Current listening
All eight discs of the complete Miles Davis live at the Plugged Nickel, 1965. They make it seem all so easy, you can be fooled into thinking that you could do it.
Various live recordings of Richard Thompson, legitimate and otherwise.
Second albums: “Portishead” by Portishead (about which, if work ever gives me a chance to do some writing of my own, more soon); “Secondhand Daylight” by Magazine (I was such a big big fan of that band; missed them by a year when they toured Australia, but then “Play” was released, easing the pain a little; could never understand the Roxy Music comparisons that seemed to permeate the English weeklies - I necessarily came late to Roxy (first album came out when I was eight years old - although my crazy Melbourne cousins had copies of “Siren” and “Country Life”, the covers of which were of some interest), and couldn’t be at all objective re Magazine, but could they not see beyond the fact that both bands had someone who could play the sax?); “Heaven Up Here” by Echo & the Bunnymen.
“The Wonderful and Frightening World of The Fall” by The Fall, which I had always relegated to the “second-rate Fall” category on account of its being swamped by the twin peaks of “This Nation’s Saving Grace” and “Bend-Sinister”. I now realise I made a big mistake, and have some catching up to do. There are passages that can only be describe as "beautiful". Who'da thunk it?
Anecdote
I spent today at work notwithstanding it was a public holiday in Canberra, so I took the boys in with me, one at a time, to provide some respite on the home front. Julius and I had a brief wander over to the National Gallery. He is fascinated by the Sidney Nolan series of “Ned Kelly” paintings upstairs. When we got back to my office he sat down and drew his own, very convincing, Ned Kelly picture using various shades of highlighter pen. He asked one of Justice Kirby’s associates to give it to the judge. Justice Kirby is known to the boys only as “Kirby”, as this is also the name of a Nintendo character. I wonder what kind of mental picture Jules has of the judge.
Wanted
If anybody has an MP3 or equivalent of “Coward of the County” as rended (sic) by Alvin and the Chipmunks, you will find our email address on the right-hand side of this page.
