Music during Lockdown

I’ve had the chance to listen to a lot more music recently, this is partly due to the fact that I’ve been at home in front of my PC that contains all my music. Which has recently been re-ripped at a silly high 320 bit rate instead of the 128 bit rate with bits of degraded sound I originally had done about 15 years ago. This doesn’t mean I haven’t bought any music since 2005. Oh no, listening to more music has resulted in buying more music!

This post does feature music (further down), but firstly I want to point out why I don’t t use streaming services, here’s why.

I don’t want to pay a monthly subscription fee for the convenience of hearing music I own. I realise some people do buy physical copies and use Spotify for convenience, that’s not for me.
Streaming services pay piss all per play to an artist, now that’s fine if you’re Ed Sheeran or Adele and get enough streams to make a decent amount off it, but their music isn’t for me. I tend to like independant artists or if you’re my wife, mocking me for liking early 90s indie bands. The point here is smaller less popular artists get fuck all from streaming.
I buy physical copies of music, because having something in your hand feels like you actually own something. A large copy of the art work if something has been purchases on vinyl is an attractive part of this. This supports the artists by them getting more money than 0.001 currency units per play*
If I buy digital copies of music, it’s usually from Bandcamp where the artist receives a decent cut.

* current units per stream vary per streaming service.

What I’m saying is that if you use Spotify, Apple Music, etc, at least buy the music you’re listening to, that way you support the artist. Use the streaming service as a way to carry the music around with you, so that extra £2 a year your favourite artist gets from you is a bonus, not the norm.

On my use Google Music, which I rarely use, but syncs my PC music library so I’ve got access to my tunes where ever I go and can get them back should my PC go tits up. It’s currently over 20,000 songs and 200GB I think that’s not too bad.

Now that is out of the way, let’s look at what I’ve been collecting in and around the lockdown period. I’m not looking review these, just give a quick synopsis and videos where possible.

This lock down is seriously affecting the income and livelihoods of artists and venues. Do what you can to support them. Investigating what’s below isn’t a bad place to start!

Ricardo Autobahn – Check The Gyroscopes

Ricardo is one half of the Synthpop duo Spray with witty, fun poking lyrics and bouncy tunes. Ricardo’s solo outings are synth driven instrumentals. I find these good for putting on in the background when working or reading as like Aphex Twin, it’s pleasant and not distracting.

His latest offering ‘Check The Gyroscopes’ is an a collection of 80s influenced tracks. Have a quick listen via Bandcamp and decide it’s so good, it’s worth the £5 he’s asking for.

https://spray.bandcamp.com/album/check-the-gyroscopes

Spray – Offerings From The Algorithm

A new EP! Released in the past week!

Rob Britton

Rob plays in Luxembourg, Menaces and Keith TOTP and his Minor UK Celebrity All Star Backing Band. Not long before lock down, Keith TOTP had put out a recommendation to listen to Rob’s new album ‘Emotional Support Animal’. I noticed it could his back catalogue for cheaps, so I thought, I’ll get it all! I have found some great lo-fi tunes.

‘Cat Fight’ has to be my favourite with songs about wearing sunglasses, loft spaces and kicking the world.

A special mention has to be made for ‘Electric Fuck Machine’ from Elektrische Fickmaschine for being a regular and powerful earworm.

Check out Rob’s Bandcamp Page and have a listen for yourself.

Miles Hunt Lock Down Demo Society

Milo has been doing fortnightly acoustic gigs for The Wonder Stuff fans on Facebook. He’s started recording Demos for a new Vent 414 record and setup a subscription service on Bandcamp for £20 for the year to hear the demos.

There are 5 songs up so far, but… each has three versions. The original demo, an acoustic version and a group demo. There’s more due up later today, but less than £2 a month, it’s certainly worth it, particularly for my favourite so far ‘In My Sights’. The money will be going towards a new Vent 414 record.

I on the other hand have been watching Milo’s acoustic sessions carefully working out the chords to some of my favourite tracks by The Wonder Stuff, like ‘Who Wants To Be The Disco King?’

Holy Apes – Listen To The Ape

“Why is he singing about Paula Yates?” said my wife as the chorus of “Holy Apes, Holy Apes, Holy Apes, Holy Apes!” from ‘Chant of the Apes’ belted out. She continued “It has that certain 90s sound that several bands had.” Raising the spectre once more that I am a 90s throwback.

Ange Dolittle from Eat and Malc Treece from The Wonder Stuff join forces again this time to form Holy Apes. Their previous venture was underrated mid 90s band ‘We Know Where You Live’.

Only available on double vinyl (with download code), there was no try before you buy for me, I have since spotted reviews of the material on the page to order the album to see if it’s up your street. It’s not my usual fare, but I’m liking it.

‘Lost Map’ Corner!

There’s been several pieces I’ve picked up from artists on the Lost Map label, so I thought I’d round off this post with that.

Pictish Trail – Thumb World

Picked this up before the lock down kicked in, but

Here’s a couple of videos of songs from the album.

Randolph’s Leap – Howling At The Sun

A selection of Randolph’s Leap songs that were re-recorded during the lockdown, the story about it is here, you can also preview some of the tracks. I’m finding this is on repeat quite a bit at the moment, nice mellow upbeat ditties.

Post Maps…

These are postcards that are sent out once a month with a newsletter as part of the Lost Map Post Map Club. They have download codes for various singles. A great way to hear some new music. Here’s a few I’ve recently received.

Good Dog – ‘Bumblebee’

I’d got the recent Post Map for the ‘Bumblebee’ and ended up ordering the album ‘Creature’, which arrived a couple days ago and is rather nice.