Author Archives: Phil

When Big Joan Sets Up – Whine Up Ya Bumpa

At 11.58pm each  Wednesday, after a day spent in a barely contained expectancy, the whole of Bradford and the Aire Valley rushes breathless with an excitement that verges on the sexual, to the nearest radio. Their roiling senses inflamed beyond reason, eyes madly dilated,and tongues lolling provocatively from carelessly rouged lips, they await the sound of their hero.

As the Town Hall ominously tolls midnight in the distance ( I don’t know whether there is a  Town Hall, whether it has a clock  or whether it tolls, but I’m on a roll here) a hushed anticipation descends, only to be broken by a lone voice from the radio speaker. A voice that blends a gossamer lightness of tone,with the stentorian air of a life lived on the cutting edge of artistic innovation. Yes, it’s Radio 1’s Huw Stephens.

Meanwhile, somewhere behind Jack Fulton’s, a man in a cardigan played these…

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When Big Joan Sets Up Playlist 29/10/09 – Sandwiches, Sheep, Banjos and Bottoms

By the way, the title refers to the content of some of the tracks in the show – not the ingredients of a good night out in Kippax. As I’m still reeling from the addition of The Fall to the bill of the Pavement ATP Festival when we’re going to the other one, this week was enlivened by finally getting hold of a copy of Live at The Palais LP and , as we do in times of Fall LP’s , playing it to death on the radio. All this and banjos too…

The Fall – “Theme from Sparta F.C.” (LP- “Last Night at the Palais”) (Sanctuary)
Chuck Fender – “I Am For The Poor” (LP – “Fulfilment”) (No Doubt)
The Yolks – “Jane” (LP- “The Yolks”) (Batchelor)
The Repeater – “Struktur” (EP- “Germanized”) (KinetiK)
Banjo or Freakout – “Leave it Alone” (7″) (Half Machine)
Flatt and Scruggs – “Farewell Blues” ( V/a  4CD set – “Bluegrass Bonanza”) (Proper)
Cate Le Bon – “Byw Heb Farw” ( V/a  LP – “The Ballad of Britain”) (Heron)
Herman Dune – “Don’t Lie About Me” (EP – “Don’t Lie About Me”) (Everloving)
DDD – “Blood Pressure” ( V/a LP – “Elektronisk Tirsdag”) (City Hall Music)
The Fall – “Hungry Freaks Daddy”  (LP- “Last Night at the Palais”) (Sanctuary)
The Fall – “White Lightning” (LP- “Last Night at the Palais”) (Sanctuary)
Cyanide Pills – “Black Lightning” (7″) (Damaged Goods)
Red Foxx and Screetchy Dan – “Fall in Love” (7″) (Sound with Soul)
Hud Mo – “Come and Get It” (EP – “Ooops!”) (Wireblock/Luckyme)
Homostupids – “Nightime Flies” (LP - “The Load”) (Load)
Helado Negro – “Goodbye Cruel World” (V/a CD “The Wall Rebuilt”) (Mojo)
Bok Bok – “Ripe Banana” (split EP with L- Vis 1990) (Dress 2 Sweat)

When Big Joan Sets Up Playlist 22/10/09 – Rooooragh!

Earache

Grind Madness at the BBC

Back to the formative days of grindcore on this week’s programme, with four shuddering blasts of apocalyptic noise  from Earache records epic 3 CD box set “Grind Madness at the BBC - The Earache Records Peel Sessions”  and also, by way of contrast, three tracks from Serious Sam Barratt’s excellent “Close to Home” LP on Ya Dig?. What else did we have in store? Walk this way , and take your shoes off ,I’ve just hoovered…

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Half Man Half Biscuit – Leeds University – Stylus – 15th October 2009

If you bumped in to British radio stalwart Andy Kershaw and asked him about Half Man Half Biscuit, he’d tell you that they are “our greatest folk band”

While this is probably a reference to the way in which Nigel Blackwell’s lyrics concern themselves with the minutiae of everyday life, the thought of a 24th Century version of Cecil Sharp House staffed with legions of reverent, bearded men in tweed jackets, brows furrowed in concentration, trying to divine the historical significance of lines like “There’s a man with a mullet going mad with a mallet in Millets” (from “National Shite Day “) or “Neil Morrisey’s a nobhead” (from “Bottleneck at Capel Curig”) is a warming one.

Half Man Half Biscuit at Leeds Stylus

Half Man Half Biscuit at Leeds Stylus

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When Big Joan Sets Up 15/10/09-The Programme Without End

When Big Joan Sets Up lurched, grunting and sweating onto the airwaves again last Wednesday with a programme so literally chock full of top tunes  that I had to fade it out without bidding my listener (hello mum), goodbye. So ,if you were listening thanks for doing so and I hope you find my continuing  ineptitude as charming as I do. Anyway, the music was good and it looked like this:

Morrissey – “Drive in Saturday”  (LP - “Swords”) (Polydor)
Emakha – “The Real Buddy” (12″) (In Da Jungle )
Buddy Holly and the Crickets – “I’m Looking for Someone to Love” (LP-“ The Chirping Crickets”) (MCA)
Teenage Lovers – “Number One” (7″) (Randy’s Records)
What Capitalism Was – “Facades” (LP - “…Plays Philip Glass On Accordion”)(Self Released)
Afrikan Simba – “Power in the Word” (EP – “Power in the Word”) (Jahtari)
Vic Chesnutt – “When the Bottom Fell Out” (LP- “At the Cut”) (Constellation)
Shitting Dick Nipples – “How to Survive Death ( The Clint Eastwood Story)” (LP - “In Today’s society it’s common to
give your album a title but because we’re too damn lazy to come up with
anything we’ll make this into a self title instead”) (Hon Signe)
Micheal Mansion – “Let Me In (Dawin’s Hemstock Remix)” (12″) (Hardcore Underground)
P.S.Eliot – “Hail Mary” (LP- “Introverted Romance in our Troubled Minds”) (Salinas)
Nuggies – “Sweat Soup” (EP – “The Sound Of Explosions from the North East”) (Gorilla Ointment)
Shackleton – “Asha in the Tabernacle” (LP- “3EP’s”) (Perlon)
Pavement – “Box Elder” (LP- “Westing (By Musket and Sextant)”) (Drag City)
The Box Elders –  “Dave” (LP- “Alice and Friends”) (Goner)
Norrisman – “Him Neva Fail” (7″) (Henfield)
C-Oldring – “Cryogenic Freezing of Friends” (EP – “Continental Drift Records Label Launch Double EP”) (Continental Drift)
Vampre Weekend – “Horchata” (www.vampireweekend.com)

When Big Joan Sets Up 8/10/09 – Passion before Professionalism

The most recent installment of When Big Joan Sets Up saw us fully taking advantage of our nightime slot with records about about what my grandma calls “downstairs business”, records with pointlessly complicated titles, me proving unable to say “Napalm Enema” with lapsing into gibberish , Abba songs in Hindi,and a man with the enviable name of Earl Worthington the Third.

The tracklist which scarcely does justice to how excellent the music was, or how hamfisted my presenting skills are, looks like this:

Deep Street Soul featuring Tia Hunter – “Kick Out The Jams” (7″) (Freestyle)
The Ladies – “Dirty Pictures of Your Mother” (EP- “Hole Sailor”) (NoWay/Black Lung)
Fy Fan – “Kleptokrat Moderat” (EP- “Ah Neji”) (No Way)
Earlyworm – ” The Nile Dread” (EP- “Dub King Killah”) (Voltage)
Hornet Leg – “Wait” (LP- “Ribbon of Fear”) (K)
Acid Elf – “Labby Darkno” (LP- “C-Lab”) (Napalm Enema)
Fairport Convention – “Matty Groves” (LP – “Leige and Lief”) (Island)
Broadcast and the Focus Group – “Make My Sleep His Song” (LP – “Broadcast and the Focus Group Investgate Witch Cults of the Radio Age”) (Warp)
The Archangel – “God is a Retard (Or: Freedom of Choice (Or: God is a Retard))” (LP – “Malachi”) (Celestial Conspiracy)
Morrissey- ” The Never Played Symphonies” (LP – “Swords”) (Polydor)
Horace Andy and Alpha – “Declaration of Rights” (LP – “Two Phazed People”) (Don’t Touch)
DJ Muante – “The Name of the Game” (V/A- EP – “Negative Connections”) (Headfuck)
Salma and Sabina – “Mitha Maze Dar (Dancing Queen)” (Cassette – “Salma and Sabina Sing the hits of Abba in Hindi”) (from www.aprilwinchell.com)
Amusement Parks On Fire – “Motown Ritual” (LP – “Young Fight”) (Filter)
The Gaslamp Killer – “Anything Worse” (EP- “My Troubled Mind”) (Brainfeeder)

When Big Joan Sets Up – Playlist 1/10/09

So what did we learn this week? Polish beer is not to be taken lightly,octogenarians like King Stitt, Bill Oddie might be listening, and there is place for bird impressions in today’s popular beat combos.  Now read on…

Unknown – “Love and Let Die” (12″) (White Label)
Echo and The Bunnymen – “I Think I Need it Too” (LP- “The Fountain”)(Ocean Rain)
Hopeton Lindo - “Rude Boy” (7″) (Maffi)
Customers – “Monsters on the Loose” (7”) (Rob’s House)
Laurel and Hardy- “Trail of the Lonesome Pine” (78 from  http://www.archive.org/details/LaurelAndHardy-TrailOfTheLonesomePine”
Karen O and the Kids -“All Is Love” (LP – “Where the Wild Things Are”) (DSG)
Cheveu – “Kador de Porno” (LP- “Chevau”) (Permanent)
Daniel Haaksman feat. MC Miltinho – “Kid Conga – Rob 3 Remix” (12″ “Gostoso Remix”) (Man Recordings)
Zoebeast – “HN51” (LP-“Vengeance Z- Squad”) (DAC Productions)
Ronnie Ronalde- “In a MonasteryGarden” (LP – “The Magic of Ronnie Ronalde”) (EMI Gold)
Anti-Pop Consortium – “Capricorn One” (LP- “Flourescent Black”) (Big Dada)
Alela Diane and Alina Hardin – “Matty Groves” (EP – “Alela and Alina”) (Rough Trade)
Head Molt – “Hole Full of Skulls” (split 7″  EP with Lazy Magnet) (Flish)
Split Personality – “Debt Collector” (V/A  LP -“Future Stars”) (Dreadnought)
Mark Sultan – “Hold On” (7″) (Sub Pop)
King Stitt and Clancy Eccles – “Dance Beat” (LP – “Sound System International Dub”) (Pressure Sounds)
Chris Hope featuring  Martyn Hare – “A” (EP – “Round 3”) (Battle Kingz)
Richard Hawley- “Don’t Get Hung Up In Your Soul” (LP- “Truelove’s Gutter”) (Mute)

When Big Joan Sets Up Playlist – 24th Sept 2009

The latest episode in the When Big Joan Sets Up saga was foisted upon the unsuspecting people of Bradford on Wednesday at midnight and oh , what fun we had (while you were asleep, probably)

Three tracks from “Butter ” the LP from Warp wunderkind Hudson Mohwake were played, alongside new stuff from Jahdan Blakkamoore, Do Make Say Think, and Simon Joyner. Everybody had a lovely time and went home with a balloon.

The tracklist (or tracklsit as my leaden fingers seem determined to call it) went after this fashion:

Digital Funk – “Vybezin” –  (V/A  EP “MindFood”) (L2s Recordings)
Earthmen and Strangers- ” Bartender” (LP – “Earthmen and Strangers”)(FDH records)
Girls of the Gravitron – “Malthusian Love Song” (7″) (Boom Chick)
Jimmy Yancey – “Bear Cat Blues” (LP – “Complete Recorded Works Volume 2 1940-1943”) (Document)
Buckey Ranks – “Push, Baby Mother, Push” (LP- “The Journey”)(Tendertouch)
Joey Riot vs. Obie – “I Require Filth” (12″) (Lethal Theory)
The Raincoats – “No Side To Fall In” (LP- “The Raincoats”) (Rough Trade)
Fool’s Gold -” Suprise Motel” (CD Single)
Do, Make , Say, Think- “Think” (LP- “The Other Truths”)(Constellation)
Hudson Mohawke – “3.30”
Hudson Mohawke – “Fruit Touch”
Hudson Mohawke feat Nadsroic – “All Hot” (all from LP -“Butter”)(Warp Records)
Simon Joyner – “The Arsonist” (LP- “Out in the Snow”) (Team Love)
Jahdan Blakkamoore feat. 77 Klash – “Dem A Idiot” (LP- “Buzzrock Warrior”) (Gold Dust Media)
Cosmic Spore “Transmission Lima” (V/A LP - “Schranz Me”) (Schlactof)

When Big Joan Sets Up

Assassins 88

Assassins 88

Hello all,

When Big Joan Sets Up is BCB’s dirty little secret tucked away on Wednesday nights at midnight like a mad relative trapped in the attic in a 1970’s horror film.  If you, humble blog reader, decide to join the happy band of insomniacs, skiving security guards and burglars that comprise our listenership, you can sample delightful new music in a bewildering variety of genres and one or two old songs as well.

This week’s cavalcade of innocent  fun featured the new tunes from Asobi Seksu, Skream and Wet Hair along with four tracks from the new Topic Records box set.   Tracklist looks like this: Continue reading →