- The Complete Beefheart Sessions:1968

Van Vliet and Ravenscroft

It's not as many as you might imagine, with Beefheart and the Magic band completeing just two sessions from Peel, both in 1968, fully a year before before recording 1969's legendary 'Trout Mask Replica', the album that took in every genre from jazz, poetry to minimal R&B and Beefhart's distinctive voice.

Due to a me-based cockup, the tracks have been uploaded seperately, so you'll need to download them one at a time. It's worth it, honestly.

04/02/1968 (recorded)

-Sure 'Nuffn' Yes I Do
-Yellow Brick Road
-Abba Zabba
-Electricity

LINE UP

Captain Beefhart (Vocals)
John French (Drums)
Alex St. Clair (Lead Guitar)
Jerry Handley (Bass)
Jeff Cotton (Guitar)

12/05/1968 (recorded)

-Safe As Milk
-Beatle Bones 'N' Smoke'N' Stones
-Kandy Korn
-You Gotta Trust Us

LINE UP

Captain Beefhart (Vocals)
John French (Drums)
Alex St. Clair (Lead Guitar)
Jerry Handley (Bass)
Jeff Cotton (Guitar)

Mistakes are all mine and will no doubt be cleared up by those kind enough to leave comments.

- A ghost at the feast: The Magic Band at Maida Vale, 7th July, 2004

You wait for ages then two posts come along at once. By the way, it's my youngest son Ozan's first birthday today, so leave a comment or he'll be very grizzly.

A bunch of old men in 2004

Does Ludwig Van have to be conducting to make a performance of his music valid? Does he bollocks, although we’d all rather have Captain Beefheart singing these songs, naturally. Having said that, this is a belter of a performance which yielded 2 festive fifty entries for 2004.

Legend has it that Peel was initially sceptical about this reformed Magic Band but, having played a live recording of the band recorded at an All Tomorrows Parties festival on his show some time in 2003, he found himself so overcome with emotion that couldn't speak and had to play a record to regain his composure. A year or so later the band did a live session for Peel.

Track list:

Diddy wah diddy
Circumstances
Hit a man
Rockette Morton bass solo
Steal softly through sunshine
Abba zabba
My human gets me blues
Alice in blunderland
Hair pie bake 4
The evening bell
Electricity
The floppy boot stomp
Mirror man
Moonlight on Vermont
Bug* eyed beans from Venus

Glaring errors to be rectified, as ever, in the comments section below.


Length: 63 mins
File size: 76 mb

*As noted on the BBC website which is absolutely jam-packed with lack of information.

- Sgt Pepper must die!

There's a theory that the only reason 'Citizen Kane' is considered the greatest films of all time is because people who compile lists need a film to stick in at number one. I've only seen it once myself, don't feel the need to sit through it again and really don't care what rosebud is. 'Star Wars', on the other hand, is a different matter (shame about the most recent three).

Music is very much the same if you ask me. How many of the so-called classic albums can you sit through on a fairly regular basis? I can't honestly say that I've listened to Sgt Pepper even once in the last 20 years, and don't even get me started on Pet Sounds. Consequently, I was really happy to stumble on this article in The Guardian the other day, that goes some way to debunking the myths of these apparently untouchable albums. In fact, going through the list of albums discussed, the only ones I wanted to defend were the ones I'd grown up listening to, and so the connection is more to do with the time and place I was in when they came out, rather than because they in some way transcend musical genres or define styles in any way.

Please take a look and see if you agree with me, here are the classics that are discussed:

Tupac Shakur, All Eyez On Me: Nominated by Mark Ronson, producer

Nirvana, Nevermind: Nominated by Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips

The Beach Boys, Pet Sounds: Nominated by Luke Pritchard of the Kooks

The Stone Roses, The Stone Roses: Nominated by Eddie Argos of Art Brut

The Strokes, Is This It: Nominated by Ian Williams of Battles

Television, Marquee Moon: Nominated by Alex Kapranos of Franz Ferdinand

The Beatles, Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band: Nominated by Billy Childish, prime mover of British garage rock

Abba, Arrival: Nominated by Siobhan Donaghy, former Sugababe turned solo artist

Arcade Fire, The Neon Bible: Nominated by Green Gartside of Scritti Politti

The Doors, LA Woman: Nominated by Craig Finn of the Hold Steady

The Smiths, Meat Is Murder: Nominated by Jackie McKeown of 1990s

Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band, Trout Mask Replica: Nominated by Peter Hook, ex- New Order and Joy Division

Read the full article here.

- The penultimate Top Gear Show, September, 1975

Surprisingly little is written about the Top Gear radio show, even wikipedia isn't very helpful. Consequently, the best I can say is that this show is from some time in September, 1975. Having just turned two at the time, I can't rely on my own memory to confirm this fact.

It's a really hot day here today, and I think the heat's gone to my brain, as I've done, quite frankly, a pretty poor job of transcribing the track listing for this one. Lots of help needed filling in the gaps.

Track listing

-The Faces - Stay with me (from a 1971 session)
-Steeleye Span - A Buddy Holly song whose name escapes me (from an unidentified session)
-Lindisfarne - your guess is undoubtedly going to be much better than mine (track introduced but fades out after a few seconds)
-Family - The Cat and the Rat (track fades in during the last few seconds)
-Roxy Music - Peel mentions the lineup in great detail but neglects to tell us what the track is called (from a 1972 session)
-Syd Barrett - Gigolo Aunt
-Steeleye Span - First minute of the track only

Peel sounds great on this one, really strait-laced. I guess he was still in full 'this is a public service broadcast' mode at this time. I wonder if he did his programs like this to give the music he was playing more credibility. Shame he's not around for me to ask him.

Download the washy mediumwave extravaganza here.

Like many of you other crazy Peel obsessives, I've got the final Top Gear show, too. For the sake of those who don't yet have it, I'll be posting it sometime next week.

Thanks to the anonymous contributor who has filled in the gaps in my fairly poor effort to supply a track listing.