Summer Solstice

Richard got into the spirit of all it at the Half Moon with a frankly sinister Morris Man outfit. Excellent sets from Le Shark and The Pepper Cake Melody Orchestra, with a terrific late night oompah version of 'Wipeout'. Me and T-Lo were on the decks as well as making a cameo appearance in the deXter Bentley set with some twin monophonic analogue synth droning to accompany 'Fishtank'. Which was nice.
Knalpot (which is an old Dutch word for exhaust-pipe) put in a top session performance on Saturday's show along with the mighty TV Smith, with me and Richard chiming in on the backing vocals for 'It's Warming Up'. Spent the rest of the afternoon at the Moat, finally putting the Crops recordings to bed - we hope to have the album out in September...stand by for more news!
We adjourned to the pub for a celebratory drink - David was driving, so he only had a small one.

The fruits of Marxism

Pay no attention to the man in the ginger beard...Someone occasionally leaves bananas at the bottom of the stairs to our flats, presumably as some sort of offering. But to whom? By strange coincidence, following a spot of trouble at mill, I decided to make a pilgrimage to Karl Marx's tomb in Highgate. There I found that someone (else, presumably) had left some oranges for the father of Communism. Could there be a connection? I shall keep my eyes peeled (I thank you) for more fruity offerings. I'm not too sure what significance the tissues had but for some reason Marx's statue kept putting me in mind of the Sean Connery film Zardoz, which wasn't helpful in keeping me in the requisite frame of mind for paying my respects to the great man (KM that is, not SC).

A bit of jiggery-pokey on the interweb reveals that the superbly named Caleb Pink, also interred at Highgate, was a pioneer American socialist and a friend of Walt Wjitman to boot. When not visiting graves of revolutionaries and pondering on fruit and massive stone heads, I found time to catch deXter Bentley play a very intimate show, featuring some great tambourine work from Mr Ravenscroft, at the Perseverance near Lisson Grove - a pub most aptly named as I went there two nights running, having got the date of the gig wrong first time round.

sierras, ovejas y calaveras

Caught up with Judge Ed again, along with Kate, T-Lo and SS, at the Malkmus Empire gig - a good old fashioned Crops night out but another strangely unsatisfying SM gig: it's really odd how someone whose albums are so top-notch just doesn't seem to cut the live mustard, but there you have it.
Oslo's Thingumajigsaw, on the other hand, are well worth seeing live, if today's marvellous session was anything to go by - the saw and the banjo are a very fine combination indeed and they do a great cover of Daniel Johnson's 'Walking the Cow'.
The calaveras are on a mural opposite a primary school in Lant Street, just down the road from top cantina, El Vergel.

Wet Dog,Ladyboys and Private Trousers

Been a bit lax on the blog of late so here's a quick catch up. Our old chums Wet Dog made an excellent session appearance on the show a couple of weeks ago accompanied by related outfit Private Trousers brandishing home-made instruments (check out the ukulele made from a baking tin!). We then zipped down to Brighton but despite the helpful signage didn't see any Ladyboys - unless Spratticus in a curly wig counts, which I suspect doesn't. Last week's show featured Skitanja and Brigid Power-Ryce.