Keeping It Peel - a.c. acoustics #keepingitpeel

This will now go back in the cupboard for another year

Right then, last session, I think I've assaulted you enough for one day.
Back to Scotland for our final session, with a.c. acoustics. I'm never sure if that should be uppercase or lowercase, all one word, or with punctuation, so I've made a guess. They were a band that always threatened to bother the mainstream, but in the end never did. What they did do before splitting in 2003 was leave behind a quartet of cracking albums in the shape of Able Treasury, Victory Parts, Understanding Music and O.

Both Stunt Girl and I Messiah Am Jailer made it into the Festive Fifty in 1996 and 97 respectively. Both are ace songs.

a.c. acoustics - John Peel Session 03.03.2003
1. A Bell Of Love Rings Out For You
2. Hold
3. Clone Of Al Capone
4. 16.4.2010

Other than a quick round-up post to follow that's me done with the Keeping It Peel Posts for this year. Remember to swing by the Keeping It Peel website to see what others have been up to.

Keeping It Peel - Spiritualized #keepingitpeel

Nearly time to put away the wee Peel Session image for another year, only one more session to go after this one.

For this one I am once again kicking all pretense of being a Scottish music blog out the window to pick another of my favourite bands ever.
I was a latecomer to Spiritualized. Up until Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space I knew the name, but not much else. That album though was released a mere two days before my 18th birthday, and was promptly bought with birthday money, and listened to on repeat on the new stereo that my parents got me as a present for much of the summer, when I wasn't off enjoying the gap between school and university, and enjoying the novelty of legal being allowed to buy booze and 18 rated videos. A bit of working backwards whenever I had some spare cash filled in the gaps, going as far back as some of the Spacemen 3 stuff.

I've said it about a couple of albums today, but Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space is another one of those records that if you have ears, you should probably own. The irony of me becoming near addicted to a heavily drug themed album has never been lost on me either.

Spiritualized - Peel Session 07.01.1992
1. Angel Sigh
2. Feel So Sad
3. Smiles

Keeping It Peel - The Olivia Tremor Control #keepingitpeel

I'll likely not get an excuse to shoehorn The Olivia Tremor Control into the blog until this time next year, so what the heck, let's squeeze them in.

The Olivia Tremor Control are another one of those bands I hadn't thought about in ages, until a few months ago when I heard there was new material on the way. That sent me scurrying to listen to their back catalogue again for the first time in a long time, and wonder why I'd let them slip my mind so much. Dusk At Cubist Castle and Black Foliage are both cracking albums. The first new material from them, recent single The Game You Play Is In Your Head, Parts 1, 2 & 3 suggests that the band's return is no bad thing either.

The Olivia Tremor Control - John Peel Session 18.03.1997
1. I'm Not Feeling Human
2. Suite One
3. Suite Two
4. Untitled

Keeping It Peel - Lung Leg #keepingitpeel

Before I carry on, just a quick mention that Fresh Air Radio are having a Keeping It Peel celebration of their own. Assuming this posts at 8pm as scheduled they are just kicking off, and you can listen live here. Don't worry, you can go listen to that and come back here later, I won't mind.

It has mostly been white boys with guitars up till now, so before I get shouted at here's some, err, Scottish girls with guitars. They make an almighty noise, enjoy. As my pal Last Year's Girl might say "shouty girls FTW".

Lung Leg - John Peel Session 29.01.1995
1. Palmolive
2. Small Screen Queen
3. Lungleg
4. Edith Massey
5. Kung Fu On The Internet
6. Blah Blah Blah

Keeping It Peel - Dawn of the Replicants #keepingitpeel

Miss a chance to post a load of Dawn of the Replicants songs? Not a bloody chance!
Along with Dogs Die In Hot Cars, Dawn of the Replicants are one of my favourite Scottish bands starting with the letter D. Oh, and Deacon Blue obviously. Wait, De Rosa and Dananananaykroyd. There's more bands beginning with D than I thought there were when I wrote that sentence. Never mind, let's carry on.

Stealing a quote from elsewhere: "Swamp rock, pop, glam-rock, electro-girlie, jazz, doo-wop, nasty ass blues, hip hop, redneck and experimentalism,' is how Dawn of ... describe their music. But then their founder members used to be music journalists, so their love of genre-checking is forgivable. They're also right."

These days Paul Vickers can be found doing all sorts of stuff, on his own and sometimes with The Leg. Roger Simian is one half of The Bird and the Monkey. I've had them penciled in for a blog post for a while, which I will get to eventually, but in the meantime consider this a quick plug for them, visit their website for loads of stuff.

Four Peel Sessions, and one entry in the 1999 Festive Fifty. All the sessions, and one from Pluto Monkey, are available to download for free from the DotR website here, so I'll just pick a couple of songs from each to stick below.

Dawn of the Replicants - John Peel Session 12.08.1997
Diggin' Bear
Fatal Firework

Dawn of the Replicants - John Peel Session 28.04.1998
Skullcrusher
Windy Millar

Dawn of the Replicants - John Peel Session 25.04.1999
Candlefire
Fearless Vampire Hunters

Dawn of the Replicants - John Peel Session 17.10.2002
Rhinestone Cowboy
Rockefeller Center 1932

Keeping It Peel - ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead #keepingitpeel

We had a couple of Scots in a row there, so time to check in on some friends from across the pond again.
I've sort of lost track of ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead as time has gone on. I'll always pick up a new album they release, but often they get listened to a couple of times and forgotten about a bit. I do regularly go back to their first few though.
I have a weirdly vivid memory of buying the debut album, on vinyl, in the record shop that used to be downstairs in Flip in Glasgow, many years ago. I'd only heard Richter Scale Madness, and vaguely knew the name, but that song and that album cover were enough to inspire an impulse purchase. Not one I've regretted.

...And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead - John Peel Session 05.02.2002
1. Invocation
2. Another Morning Stoner
3. Baudelaire
4. Richter Scale Madness
5. Homage

Keeping It Peel - Biffy Clyro #keepingitpeel

How about something nice and quiet for you to have your dinner to? How about no.
I can generally take or leave Biffy, but the stuff at the start of their career is the more takeable, and Jaggy Snake is good stuff any way you dress it up. Suppose the second session track might fall into "topical" territory, but I didn't notice that till I was about hit hit "post" on the session. Fun cover version too.

Biffy Clyro - John Peel Session 22.01.2004
1. There's No Such Thing As A Jaggy Snake
2.Liberate The Illiterate (A Mong Among Mingers)
3. You Can Go Your Own Way
4. With Aplomb

Keeping It Peel - Teenage Fanclub #keepingitpeel

Best way to follow that last post, featuring one of my favourite bands? Do one with another of my favourite bands.

If you don't know who Teenage Fanclub are then get yourself to Google and/or a record shop right now. We'll wait for you to come back.

Bellshill's finest can do no wrong by me. The alarming part is that I was only 11 when this session happened. Goodness I feel old now.

Teenage Fanclub appeared twice in the 1990 Festive Fifty, and three times is the 1991 one.

Teenage Fanclub - John Peel Session 28.08.1990
1. God Knows It's True
2. So Far Gone
3. Alcoholiday
4. Long Hair

Keeping It Peel - The Afghan Whigs #keepingitpeel

Bored of this image yet? Tough luck, I'm not done.

Aye, we've pretty much tossed sticking with Scots well out the window for Keeping It Peel, letting me instead post bands that I wouldn't normally. To say that the Afghan Whigs are a favourite of mine is a bit of an understatement. Greg Dulli is pretty much a musical hero. He was the driving force behind the Afghan Whigs, the only musician other than Dave Grohl to play on the debut Foo Fighters album, faked being a Beatle along with Grohl, Thurston Moore and Mike Mills for the soundtrack to Backbeat, teamed with Mark Lanegan as The Gutter Twins, stuck out a couple of solo records, and can now be found heading up The Twilight Singers. To my ears he has never released a bad record. You can disagree, but be warned it may end in a fistfight.

The Afghan Whigs would often through a cover version or two into their live sets, and stick them on the b-sides of singles, so it seems fitting that this session has a pair of covers, Revenge by Patti Smith and Easily Persuaded by Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, along with two songs from Gentlemen, another one of those albums that anyone with ears should have a copy of. Actually, all girls should be issued with a copy of Gentlemen on their 13th birthday and sent to listen to it with the warning "this is men, stay away from them", teen pregnancy rates would plummet. I do personally like Black Love just a wee bit more though, it was my first Afghan Whigs album, so it claimed the spot in my heart before the others had a chance to.

Afghan Whigs - John Peel Session 22.02.1994
1. Revenge
2. Easily Persuaded
3. My Curse
4. What Jail Is Like

Keeping It Peel - Sultans of Ping F.C. #keepingitpeel

Another request this time, and one I can't refuse. Not only do I love the Sultans of Ping, but the request came from my big brother Ron, whose old copy of Casual Sex in the Ciniplex is pretty much the reason I was one of a handful of 14 years olds who knew all the words to Where's Me Jumper?
Every time an election comes around and people start talking about the party manifesto my mind stops paying attention, ignoring what anyone says, as everything is replaced by "I like a manifesto, put it to the test-o", and I'm gone for several minutes. I never know what is going on at elections, but I do enjoy myself.

Here you go then Ron, thanks for getting me into the Sultans and loads of other stuff, but I'm still delighted I dodged the Genesis bullet.

Sultans of Ping F.C. - John Peel Session 05.03.1992
1. He Thought I Was Your Best Friend
2. Give Him a Ball and a Yard of Grass
3. Karaoke Queen

Keeping It Peel - World of Twist #keepingitpeel

Time for a request. I don't really know much about World of Twist, but I stuck a call out on Twitter the other week asking if anyone had any sessions they'd like to see posted, and this was one of the ones asked for, so here it is. Service with a smile from Aye Tunes! Well, as close to a smile as you'll get out of my naturally grumpy looking face anyway.

World of Twist - Peel Session 25.06.1991
1.Untitled
2. St Bruno
3. Kick Out The Jams
4. Blackpool Tower

Keeping It Peel - Prolapse #keepingitpeel

Out of the two Peel Sessions recorded by Prolapse, and the two live broadcasts they did, do I have a full one to post? No.
Will this stop me rambling about Prolapse for a bit? No.

Prolapse came from Leicester, but had a member named "Scottish" Mick. Unlike Tiny Tim, or anyone who as ever called themselves "mad", this wasn't an ironic nickname. The second "Scottish" Mick Derrick opens his mouth it is obvious the name isn't a joke.

They are also a band I hadn't listened to in years until fairly recently, mainly due to having lost all the albums of theirs that I had. Some spare eMusic credits that had to be used up led to me buying debut album Pointless Walks To Dismal Places again to see if I still liked it. I did, a shopping spree followed, and I've been a wee bit obsessed with the band over the past few weeks as a result. A mixture of shoegaze, punk and Krautrock, there's a fair chance you'll find Prolapse either brilliant or almost unlistenable. I'm in the former camp, obviously.

Prolapse made the 1997 Festive Fifty with two songs, Autocade and Slash/Oblique. None of the Prolapse Peel Sessions are available, and I don't have copies of them, except for the Peel version of When Space Invaders Were Big, which was released as a single.

Prolapse - Peel Session 17.07.1994
When Space Invaders Were Big

Keeping It Peel - Godspeed You! Black Emperor #keepingitpeel

I've never really "got" GY!BE the way that some do. That's no reason not to dig our their one Peel Session though, so here it is. This track also made the Festive Fifty in 1999, at number 21.

Godspeed You! Black Emperor - Peel Session 22.11.1998
Godspeed You! Black Emperor - Hungover As the Oven At Maida Vale

Keeping It Peel - Boards of Canada #keepingitpeel

We'll be bouncing between Scottish bands and bands from elsewhere this year for Keeping It Peel, but we'll kick things off with one of my favourites from these shores, Boards of Canada.
It has been a while, as far as I can remember at least, since Boards of Canada have released anything, but when you are responsible for the absolutely sublime Music Has the Right To Children you can do whatever you like in my book.

I'm of the opinion that everyone with functioning ears should have a copy of Music Has the Right To Children by the way. Heck, even people whose ears don't work that well should have it.

The one Boards of Canada Peel Session was released as Peel Session EP, available to buy from Amazon and iTunes, so to avoid getting into trouble I won't post the whole session, just the first track, and the last. The last song, XYZ, was initially available on the Peel Session EP, but removed due to licensing issues.

Boards Of Canada - Peel Session 16.06.1998
1. Aquarius (Version 3)
2. Happy Cycling
3.Olson (Version 3)
4. XYZ

Boards of Canada popped up three times in the Festive Fifty, with two entries in 1998 and another in 2000.

Boards of Canada website

Incrediboy - BBC Wiltshire Introducing Session 20.10.2011

Wiltshire? Yes, Wiltshire. Incrediboy, with and without his Forget Me Nots, spent enough time in Glasgow that I'm claiming him as ours by adoption. The last time Incrediboy and the Forget Me Nots was a good couple of years ago too, so a chance to feature them again can't be passed up.

The two interview segments give you more backstory and info than I could hope to cram in, so listen to them to get caught up, and enjoy the songs.

1. Interview
2. The Bridge
3. Interview
4. Ode To An Ode

You can find Incrediboy and the Forget Me Nots on Facebook.

Hector Bizerk - Ally McCrae Session 17.10.2011

We don't normally do sessions round here, leaving that game to Peenko instead (he'd beat me if I tried to muscle in on his territory anyway) but I think he is skipping this one, and I like the band, so...

Hector Bizerk are a two piece hip hop outfit from Scotland, Louie on vocals, Audrey on the drumkit. Often I find I can't get into Scottish hip hop, I blame too many years of living on US stuff, I can't get my head round rhymes coming at me in a Scottish accent properly, but there are a few bands around that force their way through my mental barrier. Stanley Odd are one such band, and I'll get back to them over the weekend, and Hector Bizerk are certainly another. Louie commands attention, and having a live drummer instead of a Macbook in the corner adds something more organic to things, as well as being much more interesting to watch.

Enough blether from me, here's the session they recorded live for BBC Introducing this week.

1. Burst Love
2. Man Up
3. Tsunami
4. The Rhythm Theory

Hector Bizerk have a self titled EP available from iTunes, and a second EP set for release any day now.
You can find Hector Bizerk on Facebook and Soundcloud.

Randolph's Leap: Moray Firth Radio Session (01/05/2011)

As you no doubt know, usually we leave all the radio session posting to Peenko. However since he asked me to record this one for him, I'll be cheeky and post it myself too.

1. Going Home

2. Counting Sheep

Randolph's Leap: Bandcamp - MySpace

Photo by Claire Thomson

Keeping It Peel - The Nectarine No.9

This will be the final Keeping It Peel post of the evening from me, but keep you eyes on the other bloggers who will be carrying on way into the night.

I'm left with umpteen sessions that I haven't found time to post, so if you want this to turn into a semi-regular thing do let me know. It'll be more like once a week, rather than once an hour though. However, up yours to those people that say I have no work ethic for the blog :)

To round things off I've picked The Nectarine No.9, simply because they are a band that I can't see myself finding a way to shoehorn into any other post, but one I really like. Formed in 1991 by Davey Henderson, a man of many bands, notably Fire Engines and personal favourites Win. Davey is still going strong with the Sexual Objects. The Nectarine No.9 are another of the groups that seemed to be ever present when I was getting into independent and local music. They have a stack of albums under their belt, and a clutch of Peel Sessions too.

The Nectarine No.9 - Maida Vale Peel Session 04.03.2001

1. Pong Fat 6

2. Pocketradiodrops

3. Found Things

4. It's Raining For Some Cloudy Reasons

That'll do pig. That'll do.

For more information on Keeping It Peel visit the website set up here.

Keeping It Peel - Aereogramme

I was very late to the party with this band. In fact, by the time I got into Aereogramme they were just about to call it a day. My first Aereogramme gig was their last, and I was left with a feeling of regret that I hadn't caught on sooner.

Delving into their back catalogue from there threw up more and more reasons to fall in love with the band, and in a short time I went from being ambivalent to fully converted.

Aereogramme's Craig B and Iain Cook are back making music together now after some time apart as The Unwinding Hours. Their debut album released earlier this year must be a strong competitor for the imminent Album of the Year polls, and their gig a little over a week ago in Glasgow's Oran Mor was nothing short of stunning.

Aereogramme recorded a couple of Peel Sessions, but I only have one handy, you can find that below.

They were in 2004's Festive Fifty twice, with Dreams and Bridges at #4 and The Unravelling at #15.

Aereogramme - John Peel Session 29.01.2003

1. Believe Me

2. Snake

3. Inhalation Blues

4. Thriller

For more information on Keeping It Peel visit the website set up here.

Keeping It Peel - Primal Scream

Nearing the end of my Keep It Peel posts, before my hands fall off or my eyes go even more wonky than they already are.

Primal Scream's two Peel Sessions were done way back in the mid 80s when they were a much more jangly band, long before the experimentations of later years. I've got a bit of a soft spot for C86 Scream Team though and it is always fun to compare between how they started and where they went.

The sound quality of the sessions is a bit iffy, but you get the idea.

Primal Scream - Maida Vale Session 01.12.1985

1. Tomorrow Ends Today

2. Leaves

3. Bewitched and Bewildered (this one cuts off before the end, sorry)

Primal Scream - Maida Vale Session 06.05.1986

1. Crystal Crescent

2. Aftermath

3. Subterranean

4. I Love You

For more information on Keeping It Peel visit the website set up here.