Highlights and Lowlights, by Freaky Trigger writers
THE BEST
THR33 L10N5
Everyone has a personal moment at Glastonbury. A moment that is their own. In the past for me it has been hearing Blur play “This Is A Low” as the sun goes down, or […]

EVERY TIME IT HAPPENS IT HAPPENS SO FAST
A hot Friday night, Summer 1985. Inertia everywhere – there’s not a lot left here for me, in 6 weeks I’ll be gone, leaving for London. But tonight something special – Factory Records ar[…]

Some Nordic Bands
In the past, whenever I thought of Nordic music, what came to mind were bands like Bathory, Mayhem, Burzum, and the like. You know the score – lunatic pagan Satanists who delight in baiting trendy people and burning down churc[…]

What do you talk about, when you talk about music? Because I don’t remember. I remember sitting in a car at two in the morning, waking the neighbours with the talk. I remember beers and hoarse throats, the hush of listening, the glee, the mocke[…]

A Little Knowledge Is A Dangerous Thing
Why is Rakim good? I asked Google this question and here’s what it told me: “Rakim’s peerless skills on the mic…the greatest MC the genre has known…to use Rakim [on a track] is to […]

It May Not Be Hot – But It Sure Is Warm
This tape was made for me in April 1998 by a Dutch music journalist as a prize for coming second in an online pop lyrics quiz held on a mailing list I was on. The top three were all called Graham or Graem[…]

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The weather matters. Saturday 1st June: 8pm, and the sky out of my window is still fading pale blue, weightless, benevolent. A jubilee weekend of rain would be a symbolic down: but then, we are long used to finding a meaning in the rain. Not just w[…]

Let’s All Get In The Boat
The title of this CD-R, which I made in Seattle in October 2000 for my girlfriend, comes from one of my favorite quotes. Studs Terkel, writing acerbically (as usual) about Chicago mayor Richard J. Daley, was talking a[…]

HOLDING ON FOR TOMORROW
If you want to point the finger of blame at someone, Ronan Keating’s as good a target as any. To be crude about it, pop successes in the 90s have appealed to some combo of the four Gs – girls, gays, grannies and ge[…]

This article might be an unusual one for Freaky Trigger. It won’t offer much in the way of analysis; it won’t put forward any grand or foolish theories; personal reminiscence will be kept to a minimum; I have no expert knowledge to drop a[…]