Frequencies

Moving chronologically forward into the realm of dub, a couple of things from Tunes from the Missing Channel. Despite being a classic this album seems to have dropped off the map a bit. Well, it's not available digitally in any of the usual places. "One of the most upfront dub albums ever recorded" pontificated one of my friends at the time. He was not wrong. It's all very good but here's side one, track one - I'm not sure what the instrument is that comes in at 41 seconds but if you've had a couple of hot knives and you're playing it loud enough, it might just rip your head off. I imagine it'll have quite a nice effect on your graphic equalizer as well.

Dub Syndicate Ravi Shankar Pt1

Side one, track two is This Show is Coming which, much as I love it, is showing its age a bit due to some overly snazzy keyboards. So I've ruthlessly swapped it for a younger model - a version from Pay It All Back Volume 2 featuring Lee Scratch Perry spouting his inimitable cosmological, messianic stuff over the top of it. Rather a long intro, the track proper kicks in at 57 seconds.

Lee Scratch Perry Train to Doomsville

Buzz feeling

Inspired by the general reggae goings on around Reggae Britannia (which I didn't watch) and by an article I read yesterday about Rastamouse, here is one of my favourite reggae tunes. Though is it reggae? It's very slow - but it's Bob Marley produced by Lee Perry, so it must be reggae.

Weirder than your average though, it certainly seems to be the odd one out on my copy of The Best of Bob Marley 1968 - 1972 on which it's credited to B. Marley - the most rudimentary of searches reveals the writer in fact to be Glen Adams. Over the years I've probably spent a few minutes pondering the meaning of the lyrics. I can't remember if I'd come to any conclusions, but if I had they were wrong.

Bob Marley Mr Brown

Minor public building

Cleland House. Until recently the home of the prison service. It looks more like it should have been the headquarters for the British Interplanetary Society, I think. I was often distracted by its jutting profile while on my way to work and made several mental notes to myself to take some snaps. So when I saw it was going to be demolished I made sure I put my camera in my bag. I'd have liked to have gone to the top of Millbank Tower and taken a photo from there.

White rabbits

On a dark night shortly before or after my seventeenth birthday I found myself at a party thrown by a girl I did not know. By the open window a curtain billowed, stained orange by the streetlight; all the while, to my intermittent distraction, dragons flapped in inky silhouette across its surface. Looking about the carpet writhed with dark patterns and the floor beneath it undulated gently. At some point I remember handling a rough ceramic vase, through the pores of which I could see and hear lava crackling. I was tripping fairly hard.

I don’t think I’d noticed the music until a friend went to change the disc, only, on experiencing some difficulty, to report from across the room that the drawer had been glued shut. We blandly accepted his assessment of the situation. So, for however long, we sat there and listened to Treasure by the Cocteau Twins. I slowly realised that I had to own the album and the next day I floated into Our Price I think it was, and plucked it from the racks.

Whenever I play the album four lines scored into its inner sleeve always give cause for a poignant moment. They were made by Tig, my brother’s cat, long since dead.

Cocteau Twins Lorelei