Went out for a hike around Hilversum today to check out the works of W.M. Dudok, the towns former planner/architect. The amazing townhall (pictured) is the obvious icing on the proverbial whatsis, but there are large numbers of schools, bridges and even entire neighborhoods designed by Dudok to enjoy. More pictures of the townhall can be found here, while other buildings can be viewed in this PDF file.

Mr Duff was going about his business this morning when he came a cross the news that those FLESHTONES will be playing at Dirty Water on October 20th. Support is said to include Glasgow's own Grease Monkeys but I haven't had confirmation of that. Seems like a good shout should it happen. The Super Rock troupe will also be at the fine Paris Maroquinerie on October 22nd. Could be a Eurostar adventure in the offing? Work is also progressing on the aforementioned VINDICATED....

'THE MASONICS' plus 'PRESTON PFANZ & THE SEATON SANDS' play 'BEATSVILLE'

at Henry's Cellar Bar, Morrison Street, Edinburgh.

Friday 4th August, 11pm - 3am £5/4

The Masonics, 'Medway Garage Beat', are Mickey Hampshire, ex of The Milkshakes, Bruce Brand ex of Milkshakes and Headcoats and John 'Lard' Gibbs (ex Kaiser). They play they're thudding mix of 'Punk Sea Shanties' and 'R'n'B Two Chorders' once more after a sell out show last January at 'Beatsville' and in support Edinburgh's own Preston Pfanz & The Seaton Sands purveyors of fine Beat and Surf Instrumentals. It's time to 'Shadoogie!'

Cardboard Compulsion "Record collecting included a compulsion to keep the mailers they were sent in. Here they are, along with the stories behind them."

RIP - Jessie Mae Hemphill

(Link courtesy of Colin Duff)

From therunaways.com:

"Hello Friends,

Many of you have written letters to Sandy West and have inquired why there is no new music or merchandise. It has come the time for us to address this issue. It has been a very hard year for Sandy.

In August of last year, Sandy was diagnosed with lung cancer. She has battled bravely and endured an extensive course of chemotherapy which is still continuing. We did not release this information as Sandy wanted her illness to remain a private issue, and to reemerge with new projects, cancer free.

Earlier this week, Sandy received some news that has made her reevaluate the issue of privacy vs her need for your prayers and support.

In addition to the existing lung cancer, Sandy was diagnosed with a brain tumor. She is currently undergoing radiation therapy in addition to the chemotherapy. It is a very hard time for her, and while we remain optimistic and hopeful, at this time we ask for your prayers and for you to please send out your positive and healing energy to Sandy.

We have set up a special e-mail for Get Well letters. Sandy won't be able to respond, but you can rest assured she will receive your letters. The greatest joy in Sandy's life is her fans. She considers all of you family and would sincerely benefit from your letters of encouragement at this time.

We have set up a Paypal account for Sandy as well. Even though she has some medical insurance, her bills are piling up alarmingly, and any amount you'd like to donate, no matter how small, would be greatly appreciated.

Please email your Get Well wishes to: lettersforsandy (at) yahoo.com

You can help Sandy here:
Donate here through PayPal.

For money orders:
Sandy West
c/o Rocket City Records/Times Square Productions
520 Washington Blvd # 199
Marina Del Rey, CA 90292-5421
Please add the insurance/registered mail option so if anything happens it can be tracked.
Money orders only. Please make them out to Sandy West
Please do not send cash!"

Motivation. Now there's a word. Ambition is another and your reporter here is sadly lacking with regard to either. I have no pressing urge to take over the world or indeed anything. The simple art of peedling on has taken on something of a downward precipitation. A tailspin that has me, frankly, wondering if it is in fact possible to avert an almighty splat. I listened to a couple of things today but nothing of any consequence and a couple just plain stank. There are cool things lying around here and stuff I oughtta be filling you folks in on but let's just say that i've come down with a bout of "writer's (breeze)block". Not that I ever considered myself a writer in the first place but you probably get my drift? One pressing matter around my noggin is to figure out about taking some time away from the stalag. Anyhoo, I hope that the lack of activity around these parts won't put you off dropping by again. I'm listening to someone on internet radio banging on about Mercury Music prize nominees. What meaningless pish that is in the grand scheme of things. However, let's take things out on a positive keel - check out this Radio Stars website and don't forget Jeroen's Chiswick sideproject. The "auld yins" are the best right enough...

No sign of Mitch and Mickey unfortunately but Derek Smalls appears in his alter ego of Harry Shearer with his wife Judith Owen at the Assembly Rooms in Edinburgh during much of August.

Also, tonight there's a BMX Bandits/Evie Sands session on Radio Clyde which you can stream live but I don't think there's a "Listen Again" function. It's on Billy Sloan's show which starts at 7pm and runs until 10pm.

Upcoming Bambi Molesters shows...

29th July - Zagreb (CRO) - Muzej za umjetnost i obrt

4th August - Dubrovnik (CRO) - "Lazareti/Mora" with DJ Dinko

16th September - Kranj (SLO) - "Wave 2" Festival

RIP - Jack Warden

Get VINDICATED! - The latest...

MAXIMUM R&R - ART and MUSIC FESTIVAL in PULA, CROATIA, August 10th -12th

thursday, 10th August -

At noon: presentation of croatian translation of Roni Sarig's The Secret History of Rock, with Lada in charge...

5 pm: ROCKUMENTARY GROOVE:

"Petrovaradinsko pleme" D. Pintarica (60 min.) www.pozitiv.si/petrovaradintribe/

9 pm: the concert
Petrol (Beograd)Fetisha (Ljubljana) www.myspace.com/fetisha and Goribor (Bor) http://www.goribor.co.sr/Sjekire (Rijeka)
11 pm: Deboto (Pula)
11.30pm: Jugoplastika (Spain) http://www.jugoplastika.com/
0.30am: Heavy Trash (Jon Spencer & Matt Verta Ray) (USA)

Friday, 11th August

at noon: presentation of cd compilation of bands from Rijeka, Croatia
5 pm: ROCKUMENTARY GROOVE:
1. "Divided States of America – Laibach 2004 Tour" S. Podgorsek (70 min.)www.laibach.nsk.si/divided_states.htmlwww.laibach.nsk.si/podgorsek.html
"When musicians shock" D. Jagati?a (52 min.) (Rock Cafe)

9 pm the concert
Gin Cooler Quartet (Zagreb) www.gincoolerquartet.com/
One Piece Puzzle (Rijeka) http://www.onepiecepuzzle.com/
Justin's Johnson (Split) http://www.myspace.com/justinsjohnson
Erotic Biljan & his Heretics (Zagreb) www.heretics.htnet.hr/
11 pm: Overflow (Koprivnica) www.overflow-tv.com/
12 pm: Bellrays (L.A. - SAD) http://www.thebellrays.com/

saturday, 12th August
at noon: discusion Is it rewarding to be in rock and roll in Croatia?
at 5 pm ROCKUMENTARY GROOVE:
"Geto 103" J.Altiparmakova (10 min.)

"Foltin" J. Altiparmakova (35 Min.)

"Ritam rock plemena" B.Modri?a (86. min.) http://www.film.hr/bazafilm_film.php?katx=6&film_id=1682
9 pm the concert
the final part of young bands
10.30 pm: Barrakuda (Pula)
11 pm: Eyesburn (Serbia) http://www.eyesburnmusic.com/
midnight: Muskat Hamburg (SLO) http://www.muskathamburg.com/
00:30 am: Kultur Shock (Seattle - SAD) www.kulturshock.com/

Great googa-mooga! GHOULARDI on Youtube! (link via the Staysick Fraternity)

It's overcast today, as am I. However, here are one or two things to check out...

RIP - John Macsween

RIP - Peter Hawkins

Sprung for a bunch of tickets to this year's Edinburgh Film Festival. Just heard that Hannah McGill will be taking over as Artistic Director from next year. Just the foot up the jacksy it needs.

Remembered something else that rankled me at the BOC show t'other night. They were selling Tyranny and Mutation shirts but on the backprint it bore a presumed typo that read "Tyranny and Mutations". Perhaps in testament to the hairstyles of some in the audience. I don't have to worry about such things, there ain't much left to sculpt.

There's a wheen of Youtube stuff to hep you to also but that will entail an inordinate amount of copying and pasting that i'm not at liberty to partake of now. Perhaps later...


And don't forget that THE RADIO THRIFT SHOP is on the airwaves again and this week's broadcast was a blinder. It includes a segment of Tammy Wynette on the Navy Hoedown programme and she does a version of "I'd Be A Legend In My Time". It was also great to hear Area Code 615 again too. Bravo lassie. If only all radio was like this...

One thing and another has postponed my blogging in recent days but being that it’s too hot to sleep, I figured that I might as well make it a late night. I’ve usually passed out in front of the TV by now…

Sunday night’s Evie Sands show was fairly well attended given the matinee nature of the timing. Those who took the opportunity saw a lady small in stature maybe but with a voice and persona to match any big hitter. Her set featured old, newish and yet to be recorded. “Anyway That You Want Me” was positively spine-tingling, anybody who didn’t get the chills is presumably clinically dead. I dug the song “Leap of Faith” and it’s “Sweet Home Alabama” undertow. Rounding things off with a rousing “I Can’t Let Go”, I don’t think she could even if she wanted to. Not sure what her band back home would be like but they’d have to go some to hold a candle to this combo. Check out the setlist, etc on the TFC message board.

The Bandits themselves followed through with a very nifty set. Sometimes I have to pinch myself to actually believe that some of these songs are coming from the man that brought us "E102" all those years ago. Tonight saw that song reborn as a burundified stomper and really, the dynamics of recent Bandit performances are a lesson in putting together the ultimate pop confection. What they do has guts, heart and soul. Rachel and Duglas trade off one another like they’ve been doing this forever and the music they make is equally timeless. BMX Bandits circa 2006 are real contenders.

The other reason for my late shift is that I just got in from seeing Blue Öyster Cult at “The Ferry” (formerly the Renfrew Ferry). First time I’ve been in it since the refurb and relocation. Don’t know if I care for the upgrade but let’s not dwell on that. The actual decision to go was only made today. Tickets 20 quid a pop, funds a tad on the boracic side but I figured that for old times sake, and to represent Kim Salmon, then I ought to make the effort. It was good but it wasn’t great. I never cared for “Shooting Shark” or even “Burning For You” for that matter and those should be ditched and replaced with “Astronomy”, “Baby Ice Dog”, “Mistress…” “ETI” - need I yatter on? The drum and bass solos during “Godzilla” simply don’t work. Not in a place where zero in the way of projection is remotely possible. There’s no lightshow, no pyro, because the place is like a mini-sodding-mall. But anyway, there were high points “Last Days Of May”, “This Ain’t The Summer of Love” (I wish The Nomads would resurrect this live!), “Harvester Of Eyes”, “ME262”. The encore was something of a misfire. “I Love The Night” followed by “Hot Rails To Hell”. The sound had gone for a burton by this point. Not sure how or why but I was mourning the lack of “Dominance” and this made things worse. They can still cut it but in small places like this they need to tailor the set but, at least there was no attempt to introduce new material. I wish they could play venues of a size that their best songs deserve and they have a trove more than most. Being on my feet for the whole set almost brought me to my knees. The spirit was willing even if the flesh has taken something of a tabering. I left feeling just a wee bit sad, thinking how the mighty have been side-stepped in place of many lesser acts. It’s verging on Tap-esque but that doesn't seem to have dampened their ability to rock.

RIP - Mickey Spillane

The 30th anniversary of punk (if you're talking the 76/77 variety) continues to gather pace and today's Seven days section of the Sunday Herald spits is tuppence worth into the fray. I've been doing a lot of talking and thinking about it too which has unlocked memories but what sgnificance do such war stories have? Shouldn't we have grown up and moved on?? I appear to be cursed but what about all the others? Ben Weasel has relocated and is back in the Blogosphere. Murray sent me a link to the Dolls section of the Roadrunner site and there's an electronic press kit on there. Like I said before the album, due out next week, is better than anybody could have imagined it could be. Check out Shock and Awe Go Home also. Look at the time. I ought not to be here. More soon. Maybe.

“I’m From Barcelona” aren’t actually from Barcelona, they’re from Sweden. Don’t know if they’re all from Stockholm but I discovered them through the HS axis. When I got on to my “dealer”, he said they were like Belle and Sebastian and while I see the comparison, these folks are altogether more exotic. Like The Polyphonic Spree vs The BMX Bandits with some They Might Be Giants thrown in. There’s definitely a touch of the Glasgow Brill Building sound, one cannae deny that. There's also a jug band choir, adult version of the Langley Schools project going on. And - being that we're actually in the throes of one this year, this could be THE sound of summer, such is the breezy singalong nature but these tunes are marinated in strangely rich arrangements of skiffle type-orchestration punctuated with horns. And then there’s the Beach Boy type harmonies Get down with the videos and get with it. The actual effect is somewhat indescribable but if you hear it for yourself then you’ll get the gist. “The Saddest Lullaby” isn’t the kind of title that I’d normally go for but it has a kind of Spiritualized gospel swing to it. Like "From The Underworld" by The Herd infused with a slow-burning gospel brass ensemble. Just read on Swedesplease that Mute will release this in the rest of Europe this coming September. One appearance on the right TV or radio show and these folks will be heading for the megasphere. Chalk up another victory for those Scandanavians...

Due in a matter of days...