Jack Whitehall and the Trustfund Hipsters Play Glastonbury

 

 

Jack Whitehall and the Trustfund Hipsters @ Glastonbury

 

What will the ‘Glasto’ moment of 2013 be? Mick Jagger cavorting on stage with a druken secretary from Cheam? Sir Bruce Forsythe dueting with Public Enemy on Sophisticated Bitch..? Discombobulate ripping the Dave Pearce tent a new one? Kenny Rogers Rascal, or George Osborne convincing Michael Evis that a few roads through his farm would ‘just about do the trick?’

 

Nope, none of the above. It’ll be Edith Long Bowmen interviewing Jack Whitehall and the Trustfund Hipsters, before they take to the Dermot-O’Dreary-X-Factor-Santander-O2 stage , in front of a VIP ‘invite-only’ audience of politicians, bankers, the landed gentry, BBC 2 wives, millionaires and a couple of wounded soldiers. Data charges will apply.

 

The band members play multiple instruments in live performances. Jack Whitehall foregoes his privileged Independent school upbringing at Marlboro Lights College and sits at a drum kit. The band uses bluegrass and folk instrumentation, such as banjo, upright bass, mandolin and piano, played with a rhythmic style based in alternative rock and folk. ‘These are possibly the instruments of our Father’s father’s fathers.’’  says Harry Zak Cooper-Porsha the bands bass player rather unconvincingly.

 

Much of Jack Whitehall and the Trustfund Hipsters lyrical content has a strong literary influence, their debut single, deriving from Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath. Rupert Benedict Fortisque, the bands guitarist has been quoted in interviews as saying, ‘We like totes relate to those sharecroppers, the Joads, in Grapes of Wrath being driven from their land in the book as our fathers too have lost money as shareholders. The storms of the dust bowl could be a metaphor for the storms we experienced as children if we didn’t pass grade 6 viola. The Battle Hymn of the Republic could almost be the song we walk on stage to, were it not for our choice of Dire Straits Money For Nothing’’.

 

The track Scotch Beef includes lines from the play ‘Glasgae Bhoys in the Hoody’, written by MC Ahreet Ya Bas, dealing with gang warfare on the streets of Govan. Jack Whitehall makes the connection with this and his father's beef farm in the highlands.

 

To be fair to them, though, the band are simply cultivating their own niche, even if it's obligatorily for them to hang up their instruments when it's time to take over their fathers business.

 

Jack Whitehall and the Trustfund Hipsters play Glastonbury on the 'Dermot-O’Dreary-X-Factor-Santander-O2 stage Saturday night and the  'Enver Hoxha Stage for self-managed, decentralised economy based upon autonomous self-regulating economic units and a decentralised mechanism of resource allocation and decision-making Stage' on Sunday night.

 

 

 

 

Discombobulate vs. Dead Mouse The Leet Prognosticator – ‘Visit Settle’

Discombobulate vs. Dead Mouse The Leet Prognosticator – ‘Visit Settle’

 

If UK dance music is about to become pop again, then this match made in heaven will surely lead the charge. Discombobulate’s rapid success in becoming one of the most talked-about dance acts in the country, and Dead Mouse The Leet Prognosticator’s ascent to the giddy heights of rave superstardom seem to have happened overnight. Both have ushered in a seismic shift in UK sugary-rushy-synthy-ravey-pop, without ever entering a club.

 

Frederick Discombobulate explains, ‘’Me and my bruv, Brandon were both working in McDonalds when a toddler accidently left their Speak and Spell Machine on the counter. We took the machine out on our fag break and started banging some sick shit out. One thing led to another and before we knew it we were dropping next level skills on a Teddy Touch and Tell machine, a Sinclair ZX-80, a Commodore 64 and an iRod’’.

 

When asked about their inspiration the duo are quite forthcoming, ‘’ We ain’t never been inside a club, bro. Can’t stand all those sweaty bastards jumping up and down looking like they’ve been electrocuted with Tasers, off their chops on yellow bentines, we’d rather stay at home and listen to Old School, like DJ Luck and MC Neat, and Craig David,  whilst playing Minecraft’’.  Brandon continues, ‘’As far as we’re concerned clubs are a waste of time. We ain’t party boys like Skrillo Pad and One Direction. I ain’t never heard of any of them names journalists always ask me about. Hacienda? That’s a type of burger innit? Zed Bias, a character from the Hobbit? Larry Levan, an actor in ‘enders, Ibiza, a type of motor, and Shoom, somewhere yer Granddad went  to pick up a bird and dance the samba, like wot they do on Strictly, innit?’

 

Dead Mouse the Leet Prognosticator’s identity has long been kept a secret from his fans. His oversized 1980’s Mouse head-shell cartridge mask shielding his face from prying eyes and dreadful theorising. Some assumed him to be the iconic rapper, Puffy Fetlock, others the Hungarian mime artist, Vinegar Bones; many believed him to be Roger Protz, the Trotskyite who escaped the ice pick to become one of the early founders of CAMRA, though most believed him to be Lips from Anvil attempting to forge (intended) a new musical direction without the cries of, ‘Play Long Stick Goes Boom, ya bastard!’ every night. 

 

Whoever Dead Mouse the Leet Prognosticator is however, it shouldn’t detract from the fact that along with Discombobulate, they have collaborated to produce a sophisticated piece of sugary-rushy-synthy-ravey-pop which will demolish hundreds of youth club discos all over the midlands. They borrow from all over the shop like a genre hungry moth trapped in a Light-emitting diode factory – their synths from drag, the snap of the snare from trap, the vocals from neo-shed, the beats from wriggle and the xylophones from plink.

 

Visit Settle starts with a woozy garridge beat, think Wookie on Quaaludes, before the sampled  pirate radio DJ voiceover  emotes, ‘Yo Visit Settle, Yo Yo Visit Settle, no finer place to put on the kettle….and have a brew’. . A mish-mash of dancey beats then come in and the biggest breakdown this side of Fry. It has elements of Discombobulate’s last album ‘Disambiguation’ alongside scatterings of Dead Mouse the Leet Prognosticator’s last 12”, ‘Airs and Graces in the Social Arena.’  It is a modern day trailblazing tune and catchy as hell.

 

But why the homage to the busy Yorkshire Dales market town of Settle? Is it a hot bed of sugary-rushy-synthy-ravey-pop fans out ‘til 11pm dancing inside melting pots of rampant abound?  Have the hardcore faces on the scene flocked there and put down their neo-roots? Brandon Discombobulate sets the record straight, ‘We often visit Settle with Dead Mouse the Leet Prognosticator. The Yorkshire Dales Falconry and Conservation Centre is next level shizzle. Malham Cove and Gordale  are sick, and Settle Play Barn is great for wet afternoons in the town.’

 

If UK dance music is about to become pop again, don’t miss this phenomenal cultural effect on dance music.

 

Visit Settle is out now

Working (Titles) For The Man.

'Working (Titles) For the Man'

 

Or :-

 

'''You’re Calling It What!!''   (Inadvisable Original Record Titles)

 

 

1.            Marvin Gaye – ‘Stick This Where the Sun Don’t Shine Berry Gordy’ (‘Here My Dear’)

 

2.            Bruno Mars – ‘Life on Mars’ – there isn’t, so ‘Unorthodox Jukebox’

 

3.            Peabo Bryson and Roberta Flack – ‘Tonight I Sellotape My Glove To You’. Peabo’s bizarre love token to Roberta was taken as an affront to personal facial space and altered. (‘Tonight I Celebrate My Love For You’)

 

4.            Femi Kuti – ‘Another DJ Comfort Break Meander’ ‘Shoki Shoki’

 

5.            Radiohead – ‘Irk the Stadiums’. Vast swathes of fans with blinkered tastes didn’t need this title to realize that Kid A wasn’t another Ok Computer. (‘Kid A’)

 

6.            Orbital – ‘The Slap-heads On the Door’. Brothers Hartnoll tried to demonstrate that there was always a humourous Goth element to their bleeps and squonks. (‘Snivilization’)

 

7.            David Bowie ‘Some Hipster Bastard’s Defaced Heroes!’  ‘The Next Day’

 

8.            The Stone Roses – ‘Led Zep VII’ ('The Second Coming of Jimmy Page' was also muted at one point)

 

9.            Joss Stone – ‘Some Whack Cornish Shit’. Premonitions of a future Mobo made Ms Stone believe in this working idea of a title.

 

10.          Babyshambles – ‘Just Say No’. Pete couldn’t, but the record company could. (‘Down In Albion’).

 

11.          JLS – ‘Pneumonia, Dysentery, Bronchitis and Trenchfoot’. JLS’s inadvisable concept album alerting kids to the dangers of First World War soldier’s afflictions was soon canned by the syrup police. (‘Outta This World’).

 

12.          Phil Collins – ‘Bring Me The Head Of My Local Painter and Decorator’. ‘No Jacket Required’ sounded less bitter from this diminutive Swiss tax-exile. 

 

13.          Coldplay – ‘Bedwetting Bondage Fans Of The world Untie’. Chris Martin’s self-depreciation fell on deaf ears at the record company.

 

14.          Miles Davis – ‘A Kind Of Album Even Non-Jazz Fans Will Like'. Davis’ gift for clairvoyance was still ignored for, ‘A Kind of Blue’.

 

15.         Daft Punk – ‘We Should Be So Lucky, Lucky, Lucky, Lucky, Lucky, Lucky, Lucky’.  ‘Random Access Memory’. 

 

16.          Arab Strap – ‘Caledonian Alky Drone Poems’. (‘Here We Go’)

 

17.          Elastica – ‘The Bootleg Stranglers’. (‘Connection’).

 

18.          Dave Pearce – ‘Flogging A Dead Horse 27’. (‘Funky House Anthems 27’).

 

19.          Sting – ‘Insufferable Tantrik Blue Navel Tendril Floss’ (‘The Soul Cages’)

 

20.        One Direction – ‘Tucked up In Bed, with Milky Drink and Sudafed’ ‘Up All Night’

 

21.          Oasis – ‘Look Gak in Anger’.. Self-important and deep within the K-hole the brothers Gallagher were advised that the new album should be retitled; ‘Standing on the Shoulder of Giants’

to detract from the fact that it was definitely no Definitely Maybe. How wrong they were.

 

22.         U2 – ‘Achtung! Bongos!’ Larry Mullen’s Percussive Concept Album recorded in Düsseldorf found no support amongst the rest of U2. (‘Achtung Baby’).

 

23.         Dido – ‘Dildo’. Post-Modernist pranks aplenty as the queen of bland misses the irony somewhat. (‘Life For Rent’)

 

24.      George Michael – ‘Gobble Gobble Gobble’. ‘Outside’ was a far more preferable title for Sony.

 

25.  Fish – ‘Vigil In A Wilderness Of Mirrors’ (‘Vigil In A Wilderness Of Mirrors’).

Electric Stag June

The Body Circus Presents Brazilica and Avastar

 

 

Qvasi Möd- Xhol

 

 

Qvasi Möd- Xhol!

 

Achtung Krautrock heads! An obscure Berlin pseudo-heavy freak-out rock band (formed 1968) with the accent on percussion, of whom we know very little, except having heard their contribution on the ‘BERLIN GEH WEG’ compilation on the ‘Kerching Gottsching’record label. Previously unreleased live recordings by this way-out-there, pioneering German band. Under-appreciated at the time, possibly due to their connections with  the Vandrugen Cotton Wool appreciation society.

 

Highly obscure live recordings from the psychedelic ghetto repressed on this limited edition clear vinyl 7” EP for Germany’s Record Bailout Day. ‘Qvasi Möd- Xhol’, who started life playing Music Cement as ‘Hands Und Fuss’, in the late sixties and then mutated into Mucky Grohl (and finally, just Xhol) as their sound developed to encompass hippified commune ‘pongfusion’ and post-"Soddom and Gomorrha" psychedelic dustbin man sound collages, on albums like "Galactic Cabbage" and the wonderfully titled "Ash Tray Tempel" (that one a classic krautrock freakfest document indeed, hence this new live collection's title of ‘Live’).

 

Four live cuts over two sides of one 7” disc (littered with spacey breakdowns from 1968 and '69, including a lengthy version of Eamon Dull's "Collapsing: Snivelling Warthogs" interpolated into Xhol's freeform "Burial Chamber Lanyard"). A second 10-minute cut, called "Hot Buttered Xhol", that features Wolfgang Minibus Moebius, utilising a drum machine and Douglas Baader-Meinhof Amps is a sonic rollercoaster of repetitive riffs and satirical freak outs. These archival recordings are great (‘Dr Schwitter’s Mitternacht’ - was originally for a radio broadcast but got stolen by the Stasi and used as an implement of torture), plus the sleevenotes on the back are full of Dr Hanz Geschieden’s case notes after lead singer Rafe Brandgeruch was committed to the Zoo Station Asylum in early 1970.

 

‘Tanz Der Phallus’ completes the four live cuts with its anarchist/socio-political bent as Brandgeruch yells over the proto-punk psyche wall of sound about his love of commune life, space-folk wispiness and teabags. ‘’All proper tea is theft’’, he shrieks repetitively over the sprawling psychedelic mess of a free form improv song which gradually meanders its way to a close encompassing the sound of a Suzuki being canned. Essential krautrock. In fact, one of the most interesting of its genre.

 

 

Strip Jack Naked

Once upon a time there lived a vain Fat House DJ whose only worry in life was to play the most upfront minimal house tunes he could find. He changed his tunes almost every hour and loved to show them off to his people.

      Word of the Fat House DJ’s refined habits spread over his website forum and beyond. Two scoundrels who had heard of the Fat House DJ’s vanity decided to take advantage of it. They introduced themselves at the Introductions page of the forum with a scheme in mind.

      "We are two very good Re-edits Producers and after many years of research we have invented an extraordinary method to produce a tune so minimal and fine that it sounds like silence. As a matter of fact it is silent to anyone who is too stupid and incompetent to appreciate its quality."

      The website moderator heard the scoundrel's strange story and sent for the cynical forum member. The cynical forum member notified the longest serving forum member who ran to the Fat House DJ and disclosed the incredible news. The Fat House DJ’s curiosity got the better of him and he decided to PM the two scoundrels.

      "Besides being silent, your House Highness, this tune will be mixed in beats and patterns created especially for you." The Fat House DJ gave the two men a bag of Gak in exchange for their promise to begin working on the tune immediately.

      "Just tell us what you need to get started and we'll give it to you." The two scoundrels asked for a laptop, piles of unreleased CDR pressure, more Gak and then pretended to begin working. The Fat House DJ thought he had spent his money quite well: in addition to getting a new extraordinary tune, he would discover which of his fans were ignorant and incompetent. A few days later, he called the old and wise, longest serving forum member, who was considered by everyone as a man with common sense.

      "Go and see how the work is proceeding," the Fat House DJ told him, "and come back to let me know."

      The longest serving forum member was welcomed by the two scoundrels.

      "We're almost finished, but we need a lot more Gak. Here, Excellency! Admire the sound colors, feel the minimal-ness!" The old longest serving forum member bent over the mixer and tried to hear the tune that was not there. He felt cold sweat on his forehead.

      "I can't hear anything," he thought. "If I hear nothing, that means I'm stupid! Or, worse, incompetent!" If the longest serving forum member admitted that he didn't hear anything, he would be discharged from the website.

      "What a marvelous minimal sound, he said then.”I'll certainly tell the Fat House DJ." The two scoundrels rubbed their hands gleefully. They had almost made it. More Gak was requested to finish the work.

      Finally, the Fat House DJ received the announcement that the two Re-edit DJ’s had come to preview the minimal house tune .

      "Come in," the Fat House DJ ordered. Even as they bowed, the two scoundrels pretended to be listening to the new tune.

      "Here it is your royal House Highness, the result of our labour," the scoundrels said. "We have worked night and day but, at last, the most beautiful minimal house tune in the world is ready for you. Listen to the beats and feel how fine they are." Of course the Fat House DJ did not hear any beats and could not feel anything like ‘House’. He panicked and felt like fainting. But luckily the computer chair was right behind him and he sat down. But when he realized that no one could know that he did not hear the tune, he felt better. Nobody could find out he was stupid and incompetent. And the Fat House DJ didn't know that everybody else around him thought and did the very same thing.

      The farce continued as the two scoundrels had foreseen it. Once they had taken the CDR out of the laptop, the two began cutting the air with their hands while hovering over the keyboard with their invisible re-editing skills.

      "Your House Highness, you'll have to take all your tunes out of your box to try and listen to the new one." The two scoundrels dropped the new tune into his player again and then held up their hands. The Fat House DJ was embarrassed but since none of his bystanders were, he felt relieved.

      "Yes, this is a beautiful tune and it sounds very good to me," the Fat House DJ said trying to look comfortable. "You've done a fine job."

      "Your House Majesty," the longest serving forum member said, "we have a request for you. The people have found out about this extraordinary tune and they are anxious to hear you play it in a club." The Fat House DJ was doubtful playing his silent tune to the people, but then he abandoned his fears. After all, no one would know about it except the ignorant and the incompetent.

      "All right," he said. "I will grant the people this privilege." He summoned his driver and a ceremonial parade to the club was formed.

A group of house fans stood at the very front of the decks in the club and anxiously scrutinized the faces of the people on the dancefloor. All the people had gathered in the main room, pushing and shoving to get a better listen. An applause welcomed the regal Fat House master. Everyone wanted to know how stupid or incompetent his or her neighbor was but, as the Fat House DJ span his new tune, a strange murmur rose from the crowd.  

      Everyone said, loud enough for the others to hear: "Check out the Fat House DJs new minimal tune. It’s beautiful!"

      "What a marvelous piece!"

      "And the beats! The beats of that beautiful Fabric type club tune! I have never heard anything like it in my life!" They all tried to conceal their disappointment at not being able to hear the tune, and since nobody was willing to admit his own stupidity and incompetence, they all behaved as the two scoundrels had predicted.

      A lad in the cloakroom, however, who had no important job and could only hear things which his ears reported to him, went up to the decks.

      "The Fat House DJ is playing nothing," he said.

      "Fool!" his boss reprimanded, running after him. "Don't talk nonsense!" He grabbed the lad’s arm and took him away. But the lad's remark, which had been heard by the bystanders, was repeated over and over again until everyone cried:

      "The cloakroom lad is right! The Fat House DJ is playing nothing! It's true!"

      The Fat House DJ realized that the people were right but could not admit to that. He though it better to continue the tune under the illusion that anyone who couldn't hear it was either stupid or incompetent. And he stood stiffly behind the decks, while behind him forum members held their hands in the air to the imaginary minimal house tune.