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Dusted Features
Every Friday, Dusted Magazine publishes a series of music-related lists compiled by our favorite artists. This week: Fucked Up and For Barry Ray.
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Listed: Fucked Up + For Barry Ray
Fucked Up
Fucked Up used to play basements exclusively, but now they play them after the show at the club earlier in the night. They are five polite Canadians who play melodic hardcore like they invented it, equal parts Donnas, Poison Idea, and street punk gobbing in the mix. Attempts to shake free of their hardcore purist fanbase by writing longer songs are only succeeding to draw in more diverse crowds. They have over 20 releases, the most recent of which is the “Year of the Pig” 12” single on What’s Your Rupture.
Top Ten Intro Music Tunes by 10,000 Marbles of Fucked Up
1. A Challenge of Honour - "The Home Coming"
Our gnarliest use of intro music. Sounds like a thousand sketchy bats flying into your ears and eyeballs, and sounds so out of place and jarring, that it makes for a hyper-disorienting tense environment just before we start playing, like as if there is construction upstairs,
but instead of carpenters its nazis. This band also has a record called "Spartan Victories" - enough said.
2. Julee Cruise - "I Float Alone"
For the exact opposite effect. We used this at a show in Washington, just beyond the Black Lodge. Peaks in just the right places, fills up a dark room with just the right amount of anticipation, and sounds like its about to unravel and spill right off the highway. Badalamenti uses all of the right tricks here - a melting horn solo, the most confusing piano mangling, and he steps on the lowest pedal on the organ, and just leaves it running.
3. Barbara Mason - "A Good Man is Gone"
Yeah, the "Yes I'm Ready" Barbara Mason, but this was the mid 70s NY alleyway version. This song is from the "Sheba Baby" soundtrack. The night before Octavio left for the psychic warzone, we played this track before our set and tore everyone’s hearts from their stomachs. Then he reminded us that time doesn't exist and we'd see him when we get there, and filtered into the vibrations, singing "Yes I'm Ready".
4. David Axelrod - "The Mental Traveller"
Nothing gets the attention of merch table monkey's like a hundred violins
sustaining for 40 seconds straight. Useful again at the 1.30 minute mark when the guitars kick in, because if you still aren't paying attention you might think it was us playing, except for when those headache-strings come back in.
5. Gustav Holst - "Mars, the Bringer of War"
Our best shows have been odes to the god of war anyhow, so why not stand up and take our hats off for the anthem before it starts? The only song better at getting people prepared to smash each other is…
6. Cro Mags - "We Gotta Know"
Sometimes we get booked to play festivals and play this like a secret code for the lowlifes that sneak in so they can call mayhem when we start. The most classic intro of all time, we actually play this with instruments,
not over the PA. When we covered "Down but Not Out" at a loft in Brooklyn three different fights broke out at the same time – talk about mind control.
7. Kinfolk Kia Shine - "So Krispy"
We still can't afford a lot of fancy gear. I had this on my iPod (Shuffle) a few weeks ago when we did a festival in England and was it came on right as I was done setting up. I put the earbuds to my guitar pickups and looped the drum intro with my line 6 delay pedal. We used the beat to start the first song of our set. A few weeks later we did the same thing with the start of "97 Mentality" but I wrote about this song because the lyrics are way more retarded ("Krispy like a two piece, not a pot pie").
8. Monty Cantsin - “Mass Media”
We had to use this a few times because David claims that he wrote it.
9. Julie London - "Like to Get to Know You"
We play this right AFTER we're done playing and seperated by everyone at
the show by 3 inches of bulletproof glass in the Fucked Up-mobile, just to rub it in as we drive away (it also has a cow catcher on the front)
10. "Kaneda" from the Akira soundtrack
We had to stop playing this song because people kept turning into huge stuffed bears and exploding into birds and pieces of felt and shit all over the club in slow motion.
For Barry Ray
For Barry Ray is the London-based duo of Carina Thorén (Sweden) and John Chantler (Australia). Their debut record, New Days was recorded over the winter of 2006/7 in London with organs, piano, guitars and a bunch of less regular instrumentation. You can find more information, musical samples, and tour dates at http://www.atbob.co.uk.
1. Robert Wyatt - Rockbottom
This is a near perfect record. It has everything great - ecstatic horns, brilliant songs about baffling subjects and acres of personality. who would ever predict the monologue about hedgehogs?
2. Maher Shalal Hash Baz - L'Autre Cap
A new record from Tori Kudo is always an absolute pleasure. This is probably his most consistent set of tunes and their realisation here is fantastic. Tori is some kind of modern day Sun Ra - an affinity for the big band but with a simultaneous commitment to slapping its conventions upside the head.
3. Tenniscoats - Totemo Aimasho
I met these guys via Tori Kudo and we just had the pleasure of touring with them in Australia. Its great we get to see each other a couple of times a year now. They are totally inspiring - in music and life. All the records are essential. Add this to that pile.
4. This Heat - This Heat
We met Charles Hayward (This Heat Drummer/Vocalist) at a market stall where we were selling these actions dolls we'd made in our own likeness. He bought one of our CDrs and came back the next day to say how much he liked it. We hadn't heard this record then. Probably a good thing as we would have been stunned stupid by his compliment if we had. We've seen him play solo since and he's a powerhouse - just phenomenal - and this record set the groundwork for what we do.
5. The Boredoms - Rebore Vol 0
Yamastuka Eye's own remix of Vision Creation New Sun shows how lame the other mixes in the rebore series were. This record channels the twin currents of krautrock motorik and pastoral psychedelia in perfect combination. Genius.
6. Träd Gräs och Stenar/Internation Harvester/Pärson Sound
There is so much joy in this music. We dig totally how they are still going strong and having so much fun playing together. The Pärson Sound collection is a really great conflation of rock moves and psychedelic minimalism. Exemplary Swedes.
7. Richard Youngs - Advent
One of the perfect, simple statements at which Youngs excels here made even more potent by the degraded sound quality - the simple repeating piano motif hovering above the tape wow and distortion. And then there is the voice, the brutal oboe parts and the keening reels of distorted guitar. We had MP3s of this for a while, but the LP re-issue makes it right.
8. Andrew King - The Harbinger of the Decaying Mind
This 10" just the beginning. For its not just the songs, but the life that is his work, taking in his paintings and mind-blowing knowledge of the arcane traditions of the british peoples... his performances are great to. We did a mix for Type Records (http://www.typerecords.com/radio) and thought it funny to merge Andrew's track with Ben Reynolds. I'd be curious to know if Andrew is aware of the interest amongst all those folks in the northern/glasgow underground in trad. song and vice versa...
9. Mount Eerie - No Flashlight
Its great to see someone like Phil take control of his work and go the self-publishing route. He's got a nice operation going on. And his drums are still sounding great.
10. Albert Ayler - Spiritual Unity / My Name is Albert Ayler
Go and see the documentary when it comes to your town. Heartbreaking stuff with some typically fantastic anecdotes from Sunny Murray and Sune Spangberg wincing as Ayler squeals. Apparently he was inspired by Swedish Folk and Jojk singing and the like. Nice to see those things being taken in different directions. On record, its got to be spirtual unity. Brief, but beautiful.
By Dusted Magazine
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