blues and 60's music but all sounding slightly different from one another. His latest project the Musicians of the British Empire released their debut album, 'Punk Rock at the British Legion Hall', earlier this year. Mark Rowland speaks to Childish at a gig in London. Our other main interviews this month are with Portland, Oregon-based alt.country band Richmond Fontaine back for a fourth interview with us, Southern California punk rock group Strung Out and up-and-coming young British post rock act the Strange Death of Liberal England who have recently released their debut album 'Forward March' and toured earlier this year with Of Montreal and the Manic Street Preachers. Elsewhere there are interviews with psychedelic blues punks the Eighties Matchbox B Line Disaster who are back touring and with a soon-to-be-released third album after a three year absence ; electro acoustic solo artist Stillman ; post punks Karma Deva and American duo Bob Frank and John Murry who have just released a collection of murder ballads, 'World Without End'. In our profiles section of Mick Wall's new biography on Guns 'n' Roses frontman W. Axl Rose and Primus bassist Les Claypool's new solo DVD, 'Fancy'. There are live reviews of the Dour Festival in Belgium and the Sonar Festival in Spain, while our Canadian writer Andrew Carver provides us with his regular annual account of the two week long annual Ottawa Bluesfest. We have as well reviews of shows by Mogwai, the National, the Animal Collective, Sly and the Family Stone, Dan Deacon and the Bees. In our features section, it is Dixie Ernill's turn to write the Soundtrack of Our Lives column, in which our writers write about the personal impact of music on them. Dixie has chosen to write about some of the music that has meant the most to him in 20 years of listening to music. In his regular Condemned by Rock 'n' Roll column, in which he writes about current events in music, Ben Howarth looks at the Mercury Music Award. There are also three Photoscapes from Anna Gudaniec and Katie Anderson of shows from ex-Million Dead frontman Frank Turner, American punks the Dwarves and cinematic new act A Silent Film. In our Re : View column, in which we look back at albums of the past, Ben Howarth examines the Divine Comedy's 1994 second album 'Promenade'. Our Website of the Month is meanwhile our writer Andrew Carver's own music photograph site National Capital Rock which he up-dates on an almost daily basis. There are also 32 album album and single reviews. We published a further 32 albums in our mid-month up-date in July. As always this magazine involved the work of many people. Thank you to Aaron Brown, Malcolm Carter, Andrew Carver, Daniel Cressey, Anthony Dhanendran, Dixie Ernill, Tommy Gunnarsson, Alex Halls, Ben Howarth, Adrian Huggins, Geraint Jones, Stuart Leech, Jonjo McNeill, Sarah Maybank, Sarah Mwangi, Chris O’ Toole, Neil Palmer, Cyrus Pearce, Paul Raven, Mark Rowland, Maarten Schiethart, Olga Sladeckova, Anthony Strutt, Helen Tipping, Andy Vincent and Phil Vincent, all of whom have contributed articles and reviews to either this edition or the mid-month July reviews up-date. Thank you to Katie Anderson for the Dwarves photos and Anna Gudaniec for the Frank Turner and A Silent Film shoots. It just remains for me to invite you to our 10th Pennyblackmusic Bands Night on September 9th. It will be our last time in our regular venue of the Spitz in its current location of Spitalfields Market, which is closing down at the end of September although hopefully reopening at a new venue in East London. Doors will open at 3pm and there will be sets from seven acts, the Bitter Springs, Hey Negrita, Fothko, Friends, Saint Joan, Kelman and Joe Gideon, all of whom have the been the subject of interviews in this magazine. There will be a special mystery appearance and music will be provided by the DJs at top monthly club Uptight. Tickets can be bought in advance from the link below for £6 or on the door for £8 http://www.ticketweb.co.uk/user/?region=gb_london&query=detail&event=229003 More details can be found on the front page of the site and in the features section of the magazine. We will be back in mid August with another albums and singles reviews up-date, and then in early September with a full up-date. We hope to be running interviews then with the House of Love, Stephanie Dosen, Qui, ex-Godfathers and Damned guitarist Kris Dollimore, Akron/Family, Piano Magic, My Sad Captains, Simon Alpin, Vinny Peculiar and California Snow Story. We also hope to run an interview with filmmaker Tony Palmer about his groundbreaking 1968 documentary, ‘All My Loving’. There will be more in the 'Profiles'. We will also have another 'Re : View', another'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