Wordle for crate-diggers

For a variety of reasons, blogging has been the last thing on my mind of late. But life goes on.

Here are a couple of websites Amusements Minor has brought to my attention in recent weeks. The first is vinylpeek.com which is basically Catchphrase but without Roy Walker. Instead of Mr Chips acting out some phrase or other, Vinylpeek reveals an album sleeve, one guessed square at a time. The fewer squares you have to reveal to identify the album, the more points you score. Simple. And there's even a leaderboard, so you can see how you compare with the rest of the world.

The second is lessgames.com/songless which is basically Name That Tune but without Tom O'Connor. You can incrementally reveal more and more of a song's intro until you get to the point of being able to identify it, with the obvious intention being to ID it quickly. There are also rock- and hip-hop-specific options you can play - I am generally quite good at one of those, less good at the other (I'll leave it to you to guess which).

I am gratified that Amusements Minor and his generation are playing these games. It gives me a little hope. And sorry if I've added to the list of things the obsessive among us feel compelled to do every day... Anyway, here's a song to end on. No points for the album sleeve or guessing it from the intro, I'm afraid. From The Strokes' occasionally-maligned 2011 album Angles, this is Games.

When a cloud holds the sunshine in

Every streetlight, a reminder

"Maybe you'll be president..."

"...but know right from wrong."

Blue Friday: Waltz #2

A delicate live performance of a sad song for Dutch TV, made even sadder by the last twenty seconds.

A YouTube commenter posted this Kierkegaard quote below the video, and it seems entirely fitting for Elliott.

What is a poet? An unhappy man who hides deep anguish in his heart, but whose lips are so formed that when the sigh and cry pass through them, it sounds like lovely music.... And people flock around the poet and say: 'Sing again soon' - that is, 'May new sufferings torment your soul but your lips be fashioned as before, for the cry would only frighten us, but the music, that is blissful.' • Søren Kierkegaard, Either - Or

177 pairs of little sunglasses

Everyone loves Sabotage, right? I blogged about it a couple of years ago, in my short-lived Great Moments in Music Video History series.

So why am I revisiting it already? Well, I read about the artist Corduroy Frames, who's spent five years (!) remaking the classic video in stop-motion form. This has been a massive labour of love - in his own words:

What started as a desire to get better at stop motion videos turned into a five year long obsession with trying to recreate one of the most iconic music videos ever made, one microsecond at a time, using card stock, foam, cardboard, tin foil and cotton balls.

He's goes on to list the ingredients for this video; 4,340 Hand Animated Frames, 108 Ad Rocks, 95 MCAs, 84 Mike Ds, 5 DJ Hurricanes, 41 Blue Cop Cars and 177 Pairs of Little Sunglasses. Oh, but no AI. Carbon-based creators rule.

Not that we need any excuse for another run through the Beastie Boys' classic but if we did, well, here's some stop-motion excellence. I very much approve.

(Sort of) New to NA: Rachael Wood

Full disclaimer: Rachael is not technically "New to NA", in that she's been David Gedge's lead guitarist in The Wedding Present since some time in 2023. As such, I've seen her live multiple times, and have increasingly admired her chops. This, though, is her first solo album: It's Not The End Of The World. To quote Rachael:

"The songs jump between bright indie riffs, surfy guitar lines, noisy bursts of energy, and quieter moments of reflection. They're rooted in the experience of feeling a bit lost, searching for purpose, and trying to understand yourself when things don't turn out the way you thought they would."

I'd also add that the album's consistent and accessible sound is sympathetically produced by Colin Walker, but then he is Rachael's husband, so I guess he really ought to get it right. As for the title, Rachael adds:

"The title is a tongue-in-cheek take on the phrase, "It's not the end of the world." It can be comforting, irritating, or impossible to believe, depending on what you're going through. That tension between hope and frustration sits at the heart of the album."

Her guitar skills are not in doubt, of course, but having only ever heard her sing Wedding Present backing vocals, I was intrigued to see how Rachael would handle lead duties on her own work. After a good few listens I've been wracking my brain for comparators, and can only come up with Rachael sounding like someone put K.D. Lang, Tracey Thorn, PJ Harvey and Dido in a pot and gave them a stir, then left them to simmer. That probably doesn't do Rachael justice but, for whatever reason - too hot? too tired? too Friday? - I'm really struggling for words today. Anyway, I rather like this, and feel it might be a grower - see what you think.

No (or, Old man shouts at cloud)

I saw the BBC News headline:

"Why playing your phone out loud in public might become the new normal"

And I read the story. To which the only reasonable response is:

I was discussing this with The Man Of Cheese last week. It will come as no surprise to anyone to learn that The Intolerance Twins both preferred a time when phones were for personal communication rather than public broadcast.

I was also reminded of a quote from Alan Bennett, given in interview in 2015:

"There has been so little that has happened to England since the 1980s that I have been happy about or felt able to endorse. One has only had to stand still to become a radical."

I also see myself in this.

New to NA: Ruby-Jean Clunie

It's too hot for working from home. I have the old nursery thermometer from when Amusements Minor was a baby in the corner of the spare bedroom I laughingly call an office. It tells me that, even this late in the afternoon, it is 29°C. That's 84 in old money! But however hot it is, it's hot enough for a song called Wilted to be appropriate.

The Man Of Cheese and I had an evening in the smoke last week, ostensibly to see the thinking man's Smiths' tribute act The Smyths at the Half Moon in Putney. But also to have a long-overdue catch-up, sink a few ales¹, put the world to rights and debate life. Which we duly did, and had a reliably excellent time in so-doing.

The support act for The Smyths was a young singer-songwriter type called Ruby-Jean Clunie, who performed a mix of covers (including Radiohead) and original compositions to an appreciative Half Moon audience. I was a bit concerned, at first, by a slight tendency to over-emote in her vocals. You know the way X-factor and BGT contenders do, to somehow convey that they are more genuine than their fellow contestants because, you know, they're really feeling it? All imagining that they are somehow about to deliver a new level of emotional heft to The Star-Spangled Banner in some far-flung US sports field? You can't blame them, it's what they think is expected; I just find it a bit false. Fortunately, as Ruby-Jean got into her set (and her own material) this tendency softened and almost entirely disappeared. By the end of her allotted time on stage, she had won me and TMOC over completely.

During The Smyth's set, Ruby-Jean, a friend and a woman I presume to be Ruby-Jean's mum, stood right in front of us, dancing along. Ruby-Jean seemed to know all the words to all the Smiths songs. I take this to be a good thing, especially in one so young. It feels very early in her career, and some of her songs on Spotify have a raw, lo-fi, demo quality, so I hope there is more to come. It's a competitive place, of course, and Spotify is full of similar types, but I wish Ruby-Jean well and hope she goes far.

As we headed back to our crashpad hotel, TMOC and I stumbled upon a pub in which a pub-rock three-piece covers band were setting up, and suddenly the early night turned into a late one. I have no idea what that band were called, so I can't namecheck them, or the DJ who played a crowd-pleasing set straight after, but they were all pretty effective. Reader, there was singing along, there were strangers putting their arms around us and, though I use the word very loosely, there may even have been some dancing...

1. Okay, more than a few ales. And possibly more than a few vodkas too, especially during the late-night pub band and DJ sets...

Randcamp: Long Hot Summer

Here we go, another Randy Camp, as C likes to think of it. It's August, so I've been searching for "long hot summer"; aside from many Style Council covers, I also found these...

Sports Team are/were a six-piece from London town. Their Long Hot Summer was released into the clear blue skies and empty roads of Summer 2020.

I was surprised to read that Suedehead are from California. Their take on Long Hot Summer sounds like the sort of indie landfill being dragged around Camden at the dog-end of Britpop.

Glimmermen are from Dublin and, in their bio, are very keen to emphasise that they are not indie landfill. I mean, they use those exact words. Okay, they use that exact quote from a magazine review...

So, three long hot summers, and not a Weller in sight. Any of these got you warmish under the collar? Or did they all leave you cold?