Posts tagged Ted Leo

Ted Leo & The Pharmacists – Where Have All The Rude Boys Gone?

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3 years ago
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Ted Leo & The Pharmacists

If there is one man in music who certainly isn’t afraid to give you his opinion on just about everything, it’s . Whether it’s the political, the social or the artistic, he has a song about it, and it’s usually rather scathing. Where Have All The Rude Boys Gone laments the current popular music scene to generic pap, which while hardly a new argument, is always a good one. There’s a slight irony in it given all of Leo’s records tend to sound rather similar musically these days, but given that words are where his talents really are, I’ve give that a pass.

Mirror, mirror, on the wall, show me where them bombs will fall..

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4 years ago
in

Arcade FireI’ve managed to almost entirely avoid the hype surrounding ‘Neon Bible’. I didn’t download any of the leaks, and it was only a few days ago that I listened to ‘Black Mirror’ for the first time. Since then I’ve only heard one more song from the album. While I like both of them, for some reason I can’t seem to get myself excited about hearing the album as a whole. I suppose I had a similar problem with ‘Funeral’. I only really liked the ‘Neighborhood’ songs and didn’t much care for the rest. I’ll still probably end up picking it up once I find it in some bargain bin though. All of that said, I really like the song below. I’ve given up on trying to draw any deep meaning out of their songs, but the imagery is wonderful, and it’s all presented in a vaguely unsettling way. Is the rest of the album like this?

MP3 – Black Mirror (expired)

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Another Form of Relief favourites will be playing a rather unique gig on April 28. They, alongside fellow indiepop bands Slow Down Tallahassee and Tottie, will be playing as part of Indie Tracks in Ripley. The twist here is that the entire event is centred around the railway. Bands will be playing on the station platform, and between sets, an indie disco will be rocking on a 1950s steam train as it bolts through the countryside. You can get fuller details from the Indie Tracks Myspace.

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The Features are back after being dropped by their record label following their ‘Exhibit A’ album. I actually rather liked that album, although I never gave it quite as much atention as I should have done. ‘Contrast’ is the title song from their first self released EP, a jaunty little number that sets the tone for their newer sound. The EP itself is a collection of five songs that you can purchase for only $6 from their website.

MP3 The Features – Contrast (expired)

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Homo Eclectic has two songs from the upcoming full length album. ‘Kid Gloves’ is fantastic, and I think ‘Stephen’ will be a grower like ‘Soft & Warm’ was. This is probably the album I’m most excited about for this year.

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Ted Leo and the PharmacistsThe new and the Pharmacists record, ‘Living With The Living’, is released next week and would you believe it? Ted is still pissed at the state of the US. Like their previous ‘Shake the Sheets’, it’s another collection of powerful, lyrically direct rock songs. Which means while there is nothing unexpected here, it is another solid collection.

‘A Bottle of Buckie’, awkward sounding title aside, is one of Leo’s finest vocal performances yet, knowing perfectly when to jump from the restrained to the forceful. It’s a somewhat sweet song involving love in Glasgow, even if it’s a little weird to hear Leo of all people singing about Neds with their Burberry scarves.

MP3 Ted Leo and the Pharmacists – A Bottle of Buckie (expired)
MP3 Ted Leo and the Pharmacists – The Sons of Cain (expired)
MP3 Ted Leo and the Pharmacists – Bomb. Repeat. Bomb. (expired)

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I try to not post all that many Youtube videos, but I’m including the music video for ‘Thou Shalt Always Kill’ by below. I am doing this for two reasons:
1. It’s an absolutely fantastic song, but I can’t post an mp3 of it.
2. The video is a hell of a lot of fun.
Judging by the amount of play and acclaim this song seems to be getting, I have the feeling we could be looking at something huge here.

It’s been a month since we last did covers?

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5 years ago
in ,

Here I was thinking I’d be falling back on them every week.

It’s been a slow week here at Another Form of Relief, mostly because I’ve spent much of it working in London, which combined with the commute, severely limits my time and energy levels. Everything is back to normal now though a regular blogging schedule should once again resume.

MP3 – Since U Been Gone (expired) ()
There seems to be a lot of appreciation for the regular kind of pop music lately, and Kelly Clarkson seems to be at the forefront of this. Call me a jaded indie kid but I don’t get it all. It’s just generic pop music. Pretty shitty generic pop music at that. A strong singing voice in itself doesn’t equate to good music. This will just have to be one of those things that remains a mystery to me though. I don’t know whether Ted Leo was trying to be ironic or not in covering this one, but somehow it comes off rather well. Granted his high notes seem a little too high at times, but the rest of it all works well, from the powerful acoustic guitar through to the song suddenly diverting into a cover of The Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ ‘Maps’ halfway through. That you can move from Kelly Clarkson into The Yeah Yeah Yeahs so easily is more than just a little disturbing.

MP3 – I Touch Myself (live) (expired) ()
For those unfamiliar, The Bens is a supergroup consisting of , and . They released one EP back in 2004 and toured together a little, but that was it. This is something of a shame as they were actually really good. This cover is taken from a show in Sydney that was recorded for radio. For the most part it’s Folds and Lee playing off of each other, although Kweller does make it into the song at the end. This is the weekly cover where I’m not familiar with the original, so I can’t really tell you how it compares, but it somehow manages to be the perfect kind of song for these guys. A tad juvenile? Of course. A hell of a lot of fun? Most certainly.

MP3 – There Is A Light That Never Goes Out (expired) ()
Much as I can respect the influence that The Smiths have had over music as a whole, I’ve never really liked them very much. There’s nothing wrong with their music at all and the songs are good, but I’ve never found myself actually wanting to listen to The Smith, or Morrissey for that matter. That said, there are a handful of Smiths songs that I enjoy, and ‘There Is A Light That Never Goes Out’ is one of them. It also seems to be the most covered Smiths song, although most of them sound pretty awful. There’s a version by The Lucksmiths that I like though, even if it’s almost a note perfect copy of the original, and there’s this one by Nada Surf. I really like Nada Surf, even if their music sometimes wanders into the middle of the road. I’m not sure where this recording comes from, although from the quality I’d hazard a guess it’s from a live radio performance or something. Obviously if anyone can clarify where it does come from, the comment box is waiting below. As for the song itself, Matthew Caws doesn’t have the vocal power of Morrissey, but it doesn’t really matter with a song like this. Caws delivers the song as if he is incredibly weary and just wants to rest. He’s backed up by a nicely restrained guitar and some strings that soar, but never overwealm the other elements of the song. It’s not perfect, and the start seems a little bland, but once it gets going, it’s far better than it really has any right to be.

Where I foolishly combine politics and music

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5 years ago
in ,
I'm not political, but..

Anyone who knows me will know that I’m a very political person. As such, you can’t really expect me to not bring the topic up today. May 4 is local election day across much of the UK, with around 4,400 local council seats up for election across roughly a third of the country. If you are unsure whether or not your council is up for election, the BBC have a helpful guide.

Now it certainly isn’t my style to try and push my political beliefs onto you in any way. I’m not going to encourage you to vote for any one political party. I’d just like to encourage you to actually vote. If you want to vote Lib Dem, that’s awesome. If you want to vote Conservative, that’s ok too. Hell, if you want to vote Labour, despite some minor troubles, and can do so in good conscience, that’s your choice. Just don’t waste your opportunity. Have an opinion. Whatever it is.

MP3 Ted Leo & The Pharmacists – Criminal Piece

So, so long to all you “moderates”,
Yeah, it’s time for getting down.
Your peace and quiet is criminal,
While there’s injustice in your town.

Covers (I have no pun)

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5 years ago
in ,

It’s sunday and I’m not feeling particularly creative, which means you get a bunch of covers! There’s a certain irony that these posts I add when I’m feeling lazy seem to get more hits than ones where I’m actually trying, but we’ll overlook that little factor.

MP3 – BK Baby (expired) ()
This isn’t a strict cover as Ben has changed it round a little to fit himself. I don’t know if he still does this, but he always used to open his shows with this song, which is one hell of a way to get attention. It’s just him and acoustic guitar, rocking out as hard as he can, declaring who he is. Some of the words have been changed to make it decidedly uncool (“rollin’ in my grey Volvo”), which adds a nice irony given he’s about the last person to “rock the mic like a vandal”.

MP3 – I’m In Love With A Girl (expired) ()
Covering Big Star seems to be in thing to do these days (how many versions of Thirteen are there?) but you don’t hear this one done very often. It’s a tiny song that’s unapologetically positive to the point where it’d probably become nauseating if it ran a full four minutes. As it is though, it works perfectly. The Flops version doesn’t really add anything to the original, but it’s another way for me to push a little Trip Shakespeare / Matt Wilson love on here.

MP3 – Get Your Hands Off My Woman (expired) ()
Just about the strangest cover here, this was the last song in a set of covers that Folds offered up in his run of EPs before ‘Songs For Silverman’. For what it’s worth, I think that The Darkness are one of the most awful bands I have ever heard, and I think this song is pretty terrible. Folds can’t really do a great deal to recover it, but it’s certainly interesting to hear it turned into piano rock. There’s also something mildly fun about Folds bellowing “get your hands off my woman motherfucker” in the highest voice possible too.

MP3 – Dancing In The Dark (expired) ()
Ted Leo seems to like a good cover as much as I do (his ‘Since U Been Gone / Maps’ medley seemed to cause a small blog storm last year) and this is certainly a good choice for him. It seems somewhat bizarre that he would mellow the song considerably from the Springsteen one, reducing to just an acoustic guitar and restrained vocals. It works well though, and it suits Leo’s style pretty well.

Site stuff..

Honestly, the MC Lars report is coming, I’ve just been holding off a little to see if any pictures from the show turned up online as I didn’t take any myself. I’ve found some of the support act but none from the MC Lars set. I’ll give it until tonight and then just post anyway if nothing shows up.

I’ve got some ideas for a couple of new (semi) regular features in the works. The first is something similar to these cover posts where we look at great songs that are under two minutes in length. Seeing as these songs are often overlooked and I have a short attention span, this could be kind of fun. The second is something along the lines of 6Music’s “great lost albums”, where a great overlooked album is looked at retrospectively. I’d limit this to within the past ten years as that’s the music I know well. Pretty much the albums that bloggers would be jumping all over if they were released now, but are sadly unappreciated as it stands. I’m thinking of things like Enon’s ‘High Society’ or The American Analog Set’s ‘From Our Living Room To Yours’. Of course if anyone has any suggestions for albums that fit the criteria, feel free to leave them below.

Mix: The World Is A Mess, But Our Hair Is Perfect

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5 years ago
in

There is just about one thing that I find more interesting than music in this world: politics. Now I realise a ton of you have just written me off as being entire insane, but I can live with that. Nor do I particularly hide my politics, being a card carrying (literally) liberal of the (hopefully) non-loony variety. As such, it seemed fitting that the first mix I’d put together on here would be a combining of my politics into what I usually do here.

So in celebration of another glorious raping of our civil liberties that the public don’t give a shit about, Another Form of Relief is proud to present The World Is A Mess, But Our Hair Is Perfect. This is an updated edition of a mix I originally made last year, and seems depressingly more relevant than that. I know there’s a certain irony in most of the songs being by American bands about American issues, but god knows British bands aren’t getting political which would make this thing pretty damn short.

Note: This will only be available for a limited amount of time, so if you want any part of it, get it now, as I’ll be taking it down within a week of this post.

MP3 01 – – The Genocide Ball (expired)
MP3 02 – – Why Bother At All (expired)
MP3 03 – – This Damn Nation (expired)
MP3 04 – – Terror! (acoustic) (expired)
MP3 05 – & The Pharmacists – Counting Down The Hours (expired)
MP3 06 – – Sixteen Military Wives (expired)
MP3 07 – – All You Can Eat (expired)
MP3 08 – – Amber Waves (expired)
MP3 09 – – Celebration Guns (expired)
MP3 10 – – A Distorted Reality Is Now A Necessity To Be Free (expired)
MP3 11 – – Jerry Falwell Destroyed The Earth (expired)
MP3 12 – – Greater Omaha (expired)
MP3 13 – – Worlds Apart (expired)
MP3 Bonus – The Rakes – The World Was A Mess, But His Hair Was Perfect (expired)

The additional Rakes song doesn’t really fit the rest of the theme, but the title fits perfect and it’s a rather good song, so I thought I’d throw it in there. There’s an 18 minute version of it with a massively extended pub conversation, but that seemed a tad overbearing so I kept it to the shorter version.

I’m not sure how well it flows together, but I tried to assemble it the best I could so it had some sense of cohesion to it at all. I know it can be a little preachy at times, and this may grate for some people, but I like my music to actually have a message, and everything here certainly has one.

I’m going to try and put up some kind of new mixtape every fortnight, but seeing as I’m exceedingly lazy it’ll probably end up being every couple of months instead. Still, enjoy. Normal service will resume sometime tomorrow.

And until then, Good Weather For Air Strikes have a complete Belle & Sebastian concert up in awesome quality that is certainly worth your time.

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