Joe writes: Anyone Can Play Guitar, a film by Jon Spira, is possibly the definitive document of a local music scene, with all its passion, small-mindedness, resentment, jealousy, good fortune, ill fortune, stupidity... and some truly great music. Ed O'Brien and Colin Greenwood from Radiohead, one of the biggest and best bands in the world, appear alongside people who are unknown in the wider world, but were legends in a world of their own creation - the Oxford music scene. The film's thesis is [...]
After a short adjournment from the Mrs Mackerel mantle, it's back to business this week with a blast from the musical past. Anyone Can Play Guitar had a one-off showing at my beloved Phoenix Picturehouse in Oxford this week. It's always a pleasure to go the Phoenix and I have to admit, I didn't really know what I was going to see other than a film about the Oxford music scene featuring Radiohead . I didn't realise that one of my oldest and bestest friends played a large [...]
A few days ago when I was pondering Cheerios, I considered that the cereal would be ideal for serving at state functions while entertaining foreign dignitaries. Alas, as I cannot gut a moose, I fear that I have no possible route to high office where I could enact this bold idea. But I think I'd make a fine head of state and I suppose that I could overthrow a current leader and install a puppet regime. Like moose-gutting, leading a coup d'état is not in my skill set. Yet I have an innovative [...]
The calm before the storm. Literally. New York is bracing for the biggest hurricane it's ever faced (named after Irene Ryan, Granny Clampett was one tough cookie) and I'm just hoping my 100 year-old building will survive the winds. (It survived the earthquake on Monday... what a week!) Until then, or if you're somewhere not on the East Coast of the United States, please enjoy the collection of mostly jangly pop. This week mostly ping-pongs between now and the mid-'80s (hey, that's new for me!), with a few stops in the '90s as well. Cover art this week [...]
OK, so I'm never going to win any prizes for lateral thinking with the choice of song to accompany this post, but you've got to admit Monday Morning by the Candyskins is at least 78.2% less predictable than Manic Monday , I Don't Like Mondays or Monday Monday (although I do love a bit of The Mamas & the Papas). Oh, and it features backing vocals from Amelia Fletcher and some bloody good advice to boot. What more could you ask for on an overcast post-weekend A.M.? [...]
You don't really see dudes sporting mongo chunked out necklaces anymore. Who's gonna bring that back? Really, there's only one person I could think to nominate for the job . By all accounts, The Candy Skins are still defunct. Founding members, the brothers Nick and Mark Cope, are related to actors Kenneth and Martha Cope, both of whom have appeared on Dr. Who . Wonder if that's ever awkward grist for the [...]
Nov 14, 2009, 5:50pm
Fmly
So I always say that I'm going to commit to bringing this series back, but that's going to have to wait until I feel like getting overly nostalgic and bro'ing out all of the time. If you've never been here for a Flashback! Party Sequence it's pretty self-explanatory, three throwbacks at a time to prevent an overload on good vibes...see you on the other side. Ghost Town DJ's, hot damn. Booty shaking beats with those 'I'm thinking of you' lyrics delivers the sweetest punch of my mind [...]
Psuedo-bubblegum brit-pop hipsters The Candyskins definitely were a flash in the pan, but such a great t reat for a cheesy nostalgic indulgence on a Friday morning. The Oxford-based quintet hit the ground running and were showcased on MTV's 120 Minutes back in the early 1990s with "Submarine Song;" and a year later put an album of sweet sunny 60's pop with some great jingly-jangly guitars on the Space I'm In . The album featured a great cover of a Buffalo Springfield's peace chant, "For What it's Worth" as well as the [...]
OK, part two of my attempt to fill in the blanks of Rhino's worthy but incomplete Brit Box chronicling the UK indie scene from 1985 - 2000. (Part One, or Disc Five, is here.) Mind you, these are filtered through...
The second single from the second Nine Black Alps album is Bitter End and it's a good one. But their best and poppiest track to date is the third single, Future Wife. It reminds me of when I was first listening to Radio 1 and Mark Goodier was presenting the Evening Session. Which specific band I'm not sure - maybe The Candyskins. Future Wife - Nine Black Alps (album is released on October 22 so not on iTunes yet) There are excerpts from five new Alps album tracks here [...]
It was a recent post by Bob Lefsetz on the Lefsetz Letter about Sirius Left of Center, and more specifically, The Matt Pinfield show, that had me digging through the the dark, dank vaults of I Rock Cleveland for the song "Wembley" by The Candyskins. An early nineties forerunner to the Brit-Pop sound, The Candyskins never achieved the level of success in England, or The States, enjoyed by their peers. During their brief career, they did manage one minor, alternative radio hit, with "Wembley," a song that made it into steady rotation on The [...]
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