On This Day..
1963 On a recommendation by George Harrison Dick Rowe Head of A&R at Decca records, (and the man who turned down The Beatles) went to see The Rolling Stones play at Crawdaddy Club, London. The band were signed to the label within a week.
1968 Buffalo Springfield split up. Richie Furay formed Poco and Stephen Stills teamed up with David Crosby and Graham Nash in Crosby Stills & Nash.
1972 Blind blues guitarist Reverend Gary Davis died of a heart attack aged 76. His unique finger-picking style influenced many other artists.
1992 Radiohead released ‘The Drill EP’, their first record in the UK. The band were still called “On a Friday” when the songs for this EP were recorded; they changed their name to Radiohead the following month.
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Brand New Music
Slowdive | Slowdive
When a wiley old vet comes back out of retirement to show the young gun how it’s done (one of the best and worst examples of this being the 1998 flick, The Mask of Zorro) they always, first show the whippersnapper what they’re doing wrong by doing something better themselves. Enter Slowdive who after 22 years(!) have returned with a self-titled effort that, rather than relying on what they knew to be “shoegaze”, a genre that had it’s time and place two decades ago, they’ve applied this newly transformed sound to their existing skillset. This is a work completely on par with some of the work of their modern contemporaries. And in a landscape rife with shoegaze imitators Slowdive does thier best to simply ignore the noise and get right on with releasing an innovative and atmospheric LP for all of us to get lost in.
Mac Demarco | This Old Dog
When I found about Mac Demarco he was a goof, chain smoking in his one-bedroom recording studio in Brooklyn. Today he, and his music, is sun-drenched in the California sun. While typically stylistically at ease, while still delivering a song that is earnestly heartbreaking while still uplifting. Now multiple LPs deep into a very impressive cataloge I’m beginning to ask myself: is Mac Demarco one of the best lyricists of the decade? He’s certainly making a case.
Perfume Genius | No Shape
Some people have the abilitly to sing about the most mundane things and bring a hard person to tears. One of those people is Mike Hadreas. For some reason this Seattle-based crooner can so easily encapsulate the meeting point of both beauty and pain that it makes the listener ache. The album itself has a good mix of arty experimentation and calculated development, making No Shape cooincidentally his most realized work to date.
