FARMERS BOYS Loveable East Anglian indie saddoes. Great melodic
pop songs, very catchy. Sense of drama, sense of irony. Saw them once at
Sussex University, a great gig. Very tight, and a lot of fun.
Essential "Get Out and Walk" and "With These Hands" l.p.s.
www.thefarmersboys.com FIRE ENGINES Davey Hendersons post punk, Beefheart influenced band. Excellent stuff.
FLATMATES Poptastic indie saddoes with a sense of fun. Saw them at the
Shelly Arms, Nutley. They were great, very friendly and likeable. Also
saw them later at Tunbridge Wells, where they were trying a bit too hard
to be cool, and were rather over shadowed by the support band, Choo
Choo Train. Essential "Happy all the Time", "You're Gonna Cry", "Janice Long Sessions" e.p.s,
"Shimmer" single.
FLYING LIZARDS Had a couple of big hits with their ultra weird
versions of "Summertime Blues" and "Money". Great. And hilarious.
FRED FRITH Guitar torturing genius. Main man of Henry Cow,Skeleton Crew, and the Art
Bears. Inventive, experimental, and as weird as it gets. Made several
wonderful solo albums and collaborations, all different. Some of his stuff
is like using the guitar as a sound source, rather than an instrument.
He does all sorts of abusive things to make it divulge its secrets, like
yanking the strings away from the body and sawing across them, etc. I have
a video of a Channel 4 programme from ages ago, featuring 4 unorthodox
guitarists. Fred gets about 10 minutes. He really looked like a torturer
at times, pulling on the entrails of his victim till it screams in agony.
Essential "Guitar Solos", "Gravity", "Live in Japan", "Speechless", " French
Gigs" (with Lol Coxhill), "With Friends Like These"
and "Who Needs Enemies" (both with Henry Kaiser) l.p.s.
http://www.fredfrith.com/ FRIPP AND ENO Made two albums of hypnotic, transcendent music, created by Eno's
tape delay and other special treatments to Fripps guitar work. Saw them
in Tunbridge Wells once. Very weird. The performance was delayed by 3 hours
because an essential piece of equipment had failed, and someone was on
the way from London with a replacement. Most of the audience were Fripp
fans, and were expecting something like King Crimson. It started
with an empty stage, except for a large reel to reel tape recorder, slowly
revolving. Gradually, imperceptibly, you became aware that it was emitting
very quiet, looped electronic sounds. This gradually increased in volume,
taking several minutes to exceed the volume of the audience chatter. Several
more minutes later they came on, and sat at the equipment and waited. Eventually,
Fripp played a note, but you were hardly aware of it, as the hypnotizing
tape loop had gotten loud, and had altered your consciousness. Eno
would take Fripps notes and add them to the loop, gradually, gradually,
building up layers of sound. At the same time, a looped film was playing
behind them, and that was imperceptibly changing as well. After an hour
or so, they left the stage, leaving the music playing, and slowly, very
slowly, fading away. Most of the audience felt bemused, or cheated,
but I loved it.
Essential "No Pussyfooting" and "Evening Star" l.p.s
FURIOUS
PIG Bunch of weirdos who only use voice sounds in
their music. Weird, wonderful, hilarious.
Essential "Furious Pig" e.p.