The Mummies - The Fly

Ooooooh it's cold. Being so well wrapped up I bet these dudes don't feel it though. Cop a load of The Mummies doing their garage rock thang back in the 90s. Tu-tune-khamun!

The Destroyers - Out Of Babel

Three years ago the world lost Mr Paul Murphy, perhaps best known as the lead singer and whirling dervish at the centre of The Destroyers. Boy were this lot a wonderful live act! RIP Paul.

Sir Charles Jones - Friday

A new (to me at least) Friday related track from US soul singer Sir Charles Jones for all those 9 to 5 workers out there. Lay back, chill out and let the groove take y'all into the weekend...maybe not if you're still in the office mind you...then again why the hell not eh? I've done worse.

Ranking Roger - Wha'ppen

Sad news reached the Aid this week with the announcement that Two Tone legend Ranking Roger of The Beat had suffered a couple of strokes, was diagnosed with lung cancer and had a brain tumour (one of two) removed at the end of 2018. Blimey, talk about bad luck coming in threes eh? This all happened at a time when The Beat (Ranking Roger's version...there's another one in the US...it's complicated) were on the cusp of releasing and touring a brand new album too. Happily, as the interview above shows, Roger's determined to get back doing what he loves as soon as possible, in the meantime cop a load of the darn fine recent single Maniac.

All the best Roger.

Bis - Sound of a Heartbreak

So great to have Bis back again and releasing new music. Such an underrated band back in the day, absolute indie pop perfection. Heartbreak never sound so good. Enjoy!

PS: Here are a trio of classics from archives!

Let's hear it for the 90s

Can the start of the 90s really be almost 30 years ago? Good grief. Signs of a 90s revival started appearing a few years back and a new compilation from Steve Lamacq's set to shine a light on some of the many, many (oh so many) 90s bands that have perhaps faded from your memory. Although if you're reading this I guess there's a fair chance you may have barely been a twinkle in your parents' eyes when Voodoo Queens had their all too brief flirtation with fame. I was lucky enough to see 25 or so of the bands on the 4CD compilation and have fond memories of sweaty nights in Edwards, The Flapper (and Firkin as it was), The Foundry, The Hummingbird and no doubt one or two other venues that have vanished from memory under a tsunami of Dry Blackthorn.

Anyway, here's a trio of top tracks from the almost 80 on offer. Steve Lamacq's Lost Alternatives is out on March 22nd courtesy of Edsel Records.

Slowthai - Doorman

Music's a funny thing. A lot of what passes for 'cool' these days makes me want to rip off my own ears and feed 'em to a pack of rabid dogs but this track has enough of a punky swagger to float what's left of my boat. This is a rather well pulled off live (well, live-ish) version too.

Pardesi Music Machine - Pump Up The Bhangra

A bit of a Facebook 'chat' about this article reminded me of buying a tape at a Mela at Cannon Hill Park waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay back in the 80s. I've somehow mislaid it over the years but here's a bit of a mix from the album. Great stuff eh? Enjoy!

DJ Kool - Let Me Clear My Throat (Funkmaster Flex in da mix)

Back to last weekend's CD haul for this week's Friday Banger and a remix of DJ Kool's classic Let Me Clear My Throat. Picked this up for 33p, seven versions on a Maxi CD single too. Bargain.

Liam Lynch - United States of Whatever

Picked up another small mountain of CDs at the weekend for as little as 33p each. As I've banged on about many times before the CD revival is just around the corner people. Here's why:

- CDs sound better than downloads...and they're often a lot cheaper these days too.

- You can't stick a bunch of downloads on your shelf and go "Ooooh pretty" or show off your crap/weird taste to your mates or that person you want to cop off with.

- Apple/Microsoft/Spotify can't decide to block access to the tunes that you've already paid for or suddenly start charging a fortune to listen to stuff.

- CDs remind us of a time before the ruddy internet which, lets face it, is doing more to screw up the human race than pretty much any invention ever.

- Unlike vinyl CDs are pretty resilient, they don't take a huge amount of expensive kit to play but they still have a little book of lyrics and pretty pictures to look through.

- If you don't buy CDs they'll end up in a landfill and all the ickle baby penguins will die.

I know, I know...streaming/downloading is more convenient blah blah blah but, in the words of Mr Liam Lynch, whose CD single I bought on Saturday, I'm like...whatever.

Chop Suey baroques...

Psssss...ever wanted to hear System Of A Down's epic Chop Suey played on a Baroque Grand piano? Yes, me too. Settle down with a cup of tea/coffee/chop suey and enjoy.

PS: Just in case you've not heard the original in all its glory here you go. You're welcome.

Art Of Noise - Close To The Edit

Happy New Year dear reader and welcome to the 14th...good grief...year of The Hearing Aid. Okay so my posts these days tend to consist of roughly 16 words but never mind the quantity feel the quality eh? Hmmmm. Anyway hopefully this year I'll make it to slightly more gigs than I did in 2018 which, given that I only really made it to 2 (plus a couple of festivals) shouldn't be too tricky.

As per usual Christmas at Baron Towers was spent in a haze of gin, wine, yule log cream and artery blocking food but we did venture out to the chazzas and predictably came back with yet more CDs including a double from the rather wonderful and underrated Art Of Noise which only came out a few months ago. Presumably the buyer just uploaded the whole shebang to his/her/their ruddy smart phone or laptop and didn't need the original. Suits me.

PS: Sad to hear about HMV, inevitable but still incredibly sad. It looks unlikely that anyone will step in to save it this time, especially as the last lot (a 'vulture' fund called Hilco) seemingly took £50million out of the business over the past few years. I really do fear for the future of music. Sure there will always be great bands and artists out there but who the hell will be able to afford to pursue music as a 'career' when a million hits on You Tube only nets you enough for a single stick of gum? The result? A music biz controlled by one or two massive corporations, a handful of manufactured acts releasing tunes genetically modified to appeal to as many people as possible for roughly one week before the next comes along and a live scene that withers away to nothingness leaving just enormodomes playing host to holograms of long dead performers playing the hits to a crowd videoing the whole thing on their phones. The internet really does have a lot to answer for when you think about it.