Don’t believe a lot of what you read here.

It’s just wrong. Maybe it has been edited by a few people to self promote; all respect to those people, but they arrived a bit later. Doesn’t it strike you as odd, when the page actually mentions GYBO and Boomselection started in 2001/2002 all the ‘notable’ dates are from 2004/5 on? So apparently we all sat on our hands for 2-3 years doing nothing? Probably posting lolcats and bitching about Weiser/IDC LOL.

I added the first mashup albums/compilations (Parkspliced, I Created A Monster, London Booted – some of the first to mash up a whole album) a while back and they’ve been removed. Why? Well probably cos the wikitrolls and wikimods use Google as a primary source. Extremely sad – but why you should NEVER use Wikipedia as a primary source. Ever. It has some rather glaring omissions/wrongness:

• No Frenchbloke & Son? Esp in Bootleg Albums – no Haggis Trax (1999 apparently, not 2002! Played on JOHN PEEL FFS)
• No Fondue Meltdown?
• No Soundhog?
• No Erol Alkan / Kurtis Rush?
• No Strictly Kev? No DJ Food?
• No Coldcut – they’re rather important re: mashups…Beats and Pieces was seminal as well as the KLF
• Your Woman by Whitetown as good as it is, is NOT a mashup. It has no recognisable 2nd ‘B’ element?
• No Cartel Communique – well Bastard is sort of mentioned…in passing, sad for this is the first ever mashup club, the one that influenced Bootie. So why is it passed over, with a small image credit?
• Soulwax created Blue Monday vs Kylie – really? LOL (it was actually Erol Alkan as Kurtis Rush, Soulwax remade it)
• No mention of how DJ Hero actually started at Bastard?
• Never ever heard of Bonna Music, Good Copy Bad Copy (self promo?), WTF is Glee doing there?, White Panda – WHO?, Max Tannone – ditto, never heard of you, Tom Caruana – ??? and Clayton Counts should probably not be there either – the latter was just doing it as a stunt like his rather sick ‘death’. ‘Punkmash’ != mash.
• Why is Girl Talk on there since he’s said he’s not a mashup artist?
• Love you ToTom but why is there a separate section for your work and GHP and Freelance Hellraiser doesn’t? Or Soundhog or Frenchbloke or Fondue Meltdown or…
• Ditto Legion of Doom – you’re a precursor cos you started doing mashups in 2004? Really? Err…

OTOH, nice to see Phil n’ Dog’s Doctor Pressure getting rather belated props…

As an aside, I heard from John that one of the editor of  an influential 70′s gay rights magazine added it to Wikipedia cos it wasn’t there – to be deleted by some Wikitroll. Why? Well apparently it ‘didn’t have enough Google hits’. *facepalm*

Of course! If  it isn’t on Google it doesn’t exist! I mean it’s not like there is a massive pre-history of the world that hasn’t been digitised yet…oh. And this is recent history that thinks mashups started in 2004/2005 – it’s far worse for say the history of Gay Rights and GLF. Distortion for personal gain of near and nearish history is very common.

Oh and response to those who’ll helpfully say: ‘why don’t you edit it then?’ – I did that for many years correcting the mistakes, they all get reverted back to wrong/self promo/recent stuff. So maybe you should have a go (enough people repeatedly doing it might get the message across). Go to it gang!

Other response might be: ‘who gives a fuck about history’ - well it’s a lucrative & powerful position to write it. Such gatekeepers get appearance fees, book deals and lazy journalists apply them with ‘expert’ status firming up their position and their ‘idea’ of history. It then gets written down as ‘the truth’ til many years later – if ever – someone actually bothers to question it, but by then the damage is done. But recent events have shown it’s worryingly about who shouts the loudest, who shouts longest, and public perception rather than any idea of truth (which I know is subjective, but to abandon any ideal of objective truth even if it is an impossible goal, but an important journey, is worrying).

And no I wasn’t adding Radio Clash – someone did that years ago and it stayed for a while*, ironically when I’d stopped playing purely mashups…more adding those who should be remembered and never were (part of the remit of Radio Clash and the mashup history series, it has to be said – must resurrect the Mashup History because otherwise this will be forgotten and people will think Glee invented mashups LOL).

*It then got removed as teh Wikitroll said apparently podcasts have nothing to do with mashups…okaaaay. Never reappeared on the podcasting page. Being one of the first (I lose count of whether I’m 2nd, 3rd or 4th – not bothered about the ranking, tbh) podcasts in the UK doesn’t count for much it seems

Well it’s official – the ‘not going to happen’ axing of BBC 6music, the only real music station now worth listening to, is going to happen.. Or will it? Let’s see.

What can you do?

Firstly there’s a flashmob protest at 6pm tonight outside Broadcasting House, dunno who’s organising it (the nature of flashmobs says: No-one! It’s beautifully organic) but they want you to print out and bring this flag . I’ll see you there.

Public consultation is until 25th May but act now – you can write to the BBC Trust at srconsultation@bbc.co.uk or trust.enquiries@bbc.co.uk (check out their requirements here re: a cover letter or fill in their online survey or write to them at the address here (or all 3?) explaining how the cutting of BBC 6 Music is wrong and a severe loss for music, and a affront to the memory of John Peel and those who fought for new and alternative musics on the BBC.

Strange that the Strategy voices wanting to increase quality, but is doing this be restricting the amount of choice, a monoculture that allows the travesty that is BBC3 to exist (Sorry Andrew Collins, I know it’s part of your money stream but it’s an expensive carbuncle) and funds audience dropping Radio 2 far more, as Nigel Jenkins posted over on the FB group:

Radio 3 (2 million weekly listeners, annual budget £51.1 million, cost per user per hour 6.3p) No real changes detailed.

Radio 1Xtra (0.6 million weekly listeners, budget £9.6 million, cost per user per hour 4.5p) Links with Radio 1 will be “strengthened”.

Radio 6 Music (0.7 million weekly listeners, annual budget £9 m…illion, cost per user per hour 3.4p)

So if that’s true Radio 6 costs LESS than 1Xtra, and much less than Radio 3 (I’m not calling for Radio 3 to be closed, John would kill me…and like Radio 4 that would never happen, those in power listen to them).

Also the whole ‘making it bigger will make it commercial’ is a fallacy – as we know DAB and digital radio is still early-doors; and if ‘we don’t want to compete with commercial radio’ ethos was true then Radio 1, 2 and 4 would be for the chop for the start – especially Radio 1 which KissFM should be especially pissed off about. The idea Mark Thompson is upping the quality is a smoke screen – this is just a numbers game ignoring the Reithian ideals of community provision.

I strongly doubt that the mass produced banal pap the corporation produces will actually be less (it’s a mixed message – we need to concentrate on quality; so let’s axe the quality niche products and focus on the mainstream – eh?) and that Radio 1 or 2 will change at all, or as Mark Thompson alluded to start catering for the 6Music audience (in fact Radio 2 is going to go older, and Radio 1 gets off scot free for some reason, and 1Xtra’s audience won’t want 6Music’s breadth).

Really it is a victory for genre/demographics targetted radio, that you are all in little ticky tacky boxes and should stay in your ghettos – obviously new, unsigned and eclectic music isn’t going to be everyone’s bag, but to kill the station pretty much at birth without ever letting it have a wider (FM, or when DAB covers the whole of the UK) audience or promoting it, is totally short sighted.

There’s also a petition at 38Degrees I’ve signed, and you can follow action on twitter by the #saveBBC6Music or #save6music hash tags or follow love6music.

Facebook group: Save 6Music 88,000 people and counting!

Another petition:

PS. I’d use the email address for the consultation rather than the flakey online form to contact the BBCStrategy Review – just got this lovely error after the first page:

Site Error

An error was encountered while publishing this resource.

ZODB.POSException.ConflictError
Sorry, a site error occurred.

Traceback (innermost last):

* Module ZPublisher.Publish, line 202, in publish_module_standard
* Module Products.LinguaPlone.patches, line 67, in new_publish
* Module ZPublisher.Publish, line 170, in publish
* Module Products.LinguaPlone.patches, line 67, in new_publish
* Module ZPublisher.Publish, line 170, in publish
* Module Products.LinguaPlone.patches, line 67, in new_publish
* Module ZPublisher.Publish, line 170, in publish
* Module Products.LinguaPlone.patches, line 67, in new_publish
* Module ZPublisher.Publish, line 157, in publish
* Module plone.app.linkintegrity.monkey, line 15, in zpublisher_exception_hook_wrapper
* Module ZPublisher.Publish, line 125, in publish
* Module Zope2.App.startup, line 238, in commit
* Module transaction._manager, line 96, in commit
* Module transaction._transaction, line 395, in commit
* Module transaction._transaction, line 495, in _commitResources
* Module ZODB.Connection, line 510, in commit
* Module ZODB.Connection, line 547, in _commit

ConflictError: database conflict error (oid 0x10dca9, class Products.QuickConsult.content.Survey.Survey)

Nice. Great public consultation if the form doesn’t work? Of course they don’t want the form to work, they’ve decided their route…interestingly it looks like it might become an election issue, so sorry BBC, this won’t go away. I think it’s going to be hotly political, fast.

Oh and BBC 6 Music just played Public Enemy – Fight the Power, an audience choice. I think they’re in a fighting mood.

Let’s do this, show Auntie how we roll with social media campaigns – we did RATM #1, Trafigura, MP’s expenses…now here’s the biggest one: the BBC.

I’ve been on a Viv Stanshall kick (again) recently because a kind listener (reader? what is the collection noun for podcast and blog listeners? poggers? pistener? err..anyway thank you Julian it made it through the snow!) sent me some Viv rarities as a result of the ‘Viv and Neil’ podcast I did last year inc the excellent 2002 radio documentary ‘Canyons of His Mind‘ which of course is referring to the above track, recorded for ‘Colour Me Pop’ in 1968. Apparently they did the whole show, which I really want to see.

Also read a great piece about Viv by his second wife, Ki Longfellow about how they met…I mean I fell in love with him reading it, so in person the effect must’ve been greater . She as mentioned in the text SHOULD write a book about him. If she or anyone relating to her is reading this, please give her a prod, because reading that I would buy a copy, and I have a feeling a lot of people would feel the same way…and also because of his mysterious/insane/wonderful/maddening/glorious lifestyle there are a lot of wrong rumours out there – one of which is that he set himself alight with cigarettes when he died (no, coroner said it was electrical wiring, apparently). Would be great to have a book that comes closer to the real Viv (well dunno if that’s possible actually, but closer than the people writing ones who never met him!) and fills in that gap post Bonzos in the mid-late 70s.

Also did they ever record Stinkfoot? I’ve always wanted to have a copy, either on DVD or audio – and missed hearing about the short revival on Thekla last July…bah!

Oh a few of you might not know who Viv Stanshall was, you poor petals. So here’s a good intro, a show produced by the BBC and introduced by John Peel with Viv on himself and his history in his own words and music (the original piece in 1991 was called ‘Crank’, it seems to have gained the name ‘Diamond Geezer’ somewhere?).

It explains how Viv was just Viv ‘Well I don’t do it, I’m merely being myself, as near as dammit without frightening the housing estates…and her question was absurd rather than fatuous, as if I’d decided one day to wake up and decide I’m going to be a giant squid for the weekend or that’s it I’m going to be a wardrobe for the rest of my…err..word. Well strap me to a tree and call me Brenda! I’m whatever you like just don’t expect me to join in….You see I’m not different for the sake of being different, only for the desperate sake of being myself” Great words, indeed

…although I have no idea why an obit from 1995 has the roman numeral date of 1993 (I suspect it’s been edited together from Crank?) – EDIT: it is from 1993, someone added the ‘Diamond Geezer’ in 1995, seems like many layers of ‘Late’ show, I’ve got a headache.

Bonus: One Man’s Week, a 1975 film about Viv seems to have escaped from the BBC’s Gormenghast Colditz Vaults by means of 1975 quality video…such a shame Viv wasn’t let loose more often on the public with a camera, that would’ve been a great TV programme. Also in part 3 you can see him working on ‘Men Opening Umbrellas Ahead’ which was heavily African influenced and years before it’s time.

As you might have guessed I tend to avoid hype and spam, I prefer to discover the new on my own rather than follow the crowd – the John Peel approach of avoiding what the industry or received opinion says and making up your own mind. Sadly that means that sometimes you miss stuff, as I did with the excellent Bhangra Bootay which I’ve just found (8 months late!) via Phil Retrospector’s blog…still after the recent success of Foolklegs 2 I think this still deserves a listen, and is from the SoundUnSound forum with liner-notes from the ever-wonderful Marc aka Neckice, the nicest person in bootlegs -FACT!

I love bhangra and bollywood tunes, and this is a great mashup album mixing east and west which shows where mashups really can win and create new ground exploring new avenues than the usual rock vs rap or electro vs reality diva; into different genres and less explored sources. MOAR plz!

Anyway you can download the full album with artwork here at SoundUnSound – but here are some of my favourite tracks if you don’t want to download the whole album.

Oscar TG doing something very different with Don’t Cry Beloved Fool – Erasure meets dub via Orbital, eastern beats from 2Kool and Marley in something that sounds closer to The Orb than yer usual A+B mashup – and that’s no bad thing.

Also in the breathing life into the overused acapella department is F.E.A.R In Lila’s Eyes by Bobby Martini, taking Kelly Clarkson and Ian Brown and giving it a different eastern and chilled twist via Vas’s Lila. And the humour/Bollywood-WTF-soundClash award goes to mARKYBOY for the Madonna vs Dilwale Dulhania le Jayenge ‘Deepur and Deepur‘ – classic, and accordion-tastic too, even if it does go slightly clashy at the end, it’s worth it for the giggles alone Also highly recommended are the tracks by Phil Retrospector, and the best named track award goes to Reborn Identity for ‘You Can’t Curry Love’ LOL.

One Hundred and EEEiiiightyyyyy!!!!

Last of the Beatles Podcasts, a bumper edition concentrating on the end of the Beatles, their various followups in mashup and cover form, and John Lennon’s death.

I live near Abbey Road so I just popped out and took these pictures – the ones of the tourists recreating the famous picture (and blocking the traffic in the process) are priceless – including the one below!

Tim you went too far this time…about 2 hours 18 minutes to be exact (138 minutes – EEK! 103Mb)

• The Rutles
• 17 Plombs Pour Peter Les Tubes – Come Together
• The Exterminators – The Beetle-Bomb
• Easy Star All-Stars – With a Little Help from My Friends
• Roy Redmond – Good Day Sunshine
• Wax Audio – Blue Rigby
• Stereo MC’s – Tomorrow Never Knows
• John Peel,John Lennon, Kenny Everett, Malcolm MCdowell – Nostalgia
• Jimmi Jammes – Let A Girl Be
• George Harrison – Pirate Bob
• Keith Lynn & The S.P.M’s & Byron Lee & The Dragonaires – My Sweet Lord
• Go Home Productions – Just Be Good To Paul
• People Like Us – Let Them In
• Ringo Starr with Stevie Nicks – Lay Down Your Arms
• The RIAA Remixes DO or DIY – Lord Only Knows:
• Byron Lee & The Dragonaires – Live And Let Die
• Ferris Bueller’s Day Off – Isms
• Rainbo – John, You Went Too Far This Time
• Yoshida Brothers – Oh, My Love
• Elliott Smith – Jealous Guy
• John Lennon And Kenny Everett – Desert Island Discs
• The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band – Give Booze a Chance
• John Lennon & ATOM – John Lennon-Nobody Told Me (ATOM’s Yin & Yang Mix)
• Yoko Ono – Everyman Everywoman (Basement Jaxx Man 2 Man Mix)
• Mountain Con – Variations on Outkast, The White Strips and John Lennon
• Marianne Faithfull – Working Class Hero (live)
• Wax Audio – God
• The Beatles – John Lennon with Yoko Ono – Interview (Part 2) June 1969
• WFMU – New York, NY Radio / The Night John Lennon Died
• John Lennon with Yoko Ono – Imagine (instrumental)
• team9 vs lennon vs temptations vs morrison – imagine vs ball of confusion vs palestine woman
• rx – imagine…walk on the wild side
• The Kleptones – Imagine The End Of The World
• DJ Earlybird – John Lennon vs the Supremes ‘Baby, imagine Love!’
• Go Home Productions – Imagine The Game
• Lennon – Love (demo)
• John Lennon – Stand By Me (demo?)
• Easy Star All-Stars – A Day in the Life
• Nina Simone – Here Comes The Sun