BEATS OF LOVE 

118. Hai-Donan by Shigharu Mukai-Morning Flight     

IS IT Balearic are spinning off in a variety of musical directions that highlight their depth of talent. The Marius Circus twelve has unsurprisingly been the pick, but Wrekin Havoc's Camino is also brilliant and representative of what they do best. Soulful Italo influenced goodness.

If the Delia Recordings sampler is anything to go by, three brilliant LPs are just around the corner by Shrinkwrap, Torn Sail and Brown Fang. Three unique acts that instantly scream quality. Add to that Jim's remix package that includes a sun-drenched Begin interpretation of Still River Flow with its subtle keys, with a more dizzying, floor-friendly X-Press 2 remix of Phoenix and you have a Midlands set on musical fire.

I had to mention that, but this week I've been obsessed with this colourful masterpiece. It was either Basso or Moonboots who first introduced me to Japanese jazz-fusion with its ridiculous attention to detail and resplendent touches that work against the American orthodoxy to produce something more sanitized yet more magical. When I searched for some online info about trombone virtuoso Shigeharu Mukai, I not only discovered he'd lived in New York before forming his group back in Japan, but also learned of his blood group. Note the ridiculous attention to detail.

More noted for the powerful Miracle of Tungus that elevates his trombone to the next level boogie machine, this album opener leaves me drenched in steel band percussive fairy dust. With reggae man Pecker sprinkling the magic as the trombone soothes, whilst I ask myself, 'is it Balearic?'

BEATS OF LOVE 

117. Last Night I Had a Dream by Randy Newman

I'VE ALWAYS been fatalistic and superstitious. And with just cause. My father suffered a heart attack on Friday the 13th, then suffered a fatal one thirteen days later. 

My mother spent a full six months of tests and anxiety after a bleed led her GP to fear the worst, only to be given the all clear. Less than a month later, she was dead after tripping over her hair drier.

Quite a few friends attended Buddhist retreats in their twenties and despite me not biting, the undeniable change in them left an indelible mark on my senses.  I vividly recall the torpor of an unmonitored cold turkey withdrawal from Librium in my aunt's back bedroom where she thought I'd gone full, Syd Barrett. Only when I prayed did I feel any relief and at just that point, a massiv bolt of light shone through the window. I woke up less agitated, reasoning it was just coincidental that the streetlights came on. But I wasn't certain coz I began praying more regularly.

Despite turning back to my faith, I still catastrophize too easily, worrying about all the bad or strange stuff that might happen. What my faith and music do is give me introspective time to reflect on all the good stuff that has actually happened. And continues to happen. These reflections feed into me imaginary others, which sounds a little schizophrenic, yet who've actually helped me to stop smoking and to regulate my alcohol intake. Not before helping me challenge myself to stop partaking in unwanted behaviour patterns.

Little wonder I'm able to call these my other friends. Friends that enter my subconscious more and more, strengthening my faith while making me a little less fatalistic and superstitious. Hallelujah! 

BEATS OF LOVE

116. Sworn by Dream Boys

MUST SAY, it's great to have Horsebeach's Pure Shores spinning on the turntable. Ryan has made the song his own with his inimitable charm and colourful way around a song. 

Wanting to know what made him tick led me to discover this LA/Scottish band whose name creates a google nightmare. Their sole LP was a steal and has been played constantly since it arrived. Their songs are awash with a fiery fragility that sound like they could collapse at any time but miraculously don't. 

The chiming guitars glide over rich harmonies that never sound fey and keep a certain suspense. A suspense that's missing in most songs. Even songs made with guitars in 1986. 

This song is short but packs a real punch with its subtly crafted breaks and soaring fallen angel voices. A band should sound like one person, albeit a superhuman one, so Horsebeach has a distinct advantage, as do bands comprising siblings, and in this song, the trans-Atlantic Dream Boys truly do sound as one. No mean feat.

There's nothing greater than hearing a short blast of perfect guitar pop. It's arguably the only enduring gift left to give that commerce and media styling hasn't tainted. 

https://open.spotify.com/track/2Ehm3s5f2OQF9bYGeqBJnD

             

BEATS OF LOVE 

115. Sometimes by James

THE MIND is strange, or at least mine is. I have this crystal clear image of a guy at my school enraptured on the stage with James in one of their oversized tee-shirts. 

I've never seen James live, and the only possible explanation for this crystal clear memory my mind holds is he was instead invading the stage as The Man From Delmonte supported the Fall. It would help explain why the life affirming anthems of the era sung with frenzied passion on a bed of proper adult musicianship sailed clean over me. I loved the unpredictable intensity and warmer intimacy of less accomplished smaller gigs. 

With age, this momentous song now feels alive in me as, outside of Weatherall's interpretations of their work, I've never really experienced the band itself at the peak of its powers. Cheers to Matt Best for sharing this might online. It's truly heartwarming to know that the Beehive Mill was their practice space as round here mills became warehouses, stifling creativity, before finally being razed to the ground. I was going to treat myself to a vinyl copy until I realized I could add the CD to an existing order for just 50p. The fact I keep spinning it means it's super value for money coz you can't buy a chocolate biscuit for that.

The mind is wonderful, or at least mine is. For, despite having some serious water cascading toward me, I can completely escape myself and still get lost in music. It hasn't failed me yet.   

BEATS OF LOVE 

114. One Goodbye in Ten (Album mix) by Shara Nelson

BOB STANLEY wrote a moving piece in the Guardian about his friend Shara Nelson.

Not known for a profligate lifestyle, instead she unassumingly but magnificently touched us with songs she co-wrote, so the news of her deteriorating mental health was tragic. And yes, I concurred Bob was right. When famous men lose their minds and behave uncharacteristically oddly, they get labelled geniuses which help them cope with the public shaming. Women have no such support. The fact she has kept a dignified silence speaks volumes. 

Despite being a major part of quintessentially the Massive Attack arsenal, this track fully realizes a Motown influenced sound the Saint Etienne boys had been trying to master. She never impinges but contributes to a greater whole and as a result, Stanley and Wiggs have never crafted a better song. The timeless soaring strings still get me every time and the warmth of her soothing voice, like a fine taste of Remy, put me in my happy place. Great pop music can be as effecting as any work of art and its exponents don't need to be capricious or contemporary. They just need to know exactly what they want to do.

Thank God Shara heard Only Love Can Break Your Heart and began to hear this absolute dynamite. For this alone, she deserves countless blessings. 

 

BEATS OF LOVE 

113. Reflection on the Crucifixion of Our Lord, Jesus Christ by John Littleford

WE SKIPPED film class to attend this talk in my local church community hall. It's fascinating to learn about the other life of people and even more fascinating when they turn you onto their art.

John's crucifixion series took inspiration from Matthias Grünewald's Isenheim Altarpiece with its Triptych design and contemporary theme, but moved toward abstraction. I'm not really into moving towards something, but thankfully the last work he displayed was more figurative and, thanks to the massive success of Oppenheimer, more now. Inevitably, physical texture is less dramatic when mixed-media art get photographed, so I came away wanting to see the actual works.

His Great War figures, sympathetically painted, are climbing over the trenches to meet their fate. This he only alludes to, more mindful of today's more meditative viewer, who could easily assess graphic war imagery. Grünewald was fearless in depicting a plague infected Christ as a figure of empathy. The site of the commission being a hospice where plague doctors walked about in the protective masks that influenced the beak like creations of Hieronymus Bosch. Inflicted patients desperately needed hope. The intended site for John's is a modern day unimpressive parish church. Possibly ours. Yet we, too, still need hope. 

Depicting the second atomic bomb because its cloud lends itself to encasing Christ better is odd, but that's the problem with schematic figurative art, I guess. Thumbing through the delightful draughtsman ship of John's sketch-books is fascinating coz you see how reworked his Christ was before he arrived at the Gauguinesque figure. A figure dwarfed by the famous sentence of reconciliation 'Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do.' These words of God still have great global force. The 20th century made horror inescapable while introducing collective shock and mass spectacle into society. The 21st century, with its Millennium dome, the first building in history to put a gun to its own head and pull the trigger, summarizes this state of overkill we now live through.

It's why when this series escapes John's attic and bubble wrap, it will be important. Important for the church when it finally becomes more radical in defence of social justice, which it must, to offer people an antidote to their feelings of intense hopelessness. 

BEATS OF LOVE 

112. This by Me 

This 

an aborted sonnet, akin to the fickle fragility of childhood friendship 

tossing words about boisterously in sheer fun,

then bawling loudly for Mum

once this fighting starts

Who reflects herself

across this mental plane

in a translucent ocean wave

Suddenly, after a big cheery splash, 

everything is unruffled, calm on the page even

and I think, 'something's amiss, I must've plagiarized this'