Andrew:
Four Tet ‘ There Is Love In You’ – A wonderful new album. I can’t stop listening to ‘Sing.’
‘Bad Science’ by Ben Goldacre – One of my best non-fiction reads in years. Goldacre calmly dissects the nonsense that is homeopathy and alike. He highlights the terrible coverage that science receives in the media and dispels the myths behind MMR, MRSA, and best of all, ‘Dr’ Gillian Mckeith. It should be added to the national curriculum. good site too.
The Red Riding Trilogy – The screen adaptation of David Peace’s novels. Brutal, dark, brilliant.
New Orleans Funk Vol 1 and 2. Excellent Soul Jazz compliations that have been rarely off our stereo for the past couple of months.
Florence Walsh. 28/1/10
Robin:
Caribou ‘Swim’. Like Arthur Russell magicking music underwater, this woozy piece of mecha-disco psychedelia is another essential record from pioneering
Canadian Dan Snaith. You can download the first track from the album HERE. Warning – do not operate heavy machinery while listening to this.
The two pints I had with my Dad the other day in the Plough and Harrow in the Vale Of Glamorgan. One of them was a Hereford Pale Ale – the kind of beer that cracks the dull glaze in a funereal Welsh day.
The Byrds ‘Ballad Of Easy Rider’. Dad gave me an original vinyl copy of this the other day (pre-pub) and it set my mind rambling. The LP cover, gently aged and a little bruised by housemoves and probing kids, looks like a piece of art. The record still sounds heavenly whatever the format, whatever the decade.
Sky One’s triple headed incentive to stay in of night. 24 is back for series 8 (Christ – that’s over a week I’ve spent in the company of Jack Bauer) and Lost returns for one final headspinning jaunt. This week they launch Battlestar Galactica prequel Caprica. Really not sure how it can equal that particular televisual mother lode but then again I had no expectations when I started watching Galactica and that turned out to be (cliché fast approaching) the best thing on telly other than The Wire. It just pisses me off that I’m in thrall to the bleedin’ Murdoch empire.
Joanna Newsom ‘Emily’. Been spinning this in anticipation of Newsom’s new triple album out in a month or two. To the uninitiated, this track is the careering 12 minute opener from Newsom’s last album ‘Ys’. It’s utterly beguiling.
Jeff
Robert Forster – The 10 Rules of Rock and Roll (Black Inc.paperback). Go-Between as rock critic. Review to follow.
Belinda Bauer – Blacklands (Corgi paperback) . In an attempt to bring some sort of normality back to his family life, a 12 year old boy sets out to find the burial place of his Uncle Billy, murdered, aged 11, by a sickfuckserialkiller 18 years previously. The kid contacts the killer in prison. The killer gets out of prison. Oh dear. Described by the Guardian as “a psychological tour-de-force about the cruelty of hope and, ultimately, the triumph of innocence.” Described by me as, “scary as fuck”.
Laura Veirs – July Flame L.P. (Bella Union). to calm myself down after reading Blacklands. A beautiful record. Her best.