The TUTS Jukebox > What Are You Playing This Week?

[GJ]

Have to say I was really disappointed with Duncan Reid's new CD. The 3rd CD was really good which made up for their 1st 2 which had a couple of great songs but nothing else. The new one starts well with 3 good songs but after that all we get is weak wimpy pop. Hard to believe that such a great live band can put out something so poor. Duncan's vocals are awful, he sounds like he's auditioning for Supertramp.

[Uli]

I have to admit: I haven't listened to Duncan's cd on my stereo (yet), it just seems to me it was made to be listened to while driving my car! 

What I don't like about it: some tunes seem "not really new", they remind me of older songs (plus one is a blatant rip-off, I encourage everyone to discover it themselves).

The new one starts well with 3 good songs but after that all we get is weak wimpy pop.

I'd had the same impression with the 3rd one ("Bombs away")... which included quite a few weak pop songs (to my ears).

he sounds like he's auditioning for Supertramp.

He always sung like that, even for The Boys (who now struggle to deliver those vocal parts live).

[Uli]

Finally I've been able to listen to The Sinclairs. (Last track sounds a bit like The Shadows meet Ennio Morricone!  )

Other than that, I've been digging out old vinyl: Stiv Bator (Disconnected 10"), Neil Young (After the Goldrush)...

[FredNoTimeToBe2021]

I've found myself playing through the recorded outputs of several bands recently.

The Lurkers two weeks ago - always good fun whatever version of 'the band' you hear.

Last week it was The Runaways - far better in their early glampunk days than the more metal later stuff. I also watched the 'Edgeplay' documentary again last night. Parts of it are really heartbreakingly sad.

Looks like Wire this week - first two albums and associated demos/live recordings so far...

[Rockula]

This week, and for the last couple of weeks, I've been playing mostly Ennio Morricone.

[FredNoTimeToBe2021]

Needed cheering up and felt nostalgic, so lots of classic Sweet for the last couple of days.

[Uli]

Still love The Sinclairs, very cool.

Other than them, I've been listening to The Dead Boys, Replacements, Keith Richards, Hugo Race, Calexico and others.

[Uli]

The Waterboys - Room To Roam

Keith Richards - Talk is cheap

The Damned - Live at Shepperton 1980

Hugo Race Fatalists - 24 hours to nowhere

[Uli]

I'm listening to "Star Birth / Star Death" by Hugo Race & The True Spirit:

‘Star Birth’ is international maverick and music icon Hugo Race’s 15th album with his band of True Spirits. It’s a double album and the twin album’s name is ‘Star Death’.

Star Birth was recorded during Australia’s black bushfire summer then mixed as the pandemic hit. When the stars align it all makes sense, Hugo explains, adding that one oceanic evening while writing the album a bright star exploded right before his eyes, the sign of a sudden end and a new beginning...

“'Star Birth' is a flung fisherman's net, mighty in scope, irrevocable as looking up from the stone floor of a cathedral – there is space, yet there is profound intimacy from the immediacy of the lyrics, our thoughts rattling around like panicky goldfish. Race has taken aspects of areas previously explored, and made a quantum leap into the unknowable. With opening track Can't Make This Up, the gauntlet is flung down – ‘what is need, what is greed / it’s a new crush, the brain trust/ hive mind rewrite rewind/ falsehood streaming’” – Robert Brokenmouth

Hugo writes about the times in which we live – political disasters, our planet, the absence and the presence of spiritual values, broken promises, cracked hearts and if any of it really matters anyway. With hell raising lyrics like, Expendable, you’d have to wonder if anyone of us will make it through alive – ‘hey sister, are we all expendable? nobody wins, but so many of you think they do / don’t try to fool yourself people, deep down you know the truth - everybody gets their one hot shot but no one’s bullet proof’. But then The Rapture reminds us that there will always be stars dying in the glory of new life – ‘empower us with divine love and deliver us from evil / for you are the one true light / the power and the glory / forever /amen’

Hugo’s True Spirit deliver a lush, sonic love letter of rock, electronica and dramatic orchestration, based in blues, hypnotic repetition and sonic exhilaration. Multi-instrumentalists Michelangelo Russo and Nico Mansy are a huge part of this atmosphere; the entire band and production is incredible from start to finish. Star Birth is 48 minutes of mind expanding, mind blowing, heel tapping tunes, with its sister album Star Death's deep-psyche remixes that will send you searching for your own exploding star somewhere in the sky…

http://www.hugoracemusic.com/

"Heavenly Bodies":
https://youtu.be/LoMdDLEv8h0

[Rockula]

What I have on rotation....

Lockdown Holiday - T.V. Smith - Obviously
Stay Young - The Outcasts - The 'comeback' E.P. by the Belfast band. Recorded in 2018 but release delayed for obvious reasons.
Electracoustic (Volume 1) - Ruts DC - Old songs in a new way.
Hatful Of Holloway - Various Artists - Fundraiser for 'The Lamb' pub in Holloway featuring 22 great cover versions by The Men That Will Not Be Blamed For Nothing, The DeRellas, The Priscillas, Healthy Junkies, Paul-Ronney Angel, etc.
Rockfield Files - The Damned - The latest release. Only 4 tracks but it'll do for now.
Battle Of Britain - Vice Squad - Great new album. Also got their limited 'Vice-O-Lation' E.P.'s.
Tower Of Strength 2020 - ReMission - Charity single by The Mission and friends. Several interesting remixes.
Get Back Into The World - The Sensible Gray Cells - Currently on the deck.
Elemental - Pauline Murray - Her new solo album. I like it but I'm hoping there'll be more Penetration.
Mondo Pulp - The Tubes - CD direct from the band with live recordings from the 2016 European Tour.
The Death Of Imagination - The Defects - New one from the Belfast band.
Love Your Work - Eight Rounds Rapid - Excellent 3rd album by the Southend band that includes Wilko Johnson's son. Nice chaps too.
Mass Manipulation - Steel Pulse - Excellent album released the end of last year. First album of new material in 15 years.
Dragged Up - Hung Like Hanratty - Only bought it for the one track featuring Dave Greenfield but enjoying the whole thing. Strangely I don't really like them live.
Electric Music - The Wolfhounds - Latest album and 3rd in 6 years. Old friends. Also got the new collection of all their John Peel Sessions.
Together - The Vapors - I like the new stuff more than I liked most of the old stuff.
Made Of Rain - The Psychedelic Furs - Unexpected pleasure of a comeback album.
Howl - John Foxx And The Maths - More like the old Ultravox! than he's done for years because of having Robin Simon on guitar.

....amongst other things.

[Uli]

Seems like I'm listening to a #1 album these days...

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/feb/26/mogwai-first-no-1-album-25-years-as-the-love-continues

As the Love Continues is the band’s 10th studio album of atmospheric guitar-centred music. Frontman Stuart Braithwaite, who also runs the tiny independent Rock Action label that releases their albums, told the Guardian it was “totally surreal, completely unexpected. ”

He said the escapist nature of his band’s music has resonated with audiences “in pretty testing times”, and thanked BBC Radio 6 Music for its support. He also credited online enthusiasm at them topping the midweek charts for their eventual No 1 position: “I saw a lot of people saying that having social media be full of something positive was such a nice change, because there’s so much negativity on the internet.”

[Uli]

New song by Chris Eckman, from the upcoming album "Where the Spirit Rests", out via Glitterhouse Records on June 4th, 2021!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2eLvPeDtBfc