It was around 2005 when I really lost interest in music. Temporarily, at least. I had stopped smoking ‘weed’. Cannabis in its many forms was something I really ‘dug’. I never smoked in the full-on Cheech and Chong, get-utterly baked kind of way. I just liked having a soft hazy fug between myself and reality. I also liked listening to music in a grass-enhanced way. Dope gave me loads of ideas, but it sapped the energy to actually get down to the business of songwriting. So, I stopped smoking weed. When I stopped ‘smoking’, I lost interest in listening to music. So I wrote a musical. Then I wrote some books.
It took me until 2009 to reconnect with listening to and recording music. I found a way back. I realised that I really liked super prolific artists. It seemed to me that there was dignity in a band or solo artist pursuing a long, strange career. I could completely empathise with the artist who, habitually, perhaps mindlessly, just plugged away. Until insanity, infirmness or death put a stop to their shenanigans. To all intents and purposes, this was me. Happily making records doomed to be forgotten; ephemeral, aimless. Commercially unviable. It kept me quite content.
I was on safe ground with the ultra-prolific artists that I knew: Neil Young, The Fall, Hawkwind, Lou Reed and David Bowie. But I needed more. Perhaps I had no critical criteria other than a group being super-productive. I knew where I had to go: to the Z section. Frank Zappa.
Bu hikaye Record Collector dergisinin Christmas 2022 sayısından alınmıştır.
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Bu hikaye Record Collector dergisinin Christmas 2022 sayısından alınmıştır.
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WINDOWS ON THE WORLD
At the peak of their powers in the early 70s, by 1975 there were signs that Led Zeppelin were burning out, and their legendary appetite for excess, not to mention stadium-straddling, mythically charged, epically inclined hard rock, might be waning.
HI-FIDELITY?
Running a record shop is a dream for many music aficionados. Steve Burniston investigates how to run a successful one
THE ENGINE ROOM
The unsung heroes who helped forge modern music
UNDER THE RADAR
Artists, bands, and labels meriting more attention
45 SHEFFIELD 45s
Continuing our celebrations of RC's 45th birthday and following on from our look at the best 45s to come out of Manchester, Liverpool, Bristol and Glasgow, we focus on the urbanisation formerly known as Steel City: Sheffield. Close to the (Nether) Edge: Jeremy Allen
Finished Symphonies
In the late 80s, Shelleyan Orphan made rarefied, ravishing, precious (both meanings) baroque pop, all chamber quartet accompaniment and literary reference points, like an 18th century Cocteau Twins.
"BLACK BRITISH PEOPLE HAD SOMETHING TO SHOUT ABOUT"
Breaking new ground for black music in Britain from his teenage years in Matumbi in the early 70s, Dennis Bovell went on to become one of reggae's most highly regarded producers, helping popularise lovers rock. He also played a pivotal role in post-punk's experimental incorporation of dub influences on records like The Slits' Cut and The Pop Group's Y. As new compilation, Sufferer Sounds, reaches back to his early days to compile some of his best early dub plates, Lois Wilson gets the full backstory from one of British music's most enduring forces.
FRENZY REUNITED
Swindon's finest musical export, XTC were also one of the most quietly influential British bands, setting a template for Britpop while pioneering a brand of left-field guitar pop – from herky-jerky invention to consummate craftsmanship – that has spawned many imitators.
Paperback Blighters - The books every record collector should read.
The books every record collector should read. Vinyl, you may have heard, has made a big comeback. In 2022, sales of vinyl albums surpassed compact discs (CDs) for the first time in more than three decades in terms of global revenue, racking up more than $1.2bn.
"Beware the Savage Lure/of 1984..." - David Bowie is one of the most venerated musicians ever. But even he had his bad periods.
David Bowie is one of the most venerated musicians ever. But even he had his bad periods. For many, 1984 remains the nadir of his Phil Collins” phase; an artistic/sartonial/tonsorial disaster area. But was it really that awful? Forty years on, Matt Phillips explores Bowie's so-called annus horribilis.
