Duel!

Duel!: as promised, it’s interactivity time. A different poll every day, building into a knockout competition to decide who is the worst band in the world today. Vote early, vote often. This is Monday’s Duel, incidentally.

We have an update!

We have an update! Freaky Trigger launches its Bad Music issue with a frankly incredible cover picture by my insane brother, and two new articles - a musing by me on growing up with parents who hated pop, and a howl of despair from David Naylor on the state of English music.

Also coming very soon, a superb MJ Hibbett rant, a reply by me to Dave’s piece, gig reviews and an amazing leap into INTERACTIVITY as Freaky Trigger takes it upon itself to discover who the WORST BAND IN THE WORLD is.

What to tell your parents about the history of electronica

What to tell your parents about the history of electronica: what an amazing title for an article. Sensible 1997 primer, intelligently written and attractively laid out - and it isolates the way the problems with marketing the music were dressed up as aesthetic deficiencies by rockist journalists, too.

Pop Rock Music And Mind Control

Pop Rock Music And Mind Control: BEWARE! Thank goodness he’s never heard Coil, eh readers?

Kids parents, and Music

Kids parents, and Music: Josh was asking in e-mail a while ago what music children could be played to make sure they, as it were, grew up right in music taste terms. This article would argue, I think, that it’s just sponsoring the interest of the children in music that’s important - I personally am not even sure I’d go that far. A kid will either get into music or they won’t: it’s not something you can or should force.

REAL PSYCHEDELIC MUSIC. dada, surrealism, kitsch, LSD…

REAL PSYCHEDELIC MUSIC. dada, surrealism, kitsch, LSD…: by Chris Bickel, ‘King of Epinions’, a Nurse With Wound review. (link via Sparky’s Rumpus Room)

This is about fanzines

This is about fanzines: I think this is one of the best things Tangents ever published - a piece, back in 1996, on the fanzine explosion of the 80s and the opportunities for e-zines to similarly capture the moment. I’m blogging it because it was inspiring at an early stage in Freaky Trigger’s production, and because the convergence of MP3 technology and easy-edit technology and internet access and everything makes this the most exciting time for non-professional, non-dead music writing in years.

The Annual All Time Best of the Worst Country Song Titles

The Annual All Time Best of the Worst Country Song Titles: Ones which would also be on the Best of the Best Country Song Titles:
If The Jukebox Took Teardrops I’d Cry All Night Long
Out Of My Head And Back In My Bed
Heaven’s Just A Sin Away
My Eyes Were Bigger Than My Heart (awesome!)
The Last Word In Lonesome Is “me”

The rest are funnier but those are just killer song titles. Link via Haddock.

‘Mom, I blew up the music industry’

‘Mom, I blew up the music industry’: interview with Shawn Fanning of Napster which unforgiveably gets how Napster works completely wrong. That said the article redeems itself somewhat by acknowledging Napster (and MP3s’) vast oncoming cultural impact.

ORF ON FM4

ORF ON FM4: “Tosender Applaus für Björk! Faule Tomaten für die All Saints!” - it’s a collaborative music weblog! It’s also in German! (link via Euroranch). On an almost totally unrelated note, FT got a link from a French website, and apparently in France web-users are called ‘internauts’, which I think is the most magnificently elegant word I’ve seen all year.