Rachael Sage and rainy days

I'm sitting indoors at the moment working on a review of Orchestre National de Barbes and listening to Rachael Sage's stunningly poignant album Delancey Street which is now going to be distributed worldwide. Outside the skies are grey and dreary, but inside where it's warm my mind is being flooded with Rachael's honest and tender vocals.

That's what I love about Rachael's music, some people probably dismiss the ballads as cheesy and trite but to me they strike a real chord. They're not gritty and harsh but they tug at your emotions and express something very fundamental about the inner working of the human psyche. She shows such vulnerability and willingness to be exposed in the interest of making that essential human connection with another person.

Sometimes, at moments of great joy or sorrow we need to know that we are not alone and, for me at least, Rachael provides that comfort. Her songs talk about emotions that we keep hidden most of the time and allows us the space to admit them, at least to ourselves.

If you don't enjoy songs about lost loves and struggling to get through the human condition then you won't like Rachael's music, but if you've ever felt totally alone and wanted to run away from everything that you were tearing out your hair about then just maybe you should give her a try.

Her music isn't anger, revenge or rousing, it's heart-wrenching empathy instead. Her voice lilts over soft chord progressions that run through the wilderness in your mind. It can give you strength or comfort and it can just make you contemplative if you like.

On another note, if you ever get a chance to see her live, please do! It's more than worth it and often involves kazoos and audience participation.

Rachael's playing The Enterprise in Chalk Farm tomorrow night (31/05/2011) at 9:30pm if any of you fancy checking her out. If you make it down, I'll see you there.

For now, here's a slightly silly video for one of her more upbeat numbers 'Big Star' which is an indictment of the reality of the entertainment industry.

Gil Scott-Heron and music that matters

So, I'm sure we've all heard the news today about Gil Scott-Heron passing away. Of all the times for it to happen. He spent years abusing drugs and alcohol and spent over a year in prison and when he finally cleans up, starts making incredible music again, starts touring the world and restarting his career, he gets sick and he dies. I'm sure the tragedy for us is nothing compared to that for his friends and family and my thoughts go out to them, but we are all going to be missing out on a world that includes an artist that really meant something.

His critiques of discrimination, poverty and all of society's ills were open, honest and revolutionary. He told it how it was and didn't need to sugar coat a single word. He was a poet and musician and social commentator. That didn't change with age and his album I'm New Here from last year continued the trend. He also had an appreciation for the importance of music and verse as communicatory tools. He respected them. If you look at the sleeve notes to I'm New Here, he gives instructions on how to listen to the album, not in a condescending or patronising preachy way, but as a reminder that music is more than just something to have on in the background and neither is it just a quick fix, it should be savoured when it's good. That album was good.

I feel priviledged that I got to see Gil Scott-Heron perform last year in Brooklyn, NYC. I feel even luckier that it was a small, intimate show at Littlefields as part of the final night of entertainment for the National Black Writers' Conference that had been taking place all week and had been chaired by the incomparable Toni Morrison. Some might argue that Gil Scott-Heron deserved a nobel prize for literature just as much as she did. On the line-up alongside him was another poet of our age, Talib Kweli, who gave shoutouts to his parents in the audience and came up on stage for a couple of songs with Gil Scott-Heron too.

It was a gig that mattered with people that made music that mattered and it feels like that might be becoming a rarer commodity these days. This is clearly a very niave statement from me as there has always been a mountain of chaff to sort through till you get to the wheat, but history has performed a filtering process for us and (for the most part) only the cream has risen to the top of our memories. However, it can be easy to lose sight of that fact when you are hit from all sides by endless waves of meaningless drivel puporting to be the 'next big thing'. I hope history forgets Justin Beiber, I really really do.

Even though he has passed, the lessons and inspiration he gave out should not be forgotten. His music will rise to the top and last for generations and our children will listen to Winter In America and understand just what it means, they will relate their own struggles to those of the past.

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." - George Santayana

Thanks to people like Gil, we will not forget the past and nor will our children, if we teach them how to learn and grow, and just perhaps that will lead us to a brighter future.

RIP Gil Scott-Heron

April 1, 1949 – May 27, 2011

Idlewild's 100 Broken Windows

Listening to music from your past when in a moment of turmoil always seems to take you back to a simpler, more secure moment in your timeline. Undoubtedly, this is in part down to hindsight being an exacting art but it's more than that. Music can work as a touchstone in this world ever in flux. It reminds you of something stable at the centre of your core. If you still love this band you listened to as a kid then you haven't lost everything of who you were back then too.

This is what springs to mind as I revisit 100 Broken Windows by Idlewild. 'It's a better way to feel when you're not real, you're post modern'. I wonder if the hipsters I see wandering about my neighbourhood in Shoreditch follow this mantra. The first time I ever heard of Gertrude Stein was when I listened to Roseability and even when I studied her at university in Glasgow, Roddy Woomble's words followed me back up to Scotland and floated around my head all day after lectures.

A truly great album is one that can sit untouched for years and then when you do dust it off and put it on it has transformative power. As much as I want to skip through to my favourite tracks, every time the next song comes on I am reminded of why I loved it in the first place even if it had faded in my mind and I think to myself 'oh, I'll just wait until this one's over until I put on Actually It's Darkness'. In the end I know it'll come all in it's own time. Probably just the way they engineered it to in the first place.

I challenge anyone who grew up with 90s/early 00s indie (you know, before Fran Healy and co. spoilt it with The Invisible Band - I was going to say The Man Who but then I remembered I really like Writing To Reach You) to listen to this album and not break out into a giant heart-warming smile as you remember the good times.

Even the interruptions of the incessant Spotify ads can do little to dampen the enjoyment of listening to this album from start to finish (incidentally the best way to listen to almost every album). A touchstone like this can help you to take stock of your life and your position within it. You can see how far you've come, changed, (even evolved perhaps?) and you might even get a clearer vision of how far you've got left to go and the way in which you might get there.

Even if it doesn't quite send you on a mystical quest, I would recommend that everyone who reads this stops everything they're doing right now and finds an album that they haven't listened to in years from an earlier era in their life and put it on from start to finish and just simply enjoy. My Christmas present to you all, if I could give one, is that I make you remember how good music can be and how fantastic it can make you feel. Be a kid again for an hour or so and love it.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.

Radio Silence...

Apologies for my online absence over the last 6 months, it's been an exceptionally busy time and I just dropped off the radar whilst I've been engaged in other things. However, you may or may not be happy to hear that I'm back to stay. It'd take me too long to catch you up on all the individual links to articles so instead here's a permanent one to all of my DMG work past, present and future...

DMG ARTICLES

There's about 11 new ones up there but my newest is a review of Trail's new single 'Killing Sun'. You may remember that I reviewed their single 'Prism' last year. Check out the new review to see how far they've evolved in that time (or how far my opinion of their music has evolved at least).

Keep your eyes peeled for plenty of new articles on the horizon guys!

So much done and so little time to tell you about it...

It's been a long time since I've posted and for that I am eternally apologetic. I've published a couple of articles on Suite101 in this time but I don't really think the site is for me. Still, I've included links to them below for your viewing pleasure,

Is Urban Farming a Tenable Solution for UK City Dwellers? (Suite101)

Roll Deep Ft. Jodie Connor – Good Times (single - Suite101)

Apart from these little beauties, I've been down in Brighton, covering The Great Escape Festival 2010 for the Daily Music Guide. The whole experience was fairly intense and I met some incredible people whilst I was there. For a full run down of all 3 days, check out my reviews below,

The Great Escape 2010 - Day One (13/05/2010)

The Great Escape 2010 - Day Two (14/05/2010)

The Great Escape 2010 - Day Three (15/05/2010)

As always, comments and feedback are very much appreciated! I should be posting up some new writing soon, but in the meantime I hope you enjoy this little lot.

New music and Dan Le Sac Vs Scroobius Pip.

Hey guys.

Sadly back in the bad old UK again. On the plus side there are some tasty new articles abounding for you to sink your teeth into. Check out my first features article on DMG,

The Rise and Fall of New Music

I've also been scrutinising the new album from Dan Le Sac Vs Scroobius Pip,

Dan Le Sac Vs Scroobius Pip - The Logic of Chance (album)

Overall, it's been a busy time lately. I'm also starting to write some more politically focused articles for Suite 101 but I'll set you up with a link to my profile once my first article has been published. The first one should be about urban farming so keep your eyes peeled.

Gil Scott-Heron

I went to see Gil Scott-Heron with Talib Kweli on Friday night in downtown Brooklyn as part of the Black Writers' Convention that was taking place this weekend. It was an incredible experience. One that I want to write more about soon in fact, but in the mean time I thought I'd post something that I wrote about Gil about a month back, having just listened to 'I'm New Here' for the first time. I hope you all enjoy my strange rambling tangents in this piece.

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At some points in musical history, special attention must be paid, and this is one of those times. The release of Gil Scott-Heron’s first album in 15 years heralds a return to some sense of the genuine which seems to have been lost in these shiftless times of horror stories and vacuous, paper thin excuses for recording artists that will do what they are told and force feed you sludge until it spills out of your mouth in a stream of putrid, broken crotchets and quavers, indistinguishable from each other in a droning mess.

‘I’m New Here’, well aren’t we all? After the circle turns so far don’t we all feel new again when someone reawakens us with songs to agitate the soul. Gil’s heart has started to beat again in our breasts and he is calling his soldiers to war and the revolution we bring will not be televised, the revolution will NOT be televised. Broken up through the decades but never truly destroyed, the strength of Gil was forged from what he was given by those the state call broken though he was not from a ‘broken’ home. Bitter sweet smells of the streets and the South emanate from the strings and the bars on which hang the delicate protraction of notes tugging at the cat guts from inside us, used to be plucked and create our screams.

We are ready for our commands that come from the first. Of unfolding gently, with pride and respect, the covers of the box like the body of a lover, parting their legs,

"There is a proper procedure for taking advantage of any investment.
Music, for example. Buying a CD is an investment.
To get the maximum you must

LISTEN TO IT FOR THE FIRST TIME UNDER OPTIMUM CONDITIONS."

Yes sir. Would you ignore orders from such a man, such a man.

There is a travel in his words that transports us further than a bus, train, plane, automobile ever could. Far beyond the realms of our imagination and the stars whom, after all, are nothing more than burning clouds of gas and rock and one day will die just as all of us will, and one day so will Gil. As he reminds us on this album, that is why parents give birth, give life to follow their lives with some semblance of themselves and educate you with the ideas they feel fit to be carried forth unto your world.

Soul claps enunciate the power of running down the street towards the trouble. Trouble you know is there but draws you further in to their mesmerizing swirls of pain like a magnet draws that metal home even when it sure as hell doesn’t want to go from its own world of contentment. This is the power of words. This is the power of Gil Scott-Heron, and don’t you ever forget it.