Been in Sweden for a few weeks, mainly to visit relatives and partly to attend a festival there known as 'Peace and Love' in Borlange, started up 10 years ago to bring something positive to a town that had previously sufferred a bit of a crime problem, with a few shootings, hence the name.

Having listened to the last podcast (just a few weeks off and so much to catch up on Word-wise, when will I find time?) talking of festival rules for performers to promote entertainment for the neutral festival-goers when watching a band who they are not fans of especially, and thought I'd share my experiences.

This was a festival in a large (by Swedish standards) town centre, so thankfully no risk of mud. We had good weather anyway. A diverse line-up from scandinavian metal to swedish pop to long establised UK and US acts like Suzanne Vega and Waterboys. Oh, and The Sex Pistols, who gave a pretty good performance, mainly thanks to John Lydon's force of personality and amusingly, cantankerous comments, although I would say those old songs no longer have the power and impact they once had, it's all a bit of a pantomime, and has become quite mild really.

What was really good that we saw? Well, there was Rocky Erickson formerly of Thirteenth Floor Elevators fame performing with The Nomads, who stepped in late on after The Cult dropped out - quite glad about that. Manu Chao who really knows how to work a crowd, mostly of swedish teenagers (who wore big plastic glasses with no lenses and had black or blonde, floppy hair and wore tight black skinny jeans slipping down their bums, and who liked to run in and out of the crowd very fast while holding hands with their friends, forming chains - quite a hazard) who probably didn't know his music very well, as I didn't, but were won over, as I was, by a fantastically, energetic performance with Bob Marley-like 'yo yo' chants and lots of jumping up and down. A highlight. We also saw The Waterboys who rocked out seriously on The Pan Within - a series of great solos jazz style, i.e. one musician at a time - Mike Scott was, well, on fire really, I have to say (not literally I should add).

Then there was Martha Wainwright who impressed, and on a smaller stage teriffic shows by Jim White, Devotchka and a band I'd not heard of called Marah from US who were a bit Springsteen-like in a way and really threw themselves into it. Jim White - very droll comments between songs. One song was called 'Turquoise House' prefaced by reference to all the red houses in Sweden that are painted the same, and Jim put forward the highly provactive, outrageous suggestion of trying another colour, maybe turquoise. His appeal has a lot to do with his delivery. He also offerred to chat with the audience at the end and handed out t-shirts and hats, not with his name on or anything - just a variety of random items of clothing he had in a box. We had a few words with him, what a nice guy. Devotchka from the US also - excellent. Frenzied East European gipsy folk that got everyone dancing and kept changing pace teasingly, and an impressive female sousaphone player whose sousaphone lit up with a picture of a black cat on it. Plus they did a cover of Venus In Furs.

So the conclusion is - give it everything, make them dance, make them laugh, put lights on your instruments, and it doesn't hurt to have some gifts for the audience, then you can't fail to entertain and make an impression.

Bob Dylan makes use of sexual innuendo in his rather marvellous song 'Absolutely Sweet Marie' as follows:

Well, your railroad gate, you know I just can't jump it
Sometimes it gets so hard, you see
I'm just sitting here beating on my trumpet
With all these promises you left for me
But where are you tonight, sweet Marie?

There must surely be other song writers who have come up with suggestively fruity double entendre lyrics while fiddling with their instrument (ooh er), as in piano or guitar of course.

Revolution Blues by Neil Young and Psychokiller by Talking Heads are both songs written in first person from an imagined character's viewpoint. In this case they are both killers funnily enough (clue's in the title in one of them of course). Not really funny ha ha though. Is this unusual? There must be more I should have thought. They don't have to be killers by the way, but would be interesting to know of any more examples of this sub-group too.

Here's some lyrics from the Neil Young song:

Well, I hear that Laurel Canyon
is full of famous stars,
But I hate them worse than lepers
and I'll kill them
in their cars.

If I am walking down the street while listening to my MP3 player and Honky Tonk Women comes on, I find I am suddenly unable to walk normally. My legs seem to have a mind of their own and I am put off my stride by the sheer power of the groove momentarily taking me over. At this point I usually look around to see if anyone is looking at me in a funny way then carry on, having pulled myself together. Anyone else had an experience like that?

A certain Mr Jeff's comment re Blondie's 'Hanging on the Telephone' reminded me of a blog I thought of writing about music you like to jump around the room to, generally when alone. I did try jumping around once with a friend to The Stranglers 'Bring On The Nubiles' but I became concussed after cracking heads with him. That was many years ago. I think The Flamin' Groovies 'Shake Some Action' would be good. 'Jumpin' Jack Flash' has also been found to work. Air guitar is not necessary. We do it when we are teenagers but do you do it still, and to what song? If you are young you no doubt find it easier than some of us, who risk straining something.

Was listening to Mark Radcliffe last night and he played Nick Drake's At the Chime of a City Clock. Afterwards he said 'If you don't like that you don't like music really'. I am not particularly au fait with Mr Drake's works, although I have heard the odd song, but I must say after hearing that track I tend to agree with the sentiment.

Is it possible to say the same about any other pop or rock music I wonder, or perhaps you disagree with the above comment?

They have just opened a Beatles (sorry it's them again) themed hotel in Liverpool called A Hard Day's Night (of course), still flogging the dead horse, still can't blame them cashing in on a major asset I suppose. Of course it's open eight days a week but they're still fixing a hole etc etc. There's a Lennon suite in white together with Imagine style grand piano:

http://music.monstersandcritics.com/features/article_1389500.php/In_phot...

I wonder what other hotels themed just on one band would be called and what special features they would have to offer...

Recently been listening to some Moby Grape, and recalled that, according to the booklet for their best of CD, they had a lot go wrong for them, preventing them making it really big. One particularly daft idea was to release five singles at once off their fine debut, an idea that, not surprisingly, back-fired.

Another example of a dumb idea, thought amusingly anarchic by some of those involved (though maybe not at the time), was to make New Order's cover for 12" single Blue Monday so expensive that it cost more to produce than could be re-couped by sales.

I wonder what other examples there are of misguided decisions on the part of bands, their management, or record company, that had disastrous consequences whether in a minor or major way...

Instrumentals are un-sung heroes in music but deserve recognition I feel.

I am fond of the likes of Third by Soft Machine for example (Out-Bloody-Rageous (terrible title) is one of the tracks I am thinking of), and then there's the rather different but marvellous Green Onions by Booker T and the MGs that I have been know to get on down to on the dancefloor on more than one occasion.

What other tracks stand out where they say it best when they say nothing at all?

Don't know if you want to go for this but thought it might be interesting to see what people are into now that's new, like the New Favourites part of the magazine really. We do tend to look back rather a lot but what is it that is recently out that's got you going lately? I am thinking of a CD or track, a book, a film or DVD, TV programme, and possibly a gig, play or maybe even an art exhibition that's worth a mention.

My choices are:

CD: Roisin Murphy - Overpowered. As good as Moloko 'The Time is Now' if you like that kind of thing.

Book: A Box of Matches by Nicholson Baker. About a middle aged family man and his daily routine of lighting the fire. Each chapter begins with 'good morning it's 5:15 am' or 5:30 etc and he goes through his thoughts so we gradually get to know about his life. It's great.

DVD: The Gangster. An Indian film about a woman who loves a gangster and another guy who sings in bars. The violence of the gangster's world destroys her life. It turned about to better than it initially seemed it would. Like an opera - highly melodramatic but in a good way.

TV: Strings of Soweto. Really uplifting film about english woman who teaches poor black kids how to play classical violin. On BBC i-player now!

Read this during lunch and thought I'd post it here in case you haven't seen it.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/jan/07/myspace.digitalmedia

Is this what is really going to be happening in 2008 as far as music is concerned - hermetic subcultures not needing the music industry at all, except of course the bands really hope to be discovered and make it big? Tee total teenagers, and dance music made with kids toys??!! As I type this I am listening to Blind Willie Johnson on the new Now Hear This CD - what a long strange trip it's been.

Did I really hear the voice over on the recent OK-ish Pink Floyd rockumentary say something like 'getting the Floyd back together for Live 8 was akin to making poverty history'with no hint of irony? How crass is that?

I wonder what decent TV rock type documentaries there have been. My feeling is that things like the Classic Album series worked - eg Dark Side of the Moon and Who's Next? - since they didn't try to cover too much in one hour. But has there ever been anything that was really great?

I would definitely rate the Dylan/Scorcese thing, mainly because of Dylan's input. I'll happlily watch anything on reasonably decent music and enjoy it, even if it's a bit ropey. Oh and the BBC4 films on Factory and Stiff were excellent I thought.