Sunday, September 30, 2007

Blacker than black...

Playlist
Cloudland Blue Quartet – Erstazreal : New Short Version!
George Benson – The George Benson Collection (Gimme the night - la la)
Various – Super 70s Reggae
Goodbye Mr Mackenzie – Good Deeds and Dirty Rags
Goodbye Mr Mackenzie – Hammer and Tongs

Slept late till 9:15 – felt totally washed out – I blame the drugs...

While the pain is much lessened, there’s seems to be nothing that can stop the periodic paralysing pins and needles in my arm and hand...

After yesterday’s realisation that the new album is simply too long, and knowing that “Blue Eyes Across the Room” would now be the lead off track, I set about giving the song a slight remix – the way the acoustic guitar entered has always niggled with me but didn’t seem to matter as much when it was track seven...

With that done, I sat down with Anne in her guise as Executive Producer and went through every song, keeping or rejecting each – I already had a short list and had decided on ten songs of the twenty to keep – Anne had a couple of “must have” scenarios going on for songs I’d rejected while she rejected a couple I’d kept....

And so a new, smaller, fitter, leaner squad of songs was selected...

I mailed webmeister Craig to advise of the situation and the release postponement till next week...

Then a break and out to the tile place to choose some floor tiles for the bathroom at Crispycat Towers...

Having found what we wanted and noted the details, we were home in time for Anne to watch the St Mirren v Hearts game, while I put together the new short master of my new CD and redesigned the cover – taking out all the unrequired lyrics etc etc...

After the match, which Hearts won 3-1 but were less convincing than the scoreline might suggest, I played the disc full pelt in the living room and it sounded good...

In the evening, an hour long Corrie was accompanied by a lovely Chinese meal collected from the New Happy Palace which makes the best King Po chicken in the world (probably)...

Then the latest from Michael Palin and Match of the Day 2, with this week’s double episode of Heroes in bookending mode...

It's getting good...

Listening to Goodbye Mr Mackenzie tonight, I wondered at the fickle world of pop and why they weren’t more successful – doesn’t matter really though as I like them anyway...



My favourite is "Now we Are Married"...

Tomorrow, autumn with a vengeance...

Highlight of the Day : Finally finishing the new album – ready to go..

4 comments:

Sky Clearbrook said...

I've only ever (knowingly) heard two Goodbye Mr MacKenzie songs; "The Rattler" and their eponymously-titled third single. Both were really good.

I've always had it in my mind that "The Rattler" was released about a billion times to try and make it a hit and was recently surprised to learn it had only been out twice.

Used to see Big John a lot in and around Edinburgh in the late '80s.

Cloudland Blue Quartet said...

Before my group, Call Me Clive, had the honour of supporting GMM in 1988/9, I already knew Big John from having recorded a single with both him and Gary from the Exploited in October 1984 for a guy known as The Square Peg.

The EP was called "Echoes of War" and I was contracted to produce the sound of a nuclear explosion with my synthesiser.

I recall staying up all night at Pierhouse Studios mixing the track and getting home bleary eyed around 8 in the morning...

I recently saw the CD of this in Avalanche - The Square Peg man has re-released all his classic mid-eighties punk stuff..

I am credited on the cover as "David Reilly - Synthesiser"...

Ah great days...

Sky Clearbrook said...

Yes, great days, indeed.

It's funny because I was thinking about the Exploited just this morning. I used to attend a local disco when I was about ten or so and in amongst all the Adam and the Ants, Shaky, Matchbox, Madness, Bucks Fizz and Bad Manners, the woman who ran it (teenage daughter of our lollipop lady) would often drop "Fuck A Mod" into the mix, much to the delight of all us young kids and (surprisingly) without complaint from any of the adults in attendance. Good times.

Cloudland Blue Quartet said...

Would we get away with that now - or would it somehow breach someone's human rights?