albert 16th Mar 2018 | | Vinyl AlbumCaptain Beefheart And His Magic Band - Strictly Personal | I've added the original Liberty release to the database.
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albert 16th Mar 2018 | | Vinyl AlbumCaptain Beefheart And His Magic Band - Strictly Personal | Just to warn people that there are many that have damage to the vinyl (mostly just on one side), looks similar to the leeching effect of PVC. Needless to say the vinyl plays terrible on the damaged side but a lot of these were sold as 'mint/unplayed' when they surfaced in the 1980's (I think it was a warehouse find).
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albert 16th Mar 2018 | | Vinyl AlbumCaptain Beefheart And His Magic Band - Mirror Man | The flimsy front cover with it's die-cut shattered mirror, and the fact that you need to open it up to get to the record meant that many of the original covers are torn and battered.
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albert 16th Mar 2018 | | Vinyl AlbumCaptain Beefheart And His Magic Band - The Legendary A&M Sessions | The UK release has the same sleeve but with AMY226 catalogue number stuck to the rear. My copy has red A&M labels stating that it was "Made in England"
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albert 15th Mar 2018 | | Vinyl AlbumVarious Artists - Reps Sampler | So rare its not even on Discogs yet. This could well be the first appearance of Roxy Music on actual vinyl, though not for sale.
The info sheet on Island printed paper has a hand-typed track listing, in the incorrect order, and doesn't even have the proper title for the Dick Heckstall-Smith track, instead just stating "from his album ILPS 9196 Dust In The Air Suspended Marks The Place Where A Story Ended".
The Laurie Styvers track is from a Chrysalis LP, and although Chrysalis was linked to Island originally, her Spilt Milk LP does not have an Island credit anywhere on the sleeve/inner sleeve/label. Strange.
Also check out my other Roxy Music oddity, Virginia Plain in a UK promo sleeve.
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albert 13th Mar 2018 | | BookPatrick Humphries - Nick Drake: The Biography | Just read the first few pages today, the forward, introduction and then some random paragraphs inside the book. The author begins with some tenuous link between Nick Drake and the Titanic (yes The Titanic) via the author's uncle Jim who watched the ship's launch, and gives other mundane happenstance reasons for writing this book. 20 minutes later and I was flipping through the book, some random paragraph tried to convince me that no other English singer except Peter Skellern, maybe, sang in Drake's particular English way. Other paragraphs waffled on about non-Drake stuff giving the impression of padding out. Perhaps one day I will have enough idle time to waste on this, but for now the book has been filed away in the big cardboard box at the back of the cupboard.
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albert 6th Mar 2018 | | DVDHullabaloo Volumes 1-4: A 1960s Music Flashback - MPI Home Video | Re: GEMSMFAN's comment.
A similar thing happened in the UK in 1950s/1960s, not many music TV appearances have survived in their original form. One of the problems in the UK was to do with unions 'protecting the musicians interests', so regardless of whether the artists disagreed with the arrangement the unions had with the TV companies, the band's performances often got wiped after broadcast.
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albert 6th Mar 2018 | | TVMax Headroom (1987 - 1988) | I'm with Harley on this. I recall the TV film came before the first series, the film sets up the first series, ie the wisecracking detective/investigator gets his personality stolen/digitised by a computer geek, the computer containing the talking head then falls into the hands of a tiny independent TV broadcaster and is used to review music videos (and in the process tops the ratings and becomes a much sought after item). The computer/monitor box got bashed/damaged which is why the talking head forgets his name and adopts "Max Headroom" and often jitters when talking.
The 'first' series just had Max introducing videos and making wisecracks, its not on 45worlds yet. According to that website the first series began 1985 and was one of the early CH4 broadcasts, it was budget TV with a good idea.
Beavis & Butthead was essentially the same idea.
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albert 3rd Mar 2018 | | TVDo They Mean Us? (1984 - Now) | Those who remember will guess the clip pretty quickly, this looks like the original source:
[YouTube Video]
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albert 26th Feb 2018 | | Live MusicThe Yummy Fur @ Nice 'N' Sleazy | Rough sound on this.
[YouTube Video]
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albert 26th Feb 2018 | | Live MusicThe Yummy Fur @ King Tut's Wah Wah Hut | Sure would like to see the Yummy Fur again.
[YouTube Video]
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albert 22nd Feb 2018 | | Vinyl AlbumJohn Cooper Clarke - Disguise In Love | LP title is a pun on the Bacharach & David song.
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albert 25th Jan 2018 | | Live MusicLevitation 2015 @ Carson Creek Ranch | Legendary band 13th Floor Elevators reforms, resulting in weather chaos as time-travellers flock to see the spectacle.
Sound quality on this clip is a bit poor
[YouTube Video]
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albert 25th Jan 2018 | | CD AlbumThe Thirteenth Floor Elevators - Easter Everywhere | The reality of the Charly tapes is that they are painful to listen to.
I bought the hyped Sign Of The 3-Eyed Men box set which promised the very best quality ever heard ...and it turned out to be the same rubbish source tape with a bit of digital tweeking. Charly released this CD soon afterwards.
The travesty is that Charly were apparently offered the use of the actual multi-track master tapes, FOR FREE, but they refused the offer.
Charly might own some kind of copyright on The Thirteenth Floor Elevators which stops other companies from releasing, but there is no need to subject the buying public to same old sub-standard mix time and time again.
Read more here (old thread) and here.
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albert 2nd Dec 2017 | | CD AlbumVarious Artists - Rockabilly | From what I can remember , this compilation suffers from a slightly muffled sound quality indicating that they might have dubbed off vinyl then applied click removal. Or maybe its just a bootleg.
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albert 8th Nov 2017 | | Live MusicPink Floyd @ UFO Club | Opening night for UFO.
International Times 12-25 Dec 1966 has an advert and a news piece "UFO (Unidentified Flying Object), IT's own Nova Xmas place opens on December 23 and 30th at 31 Tottenham Court Road, under the Berkeley Cinema. The Pink Floyd, Scorpio Rising, Trip Clothes, Mantras, Food and Heating too, 10:30 pm- 4pm".
I guess Scorpio Rising is the film, not a mysterious band. Also note they say under the Berkeley Cinema, officially UFO was held in the Blarney Club (which was part of the same building).
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albert 6th Nov 2017 | | TVWhy Don't You? (1973 - 1995) | One of my flatmates was the uncle of a girl who had been on a couple of episodes, this seemed to give her an elevated opinion of herself, the reality was that she was probably the most nauseating arrogant selfish demanding person that I have ever had to live with.
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albert 31st Oct 2017 | | VHSMcVicar - Spectrum | "A Sense Of Freedom" is a 1979 film about Jimmy Boyle which is a bit more *ahem* extreme, but often get confused with McVicar. Director John Mackenzie.
It is available on DVD.
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albert 27th Oct 2017 | | CinemaRambo (2008) | The first Rambo film was called First Blood, it wasn't a great title to call a film franchise since what would you call the second film..... The second film was called Rambo, or sometimes Rambo - First Blood part 2 ....which is a bit of an oxymoron, well I suppose they had some sense not to call it Second Blood - that would be just too corny.
EDIT: just to add more confusion... the new DVD releases now call the first film Rambo: First Blood, the second film is just Rambo, and the latest film is unimaginatively titled Rambo: Last Blood. ...or something like that.
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albert 25th Oct 2017 | | Video GameQ*bert - Gottlieb | This was great fun when it first appeared, although game play was a little tricky having to adjust my brain to the 45degree '3D' world (I had similar problems with Zaxxon). Somewhere I did read about the history of the game's development and was amused that some of the features came about through necessity rather than design, such as the speech engine that did not work and instead uttered gibberish. Q*bert was originally to be called something like Cube Bert and game play was too easy so they had to add the snake.
A solenoid is built into the base of the cabinet to give a thud if q*bert falls off the pyramid.
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albert 25th Oct 2017 | | Video GameSpace Invaders - Taito | Original cabinets have the monitor mounted in the base with the image eerily reflected on a sheet of angled glass above, this setup allows for a moonscape-style background to be placed at the back of the cabinet and a colourful bezel to be placed on the front glass. The whole setup looked amazing in comparison to other arcade games of the time.
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albert 21st Oct 2017 | | CinemaToto Le Héros (Toto The Hero) (1991) | Very entertaining film. There is so much going on and so many sharp twists of the knife in poor Thomas' life that its difficult to write a summary without spoiling the film, in fact I had to edit my review because I'd inadvertently let slip a major surprise in the plot. I cannot even tell you how the story starts because you need to see the film all the way through and then decide for yourself what it was all about. Lets just say the film tells you Thomas' side of the story, and that's Ok because its his life, but whichever way you look at it, and make your own judgements, you will still be entertained.
Short trailer, which doesn't give too much away:
[YouTube Video]
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albert 21st Oct 2017 | | CinemaToto Le Héros (Toto The Hero) (1991) | ReviewBrilliant and inventive storytelling from Jaco Van Dormael, his debut full length feature. It is the life story of Thomas as told by the protagonist from traumatic childhood to embittered old man fretting over the life he could have had, had he been born Alfred - his neighbour and enemy. The three ages of Thomas' life are told in fragments but so expertly woven together that the 90 minutes fly by. The film has some strange moments of fantasy to divert you and drops clues that you will need to think about carefully to fully appreciate what is going on.
5 people found this review helpful. ✔︎ Helpful Review?
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albert 20th Oct 2017 | | Vinyl AlbumVarious Artists - Impact | Just picked up a copy at the local Scouts annual jumble sale for 50 pence. It has labels like Bodston's scans and also has a flip-back 'file under POPULAR' sleeve, (in case you are wondering, I bought it for the EMI advert inner sleeve, not too rare but this one is minty).
Oh and there is writing on the sleeve "M.R.Coupland 3rd Oct 1970", so that makes two of these records with written dates, wonder if it was a trait for buyers of this kind of LP.
They had more Studio 2 Stereo including "Breakthrough" but none with inner bags that I wanted.
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albert 14th Oct 2017 | | CD AlbumRadiohead - Amnesiac | Also available in the UK was a special 'book' edition, though I doubt many people care about that.
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albert 14th Oct 2017 | | Vinyl AlbumThe Velvet Underground And Nico - The Velvet Underground And Nico | I have only once seen the original pressing with the non-airbrushed 'upside down' man and it was at a London record fair in the 1980s for about £40, which was quite a bit of money. I decided not to get it because the stalk of the banana was missing, just what was I thinking, certainly not USA original - rare - in the UK - very rare - vinyl great condition - very very rare. Didn't learn by my mistake though as about a year later I passed on an original UK pressing of the 3rd LP which is just as hard to find.
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albert 12th Oct 2017 | | Vinyl AlbumVarious Artists - Brum Beat Live At The Barrel Organ | Rare double LP of bands recorded live and includes a very early vocal appearance by Carol Decker. The LP is in a gatefold sleeve and is littered with adverts (which was a way to cover production costs).
Some notes taken from the cover...
"Like most journalists I'm prone to a twinge of exaggeration from time to time but even in my wildest superlatives I couldn't begin to describe the sheer electric excitement with which Carol Decker of The Lazers ripped me apart.....Forget Little Miss Dynamite - this is Little Miss Nuclear Bomb! The Lazers are going to be stars, Carol Decker is going to be the whole bloody solar system - or the business may as well go into liquidation en masse!"
Later one of Carol's dumped bandmates, Julian Ward, did a tell-all expose for the tabloids amusingly headlined "She's a two-faced bullying bitch" (which I still have a copy of) and rather tragically the hilarious write-up only served to enhance her reputation as a wild girl of rock.
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albert 11th Oct 2017 | | Vinyl AlbumHidemi Saito - Beatles Song Book | Hidemi Saito at the Yamaha Electone Organ.
Apologies for the lousy images, I'm picking up the details from some of my very old ebay listings that I found on backups.
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albert 11th Oct 2017 | | Vinyl AlbumThe Léo Chauliac Orchestra - The Léo Chauliac Orchestra Plays The Best Of The Beatles | French title is "Les Classiques des Beatles par Les Grand Orchestre Léo Chauliac" and is also on the Concert Hall label.
Apologies for the lousy images, I'm picking up the details from some of my very old ebay listings that I found on backups.
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albert 11th Oct 2017 | | Vinyl AlbumVarious Artists - Too Pure | Added some pictures from an ebay listing I did donkeys years ago, apologies if the images are not so good (old technology). I remember reading that the band members featured on the record all sat together in a warehouse and customised the individual record sleeves, it's not possible to tell which band member made doodles and stuck cuttings on this sleeve but you can imagine the fatigue/boredom seeing the "bewaare" spelling mistake. The Indian Elephant picture is stuck on (looks like it originated from a desk calender 1989), the splashes are sloppy glue marks.
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