Category Archives: Podcast

Selection Box Show 249: Kris mass time

Nothing says Folk more than a set of welding goggles

Last Wednesday was a good evening for Kris Drever.  At virtually the same moment he was stood on stage, towering over his Lau bandmates Martin Green and Aidan O’Rourke as they picked up the Radio 2 Folk Award for Band of the Year, he was also treated to an even more thrilling achievement in that his solo recording of Harvest Gypsies, from the album Blackwater, was the opening track to Selection Box.  I dare say that life will never quite be so exciting for him again.

I did suffix the track by saying that it was one of my favourite records of the last five years, then suggested that it may well be older than that. In doing so I have made myself right and wrong simultaneously as it is in fact an astonishing 7 years since said offering was released.  No matter, though, because I’ll just readjust my hypothetical lists and declare that it is one of the best records of the last seven years.

Because it is.

 

 

Selection Box Show 249 (Listen Again here)

Transmitted 30/1/2013

1. Kris Drever – Harvest Gypsies
from: Blackwater

2. John Grant – Pale Green Ghosts
from: Pale Green Ghosts

3. Unknown artist – Oun Rognea Dul Chung Knong
from: Aquarium Drunkard Presents Dengue Fever (various artists)

4. Besnard Lakes – People Of The Sticks
from: Until In Excess, Imperceptible UFO

5. Julia Holter – Boy In The Moon
from: Ekstatis

6. Wave Machines – I Hold Loneliness
from: Pollen

7. Freddy Slack & His Orchestra – Mr Freddie’s Boogie
from: Bands That Can Boogie Woogie (various artists)

8. Pulp – After You
from: single release

9. Mary Love – Baby I’ll Come
from: Soul ‘n’ Moody, Black & Bluesy (various artists)

10. Beryl Bryden’s Backroom Skiffle – Rock Me
from: Heroes of Skiffle (various artists)

11. Rachael Zeffira – Here On In
from: The Deserters

12. Nick Cave – Jubilee Street
from: Push The Sky Away

 

Patrick Thornton presents Selection Box every Wednesday at 9pm.

Selection Box Show 248: Landmarks & Engels

I think we can safely assume that time travel is impossible (which is a shame, because I’ve already written this entire thing once and then accidentally irretrievably deleted it [although admittedly this would be footling use of such a powerful tool – shall I stop the Holocaust? No, I’ll undelete the BCB piece I wrote and lost which was largely about myself. Still Marty McFly didn’t do much more than make his family rich and everyone seems to love him]) so I think I can be forgiven for failing to play David Bowie on last week’s show. As I have previously explained, the cunning fox sent his new single Where Are We Now? out into the World just a few hours after I had recorded my show. Still, it provided a perfect opener for this week’s Selection Box. What is more remiss of me is the fact that the 70th birthday of arguably the greatest ever pop singer, Noel Scott Engel aka Scott Walker (anyone now yelling “Frank Sinatra!” at their computer can go and shove it up their badger. I’ve never understood the fuss over Ol’ Short Arse and never will), passed me by on the very day my first show in the new timeslot was broadcast.

Whilst I would always maintain that some of the greatest vocalists of all time are people who cannot actually sing (Mark E. Smith being a primary and quite astonishingly brilliant atonal example) when hearing Walker open his trap and, indeed, his throat I feel the pressing need to point people at the speakers and say, THAT is how you sing. I can’t imagine anything I’d like to see less than a guest appearance from Scott Walker on The X Factor, but if such a thing took place at least the result might be that the long queue of neat-haircutted chicken-in-a-basket warblers might just nudge each other and say, “Come on, we may as well go home.”

Not that such a thing is likely, of course, because these days Walker’s output couldn’t be further removed from the conveyor belt claptrap offered by ITV’s flagship God-it-goes-on-forever entertainment piece. Indeed is hard to think of another successful artist who has moved as far leftfield as Scott Walker. I cannot help but applaud any bloody-minded artist who is determined to challenge their own boundaries, experiment with new sounds and seek to explore untrodden avenues, and to hell with shifting units and keeping the bank balance high enough to afford another swimming pool in the back of a stretch Hummer. However, that’s not to say this necessarily results in a more rewarding output because, as much as I love music that takes you somewhere you’ve never been before, I must confess that some of Scott Walker’s more experimental material leaves me rather cold – indeed parts of his 2006 album The Drift were frankly unlistenable. When his new album Bish Bosch was released last month I was, therefore, left with a ummm ahh hesitation as to whether I actually wanted to hear it, let alone buy it. However, I have decided that hard-earned brass must be shelled out as the wares from the album I have heard thus far have been really rather splendid.

This includes the extraordinary Epizootics – which featured in this week’s Selection Box as our long track for the Thanking Your Kind Indulgence section of the show – a 10-minute brooding stew of tribal drums, a malevolent squealing three-note trumpet motif and Walker’s haunting vocal with the added bonus of hearing our hero intoning that we should “take that accidentally in the bollocks for a start.” What’s not to like, frankly?

A belated happy birthday to you, Noel.

Here be the tracklisting, by jingo:

Selection Box Show 248 (Listen Again here)

Transmitted 16/01/2013

1. David Bowie – Where Are We Now?
from: The Next Day

2. Berna Dean – I Walk In My Sleep
from: Theme Time Radio With Your Host Bob Dylan Volume 1 (various artists)

3. Harry Mudie – Heavy Duty Dub
from: Ghostcapital III (various artists)

4. Tadao Sawai – Futatso No Hensokyoku Sakura Sakura
from: Sanka Tadao Sawai Plays Tadao Sawai

5. Clinic – See Saw
from: Free Reign

6. Joe Williams’ Washboard Blues Singers – Baby Please Don’t Go
from: Western Swing Roots 3: Jug / Washboard Bands (various artists)

7. Scott Walker – Epizootics
from: Bish Bosch

8. Scott Walker – Plastic Palace People
from: Scott 2

9. Jessica Pratt – Night Faces
from: Jessica Pratt

10. Pulsallama – The Devil Lives In My Husband’s Body
from: The Devil Lives In My Husband’s Body 7″ single

11. T.P. Valentine – Love Trap
from: The Northern Soul Story 3: Blackpool Mecca (various artists)

Patrick Thornton presents Selection Box every Wednesday at 9pm.

Selection Box Show 247: No Wowee for Bowie

Ol' blue eye is back.

Quite frankly, I find it hard to criticise David Bowie in any way. As I outlined last year in my 65th birthday love letter to him, even the dreadful offerings of Tin Machine and the Tonight album serve a vital public service in making us all feel a bit less inadequate that we are not David Bowie and he is.  However, I am mildly miffed that His Nibs Jones saw fit to release his first single (though not strictly his first new material as the popular press seem intent on telling us) in 10 years a mere 10 hours after I had recorded this week’s show – the first in the new time slot of 9pm on a Wednesday – therefore leaving my hour’s offering notably shy of Where Are We Now.  He could have told me first.  Thanks a bundle, Dave – and I call you Dave knowing full well that you don’t like people calling you Dave, just as I come out in hives whenever anyone refers to me as “Pat”.  Eugh.

 

Show up at Glastonbury in June and I’ll consider letting you off.  And indeed I’ll call you “David” again.

For those of you still stuck with your head in an ignorance bucket, here’s Bowie’s rather lovely comeback offering:

And here’s the Bowieless playlist for this week’s show:

Selection Box Show 247 (Listen Again here)

 

Transmitted 09/01/2013

1. Television – Marquee Moon
from: Marquee Moon

2. Otis Rush – Homework
from: Black History: American Blues Classics (various artists)

3. Rennie Pilgrem Presents Thursday Club featuring Anthea – Somewhere
from: Y3K> Deep Progressive Beats (various artists)

4. Soul Dendi – Hanoubiangabou
from: Le Super Bourgou de Parakou (various artists)

5. Broadcast – Hammer Without A Master
from: Black Session, Paris (5/4/2000)

6. Parno Graszt – Odi Phenel Cino Savo / Ast Mondja A Kiffiam
from: Rávágok A Zongorára

7. Beth Orton – Mystery
from: Sugaring Season

8. Braintax – Syriana Style
from: Panorama

9. Mobile Strugglers – Memphis Blues
from: Western Swing Roots 3: Jug / Washboard Bands (various artists)

10. Prince Fatty featuring Hollie Cook – And The Beat Goes On Dub
from: Prince Fatty Presents Hollie Cook In Dub

11. Moulettes – Circle Song
from: The Bear’s Revenge

 

Patrick Thornton presents Selection Box every Wednesday at 9pm.

Packing and unpacking Selection Boxes

Experts say that moving house can be almost as stressful as moving house.

The majority of you have probably polished off your selection boxes sometime mid-last week (leaving the Jelly Tots as a slightly crap last treat if you’re anything like me. Do they still even do Jelly Tots? Who cares, it has nothing to do with this, press on…) but for some of us a Selection Box, like a dog, is for life and not just for Christmas. Not that I have a dog. I didn’t get a choccie selection box either, but that is by the by.

My Selection Box has been a midnight feast for the past five and a half years, but as from this week any late night gorging will come to an end and will instead be taken with a post-meal coffee. In other words, and to stop talking in tortured metaphors at last, Selection Box is now set to be primetime fare as it moves to its new slot at 9pm on Wednesdays. The glamour. For those of you loathe to replace the sultry tones of BCB’s resident five tissue fantasy Laura Rawlings for that of an utter divot, Laura’s commitments with a high-fallutin’ rival broadcaster have sadly taken her time away from these shores somewhat, though her BCB Sessions show will still be a going concern once a month on a Sunday, starting on 20 January.

Here’s what I played on what turned out to be my last midnight show:

Selection Box Show 246 (Listen again here)

TX 24/12/2012

1. Tracey Thorn – Joy
from: Tinsel & Lights

2. How To Swim – A Minor Key Christmas
from: A Minor Key Christmas

3. Housewives On Prozac – I Broke My Arm Christmas Shopping At The Mall
from: I Broke My Arm Christmas Shopping At The Mall

4. The Raveonettes – The Christmas Song
from: The Christmas Song CD single

5. Kate Bush – Snowed In At Wheeler Street
from: 50 Words For Snow

6. Hasil Adkins – Santa Claus Boogie
from: Best Of The Haze

7. G Love – Christmas Blues
from: This Warm December: A Brushfire Holiday Volume 2 (various artists)

8. Ron Holden & The Thunderbirds – Who Sez There Ain’t No Santa Claus
from: Rockin’ N’ Rollin’ With Santa Claus compiled by Mark Lamarr (various artists)

9. Paul Simon – Getting Ready For Christmas Day
from: So Beautiful Or So What

10. Shonen Knife – Space Christmas
from: 7″ Single

11. Ernest Tubb & His Texas Troubadours - I’ll Be Walkin’ the Floor This Christmas
from: Country & Hillbilly Christmas (various artists)

12. Cocteau Twins – Frosty The Snowman
from: Snow EP

13. Neil Halstead – Home For The Season
from: This Warm December: A Brushfire Holiday Volume 2 (various artists)

14. Little Joey Farr – Rock & Roll Santa
from: A Very Norton Christmas (various artists)

15. Kill It Kid – Just Like Christmas
from: CD single

Buffet’s 2012 Review Thingy

So 2012 is coming to an end and, as is tradition on Buffet, we offer a loose musical reflection on the year. And in the absence of Jenny Jet and Emma Bob 3 we have a studio guest – James Davies (the man from Spunkle and new electro project Konstanzegraff).

If you want to catch up with the show on BCB’s fabulous listen again page you can do so here.

And here’s what we played:

1. TY SEGALL BAND – Death
2. KIM DEAL – Walking With A Killer
3. BEASTIE BOYS – Super Disco Breakin’
4. IT BITES –  Cartoon Graveyard
5. CLAUDINE LONGET – Snow
6. PLAN B – Ill Manors
7. RAVI SHANKAR – Afghani Sitar
8. PEACHES et al – Free Pussy Riot
9. KONSTAZEGRAFF – Billy
10. FUTURE OF THE LEFT – Robocop 4 – Fuck Off Robocop
11. THE B52s – Rock Lobster
12. EMPTY VESSEL MUSIC – She Brings The Moths In Flame
13. THE MONKEES – Daydream Believer
14. SUFJAN STEVENS – Auld Lang Syne

See you in 2013 – have a good one!

x

The Rock Show.

Greetings earthlings……..

People like to call me Alex (cos that’s my name) and I host the monthly rock show here on BCB.  Basically if I like it I’ll play it which is lucky for you because I like a wide range of guitar music.  From long-haired, chest-beating, village pillagers to nerdy, shoe-gazing  mummy’s boys.  I don’t discriminate (and neither should you).  My show’s on a Thursday from 9-10 pm and don’t worry, I’ll give you plenty of warning when it’s coming up!  You can listen to my last show here and below is the playlist.  The next show goes out on the 13th September and it’s gonna be black-belt.  Til then……………..

1.  The Horrors – Sheena Is A Parasite
2. Arctic Monkeys – R U Mine?
3. Garbage – Vow
4. Talking Heads – Memories Can’t Wait
5. Led Zeppelin – Ten Years Gone
6. The Boogs – Palomino’s Dream
7. Grandaddy – A.M. 180
8. Belly – Now They’ll Sleep
9. Jeff Buckley – Eternal Life (Road Version)
10. Deftones – Back To School
11. Yeah Yeah Yeahs – Rockers To Swallow
12. Rocket From The Crypt – On A Rope
13. Syd Barrett – No Man’s Land
14. Dead Skeletons – Dead Mantra

 

 

Eclectic Mainline 1st August 2012

The new EP by Lightships is out this week.  Here’s the lead track, ‘Fear & Doubt’:

Lightships – Fear & Doubt by Domino Record Co

You may have heard a few tunes from the new Cinematic Orchestra curated album in my show recently. I hadn’t played Austin Peralta’s ‘Lapis’ yet, but I made up for that tonight.  What utter beauty.
Austin Peralta – ‘Lapis’ (Edit) by Ninja Tune

If you have a desire to listen back to the full show, you’ll find it over here.  Here’s the full list of tunes I played:

Lightships – “Fear and Doubt” (EP – “Fear and Doubt”) (Geographic)
Laetitia Sadier – “There Is A Price To Pay For Freedom (And It Isn’t Security)” (LP – “Silencio”) (Drag City)
The Helio Sequence – “October” (single and LP – “Negotiations”) (Sub Pop)
Lower Dens – “Candy” (single and LP – “Nootropics”) (Ribbon)
Slugabed – “Mountains Come Out Of The Sky (Two People Remix)” (single) (Ninja Tune)
Jonjo Feather – “Comma In The Words” (LP – “Held”) (Numb Tongue)
James Yorkston – “Border Song” (single) (Domino)
Cate Le Bon – “What Is Worse” (EP – “CYRK II”) (OVNI/Turnstile)
Christian Fennesz – “Kae” (CD – “OST: AUN – The Beginning and the End of all Things”) (Ash International)
Patrick Watson – “Step Out For A While” (single and LP – “Adventures In Your Own Back Yard”) (Domino/Secret City)
The Herbaliser – “The Lost Boy feat. Hannah Clive” (single and LP – “There Were Seven”) (Dept.H)
John Cale – “I Wanna Talk 2 U” (single and LP – “Shifty Adventures In Nookie Wood”) (Double Six)
Euros Childs – “Around And Around” (LP – “Summer Special”) (National Elf)
Austin Peralta – “Lapis” (LP – “In Motion #1”, curated by The Cinematic Orchestra) (Ninja Tune)
Frankie Rose – “The Fall” (LP – “Interstella”) (Memphis Industries)

Eclectic Mainline 7 March 2012

Albert Freeman, yesterday.

And lo, did I feel the bearded hand of Uncle Travelling Albert on my shoulder, informing me that he was returning from his global jaunt and that my stint in the coveted Electic Mainline chair (a decorative castered sedan with attachable caviar tray) was in its last throes.

 

Sadly, due to a misunderstanding between himself and a helmeted law enforcement officer regarding a holed-out turnip, a pair of malfunctioning trousers, a series of primal yelps and the back seat of an omnibus, Phil Cope was unable to co-present with me once more and the show progressed as a Thornton-only concern. Contributions to his bail should be sent in the form of cash directly to me in a brown paper envelope and without out a word to the Inland Revenue.

Still, despite the dearth of Cope’s lovely Pontefract brogue there were plenty of terpsichorean treats to fill the programme. Here be the monikers what be done gone given to them as rudimentary identifiers, and meanwhile I’ll scuttle back off to my Midnight griefhole with a chair made out of razorwire. Thanks for having me.

Eclectic Mainline 7 March 2012 (listen again here)

1. PJ Harvey – On Battleship Hill
from: Let England Shake

2. Meta Marie Louise featuring Max and Momo – Gramma’s Flower Pots
from: Sunny Spots

3. Chairlift – Met Before
from: Something

4. Cavacha Bariba – Adiza Claire
from: Le Super Borgou de Parakou (various artists)

5. Kate Walsh – Le Jardiner
from: The Real Thing

6. Band of Skulls – Bruises
from: Sweet Sour

7. Bonobo featuring Andrea Triana and Dels – Eyesdown
from: Black Sands Remixed

8. Joan As Police Woman – Run For Love
from: The Deep Field

9. Robert Ellis – Comin’ Home
from: Photographs

10. Spoek Mathambo featuring Yolanda – Let Them Talk
from: Father Creeper

11. Erik Friedlander – Tabatha
from: Bonebridge

12. Gang Gang Dance – Chinese High
from: Eye Contact

 

Patrick Thornton presents Selection Box every Monday at Midnight.

Selection Box Shows 211, 212, 213 & 214

Imagine, if you will, the effect on your body and mind from having spent several weeks slaving away at the coal face of public service broadcasting having to work for a whole two hours every week.  Well, look upon my exhausted face and see such a reality, for having recorded my own show I have also been sitting in for Albert Freeman on Eclectic Mainline.  So yes, that’s not one hour per week but two – you’d barely think that such a feat of human endurance was possible but I am living proof that with proper application and a back-up stock of biscuits a man can push his corporeal essence to the very limits.  It knocks that John Bishop bloke’s efforts into a tilted titfer, I think you’d agree.

Anyroad around, this week’s featured record comes from My New Favourite Band for this week Those Darlins who are a four-piece from Tennessee who have the knack not only of making smashing three minute guitar pop records but also looking ruddy great.  Here’s the second track from their new album Screws Get Loose entitled Your Bro which has lyrics to die for.  Not literally, obviously.  No one should ever die for a lyric.  Unless it’s as punishment for Des’Ree. I’d rather have a piece of toast.


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Eclectic Mainline 22 February 2012 & 29 February 2012

 

Phil Cope has yet to follow the example of Richard Herring vis-a-vis facial hair.

When Albert Freeman proferred his chair to myself and Phil Cope (one sat on the other’s knee since you ask) he did so with the promise that we would ensure that his commitment to a weekly blog about his show would also follow.  What Albert foolishly failed to check was whether myself and The Mod Oliver Hardy were in fact hiding cross keys behind our backs, which as everyone knows is the legally-binding get-out clause for any promise made publically or privately and is sadly a manouevre often abused at weddings by men intent from the start on being serial adulterers.

 

So, I have welched on this agreement made betwixt Freeman, Hardy & wally and thus have to use one blog entry to catch up on two editions of Eclectic Mainline.  The first saw Cope & I playing catch with such political hot potatoes as Adele’s sac of living tissue in which she nurtures her young Brit Award eggs, the appropraicy of Paul Weller’s tie knot and the manner in which a radio wireless show can disobey the rules of the space/time continuum.  In summary: we titted about again.

Ding dong Dingle, where chair?

Sadly, such titting was reduced to a solo practice for last week’s show and Mod Laurel was forced to go it alone as, due to the constraints of that there time that they have these days, Phil was unable to join me.  You may think that recording an hour of radio together per week is not that restrictive in terms of the ticky tick tock of clocks, but if you are thinking this it just goes to show what a wretched and naive specimen you are.  You are clearly failing to take into account the work that goes into ensuring that our voices are being pushed out of radios, computer speakers, iPods, phones and various other devices accross the World simultaneously.  Everyone says that Father Christmas is amazing for managing to get around every household in the World in a single night once a year, and yet we manage to be inside thousands of radio machines all at the same time, wittering nonsense about hair dos and Cain Dingle off of out of Emmerdale Farm.  You don’t get that without at least half an hour’s preparation time, I’ll tell you now.

Anyway, here’s the track-listing, brought to you via the twin media of the written word and contemporary dance, although only one is visible here:

Jagwar Pirates' Full Total Complete Bronzage

 

Eclectic Mainline 22 February 2012 (listen again here)

1.  Adele / Prophet Arise Riddim – Dubbin In The Deep

from: unreleased

2.  Steinvord – Maelstrom

from: Steinvord

3.  Alex Chilton – Come On Honey

from: Free Again: The “1970” Sessions

4.  Field Music – A Prelude To Pilgrim Street

from: Plumb

5.  Paul Weller – That Dangerous Age

from: Sonic Kicks

6.  New Age Steppers – Conquer

from: Love Forever

7.  Liechtenstein – No Idealists Left

from: Fast Forward

8.  Jagwar Pirates – Rocket Surf

from: Full Total Complete Bronzage

9.  Chairlift – Sidewalk Safari

from: Something

10.  Soap&Skin – Wonder

from: Narrow

11. Twin Sister – Gene Ciampi

from: In Heaven

12.  Tesfay Taye – Selame

from: Ilita!: New Ethiopian Dance Music (various artists)

Those Darlins: what's not to like?

 

Eclectic Mainline 29 February 2012 (listen again here)

1.  Liz Green – Hey Joe

from: O, Devotion!

2.  Afro Beat Bariba – Abakpe

from: Le Super Borgou de Parakou (various artists)

3.  Tom Waits – Raised Right Men

from: Bad As Me

4.  Emporium – Mindbender

from: Another Planet: The Best of Emporium

5.  Crybaby – When The Lights Go Out

from: Crybaby

6.  Those Darlins – Your Bro

from: Screws Get Loose

7.  Dave Davies – Do You Wish To Be A Man

from: Hidden Treasures

8.  Amadou & Miriam featuring Santi Gold – Dougou Badia

from: Folia

9.  Leonard Cohen – Amen

from: Old Ideas

10.  Grinderman – Palaces of Montezuma (Barry Adamson Remix)

from: Grinderman 2 RMX

11. Bowerbirds – Death Wish

from: The Clearing

12.  Saint Etienne – Tonight

from: Words & Music

 

Patrick Thornton presents Selection Box every Monday at Midnight

Phil Cope presents When Big Joan Sets Up every Wednesday at Midnight