Music Monday – E

 Music Monday  No Responses »
Mar 152011
 

Elviss

Elviss are an obscure UK punk/rock band who have been a cause of great frustration to me over the years! When I first heard them on Radio 1 in 2002 I fell in love with their sound – similar to that of The Wildhearts but not a ‘copycat’ band. As soon as their single ‘D-Change’ was released I bought it. The following year they released their second single, ‘Radio (Kill It)’, which I also bought. As far as I’m aware they never released an album. They had some cracking songs on the singles but nothing seemed to come of them. Even googling it doesn’t pull up any meaningful information – just lots of dyslxic fans of ‘The King’…

  1. D-Change (from ‘D-Change [single]‘)
  2. Protocolic (from ‘D-Change [single]‘)
  3. Radio (Kill It) (from ‘Radio (Kill It) [single]‘)
  4. Common Thread (from ‘Radio (Kill It) [single]‘)
  5. Orange Glow (from ‘Radio (Kill It) [single]‘)
 Posted by MaFt at 12:07 am  Tagged with:

Music Monday – D

 Music Monday  No Responses »
Mar 072011
 

Dance Hall Crashers

Everybody loves happy, bouncy music full of gorgeous harmonies. Or, rather, everyone should love happy, bouncy music full of gorgeous harmonies. Dance Hall Crashers hail from California and were originally formed by Matt Freeman and Tim Armstrong (Operation Ivy / Rancid) although they left shortly after their first gig. Owing to the two female vocalists (Elyse and Karina) bouncing their harmonies off of each other, the whole sound tends to be more ‘poppy’ than most other ska-punk bands. This isn’t a bad thing, it gave them a pretty unique sound (sometimes akin to No Doubt’s “Tragic Kingdom” era) and a they are a joy to listen to as well.

  1. Cat Fight (from ‘Purr’)
  2. The Truth About Me (from ‘Honey, I’m Homely!’)
  3. Will Tomorrow Ever Come (from ‘Honey I’m Homely!’)
  4. The Real You (from ‘Purr’)
  5. Lost Again (from ‘Honey I’m Homely!’)
 Posted by MaFt at 11:20 am  Tagged with:

Music Monday – C

 Music Monday  No Responses »
Feb 282011
 

Cephas

Cephas, wow, what can I say! A relatively unknown band hailing from the South of England although relatively huge in the UK Christian Punk scene. The four-piece started off with Green Day-esque 3 chord ‘basic’ punk with hard-hitting lyrics. Over the years they went more alt-punk sounding more akin to bands like The White Stripes albeit with a bit more aggression! They never pulled a punch with regards to their faith and would regularly cause a bit of a stir while playing live. Their highlight in the secular scene was probably being invited as the main support band for Reuben at, if I remember correctly, The Garage in London (resulting in some rather varied comments on Reuben’s discussion forum). In the Christian scene they headlined the Green Belt Festival with a set of Punk Worship as well as making a number of appearances at the Meltdown Hard Music Conference. My personal highlight was getting a mention in the thanks list of their final release, ‘This Is Real Revolution’. While they are no longer together, they let a lasting legacy in the UK Christian Punk scene and I’m sure with a bit of digging you can get hold of some of their music. Failing that, drop me an email and I will check with John (ex-singer, now videographer) whether I can share some of their recordings.

  1. Disregard (from ‘Happy Go Loser’)
  2. It’s OK (from ‘Fool On Show’)
  3. Quiet Cancer (from ‘Happy Go Loser’ / ‘This Is Real Revolution’)
  4. Pursuit For Purity (from ‘This Is Real Revolution’)
  5. The Torment (from ‘New Wave’)
 Posted by MaFt at 10:07 am  Tagged with:

Music Monday – B

 Music Monday  No Responses »
Feb 212011
 

Blink 182

Blink 182 are an American punk/rock group active since the early 90′s. I first got tickets to see them just before their popularity exploded with ‘Enema Of The State’. The gig, at Manchester, consequently got upgraded from The Hop & Grape (Academy 3) to the MDH (Academy 2) and ended up being at the Academy (Academy 1). It was, needless to say, full of drunk 13 year old kids – that provided some good entertainment, especially watching them being picked up by their angry mums and dads afterwards! The only other times I’ve seen them was at festivals where poor sound let them down. They tend to layer a lot of guitars on their albums and they simply can’t get the ‘depth’ live as a 3-piece. At least Green Day take extra guitarists on tour with them! You’re probably wondering why, after all the complaints, that they are my Music Monday this week? Well, their albums are great. They’ve had such a range down the years with their self titled album being rather atmospheric at times. Other albums are straight forward fun punk rock. While I’m not keen in them live they have some scorching tracks!

  1. Carousel (from ‘Buddha / Cheshire Cat’)
  2. What Went Wrong (from ‘Take Off Your Pants And Jacket’)
  3. Dammit (from ‘Dude Ranch’)
  4. Mutt (from ‘Enema Of The State’)
  5. Violence (from ‘Blink 182′)
 Posted by MaFt at 11:35 am  Tagged with: ,

Music Monday – A

 Music Monday  No Responses »
Feb 142011
 

A

A are a fantastic British rock/punk/alternative band who were pretty big in the late 1990′s and early 2000′s. My mate, Jim, who I met at uni got me into them and I was surprised that I’d not actually heard of them before then! I got to see them at a few festivals but never got to one of their own gigs before they went on hiatus. They have recently reformed and I was lucky enough to see them supporting Bowling For Soup at the end of last year. I was blown away at how good their songs are and tight they are as a live band.

  1. Foghorn (from ‘How Ace Are Buildings’)
  2. Monkey Kong (from ‘A Vs Monkey Kong’)
  3. Bad Idea (from ‘How Ace Are Buildings’)
  4. Nothing (from ‘HiFi Serious’)
  5. Old Folks (from ‘A Vs Monkey Kong’)
 Posted by MaFt at 12:28 pm  Tagged with: ,

Can I Be Committed?

 Blogging, Music Monday, Random Musings  No Responses »
Feb 082011
 

There’s this thing called ‘Music Monday’ that @girltaristhan does on her blog. Admittedly she stole it from Rickie (and probably numerous other folk across the interwebs). Basically, every Monday you do a short blog post about a band and 5 songs of theirs that you like or that have some deep meaning in your life that you can pretend your readers actually care about. You start with the letter ‘A’ and work through the alphabet right through to ‘Z’. If you miss a letter then and angry set of wild elves ride in on a pack of wolves and chew through your phone line or broadband connection thus rendering your life useless. Continue reading »

 Posted by MaFt at 2:16 pm  Tagged with:

Has My Love of Music Faded?

 Gigs, Life, Music  1 Response »
Jan 132011
 

When I was younger, probably half my current age, I used to know every single word to virtually every single song of every single album that I owned. Some may call this a bit sad, I prefer to say that it was simply quite anal! It had it’s advantages though, it meant me and my mate Neil could challenge each other to pass the time in mind-numbingly boring jobs. One such job was at Multiserve in Shipley (StreetView: the grey building with the zig-zag roof). The job entailed sticking lolly’s to the front of kids magazines; another was sticking packs of seeds onto the front of gardening magazines. I always thought that these things were automated by machinery – well, perhaps they are for real publications, but these things were incredibly obscure. I remember the ‘boys’ magazine that we were sticking the lollies onto featured an interview with, and I quote, “Someone Who Knows Tiger Woods”. I had some crap jobs, but that’s for another blog post I think!

* Top left image from MediaMonkey

Continue reading »

 Posted by MaFt at 7:45 pm  Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,

Misery Business vs Faith

 Faith, Life, Music  1 Response »
Apr 012010
 

I’ve been chatting to a mate about Hayley from Paramore’s public apology for the blasphemous lyrics in their song, Misery Business. No sooner had I finally found the post form Hayley the song itself came on Kerrang! Radio on Freeview! How freaky is that?

Anyway, if you’re interested here’s an excerpt:

“but god does it feel so good… to steal it all away from you now. and if you could then you know you would. cause god it just feels so… it just feels so good.”

i’m ashamed to say that, although i’m a believer in Jesus Christ and i claim him as my God, when i wrote those lyrics i wasn’t addressing him. i was using his name casually. in vain, to be blunt. if you know much about the Christian religion (which i’m not too fond of addressing my faith as), you’ll probably know that one of the ten commandments is “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord your God in vain”… it goes on to say, “…for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.” As a believer in Christ, that last part scares the hell out of me. i don’t want to be held accountable for being the cause of so many people using his name in vain. you don’t have to believe in what i believe and no one in Paramore is ever going to go around forcing our faith into people’s lives… but believer or not, i might have led some of ya’ll to believe that i take my saviour lightly. and i don’t.

Read the full post including the background for the song here: http://paramoreband.livejournal.com/31376.html

 Posted by MaFt at 2:02 pm  Tagged with: , , , ,

The Week So Far

 Android, Family, Gigs, Home, iPhone, Life, Work  1 Response »
Oct 282009
 

I would dearly love to show you some video from Monday’s Green Day gig at Sheffield Arena however my iPhone was stolen and was last ‘seen’ in Liverpool, near Kensington Gardens…
Find my iPhone
On Sunday night my car was broken into as well. Nothing was taken but it did mean I had to pay for a replacement window and the hassle involved.

Continue reading »

 Posted by MaFt at 9:28 am  Tagged with: , , , ,

Physical CD or Digital Download?

 Music  1 Response »
Oct 132009
 

Music has played a massive part in my life – since I was first introduced to Metallica and Megadeth by my older brother, Nat, I have bought and listened to countless albums. While I was at uni I built up an awesome punk-rock vinyl collection but in a possibly silly move I sold it all a few years back when we were seriously strapped for cash. However, I kept my CD’s and, although occasionally sell a few that no longer get listened to, I still have just short of 900 physical CD’s in my possession. There are clearly storage issues here – while it’s not a huge collection, it certainly isn’t small… Continue reading »

 Posted by MaFt at 11:44 am  Tagged with: , , , , , , ,
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