Music

Possibly. Paul Rodgers has been talking to Billboard.com. Apparently there are nine songs recorded for the new album. Some interesting insight into how Brian May holds the different layers of a song in his head and directs the recording of each bit individually. It then comes together in the edit. BTW it says in the interview that BHM has just got his PhD in Astronomy. According to Brian over on his site (see entry entitled Musing at Imperial College posted 18th June 2007), he has just finished the thesis but has still to submit it, do his defence and present to the Imperial College Astronomy Department. So still a bit of work to do. If you’re reading this, good luck!Anyone else doing a PhD should check out the PhD student comic strip. Actually that’s worth putting in your RSS reader even if you’re not doing a PhD.

The 2-day TVital concert in Belfast this year will be on 21st and 22nd August. Acts confirmed so far are The Killers, Manic Street Preachers, Razorlight, and Kasabian. Just watching The Killers live at Glastonbury 2007 on the BBC at present. Marvellous 🙂 I’ll definitely be there for at least The Killers on 22nd August. Probably go on the 21st as well.

I didn’t make it to TVital last year. The 2004 concert was excellent (The Darkness headlined and were brilliant). In 2005 Scissor Sisters headlined the night I was there, but Franz Ferdinand blew them off!

Yeah! New Tori Amos album and tour. Bought the album from iTMS this morning. On first listen I really love some of the tracks. Especially Big Wheel (the new single), Body and Soul and Programmable Soda. There are 24 tracks on the album! Will take a while to dissect the package. There is a whole back story with 5 different characters (the American Doll Posse) associated with the album. See the web site. I like Clyde best 🙂 There are blogs for each character and a MySpace page where you can listen to some of the tracks. All good stuff.

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Update: I’ve listened to the new album a few times now. I like it a lot. Not sure if it is better then The Beekeeper. Time will tell.

I’ve got an iPod nano in my car that I listen to via a Kensington FM Transmitter. Now the iPod in question only has about 850 tracks on it, and as I hand picked them all, they are some of my favourite pieces of music. So it shouldn’t really be surprising when on random play the iPod throws up a song that I really, really like. Today it threw up Machinery of the Gods from The Franklin-Neumann Project. Been playing it a few times since then. Marvellous stuff.

David Lee Roth? Spotted doing a bluegrass version of the Van Halen song Jump. It’s actually pretty good stuff!

Van Halen are reforming for a tour as well.

Queen made a lot of videos. I still like the one for Somebody to Love the most I think. It’s simply the 4 of them in a studio, inter-cut with concert footage. So the most important thing, i.e. the music itself, doesn’t have to compete with over ambitious visuals or story. You can watch a 30 second clip at the iTMS or buy the video in its 5 minute splendour there as well.

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Yeah!. New artist. New Music. Mika is going to be huge. Dodgy Holiday is very good. The performance of the song Grace Kelly on Later with Jools Holland is very good as well. Available as a QuickTime file at the Mika MySpace Music site.

He has a very broad vocal range. The control is better than most and he uses it really well. Inevitably there is comparison to Freddie Mercury and Marc Bolan et al. Sounds a bit like Scissor Sisters and The Darkness from a vocal perspective (but better). He doesn’t need the comparisons to other vocalists. He can stand alone as a very good singer and musician. Looking forward to the album.

[Thanks to Brian May’s Soapbox for the pointer]

I noticed today that the play count for the Kate Bush song Sunset has hit 100 in iTunes on my Macintosh! I said I was listening to it a lot. This includes iPod and desktop plays but not the plays via CD in the car. Here’s a picture of my top 10 in iTunes by play count (click picture for a larger view).

The Hot Puppies are good. You can listen to some tracks and watch some videos at their website. The live Shoot Em in the Head video is good. Their debut album is on iTMS as well, although it’s not officially out until later in July. They have an excellent crisp sound. You can hear the vocals really well as they are not drowned out by the instruments. Good stuff. Early Queen recordings made a point of making sure the vocal mix was “crystal”. It’s something all bands should try to do. Well assuming they can actually sing, of course.

Another blast from the past. The Hot Space album from Queen. I love this album (except for Under Pressure which will surprise most people). I’ve loved it since it came out and has been my favourite Queen album since 1982. Most people hated it at the time. Even my Queen loving friends. Funnily enough most, if not all of them now love it as well. The 3 tracks at the start of Side A – Staying Power, Dancer and Back Chat are brilliant when played together like a single long track.

This album has provided me with many hours of pleasure since it was released 24 years ago. Including another hour earlier today.

I was at the Milton Keynes Bowl concert in 1982 that was part of the tour that promoted this album. This was recorded for The Tube on Channel 4 television and has since been released as Queen on Fire – Live at the Bowl. I was right at the front on the right hand side of the stage.