Dear oh dear. What has happened to diskant this past month, you must be wondering? Well, I have to say I am wondering that myself. There really has been no action through September so I haven’t bothered with a newsletter. I assume, like me, the rest of the diskant team have been caught up with other things. I am famously against our writers promoting their outside interests on the blog but for one week only it is being actively encouraged. Come on diskanteers, tell us about your upcoming gig, your new record, your new band, your annual charity all dayer (ahem). That is, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?

I will begin.

The main reason I have been neglecting diskant shamefully is in order to become An Artist. As you may or may not know, I make purses, brooches, stationery etc. under the name Asking For Trouble and I have been asked to be part of the Gifted exhibition at no less than The National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh! I was rather gobsmacked and have spent the last month feverishly sewing in my spare time (yes, I still work full time as well) to get my twenty purses all handstitched and delivered for this weekend. Anyway, if you are in the area please do come along and see the exhibition. It takes place from November 16th-January 6th and is free entry. More info on my website as I know it.

I also run an online shop for my crafts and, since I have neglected you, you can all have 10% off for the month of October. Just enter DISKANT at the checkout and you’ll get 10% off your order. I ship internationally and thanks to the wonder of internet postage I can get your order posted super fast. Why not get your Christmas shopping started early?

Lastly I am GOING TO JAPAN in two weeks, as everyone who knows me is sick of hearing. We have an itinerary as long as the distance from here to Tokyo and I really really cannnot wait.

So, how about you?

My CD player died last weekend. I say ‘died’ but I actually mean ‘ate a CD and lost it inside somewhere’ so more like committing suicide. It was a crappy £100 all in one stereo from my student days and the record button fell off one of the cassette decks about 6 years ago but still. I can still listen to vinyl and cassettes but the diskant review box isn’t exactly overflowing with those formats. At the same time, my iPod has started playing up and last night I had to do a restore on it which took a good half hour re-copying over my iTunes library.

So I figured I’d go for the whole shebang and deleted all the listening data from my Last.fm profile. I’ve been using Last.fm for years now and it lost all its shiny excitement a good six months ago as my overall listening charts were so unchanging, needing me to become totally obsessed with something for it even to make a dent. Not their fault, of course, but a fresh start might jumpstart my listening.

It’s all really made me so aware of how little I actually listen to music these days. I’m so absorbed in my neverending list of tasks that if I put music on, I don’t really hear it, or notice when it ends.

When I get back from Japan (four weeks til I go!) I am going to buy a real stereo, piece by piece, and set myself some musical challenges. After all, I still have 32 reviews to write for diskant by next March so something needs to happen.

Sorry diskant is so inactive at the moment. Looks like we all need a jumpstart. If you want to review some records, get in touch.

Rubbish band find bad review on diskant two months after it was posted and encourage their fans via Myspace to leave comments telling us we are idiots. Badly spelled hilarity ensues. Go see. I love the timing – HAPPY BIRTHDAY JGRAM!

Oh dear, I have been slacking with this. I’m afraid my computer time is still limited because of my RSI so where one thing gains, another loses. Which is my way of saying, LOOK, NEW THINGS. Well, our round-up article on Supersonic is now online. We all had a great time – the bands were great, the weather was perfect, the Custard Factory is an awesome venue and the cake was pretty grand too. Go and read all about it. Similar fun was also had at Hey You Get Off My Pavement in Glasgow the other week but sadly without the lovely weather. It was still great and you can read about that on the weblog.

Over on the Films blog, Simon has started posting up a series on our favourite film soundtracks complete with video of the films in question. If you’ve got a favourite film soundtrack do get in touch and tell him about it and we might feature yours.

If you’re really bored, come join us over on Facebook in the diskant rocks group where you can hang out with us, post photos, discuss things and do whatever else people do on the internet. Waste time basically. See you there!

Current listening: Robyn, Girls Aloud, Electrelane.

I keep meaning to mention this. If you are a member of hip new internet sensation™ Facebook, then come join us in the diskant rocks! group where you can talk to us and find out the latest happenings in diskant world. It’s almost as exciting as real life!

The actual latest happening in diskant world is that the Supersonic 2007 round-up article is now online for your reading pleasure. Who says Sundays are boring?

So, yesterday was Hey You Get Off My Pavement, the annual alldayer by the lovely folks at Mono. The concept: a festival-like atmosphere in the city centre with awesome local bands, shopping, the wonderful Monorail, vegan foods and of course plentiful alcohol. Your ideal Sunday in Glasgow really.

The reality included all of the above but with constant pouring rain. Normally this would kill off a festival but luckily this one is held in a courtyard with concrete underfoot and sheltered areas all round so it only dampened the enthusiasm a little. The line-up was pretty fantastic already and the secret surprise guests turned out to be Franz Ferdinand which made us all feel a bit smug. Yes, we may be standing around in the rain like losers but you’re missing a tiny gig by Franz Ferdinand.

Anyway, I was doing a little stall inside (thanks everyone who stopped by!) so I was nicely sheltered but also cut off from the bands. I did see bits of Dananananaykroyd (riotously fun as ever) and The Twilight Sad (one of those bands who definitely have something and will probably do well but just don’t hugely appeal to me. You know?). Sadly Part Chimp pulled out but De Salvo seemed to be doing a reasonable job at trying to break some sound barriers in their absence.

Once I had packed up my stall it was time for Franz Ferdinand and it was still pissing it down but we are from Glasgow so we had hoods and hats and umbrellas. I haven’t seen Franz play since way back at the beginning so I was quite looking forward to seeing them. And thus quite surprised to discover they were really dull. I kept thinking they were playing new songs but then I would slowly recognise them as album tracks played in a rather lacklustre manner. No hits and nothing much particularly exciting. Very disappointing.

I might have blamed it in some part on the rain or the sound but Errors were on after and sounded immense. They managed a bigger moshpit than Franz and in more rain as well. Errors have been playing all over the place recently and have quite obviously grown more confident in their talents. They may still look like they’ve wandered in off the street but they’ve lost a lot of their previous rabbit in the headlights nervousness, and their onstage banter is even almost decipherable. But none of that really matters when you have a synth that goes URRRRRRR and you play it very loudly alongside those chiming guitar lines and the relentless drumming. By the time they pulled out a glitched-up extended Mr Milk people were punching the air and dancing in the rain and Franz Ferdinand were all but forgotten.

I love Glasgow. I really do.

(I love Mono too. Thanks to everyone for such a fun day.)

I don’t normally post these types of things as I am always dubious of the whole ‘win free tickets by visiting our corporate sponsored website constantly” thing but I actually won some tickets so I will pass it on.

Hyperbolic press info below (“ground-breaking”, haha):

BECK’S FUSIONS
London, Dublin, Manchester, Glasgow. Art and music will unite.

This September four iconic centres across the UK and Ireland will host groundbreaking events fusing art and music. The Beck’s Fusions Experience, a unique touring audio-visual gallery commissioned by Beck’s and the ICA, will show continuous projections created by a selection of the most exciting and innovative artists and musicians working today. The Beck’s Fusions Experience will be open to the public free of charge and will be followed with the exclusive ticket only events.

Each Beck’s Fusions event will build towards a unique live performance from pioneering art and music talent including The Chemical Brothers, United Visual Artists, Calvin Harris and Novak 3D Disco among others who have been challenged to create inspiring and truly memorable experiences.

LONDON
Trafalgar Square, 6th – 8th September
Chemical Brothers & UVA
Calvin Harris & Novak 3D Disco
Erol Alkan – DJ Set

DUBLIN
Meeting House Square, Sunday 16th September
Calvin Harris & Novak 3D Disco

MANCHESTER
Urbis, Saturday 22nd September
Calvin Harris & Novak 3D Disco

GLASGOW
The Old Fruitmarket, Saturday 29th September
Calvin Harris, Errors & Novak 3D Disco

The daytime events are free to everyone. The evening things with the bands are all free tickets. You can win them on the website at www.becksfusions.com. Good luck!

I will be getting “the gang” together for a proper round-up article shortly but I think it’s fairly safe to say everyone had an awesome time. What a great place The Custard Factory is. Anyway, in the meantime you can look at our photos which should start turning up in the diskanteers Flickr group shortly. I’ve added a few of mine but typically all my photos are of Birmingham Botanic Gardens and the sky and not of bands or anything. Others will have that covered though, I’m sure.

I’d also like to thank Fate for sticking to just having a laugh with the weather and ignoring the more tempting possibilities offered by a) me flying on Friday 13th in what appeared to be a toy plane and b) me and Mogwai being on the same flight back to Glasgow. If there’s one way I don’t want to die, it’s in a plane crash with Mogwai. My obituary would pretty much write itself. Although if there’s any LOST-style shenanigans involved then having Mogwai around would probably be quite amusing.

(Adapted from Alistair at Unpopular)

Listening:

Japanese Survival phrase lessons from japanesepod101.com on my iPod. I got by okay in Japan last year but I could really do with knowing phrases like ‘sorry, I am a dullard’, ‘where the hell is this amazing shop I found on the internet?’, ‘can I have a metre of every fabric in your store please?’ and ‘what is this and should I really eat it?’ for when I go back in October. I’m finding it all very useful so far, especially for making use of my tedious bus journeys. Music-wise, I am still obsessed with the Kaput! promo mixes.

Reading:

Finally finished reading the last issue of Beard zine which was highly enjoyable. Lots of festival round-ups (ATP, Instal, Triptych, Green Man etc. etc.) and interviews with the likes of David Berman, Vashti Bunyan, Gay Against You and Dananananaykroyd plus cartoons and stuff. All great! Other than that, mostly books about Japan and crafting, and 17 million blogs.

Watching:

LOST! I have been having to rest my arm lately but I still hate most TV so I was finding it difficult until the amazing Greg Kitten sent me the last bunch of episodes from Season 3 to catch up on. And now I have started watching it all again from Season 1.

Anticipating:

Supersonic this weekend. Who’s all going? Also, JAPAN in October and, um, hmm.

Working on:

My new Asking For Trouble online shop (just launched – go see!), purses and things for the Miso Funky Market next Thursday in Glasgow, diskant redesign (still), Glasgow Craft Mafia launch event.

What are you doing?

TrocaBrahma 07 is a festival to celebrate the spirit of Brasil this summer with exclusive collaborations between established and emerging UK and Brasilian music talent including Bonde do Role & Radioclit/Amanda Blank, Gruff Rhys & Tony Da Gatorra, Fourtet & Open Field Church and Optimo & Os Mutantes. In May the UK acts visited Brasil to meet and collaborate with the artists in Brasil and this month they will meet again in the UK for events in London, Liverpool and Glasgow from July 26-29. Neil Mowat, one of the co-programmers told us some more about the event.

We’ve also got three pairs of tickets up for grabs so look out for that at the end of the interview.

What’s the whole idea behind TrocaBrahma?

TrocaBrahma is about offering different opportunities and new perspectives for both the audience and the artists involved. Brahma wanted to present a genuine alternative to the usual summer festival provision that would allow the artist and audience to have a bit of fun and produce something entirley new.

How did the artists choose who to collaborate with?

Gruff Rhys knew all about Tony Da Gatorra’s work and was very keen to work with him, this was also the case with Fourtet and Open Field Church, and Bonde Do Role with Radioclit and Amanda Blank. King Creosote wasn’t previously aware of Romulo Froes’ work but was really enthusiastic about how they could work together after listening to a number of different Brazilian artists. Optimo’s JD Twitch is a long time admirer of Os Mutantes and had been in touch with them previously, so we just facilitated a discussion between them. With Ben Westbeech and Tita Lima, Gilles Peterson advised us that he thought these artists would work well together, we approached them, and they agreed.

The artists have all now met up and worked together in Brazil. How did it go?

Nobody really knew what to expect as it was a new experience for everyone involved. It turned out brilliantly, a really intense week in Sao Paulo. All of the artists got straight into working together and developing new material for shows we had organised at the end of week. So a great mix of work and socialising for 6 or 7 days (which the Brazilians are exceptionally good at). Most of the artists contributed to blogs while we were there and there is video and audio from the week up on the blog site at trocabrahma.net.

What parts of the lineup are you most excited about?

It’s difficult to single out any part of the programme as all of the collaborations have turned out so well. All of the artists are doing full live sets as well as the new material so every night is packed with exceptional shows. However, I can’t wait to see incredibly rare performances by Os Mutantes, and the collaborations between Gruff Rhys and Tony Da Gattora, and King Creosote and Romulo Froes are going to be amazing.

Will this be a regular event?

Yes this is the second year this has happened and everybody has been so positive about it that we’re sure we’ll be doing it over the years ahead.

TrocaBrahma 07 runs through London, Liverpool and Glasgow from July
26-29. We have three pairs of tickets to the TrocaBrahma gig of your choice to give away: just mail info@trocabrahma.com with your choice of gig and choice of city – plus ‘Diskant Comp’ in the subject header – and the first three entrants will receive free tickets. For more info on this year’s event and artists, see www.trocabrahma.com.