Friday, June 04, 2004

Whilst on the subject of the written word, check out the great ROBBIE FULKS writing about the equally fabulous LUCINDA WILLIAMS. Talk about right on that there button.

The good lord knows there's not a lot of great "actually" printed material around these days but the most recent edition (#10) of ARTHUR is out now and tis of a very high standard. It can be picked up free in hip outlets (incl. Amoeba) throughout the US and Canada and even in the lobby of Ms Laura Cantrell's old apartment. It can also be subscribed to and I'll be danged if it isn't actually worth money.

This quite literally, joss came in...



"Yus, indeedy, Big L and brethren, sweetboy Teenslain and yer ever-lovin' BigKegShandy have found a new fortnightly, late-openin' home for Sonic Reducer, up the road in RayDaviesLand, London N6, cheek-by-jowl with Highgate tube ... Following an aborted push into the West End before Xmess, which saw The Beatings rock a packed Metro like four cheap alarm clocks (or even THE Alarm Clocks!) and yers trulies get a bollocking from Paul 'Blow Up/Off' Tunkin for daring to mix rekkids made before 1977 with those made afterwards (like, duh!), we've decided to return to our spiritual home, and lick our wounds (or nuts?) ... Expect the same mess o'righteous sounds (no Shite Stripes etc!) from the darin' '20s to these decidedly non-naughty noughties, including plenny o'sweaty funk, choice '60s garage, ravin' R&B, salacious soul, hemp-saturated jive, moon-hoppin' JA sounds, high energy rock'n'drool, and all'a the other shit that's fit to spin ... We kick off on July 9th, then go fortnightly after, with special guest DJs, too ... The Sonic Reducer Tag Team is also unbelievably proud to announce that we're DJing at the MC5-DKT gig at the Londinium Astoria on August 25th ... Be
there, or go boil yer 'eads ... Selah! Joss & Joe"


So, it's a Thursday night in Bainsford. EDDIE AND THE HOT RODS were playing the Marquee in London 28 years ago and now they're hitting up The Martell in front of maybe 30 fans who've largely been with them since back in the day. Barrie Masters still has molto much more energy than me and the band delivered a solid set of old chestnuts and some new material that stands up better in the set at the required volume than it does on the new album, BETTER LATE THAN NEVER. Still it's great that they're still rolling and for my money The Hot Rods were the first UK punk combo in what was until then a US sense of the word. They transcended what became known as Pub Rock and veered off on an MC5 type trajectory while The Feelgoods largely stuck to their own finite furrow. These guys were doing it when the Pistols blueprint was still very much on the drawing board. A little known fact then, Eddie and the Hot Rods were on the cover of the pilot issue of NBT in September 1976. I never kept a copy and I don't think any survived but go ahead and prove me wrong if you can.