What makes loneliness an anguish is not that I have no one to share my burden, but this: I have only my own burden to bear.
—
… no really. This is what the internet is for. (via)
I know it’s easy to say this now, but I dreamt of a website very much like that a while ago. Absolutely beautiful. Requires speakers, a broadband connection and enough time to truly appreciate where you can take it.
… my life’s work, she said, is the impact that this has…
As an addendum to the last post…
UPDATE 24-05-09: As Gyrus points out in the comments to the previous post, these P-Funk videos are but small parts of a larger whole. Check out The Mothership Connection for some amazing music and visuals.
I’m still feeling quite blown away by the Damo Suzuki and Makoto Kawabata set the other night, though as I’m seeing Billy Bragg tonight I suspect the radical shift in vibe will put me in a rather different headspace. So while I’m still in that spaced-out groove, I thought I’d put up a couple of videos for you lucky people. First up, something from Can. Trouble is, there’s a real dearth of decent footage of Damo Suzuki and Can out there. It goes without saying that a band this far from the mainstream didn’t make lots of slickly-produced music videos, and the live footage that exists tends to be mostly low quality, both sonically and visually. This might just give you a flavour of what they were about though…
Yes, the massive hair wearing a red jump suit is Damo.
And here’s a clip of Acid Mothers Temple playing live. Again, do bear in mind this is just a taster… something to give you an idea of what Makoto Kawabata’s guitar playing (as well as the rest of the band) is all about. If you’ve never been to see anything like this, then I need to emphasise that it’s all about being there. Experiencing it first hand. Anyways, there’s about a minute and a half of silence punctuated by spooky atmospherics. Then, at about 1:40 Makoto kicks in.
ROCK!
From 1986. But frankly, political music doesn’t get much better than this (though the YouTube video’s sound is about a half-second out of sync with the images which is annoying).
From 1997. Sound quality on the video could be better I guess, but it’s still a cracking track.
In honour of today’s date, 8-08-08, those of you who also spent the late 80s / early 90s dancing ’til you dropped whilst gurning like a loon in English fields, should be taken right back by this classic…
Ah, those were the days. Now. Anyone got any Veras?
In. Yer. Face!
EDIT: Actually, given what’s currently going on over in China, this would probably have been a more appropriate choice…
One for the chill-out tent, that.
A big thankyou to Michael Greenwell for pointing me towards this wonderfully laid-back live performance of Bob Marley’s Stir It Up. As I think I’ve mentioned before, The Wailers were the very first band I saw live. It was the mid-80s and Bob had sadly moved on by then, but it was a thoroughly amazing evening and live music has been a huge passion of mine ever since (I can only imagine how different my life would be if I’d skipped that gig and gone to see a football match or something else instead!) Not long after the gig had begun, a massive rastafarian in the audience (and there weren’t many of those in Athens at the time) handed a joint to a friend of mine who in turn passed it to me. It wasn’t my first toke, but it was an influential one………
Anyways, let’s Stir it Up why don’t we.
I’m really enjoying the new album from Nick Cave (and somewhat annoyed about failing to get a ticket for the forthcoming Dublin gig). I’m also enjoying his fantastic moustache which features prominently on magazine covers and posters wherever I go. Wandering around town today, the title track came on my mp3-player, and I found myself involuntarily strutting.
I think I may have watched this video one too many times.