XMAS ROSEBUD

oh little town of Bethlehem...









1. TBC POUNDSYSTEM--Losing My Sledge
2. THE KNIFE--Christmas Reindeer
3. MATMOS--Steam And Sequins For Larry Levan
4. 2 BAD MICE--2 Bad Mice (Original)
5. THE HUMAN BEINZ--Nobody But Me (Pilooski Edit)
6. MEKON FEATURING ROXANNE SHANTE--Yes Yes Yall (Sinden Baile Funk Mix)
7. YAZ--Don't Go (Diplo Master Mix)
8. CURTIS VODKA--Thriller
9. DEPECHE MODE--The Sinner In Me (Ricardo Villalobos Conclave Remix)
10. ELIAS RAHBANI--Dance Of Maria
11. SDP--Santastic Mix
12. VINCE GUARALDI TRIO--Christmas Time Is Here (Vocal)
13. PANDA BEAR--Bro's (Edit)
14. THE GOSPEL STARS--Have You Any Time For Jesus
15. TERRIFIED KID--On Santa's Lap

BORAX

Unisonance







1. EL MICHELS AFFAIR--C.R.E.A.M.
2. GEORGE JACKSON--My Desires Are Getting The Best Of Me
3. THE EQUALS--Police On My Back
4. SHOCKING BLUE--Love Fuzz
5. TAMI LYNN--Mojo Hannah
6. ESG--Dance
7. BETTY BOTOX--Voodoo 3
8. BUNJI GARLIN--Kingdom of Heaven (March Out Riddim)
9. DJ MAD--Wah Dem A Do Refix
10. LADY STUSH--Chromedollar
11. MAHMOUD FADL--Jibal Al Nuba
12. AMSTERDAM KLEZMER BAND--Ispenzola
13. OMFO--Money Boney
14. LADY SOVEREIGN--Love Me Or Hate Me
15. RHANY--Chan Chan
16. SWEET CHERRIES--Don't Give It Away
17. WOLFMAN JACK--Free Shots
18. BETTY HARRIS--I'm Gonna Git Ya
19. IKE & TINA TURNER--Dust My Broom
20. BRAVE COMBO--Crazy Serbian Butcher's Dance
21. THE AFRICAN MESSENGERS--Highlife Piccadilly
22. RIAA--Reach Out For The Queen

MARYLAND

Lee & Annamarie left for a half year in Baltimore, MD.

1. FAT FREDDY'S DROP--Cay's Crays (Digital Mystikz Remix)
2. NINA SIMONE--Baltimore
3. EMILIANA TORRINI--Sunnyroad (Manasseh Mix)
4. TIPSY--Tuatara
5. AMY WINEHOUSE--Love Is A Losing Game
6. JEANETTE--Porque Te Vas (DreamTime Mix)
7. JAHCOOZI--Black Barbie (Modeselektor Remix)
8. CIARA--Goodies (Richard X Remix featuring M.I.A.)
9. THE HUMAN LEAGUE--Don't You Want Me (Eric Prydz Remix)
10. STEVE COOGAN--Criticizing DJs
11. THE FIELD--Over The Ice
12. TOM TOM CLUB--Who Feelin' It (Mista Sinista Full Remix)
13. TONY ALLEN--Moyege (Mark's Disco Dub)
14. BARRY BROWN--Nice Up The Session (Version)
15. RIAA--Kick Bob Marley In The Head
16. MILT JACKSON & LILIAN CLARK--Kiss And Run
17. HENRY MANCINI--Lujon

INSECTICIDE

Us and Them



1. FRANKIE VALLI & THE FOUR SEASONS--Beggin' (Pilooski Edit)
2. ANANDA SHANKAR--Streets Of Calcutta
3. MOHAMMED RAFI & ASHA BHOSLE--Dekho Ab To
4. AMERICAN FOUR--Luci Baines
5. DIPLO--Shhake It Up
6. MANNY DURAN & HIS SEXTET--Johnny Comes Marching Home Mambo
7. LOVE--A House is Not A Motel (Beyond The Wizard's Sleeve Re-Edit)
8. KOUSHIK--None In Mind
9. THE BEATLES--All You Need (Banzai Republic Remix)
10. ANIMAL COLLECTIVE--People
11. LE MANS--Mi Novella Autobiografica
12. CLAUDINE LONGET--Holiday
13. THE FREE DESIGN--Michelle
14. THE BEACHLES--God Only Knows What I'd Be Within You
15. SACHIKO KENONUBU--Look Up, The Sky Is Beautiful
16. CAROLE KING--I Didn't Have A Summer Romance
17. JOE BATAAN--This Boy
18. THE BEATLES--He Said, He Said (She Said, She Said)
19. THE BIRDS--Femme Fatale

GUANTANAMO, HERE WE COME

Haven't posted for over a month. In December we had two visits from friends in the US. I'm busy with a backlog of writing assignments, though still on annual leave from the university until early February. Just completed and sent off the first draft of a piece about The Smiths' 1987 album Strangeways, Here We Come for a collection of essays on the group to be published by Manchester University Press later this year. I'm full of trepidation since it's a departure from strictly 'academic' prose to more 'creative' writing. Here's the first paragraph:

When I was thinking about the best way to revisit the Smiths for this collection of essays, I couldn’t help returning to a particular setting: a bedroom somewhere in the north of England with a copy of Strangeways, Here We Come lying in a closet. The last Smiths album is caught for a freeze-frame instant in the grainy footage of one of those mosque terrorist cell exposés. The LP could belong to the Muslim male subject but may be a hand-me-down from an older brother or sister. A pamphlet of local prayer times sits on the bedside table next to the clock with its automated muezzin. The hidden cameras earlier revealed that this was where the subject listened to music, worked with computers, and shared information with friends and associates, unbeknownst to other family members. The British-born youth of Pakistani descent had groomed his beard and prayed shortly before leaving his home to make the journey to Londonistan and beyond.

SECTARIAN

SECTARIAN 19.11.06

What about THE RIGHT TO NOT BELONG to a group defined by ethnos, nation, religion, gender?

DON COVAY--What's In The Headlines
One of the great singer-songwriters with a lament that fluctuates between resignation and bitter irony about the stuff that doesn't make it to the news writ large. Some media studies types used to call this agenda setting or gatekeeping. Features a disturbing kazoo.

THE DIXIE NIGHTINGALES--The Assassination
I was thinking about that recent film Death of a President with that Zabruder-type fake still of GWB getting a bullet. This song is a gospel number about Lee Harvey Oswald and his buddies. But a week after I'd dubbed it Gemayal was killed in Lebanon and that former Soviet spy received the radioactive poisoned chalice. Weird. I suppose assassins are always at work, the norm rather than the extraordinary.

JACK PALANCE--The Meanest Guy That Ever Lived
Could have been written for Pinochet or Osama Bin Laden or any number of dead presidents. Reminds me of the recently deceased thespian's fantastic turn as the hired gun in Shane (see image above). I love the way he grins when he mows down Elisha Cook Jnr. The malevolent spirit of the Wild West is still alive and well beyond the western frontier. You don't have to watch Deadwood to appreciate that. I met Jack Palance once. I must have been about 10 years old. It was the early 70s and Majid this drinker friend of my Mum and Dad's--the only serious drinker friend they had I think--was walking with us around Hyde Park near Speaker's Corner one Sunday. Art vendors were peddling their wares, as they say. Majid shouted Jack Palance and rushed up to the actor with a smile on his face. Can't recall the words exchanged, just a shake of the hand and a nod our way.

SUICIDE--Ghost Rider (Live)
This is the ride of the valkyries after the apocalypse. Sounds like the buzz of a hundred helicopter gunships ready to land on your head.

JOHNNIE TAYLOR--Rome (Wasn't Built In A Day)
A crackly almost northern soul tune about the repair work needed for a relationship. Could work just as easily as a neocon fable for the reconstruction of Iraq.

THE WILD TCHOUPITOULAS--Big Chief Got A Golden Crown
It's ready to get knocked off though. Allen Touissaint with that whoozy Nawlins sound. Tribal.

EDDIE KIRK--Them Bones
There's a lotta dem bones scattered around the soil. Eddie Kirk's are still moving.

CANDI STATON--As Long As He Takes Care Of Home
Domestic policy is more important. It's the economy, stupid. That's what they said. If he fixes that, then all the stuff overseas is forgiven. Not--as Borat might say.

JAMES BROWN--Don't Tell A Lie About Me And I Won't Tell The Truth About You
Honesty in short supply. Make a deal.

DR WHO DAT?--March To Viberia
If only we could do that instead of leaping into Narnia or another tract of sand.

BEF--Groove Thang
We don't need that fascist g-thang. Heaven 17 without the vocals.

NICKODEMUS--Cleopatra in New York (Zim Zam remix)
Yes, she's a flaneur on Fifth Avenue.

NICOLETTE--No Government (In The Jungle)
What if, rather than the anarchist impulse of this anthem for the rave generation

LYRICS BORN FEAT. EVIDENCE & KRS ONE--Pack Up Remix
Haven't heard KRS One so on point for a while.

LIL' LOUIS--Blackout
Is it global warming or the failure to manage the grid around the world? Mr French Kiss gives a fundamental(ist) warning about the almighty's possible actions.

BOIKUTT--Sabe3 Nomeh
Ramallah hip hop instrumental. So stark, so brutal, the meaning's in the space between the notes.

THE BETHLEHEM GOSPEL SINGERS--My God Can See You
This isn't the Old Testament punisher of Lil' Louis's track, but power defined by a benevolent surveillance. That's the way conscience is pricked. The fear of god works many ways.

THE DEAD TEXAN--A Chronicle Of Early Failures (Part One)
Yes, that's GWB's presidency and his political fate. Music to drown the past and present.

BIPARTISAN

BIPARTISAN 16.11.06

Another slice of Americanismo. I've been meaning to post this playlist for ages but Saghir (newly American with freshly minted blue passport) was visiting from San Diego, so it got sidelined. I do really love his country. Thanks again to the audioblogosphere which is primarily responsible for my ongoing musical education. This comp's loosely inspired by the fallout after the kickout of the Republicans from Congress and all that reconciliatory baloney. I hope that in the new year several committees will begin to investigate with rigour, purpose and speed the Republican administration's corporate mismanagement of the War on Terror (not just Iraq) along with the associated corruption. Loadsamoney. Not sure how much the change in the personnel will make to foreign policy. It's too late with scores of people being killed in Iraq every day. The Iraq Study Group's report (rather an inocuous academic name for a policy fink tank) has produced an old Republican spin on the neo-con strategy in Iraq and the Middle East. Back to the Texas/CIA nexus that have supported George Sr. for decades. (That reminds me of the time I bought the Dallas 1963 shooter team's getaway vehicle when I lived in Texas. Will save that one for another post though. ) The media is hyping the Iraq report as a major indictment of Bush and a new way forward, but as someone from the Institute for Policy Studies in the US said on the BBC today, it really doesn't have any clear plan for withdrawal. It doesn't acknowledge the illegality of the invasion and occupation. The Report is meant to show the US public that the Republicans have sorted themselves out, given Georgie Boy a slap on the wrist and got rid of the neo-cons in the administration. Georgie Boy is probably hoping for the compensation of Saddam's swinging corpse as a Xmas present before he departs the Oval office for good, having got the US into another war that it has lost. Georgie was always up for an execution, as we know from his time as the Governor of Tejas.

GROUCHO MARX--I'm Against It
I'm not sure if this is from Duck Soup (which may the greatest political satire in Hollywood history--certainly more anarchic than Chaplin's more acclaimed The Great Dictator)--but whichever movie it's from I'm increasingly appreciative of Groucho's Marxist commentary about political offices and hallways. Included here for its juxtaposition with the two-faced term that is the title of this playlist.

HENRY "RED" ALLEN--Get The Mop
If we're still thinking cinematically, I'm conjuring up an early 1940s musical directed by Frank Capra in which a black janitor, played by Bill 'Bojangles' Robinson, steals the film from the white folks with some taps and a mop to sweep the incumbent losers of the Republican Party out of the corridors, down the steps and out on to the street.

BING CROSBY (WITH JIMMY DORSEY'S ORCHESTRA)--I'm An Old Cowhand
Amazing NYC song about 'fabricating authenticity'. Just a great city slicker tune. Thought this fit Georgie since he's always going on about being so Texan and a ranching dude when he's really a spoilt east coast frat boy who tried to sound really western.

SPADE COOLEY & HIS ORCHESTRA--Three-Way Boogie
Not possible as a political or sexual formation when you've got it locked down by the Republicans and Democrats. Western swing vote.

FLOYD TILLMAN--Drivin' Nails In My Coffin
If only we could. More honky tonk.

DON GIBSON--Oh Lonesome Me
Yep, you should be dispatched back to your ranch in Crawford. Don't ever bother coming back.

LINDA LANE--Tribute To America
With a title like this, and on a country-ish collection, you'd expect this to be female redneck fare, but no it's a remarkably bipartisan paean to all that is great about the greatest country in the whole fucken world. They take the immigrants. They've given so many things to the rest of the world, like freedom and democracy.

CHARLIE FEATHERS--Too Much Alike
Madame Clinton voted for the war, remember. She lurves Israel. Lots of anti-abortionists among the Democrats too.

KITTY WELLS--A Woman Half My Age
One for that Senator who wrote those emails to his interns.

JOHNNY CASH--That's Enough
Cut the bullshit. Only Jesus can save our boys in Iraq.

SOLOMON BURKE--He'll Have To Go
Yes, he will. A Lieber & Stoller Spanish Harlem-ish take on the Jim Reeves hit

THREE J's--Chalito, Part Two
Moody organ for that border fence.

MANNY CORCHADO--Pow Wow
Nuyorican boogaloo to hook up all interested parties for a diplomatic solution.

PAPI BRANDAO Y SUS EJECUTIVOS--Viva Panama
Can't forget the Latin sphere of influence and the canal in Uncle Sam's back yard.

SESAME STREET & THE POINTER SISTERS--Pinball Number Count (DJ Food remix)
This might help those counting the votes in the elections, especially if they hail from Florida or Ohio.

WILLIE BOBO--Fried Neck Bones & Some Homefries
Homefries are freedom fries, not French fries. Mmm, fried neck bones...

ENNIO MORRICONE--Death Rides A Horse (II)
It wishes to take the evildoers dead or alive.

SUZANNE GABRIELLO--Z'avez Pas Lu Kafka
Franz wrote Amerika without every having visited there. I wonder if this European starlet wrote Kafka without ever having visited Prague.

HANK SNOW--I've Been Everywhere
A round-the-country travelogue. 50 states in his truck. Hawa'ii, just. Even beyond, following the Monroe doctrine.

LOUVIN BROTHERS--Kentucky
Also covered by the Everly brothers. I can smell the blue grass.

DIXIE CHICKS--Travelin' Soldier
It's always Vietnam in these songs though we know they're talkin' about this war.

JOSH RITTER--Girl In The War
'Talkin to Jesus is like asking Laurel to give Hardy a gun'. I know a girl in the war.

BUFFY SAINTE-MARIE--Lazarus (Dead Or Alive)
Back from the grave. Buffy is an angel of history here.

STAN FREEBERG--Heartbreak Hotel
Echo & reverb ad absurdum in this Elvis spoof.

13th FLOOR ELEVATORS--May The Circle Remain Unbroken
Echo & reverb ad absurdum in this psychedelicized country myth

BLUE SKY BOYS--I'm Here To Get My Baby Out Of Jail
Should be matched up with another great prison song, The Zombies' 'Care of Cell 44'. I want more songs about female prisoners. Guantanamo, here we come.

NIQAB ZOMBIES!

Imagine the climax of a film directed by George Romero or David Cronenberg.

Vaguely human figures are swathed in cloth, ready to bite pieces out of Tony Blair, John Reid and other parliamentaries in Westminster.

The horde of hooded women runs rampant through central London, knocking down statues of England's finest.

They enter the Abbey where they ululate at a high pitch and impale a bishop on a holy candlestick as the plaster cracks around them.

The evacuation of Downing Street is too little too late as a gaggle of these monsters overcome the PM in his hallway. They asphyxiate him with yards of cloth, then wrap him up like a pupa.

These living dead are not identikit mummies.

In this shariah splatter movie we follow one character home to her terrace after some grocery shopping for eggplant and chillies. Her capped husband expects the meal on the table at the right time, and the timely completion of other necessary duties that become a Muslim woman. May they be carried out mercifully without friction, he thinks. Several sociologists, professional psychologists and other experts will later state that this marital stress is the source of Muslim female aggression rather than Britain's ambient Islamophobia.

The burqa women meet regularly in high-street shops such as Boots the Chemists to mutter in their own languages. They tend to frequent the chippies not the hammams. Groups of mothers pray together. They share babysitting duties. Despite these banal activities, something compels them to a medley of sudden and highly choreographed violent acts.

Tourists are shocked when a small phalanx of these ladies begin yodelling and waving their arms in Piccadilly Circus after Jummah Prayers, just a couple of days after the Baqr Eid. The object of their wrath is unclear, but the Metropolitan police keep their distance.

The next day a chubby right-wing politician who has recently exercised his freedom of speech is found hacked to death with a crescent moon and star cut into his face. The forensics identify the weapons as very long manicured fingernails. The nail polish is traced to a brand sold exclusively at Harrods.

A few days later the naked, bloated bodies of three Cockerney skinheads float to the surface of the Thames to the screams of mothers pushing prams on the South Bank. The puffy white corpses have been wrapped in black burqas.

Paranoia stalks the streets of London. Spit rains down from the top deck of red buses on to many a woman in a burqa.

One such case engenders panic in the away supporters section at the Emirates Stadium, until police discover that she is the wife of one of the Arsenal team's sponsors. She is only carrying the Gunners' colours--no guns, grenades or strap-on bombs.

In the coming weeks, billboards featuring scantily clad women and alcohol are found almost every morning vandalized with blood red paint and Arabic slogans.

Pet dogs mysteriously disappear and reappear daily as mangled roadkill.

Muslim pundits appear on the news to tell the British public that those responsible are an extremist minority of militants, and not representative of the modest and homebound majority of British Muslim women.

The next morning the imam of the city's central mosque is found naked, dead and mutilated at the bottom of the number one minaret. He has been repeatedly slashed with knives and swords. The scars form geometric patterns that match the Islamicate designs lining the main door of the mosque. The victim's long beard has been shaved and bits of hair have been glued together crudely on the concrete beside his body. The dense grey bush of Arabic calligraphy reads 'Astaghfirullah' ('May Allah Forgive Me') . The imam's throat has been cut halal-style. In the fear-gripped capital, rumours of his castration circulate.

The soundtrack for Niqab Zombies! was assembled for October 31 but I've been finessing its fear quotient since Halloween. Giorgio Agamben via Nikos Papastergiadis on 'zombie multiculturalism' inspired the finishing touches.


NIQAB ZOMBIES!
12.11.06

LEADBELLY--Where Did You Sleep Last Night?
MARIANNE FAITHFULL--Black Girl
LITTLE ANN--Deep Shadows
LIGHTNIN' SLIM--I'm Evil
LOMBARDO TWINS--Arabian Nightmare
PINCH--Qawwali V.I.P.
TORTOISE--TNT (Nobukazu Takemura remix)
BOLA--Ballast (Triangle)
MR. FINGERS--Stars
SUBTLE--F.K.O. (Console remix)
ISOLEE--Hermelin (Original Mix)
CHURCH UNIVERSAL & TRIUMPHANT, INC.--Invocation For Judgement Against And Destruction of Rock Music
JOHN CARPENTER--Halloween
DIGITAL MYSTIKZ--Haunted
TOM TOM CLUB--Spooks
CONNIE PRICE & THE KEYSTONES--Sticks & Stones
SONNY BOY WILLIAMSON--Your Funeral & My Trial
BETTYE SWANN--Cover Me