Vinyl Story 2024

Year 2024 brought several frustrating occasions when I was listening to new albums and singles and then noticed those were limited editions or that the pressing plants couldn't deliver. Plus when I received the wrong record. The first time there was a package with Heart Fresh Kopy labelled on it, there was a Jason Molina LP inside. Quite different music. Worst is when the artists or the labels themselves make a bit of a mess. In the end, it can take easily over a year between ordering an LP and actually spinning it on your turntable.

The local store sold me local treats like the Kaboutertje Putlucht (Stench Dwarf) ten inch and at the time of writing I still have to take the train there and pick up the new Ergo Phizmiz and Laurence Pike LPs in wonderful Nijmegen. This shop re-released a Sun Ra classic on 7 inch on their Waaghals label but moreover they have a keen hand picking cheap classic LPs like Robert Rental's 'The Bridge', so each little train trip down South to Nijmegen I get back with at least one crammed bag of vinyl. 2024 must be my record low for buying new 7 inch singles, now that the little gems sell at ridiculous prices. Independent labels still strive for affordable vinyl, like The Leaf Label, Les Disques Bongo Joe, XL and Glitterbeat do. Yet it very much feels like I'm in a Top 40 menopause. On top of that, I'm going through this retro industrial new wave phase as well, enjoying the likes of the minimalist Italian dance troop Zona Utopica Garantita.

The greatest treat was how the Oïmiakon LP from Paris still played in spite of it arriving very warped. Imagine, even the sleeve had gone warped. A noticeable record was set by the Slovenly label for selling me the wrong item, once more a great one, a fourth time. 2024 also was the first year in ages that I bought a Wedding Present single, albeit one from their 2022 series. Patience awarded as I got it for around 6 quid, the amount I keep sticking to as the standard 7 inch 45 RPM vinyl record price.

Unlike book publishers, music labels don't have set prices on their products thus allowing greedy online stores to raise them at will. Indeed, buy music on Bandcamp, you'd answer. Bandcamp remains the best place to go when you haven't got a good record store within travelling distance. The experience of being in a warehouse music store with thousands of LPs and singles where you can check the vinyl on their Audio-Technica turntables cannot be beaten. Each time.

Testing

 Testing after a long absence...l.

Pennyblackmusic Magazine August Edition

We have recently put on-line the August edition of the Pennyblackmusic magazine.

Our lead interview for this month is with the critically lauded late 80s/early 90s angular guitar outfit That Petrol Emotion, whose vocalist Steve Mack and guitarist Raymond Gorman talk about their band and its reformation after an absence of nearly fifteen years.

The other main interviews of this month are with the Australian indie pop group the Lucksmiths who have announced their decision to split after over fifteen years together; American musician Bill Callahan who has recently abandoned his Smog moniker to record material under his own name, and the Declining Winter, the new band of Leeds musician and Hood member Richard Adams.

There are also new interviews with Portland, Oregon band Richmond Fontaine, whose singer songwriter Willy Vlautin back for a fifth interview with us speaks about his group’s eighth album, 'We Used To Think The Freeway Sounded Like A River’; rapidly rising lush pop outfit the Leisure Society; Scottish musician Jo Hamilton about her debut album ‘Gown’, and lo-fi American act the Drugs Models Love.

We are also running interviews with Edition 59, a remarkable German label which limits each of its releases to just 59 copies ; American journalist David Rothman whose political thriller and debut novel ‘The Solomon Scandals’, is part inspired by Bob Dylan, and Rebekah Why, the editor of the Los Angeles-based Penny-Ante, an unusual annual publication which combines together music, journalism and art.

Other highlights include features on Daniel Johnston, the Average White Band, Damned guitarist Captain Sensible and the twentieth anniversary reissue of the Stone Roses' debut album. There are also new photo shoots from Matthew Williams of recent Jane’s Addiction and Nine Inch Nails shows, while in our regular ‘Soundtrack of Our Lives’ column Carl Bookstein writes about the revelation for him of discovering the music of The Band in his late teens.

In 'Rock Salt Row', Lisa Torem will be debating each month with a different Pennyblackmusic writer about a moment in rock history and its impact now. In its second instalment, she takes an Aldous Huxley quote which gave the Doors their name, and talks with Malcolm Carter about whether rock music can ever really change perceptions.

There are also 32 new album and single reviews.

We will have another album and singles reviews up-date in just under a fortnight and then another full edition in early August.

Thank you for reading the Pennyblackmusic magazine.

Pennyblackmusic Magazine June Edition On-Line

We have recently put on-line the June edition of the Pennyblackmusic magazine.

Our lead interview this month is with sixties folk/protest singer Janis Ian who speaks about her forty years of making music, her more recent career as both a journalist and writer, and her continued regular touring.

Our other main interviews this month are with Slowdive and Mojave 3 frontman Neil Halstead, who recently released his second solo album, 'Oh, Mighty Engine !'; Roddy Woomble , the singer with Scottish rockers Idlewild , who will soon put out a fan-sponsored new album, and Bella Union label boss and ex-Cocteau Twin Simon Raymonde.

There are new interviews too as well with New York experimental folk collective Akron/Family ; 60’s band Herman's Hermits ; Northern Irish pop punk trio In Case of Fire ; rising hardcore group Rolo Tomassi ; Edinburgh-based post-punks/surf act Isa and the Filthy Tongues ; bedroom act Banjo or Freakout? and London-based singer-songwriter Tallulah Rendell.

Other highlights include features on Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, solo artist Anthony Phillips and 80’s psychedelic/drone experimentalists Loop. There are articles on the Grateful Dead’s 1970 album ‘Ameircan Beauty’, Leonard Cohen’s 1972 album ‘Songs of Love and Hate’ and the Drop Nineteens’1992 debut album ‘Delaware’. We have plenty of live, album and single reviews as well, and the start of a new regular column ‘This Metal Sky’ in which our writer Jeff Thiessen, in the belief that all music good and bad is personal, will be writing about the links in his own life with a new piece of music he hears each month. He begins by describing his reaction to hearing New Zealand country act Steve Abel and the Chrysalids' 'Flax Happy' .

We will have another album and singles reviews up-date at the weekend and then another full edition in early July.

Please check out as well the new pod of our long-term writers, Mark Rowland, Ben Howarth and Sarah Johnson, which they have been using as a forum to debate about some of the new music we are writing about on the site. There are three podcasts on-line already which can be found on most pages of the site, and Mark, Ben and Sarah will be doing another up-date shortly.

Thank you for reading the Pennyblackmusic magazine.

Test lauch

Test this, just click and see what happens.

PBM

The show is supposed to start while launching RealPlayer, when it's on your computer of course and just perhaps the Pennyblack Music homepage shows in that very same internet media browser. Probably not though.

On the top bar of RealPlayer, you may see the tab of WEB light up, click that. In my case, that brought on the Pennyblack Music page the way I intended.

Use Real Player as the browser for Pennyblack Music?

Thanks John!

I noticed the direct link to the magazine website is missing, here it goes:

http://www.pennyblackmusic.co.uk

I have been testing the good'ole webbrowser that is used by Real Player and whoopie, when you play a radio show in Real Player, in stand-alone mode, not embedded, the shows continue as they should whilst you can browse the website.

Try it. Here's the URL of a radio show, copy the link, open Real Player and open the file. Copy/past - Ctrl + O/Ctrl + V in Windowspeak. I don't speak Apple, you do, so please edit this.

http://www.pennyblackmusic.co.uk/Radio/live2012.ram

Perhaps you only need to click the link above to start Real Player. It depends on personal settings on computers whether it would or would not work immediately.

If so, I would recommend to set the home page in the browser with Real Player to our website and Bob's your uncle. Then in future we will simply post here the link to any new show.

Once the radio show plays, you can again open (Ctrl + O) any webpage.

So, rather than embed the audio in a webpage, the webpage comes embedded while the radio plays as it were.

See for yourselves, whether you prefer this approach. I would not recommend Real Player as a web browser. Yet for the purpose of listening to our radio and going through our webpages at the same time without interrupting the radio, this is a very handy solution I feel.

Pennyblackmusic May Edition On-Line

We have recently put on-line the May edition of the Pennyblackmusic magazine. Our lead interview this month is with Sylvian Sylvian, the guitarist and one of the two surviving members of seminal punk-precursors the New York Dolls, who speaks about his reformed group’s new album, ‘Cause I Sez So’, and its capacity for tragedy, but also survival against the odds.

Other main interviews include durable Northern Ireland guitar rock trio Therapy ? who recently released a career highlight with their thirteenth album ‘Crooked Timber’ ; Shetland-born singer-songwriter and former Goya Dress frontwoman Astrid Williamson whose risk-taking fourth album ‘Here Come the Vikings’ comes out in June and much praised rising pop/rock band Official Secrets Act.

There are also interviews with NYC shoegazing/psychedelic trio signings A Place to Bury Strangers ; Kurt Cobain’s favourite band the Vaselines ; Swedish post-rock outfit Jeniferever ; singer-songwriter and actress Abigail Hopkins ; ambient project Sleepingdog and Nathaniel Cramp, the owner of London-based shoegazing label and club night, Sonic Cathedral.

We have a two part interview as well with Simon Reynolds, the music journalist and the author of the critically acclaimed books on post punk, 'Rip It Up and Start Again' and 'Totally Wired'.

Other highlights include a profile of bestselling New York act the Yeah Yeah Yeahs ; reviews of music-oriented films ‘Awaydays’ and ‘Sounds Like Teen Spirit’, and classic records, The Replacements’ 1983 second album, ‘Hootenanny’ and 1988 debut EP, ‘Superfuzz Bigmuff’. We also have plenty of live, album and single reviews.

We will have another album and singles reviews up-date the week after next and then another full edition in June.

Please check out as well the new pod of our long-term writers, Mark Rowland, Ben Howarth and Sarah Johnson, which they have been using as a forum to debate about some of the new music we are writing about on the site. There are two podcasts on-line already which can be found on most pages of the site, and Mark, Ben and Sarah hope to be doing another up-date next week.

Thank you for reading the Pennyblackmusic magazine.