Miscellaneous - November 2013

  by Admin

published: 6 / 11 / 2013

intro

Hello and welcome to the November edition of the Pennyblackmusic Magazine. On Sunday October 27th Lou Reed died at

Hello and welcome to the November edition of the Pennyblackmusic Magazine. On Sunday October 27th Lou Reed died at the age of 71. News began to filter through of his death at about 6 p.m. in the UK that evening, and, as I sat in an Edinburgh coffee shop, I first heard of it after receiving a text from one of our writers. Within a matter of minutes, various other emails and text had arrived both from friends and other people involved in the site. It is impossible to underestimate the importance of Lou Reed’s passing, and it is not an overstatement to say that this site would probably not have existed without his influence and that of the Sex Pistols. As I wrote in an email to our writers as I listened to his and John Cale’s 1990 album ‘Songs for Drella’ that night, “After discovering him through David Bowie, Lou Reed was my main musical hero between the ages of eighteen and twenty-one. I spent those years between 1984 and 1987 and, with whatever money I had as a student and then in my first year of employment, buying as many of his already extensive back catalogue of albums as I could. I have continued to buy them ever since.” “As with anyone else who could be described as being a "genius", it was not always easy being a Lou Reed fan. He had a habit of chewing up journalists, and I think he would have been the ultimate nightmare interview. There were as many bad albums as there were good ones. I saw him live many times, and sometimes he was absolutely terrible. I remember attending an awful show at the time of the 'Ecstasy' album in 2001 in which no song lasted under ten minutes and the whole three hour set consisted of endless, discordant guitar solos, and then there was that "poetry" evening in 2003 to promote 'The Raven' album, which could be politely described as pretentious in the extreme. When he was good though, he was brilliant. I have got very fond memories of the 'Magic and Loss' tour; the two shows that the Velvet Underground played in Edinburgh in 1993 at the start of their ill-fated reunion tour, and was delighted to see him perform 'Berlin' twice, once in London in 2007 and again in Edinburgh - the last time I saw him - in 2008….He could certainly never be accused of being dull or boring.” Amongst the emails that arrived that evening and in the days after that, one from the always sage-like Nick Dent Robinson stands out. He has given kind permission for me to reprint some of it here. “I think he was actually quite a sensitive soul who was finely attuned to the absurdities, vagaries and fragilities of life and who had concocted a tough shell within which he was better able to deal with the world. He had great intelligence, conviction, self-belief and integrity but didn't waste time on sentimentality. He also despised business - especially the music business - and found fame hard to deal with (as have some other artists whose brilliance brings big commercial success). I can't imagine Lou Reed ever really felt satisfied or accepted or settled. Perhaps he could never quite reconcile his rather tortured inner self with the materially comfortable middle class upbringing he'd had......and having to endure electric shock treatment as a teenager to cure him of homosexual urges (his family claimed the treatment was merely to discourage bad behaviour) would not have helped!” “It is also hard now to understand just how radical Lou Reed's material was over 40 years ago. Nobody else was singing about prostitution, adultery, trans-sexuality, hard drug use and suicide. And in that pre-sexting, pre-porn chic, pre-punk world, teenagers were - and almost everybody was - pretty naive! So Lou Reed's New York City cynicism and honesty and directness was bound to hit a nerve whilst bringing great comfort to those who felt they were fellow-outsiders - as so many of us do when we are young!” Whatever one might have thought of Reed – and he had as many detractors as he did admirers (Ask my brother!) – one couldn’t ignore him. On this site, there are a lot of fans, and we are running various articles in tribute to him this month. In our ‘Profiles’ section Denzil Watson has provided an obituary which looks at each one of his albums, both with the Velvet Underground and also in his extensive solo career. Dominic Simpson examines Reed’s often prickly relationship with journalists and the media, and Anthony Strutt, who met him on various occasions, provides some personal memories and insights. In our ‘Regular Features’ section we have also given over our ‘Ten Songs That Made Me Love…’ column to Reed with a double edition. Jon Rogers reflects on the Velvet Underground, and I look at his solo career. In our ‘Re: View’ section, in which we look back at albums from the past, we have reprised an article from last year again by Dominic Simpson on the Velvet Underground’s seminal 1967 debut album ‘The Velvet Underground and Nico’, and which was originally published at the time of its 45th anniversary reissue. Our main interview for this edition is with Russell Leetch, the bassist with alternative rockers Editors who talks about their four years-in-the-making latest album ‘The Weight of Your Love’, which saw the group working with film composer Clint Mansell. Our other headline interviews for this month are with Jake Shillingford from orchestral indie pop group My Life Story who talks in the first of a two part interview about his group’s twentieth anniversary which they are celebrating by playing their first full-scale UK tour; former Coral guitarist and singer-songwriter and composer Bill Ryder-Jones; Brian Wilson Band musical director Paul Von Mertens and former Bluetones front man and singer-songwriter Mark Morriss. There are interviews as well with Leicestershire-based post-punk trio Young Knives about their fourth album ‘Sick Octave’ which they have released after an extensive Kickstarter campaign; Nick Halliwell from Occultation Recordings about his label’s new vinyl edition of the Wild Swans ‘The Coldest Winter for a Hundred Years’ which comes in three editions, and Rusty Young from pioneering country band Poco about his recent decision to retire and their farewell tour. We are also running interviews with Kevin Morris from rhythm and blues giants Dr Feelgood about their new double CD compilation, ‘Get Rhythm’, which brings together everything that the 1983-1989 line-up of the group recorded; Connecticut-based singer-songwriter and ex-Miracle Legion front man Mark Mulcahy on his new album, ‘Dear Mark J Mulcahy, I Love You’; rock outfit Monster Magnet about their decision to tour America for the first time in ten years, and Oxfordshire-based singer-songwriter Aitch McRobbie about his debut album, ‘Take Off Your Shoes’. Other highlights include in our ‘Profiles’ section hardcore Morrissey fan Andy Cassidy on his controversial new ‘Autobiography’, and in our ‘Regular Features’ Tony Gaughan in ‘Gig of a Lifetime’ on a 1997 Davie Bowie fan-club gig at the tiny Hanover Grand in London and Ben Howarth in ‘Condemned to Rock ‘n’ Roll’ on Shearwater’s new album and covers record ‘Fellow Travelers'. In ‘Vinyl Stories’, Dave Goodwin meanwhile talks to BBC DJ Mark Dennison about some of his favourite vinyl records. There are also 31 album and single reviews. As always, this magazine has come together as a result of the enthusiasm and dedication of many people. Thank you to Carl Bookstein, Malcolm Carter, Andy Cassidy, Dastardly, Nick Dent-Robinson, Anthony Dhanendran, Dixie Ernill, Gillian Fish, Tony Gaughan, Dave Goodwin, Ben Howarth, Adrian Huggins, Fiona Hutchings, Adrian Janes, Richard Lewis, Jon Rogers, Maarten Schiethart, Harry Sherriff, Dominic Simpson, Anthony Strutt, Lisa Torem, Paul Waller and Denzil Watson, all of whom contributed articles to this edition or the reviews only update. Special thanks to our webmaster Richard Banks for everything that he does behind the scenes, and also to Marie Hazelwood and Darren Aston for all their photographic work for this edition. We will be doing an album and singles reviews only update in early December. Our next full magazine will then come out in mid-December. We hope to run interviews then with Glenn Tilbrook, Walter Lure (Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers/Waldos), John Howard, the Distractions, Goodbye Mr Mackenzie and Isa and the Filthy Tongues’ Martin Metcalfe, Talulah Gosh, Doggen (Spiritualized/Six by Seven) Jane Badler, Reichenbach Falls, Luxury Stranger and the second part of My Life Story. There will also be a poll of our writers and photographers Albums of the Year. Please check out our regular Facebook and Twitter updates. Thank you as always for reading Pennyblackmusic, John Clarkson, Magazine Editor www.pennyblackmusic.co.uk