You know the old series of cartoons with the boy and girl that led with “Love is …” (They have a site here)? Well, I have an original to contribute.

Love is … remembering that Tom once mentioned The Posies 8 months ago in a meaningless conversation and reminding him that they will be playing this Sunday in Singapore.

That’s right, folks, my partner in crime (who sneaks around this site when she’s bored at work) found out about The Posies’ gig this Sunday at Bay Beats 2006. How cool is that? All the way from Seattle. Not only that, but Ken Stringfellow will also play 2 solo sets.

This makes up for the diabolical Coldplay concert this past Monday.

These Elliott Smith-esque days are coming thick and fast. There are many more reasons to detest the ubiqutous iPod than there are seasons in the sun, the least of which is the overturning of conventional punctuation which results in Steve Jobs iCon (sic) biography. The more glaring one is that, for most, for the recent past, these invariably white units have become synonymous with “music”. But what music takes place in the 20cm between one’s ears? Surely it’s natural - and just - to feel the composition of musical genius below the neck, and not from within.

Music is never private, not in its manner of production and re-production. Public play is its raison d’être, hence its very distribution. Its pre-birth, the compositional phase, takes place in silence, but this silence is not yet musical. Yet these little machines do nothing less than to challenge natural laws, and instead isolate and atomise us. Man, I’m so iRate.

Notwithstanding that, this little machine (and its various non-Apple bastard-siblings) has been a boon in one respect. The podcast has brought radio - of all things - back to life. The original phenomenon known as radio, which was ever wireless, has always remained relevant: intelligently relevant and freely relevant. Radio’s bane has been distance, until the advent of the miniature relayer and the internet.

What I love about radio is content. Long before television, that evil black box in the corner, radio, that little gadget that tells the time and also usually simultaneously lullabies you to, and jolts you out of, sleep. Usually, the stuff of radio is music; when it is not, radio survives on reasoned voices. And much of this is available on podcast thanks to the BBC.

The BBC has taken to the digital age in a big way and Radio 4 stoically chugs along with marvellous, marvellous programmes on asteriods, magnetism, and Pragmatism. Where else would you find a dissection of the finer points of Dominican history? Or bring the Cynics to life? Mark Kermode’s weekly Film Review is a gem. Listen to how passionate he becomes. Intelligent and passionate insights into moving pictures. Ironic, then, how the upstart has resuscitated the world’s first and oldest form of wireless communication.

Alas, a mellow mood prevails. Listening to these reasoned voices engaging in debate on fundamentals only brings to light what is lacking in diabolical Singapore: our most primitive needs are not met. That and a good winter.

iLike these:

KCRW’s selection of podcast programmes are found here. Not to forget
NPR and underHeard.org - small time, Big Heart.

This month’s haul of new music had the feel of a “looking back”, the look of a nostalgic bent.

Big Star’s return, Posies in tow, “In Space” prompted a belated airing of the late Chris Bell’s “I Am The Cosmos”. Maybe the two will mesh to create a cosmic Big Star, a divine reunion of aural majesty? Quite in theme, and with the present and the power pop demographic in mind, we also have Teenage Fanclub’s “Man-Made”. Is this as good as their “Grand Prix”?

Continuing this look over our shoulders, this time to the late, great past, are The Reivers’ “Saturday” (1987), Material Issue’s “International Pop Overthrow” (1991), The Rooks’ “Encore Echoes”; Richard X Heyman’s “Basic Glee”(2002) closes this month’s collection.

On reflection, there is no “then” and “now” with good music: they are of an integral whole. Chris Bell’s posthumous 1979 album and this year’s releases are separated by numbers designating Christian Time; in our sense of things, in the personal history of music, there is the fullness of a physical extension between points that ridicules the false urgency of temporal measure. Such musicology creates a space of familiarity through dissonance; like my buddy Yudson said:

Life is full of distortion

It makes sense. Remember when we wore our records and tapes out, and how compact discs appeared in the early 80s as an indestructible god-send? Truth be told, it brought with it a nasty under-belly. These compact discs cut-off frequencies at 20KHz, compared to the typical LP’s cuts-off at 36KHz. Even though we don’t actually hear anything above 20KHz, that potential, that spectrum of hidden reserves found in LPs is important; sound cannot be directly expressed as sound in this inaudible zone, but rather finds expression as distortion, dirty noise, so to speak, the non-linguistic hum to our verbose world. That friction, that resistance against which we measure up to, that is why we love it so.

The “dreamt up” clarity of the compact disc brought with it a clinical-ness that raged to reduce all to definition. Even this hum.

I’ve been to Paradise but I’ve never been to me (Charlene)

Is this the lyrics of a “so-bad-its-good” 80s disco song, or does it question the incongruence between the Good Life and self-reflection, the non-identity of the Divine and subject?

Following on from my infatuation with Buffalo Tom comes Bill Janovitz’s “Fireworks On TV”. For old times’ sake, Maria Mckee came “Peddlin’ Dreams”: best served moody blue. The three Matthew Sweet-related discs were thoroughly disparate, not surprising given the years that span them. Finally, the way Ryan Adams “borrow” from Neil Young and the rest of the 70s makes me wanna …

Joe Strummer & the Mescaleros’ Streetcore offering is a blast: the vibes of “Midnight Jam” is as mellow it is surprising. The opener’s melody stays in your head. Cat Power’s Moon Pix was a shot at redemption.

Elliott Smith’s eponymous 1995 disc and Either/Or continues the recent burrowing into this guy’s torrid creativity. John Coltrane’s Meditations caps off the evening with a lullaby.

The token “recent, happening, cool band” this week is Ambulance LTD and their debut disc.

this week’s batch of randomly selected music: Buffalo Tom’s “Asides”, Grant Hart’s undeservedly little known “Good News For Modern Man” and The Kropotkins’ “5 Points Crawl”. They wouldn’t sound half as good if you heard them played on MTV.

Memphis Cat has this classic from 20 years ago (!?) streaming online and guess what: Capitol have released a deluxe edition, with 18 demos and rarities. I actually saw Mr. Cole perform (sans Commotions) in Wolverhampton one autumn evening in 1991. The boy could sing.

A bootleg (in the truest sense of the word) recording of their September 1982 show in New York’s “Peppermint Lounge”. This is punk at its best: and there is the tender “You can’t put your arms around a memory”.

Another of the randomly selected “music to move apartments” to. A little John Mayerish, which (in my book) is a heinous crime.