Sixty for 60: 30. Swansea Sound

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The question on the card now is: will I get to the end of this series before I reach my next birthday? I do not deny that is not the most exciting of questions, but…

Swansea Sound: a band that came into being during lockdown and decided that fast, loud, political indiepop punk was the answer to being stuck indoors.  Who needs introspection?  Hue Williams is reunited with Pooh Sticks singing partner Amelia Fletcher (ex-Talulah Gosh, Heavenly). Rob Pursey (also ex-Heavenly) and Ian Button (Wreckless Eric’s live collaborator) provide the noise.  Swansea Sound are the funny, angry, gleeful and savage past, present and future of indie.

That’s what they say. I’m sold already, especially after I was reminded of this on Twitter recently.

I enjoyed their description of the second track on the forthcoming album Live At The Rum Puncheon (released 19 November 2021, not available on streaming sites).

‘I Sold My Soul on eBay’, also two minutes long, savages the corporate piracy of our digital present, where anyone can earn plenty of ‘likes’, but no-one gets paid any money.

There is also some stuff the weird way music only attains value in some people’s eyes if it has monetary value attached, which looks like fun and vaguely subversive: Four of the tracks were released as singles, all of them now impossible to obtain. ‘Corporate Indie Band’ was a limited edition cassette, ‘I Sold My Soul on eBay’ was a one-off lathe cut that got auctioned on eBay (with a £400 winning bid), ‘Indies of the World’ was a 7” inch single that briefly hit the UK physical charts, but quickly sold out and plummeted back out again. 

Mostly, I was impressed by the fact the band still remembered me and decided to send me an email informing me of all this despite the fact I clearly am not in any sort of position to aid them in their quest to gain two dozen more ‘likes’ on Facebook and perhaps Twitter as well.

I seem to have changed my tenses. Senses. Tenses. Swansea Sound don’t like shit-stirring racist trolls, and neither do I. The following track is quite downbeat, sardonic and vaguely melancholy – not savage or gleeful, although I may have a different understanding of these words. Or fast or loud either… although it’s all relative. It’s all very post-postmodern (and again, I think I am struggling with definitions) but there are harmonies, there is intelligence, there is a gorgeous sense of togetherness and love for the music of Chris Sievey, and it feels like it’s about to rain any moment and so I need to move this laptop inside. I like this song. It makes me feel a lot warmer inside than I am feeling outside right now.

I do get the impression however that some – if not all of – these people may be too self-aware for their own good.

Sixty for 60: 24. beabadoobee

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To celebrate my 60th birthday, I asked my social media friends to nominate a favourite song from 2021 – 60 to commemorate the fact I am 60. Today I have decided to indulge myself and choose a new song from beabadoobee – Last Day On Earth.

I’ve had occasion to write about beabadoobee before, doubtless noticing her wonderfully seductive vampiric qualities, her ability to plunder some of the finer, slightly more obscure aspects of what once was called ‘indie’ music in the late 80s/early 90s. Last time around, I was more than surprised to hear myself listening to what sounded like Felt on the Radio One Breakfast Show; this time around I am more than happy to be reminded of The Sundays (specifically ‘Here’s Where The Story Ends’) whenever Greg James decided to cast a glance in the direction of beabadoobee – albeit with a little of The Stone Roses’ delectable rhythm section (specifically ‘Waterfall’) thrown in. Maybe it’s the Matt Healy connection? I am rather fond of yr Matt Healy. Maybe it’s the context (much as I enjoy Greg James’ slightly forced banter and love of cricket vaguely charming, I can’t say I am a fan of the lukewarm grey lacklustre singer-songwriter uncle rock his programmers like to populate his programme with). Context is everything.

I listen to beabadoobee now, shorn of the context of bleary Monday mornings and sullen children arguing, and once again think that perhaps she’s a little too cutsie, a little too slick, a little too Urban Outfitters for my taste. A little too landfill indie. Perhaps I am simply way too old.

And then I go back and check the lyrics and I am like, yeah. Whatever.

I want to get fucked up at home
Be naked alone
And turn up my phone
Because this song I wrote
Is just so fucking sick

Frankly, I prefer “People I know/Places I go/Make me feel tongue tied” but maybe subtlety is no longer allowed in the TikTok generation. Either way I know I am gonna love this the next time I tune into Radio One with the kids.

How NOT to write about music – 127. Purple Mountains

ah, this was the side of pavement i always preferred. with the double darkness lyricism of david berman. i did not get round to listening to the album before david died and now he is dead listening – like much of life – seems futile. most weekends i spend wondering how old my kids need to be before i can die without anyone noticing. most days and evenings are spent dreaming of sleep. lush and orchestrated and opulent and still this music cannot keep the darkness at bay. all his happiness is gone. how many times did he need to tell us before we started believing? i ain’t accusin’, ain’t finger-pointin’. the strings sound beautiful but strings usually do. the intro should last forever. that would solve something surely. yes i do. i too would like to create beauty before i die but i too see the ultimate futility in this. as the man from the guardian writes with tangy irony, “is berman’s relish in his vocal delivery, and the robust instrumentation, his way of telling us that he’s actually doing ok underneath it all? Hopefully. Cries for help have rarely been so clear, self-aware, and funny.” does it matter whether this is david’s finest music or his worst? really? what do you base your assumptions upon? i’d suggest losing yourself in this but where is the point in losing yourself in this. “is the album of the year a suicide note,” asks one cipher. uh, duh. i have no words of false comfort to offer here.

i’m not trying to make sense of anything.

And as much as we might like to seize the reel and hit rewind
Or quicken our pursuit of what we’re guaranteed to find
When the dying’s finally done and the suffering subsides
All the suffering gets done by the ones we leave behind
All the suffering gets done by the ones we leave behind