Love that live stuff

Quick update with some live material I've got on the ole hard drive.

Awhile back, one of our loyal readers emailed me mp3s from an Orange Juice gig that took place at Keele University in Staffordshire. The date was Nov. 24, 1982, the same month the band released its second album, Rip It Up.

I've also uploaded some tracks from a Jesus And Mary Chain show that took place Nov. 5, 1985, at a venue known as The Loft in Berlin -- just eight months after the infamous "riot" gig at North London Polytechnic.

Hear it for yourself. Download: "Poor Old Soul" and "Flesh Of My Flesh" by Orange Juice, and "Inside Me" and "In A Hole" by The Jesus And Mary Chain.

(Note: Nabbed the above photo from New Wave Photos. Terrific web site -- check it out.)

Come, take the waters

In the 1800s, folks from all over England flocked to Leamington, to soothe their various aches and pains in pools filled with salty spa waters. In the 1980s, bands flocked to this quaint town nestled in The Midlands for a different reason: To record.

Leamington was the home of John A. Rivers' Woodbine Street Studios, one of the U.K.'s oldest independent studios. Rivers -- who has worked with everyone from The Specials to Swell Maps to Love And Rockets -- became the producer of choice for many indie bands in the '80s.

To quote Martin Whitehead, from TweeNet: "Most engineers in small local studios had little grasp of what these bands were trying to do at the time and were still trying to produce booming drums, slappy bass, and choppy funk guitars. In the mid 80s, indie bands were very much on the fringe of what was happening and were pretty obscure. A producer who understood them was worth travelling for. Even to Leamington Spa."

Back in the late 90s, TweeNet began compiling tracks from various indie artists that had once recorded at Woodbine Street, as well as other unknown groups with the same infectious guitar pop sound. The result was the The Sound Of Leamington Spa series, which is currently five volumes in length. The series has drawn frequent comparisons to the late 1970s Pebbles compilations, which highlighted hard-to-find Sixties garage rock.

Two Scottish acts featured on the The Sound Of Leamington Spa, Vol. 4 were Glasgow's The Clouds and Paisley's The Church Grims, who I discussed back in early July.

Hear it for yourself. Download: "Get Out My Dream" by The Clouds and "Plaster Saint" by The Church Grims.

Music to slosh paint to

For a country known for such unparalleled beauty, Ireland hasn't produced its share of noteworthy painters. There's the impressionist Walter Osborne, the war artist John Lavery, the great colorist William John Leech, the lauded Paul Henry, the man who did for Irish landscape painting what William Butler Yeats did for the Celtic Revival. I struggle to come up with more names; it seems our all-consuming bursts of creative frenzy are inspired by the blank page, rather than the blank canvas.

All this danced through my head as I painted the shed this weekend. I could be a decent colorist, methinks; I wanted to give the old structure something other than the customary coat of white, but the old hag wouldn't have it. "Fuchsia?" she shouted at me. "Are you mad?" I doubt Leech's aspirations were squashed in such a manner.

The great artists were likely inspired by song, but for me, songs serve another purpose, as they make labor's monotony tolerable. The Bothy Band -- which, like the aforementioned Yeats and Henry, were quite influential within its particular genre -- are terrific to paint to. Lively, ferocious, and vivacious, the music keeps my hands moving and my heart thumping.

And you do know what a bothy is, don't you? They are rather simple cottages where, many generations ago, single lads would dwell together. Oftentimes, the young men would hold musical nights, entertaining folks from all over the surrounding region.

Can't say I've ever painted a bothy.

Enough gabbing . . . . Here are two favorites by The Bothy Band: "Old Hag You Have Killed Me" and "Farewell To Erin."