Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Why put the body where the body don't want to go?

It's a heartwarming tale beloved by children and their elders: the story of how the inchoate Welsh rage that was McLusky magically transformed into the inchoate Welsh rage the world now knows as Future of the Left. I never saw the former onstage, to my eternal regret. I finally saw the latter on Monday night.

Is Travels with Myself and Another better, or even much different, than the first Future of the Left album? I prepared for the show by listening to both, and they are equally filled with joy and wonder. Songs from both albums were performed at the show, minus a few of my favorites. I can't complain, but sometimes I just did.

The band is as entertaining between songs as during them. Andy Falkous furrows his brow and looks to me like Morrissey's bratty younger brother. During the final song, "Cloak the Dagger", Kelson Mathias entrusted his bass to a female audience member, and his body to the rest of the crowd, which hoisted him above their heads as Falkous methodically dismantled the drum kit (while Jack Egglestone was still playing it.)

Like a fat caterpillar into a graying butterfly, I too will soon transform: from tragic concert-going loner into tragic concert-going chaperone. My teenage son wants me to take him to his first metal shows. In the next month, we plan to see Converge, High on Fire, Mastodon, Dethklok, and iwrestledabearonce. I'm sure they will be loud and angry. Some of them are amusing, and some are humorless. But I doubt that any of them will match the intensity of rage and humor that Future of the Left brings to the live arena. It sounded something like this:

McLusky:
Falco vs the Young Canoeist (live)

Thursday, October 15, 2009

Mark E. Smith Mix N. Match

Match the lyric to the song title. Winners will get a new profile razor unit, made with the highest British attention to the wrong detail. Another new Fall album ("Our Future -- Your Clutter") is due in November.

  1. Notebooks out plagiarists!
  2. They couldn't tell Lou Reed from Doug Yule.
  3. I'm not saying they're really thick, but all the groups who've hit it big/ Make the Kane Gang look like an Einstein chip.
  4. He said he told the policeman what he really thought/ But knowing him, I don't believe that.
  5. His heart organ was where it should be/ His brain was in his arse.
  6. Had a look at the free festivals/ They're like cinemas with no films.
  7. All the English groups act like peasants with free milk enroute to the loot.
  8. I curse the self-copulation of your lousy record collection.
  9. To be a celebrity you've got to eat the past nowadays.
  10. There's a brand new club in town/ Plenty of space for posing around.
  11. Communists are just part-time workers.
  12. The palace of excess leads to the palace of access.
  13. And if I ever end up like Bono, slit my throat with a kitchen knife.
  14. I just left the Hotel Amnesia. I had to go there. Where it is, I don't remember.
  15. I got news for you my friend, to which you will have to attend/ Reduce your knees to noodles, your Doberman Pinschers to poodles.

(A) Lost in Music
(B) Just Step S'ways
(C) Two Steps Back
(D) Shoulder Pads #1
(E) Passable
(F) Mere Pseud Mag Ed.
(G) Room to Live
(H) The War against Intelligence
(I) The Classical
(J) C&C Mithering
(K) Gut of the Quantifier
(L) New Puritan
(M) Tommy Shooter
(N) Fantastic Life