Ca Plane Pour Nous

Plastic Bertrand's birthday, apparently, and we celebrate with a visit to the show from seasoned veteran Dave Russell, whose energetic performance would put many a younger man to shame. He has an excellent album out on Sexton Ming's Rim Records, but really has to be seen and heard live to be fully appreciated. Cheers Dave!


Brighton's Shrag played live too, sounding somewhere betwixt Sonic Youth and the B-52's, and causing a certain amount of heat under the collar of our hormonal young engineering crew. Anthony and Rich from the Xerox Teens also popped in to talk about their Resonance fundraising gig in Clapham next Saturday, in which they will be performing the backing music for a troupe of dancing dogs.

And here's Nostalgie Ya Mboka's Vince, who is younger than Plastic Bertrand

Anti-pasti folk

A particularly lively Hello Goodbye this week with no less than 4 live acts. First up was Devon's Uke Stanza with a brace of songs: one about the death wish of the pheasant and the other about naked waltzing. Did I mention that he was from Devon? Taking time off from pulling pints of Adnams in the Gladstone, Dan Orcese also played a couple of songs, with his reference points being much more urban - I think his song about Hackney Downs should have been called 'Hackney Downs Syndrome' but on reflection, it is perhaps a little tasteless. Glastonbury's Flipron gave us three excellent songs too - a very fine band with a most charming frontman called Jessie, who sports a splendid pair of sideburns - always a sign of a man of good character. Last but not least, The Irrrepressibles returned to the show in a slightly reduced form of their new expanded line-up, with Jamie's voice in astonishing fettle as ever. Sadly I didn't get a picture of them as we were so crammed in to the control room I couldn't nip down to the live room to take any snaps.
On to the 12 Bar in the evening for the Anti Folk Winter Festival. I'm not too sure quite what anti-folk is, but a good night was had by all, with Jesus Licks in particularly fine form. I was most impressed with Dom's ability to sing and play the flute almost simultaneously. Looking forward to seeing them again at Madam Jo Jo's on 14th March for the Resonance fundraising do. Thee Intolerable Kidd (seen here with King on drums) was another highlight of the anti-folk night and though I say so myself, the deXter Bentley performance was none too shabby either. An honourable mention should be made here to Richard's 'Woody from Toy Story' outfit, alas not captured on camera.
While writing this entry I have been listening to Dave Cloud's 'Fantastic Rage', a song to suit all moods.

Hair of the Sea Dogs

Shelly's birthday celebrations started on Thursday in a civilised enough vein with a preview of Michel Gondry's 'The Science of Sleep', which was followed by a Q & A with the charming Frenchman. I wanted to ask him who was the better drummer between him and Gael Garcia Bernal but the audience was full of film students with far less interesting questions. Anyhoo, the film's well worth seeing, with great performances from Bernal and Charlotte Gainsbourg, though not as good as 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind', which we watched again on DVD last night in homage to Gondry.
Friday night saw things get more raucous with deformed eggs and copious amounts of red wine being consumed, mostly by me, it would appear. Anyway, cue drunken renditions of Nick Cave and Jacques Brel songs with ham-fisted guitar accompaniment, but much harmless fun was had by all and sundry.

This all meant of course that Saturday morning saw me nursing a particularly ferocious hangover: possibly not the best state in which to be co-presenting a radio show.


Usually our engineer Michael is on hangover duty, but he wasn't in this week, probably due to not having a hangover, so it was clearly my turn.


Fortunately Woodcraft Folk were in session, playing some very soothing music, including a very relaxing version of the Fall's 'English Scheme'.


Captain Blood Blood and the Sea Dogs were noisier but I can forgive them since they were also highly entertaining. If there was any justice in the world these lads would be riding high in the popular music charts instead of the indie schmindie fops polluting the hearts and minds of our young people these days.

Sang douce

Just got back from my six-monthly diabetic MOT at the gloomy obelisk that is Guy's hospital. Been struggling to get my blood sugar readings below double figures since they took a hike over Xmas, so was bracing myself for being told time it was time to go on to insulin: my HbA1c (3 month average) is 8, so a little over the level they'd like it be, and higher than it has been previously.

I see a different doctor every time I'm there, so never know quite what, or who to expect. Fortunately this time it wasn't the clinically depressed Irishman struggling to operate his computer who I saw last year, but a much more personable endocrinologist. She didn't seem too alarmed by the readings and suggested that instead of insulin, I try metformin, which comes in tablet form and helps the body to make better use of the insulin it produces - it's usually prescribed for Type 2 'betics, who are insulin resistant rather than insulin deficient. So that's two more tablets for me to take every day, but at least it means I now qualify for free prescriptions.

The doctor also warned me that the tablets may cause diarrhoea, so instead of injecting needles I could be shitting through the eye of one. Stay tuned for further developments!

Dillon Sticks Bronsteins Bib

Another day of quality music courtesy of Hello Goodbye. Sandy Dillon dropped in to the show for a quick half hour of songs from her excellent new album, accompanied by a wonderful vintage casio keyboard and a small unnamed string instrument possibly of Vietnamese origin. She's a true survivor and spoke cheerfully of death, cancer and the horrific effects of MRSA. Hopefully she'll be back on the show again soon with her whole band. We also had a great session from Brighton duo The Sticks, who went on to give a superb performance at the Betsey Trotwood last night, along with The wondrous Bronsteins, who had to contend with a drunk (no, not me) in the audience testing everyone's tolerance levels of twattery to the limit.

He'd been taken home by his embarrassed girlfriend by the time the mighty Bib took to the stage, which was a shame in a way, as I'm sure Duncan would have had some fun with him. Readers in Australia will be disappointed to learn that '24 Hour Supermarket' no longer features in their set, but they were nonetheless on fire last night, with Duncan's Ian Curtis dancing getting more and more impressive with every show. Add to this the fact that he was clearly in pain, putting out an appeal for some Lockets a couple of songs in, and you realise what a consumate performer the man is. Yes miss!