Shyness can stop you from doing all the things in life you'd like to ..

So if there's something you'd like to try
if there's something you'd like to try

Ask me, I wont say no.. how could I ?

Ask me Ask me Ask me...

I hate Morrisey.. but he wrote some of the songs that had touched me deeper than what I can recall..

Johny Marr is a genius.. and Mike Joyce and Andy Rourke, were the best rhythm base of the 80's.

I discovered the Smiths while I was studying for my exams to get into College... all I was doing apart from studying, was playing chess and listening to their last record "Strangeways, Here We Come", and that is such a nice memory I gather..

.. my feelings are more important than yours

Whenever I listen to this chorus.. I nod with my head..

Some of Julian Casablanca's lyrics are excellent, uncomplicated things that you already know.. but fail to remember until you heard them in someone else's mouth..

Plus if it's said, with such edgy guitar lines and riffs of the Strokes.. it sounds even better...

The mess of guitars during the intro are so chaotic and untidy…

Sounds like a rehearsal studio down any alley..

but everything is on it's right place..

I needed some cool rock after my electronica week..

And as the greatest last rock band is this one..

I choose Razorblade for today.

Oh, the, Razor blade, that's what I call love
I bet you pick it up and mess around with it
If I put it down
It gets extremely complicated
Anything to forget everything

You got to take me out
At least once a week
Whether I'm in your arms
Or I'm at your feet
I know exactly what you're thinking
You won't say it now
But in your heart it's loud

Oh no, my feelings are more important than yours
Oh, drop dead, I don't care, I won't worry
There you go

Oh, the razor blade
Wish it would snap this rope
The world is in your hand
Or it's at your throat
At times it's not that complicated
Anything to forget everything

He would never talk
But he was not shy
She was a street-smart girl
But she could not lie
They were perfect for each other
Say it now
Cause in your heart it's loud

Oh no, my feelings are more important than yours
Oh, drop dead, I don't care, I won't worry

Ayh

Sweetheart
Your feelings are more important of course
Of course
Everyone you wanted
Everything that we would take from them
I don't wanna know, I don't wanna know
Tell me, tell me, tell me, tell me

no, don't, okay

..It's unfortunate that when we feel a storm

Massive Attack released an amazing record this year...

I was looking for their old tunes cause I remember that Blue Lines, Protection and Mezzanine were three of the best CD's from the 90's... and, as I had lost their track lately, didn't even know they had a record out this year...

I was letting this new record Heligoland sound in my room until "Paradise Circus" got me hypnotized ...

just listened to the piano...

The hand-claps and the beat..

Then the voice of Hope Sandoval..

It's unfortunate that when we feel a storm,
we can roll ourselves over 'cause we're uncomfortable

Oh well the devil makes us sin

But we like it when we're spinning, in his grin.

Love is like a sin my love
For the ones that feels it the most

Look at her with her eyes like a flame

She will love you like a fly will never love you, again

Oh, ho..

It's unfortunate that when we feel a storm,
we can roll ourselves over when we're uncomfortable

Oh well the devil makes us sin

But we like it when we're spinning, in his grin.

Oh, ho,..

Love is like a sin my love
For the one that feels it the most

Look at her with her smile like a flame
She will love you like a fly will never love you, again

...Up on Melancholy Hill there's a plastic tree

I‘ve been listening to some electronica lately.. to get some inspiration..
Was revisiting the old 90’s school … Chemical Brothers, Massive Attack, plus some late things JUSTICE, Royskopp, The Crystal Method and LCD SoundSystem...

Then went to had a look to the last Gorillaz release Plastic Beach..

Reviewing the song titles I was immediately attracted by On Melancholy Hill… Song titles are that significant for me…The other one was Rhinestone Eyes…

This is a classical example of Euro Synth Pop, that could have been recorded in 1985..

But Damon Albarn's voice is sad and low.. the opposite of how would have been sung in the eighties... and this is what makes it this special..

I read that the song was rehearsed during the Good, the Bad & The Queen sessions.. and there is a video around with them playing it..

The lyrics, as the song is called, aren’t that sad … for me they are like a picture of a boring day waiting for something to happen or someone to call you ... which somehow gets well with the Gorillaz post apocalyptic universe…

And I don't know what the precise reason is... but helplessly got so addicted to this song..

Up on melancholy hill
There's a plastic tree
Are you here with me
Just looking out on the day
Of another dream

Well you can't get what you want
But you can get me
So let's head out to sea
'Cause you are my medicine
When you're close to me
When you're close to me

So call in the submarine
'round the world we'll go
Does anybody know
If we're looking out on the day
Of another dream

If you can't get what you want
Then come with me

Up on melancholy hill
Sits a manatee, love
Just looking out for the day
When you're close to me
When you're close to me

When you're close to me

I need someone who doesn't need me ...

The Doors made an instant classic album with L.A.Woman.

Whatever has Jim Morrison's voice on it, it is for me …

and also a music masterpiece.. with three of the best musicians of all time, John Densmore, Robbie Krieger and Ray Manzarek..

Top of the list, as drummer, guitarist and keyboard player…

The first song that got me into the Doors was "People are Strange" ..

That lyrics still make so much sense.. it seems he wrote them just thinking in you or me.. but obviously was about him..

Today I was listening to Chopin and suddenly remembered that Ray Manzarek uses a piece of him on the keyboard solo on Hyacinth House.

It is the Polonaise in A-flat major, Op. 53...

Now I remember When I went to Pere Lachaise cemetery to visit Jim's grave..

Surrounded by so many artist I admire …

Edith Piaf, Amadeo Modigliani, Oscar Wilde...

and not far away from Jim’s there was a majestic grave with a casket spray from the Polish Consulate.. and it was Frederic Chopin's..

....I suppose there's nothing I can do

The Clash, the Clash, The Clash !!!
Mick Jones.. cool voice, amazing composer and great guitar player..

He wrote the classics on the Clash, Should I Stay or Should I Go and Train in Vain.. the rest is great... but these two songs are the ones that separated them from punk and got them in the 1st division of rock bands..

After all is only rock and roll...

Apart from him, Topper Headon's drumbeat, the harp and the Piano...

As Scott Kenemore wrote on his article "All Talk and No Stick" about the most Underrated drummers.

"Topper’s drumming remained superb. It does what drumming is supposed to do: make great songs even better. "

I guess the song should be called Stand By Me but obviously that title was already taken... Instead they choose Train in Vain.. which is a bit pointless.. and quite punk !!

...Won't you help to sing

This will be my first post paying tribute to the black artists from all time..

Bob Marley will be the first.. and the song I'll share is the last that he recorded on the last album he released.. Uprising..

All his philosophy, way of life, teachings are explained here in 3 minutes..

He says so many valuable things on here that you just can't be the same person after having heard it..

What it's music all about ?

For me music is what Bob Marley did with Redemption Song.

Old pirates, yes, they rob I;
Sold I to the merchant ships,
Minutes after they took I
From the bottomless pit.
But my hand was made strong
By the hand of the Almighty.
We forward in this generation
Triumphantly.
Won't you help to sing
These songs of freedom?
'Cause all I ever have:
Redemption songs,
Redemption songs.

the cheapest stuff is all I need ...

If this blog was a dictionary and I had to describe what a riff is… It would be quite a boring thing to do.. so I believe that hearing one is actually the best way to get it. ..

I love riffs.. and people may say that Whole Lotta Love or Smoke on the Water are the best ever..but I really don’t know if there's such thing..

Satisfaction has one of the greatest riffs and also is very easy to play..

They said the first riff song was What'd I Say by Ray Charles.. which actually it’s played on a keyboard..

Anyway my choice for the golden riff is …. COLD GIN by the ace of the aces… Mr. Ace Frehley, aka the Spaceman, and other three guys that use to play with him.. in a band called KISS.

The cut-rate mime walking through the dirty streets..

Last week I bought “Things the Grandchildren Should Know” by Mark O. Everett.

Such a suggestive title…

As I am always wondering about which are the things that I should already know… and as once I was a grandchildren it got me hooked straight away..

I wasn’t a big fan of Eels, because their first single, "Novocaine for the Soul".. sounded to me so much as an intentional hit .. didn’t felt like buying it..

Anyway as time passes good artists remains, and so he did.

I started admiring him when he was asked to contribute to the disrespectful edition of Kurt Cobain’s personal writings with a comment… He replied: "Please don't do this to me after I kill myself"… enough said…

I took one of his albums randomly which happened to be “Daisies from the Galaxy” and it became for a while a very comfortable company.

So... buy the book and then read it !! and you won’t be able to avoid laughing .. even though he explains quite tragic episodes of his life.. he manages to lower the importance, which actually is the cure for any disgrace.. sometimes I forget..

I Don’t Know Where The Sunbeams End And The Starlight Begins

Helplessly I had to surrender to the Flaming Lips pressure ...

There was so many references all over the media to not realize.

So I left myself get into their bizarre and fantastic sonic world.

They really succeed in writing perfect pop songs with surreal landscapes which seem to drink from every possible source done in the previous decades..

They are the greatest modern day psychedelic band mixed with hard beats, edgy guitar lines and evocative lyrics..

Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots have enough good songs to be on the place it deserves.. And Fight Test is the perfect song to start with..

I read somewhere that they were sued because the song resembles to Father and Son by Cat Stevens... which by the way it's quite true..

...You Can't Put Your Arms Around A Memory

It's impossible to find a better name for a rock musician than Johnny Thunders and a better name for a song than "You Can't Put Your Arms Around A Memory"..

It could come from a novel by Truman Capote, but again reality surpasses fiction.

Johnny Thunders was the ultimate cult rock star; raw, elusive, dark, unpopular, stray and since 1991, gone...

"You Can't Put Your Arms Around A Memory" appeared on his solo album So Alone released in 1978 and it is a punk anthem sang with such fragility from a guy who had been in the most obscene band to date, The New York Dolls...

Their plan may have been to steal the The Rolling Stones's seat back in the early 70's .. but obviously failed.. as all the rest who tried ..

No happy ending..

...And he remembers Roxy Music in 72

"If You're Feeling Sinister" was released in 1997 and it's the second record by Belle And Sebastian

It was considered a gem at the time of its release.
Basically because contains four songs in a row which makes it excellent.

Me and The Major, Like Dylan in the Movies, The Fox In The Snow and Get Me Away From Here, I'm Dying.

All of them are modern classics.

This record is a pop masterpiece that could be stored among Rubber Soul and Bridge Over Troubled Waters.

I will always love Like Dylan in the Movies, because it was the first song that caught me from them..

But the funny lyrics and the harmonica of Me and The Major, the pumping rhythm, the references to the punks and the hippies that ends up mentioning Roxy Music.. always make me laugh..

There I stand 'neath the Marquee Moon...

Just waiting ..

There are years which are like milestones for music culture.. my favorite is 1977.
I can't recall how many records from that year I love..

It's a year strongly linked with punk birth.. Though Punk was born ten years earlier with the MC5's.

Anyway... Television was not a punk band.

They are a specie of their own.. I guess people would find hard to define which their influences were... even today.. I don't know where did Tom Verlaine and the band found inspiration for making this record, nobody was singing like this before, or playing this sharp clean riffs..

Before this NYC movement became global, Television took up residency at the CBGB club

In 2003 NME declared Marquee Moon as 4th best album of all time.

... Why are you so far away ?

Strange as angels

Dancing in the deepest ocean

Twisting in the water

You're just like a dream...

You're just like a dream...

...But he knows not what it means

Nirvana wrote quite a bunch of songs which now are part of the best music done in the last 20 years.. Don't know exactly why but my song is "In Bloom"..

Probably Kurt would hate it, but I can sing along to this chorus for hours..

The way Dave Grohl plays here is fantastic.. he just can't play with MORE energy..

And Novoselic grooving in the back .. fitting perfectly..

They had that chemistry that can make you go wherever you want..

How great they were .. How good this record was ..

But the best of all is how three guys from nowhere changed the whole music scene with four chords...

...And I would rather be anywhere else

♪ ♫ Than here today ♪ ♫

Elvis is a nerd ...

Elvis is quite ugly ..

And Elvis is alive ...

He's one of the reasons why the 80's doesn't suck that much ..
Plus he's been using since day one the best guitar ever, a Fender Jazzmaster. He had a signature release a few years ago...

That's why I love Music.. how in the hell would he be able to get married to Diana Krall otherwise...?

Back when he released Armed Forces... he was something quite strange between punk, post-punk, goths, rockabilly and new age.. And after 30 years he's a legend, an innovator, but overall and old times rock and roller ....

... for one single yesterday

I read Leonard Cohen wrote Chelsea Hotel #2 for her..

She deserved that one and twenty more..
Specially if they are quite as intense.

Cohen, later regretted his indiscretion... which is something which I also once felt.. Anyway I guess she was clever enough to forgive..

She brings a lot of life to me when she comes from the speakers..

Top 5 women who rocked the world...

Janis was leader, her voice was louder than no one..
she kicked everybody's ass and then she died..

I admire her, but over all I respect her..

.. but all I know is you got no money

But that's got nothing to do with a good time

The picture above is from a year after Appetite Of Destruction came out.. then they signed with the same record label... got to love eclecticism...

It strikes me the look of Steve Shelley, far right.. it must be from the least pretentious musician in the world..

What if a band like Sonic Youth would appear again.. ??

Born on that extremely inspirational years of 1979 / 1980 .. Once punk had given a kick in the ass to the whole musical panorama..

They had their own language.. And Thurston Moore is probably the coolest guy on the planet.. after he came, with that nerdy grungy look.. the whole 90's happened..

Another good reason to respect the 80's..