The catholic boat!!

Teardrop, by Massive Attack was released in 1998 and reached a whopping number 10 in the UK sales charts. However good the song was, it was the music video that everyone always thinks about when they think about the song. When you hear it you cant go without thinking of the eerie fetus that lip syncs to the song, which worked even more so because the heartbeats were in-time to the song (or vice verser). The fact that I learnt today that I never knew was that the singing for Teardrop was actually done by one of the Cocteau Twins. In more recent times there have been a couple of really good covers of Teardrop. The very first was done by Elbow on the Radio One Live Lounge show. Elbow are a bit of a Bidet regular and hopefully need no introduction. Newton Faulkner also released a version of Teardrop on his debut album, Handbuilt By Machines (which unfortunately doesn't follow suit from this awesome cover). Another Bidet favourite has also recently done an amazing cover of Teardrop. Jose Gonzalez, the Swede/Argentine is on the road for the release of his new album, In Our Nature (which is awesome). To my surprise I heard this cover when flicking through the album, and as always Jose does an amazing version of an already fab song!

Elbow - Teardrop
Newton Faulkner - Teardrop
Jose Gonzalez - Teardrop

I'm in Slough Motherf$@ker!

Yesterday I was taken to the Charlbury street music festival. Charlbury is a small Cotswolds village not to far away from Oxford. Unfortunately this year they were hit quite heavily by the floods that have been ripping through the UK this summer but have managed to get that behind them and host a rather awesome free music and crafts festival. The height of the celebrations revolved around an Irish ban who brought dancy folk country music to the masses, and everyone jigged till the early hours! This brought me to ponder the use of Irish music in popular music and I remembered two of my favorite tunes from years ago!

East of Eden were a progressive rock band hailing from several areas of England, mostly Leicester and Bristol, in the days when prog rock was the only way to go! They were most noted for their use of jazz and folk licks/riffs in their music, creating a raw fusion of sound (so I am told). Jig-a-jig was one of the most famous works that East of Eden released and actually got them into the top ten. Using the regular prog rock build up they bash out fiddle licks on an electric violin (if thats not prog rock I don't know what is!) and back it up with some fabby beats!

East of Eden - Jig-a-jig

Kate Bush, who if you need introducing to you cant go much wrong with this track, was an odd lady, and really hated the limelight! This was a shame given that she is possibly the best female songwriter that the world has ever seen, and thankfully she is still going! Jig of Life was her homage to her Irish routes and had some rather bizarre poetry that she wrote at the end!

Kate Bush - Jig of Life

12 vacancies. 12 cabins, 12 vacancies.

Elvis Perkins has had as colourful a life and upbringing as it is filled with tragedy and mourning. Elvis's father Anthony Perkins was famous for his role as Norman Baites in Hitchcock's Psycho. Anthony was quite open about his bisexuality and had two sons with Elvis's mother Berry. Unfortunately Anthony sadly died in 1992 from AIDS aged 60. Berry Perkins was a famous photographer and model in New York until sadly at age 53 she was returning back to New York on American Airlines flight 11 on September 11th 2001 which was one of the planes that crashed into the twin towers. Elvis Perkins music on the other hand is full of upbeat and folk like guitar strumming, light brush drums and melancholic lyrics (who can really blame him). I came across Elvis when he was on tour supporting Willy Mason, he has also lead support in America for Clap Your Hands and Say Yeah and Cold War Kids. His debut album Ash Wednesday was released in February this year, and has been put together chronologically with tracks 1 to 6 leading upto his mothers death and 7 to 11 after the tragic events of the 11th. The tracks I have chose are While You Were Sleeping, which was track 1 (to put it into context) and is a lovely bouncy song. The Night and The Liquor is a quite deepset display of the feelings that must of been felt at the time (track 8), and can induce tears!

Elvis Perkins - While You Were Sleeping [Dazzler fave!]
Elvis Perkins - The Night and The Liquor

p.s I have been assured that internet is available at home so let the posts roll!