excess baggage

Kuala Lumpur, Indonesia, January 18th, 4.56 am So welcome to the Excess Baggage portion of the Tag Team Records website - an horrendously ill-defined space for me to spout crap and do a lot of whingeing with a vaguely musical subtext. Why the hell would you care? You don't know me. I certainly don't know you - indeed, unless the online sales figures for Lonely China Day's wonderful EP go through the roof, I don't really think I want to. Yeah, that's right. This is exactly the kind of hard-hitting and insightful prose you can expect. At least until the overlords at Fortress Tag Team bother to check here and my untalented arse gets chucked back out on the street, where it undoubtedly deserves to be. Don't worry, guidelines from Team Kagler landed with an ominous 'THUD' in my inbox this morning, viz: 1. Discuss Tag Team related releases and/or events. 2. Complain bitterly and frequently about your lack of love life and apparent inability to remedy the situation all the while sprinkling your prose with thinly disguised boasts of your mastabatory prowess. 3. Use this page to help develop Tag Team's white slavery sideline. 4. Pronouns should be considered optional. 5. Mentions of Van Morrison to be kept to a minimum. 6. All manner of lewdness, cursing, scatology and profanity is encouraged as long as the word 'bumblefuck' is not used and no goats are harmed. 7. Use of punctuation and correct spelling should be whimsical, not rigorous. 8. Discussion of non-Tag Team related music is acceptable as long as nothing on Modern Sky [corporate lap dog bastards] is mentioned. 9. The marvelous fabulous Indie Night should be plugged relentlessly and ruthlessly. 10. The White Stripes should be referred to as a great band, and not as a great SINGLES band, which, in fact, is what they are. [Ooh! Controversy already!] 11. Never use 5 words where 27 will do. 12. Generally be mean and bitchy and alienate everyone you've ever met or are likely to meet. 13. Discuss and comment on the local indie rock scene [such as it is]. If you do this slavishly and frequently enough you may be invited back stage at a 'Hang on the box' gig where you will be presented with any number of opportunities to be rejected by their fit bass-player. 14. Always use British spelling and idioms. Be sure especially to refer to women as 'birds' like you're Michael Caine in 'The Italian Job'. Woman of reportedly debatable virtue should be referred to as 'slagbag'ores'. This should irritate everyone, who will assume that it's some kind of uberhipster affectation that they aren't quite cool enough to pull off. So that should help you decide whether to bookmark this or not.

NB In my humble opinion Van Morrison is god - above and beyond all petty genre distinctions, and that I will therefore be mentioning him as frequently as possible. Maybe, by using this forum, I can persuade the Kaglers-that-be to sign him up to Tag Team. It's possible Van is perfectly content with his present recording arrangements, but should he suddenly decide that he wants a recording contract with a rather small [but growing] independent record label operating largely out of China, then I feel Tag Team should be ready to swoop in. Hey! I'm not saying it's going to happen tomorrow, but soon… soon… We're already negotiating with Bob Dylan for his next five albums. Shit! They probably didn't want me to mention that until all the details have been ironed out [which consist, in the main, of encouraging Bob to lose that 'tache].

In line with the above cast-iron guidelines, there now follows a plug; The ever amazing, ever evolving, ever imaginatively-named, ever bestfuckingnightinBeijingever* INDIE NIGHT continues to change people's lives in deep and meaningful ways every other Thursday at Kai. The next one is either on the 9th of February. Kagler is the rugged Aryan U-Boat captain-looking one, I'll be the suave, consumptive poet type not beating the women off with sticks, while Kyle will be the cowed new boy in the corner waiting for permission to speak. Just kidding. Kyle brings that all-important fit-bird-who-may-get-drunk-enough-to-talk-to-Ian demographic as well as an alarmingly annotated collection of select tunes. Let's face it, he's just much more interesting to talk to and/or look at than either Kagler or myself. NB we don't play the theme tune to 'Baywatch', no matter how ironic the request.

*except for that one night. You know the one I mean.

If you haven't been before, where the fuck have you been? Don't go to the 'nu-breaks old-rope' night at Lush. Firstly, it's in fucking Wu Dao Kou - which, as everyone knows, is the STD capital of Beijing. Secondly, I happen to know for a fact that DJ Blackie, who stands behind the decks looking moody and knowing and quite a lot like Oz out of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, eats babies for breakfast and pushes sweet old grannies in front of speeding cars. That's right! BABIES! GRANNIES! Don't enable this fiend's deviant behaviour. Come to Indie Night! The finest tunes, cheapest booze, woman-friendly brass pole in the middle of the dance floor and no BABY EATING!*

*although we don't rule out the occasional toasted lemur.

Meanwhile back in Beijing, January 22nd, 4.45pm Lonely China Day gig last night. Rather sparsely attended, due to the oncoming spring festival. But by god, these guys can rock. There's an interesting article by the everpresent Jon Campbell over on Popmatters about the allowances most foreigners in Beijing based foreigners make when it comes to most of the ramshackle bands on the Beijing music scene. He's mostly right, I think. However, LCD really really deliver a quality product. These guys don't belong on the stage at Two Kollegas [even though the acoustics are nice and tight], they should be blasting from the stage at the Worker's Stadium. The music is big, expansive - possibly even majestic. Totally indefineable - but not in a scary way. Anyway, as you can plainly tell, I can't review music for shit. If you're in Beijing, you really should get out to see this band. Also, for those idiots who thought the first EP was a little on the morose side, it seems as if Dong Pei's been taking his happy pills. The new tunes he played last night seemed, dare I say it, peppy and upbeat. So while we're on the subject of being unable to review music, I'm going to slap my year-end list up here, for lack of anything else to do with it. I can't think of a single reason why anyone would be interested in what obscure Bulgarian punk bands I liked last year, but who knows? Maybe there's model in Sofia right now whose musical tastes are so in sync with mine that she jumps on the first 'plane east, has lots of monkey sex with me, marries me, and starts pumping out lots of little Shermans. Nah… that's just stupid. Besides, Sufjan makes the list and everyone loves Sufjan, right? In a feat of email onamism rivalled in scale only by the presumption that any of you will give a shit, there follows my music list for 2005. Apologies in advance. My brain won't stretch to actually enumerating these things. So, except for the first, these are in no particular order. UNQUESTIONABLE ALBUM OF THE YEAR Erm... actually, it's a band. Akron/Family. They've had such a busy year - three releases - that it's impossible to narrow it down to one plastic disc. Firstly, early in the year, was their eponymous debut, followed swiftly after by a stint as backup band on the Angels of Light's 'sing "other people"'. Then a couple of months ago came a split disc with the Angels. All of these releases are indispensible. Joyous, accessible, extraordinary music. Songs are unexpected, twisting masterpieces. Unlike, say, the Fiery Furnaces who try to squeeze an entire albums-worth of ideas into one tune, but forget to leave out the filler, Akron/Family tunes are constructed from only the most plump and juicy of greatest hits. Listening to 'Dylan part two' off the Angels' split is the nearest i've come to musical orgasm since My Bloody Valentine's 'Soon' or Van Morrison's 'Sweet thing'. Go now, leave your turkey slump and buy all of these beautiful albums. And the rest: ALBUMS OF THE YEAR Man Man - The Man in the blue turban The kind of album that makes you fear future releases by the band since they couldn't possibly outdo this. Bizarre bacchanalian circus music from Mars made by men with lots of facial hair and a proclivity for heavily reverbed drums. Like nothing else you've heard this year... but in a good way. How can you possibly resist an album that includes a song titled 'werewolf on the hood of your car'. This hasn't left my MP3 player in a good ten months. I've managed to... ahem... obtain an early copy of their next album - they've toned it down a bit but it still bodes well for the future. Good luck finding this puppy, though. Okkervil River - Black Sheep Boy Is there any genre of music more blah, more meat-and-potatoes than Americana? Is there any rational reason for Wilco? I mean they did alright backing Billy Bragg on that Woody Guthrie album, but seriously - enough! Anyway, this is Americana made sublime. This record practically drips passion. It kicks off when necessary, but most often it cries into its whiskey whilst the bartender confiscates its keys. Dirty Three - Cinders Aussie band's gritty, lovely, mostly instrumental opus. Something terrible is happening in these tunes, you can feel the pain. Each piece sounds like a slow burning bar fight. Which is a pretty nifty achievement when the band's primary instrument is a violin. Of course, the band would probably beat me up for calling it a violin. Here, it's very much a fiddle. They've presumably bowed to the record company suits for this record and drafted in some 'star indie voices' for a couple of tunes. Totally unnecessary. Two Gallants - The Throes I know absolutely nothing about these guys. They dropped into my musical world about 5 months ago and have left it only rarely since. I know, I know - there's something distinctly gayish about the band name. Nothing wrong with that, obviously. But it gives entirely the wrong impression of the music these people make. There are no discofied, camped-up covers of Pink Floyd on this album. The best way to describe this would be as, erm.. freight-car-trashcan-fire-hobo-torch-songs sung in a blues stylee! By a man who sounds like he's been burned a time or two. On this album, they don't DO songs under 6 minutes long, they don't DO happy, they don't DO arpeggios, guitar solos or any other newfangled 'frippery' and they rarely DO fast songs. But they'd probably DO your mother, if they could get some pain out of the experience... and i've met your mother... Shugo Tokumaru - Night Piece I've just consulted upwards, and it does seem as if I'm being willfully obscure here. I'm really not. These genuinely happen to be the records that I've kept coming back to this year. Anyway, this one's not so obscure, if you read the right websites. Sweet ecclectica [probably just made that word up] from Japanese god. You want it, he's got it - speakeasy Gershwinisms, simplistic lullabies, whale-noise ambiance, Japanese folk tunes, etc. - all seemingly picked out on whatever he happened to trip over that morning as he stumbled out of bed. This is not nearly as cacophonous as it sounds, only where necessary. OKAY - High Road/Low Road Marty Toolazytolookupsurname was the leader/guitarist/singer/all-round-go-to-guy for math rock/jazz rock/freak rock gods Dilute. They made some kick-arse albums for a few years [particularly recommended - their live split LP with Hella]. Then Marty caught a rare blood disease, was confined to a wheelchair - permanently hooked up to a drip, got dumped by his longstanding girlfriend and, due to the fact that very few people had ever heard of his amazing band much less bought any of their albums, was forced to move back into his parent's home. And that is the backdrop to this never-mentioned 21st century classic. However, apart from an opportunity to mention the truly, truly mighty Dilute, none of the back-story is important. Released in the summer of 2005, and recorded in what was essentially the Tolazytolookupsurnames' garden shed over the previous few years, this is a double album with the loose concept of the Gulf War as seen through the filter of media. These really are the songs of Nick Drake's "Man in a shed" - just with a laptop and a decent sequencer. Since I'm a little drunk whilst writing this, i want to write in terms of emotional responses to this music - this looping, soothing, cathartic, uplifting, comforting music. Don't fear! There are no whale noises and it ain't Moby. This is musical music played on real honest-to-god instruments, piped into Marty's laptop and layered. In fact if there's one problem with this work, it's the small fact that marty does seem to only have one M.O. for constructing songs without a band. One rhythm guitar riff evolves into many instrumental parts overlayed with multi-tracked vocals. The production is crisp but always obvious. Still... I adore this record. Sufan Stephens - Illinoise If you don't know why by now, then there's no point in me getting into it. Wolf Parade - Apologies to the Queen Mary Personally, I prefer the rougher, slightly less produced versions of these songs that appeared on the various EPs Wolf Parade released prior to this album, but I can't remember if they came out in '04 or '05 so we'll just stick with the album. Like a punch in the face. There. That's it. That's all I'm going to say about this band… music like a punch in the face. And of course... Lonely China Day - EP Elegiac, mournful, joyous and majestic music made by manic obsessive Deng Pei and his laboratory-grown cohorts. A lot of time, effort, love and pedantry have gone into this music and it shows. Not actually released in Dubya-land until March '06, it's been expanding minds this side of the bamboo curtain for a few months now. As intimated above, it cannot be long until these guys are leaving musical skid marks all over the stage of your nearest obnoxio-dome and Conan O'Brien is doing his patented 'amusing neck jerks' in their videos. Undoubtedly, the specific release date will be emblazoned all over the other more interesting parts of this website. Having located this information I would suggest you do the following; 1. Locate your nearest Independent Music Emporium. Easily identified by the hipper-than-thou sales staff with lovingly-tended neck tattoos and a permanent 'morning after last night's gig' demeanor, even though all they actually did the night before was play Magic: The Gathering on-line whilst drinking cheap Hungarian white wine out of a hastily rinsed plastic cup. Don't worry, their time is coming. 2. Purchase a tent from local sporting goods shop. Whilst there, resist urge to buy sandals. 3. Steal thermos flask from your mother. C'mon, everyone's mother has one somewhere. 4. Give up on any sort of romantic existence. 5. Stock up on Magic: The Gathering cards - necessary for schmoozing sales staff. 6. Pitch tent outside previously identified Independent Music Emporium. If necessary chase away any vagabonds, street urchins, crack whores or Modern Sky representatives who may already be established there [Independent Music Emporia are rarely in salubrious parts of town]. 7. Wait. 8. Grow some facial hair [works best if female]. Devise new band names featuring the word 'wolf'. Formulate a way to accommodate 19th century Marxism with the realities of a twenty first century world. Start a blog [everyone's doing it]. Discover the reason for the general shittiness of mainstream American music magazines while British mags tend to be quite good, actually [you just have to skip the articles about James Blunt]. 9. Wait a little more. 10. Worth it, wasn't it? A COUPLE OF SONGS OF THE YEAR Wooden Wand - 'Eagle Claw'. Suspicously accessible stuff from a man who typically releases an album of 'turtles fucking to the sound of a boiling kettle' every other Wednesday. What next? An album of Simon and Garfunkel covers? A lament/dirge to the passing of time. Beautiful, sad, hopeful music. To be played right after something by Devandra Banhart. Should be followed by 'My Madonna' by Two Gallants. Animal Collective - 'Turn into something'. An adrenaline-rush of a song. Uplifting, fairground loopyness from a fairly overrated band. Play in conjunction with Man Man. Serena Maneesh - 'Selena's Melodie Foundation'. Sounds like the bastard child of My Bloody Valentine and pre-anal-exploration Smashing Pumpkins getting drunk, stealing a car and going for a joyride. 'Irregular' mixing a bonus. TWO THOUSAND AND SIX. LET'S SEE IF THEY'RE STILL THERE AT THE END OF THE YEAR. Oxford Collapse - 'A good ground' May have actually been released at the end of last year. Sue me. Serena Maneesh - Eponymous Made me wet my pants for the first time in three and a half months. Emperor X - 'Central Hug/Friend Army/Fractal Dunes (and the dreams that resulted)' Not nearly as weird as you'd expect. Arctic Monkeys - 'Whatever people say I am, that's what I'm not' Good tunes. Interesting lyrics. I imagine all of these songs describing events in some god-forsaken northern 'niteklub' called the Roxy. Proves once and for all that Northerners are good for something other than coal and unemployment. [back to Excessbloggage Archive]