End of year and end of blog for a while: It’s time for the annual Music That I Did Like Best blog of lists and that…

Songs of 2011:
Fingersnap: I Wanna Rise: A ruddy big soul anthem from the year’s most played EP (even before it was released, via their Soundcloud page).
CockNBullKid: Distractions: Marvellous album with so many top tunes. This was like a magical All Saints pop song.
Patrick Wolf: Together: Single from the excellent mostly-happy-love album. Patrick’s popstar moment.
Autoheart: Control: Debut free single from The Band Formerly Known As the Gadsdens. Beautiful and intricate.
Stevie Nicks: Secret Love: The largest gestation period ever with a song demoed in the 1970s. Bewitching.
The Melting Ice Caps: Strike in the Dark: The band that keeps on growing released an excellent EP and this is the lead track.
Brett Anderson: Unsung: Mega return to form when Brett came back with a rock band.
Bright Light Bright Light: Disco Moment: The launch night gig was a top memory. Glittery greatness.
Kimbra: Cameo Lover: Classic pop from an artist who hasn’t really launched in the UK yet.
Monsta: Holdin’ On: Bryn Christopher returned with that voice in a band whose Soundcloud has some big songs on it.
Florrie: Experimenting With Rugs: Another one of the top EP artists of the year. Pop gold.
The Original 7Ven: Strawberry Lake: The Time came back and continued where they had left off. Funky.
The Pipettes: Boo Shuffle: New non-album energetic single that sounded like the old days.
James Vincent McMorrow: We Don’t Eat: Lovely album, great for the quiet moments.
Emeli Sande: Heaven: When not with shouty rappers Emeli did good things in my ears.
Foster The People: Call It What You Want: This song ended up everywhere in the end.
Lana Del Rey: Blue Jeans: ‘Internet Sensation’ whose songs are on every bloody list this year.
Gomez: Song in My Heart: They continually make great albums and make that seem easy.
Bernhoft: Choices: One of Husband Jamie’s discoveries: super-talented Norwegian all-rounder.
Penguin Prison: Don’t Fuck With My Money: This should have been the pop anthem of the year.
Will Young: Safe From Harm: Consistently good artist teams up with Richard X and makes best album of his career.

Now it’s time for some music:
Control by Autoheart

MONSTA by MONSTAcloud

Disco Moment [Video Edit] by brightlightx2

Back to the ‘awards’:

Best UK album:
Winner:
Patrick Wolf: Lupercalia : A coherent long-player is quite hard to find these days but Mr Wolf goes from strength to strength.

Runners-up:
CockNBullKid: Adulthood
Brett Anderson: Black Rainbows
Sarah Nixey: Brave Tin Soldiers
Nerina Pallot: Year of the Wolf

Best International album:
Winner:
Steve Nicks: In Your Dreams: I fell in love with the singles and videos, and ended the year with a load of her Fleetwood Mac albums.

Runners-up:
Bernhoft: Solidarity Breaks
Jenny Wilson: Blazing
Foster The People: Torches
Joan As Police Woman: The Deep Field

Best UK Group:
Fingersnap: David McAlmont has always been in my musical lists and the addition of Guy Davies led to one of those duos that are more than the sum of their parts.

The Melting Ice Caps
Autoheart
Monsta

Best International Group:
Foster The People: Earworm singles, fun videos and an album that got played so many times.

The Pierces
The Original 7Ven
Wolf Gang

Best UK Male single:
Bright Light Bright Light: Disco Moment: Why is this man not a massive pop star? The charts deserve some great acts.

Best International Male single:
Penguin Prison: Don’t Fuck With My Money: American equivalent to the great things I see and hear in Bright Light Bright Light.

Best UK Female single:
CockNBullKid: Yellow: She’s just been excellent all year.

Best International Female single:
Steve Nicks: Secret Love: I’m repeating myself from my Songs of the Year now! Lead single that was just perfect.

Best UK EP:
Winner: Fingersnap: Smokehouse EP: See all my other bloggings about why this is such a treasure.
Runners-up:
Florrie: Experiments EP

The Melting Ice Caps: Strike EP
Patrick Wolf: Brumalia EP
The Mummers: Mink Hollow Road EP
The Primitives: Never Kill A Secret EP

Best International EP:
Winner: Beth Ditto: EP: We need an album of this electropop Beth.

Runner up: Uh Huh Her: Black and Blue

Best Gig:
Fingersnap at the Jazz Cafe (20th November): Stunning set, great company, chat with the singer, intimate venue. Excellent.
The Melting Ice Caps, Dream Themes and Mr Solo at Buffalo Bar (21st August): David Shah’s Ice Caps got even better and the other acts were pretty good.
Bright Light Bright Light single launch at London Fashion Week (21st September): Surrounded by trendies (eek!) but the music was so exciting.
The Soft Close-Ups at Native Tongue (2nd August): Perfect sit-down music with beers.

Best Live Album:
David McAlmont Live From Leicester Square CD & DVD : Even if I hadn’t been to that show I would have to recommend this one.

Best project people complained about but I quite liked:
Winner: Kate Bush: Director’s Cut album : But then I didn’t own all the original albums that got re-jiggled and it came in a nice package.
Runner up: Sophie Ellis-Bextor: Make A Scene album

Best album I know is good but I just couldn’t get to grips with as much as I wanted to:
Wild Beasts: Smother : The music didn’t register in my memory despite multiple plays but the EP that followed it had some songs that I understood far better.

Artist that gets a lot of love but I just don’t feel:
Lady Gaga : A hybrid of Grace Jones and Younger Madonna being all Ooh Controversial with some average pop songs? I’ll pass.

Return to form:
Brett Anderson: Black Rainbows : Glad he went back to what he does best after the previous album was too boring to buy. That seemed so wrong.

Best video downloady thing that’s kind of a single I think:
Miles Fisher: New Romance : It’s apparently an in-joke/tie-in with a film I have never seen but still great fun.

Surprise new song that was number two in the UK Top 40 when I heard it:
Emeli Sande: Heaven : Unfinished Sympathy is 20 years old and still wonderful.

Best Scandinavian import newcomer album:
Bernhoft: Solidarity Breaks : The live video clips don’t really show off the full blown production of the album.

Hamel: Lohengrin : Good old fashioned music and lyrics is sometimes all you need.

Best new artist found via a Facebook posting:
James Vincent McMorrow: Early In The Morning album : Minimal at times but always lovely. Not ‘bland’ like this year’s buzzword.

Best new Antipodean act:
Lovers Electric : I ended up buying both their albums after the new one looked promising on a leaks site.
Gotye
Kimba

Best Mashup:
Soundhog: A Witty Title Involving Rockets & Losing Sleep : Marvellous.

Best Comeback For An English Band Popular In The 80s:
Winner:
Duran Duran: All you Need Is Now : The most Duran Duran sounding album since Rio, probably.
Runners-up:
Human Leage: Credo
The Primitives: Never Kill A Secret EP
Blancmange: Blanc Burn

Best cover of one of my favourite old vinyl singles:
Beverley Knight: Fairplay : Lesser known Soul II Soul debut single done well.

Best modern remix of an old track:
Depeche Mode: Puppets (Royksopp Remix) : I wasn’t all that familiar with the original so this sounded like an excellent new track.

Best modern remix that purposefuly sounds like an old one:
Kylie Minogue: Put your Hands Up (Pete Hammmond Remix) : Sounds about putting hands up in a retro remix style proved popular.
Bright Light Bright Light: Italo Disco Moment
Nerina Pallot: Put Your Hands Up Like It’s 1987

Best Use of the Funky Drummer beat:
A tie between Katy B: Broken Record and Jamie Woon: Spirits : The one where I listen to what the young people and critics like.

Best Deluxes Reissues:
Winner:
All of the Suede albums : Even if the packaging of these fat products weren’t quite strong enough to prevent spine damage. Second only to those Saint Etienne ones from last year.
Runners-up:
Frankie Goes To Hollywood: Welcome To The Pleasuredome
Mica Paris: So Good

Best New Song That Arrived Out Of Nowhere:
Winner:
Hologram Heart Parade: Dirty Heart : Massive earworm song that got played a lot on my Czech holiday.

Runners-up:
Foster The People: Call It What You Want
Kimbra: Cameo Lover

Best debut Double A Side ‘single’:
Lana Del Rey: Blue Jeans / Video Games : Was this even a real old fashioned single? Is that concept even relevant anymore?

Best Artist I Always Thought Was OK But I Finally Got Into:
Winner: k d lang : It’s always good to go mad for a bunch of second hand albums by an artist you should have tried before.
Runners-up: Japan, David Sylvian

Best person from a terible TV talent show who made a good album:
Will Young: Echoes : I’m partial to bits of his other releases too but this one actually got purchased in our house.
Rebecca Ferguson: Heaven

Best new song from a Best Of compilation:
Winner: Scritti Politti: A Day Late And A Dollar Short (from Absolute) : Please can we have a new album now?

Runner up: Claudia Brucken: Thank You (from Combined)

Best new Various Artists compilation:
Zang Tuum Tumb: The Art of the 12″ : Excellent double disc ZTT retrospective in 12″s form, with a sequel due in Spring 2012.

I usually do a Christmas ‘Mixtape’ but this year I’ve done for the videos option instead. Some of these are fun, some are peculiar and at least one is fascinatingly awful…

Doctor Who trailer/interview for The Doctor,the Widow and the Wardrobe. This looks like it could be pretty great and I’m  usually a bit disappointed by the Christmas specials. Maybe it’s because I’m half asleep by the time they are on? Never from booze, honest.

Fingersnap: Merry Christmas Is You: It’s nice when a new Christmas song comes along and this first appeared last Christmas but has been  doing the rounds all over again. Fingersnap may be my top band of 2011 when I write that particular blog post.

Emmy The Great & Tim Wheeler: Home For The Holidays: I don’t usually do Christmas albums as they tend to wind me up but this year’s winner is the Tim & Emmy one. Festive and fun with great tunes so no “bah humbug” from me.

Ed & Oucho Christmas 2008: Ed and Oucho are Christmas for me and it’s just not the same with no new Christmas Man, Grotto or other ridiculous features.

Bright Light Bright Light Egg Shampoo: Short thing from an online advent project. Rod has done a Christmas Mixtape over at his site, which is very good of course (but it has reminded me of those Spice Girls attempting Christmas Wrapping which I had deleted from my brain).

Advent 18 – Bright Light Bright Light from David Wilson on Vimeo.

The Weather Girls: Dear Santa (Bring Me A Man This Christmas): This would be the key new old track to the Christmas Mixtape I would have made.

Wentworth Detention Centre Christmas Show: This was the height of TV entertainment in the early 80s. We love Prisoner and have been rewatching it from the beginning, which is slowly rotting my brain.

Frankie Goes To Hollywood on Top of the Pops Christmas 1984: Will I even watch the Chritstmas Top of the Pops this year? Doubtful. There may be a number one song about doing it gaywise as it is 2011 and that sort of thing is what the youths are into apparently (I have no ideas of course) but in 1984 this was an interesting afternoon TV highlight that my Daily Mail reading parents probably tutted at.

Neighbours: A most amusing/annoying Christmas ‘special’ promo video from probably 1989 or 90 or something. It has Plain Jane Superbrain and the mostly forgotten Second Mrs Jim Robinson Version 1.0. Bonus ho ho ho if you manage to cope with the entire clip.

Kenny and Dolly: Mostly for Jamie who set up this blog’s ‘add new post’ section to generate a random Dolly quote with every new post.

Cheeky Girls: The worst Christmas song ever? Probably. Based on a Summer time booby smash hit and with a video that cost at least the price of a dozen entrance fees to a leisure centre, this song is special for being one of the tracks on my old Bookshop Christmas CD from back in the days that I worked with other people.  I was given the CD single as a present and it reminds me of dealing with crazed shoppers and horrible festive tunes on loop.

I have realised there are a lot of good songs about space and spacey stuff so here is my selection….

Download the Space Mixtape here. Ah go on.

01 Dubstar: Stars: I’m going to call this a classic because it is. I bought the original  single release based on the cover and price and then it came out again and everyone loved it.
02 All Seeing I feat Phil Oakey: First Man In Space: A song about being the first man in space in his street, written with Jarvis Cocker and sung by Mr Oakey? Yes please!
03 Bag Raiders feat Rhys of Ted & Francis: Shooting Stars: Not the theme from the odd quiz show but a slightly peculiar dance track with a Stylophoney riff that my husband played to me.
04 Paul Weller: Kosmos (Lynch Mob Bonus Beats): Early solo Weller is fantastic and this remix may have slighly too many funny effects but it has happy Southend-on-Sea memories.
05 John McLaughlin: Planetary Citizen: AKA that song that Massive Attack sampled on Unfinished Sympathy. Love this.
06 Prince: Baby I’m A Star: He was, you know.
07 The Pipettes: Our Love Was Saved By Spacemen: Their big comeback single giveaway released shortly before their first return single proper. Fun with a great little story.

A bit of telly:

Stars

First Man In Space

Shooting stars

Kosmos (original,live)

Our Love Was Saved By Spacemen

Wii Fit pointed out that it is Day One Thousand of my Wii ‘journey’ today so here’s a perfect opportunity to use a blog draft that has been lurking for a while…

On / Off / Jump / Wobble / On / Off ...

For some reason I have always been, considering how geeky I am, strangely not at all bothered by computer games. Maybe it was the endless fighting over the Commodore 64 with my brothers when I was young or the fear of it chewing up the tapes at the crucial loading moment. I got reacquainted with computery games in the 90s when living in Ye Olde Student House where we spent far too much time on the Play Station pretending to be riding bikes and kicking our fellow race competitors, making stupid noises while creating rubbish ‘special moves’ on those fighty games or drowning pointy-boobed adventuresses not entirely by accident. Then nothing. As an independent grown up person there were plenty of other shiny things to spend my money on… until a few years ago when I changed jobs from the all-action running jumping (not for joy) lifting stretching bookshop manager routine to the sitting on my arse all day world of office work. My burgeoning cake gut actually frightened me in silhouette and demanded a new regime involving actually moving about but the usual options of jogging (dangerous and silly) or joining a gym (humiliating) were instantly dismissed. I had a brainwave: I would buy a Wii and get Wii Fit!

It took me a few months to get around to actually buying it, which was appropriately lazy of me. The purchasing finally happened when I came home from the pub after a night out and was slightly booze-influenced, spookily prompting the popular internet entertainment retail site to contact me the next day as it seemed like a very out of character purchase. Damn those Amazonians.

Jamie's Mii is always asleep, lucky thing.

The first thing to do when your Wii is set up is to create your evil doppelganger or Mii as it is known in those circles. This involves choosing a head shape, eyes, mouth, nose, etc from the menus and making a person who looks maybe slightly like you, unless you are bald and then everyone will remark how accurate it is. Mostly because it looks like an egg, to be honest. Bah. The Wii has a hell of a lot of games available for it but as I am not a games person I couldn’t give a damn about them, especially as the ones I see in the supermarket tend to be aimed at weirdoes who like horses or stupid kids who need educational ‘fun’ times. My loyalty to Wii Fit means that I will now tell you more about that particular ‘lifestyle’ as it’s all I know. I am a slave to the evil thing, which consists of a disc you put in the Wii (you could have worked that out yourself, I know) that takes seconds to load rather than minutes and does not even make a noise like a poncey 90s experimental techno record, and a board which you stand on for humiliation purposes. Once you have stepped onto the board at the right moment (it’s a fussy bugger) it does a little yelp to imply you have injured it, how amusing. I am not exactly a fatty so I don’t know if these noises vary with the body type stepping onto it but it would be nice to think that it does. The board then offers to weigh you, asks how heavy your clothes are (pass) and then shows you how bad you are on a scale of a puny softy / alright / gutbucket / put a bag over your head. If you are still calm after this (no cheating and telling it your clothes weigh 8 pounds, ok?) you can do some body tests such as standing on one leg until you shake like a polaroid picture, standing really still really badly and pretending to run on  the spot in a comedy style. All good fun, honest, and even though the Wii will then imply that none of these are your “cup of tea,” making you ever so slightly paranoid that you are a failure. These tests scientifically let it work out your body’s age which will be either stupidly young or scarily old and will make no sense from one day to the next. Best not take that bit too seriously and just focus on all the fun exercises you can do…

If yoga is your sort of thing then you can follow the on-screen instructions of a virtual woman with oddly-round boobies who will show you how to stand and sit in stupid positions. If you are me you will try some of these and end up confused and shouting at the screen, never to try them again. Much better are the aerobic exercises which actually involve doing stuff, hurrah! Choose from such delights as wiggling your hips to keep the imaginary hula hoop active (most excellent fun for your friends to observe as you look like a rather exhausted fool), walking on and off and on and off the Wii Fit board in a step aerobics style or doing the fancy boxing which will probably bewilder you for a few tries, making you scream and shout at the bossy talking punch bag who makes absolutely no sense until you get the hang of it and feel silly. If you want something less stressful and sweat-inducing I recommend the balance exercises where you can be freaked out by having to manoeuvre balls with your friends’ faces into holes on a floating wobbly platform, try headering footballs but mostly get shoes in the face, or become a penguin on an iceberg bobbing from side to side to catch the best number of fish who are curiously judged to be of different value depending on their colour. Seems a bit racist to me.

So many options...

Once you get into a routine you will love and hate the Wii Fit in equal measure as she (it seems more female to me anyway) is a harsh mistress and doesn’t like it when you come home after an evening of wine and cheese with three extra pounds of weight. You will be set targets which is all rather lovely except for when you spend a day eating only Ryvita and dust which makes the Wii think you have an eating disorder and it emails the health police. Wii Fit is “concerned” about your health when big variances happen because it is your pal. Don’t forget that. If you get bored you can always upgrade to the Wii Fit Plus like I ended up doing where you can do new mentalist tasks like bumming numbers until they add up to 10, riding a pretend bicycle or even joining a rhythmically challenged marching band. I eventually lost most of my ‘cake baby’ and can maintain a sensible weight apart from on those days where delicious lovely sugary delights become my sanity-saver at work. To be honest, the key factor for me with my Wii is that i can do the aerobics while watching television although its best to do it with the less complicated programmes so avoid old VHS rips of The Adventure Game at all costs as they make me fall off the damn thing.

It’s the return of Records Bought, Videos Embedded. Lots of it.

25th November 2011
Pet Shop Boys: Actually (Vinyl LP £1.99)

I had a day’s holiday so went on a wander mission into Rickmansworth Town (hmmmm) and scoured the second hand shops for precious things. Got this very good condition Pet Shop Boys, Actually. Very nice and an obvious Bit Of A Classic. Also got the second Bomb The Bass album which I once had on cassette:
Bomb The Bass: Unknown Territory (Vinyl LP £1.99)

3rd December 2011:
Patrick Wolf: Brumalia EP (£5 plus P&P)

New thing! Mister Wolf has released an EP after making one of the LPs of the year. This contains a great track taken from that album, some new songs that wouldn’t be out of place on the long player and the obligatory track that I don’t really get. Still very recommended.

9th December 2011
Bic Runga : Live in Concert (£8.91 plus P&P)
Bic Runga: Try to Remember Everything (£9.99 plus P&P)
I’ve been playing my old Bic Runga albums and moaning that her new one is not out on CD for me, calmed my semi-rage by buying her live + orchestra album and her b-sides and that disc. The following music videos represent her well:
Get Some Sleep:

Sway:

12th December 2011:
Fleetwood Mac: Fleetwood Mac £2.98 (plus P&P)

While having the office internet fiddled with and then the email migrated I had to do something offline. I spied a big book about Fleetwood Mac, enjoyed it and bought the first three albums of their ‘classic era’ aka when Stevie Nicks joined.
13th December 2011:
Fleetwood Mac: Rumours (£9.79)

Fleetwood Mac: Tusk (£4.99)

Rebecca Ferguson: Heaven (£8.99)

I know: A Simon Cowell person? I had never heard of her as I avoid that kind of thing but listened to the album after seeing interesting reviews, liked it, bought it. I am no music snob. The album is mostly ballady but has this disco number and one with a popular break beat from my dance music records era. Surprisingly good album, with top work from Eg White, Fraser T Smith and a bit of Xenomania (with Florrie on drums)!

15th December 2011:
P.M. Dawn: The Bliss Album (1p plus P&P)


I used to own the first two PM Dawn albums. Somewhere/when they got binned along with a lot of other music due to space issues and ever since then I’ve been re-buying things I used to own. Well we have a three bedroom house to fill with Geek Things (no room for other beds) after all.

This week’s mix theme is the familiar one of boys and girls. It’s corny but corn is good and healthy.

You can download Girls&Boys Mixtape here.

01 Alphabeat: Boyfriend (Pete Hammond remix): Take one great modern pop song and send it back to approximately 1987 for a remix. Love it!
02 Cookie Crew: Females (Get On Up): Yes! I love the female rap singers.
03 Girls Aloud: Androgynous Girls: Xemomania wrote some great pop songs for The Girls Allowed and this is a prime example. A little bit odd, just how I like  it.
04 Robyn: Who’s That Girl: Not the Madonna stinky film song, this is a super joyous synth pop moment.
05 Tori Amos: Northern Lad: From when Tori wrote songs that were about stuff, this song is one of my shiver-inducing favourites. Beware: She sings a “feck.”
06 Northandsouth: I’m A Man Not A Boy: Obligatory forgotten uncool pop track that I enjoy.
07 Black Kids: I’m Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You: It has a very long title and is a good indie pop moment to end this mix on.

Boyfriend

Who’s That Girl

Northern Lad

I visited my old home town yesterday in the daytime on a week day which I’ve not done for almost a decade. Lovely time, took a lot of photos (mostly silly boring ones) so here are some highlights:

This is a bit spooky but it's just the view from that alley near the Baker's Oven, not a visual representation of the light at the end of the tunnel.

What's through the alleyway? This! Nothing in this photograph is photoshopped (by me anyway).

I went all black & white at the cemetary. So much rabbit poo in there, my shoes will never be the same again.

Oddly calm and beautiful. I took some photographs that I actually like.

Must resist Weeping Angels reference.

One of these things is ruined.

A typical Brentwood resident.

There are a lot of sad songs about leaving and having enough of a situation so I thought that would be a fun theme for this week. Well I say fun…

You can download this mix right here.

01 Luxembourg: A Little Bit More: Luxembourg were so good that this song wasn’t even on their album. A perfect blend of devastation with a lovely tune. Shiver-inducing!
02 The Men: I Don’t Depend On You: It’s that Human League but under a different name, doing a poppier thing than their work of that time and before they became the famous incarnation. This sounds quite jolly actually.
03 Rod Thomas: Same Old Lines: One of the pre-Bright Light Bright Light solo tracks from Rod’s EP. Again with the jolly sounds and a bit of ukelele with sad words.
04 Ane Brun: Don’t Leave: This one is a bit freaky and almost Twin Peak(s)y.
05 Peach: Sorrow Town: Once again we have a happy tune with sad words. Peach are one of my ‘lost’ bands who most people don’t know.
06 Avalanches: Since I Left You: You’ve probably heard of this one.
07 Amy Winehouse: Take The Box: This song is another shiver-inducing one, I always loved this more than her more famous singles. Simply brilliant / heartbreaking.

Music and pictures:

Same Old Lines

Don’t Leave

Since I Left You

Take The Box

Nothing could beat the October Doctor Who releases but November was pretty good…

The Witch From the Well by Rick Briggs is the main range release. It’s the second of the three part Eighth Doctor and Mary Shelley mini season and if it hadn’t come after the excellent Silver Turk it would be raved about a tiny bit more than I did. It’s a witchy tale, as you can tell from its title, and has the twist of featuring aliens whose technology looks rather wiccan to people from that time periods where they liked to burn witches. How careless! The main guest star is Simon Rouse (from Kinda) as Master John Kincaid and it’s good stuff although at times it felt slightly too long.

The First Wave by Simon Guerrier is the Companion Chronicles release and it’s the third of the three Steven Taylor & Oliver Harper stories that have been released over the last year. This was the first Novemebr story I listened to as I loved its predecessors and I’m partial to a bit of Season 3 (1965/6 version) black and white adventure and gloom. I can’t really say much without spoiling it but it’s a great story that brings things to a satisying conclusion. Some fans complained about it online but some fans like to do that sort of thing. Simon Guerrier’s next story in this era is a Steven Taylor & Sara Kingdom Companion Chronicle which is something to look forward to.

Hexagora by Paul Finch from a story by Peter Ling and Hazel Adair: this is the second of the new Lost Stories and it carries on from last month’s excellent The Elite. It’s not as good as that one but still very acceptable although I again got the feeling of it being a bit too long.  The guest stars of note in this are Jacqueline Pearce as Queen Zafira and Toby Hadoke as Mike Bretherton who play kind-of-but-not-exactly potential romantic partners for two of the leads. Talking of the Doctor, Nyssa and Tegan they work well in this as a unit and the story is basically fine. I don’t sound too enthusiastic about this but it was enjoyable enough.

Coming this month:

Coming in January:

Mixtape Monday returns! Oh what fun. Despite it not being a mix as all tracks are totally separate and not even being on a tape. What next? Not even on a Monday? Probably.

Mix 1 is about Love as that’s a nice obvious theme but it’s been given my weird touch. It can be downloaded at this here link and I hope it tempts you to check out some of the artists’ work by purchasing them.

01 Carol Williams: Love Is You (Tom Moulton Reconstruction): The disco obscurity that got 95% reconstituted as Groovejet and then had a generous dollop of Bextor added to it.
02 Loleatta Holloway: Love Sensation: Spookily another disco number about love that ended up as something else. Best use of “nitty gritty” in a song.
03 Lulu: Love Loves To Love Love. Yes indeed it’s Lulu and I love this old tune. It has a whole lot of “love”s in the lyrics.
04 Betty Davis: Anti Love Song. I first heard this song when I was sharing a student house that included a DJ who had a lot of great old vinyl. I ended up making a hip hop video in Leytonstone for his song but I have almost erased that from my mind now.
05 The Human League: I Need Your Loving (Extended Version): This spent a lot of years being an abomination in my memory but after recent Human League and Jam & Lewis revivals in my ears I’ve grown to like this on its own merits.
06 Goldbug: Whole Lotta Love: Loved mostly for the Pearl & Dean sample and it reminds me of that brief Gay Indie Disco era in the late 90s.
07 Anita Dobson: Anyone Can Fall In Love: Included because I am a freak.

Audio-visual moments:

Love Sensation

Love Loves To Love Love

I Need Your Loving

Whole Lotta Love

Anyone Can Fall In Love