Author: admin

In these strange and unprecented times (I don’t think anyone has called them that yet, I think I’ve coined a term that all the cool cats will be using before long), people have been doing unusual things to keep themselves entertained.

Most of these unusual things involve nominating people to do things on Facebook with no explanation.

Some of these unusual things are quizzes. I can’t fathom where the quiz addiction has come from other than it being a form of interaction which you can do via video. I quite like quizzes so I’m not complaining.

One thing that some friends and I did was invite each other to virtual museums. This requires a small amount of backstory…

In 2016, the world went to shit. Also, we went on holiday to the Lake District to climb Scafell Pike. Whilst there, we discovered there was a pencil museum nearby. We were all rather excited to visit. Imagine our dismay when, upon arrival, we discovered that it was closed due to flooding. Actually, you don’t need to imagine our dismay because it was captured in a photograph.

It is only now whilst writing this that I discovered visiting the pencil musuem was not on my bucket list, a fact that I have just rectified.

We did manage to find another museum, The Puzzling Place, which for just £3.50 each gave us many delights. Such as this amusing photo of us all in a weird perspective.

And whilst it was a thoroughly enjoyable experience, it never quite made up for not seeing the world’s biggest colouring pencil. Anyway, ever since whenever we have gone away on one of our intrepid adventures, we have sought out the most amusing and frivolous museums nearby.

When the lockdown hit, we were all very concerned that we would not be able to go on our holiday in September and so to get our museum fix, we all created museums out of the things available in our houses. This made for a very enjoyable evening.

Adam and Alice created a Boozeum, with a quite frankly astonishing amount of alcohol. I have been to their house on many occassions and I can’t work out where it has all been hidden.

Louise and Matt created a Loo-seum, where they curated several exhibits of mainly bathroom items and exhibited them on a wooden plinth.

We created a Mugseum, because we have more mugs than any one household could use in a lifetime. We do quite like tea in our house, and have been given many mugs as gifts. We organised these into categories and displayed them for the visitors to our museum.

Afterwards we did have to admit that perhaps we have more than we need.

Anyway, if you’re bored during lockdown, I can recommend creating a museum for your friends to visit. It’s great fun. If you do, bung me a free ticket, yeah?

Band: Less Than Jake
Album: Anthem
Released: May 2003
Favourite Track: The Science of Selling Yourself Short
Favourite Lyric: “So I’m looking tonight for some peace of mind maybe then I’ll find some strength inside”

Having played for many years in a ska-punk band there had to be one ska-punk album on my list. Less Than Jake are by far my favourite ska band and (although it is now difficult to isolate just one band out of the many that I love) probably my current favourite band.

Now, I am not for one moment saying this is the best Less Than Jake album (it’s not, that’s Hello Rockview) but it’s the first one that I bought when it came out and therefore listened to over and over in a short space of time.

Less Than Jake are just one of the best bands to watch live. They’re so much fun and if I could only ever see one band again, I would have no hesitation in picking them.

Also, they cover the Spongebob Squarepants theme tune.

Band: Hell is For Heroes
Album: The Neon Handshake
Released: Februrary 2003
Favourite Track: I Can Climb Mountains
Favourite Lyric: “Can’t seem to judge the distance between my hands and feet quite literally”

Once upon a time there was a band called Symposium. The were a sort of throwaway pop-punk band. They achieved moderate success but were never going to do anything groundbreaking. They split up and then I heard stories about some of the members of the band being in this new band called Hell is For Heroes.

I’d heard their live shows were great and that their upcoming album would be amazing. It seemed to take ages for that album to arrive but when it did it showed that it was worth the weight.

This is one of those albums where nothing is wasted. It is a straight up awesome rock album with hooks, punches, screaming… all the good shit.

I have seen the band perform this album in its entirety twice (although the first time I missed half the show and I’m still upset by it). The last time was in 2018 which was one of my favourite gigs of all time. I wrote loads about this then so I may be just reiterating som of what I said.

Band: Fountains of Wayne
Album: Utopia Parkway
Released: April 1999
Favourite Track: Denise
Favourite Lyric: “Will you stop pretending I’ve never been born now I look a little more like that guy from KorN”

This is a great pop album with amusing witty lyrics. That is why it is on this list. When you’re a teenager who just listens to rock music with simple and/or depressing lyrics, finding something like this can be a game changer.

Most people will just know the band from Stacy’s Mom which got them their 5 minutes of face but (and this isn’t just long-term fan elitism) it is probably one of their worst songs.

This album is a concept album about life in suburbia and feels very cohesive for this fact.

I only saw the band once but they were great fun and one of my abiding memories of the show is that they explained that the song Hat and Feet which had previously been quite confusing was about a piano falling on a cartoon character, with all you can see being their hat and feet.

Bassist Adam Schlesinger sadly died recently due to COVID-19 and it wasn’t until he did that I realised how much he had done outside of the band including vast amounts of song writing for other artists and films including That Thing You Do and Josie and the Pussycats.

Band: Ben Folds Five
Album: Whatever and Ever Amen
Released: March 1997
Favourite Track: Battle of Who Could Care Less
Favourite Lyric: “I poured my heart out, it evaporated, see?”

I got into Ben Folds Five because Richard had a spare ticket to a show at the Kentish Town Forum as he’d split up with his girlfriend and unsurprisingly didn’t want to go along to a show with her. He lent me this album along with Ben Folds Five and Naked Baby Photos. I listened to them a fair bit before the show but it wasn’t until I saw the show that I fell in love with the band.

The energy and passion in the show draws you into the band, along with the fact that they all seemed like people you’d want to be friends with. But mostly it was the fact that Ben Folds scaled the speakers and threw his piano stool at his piano. It was at that point that I realised that pianos could be cool and not just for Elton John.

This album is the one that I will come back to again and again. The first is rawer and punkier, The Unauthorised Biography of Reinhold Messner is more musical and more polished and the stuff after they reformed was more experimental but Whatever and Ever Amen is the one that just encompases everything the band is about – beautiful harmonies, an interesting combination of instruments, songs about people and experiences which are at the same time both specific and universal.

For my birthday last year, my brother got me Ben Folds book A Dream About Lightning Bugs which I highly recommend. It is an autobiography that completely focuses in on the music and isn’t self-indulgent. It really helped me understand how he constructs his songs and gave me inspiration for song writing as well.

Band: Elliott Smith
Album: Either/Or
Released: February 1997
Favourite Track: Say Yes
Favourite Lyric: “People you’ve been before that you don’t want around anymore”

I had been told by someone into similar music as me that I would like this album. So I went to Our Price and got them to order it in for me. It arrived a couple of weeks later and I went into town to collect it. The salesperson at the desk was my friend Tim who I briefly discussed the album with as he’d not heard of it but I was unable to even give him a hint about what it might sound like having no idea myself.

I was lucky enough to see a few shows while he was still alive. The first time I saw him he was supported by Quasi who he also played bass for.

Before seeing him, I had the impression of him as an exceptionally introverted person but he seemed really quite personable. He would come out and wave to the crowd and made jokes about his voice being bad due to a cough but that he couldn’t be too bad as he was still smoking.

Anyway, this album is basically flawless. Every song on it is a beautiful work of art. Excellent music, great lyrics, perfectly structured. I literally can’t find a flaw with it.

Smith is a vastly underrated guitar player. I know because I’ve recently bought a “Best of” music book and I can barely play 2 songs from it.

I still strongly remember the night when I was lying in bed and got a text message from Richard telling me that he had died and the feeling that evoked in me.

Band: dEUS
Album: In A Bar, Under the Sea
Released: September 1996
Favourite Track: Roses
Favourite Lyric: “I don’t need no thoughts in me, don’t you want to rescue me?”

I saw the video for Little Arithmetics on the alternative show on MTV and was blown away. It’s such a beautiful song that at the end turns into a noisefest. Instantly I wanted to make music like that.

dEUS are from Belgium and so English is not their first language. Either because of or despite that (I’ve never been able to work out which) their lyrics are a lot more poetic and interesting than many musicans for whom English is their first language.

Things I like about dEUS:

• How they present their name with a small d and capital EUS
• They have a violinist
• They seem to be a musical collective. The last time I saw them they seemed to have acquired Mauro Pawlowski, the singer from Evil Superstars, as a backing guitarist/vocalist. Evil Superstars are also awesome and you should check them out.
• They don’t sound like anyone else.

Band: Radiohead
Album: The Bends
Released: March 1995
Favourite Track: Just
Favourite Lyric: “I wish it was the sixties, I wish I could be happy I wish, I wish, I wish that something would happen”

Of the albums on this list, this is the first one I had on compact disc. If you’re young, they’re like little frisbees that play MP3s.

A while before I got this, I had randomly ordered a CD of Pablo Honey from a mail order advert in a magazine. If you’re young, it was like a paper version of Amazon.

I had no idea what Radiohead sounded like but I’d read about them and they seemed like the sort of band that I would like, and the CD didn’t cost too much. I liked it but it wasn’t until I got the follow up that I really fell in love with Radiohead who took over the mantle of being my favourite band for many years to come.

This album is one of four on this list that could possibly be my all-time favourite album. It’s all killer no filler, and the band making a proper rock album before they went all bleepy boopy. Not that I don’t like the bleepy boopy stuff, it’s just that my heart lies with The Bends.

One of the weirdest gigs I’ve ever been to was a Radiohead gig at Victoria Park. The crowd was basically motionless for the entire gig except when Just came on (the best song) when it became a giant moshpit for four minutes before everyone stood motionless for the rest of the gig.

Whilst all the band are great, Jonny Greenwood is definitely one of my top 3 guitarists and I get annoyed because I find it impossible to even get close to emulating him.

Band: Beastie Boys
Album: Ill Communication
Released: May 1994
Favourite Track: Sabotage
Favourite Lyric: “Ad Rock come and rock the sure shot”

I saw the video to Sabotage on MTV and was blown away. It’s just such an awesome video, taking off 70s cop movies and you really want to have been a part of making the video.

This is one of the most rock songs on the album and effectively became my gateway into a more diverse appreciation for music.

When my dad got a new work car, whoever had it previously had left a cassette version of Ill Communication in it, which I promptly borrowed and fell in love with. It had no box so I had no idea what the cover looked like for a good few months.

If it wasn’t for the Beastie Boys, my appreciation for music would be a lot more limited and this is one of the reasons why the death of MCA is one of the few celebrity deaths that really hit me hard.

This album would not be in my top 10 favourite albums, but it is one of the most important in terms of broadening my musical horizons and for that reason, it makes this list.

Band: Nirvana
Album: In Utero
Released: 21 September 1993
Favourite Track: All Apologies
Favourite Lyric: “I’m not like them but I can pretend”

Released just a week after August and Everything After, but worlds apart in terms of sound, my second most influential album (chronologically) is the final studio offering from Nirvana.

Like much of the music that has influenced me, I have written a bit about Nirvana on my blog before. This was in the context of me feeling old about how long ago it was that Kurt Cobain died (now 26 years ago this month – he’s almost been dead longer than he was alive).

The first band that I would have classed as my favourite band was Guns N’ Roses. Nirvana were the band that took that honour from them and it wasn’t even close.

Whilst Nevermind was the album that helped them to break the big time, In Utero struck me as the album that they had actually wanted to make. It is raw, punkier, has more feeling and is less produced.

The influence that Nirvana had on me went beyond music. At I mentioned last week, I gave myself a Kurt Cobain makeover in my youth. I also play guitar left handed so I’m sure we basically looked like twins. I also read books that were mentioned by the band, including Perfume by Patrick Suskind on which the track Senseless Apprentice from this album was based.

I don’t remember being into them before Kurt died, so I never really felt a sense of loss that they weren’t around. Their restricted back catalogue almost made what they had produced even more special, and this album is I think the most special of them all.