Playlist from July 30, 2008

Echobelly -- Great Things (ON)
Heavenly -- 'C' is the Heavenly Option (Le Jardin de Heavenly)
Camera Obscura -- Shine Like a New Pin (Biggest Bluest Hi Fi)
Supergrass -- Butterfly (Diamond Hoo Ha)
The Music -- Float (The Music)
Longpigs -- She Said (The Sun Is Often Out)
Ballboy -- You Can't Spend Your Whole Life hanging Round With Arseholes (Guide for the Daylight Hours)
Eno/Cale -- Empty Frame (Wrong Way Up)
Elbow -- Weather to Fly (The Seldom Seen Kid)
Kate Walsh -- Your Song (Tim's House)
PJ Harvey -- The Garden (Is This Desire?)
Goldfrapp -- Cologne Cerrone Houdini (Seventh Tree)
Kate Bush -- Hounds of Love (The Whole Story)
Kate Bush -- How to be Invisible (Aerial)
Portishead -- Hunter (Third)
Stina Nordenstam -- Hopefully YOurs (And She Closed Her Eyes)
Southside Stalkers -- Five (The SOund of Speed)
Coldplay -- Strawberry Swing (Viva la Vida)
Forward, Russia -- Breaking Standing (Life Processes)
Foals -- Cassius (Antidotes)
Arctic Monkeys -- A Certain Romance (What People Say I Am...)
Tricky -- Council Estate (single)
Spiritualized -- Soul on Fire (Songs in A+E)

"I wanna destroy passers by!"

It appears that John Lydon (a.k.a. Johnny Rotten) has been involved in a backstage scuffle with Bloc Party frontman Kele Okereke. According to this piece in the Guardian, Okereke approached Lydon to ask about the possibility of a Public Image Ltd. reunion, and Lydon responded with a stream of (at times racist) invective and the whole thing escalated into a massive indie-rock scrap (members of Kaiser Chiefs and Foals also rolling up their sleeves and getting involved), leaving Okereke with a bruised face and split lip, and Lydon with some serious 'splainin' to do.

Rotten indeed.

Playlist from July 18th, 2008

Ballboy -- Avant Garde Music (Guide for the Daylight Hours)
Mojave 3 -- Some Kind of Angel (Out of Tune)
The The -- This Is The Night (Dusk)
Brian Eno -- Put A Straw Under Baby (Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy)
Coldplay -- Lost! (Viva la Vida)
Slowdive -- Alison (Souvlaki)
Delgados -- Coming In from The Cold (Hate)
Sondre Lerche -- Modern Nature (Faces Down)
Camera Obscura -- Number One Son (Underachievers Please Try Harder)
Minnie Driver -- Beloved (Seastories)
Portishead -- The Rip (Third)
Goldfrapp -- Little Bird (Seventh Tree)
Pulp -- The Birds In Your Garden (We Love Life)
Morrissey -- Every Day Is Like Sunday (Greatest Hits)
T. Rex -- Telegram Sam (The Slider)
Elbow -- One Day Like This (The Seldom Seen Kid)
Trashcan Sinatras -- Usually (Weightlifting)
Belle and Sebastian -- We Rule The School (Tigermilk)
Supergrass -- Mansize Rooster (I Should Coco)
British Sea Power -- Carrion (The Decline Of...)
James -- Whiteboy (Hey Ma)
Spiritualized -- The Straight and the Narrow (Let It Come Down)
Ed Harcourt -- Fireflies Take Flight (From Every Sphere)
Divine Comedy -- Lucy (Liberation)

Playlist -- July 2, 2008

Peter Gabriel -- Big Time (SHaking the Tree)
Badly Drawn Boy -- You Were Right (Have You Fed The Fish?)
Belle & Sebastian -- Jonathan David (Push Barman to Open Old WOunds)
Fratellis -- Mistress Mabel (Here We Stand)
Ladytron -- Ghosts (Velocifero)
My Bloody Valentine -- Only Shallow (Loveless)
Radiohead -- WOlf at the Door (Hail to the Thief)
Bloc Party -- Hunting for Witches (A Weekend in the City)
Placebo -- Teenage Angst (Placebo)
Coldplay -- Strawberry Swing (Viva la Vida)
James -- Bubbles (Hey Ma)
Ballboy -- Where do the Nights Of Sleep Go To? (Guide for the Daylight Hours)
Felt -- Penelope Tree ('Beloved' CD from Mojo Magazine)
The Loft -- Up the Hill and Down the Slope (ditto)
Orange Juice -- Simply Thrilled Honey (ditto again)
Ray Davies -- No One Listens (Workingman's Cafe)
Billy Bragg -- M for Me (Mr. Love & Justice)
Morrissey -- Irish Blood, English Heart (Greatest HIts)
Cure -- The Only One (single)
Elbow -- The Bones of You (The Seldom Seen Kid)
Trashcan Sinatras -- All the Dark Horses (Weightlifting)
Portishead -- Nylon Smile (Third)
Goldfrapp -- Caravan Girl (Seventh Tree)
Supergrass -- Diamond Hoo Ha Man (Diamond Hoo Ha)
Beatles -- Here There and Everywhere (Revolver)

Latitude Festival

Sure, the USA has Bonnaroo and South By Southwest and Burning Man and Lollapalooza (I think), but this is far more my speed: the Latitude Festival on the East Coast of England. A fantastic lineup of bands as well as poets and writers, a magical leafy location (check out that photo gallery), and the small-scale feel that makes it far more mellow and family-friendly than the giganto-fests like Glastonbury and Reading.

(Interestingly, the undisputed mack daddy of the summer music festival circuit, Glastonbury, has been having trouble shifting tickets for this year's festivities -- partly, it is said, due to the 'controversial' choice of Jay-Z to headline one of the stages -- while smaller 'boutique' festivals like Latitude sold out in no time at all. The tide appears to be turning against ginormo-fests in favour of the more intimate experiences like this one.)

Playlist from June 18

Blur - Chemical World (Modern Life is Rubbish)
Ed Harcourt - Hanging With The Wrong Crowd (Here Be Monsters)
Elvis Costello - Sulky Girl (Brutal Youth)
The Coral - Dreaming of You (The Coral)
Ladytron - Kletva (Velocifero)
Super Furry Animals - At Least It's Not The End Of The World (Rings Around the World)
Sondre Lerche - You Know So Well (Faces Down)
Supergrass - Diamond Hoo Ha (Diamond Hoo Ha Man)
Belle and Sebastian - Stay Loose (Dear Catastrophe Waitress)
Lilac Time - This Morning (Lilac6)
Elbow - Grounds For Divorce (The Seldom Seen Kid)
Aztec Camera - Good Morning Britain (Retrospect)
Libertines - Time for Heroes (The Libertines)
James - Whiteboy (Hey Ma)
Morrissey - You Have Killed Me (Greatest)
Wonder Stuff - Welcome to the Cheap Seats (Never Loved Elvis)
U2 - Ultra Violet (Light My Way) (Achtung Baby)
St. Etienne - Like a Motorway (Tiger Bay)
Portishead - The Rip (Third)
Kate Walsh - Your Song (Tim's House)
Goldfrapp - LIttle Bird (Seventh Tree)
Kate Nash - We Get On (Made of Bricks)
Camera Obscura - Tears for Affairs (Let's Get Out of this Country)
The Cure - The Only One (new single)

George Harrison -- Crackerbox Palace

Digging around on YouTube I came across this gem -- a video for George Harrison's 1976 single "Crackerbox Palace," directed by that noted Python, Eric Idle. The video is utterly mad, and seems to embody a kind of cartoonish excess, achieving a fusion of the Monty Python sensibility (see: cameos by Graham Chapman and Neil Innes in drag) as well as the Beatles' own take on surrealism (think a live-action Yellow Submarine), all wrapped up in a Fellini-esque carnival atmosphere.

Everyone involved seems to be having what we Brits call 'a total laugh,' and the video features some lovely footage of George's house, Friar Park in Henley-on-Thames. At the risk of dropping names, I was at school with Harrison's son Dhani, and seeing this video took me right back to my childhood, when I too gallivanted around the house and gardens shown here (although I was dressed a little less crazily.)