Lock The Taskbar

I don't suppose I'm the first person to mention this,  but whenever I see the 'Lock the taskbar' option in Windows, the chorus of the Clash song Rock The Casbah comes into my head. And then won't go away again. Worse still, I never really liked that song anyway.

Quarter-Decent Three-Chord Knobheads

In an amusing diatribe on his blog, Robbie Williams lists the 'quarter-decent three-chord knobheads' who got record deals at the height of Britpop. Amusing not least for his choice turns of phrase, it's bizarre to see some of the lesser-known names he included. Given the furore surrounding this rant in the national press, it's probably more publicity than some of these bands ever got at the time (outside of the pages of the NME). There are some good bands on there, or at least some bands who did a couple of era-defining songs, however he might have a point about a few of the names mentioned...

There's a spotify playlist below featuring most of these 'knobheads'.

Guitarslinger

A twitter conversation between Low (@lowtheband) and Woodpigeon (@woodpigeontweet).

Jason Molina 1973-2013

Long dark blues,
farewell transmission,
long dark blues,
listen,
long dark blues,
listen,
long dark blues,
listen,
long dark blues,
listen.

Magnolia Electric Co. on the Garden Stage at the End Of The Road festival in 2009.

Update: Most music Jason Molina did is available for a short while streaming and to buy on bandcamp.

Yo La Tengo Set 2013

Set list sites - to see or not to see, that is the question?

I'm off to see Yo La Tengo this week, and although I know several albums I can't claim to know their entire back catalogue. So I decided to check the set lists for recent gigs.

It's not something I normally do, and isn't always an option. Only bands of a certain level have a fanbase big enough to number amongst them the type of fan who not only notes down the set list (or grabs one from the stage at the end of the show) but also uploads it to one of the setlist-sharing sites. That's not a criticism, I've done it myself before. I guess Yo La Tengo are in that level, they're certainly one of those bands with a loyal and broad fan base.

Anyway I don't normally check the current tour setlist of bands I'm about to see but in cases like these I like to see what oldies they might be playing alongside the new album to see if I know the tracks.

Checking the last few European dates only, they have played a total of 55 different songs at the last 7 gigs! And that's not including the three or four differing covers played as the encore each night. And counting for the fact that 8 or 9 songs from the new album Fade always feature, that's a lot of extra variety.

This is good news for me, I'd rather watch a band playing a varied an unpredictable set than one rolling out the same old songs. (One time I saw them was the Freewheelin' tour when they played the first half according to audience requests.) The only downside of this approach is that your favourite song might be featured one night but not the night you go, but them's the breaks.

Here a spotify playlist of all 55 songs (and link), followed by a song list. If nothing else it gives a quick overview of popular songs (amongst the band themselves at least) from their oeuvre. [I had to use a fancy pretentious word like that in my first post]. The set lists are here, March 6th 2013 onwards for seven or so gigs.

Update: the playlist now contains 63 songs, up to and including the London show.