Johan live at the plaza

On the 2nd of august I went to see a free outdoor concert by the dutch band Johan on the Canadaplein in Alkmaar. It was a lovely sunny day and Johan is becoming a trademark for 'good music'.

More pictures on flickr.

Check out their new album '4' or the compilation box '12.5 Years, 3 Albums, 36 Songs' that contains their first three albums and a DVD with clips.

Update: three weeks later Johan has announced they will split at the end of the year (they will finish the current tour). Sad news but what a great quartet of albums.

As I can't seem to find clips for their new album, here are some clips from their 'THX JHN' album.

Dog Eared Moonlight

The second album by The Milk & Honey Band on Andy Partridge's APE label. Need I say more?


The album is wrapped in a beautiful cover that resembles an old and worn Penguin paperback.

Just listen/see for yourself: the beautiful opener 'Just You' and the first single 'Disappear'.

One of the good things about Almelo

As I wrote in this post we were in Almelo for a few days. Luckily this coincided with the dutch band Barrelhouse playing in the local pub Proeflokaal Belgie.
I had heard from them years ago and frankly didn't know they were still around. It turned out one of the friends we were away with knows one of their guitar players so that's how we got to know about it in the first place. We arrived early and settled at the bar (that stocked plenty of good Belgium beer, of course), in time to watch the band come in and set up their instruments. Amazing to know that the band started over thirty years ago and they're still travelling around in a rented van playing small pubs like this. It was a great concert, you can tell they are really doing it because they love the music.

Take a listen on their myspace page.

Below a YouTube video for your viewing pleasure.

New online music site

One of my rss-feeds pointed me to a new 'play online music for free' site: We7.
Interesting, as sites like Pandora were forced to restrict themselves because of the licencing costs.

Anyway, the sound is good and bandwith is adequate (no sudden stops midsong). So far.
I'm probably going to create an account and play around with it.

I'm available.

No I'm not.

Let me explain. I had the privilege to have two of my tracks (recorded in the early 80's) included on the Trumpett Days lp (yes, as in vinyl).
But it turns out it's already sold out right after the release! Only 520 copies and it will never be 'repressed' :-)
You can listen to a clip on the Enfant Terrible site or on the VPRO luisterpaal (but I think it will be gone soon).



If I get some more listens on my MySpace page I will put up some new/unreleased tracks there. I also take requests ;-)

Rediscovering Snakefinger

Thanks to a kind person who posted some Snakefinger albums on Usenet I am now very much enjoying some old stuff like the Chilli Willi and the Red Hot Peppers albums that I have never heard until now. Great stuff, some is a bit like Brinsley Schwarz (a 'pub rock' band that I know a bit longer), some is C&W and other songs remind me of Steely Dan.
Funny thing is, this puts his carreer in a whole new perspective for me. Cool: I can revisit all his albums and listen to it from a new perspective :-)

The Tapes, part two.

I have finished part two of the pictures of The Tapes. They are available here.

The Tapes (dutch band)

Inspired by a post of their albums on the usenet (yes, I'm too lazy to digitize my own vinyl) I scanned my negatives from dutch band The Tapes today.
I saw them play two times, in 1980 in the "Paard van Troje" in Den Haag (The Hague) and in 1981 on the Rotterdam "New Pop" festival. The band disbanded in 1982 (read some more in dutch here). Some members continued playing with other artists but as far as I know they never reformed, which in a way is to be admired but on the other hand the world could do with more good music. Releasing the old albums on cd would be a start.
Anyway, the first batch of scans is here on Webshots. The second batch will follow. Let's hope it's the start of a revival.