album review: niagara and the hitmen – st. valentine’s day massacre

Up now over at RHUM.

new smashing pumpkins

Fair to say I’m not hating it so far… 43 more free tracks to come, allegedly.

album review – ramblin’ jack elliott – a stranger here

I’ve just posted a short review of A Stranger Here by Ramblin’ Jack Elliott over at Rhum: link.

free single from new dylan album

A track from Dylan’s new album Together Through Life, “Beyond Here Lies Nothin’”, is currently available from bobdylan.com.

You will be shocked to learn that I really like it.  It has a nice bass groove, great, free roaming…

album review – gomez – a new tide

A review of the new Gomez album, A New Tide by yours truly is up over at Rabbit Hole Urban Music.

Executive summary: I like it, but I miss the Good Old Days™.

Right this way if you’d like to…

listen to (and watch) new art brut

You may recall this rambling post about the new Art Brut album – if you have any interest, you can hear one of the new tracks here. They still have the signature Art Brut sound, although the production…

screwing your customers just makes sense

I thought this was an interesting little article about the present state of the music industry and where it’s heading.

In summary, the big labels know that people paying $30/album and $2/track for recorded music is not going to…

music listening preferences and intelligence

I really enjoyed “Music That Makes You Dumb“, an admittedly psuedo-scientific analysis of intelligence vs musical preferences.  Basically, one Virgil Griffith has assembled data on music taste based on U.S. college campuses, then compared that data with the…

some people tell me I got the blood of the land in my voice

For a while there, Bob Dylan seemed to be slowing down with age.  In his youth he was an album factory, cranking out 8 albums between 1962 and 1967, and 9 albums between 1969 and 1976.  But in (ahem) modern…

after the gold rush

I was lucky enough to see Neil Young at the Adelaide Big Day Out.  Erin and I photographed the day for Rhum.

Some of my Neil Young shots (click for bigger versions):

why?

I thought no-one could do a less appropriate cover of a great song than Scarlett.  I was so very wrong.

Edit: I like this description.  What the hell is with The Watchmen anyway?  So…

you’ll be hearing from me baby, long after i’m gone

So, Leonard Cohen.  What can I say?  It was incredible.  I was not ready for how amazing his voice is live.  Despite playing to a crowd of strangers in a far off place on a scorching hot day, his warmth…

leonard cohen

It was fabulous. More soon.

my wandering days are over

This is a good little article for anyone interested in Belle & Sebastian and, in particular, their earlier days. There is a focus on the first to B&S albums, Tigermilk and If You’re Feeling Sinister.

I tend to agree with…

DRM-free itunes music files are spying on you for the music industry

You may have read about how Apple, in its benevolence, is finally releasing its entire music catalogue in a digital rights management-free format – i.e., you can copy them freely as you see fit. Sounds great…