Most bands would kill for a riff like this. Maybe Eska did, or maybe they’ve sold their souls but if so, damn, it was worth it. I first heard this song a couple of years ago and was staggered by it and, with only one more hearing a few days later, it was firmly stuck in my memory. When I got this record I placed it on my turntable and hoped beyond hope that it would be this song. When it was it seemed too good to be true. Any other band with this riff would just revel in it for about 20 minutes but not Eska, oh no. Start with one guitar and some clattering drums and then bring on the duelling. Then they’re up to their tricks, dropping the riff for twisting turns of ponderous vocals and dreamy picking which you know they’re partly doing so they can drag..it…out….and…..then…..BLAM! Then why not ditch the riff completely for a bit of utterly joyful guitarwork coupled by echoing drums with Colin hollering just that perfect distance from the mic before the guitars cut back in and out quicker than you can keep up. It’s dizzying and utterly marvellous. Still the most underrated band in Scotland but this is my favourite record of the year and I haven’t even managed to turn it over yet*.

Part of the Gringo Singles Club
www.gringorecords.com

*Apologies to New Radiant Storm King who have the unenviable task of sharing this piece of vinyl.

For some inexplicable reason (Simon forgot), we haven’t linked up Dave Stockwell’s hilarious column about the Metallica documentary. I went to see it myself last night surrounded by metal fans wearing band tshirts and enjoyed myself tremendously. I was hoping the Metallica fans were going to start headbanging or screendiving but sadly not. I wonder how much they enjoyed watching the band look like total idiots. Maybe I should have hung back and eavesdropped but I was too busy trying to stop smirking.

There’s not much I can add to Dave’s review – he does cover all the greatest bits. My favourite was when their manager told them that if they didn’t do the crappy ‘Hi, we’re Metallica!’ things for a radio station then basically their next album would be boycotted by everyone in the world and they would become bankrupt IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT? so they immediately gave in and then wrote a song about how unfair it all is. I was half convinced there would be a segment later on where they admitted they were only kidding and none of these songs ended up on the actual album but no, they were serious. Marvellous.

You might also have missed Jon Goodwin’s Guide To Leeds, the first in our new series of Talentspotter Towns. If you’d like to write about the best bands, labels, venues and stuff in your town then let us know and we might let you.

I have been forgetting to post about the films I have seen of late. Sadly no Trailerwatch as there has been nothing very interesting being shown (other than THE WORST TRAILER EVER, for L4Y3R CAK3 or however the hell they’re spelling it, which I have erased from my memory).

So, films. A couple of weeks back we rushed to the cinema to see OPEN WATER and were astonished to see how popular it was. Okay, we went on Friday night but it was in the big big room and still sold out. I thought we were the only people who cared enough about ridiculous shark movies but maybe not. The story, in case you’ve been abandoned in the middle of the ocean for a while, aha ha, is the (based on a) TRUE STORY of a couple who go diving and get forgotten about and are thus stuck in the middle of the ocean for two days while some sharks consider eating them, OH NO. All shot lo-fi for that realistic home video feel and with real live sharks and none of those fake or digital sharks (boo). It all trundled along interestingly enough for the first bit where nothing much really happened and even once they got to the abandonment in the sea bit, it continued to be quite mundane rather than ACTION and DRAMA, which was good and unexpected and realistic. In fact, the whole thing was much better than I expected except for the most important bit – the sharks! I guess understandable since they were real sharks but there wasn’t really much shark action at all. No sharks jumping out of the screen at you or biting chunks out of people. Instead there was just the sudden fin above water to make you jump and some footage of the sharks underwater. We soon realised that lots of people are scared stiff of sharks as half the audience would shriek or gasp in horror whenever any shark appeared on screen, whatever it looked like or was doing. This was most amusing when a group of people gasped in horror as footage of A LARGE TROPICAL FISH was shown. Scary. The ending was strangely ambiguous as well, or maybe I just wasn’t paying attention. So, aye, worst shark movie ever. Although it’s difficult to beat the wonder that is Deep Blue Sea, that’s for sure.

The other film I saw recently was HERO which is one of those Chinese “wire-fu” martial arts movies with ponderous historical themes. Like, yes, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Sure, if you hated CTHD you’re not going to like Hero but I didn’t find them that similar as Hero seems much smaller, shorter and down to earth though lacking some of the humour and vastness. Hero tells the story of a plot to kill the king by a group of assassins and each part of the story is re-told as the hero and the king have a kind of battle of wills and work out the truth. I didn’t really make the connections at the time but each telling is colour coded with different colours for truth, fiction and perceived truth and the acting often seems to mirror this, with the fictitious scenes seeming slightly over-acted and the true ones having much more depth of feeling. There’s also the usual beautiful fighing scenes in a variety of fantastical locations including the surface of a lake and the rooftop of a building with thousands of arrows flying around. My favourite scene was the fight in an autumnal forest, the ground strewn with leaves that whirled about through the battle and you see the scene through the dying eyes of one character, the orange trees, slowly fading red. I nearly cried, it was so lovely. The story does drag a bit in places and the political parts grate a little but it’s short enough that it doesn’t matter too much.

Commentators! Recommend me some films that I would like of a similar type to Hero/CTHD/Spirited Away/Princess Mononoke etc etc. – historical, fighting, looks amazing. Cutesy monsters a bonus.

1. I got the new issue of Plan B yesterday and it’s ten times better than the last issue (except for the lack of a fantastic Andrew Clare cover) and and about 50 times better than CTCL. The layout now no longer looks like a slight CTCL update and neither does too much of the content. As well as the full length articles and lovely photos and illustrations there’s now lots of smaller chunks of text and little things to read which makes it seem much less daunting and much more accessible. I like a lot.

2. A downloadable trailer for the new Miyazaki film, Howl’s Moving Castle (more info at Nausicaa, as always). It is indeed a moving castle and it all looks very very Miyazaki right down to the cute little flame monster at the beginning. I am already excited, even though it’s not even out in Japan until November.

I went to see Sonic Youth last night and they were great! Despite having borrowed my first Sonic Youth album in about 1990 (EVOL from Elgin Library, if you’re interested), I never got the chance to see them live until the disaster that was ATP2000. So I was very very very excited to get a chance to see them play a proper set.

Due to the Barrowlands usual early doors nonsense, I arrived to find Decaer Pinga finishing off their set. It was certainly intriguing and fun to see about 6 people onstage at the Barras making layered drones with tape recorders, clicky things, dansettes and things with lots of knobs to fiddle with. There was an element of the audience who were not impressed but either the majority were enjoying it or that was a very loud sarcastic applause. I’m not sure if I liked it but I sure enjoyed it.

As soon as they left, two tiny Japanese girls ran about on stage setting up some drums and then reappeared 10 minutes later dressed in identical red outfits with mini skirts and tinsel and proceeded to yelp and squeal and batter the hell out of their drums and guitar, respectively. They were Afri Rampo and the whole audience was bewitched with adoration immediately. I’ve never seen a band having so much fun, running around, standing on the drums and beaming with sheer happiness. If they were playing on a trampoline under a shower of glitter and sweets they still couldn’t have looked happier.

And then it were time for Sonic Youth. Due to the No Pit Access rule, I was unable to take any photos ‘cos of my smallness, so I wandered over to my usual spot, a slightly raised bit beside the stage door. Means I also got to see SY up close and Kim is smaller then I expected and Thurston really does look like a stretched, aged toddler.

But, aye, Sonic Youth were awesome. Almost entirely stuff from the most recent couple of albums with lots from Sonic Nurse which suits me as that’s what I’ve been listening to a lot. And it all sounded great – lots of pop tunes and big swathes of noise mentalism. Thurston was running around like mad, rubbing his guitar up against speakers and bouncers and his own head, and even licking the strings. Mmm. Kim was looking amazing in a glittery black dress, ditching the guitars for a few songs to just sing and shimmy. And Lee looks like someone’s dad wandered on stage but his songs were two of my favourites of the night.

See this thread at Plan B for some ace photos taken by my mate Mark who is much taller than me.

Thanks Sonic Youth for not being terrible again! We’ll call this slightly in your favour. Next good set and I’ll stop moaning about ATP2000. Deal?

Dear Mr Revels

I never thought I’d see the day when I would be writing a letter about my disappointment with Revels but it seems that day has arrived.

Yesterday I purchased a packet of Revels drawn in by the excitement surrounding your ‘new sweet’ revelations. The whole idea had given me days of thought before I even bought a packet. What would the new sweet be? And, more importantly, what sweet was being ditched to make room? My money was on the peanut. A certainty, I thought, what with the growing problem of nut allergies. The new sweet gave me more difficulty. I was hoping for coconut but knew it was unlikely since it probably has nut allergy problems itself and of course the public’s dislike of coconut in sweets, the fools. Almost as annoying as the general public’s abhorrence of liquorice (liquorice-free Liquorice Allsorts, I ask you!). Maybe a mint cream, I pondered.

So you can imagine my excitement upon receipt of an actual packet, tantalising me with question marks and promises of NEW SWEET! A rummage around and it seemed my peanut guess had been correct, there being no telltale peanut shaped sweets. I soon munched my way through the rest of the packet, each sweet providing a checklist of all the old favourites present and correct.

And then the packet was finished. AND WHERE WAS MY ‘NEW SWEET’? There was none, unless you have invented the magical invisible sweet.

Your packet clearly states the inclusion of a new sweet and this was not the case with my packet. I have no answer to my questions, no knowledge of this new sweet. When will I ever sleep again?

Yours in disappointment

Marceline Smith

PS. If you’re ever stuck for an advertising slogan feel free to use mine from a few years back: “Like a crap box of chocolates”.

PPS. The addition of raisins to the ingredients list kind of gives it away, doesn’t it?

I’ve just bought the NME in order to get an exclusive Hood track featured on the cover CD (put together by Domino). It feels rather like I have wandered into an alternate reality. All the more so after reading the NME editor’s suckup tribute to independent labels (the irony almost made me laugh out loud). Hood track is marvellous though. Hurry up with album please (which the NME will no doubt ignore).

Very interesting article on The Morning News today, a Roundtable discussion with a group of MP3 Bloggers. I haven’t gotten round to investigating audio blogs but after reading this, I may have to find some time. I’m finding it more and more difficult to discover new music that isn’t made by people I know since all the music magazines went crap (cue Plan B etc) so time to browse some of the current music and audio blogs and see who’s writing about exciting stuff. Hopefully the links menu on the left will gain from this too. Any suggestions of good blogs please stick them in the comment box.

I got some nice things in the post the other day from Alistair of Tangents/Unpopular fame. Some nice looking records (which obviously I haven’t listened to yet) and some badges but best of all was some little A5 photozines. Simply done with stamped sugar paper covers and nice shiny paper inside they’re apparently a kind of photo diary, random unconnected photos of everyday scenes and things and people. They’re really nice detailed interesting photos though with lots of my favourite things – text, signs, graffiti, patterns – and kept me occupied for a 10 minute bus ride no bother. It’s also made me long once again for a digital camera. It’s all very well having a nice proper 35mm camera but you can’t stick it in your pocket when you go for a walk. Not to mention the waiting up to a year before I have the spare cash to get films developed. Anyway, the zines are £2 each so go spend some money.

Okay, diskant-related live event plugging time:

#1 – UTER and SUNNYVALE NOISE SUB-ELEMENT play together at The Buffalo Bar in London on August 21st in honour of our fancy new record that you’re sick of hearing about (the sooner you buy one, the sooner they’re all sold and we stop going on about it). Do come, it’ll be great.

#2 – The line-up for AUDIOSCOPE 04 has just been announced with our own Chris Summerlin playing with headliner Damo Suzuki, diskant faves Cat on Form, Youthmovie Soundtrack Strategies and Sunnyvale and those OXES fools being only a few of the great bands on offer. Be there! I will be.

Some new links I have added that you may not have noticed:

Oxfordbands weblog: You might think a blog on a local music website would be cliquey and bitchy and very boring for outsiders but this is looking rather good, and not just because our own Stuart Fowkes actually blogs there (rather than just pretending to as he does here). Nice way to find out about some new bands as well. If only every town had one of these. I’m sure if Glasgow did it would quickly disintegrate into Mogwai/Franz Ferdinand abuse central so well done Oxford!

Guardian Gamesblog: I’m fairly impressed that the Guardian considers gaming to be of such current importance that it deserves a whole blog. What with this, the online blog and the Music and Food monthly magazines, the Guardian is quickly becoming my best work timewaster. It’s also got Aleks whatshername what used to be on Bitz writing for it, sad geek boys. I await her reports from the Edinburgh Games Festival with some interest to see if it’s worth going this year. Last year we just waited 20 minutes to throw some pigs around in Wind Waker and then sneered at the N-Gage.

JGram World: You may know Jason from his columns here at diskant or his marvellous No Pictures zine but he now also has a weblog where you can learn more than you ever thought you wanted to know about him. It’s better than Eastenders! Hopefully Jason will be blogging here soon too.

also worth a look for sure is our Asking For Things blog where we’re getting everyone who bought our record to tell us about the random object they got in their box. I’m really enjoying it so far.