Category Archives: North America

2012 ➤ Can this be the year Pulp and Jarvis start delivering classic reissues?

Posted on 23 Jan 2012 | Leave a comment
Jarvis Cocker, US tour, dates,Pulp, playlist, Spilt Milk,pop, Spain

National treasure: Jarvis Cocker on the road again this year with the original members of Pulp. Photographed by Shannon McClean

❚ ARE THEY MAD? They’re letting Jarvis Cocker into the States in April, with his Britpopping band who reunited last year! Following those hugely popular festival dates in Europe, and several in the UK which re-established Jarvis as the single most credible face of indie pop, Pulp in the US kicks off April 11 at Radio City Music Hall, storms into two Coachellas, sidles over to San Francisco, and that’s not all… parachutes into Spain again in May, so get booking!

On top of which, the retro-obsessive site The Second Disc reports the historic background to remastered reissues on Feb 20 of Pulp’s first three albums on the Fire Records label, on which the band spent a tempestuous and frustrating decade into the 90s. The awesome and undeniably strange albums It (1983) and Freaks (1987) and Separations (1991-2) have been expanded to include a host of non-LP singles and B-sides. Fire claims: “They cover a staggering sonic range from the pastoral, acoustic sounds of It, to the darkly romantic Freaks and the disco-tinged Separations. They point to Jarvis Cocker’s varied sources of musical inspiration and show a band in the process of finding their own unique voice.”

Cocker’s exceptional and seeringly honest song-writing skills were finally endorsed when the distinguished literary house of Faber published his lyrics last year under the title Mother, Brother, Lover. Read more about his creative coming of age and view Jarvis in a video interview where he protests: “If I’m a national treasure, dust me off.”

Y SUS CONCIERTOS INCLUYEN ESPAÑA

➢ Pulp, confirmados para el festival murciano SOS 4.8 — Pulp estarán en el SOS 4.8 de Murcia. Sí señor. Finalmente era verdad. Tras semanas de rumores, un misterioso anuncio en su twitter en el que dejaban caer que habría más conciertos de Jarvis Cocker & co en 2012 tras su exitosa reunión el año pasado (actuación en el Primavera Sound incluida), y la confirmación de su presencia en Coachella, el festival murciano se ha llevado el gato al agua en cuanto a fechas en España… / El informe siguió en crazyminds

Jarvis Cocker, US tour, dates,Pulp, playlist, Spilt Milk,pop, Murcia,Berlin, Melt festival

Together last July at Berlin’s Melt festival: the original Pulp line-up fronted by Jarvis Cocker

➢ Jarvis Cocker creates a playlist
— Mm-mm, ten tunes chosen by Pulp frontman and sampled by Calum Sager — Spilt Milk exclusive

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SS12 ➤ Season of the “Anna Wintour Look”

Posted on 21 Jan 2012 | Leave a comment
Anna Wintour ,fashion,Layers & Swathes

The “Anna Wintour Look” according to Layers & Swathes

➢ Pertinent recent report at the anonymous stylist and trend forecaster’s blog, Layers & Swathes …

“ One thing that struck me immediately after reviewing the SS12 shows was how well suited the silhouettes were to Anna Wintour’s style. First, let’s look at some quintessential Anna looks: her skirt length always below her knee, her love of prints, her narrow waist… sound familiar? ”

There then follow some key SS12 looks that look “totally Wintoured” …
/ Continued at Layers & Swathes

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➤ Rolling Stone puts Ziggy on its cover but has nothing new to say about ‘How Bowie changed the world’

Posted on 18 Jan 2012 | Leave a comment

❚ THERE’S A BREATHLESS FOUR-PARAGRAPH teaser online at Rolling Stone magazine’s website in an attempt to sell the February 2 issue. It’s headlined How David Bowie Changed The World. Yet it promises nothing we haven’t read a million times before. Instead, try our own tribute on Bowie’s 65th birthday, linked further down this post.

Rolling Stone magazine, David Bowie,Bowie changed the world, Rise & Fall of Ziggy Stardust, glam-rock, Major Tom,We Can Be Heroes,Angie Bowie, New Romantics, Blitz Kids, Bowie's Bequest, ➢ Here’s the best Rolling Stone can find to say about Bowie:

“ He phoned Angela in London, asking for her help: witches intended for him to impregnate one during Walpurgis Night. He later said Satan was living in his indoor swimming pool. David needed an exorcism (“I really walked into other worlds,” he later said), and Angela got him one – though it was by way of a long-distance phone call. “David was never insane,” Angela wrote. “The really crazy stuff coincided precisely with his ingestion of enormous amounts of cocaine, alcohol and whatever other drugs.” In any event, the rite may have helped break Bowie’s fear of a fiend possessing him. “It was time to get out of this terrible lifestyle I’d put myself into, and get healthy,” he later said. “It was time to pull myself together ” … / Continued online at Rolling Stone

❏ Update Feb 8: Now this Bowie issue has reached the UK, Mikal Gilmore’s account of the Ziggy phenomenon proves a workmanlike retelling of the familiar, but is oh-so relentlessly downbeat. He even cites an alleged quotation from 1998: Bowie is supposed to have said that, “Without Iman, I’d have put my head in the oven by now”. It’s a cheap shot because the quote has never been attributed, so counts for nothing more than hearsay. Rolling Stone claims a circulation of 1.45m.

David Bowie, 65th birthday, New Romantics, Ziggy Stardust, glam-rock
➢ Here’s what Shapersofthe80s had to say on his recent birthday:

“ As a cultural lightning rod Bowie has bequeathed insights into the realm of the imagination. As a performer he has delivered a repertoire of life-skills through a cast of mythical personalities invented for himself as a popstar, from the self-destructive Ziggy Stardust and the amoral Thin White Duke, to his romanticised “Heroes” (his own quote marks added to emphasise self-awareness). Through their formative years, Bowie invited his acolytes to do A…. and B…. and C…. ” / Read on to discover what

➢ With 12 early videos, Shapersofthe80s asks where each of these turning points in Bowie’s career might otherwise have led him

➢ Try also Strange Fascination by David Buckley (2005) — “One of the most authoritative Bowie books you’re ever likely to read” (Mojo)

➢ The Complete David Bowie, by Nicholas Pegg (2011) — “I can’t imagine how this book could be better… the definitive read for Bowiephiles” (Uncut)

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➤ Record numbers visit Shapersofthe80s for the best Blitz Kid photos and eye-witness memories

Posted on 1 Jan 2012 | Leave a comment

Planets club in Piccadilly, 1981: George O’Dowd before he became Boy, his sidekick and future singer Marilyn, and fashion goddess Kim Bowen. Photographed by Shapersofthe80s

❚ 2011 WAS A BUMPER YEAR for Shapersofthe80s. Visits to this website have doubled year on year, to a total of 174,658 page views during 2011. Also during the past six months, views increased by 40% over the previous six months — driven substantially by our exclusive pictures of Steve Norman’s wedding, and by exploring the heritage which informs We Can Be Heroes, Graham Smith’s definitive new photobook about 80s clubbing.

Of all topic areas, inevitably Blitz Kids and New Romantics have attracted most visits — about 16,000 views in total. Nightclubbing in the 80s came third with 11,000. Discover why, inside at Why them? Why then?

Most popular popstars viewed here in 2011 …

Martin Kemp, Steve Norman, NYC,Axiom,fashion

Lexington Avenue 1981: A fashion shoot features Martin Kemp wearing Demob and Steve Norman wearing Pallium, along with local girls. Photographed © by David Spahn

1 — Spandau Ballet — Total page views include Tony Hadley’s international tour with John Keeble, Steve Norman’s wedding, Martin Kemp’s cinematic triumphs and Gary Kemp as cultural pundit, as each of the band members has been pursuing his own interests since their farewell performance in July 2010.

2 — Boy George whose rise and fall seems Greek in its tragedic possibilities.

3 — Duran Duran who have patiently rebuilt their credibility over the past year. (Of their total page views here, almost half came in one day, yesterday*)

4 — Paradise Point — Britain’s brightest new pop musicians who mysteriously vanished from the stage almost as soon as they had published one of the most seductive videos of the year [see below].

5 — Sade whose long-awaited world tour slaked her fans’ thirst and gave her a No 1 album on both sides of the Atlantic.

6 — George Michael — another 80s survivor whose vulnerability almost renders him indestructible.

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Steady attractions at Shapersofthe80s are the post about John Rutter’s royal wedding anthem, and historically important interviews with the painter David Hockney (1983) and with Beatle John Lennon (1966).

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* It is an astonishing statistical exception that yesterday proved our busiest day of the year thanks entirely to Duran Duran sharing on Facebook the link to our choice of the 10 most creative tribute videos celebrating their comeback. So, despite our having followed Duran’s world tour since their newest album was launched in 2010, almost as many fans visited in a single day as during the entire year to date.
❏ iPAD, TABLET & MOBILE USERS PLEASE NOTE — You may see only a tiny selection of items from this wide-ranging website about the 1980s, not chosen by the author. To access fuller background features and site index either click on “Standard view” or visit Shapersofthe80s.com on a desktop computer. ➢ Click here to visit a different random item every time you click

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2011 ➤ Other picky people’s year-ending Best Ofs in music of all styles

Posted on 31 Dec 2011 | Leave a comment

BEST ALBUMS OF 2011 AT ALLMEDIANY

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❏ AllMediaNY.com offers the next step in the evolution of modern journalism — “free media” — an outlet where journalists and readers together decide on what is newsworthy and what is not. Editor-in-Chief Drew Kolar says it was “a great year for real music”, sadly marred by the death of Amy Winehouse.

50 SEVENS THAT REALLY STRUCK ME AT DIS

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❏ At Drowned in Sound Wendy Roby whittles her year’s reviewing down to a top 50 “that really struck me”, starting at Africa Hitech’s Do U Really Wanna Fight, via Metronomy’s The Look and ending on Jamie Woon’s Lady Luck.

POPJUSTICE READER POLL’S BEST SINGLE

❏ Rihanna — We Found Love feat. Calvin Harris.

RUSTY EGAN: WHAT’S ON MY IPOD MIX

❏ An hour’s-worth of vintage sounds mixed by former Blitz Club deejay Rusty Egan: “Some lost classics here plus some bands born in the 80s that sound like they wrote and recorded the songs in the 80s.”

CHRIS SULLIVAN’S TEN BEST MUSIC
DOCUMENTARIES EVER

Great Day In Harlem,photography,Art Kane, Esquire ,jazz,Count Basie,documentary
❏ A Great Day In Harlem (1995) — “A must for any serious black music aficionado,” writes Zeitgeist-Meister Sullivan at RedBull.com. This documentary by Jean Bach tells the story of one summer’s day in 1958 when 57 musicians from jazz history met at 126th Street in Harlem to have their picture taken by Art Kane for Esquire magazine. Keen eyes will spot such greats as Horace Silver, Charles Mingus, Coleman Hawkins, Thelonious Monk, English-born Marian McPartland OBE, Sonny Rollins, Lester Young, Gerry Mulligan, Roy Eldridge, Dizzy Gillespie and Count Basie. Kane called it “the greatest picture of that era of musicians ever taken”.

KATY PERRY’S FIREWORK SHOCKER

❏ The video for Firework not only outraged British TV stations into censoring the gay kiss, but it then won Video of the Year at the MTV Video Music Awards. Result: the single remained in the UK charts for 58 weeks, way longer than in Billboard’s.

J J WHEELER’S JAZZ PICK

❏ A refreshing selection of five CDs and five gigs from 2011 offered at The Jazz Breakfast by a much-lauded British drummer/percussionist currently studying at the Royal Academy of Music after graduating from Birmingham Conservatoire. Listen to clips from his own quintet’s imminent album Unconventional at Soundcloud.

MUSIC BOOKS ROUND-UP

Nile Rodgers, books,Le Freak, Upside Down Story, disco, autobiography
❏ A broad survey of the year’s music books by the Evening Standard’s David Smyth reveals that in his collected lyrics Jarvis Cocker says “seeing a lyric in print is like watching the TV with the sound turned down: you’re only getting half the story”… Le Freak: An Upside Down Story of Family, Disco and Destiny gives us a tour of the fascinating life story of Nile Rodgers [pictured] — conceived when his mother was 13, raised by beatniks who’d have Thelonious Monk over, he joined the Black Panthers and jammed with Jimi Hendrix, all before he wrote a vast collection of mega-hits, virtually lived in Studio 54’s bathroom and produced Madonna and David Bowie.

LADY GAGA: GOOD THING, BAD THING?

❏ PopJustice’s 2011 In Review asks singer Will Young: As a notorious homosexual, did you feel empowered by Born This Way by Lady Gaga?
Will replies: “When it came on the radio I thought ‘She’s basically written this song for me’. Amazing. I actually think I shed a tear as I was driving up to Wales. I stopped at a petrol station and I thought ‘You know what, I don’t care what they think’ and I brought some pink bon bons. Normally I would just go for a Wispa.”

STEVE NORMAN’S HOTTEST DANCE VIDEO

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❏ Tightrope by Janelle Monáe feat. Big Boi — “Amazing. Here’s to a year to remember, like 1981 only better!” says Spandau’s sax player Steve Norman.

➢ Don’t miss: Other picky people’s year-ending
Best Ofs from fashion, TV, web and film

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