bartelby

Some SWANS:

You think that's bad. Leonard runs out of the room if I even walk in carrying a bass/guitar. I don't even have to play it...

I listened to Peace Sells... and Rust in Peace yesterday, for the first time in years. Back in the mid 90s I preferred Megadeth to Metallica, but Dave's nasally vocals, and his pompous attitude, started to annoy me. Peace Sells is a great album from start to finish, but I do like Rust in Peace more, the B side of the album is some of the best Megadeth out there. My journey with Megadeth ended with Rust in Peace, the following album did nothing at all for me and live they became pretty dull.

The other week I pre-ordered a record from a German label. I was pretty shocked at the delivery time. The record was shipped with DHL. At 19:58 on the 4th March it was marked as processed. Then 11:26 on the 5th it was delivered to me!

My go to distortion is an old 80s Vesta Fire DST. I had one in 1988 but PX'd it against my Aria SB Elite in 1989. I then got a mint condition, inc box and stuff, about 10 years ago. The EQ is massively powerful and really versatile, gives a lovely crisp distortion on both bass and guitar.

Reminds me of a modern version of 80s German Power Metal...

I couldn’t be bothered to go and see Metallica on the puppets tour. Cliff was killed the following week. So I’d definitely go back in time and go to the gig.

Wilmslow Audio are great. They helped my dad when he designed his own Hi-Fi speakers and crossovers. He had previously spent quite a bit of money with them mind...

I have quite a few duplicate LPs in my collection. Might be an original pressing and a remastered version, different coloured vinyl or one version on a single 33 rpm 12" and another on 2 45 rpm 12"s. Plus I my also have a CD copy

Their new album has been announced. Hopefully they’ll be able to tour for it...

Spot on.

That reminds me of when I was younger and my dad was listening to his new Hi-Fi late one evening. Just as I was dozing off Black Sabbath's Paranoid started shaking the house. I ran downstairs to find my dad sat on the floor in the living room with headphones on. Totally oblivious to the earsplitting volume pumping from the speakers. He didn't realise you had to manually switch the speakers out of the signal path.

Stunning, as usual... 😍

SH is the reason I wanted to play bass too. I got a Blue Sparkle P in 2010

I used that booklet to write an essay about the band for school project when I was 13 or 14. I got an A It was also the start of me lusting after a Blue Sparkle Precision...

I saw Dinosaur Jr a few years back* in a tiny venue in Bristol, I started the gig about 6' in front of J's stacks (a Hiwatt and 2 Marshalls, each going through 2 4x12"s, his monitor was a Fender Twin at pretty much, his, ear level). After a song or two I went to the back and sat on a shelf. *it was 2013 too, according to the date I uploaded the video I shot:

That’s a good description of a Sunn O))) gig. The first time I saw them in 2006 the backline kept going down which left Attila to do A Cappella parts. Still bloody awesome. I’ve seen them about 10 times since then.

Iron Maiden - Live After Death by a long way then Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Live at KCRW Goat - Live Ballroom Ritual

I went to many metal gigs (of many sub-genres) during the 80s and nearly always came away with ringing ears. Over time PA tech advanced and volumes dropped... In recent years the loudest gig I've witnessed was 115dB (displayed on the soundman's rig) during a performance at the Supersonic Festival. But the performance was engineered to be uncomfortable in as many ways as possible: Volume, lit only with strobes, massive amounts of fog machines, the performers spread across the stage and audience areas and two 1/2 naked women to invade peoples personal space. Second to that were LOOP. 114 dB in the Exchange in Bristol. Very, very loud, but clear as a bell. I saw JK Flesh (Justine Broadrick) a few years back and the bass was loud and low enough to modulate your vocal chords. Not that you could really talk to anyone any way. Special mentions to Sunn O))), Sleep, OM, Earth and Merzbow gigs.

Ah, it was the Time's Up tour I saw them with The Stereo MCs at the Hummingbird.

Nah, Merzbow is much more interesting than MBV...

Was that with The Stereo MCs supporting? They got such a poor reaction from the crowd that Living Colour wouldn't come on until there was a decent round of applause... I can only remember leaving 3 gigs early due to not enjoying myself: Opeth - Watershed tour. 3rd time we'd seen them. Me and the missus were up for a nice loud set. But it was really dull and lack lustre. When they dragged out some barstools and acoustic guitars my heart sank a little. I'm a big fan of the Damnation album too. The previous times Opeth had balanced the sets really well and there was a decent amount of interaction with the crowd too. This time was just painful, so we went. Mastodon/Dillinger Escape Plan. Having seen Mastodon twice before me and some mates were well up for this. Holy moly what a boring gig. DEP just sucked all the enthusiasm from us and we ended up in the bar. Mastodon couldn't do anything to engage us. Swans. After about an hour of just pure awesomeness a wave of disquiet seemed to pass through the audience. It was like everyone took a step away from the stage and the whole atmosphere of the gig changed. It was half way through a song, Michael Gira's persona took over and everything felt much darker than was comfortable, even for a SWANS gig. It was a really weird experience. I saw some friends, who were also there, a couple of weeks later and they said much the same. But they stuck it out. The next time SWANS rolled through Bristol I didn't bother, but my friends did. They said the same thing happened, but this time they couldn't stick it and left.

Here’s a scan from a 20 year old copy of Guitar World for Schism. (hopefully this upload works) Schism.pdf