Just been to see the new Harry Potter film, I quite enjoyed it. As with the other films it's not 100% faithful to the book, but I don't see how it can be without being about 12 hours long. Still, it gets the story across, has a few funny moments and the special effects team did the Dementors, Buckbeak and the Knight Bus very well.



The CD on the left is a free on I got with a T-shirt from Relapse Records. It's a sampler from The Dillinger Escape Plan - not for the faint of heart.

I've finally updated my CD section, in case anyone is wondering about what I think about all my new CDs...

long overdue...



Hope of the States - The Lost Riots

I read a few reviews of this on the internet that compared these to Mogwai (because they do loud) and Godspeed You! Black Emporer (because of the multi-instrumentation I guess). I don't think those comparisons do this band any favours, they're much more song based, if anything closer to someone like Coldplay all be it slightly louder. Anyway, what do I think of it? I like it - if there is one problem I can't quite get used to there vocalist, but I'm willing to overlook that because the tunes are so good. Top tune: 66 Sleepers to Summer



Miss Kittin - I Com

I got this after reading the gushing review on Playlouder - I can't say I'm impressed by it though. There are a couple of decent tunes (Professional Distortion and Meet Sue Be She spring to mind) but most of it just washes straight over me...



Black Eyes - Cough

What is it about bands on dischord splitting up before they've reached there prime, is Ian Mackaye such a bad boss? Anyway, second and final (boo!) album from one of the stranger bands on dischord. They mix punk with free jazz ideas using a setup that includes two vocalists (one who sounds like a 4 year old having a tantrum), two drummers, two bassists (although I believe one of them switched to saxophone) and very chaotic guitar. I think they're great and it is a crying shame they decided to call it a day. One for the more adventurous listener.



Sonic Youth - Daydream Nation

A classic, so I can't critisise it - although I have to admit to preferring the older, wiser Sonic Youth...



The World of Arthur Russell

As I'm sure I've mentioned before I've been meaning to start listening to Arthur Russell's back catalogue - this seemed like as good a place to start. Interesting stuff, it features some of his disco funk work with Dinosaur L, a couple of tracks which sound like very early house music. However, the best stuff is the solo tunes where it's just Arthur Russel with his processed cello and maybe a bit of guitar - I'd really like to hear some more of that.



DJ Spooky - rhythm Science

This CD accompanies a book written by Paul Miller aka DJ Spooky about the art of mixing, and no I haven't read it yet. This CD is fairly similar to his other mix CDs in style even though he's restricted to using the contents of the Sub Rosa archive as sound sources. A good - dare I say it? hell, why not? - chill out CD.



Seeing the Unseen D.O.R. Almanac 2004

Free CD that came with the Wire, doesn't do anything for me really...



Kid606 - Who Still Kill Sound?

I can't listen to this CD without giggling, it's just so much fun! It's kind of a companion piece to his Kill Sound Before Sound Kills You, but slightly less subtle or restrained - not words usually associated to Mr 606 at the best of times. Full of manic beats, tunes that refuse to stick to the same idea for more than a nanosecond and plenty of silly songs titles (Ass Scratch Beaver anyone?). Great CD for those times in life when you just need to have a bit of a dance around.



Spring Heel Jack - Sweetness of The Water

Damn these lot are good; once again the Spring Heel Jack duo have gathered some respected jazz musicians and produced a truly original piece of music that almost defies categorisation. For this CD they've bought in trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith to join saxophonist Evan Parker - I think it makes for a more melodic album than there last few, and when a rhythm section is used it's done very subtley so there aren't as many 'jazz freak outs' as you may expect. Very very good album.



Richard X Presents His X-Factor Vol.1

OK from free jazz experimentalism we move on to Pop! Yep, I do listen to it - and I even like some of it! Especially Richard X, who seems to able to make anyone sound good, even Liberty X... I think it's down to the fact that he knows good sample when he hears one and isn't afraid to use them, and he obviously likes 80's electronic pop. Mostly good...



TV On The Radio - Staring At The Sun EP

Get the Young Liars EP (which has Staring At The Sun), the other two songs here aren't worth your time...



Passage - The Forcefield Kids

For those people who are familiar with anticon's output: this sounds like a harsher electronic version of what why? does. For everyone else it's hip-hop featuring melodic rapping (ie he sometimes sings) with sparse electronic beats and almost industrial samples. It's OK - but it reminds me a bit of that Grolsh advert, I can't help but think "Shtop! this album isn't ready yet". Still, it's probably worth keeping an eye on Passage's career.

Jesu are the project to rise phoenix-like (hopefully) from the remains of what is possibly my favourite band of all time: Godflesh. This link takes you to a page where you can listen to a couple of real audio clips from the soon to be released Heart Ache EP.



I think it's rather good possibly the best thing I've heard this year.

Not doing very well at staying of the CDs, still it's only a single so doesn't really count. It's the new TV on the Radio EP: Staring at the Sun along with a couple of extra tracks I didn't have. To be honest the extra tracks are not much cop. I'd avoid this one and get the Young Liars EP if you feel the urge to investigate the band...

OK, this is my last CD for a couple of weeks (yeah, right Phil!). It's from anticon new boy Passage, he makes electro-new-wave-industrial-folk- hospital-waiting-room hope-hop that you can dance or die to, according to his website anyway. He's sort of raps, sort of sings his way through 20 odd short little tunes - sounds pretty good first time through.



Anyway, enough about my CD addiction - I have two sets of pictures today: First is from a traditional Friday night out, pretty quiet really, partly due to some of the collective being at Glastonbury (even though it rained I'm still jealous, if only from catching Basement Jaxx on BBC3, they looked amazing).



The second set of pictures is some car porn from the Goodwood Festival of Speed for all the petrol heads out there.



Enjoy!

I think England's defeat by P*rt*g*l confirms my fairly ambiguous belief that there is no god, or if I'm wrong and there is a god then he's a complete and utter cunt, and when Darth Phil gets to the pearly gates he'll be flicking a few casual v-signs to any passing angels and joing the queue for the horns, tail and spikey pole thing to poke all you sinners with!



/darth phil has a bit of a cry



Couple of mp3 blog links: Mystery and Misery has posted a few tunes by a band who may or may not be called Summer at Shatter Creek, standard whiny shit - but they have a good trick where they take some Mogwai tunes and add vocals. Karaoke for indie kids I guess, but I have to say what they have done to Burn Girl Prom Queen perfectly sums up the mood I'm in today.



And this post from music (for robots) makes me believe that there is still some good in the world.

I've got a screaming hangover, and my head really hurts from a piggy back incident that went horribly horribly wrong (juicy pictures here, not for the squeamish), but I don't care! Come on En-ger-land!



Anyway, back to reality - which in my case means new CDs. Some pop music this time from Richard X - I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion he is a genius: his Prince Po remixes quite literally rock, he's managed to make Rachael Stevens sound interesting, and if you don't like what he did with Liberty X you are a fool! A fool I tell you!!!



Only one more CD to come this week, then I'm going to be good and have a break for a couple of weeks - honest!

Forgot to mention this CD yesterday, it's a sampler from a record company called D.O.R. given away with this month's issue of The Wire. Can't say any of it has desperately excited me so far, but I've only listened to the first three tracks...

No dodgy pictures this weekend, I'm afraid to report, as I've been looking after my mum whose just had what has been described to me as a fairly substantial Fibroid removed from her womb (I bet you're so glad I've mentioned that!).



Couple of new CDs to tell you about though: first up is The Sweetness of The Water from Spring Heel Jack, pretty astonishing CD continuing there adventures in modern composition and free jazz.



Second up is the new, and frankly mental CD from Kid 606 - he's gone for another Kill Sound Before Sound Kills You style freak out with this one, difficult to listen to without cracking a great big shit eating grin.



Hopefully my CD purchasing habits will slow down this week, so I'll get chance to update my CD collection page and tell you all about these CDs, and the ones I bought over the last week or so, in more detail.

phils_pheeds.xml



...exported feeds from my RSS reader - move along, nothing to see here.

Towards the bottom of this post is a really handy solution to getting mp3-esque ringtones onto a Sharp GX-30 mobile phone - just in case the post gets nuked you can also find the details in this file: howtoannoypeople.txt

Couple of things that have just appeared in my RSS reader which I feel the urge to share:



www.pitchformula.com - the people over at pitchforkmedia must be feeling vaguely embarrassed about this site.



BBC Virtual replay - shockwave based goal highlights from Euro 2004.

Went to see Gang Starr last night, well when I say Gang Starr I mean Guru as DJ Premier wasn't there (even though certain websites said he would be). Not a bad night out, being a bit of a pretentious backpack hip-hop fan I've not really listened to his stuff before, but I was suitably impressed with what I believe the kids call his "mad skillz". Support act wasn't too bad either, someone called Estelle, who might be worth keeping an eye on.



Anyway, pictures are here and a crappy video is over here.



By the way the picture on the left has nothing to do with Guru or Gang Starr, it's the new book/mix CD from Paul D Miller aka DJ Spooky that Subliminal Kid, he's been let loose on the Sub Rosa archives which should at least be interesting.

Three new CDs acquired over the last few days: some weird hardcore/punk/jazz shit from Dishord, some 80's avant-garde disco pop music, and a classic CD from Sonic Youth...

Being a Leicester fan I should be used to results like last nights...

Look! I'm so bored at work I've resorted to making a silly little mix CD, here's whats on it:



The Streets - Turn the Page

!!! - When the Going Get Tough, The Tough Get Karazee

Sonic Youth - I Love You Golden Blue

Devendra Banhart - A Sight to Behold

Slipknot - Vermilion, Pt. 2

Faust vs Dalek - T-Electronique

Pixies - Where is my mind? (Live 13/4/2004)

Aesop Rock - Freeze

Speedy J - Sevntrack

RJD2 - Making Days Longer

Nine Inch Nails - We're in this Together

Two Lone Swordsmen - Sex Beat

The Swans - Live Through Me

TV on the Radio - Dreams

Throbbing Gristle - Hot on the Heels of Love (Radcliffe Remix)



It just about fills up 80 minutes, mainly new stuff (which you'll know all about from this page) but a couple of old classics there too. We're in this together, which I reckon what a proper 'love' song should be - fast frantic and very messy; Sevntrack which is a cracking bit of techno from a couple of years back; and that live version of Where is My Mind is great, I love the way the croud carry on the "woo ooh" bit after the band have finished.



Anyway, if you're feeling particularly anal you may want to track these tunes down to see if they really do fill up 80 minutes of music.

Oh dear. Oh dear. Oh dear...



For pictures click here.

For commentary click here.



That is all.

This is the new Miss Kittin CD, I'd recommend it as a really good morning CD.



In other news I am no longer an opera virgin, I have had my cherry popped by a fiesty young lady called Carmen. Not an altogether unpleasant way to spend an evening...

Note to anyone reviewing this CD by Hope Of The States: just because a band has 'loud bits' does not make them Mogwai.



This CD reminds me more than anything of a slightly less poppy Feeder... maybe with a couple of Coldplay-esque moments - this is not necessarily a bad thing.

RadioRocketBRUNX



Geek stuff, ignore if the thought of amateur rocketry soundtracked by Radiohead doesn't give you funny feelings in special secret places.

So far this week on the CD front: an interesting underground dance music collection, a pretty danceable album from a band with a silly name, and the return of Sonic Youth - details here.

Sonic Youth, Grime and a stupid band name...



!!! - Louden Up Now

Much anticipated new CD from the band who have the stupidest name in the existence of time: '!!!' , apparently if you actually want to say there name you just need to repeat 3 repetitive noises, "chk chk chk" being the traditional version - I'm sorry but just fuck off, that's crap, get a proper name... Now that I've got that out of my system let's get back to the issue in hand, ie the album. Well, like anything that gets hyped to death - it's all a bit of an anticlimax, don't get me wrong there are some great tunes here: kicking off with the excellent When the Going Get Tough, The Tough Get Karazee and Pardon My Freedom, but then they start to calm down a bit... until we get to the song with one ofg my favourite breakdowns ever Me and Giuliani Down by the Schoolyard, but that's been out on an EP by itself and seems a bit out of place on the album. I'm probably being a bit too harsh on this CD really, it's very danceable and makes doing the ironing much more fun - I just think there's material here for a truly great EP rather than a quite good album.



Grime

Grime seems to be what the kids are calling the newest form of urban music, I always had the impression that it grew out of the garage scene, but from what I've heard here it's got much more in common with drum'n'bass. Of course this CD may be completely missing the point as there are only three artists on display here: Mark One - who seems to be the star of the show, Plasticman - who uses the vocal line from Technotronics Pump Up The Jam and completely gets away with it, and Slaughter Mob - who bring a bit of dub terrorism into proceedings. It's all pretty intriguing stuff.



Sonic Youth - Sonic Nurse

I've been listening to this album pretty much non-stop since Monday, and I'm damned if I can pick a track I don't like. Absolutely blinding album that should put bands half there age to shame and in my opinion is the best thing they've done for years.

Lunch Time CD: Sonic Youth's new album Sonic Nurse...



Four songs in, and I have to say it's great - they've still got it, even if they are starting to show there age a bit on the photo in the CD booklet. Damm they look old!



Anyway if you're not familiar with Sonic Youth may I suggest a visit to there official site to acquaint yourself with indie rock's older wiser statesmen (and woman). They seem to have quite a few mp3s to download too, that page is over here.

I just love Monday mornings, that slight feeling of depression that inevitably follows from a weekend of heavy drinking; waking up and promising that this week will be the week where I finally stop smoking, stop drinking so much, and actually do some exercise... knowing full well that by this evening such virtuous thoughts will be thrown right out of the metaphorical window.



Anyway, enough moaning. One thing about this week is it's a pretty damn fine one for music, two of which have already turned up due to Warp's mighty fine mail order service



Frst up is the new album by !!! which is very funky and danceable, although I have a nagging feeling that it would have been better as a mini album - still it has a song with the chorus "Like I give a fuck, Like I give a shit", which is alright by me...



Second CD is what I think is the first official compilation of Grime, it's not quite drum'n'bass, not quite garage, and I don't know if it's just me - but I reckon most of the tunes on offer here would make really good mobile phone ringtones. In reality this compilation is a great example of if there is one thing that we do really well in this country, it's underground dance music.

Hey Pig, Piggy Pig Pig Pig



...lyrics from a Nine Inch Nails song in case you were wondering - I'm feeling a bit goth today.

I think it needs to be said that TV on the radio rock, they rock even more in the flesh (if you can actually see them) - quite impressed with my little trip to Camden tonight, got offered drugs after approximately 20 seconds of leaving the tube station, although on the downside it has to be said that the BarFly sucks as a venue.

OK, I do occasionally get it wrong - I'm going to have to hold my hands up and admit a couple of the CDs I've purchase recently could be categorised as being 'shit'.



More details here...

I do occasionally get it wrong...



Stone Sour - Stone Sour

OK, I got a bit carried away with the new Slipknot album and thought this might be comparable - it's not... it's shit. Move along, nothing to see here.



Broken Social Scene - Beehives

I really wasn't expecting much out of this B-sides collection, but I've been pleasantly suprised by it. It's no where near as good as there 'You Forgot In It People' album, but it's going to be difficult to top that album. The best way to describe this is with the word 'amble' - it kind of ambles into the room, sits in the corner, has a bit of a sing song then ambles out. You don't really notice it while it's there, but for some inexplicable reason the sun just seems to shine a little bit more. A nice album.



Infinite Livez - Bush Meat

Extremely silly, and very British, hip-hop album from the Big Dada off shoot of Ninjatune. He raps about My Little Ponys, Lactating and *ahem* White Wee Wee - alongst side his one-eyed puppet side-kick Barry Convex. As you may guess, not the most serious album in the world. Still pretty good though.



Sunburned Hand of the Man - Rare Wood

I've heard about this band countless times in The Wire, but never had any success at purchasing any of there albums, however they've now got round to releasing one on a proper label. The last song is really good, I'd heard it from an mp3 blog before - sort of a thigh slapping, acoustic slide guitar driven, stomp-a-long. The trouble is the rest of the CD is utter shit - I do like some improvistational music, stuff like Jackie-O-Motherfucker, some of the new Spring Heel Jack material, even some pure noise artists like Kevin Drumm - but the stuff that Sunburned Hand of the Man produce on this CD just doesn't work... except for the last track.



Swans - Children of God / World of Skin

From what I can work out this is a collection consisting of the Children of God album combined with several EPs which now make up the World of Skin collection. Like the previous Swans album I purchased this is pretty heavy going due to it's length, but worth the effort - I can understand why Justin Broadrick of Godflesh rates them so highly, they really did know how to write some truly crushing songs. Also possibly the most truly gothic album I've purchased.

Darth Phil is feeling sad tonight - his family's dog had to be put down today... :-(



So here's to Sally Smith 1986-2004, OK she may have only been a dog, but she was always considered part of the clan, all be it the one who used to go to the toilet in public and who never quite mastered table manners, but still...