Miscellaneous - January 2013

  by Admin

published: 12 / 1 / 2013

intro

Happy New Year! Hello and welcome to the January edition of the Pennyblackmusic Magazine. Our lead interview this month is with David Thomas from the

Happy New Year! Hello and welcome to the January edition of the Pennyblackmusic Magazine. Our lead interview this month is with David Thomas from the long-standing and seminal American alternative rock act Pere Ubu, who talks about his band’s new anti-dance album, ‘The Lady from Shanghai’. Our other main interviews this month are with Chris Jagger, the younger brother of Mick, who talks about the Swinging Sixties and his long-standing careers in both music and acting; rising Maidstone-based indie rock band It Hugs Back about their recently released new album, ‘Laughing Party’; film composer Guy Dagul (‘Mississippi Burning’, ‘Arachnophobia’, ‘Sea of Love’, ‘Last of the Mohicans’) about his long career, and Leeds-based post-rock duo Glissando about the difficult making of their second album, ‘The World Without Us’. We are also running interviews with retro-influenced act Vintage Trouble who have just supported the Who on an American tour; Baltic Fleet, the project of ex-Echo and The Bunnymen keyboardist, Paul Fleming; acclaimed New York-based singer-songwriter Ed Romanoff and Los Angeles-based pop-rock artist Kat Parsons who talks about her three new fan-funded five-song EPs/mini-albums. There are interviews too with North Carolina-based Americana act the Old Ceremony about their fifth album, ‘Fairytales and Other Forms of Suicide’; Andy Elliott, the former front man with acclaimed indie rock act Das Wanderlust, about his two new bands Golden Orioles and the Council Tax Band; and Swedish singer-songwriter and cellist Linnea Olsson about ‘Ah!’, her debut album. Our final interviews for this month are with British indie act Dodson and Fogg whose front man Chris Wade chats about their psychedelic-influenced debut album; singer-songwriter and political activist John McCutcheon about his latest album ‘This Land’, which is a collection of covers of songs by Woody Guthrie, and energetic young Brighton-based band Holy Vessels who have just released their debut album, 'Last Orders at The Marshall Arms’. As well as these fifteen interviews, we also have in our Profiles section a tribute to the late jazz composer and pianist Dave Brubeck who died last month. There are book reviews as well of Lucy O’ Brien’s groundbreaking history on women in popular music ‘She Bop!’, which has just been published in a third edition, and Pete Townshend’s autobiography, ‘Who I Am’. There is a feature as well on the 1980 cult rock film, ‘Breaking Glass’, which starred Hazel O’Connor and Phil Daniels and has just been released on DVD in a collector’s edition. There are sixteen new live reviews, while in our ‘Regular Features’ section some of our writers look back on 2012 and list their favourite albums of 2012. Ben Howarth in ‘Condemned to Rock ‘n’ Roll’ reflects on our current musical obsession with the past and asks what the future holds for rock and pop music. In our Re:View section, in which our writers reflect on classic albums from the past, there are articles on the House of Love’s 1988 self-titled debut album which has just been released in a three CD edition; Aztec Camera’s 1984 second album, ‘Knife’ which has just been reissued in an expanded edition, and the Doors ‘Live at the Hollywood Bowl’ ‘68’, which originally issued in 1987, has just come out in a new edition. Our Website of the Month is ‘Music News’, a daily music information and news website. There are also thirty-two new album and single reviews. We have two new writers this month. Adrian Janes is an ex-drummer and Basildon-based music fan. Gillian Fish is from London and has written for various other music sites. Adrian contributed the Jah Wobble and Keith Levene and Electric Stars reviews, and Gillian the Fuzzy Lights, Crowns and Zolas reviews. Thanks to Adrian and Gillian. Thank you also to Carl Bookstein, Malcolm Carter, Andrew Carver, Andy Cassidy, Dan Cressey, Dixie Ernill, Tom Fogarty, Dave Goodwin, Tommy Gunnarsson, Adrian Huggins, Fiona Hutchings, Nick Robinson, Jamie Rowland, Mark Rowland, Maarten Schiethart, Dominic B. Simpson, Lisa Torem, Paul Waller, Cila Warncke and Denzil Watson, all of whom contributed articles to this edition or the mid-month update. Thank you also to Marie Hazelwood for the Eugene McGuinness, Raveonettes and Rialto Burns photo shoots. Special thanks to our webmaster Richard Banks for all he had done for this edition and behind the scenes. We will be doing an album and singles reviews only update in late January and then will be doing our next big monthly up-date with interviews, features, live reviews and more album and single reviews in early February. We hope to run interviews then with Joe Gideon and the Shark, Swans, the Selecter, Skunk Anansie, the Bitter Springs, T.OY.S., Vagabond Opera, Amelia Curran, Ten, and Mike Targett. Our thoughts are with Wilko Johnson - one of the true gentlemen of rock music - and his family in his illness. Thank you as always for reading Pennyblackmusic, John Clarkson, Magazine Editor www.pennyblackmusic.co.uk