The Big Untidy Magazine

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Music Ordered by Artist
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BigUntidy Podcasts
Kevin Coyne Night Out June 2008

Big Block 454

Foreign Aeroplanes Upset Sleeping Tirana

I was Arthur Brown's Health & Safety Advisor

Ouspenskys Cellar

Hi Lax Old Medic

Big Block 454 is a semi-amorphous post-modern / situationist neo-dada cross-platform compositional construct from Manchester, England (featuring people from Liverpool, Leeds and Lincolnshire).

Over the years, Big Block 454 have unleashed a series of albums and multi-media happenings upon an unsuspecting public, combining influences such as Faust, Can, Brian Eno, The Residents, the Bonzo Dog Band, King Crimson and the BBC Radiophonics Workshop - surrealism meets Krautrock meets downright Northern stupidity. "We play whatever we bloody well like, alright?" - all sounds pretty Untidy to me.

Copies of their latest album Bratislava form which these tracks are offered is currently being secreted in isolated locations, such as Kinder Scout and a Virgin train, throughout Great Britain and anyone finding them "will be given a lovely prize" on reporting back to Big Block 454.

Citing "English things" such as steam railways, prehistoric sites and ley lines, country houses and old churchyards, trolley buses, pointless heroism, fish and chips, millstone grit, Marmite, the Elder Gods as wider influences Big Block 454 declare musical reference points including:

Brian Eno, Faust, Can, Comus, The Cardiacs, Frank Zappa, Syd Barrett / Pink Floyd, Robert Wyatt / Soft Machine, Gong, XTC, Animal Collective, The Flaming Lips, The Residents, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Carl Orff, Béla Bartók, Radiohead, King Crimson, and the BBC Radiophonics Workshop.

Maybe there should be a secret CD hidden in the gardens near Bartoks statue in Kensington London?

Personally anyone that cites trolley buses as an influence and has a track called I Was Arthur Browns Health & Safety Advisor has already stirred enough emotions deep within my soul that their place in the Untidy scheme of things is assured.

Hours spent as a small child watching the man with the pointy stick flick the connecting poles across the wires in the turning circle outside the Odeon and yet more hours spent chatting with Arthur Browns pyrotechnics man one Sunday afternoon - as Colin says "They wore space suits - as you do"

Devil Glitch Chris Butler
Seasonally known as the front man for The Waitresses whose timeless Christmas classic Christmas Wrapping is to found in shopping malls the length and breadth Chris is also curator of fossil music and a host of other projects. Devils Glitch was recorded as the worlds longest single and the Guinness Book of World Records confirmed that achievement, rest easy though this is the shortened version.


Andy Baron and Concrete Johnson
Positive Dub (Mad Professor remix)
www.myspace.com/andybaronconcretejohnson


Ordinary People

Mindflow

"These guys are the direction in which reggae should be heading" Dennis Bovell

"They are brilliant, I'm a fan." Mad Professor

Andy Baron + Concrete Johnson started working together in 2005 and soon found themselves surrounded by some of the finest British based reggae musicians including Richie Stevens, Jeff Scantlebury, Winston Rollins, Tim Cansfield and Milton Myrie who have between them have worked with Maxi Priest, Aswad, Shaggy, Eddy Grant, Soul2Soul and many many more. Their debut single Ordinary People, Mindflow and Ordinary Dub is out now as a limited edition 12" vinyl on their own brilliantly named i and i tunes label and is available for download on itunes.

Clive Product music
Tea
Pass into the Night [clive's thoughts on this song available here]
Wobble Clive Product

Dave Russell
Nuclear Freight Disaster

Notting Dale Commentary

You Need an Excuse

Dave Russell came to our attention through the 3rd Ramblin Garden Blues piece where Frank makes mention of Notting Dale Commentary.He's the sort of performer that inspires people to leave comments on web forums like "Some people sound great, some people look great. Dave Russell IS great. One of the most exciting and original performers that I have ever seen. Not always the most accessible, but he's well worth the effort." All 3 tracks here are from his CD 'Into The Fourth Dimension'. Many thanks Dave.