My Friend Jack

Allmusic.com's album of the day is once again a scorcher. The Smoke is an amazing early garage group. A friend put them on a mix for me and I remember it was so good that I was legitimately disappointed that it took me so long to hear it for the first time.



Check it out below.



Tons of work to do today--Fitness convention this week in Rosemont, IL.

Meh.

Mountain Energei

"To get a mortgage, you need an income lid...I thought it was free."

Mark E. Smith is an absolute legend. I have to say that my worries about money have made a lot of Fall songs feel more relevant to me. I'm trying desperately to get my funds in order. I'm reading the book The Fallen, which is a series of interviews with various ex-members of The Fall. The first chapter is a long interview with Mark E. Smith, and his vision of his music/art/livelihood is really head-turning. "It's like football--sometimes you have to go and replace the centre-forward." Crazy.

TONS of great music got acquired this week--AA Bondy, Deerhunter, Interpol, Grinderman, Women, Gentleman Jesse, Crystal Castles, Tom Waits, and much more. The new No Age was an awesome surprise. Great record.

This is all totally making me want to record more music. Excited.

AZ can't take the heat...

Just saw this via another blog.

Scotland on my mind...

VILLA Move to 5th with win over Wolves

Midlands derby day with Aston Villa at Wolves. I didn't get to catch the match as it wasn't on FSC, but saw the highlights. Great goal from Emile Heskey.

I'd like you to write Punk Rock Warlord...with Warlord being one word.

Interesting piece over at the NME suggesting that London's legendary 100 Club might be closing. There's a campaign in the works to save it, but overhead costs are becoming too high for the club to continue to operate the way it's been operating.

Mick Jones has even said that he would do what he can to help.

I remember seeing old flyers of the Clash with the venue listed as the 100 club, or a number of other punk bands (the Vibrators, Sex Pistols, Damned are the first that come to mind). When venues get shut down like this--much like CBGB's in New York--I always wish I would have had the opportunity to play a show there before it disappeared. Sad.

Flowers and Football Tops...

For those of you who saw, today saw a lot of interesting results in football/soccer.

EPL -- Tottenham lost to West Ham 1-0, West Bromwich Albion beat Arsenal, Liverpool drew with Sunderland, and Chelsea, who looked all but unstoppable, lost to Manchester City. In La Liga, Real Madrid were held goalless by a side who just got promoted from the Segunda. With as much money as Real Madrid has invested on the biggest players in the world, including new World Cup stars like Angel Di Maria and Mesut Ozil, it's incredible to me that they don't dominate with as much fluidity as a team like Barcelona (who won 3-0 without Lionel Messi). Manchester City's money-spending has got them a team of complete all stars, but it still seems like the only one they really needed is Carlos Tevez. He scored in between the legs of Ashley Cole today and it was fantastic. I felt like I could feel the goal building as soon as Tevez got the ball.

Anyway, my Saturday has been completely spent between soccer and music. I hung out with a few friends and played quite a few riffs/jams I've been trying to work on and I was super excited about the way everything sounded. Here's to hoping we're able to do it again some time soon. I'll post recordings here if I ever end up doing anything with them.



UPDATE: Here's a really great interview on Tevez being given the Captaincy at City.