Miscellaneous - May 2008

  by Admin

published: 9 / 5 / 2008

intro

Hello and welcome to the May edition of the Pennyblackmusic magazine. In what is a very extensive edition, our lead interview this month is with David Pajo. The one time guitarist with Slint, Pajo has since gone on to work with

Hello and welcome to the May edition of the Pennyblackmusic magazine. In what is a very extensive edition, our lead interview this month is with David Pajo. The one time guitarist with Slint, Pajo has since gone on to work with Tortoise and Will Oldham. He has also been in the instrumental groups Papa M and Aerial M ; fronted the self-named Pajo, which found him singing for the first time, and is currently playing guitar with his latest band, Dead Child, an old-style heavy metal act. Mark Rowland speaks to him about the many different strands of his extraordinary career. Our other lead interviews this month are with former Drive By Truckers member and now solo artist Jason Isbell ; Nebraskan post-punk survivors For Against who have just released their seventh album, ‘Shade Side Sunny Side’, and lo-fi London-based rockers the Wave Pictures. There are interviews too with acoustic folk-singer-songwriter John Henry Lambert ; Lawrence “Lal” McLusky from C86-influenced groups Strawberry Whiplash and Bubblegum Lemonade and ambient/electronic Glaswegian act Laki Mera. We also have interviews with new Danish-based indiepop trio Northern Portrait London-based French duo and couple John & Jehn ;and rising Oxford piano and guitar band A Silent Film. In our profiles section, Maarten Schiethart examines the Audio Dregs’ label’s new compilation, ‘Ambient Not Ambient’ and the current electronica movement , while Helen Tipping looks at Red Sky Coven Rev Hammer’s ‘Freeborn John’ DVD. There are live reviews of shows by the Dirtbombs and Kelley Stoltz, the Breeders, REM, City and Colour, HEALTH, We are Scientists, Alabama 3, Jay Reatard, the Shortwave Set, the Courteeners, Pete and the Pirates and Rotary Ten. In our features section, in our ‘Soundtrack of Our Lives’ column, in which our writers write about the personal effect of music in their lives, Denzil Watson writes about Joy Division and ‘Closer’. Ben Howarth in his ‘Condemned to Rock ‘n’ Roll’ column looks at Q’s latest 50 Best Albums of All Time poll, and there is a preview of Pennyblackmusic photographer Matt Williams’ latest photographic exhibition at the West End Centre in Aldershot. In our Re : Views section,in which writers look back at albums from the past, Ben Howarth examines Hefner’s about-to-be-reissued 1999 second album ‘The Fidelity Wars’, while Andrew Carver looks at psychedelic Sacramento-based psychedelic musician’s 2005 record, ‘In the Village of the Apple Sun’. Our Website of the Month meanwhile is the Roxy Club ’77, a website dedicated to the 70's punk club, and which builds on the information in Paul Marko's recent book, 'The Roxy London WC2 : A Punk History'. In our reviews section, we are running 30 new reviews, while in our mid month up-date review we ran another 32 reviews. Thank you to Aaron Brown, Malcolm Carter, Andrew Carver, Dan Cressey, Ben Howarth, Adrian Huggins, Sarah Johnson, Chris Jones, Geraint Jones, Sarah Maybank, Sarah Mwangi, Chris O’ Toole, Paul Raven, Mark Rowland, Maarten Schiethart, Dominic Simpson, Anthony Strutt , Helen Tipping and Denzil Watson, all of whom contributed articles to either this edition or the mid-month up-date. Thank you too to Neil Bailey, who took the photos that accompany the We Are Scientists’ review.We put on-line this month a new radio show from our radio manager, Maartn Schiethart. Special thanks both to Maarten and also to Richard Banks, our web master. Congratulations and best wishes too to Pennyblackmusic writer Peter Allison and his partner and occasional guest reviewer Claire Sims who had a baby daughter, Ada Marie, on May 8th. We will be back in mid May with another mid-month reviews up-date and then in June with another full edition. We hope then to be running interviews then with City and Colour, the Silver Jews, Fighting with Wire, Levinhurst, the Wedding Present, A Place to Bury Strangers, Crystal Castles, Jordan Zevon, Mountain Movers and Paul Marko about his Roxy Club book. There will be more '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