I Eat Music

Having bad ideas while on drugs is not a new thing, but I’m impressed that anyone could stay stoned long enough that this song not only got recorded but also had a video made for it. The rap section is a particular highlight.

Via Robert Popper

This week it’s been hard to move for news and comment about the BBC’s Strategy Review, and, in particular, the plans to close digital radio station 6music.

And there have been a lot of emotionally charged calls for the BBC to save 6music. But I am a cold and unemotional creature. I was quite happy for Abbey Road to be turned into a kebab shop and I don’t think any band should reform ever. If something’s done with and served its purpose, it should be allowed to die. But 6music is not done with, and it’s still very much in the process of serving its purpose. So, for that matter, is the Asian Network, which is also earmarked for closure.

The BBC tell us that it wants to make cuts in order to focus more on “high quality programming”. Which sounds nice, but actually says very little. You might as well say you want to make programmes that feel more sticky. Plus, you could just as easily find money for more high quality programming by cutting the budgets and number of staff on things like Chris Moyles’ Radio 1 show, which have far too much of both. It makes no sense to completely cut services that are both high quality and incredibly important to their listeners, who are underserved elsewhere in broadcast media.

Also, we’re told that the BBC needs to give its commercial rivals a chance. If that’s the case, why aren’t they closing down Radio 1? And since when is competition a bad thing? Yes, the BBC receives its funds in an unusual way, but that doesn’t mean commercial services can’t produce better material than they can. If the entire BBC shut down tomorrow, would Sky suddenly start making programmes that were actually watchable? Somehow, I don’t think the BBC’s existence is what’s holding Sky back in that area.

And who exactly are these rivals who would thrive if 6music closes? Xfm and NME Radio are cited by some, but these stations do not serve the same audience. Because they’re funded by advertising, they have to go for the more lucrative youth market, with 6music’s listeners more likely to be in the thirty-something bracket. In fact, even Xfm’s Eddy Temple-Morris has called for 6 to be saved (see here).

While it’s true that the BBC could make significant savings in a variety of areas, and use the licence fee more efficiently, the cuts put forward just do not, er, cut it. But all is not lost, the BBC Trust still have to approve these proposals. You should tell them why they shouldn’t, and you can do that right here.

Okay, lengthy rant over, sorry. You can follow CMU’s coverage of this story as it develops here.

This is my editorial from this week’s CMU Weekly, which you can read here. I wrote something similar for the Remix Update, which you can see here.

Channel 4 cut Shane MacGowan’s epic and entirely incoherent introduction to the video for his Haiti charity single, I Put A Spell On You, from their coverage of the NME Awards, which is a shame, because it was one of the highlights of the evening.

Here’s an interview he did with NME Radio’s Jon Hillcock earlier in the evening, when he was a bit more sober:

But, being able to drink dangerous quantities of alcohol is not Shane’s only talent. The group of musicians he managed to pull together for his cover of I Put A Spell On You, which includes Bobby Gillespie, Johnny Depp, Mick Jones, Glen Matlock and Paloma Faith, makes an impressive list. And the song itself is fantastic, as well. A charity single you could actually listen to? That doesn’t happen so often.

The single’s released on 8 Mar. You can pre-order it at 7Digital, here, or by texting SPELL (all in capitals) to 78789 (texts cost £1.50).

Back in January, we at CMU launched a new feature in CMU Weekly called Powers Of Ten. Each week we ask a different music-related (or not, as you will see in the near-ish future) person to select ten songs they love and then tell us a little bit about each one.

It’s fast become one of my favourite features, as it often throws up little nuggets of information about the compiler that you might not get from a normal interview. Plus, you get to listen to ten songs that you might not already know, which is always fun.

The feature is named after a 1997 documentary, which “depicts the relative scale of the Universe in factors of ten” (read the Wikipedia page here). Slightly pretentious, yes. But it sort of explains the aim of the piece. You can see all the playlists so far here, or sign up to get them (and the rest of CMU Weekly) delivered straight to your inbox every Friday afternoon here.

To get the ball rolling, I did the first one. You can listen to it on Spotify by clicking here. My selections and their blurbs are below.

01: Scott Walker – It’s Raining Today
This is the first track on what, I would argue, is Scott Walker’s best album. The strings just hint at the darker turn his music would eventually take.

02: Latyrx – Latyrx
I actually wanted to include the alternative version of this track, ‘Latyrx (Last Chance To Comprehend)’, which is stripped back to almost nothing but the two vocal lines. The way the work against each other is amazing. Unfortunately, Spotify doesn’t have it. This album version is still excellent, and it’s longer, so that’s a bonus.

03: Mommy And Daddy – Confection
I never tire of hearing this song, and every time I do a little buzz of excitement shoots through me. It’s amazing what you can do with a bass guitar and a drum machine.

04: Kelly Clarkson – Since U Been Gone
I was going to stick some hardcore or metal in here, but it broke up the flow of the playlist too much. So, instead, I went with something that will be equally offensive to a large number of listeners. It’s a bloody brilliant song, though.

05: Faith No More – Midlife Crisis
I’m sure Faith No More were wasted on me as a teenager, but they acted a gateway to all kinds of other great music. The first time I bought Metal Hammer was because it came with a FNM special. They continue to be one of my favourite bands.

06: Mew – Am I Wry? No
I interviewed Martin Grech before a gig in Northampton in 2002. After speaking to him, I sat down to watch the support band soundcheck. I’d never heard of them, but the two songs they played completely floored me. They were Mew, and this was one of those songs.

07: MC 900 Ft Jesus – Adventures In Failure
The lyrics on this track are just brilliant; man dissatisfied with his life goes on a drunken rampage and then considers holding himself to ransom so that he doesn’t have to explain to his wife how he came to destroy her car.

08: Busdriver – Sphinx’s Coonery
The whole of Busdriver’s ‘Fear Of A Black Tangent’ album is brilliant, but this track has always stood out for me. More psychedelic guitar on hip hop tracks, I say.

09: Arab Strap – Love Detective
There’s something about dark lyrics delivered in a Glaswegian accent that I’ve always really liked.

10: Plans & Apologies – The Paperclip Key
Plans & Apologies are one of my all time favourite bands. This song was written after the computer containing the original recordings for their ‘Tree Dee Pee’ EP was stolen. I love how angry it gets before nonchalantly dismissing the thieves and ending in an upbeat fashion.

It’s all been about the iPad this week, hasn’t it? Well, not all of it, but certainly some of it. And, in some small part, that has been my fault.

First off, tech blog Pocket-lint asked me to contribute to a feature called How The Apple iPad Will Change The World. I gave my thoughts on what effect it might have on the music industry both before and after the launch.

Then, not content with filling other people’s publications with my words, I went and dedicated my editorial in CMU Weekly to the iPad, as well. Here’s what that looked like:

I do so love an Apple product launch. The hype that always precedes them can only ever mean that the new thing Steve Jobs trots out with will be a big disappointment by comparison.

I suspect that this might be part of the plan, though. People always flock to point out that the latest Apple gadget is pointless, unoriginal and over-priced. And then what happens? Once the products are actually released – with our expectations reduced a little – those devices seem rather cool. And so you have the iPod, the iTunes Store, the iPhone and all the rest. The impact all those things have had is undeniable, despite all the initial naysaying.

Will that be the case with the iPad? Only time will tell. So far its main contribution to the world is to fill Twitter with jokes about “Dom Joly’s new iPhone” and iTampons. It’s certainly not the home computer replacement I was hoping for, and nor am I going to start carrying one around in my bag instead of my iPhone (I’ll still need that for phonecalls, if nothing else). However, if, as I suspect, the iPad turns out to really be the uber-terminal for accessing online content, at home or on the move, it becomes more attractive.

Following their purchase of digital music platform Lala.com late last year, it’s been rumoured Apple might launch a service that would let you store your entire iTunes library online, ready to be accessed from anywhere. If that included films as well as music, and assuming WiFi and mobile internet connections can handle it, you’ve suddenly got a fast, friendly and lightweight way to access all your entertainment content from anywhere.

I’m not entirely sure if that’s something worth having in addition to a laptop. Possibly not. But if you only really use your laptop as an online entertainment centre, well, then why have a laptop at all? And you should never underestimate Apple’s ability to sell something people didn’t think they wanted by the millions. As with all these things, it’s the content that really makes it what it is. All you need is one truly great app to make the iPad a must-have.

Read this edition of CMU Weekly in full here.