The Mekano Set

We now have unconfirmed reports of a gig on Thursday 3rd March @ Sussex Arts Club, Brighton. Yay!

This week, I finally got my hands on a copy of the Neil Barnes / 2002 remix of God Save The Queen. It's surprisingly listenable - electro without being in the least bit commercial {probably why it was a flop}. Lots of squidgy guitars, a hint of dancehall {which makes sense when you consider John Lydon's reggae obsession, and the fact that he and The Johns {the first British Punks, if not the original Boring Lesbian Boys} first stepped out into the world at a certain London lesbian night club, dancing to diso!}.

We're currently trying to pick a song to do a cover[t] version of. Well, that's enough for now.

"Hello, good morning, shut up." Ivor Cutler.

The Mekano Set

Right, where are we? Who are we? And indeed, what are we wearing? Those shoes, with that dress? What were you thinking?

So last night we were headed for the Spirit of Gravity gig at The Freebutt, but there was some flu / alcohol / antidepressant / beard / tallness related confusion, resulting in the witnessing of a flamenco group at The Albert instead.

It's a way off yet, but we'll be playing @ www.allmanna.co.uk/ in North London on Friday 8th April. More details to follow, but at least it gives you plenty of time to get your pinstripes pressed and your cuff-links polished. That's right folks, "we have gig." Phew. Thanks to Grandmaster Pat for that one.

I can't remember where I found this, it might have been @ Barbelith. Funny.

Don't say f*ck or bugger!

In other nudes, I've recently stocked up on a load of new drum sounds, including some of the biggest, phatest kicks, and the weakest, bleepiest spray-can snare sounds ever. I've also got my hands on a batch of 'factory presets' that came with the Fairlight organic sampling sequencer godmachine that made Thee Kate Bush and Peter Gabriel sound like the end of the world, and made the end of the world sound like a nice place to be...

So while Beth digs out her chain-mail and broad sword, and I start saving up for a giant flower-head costume, I can amuse myself with snares that sound like atomic explosions, and toms and synths that make you want to wear a photo-facemask of your girlfriend / boyfriend, a grey body-stocking, and start running on the spot for hours on end... See, if we don't indulge ourselves, who will?

Jumpers for goal-posts / smirking at Donald Sutherland on a hillside. As camp as a row of tents at a Carry On convention, as tom-boy as Peppermint Patty at a K. D. Lang concert, as dirty and sullied as a team of doubly incontinent mud-wrestlers at a Scataholics Anonymous meeting, it's The Mekano Set.

So we've not been having much luck sorting gigs out. I probably shouldn't blog that but why not, it's true. I can't understand it, because I've seen us live and frankly we're ace! I should have seen this coming really. Alex is putting us to shame. He's only been in Brighton a matter of weeks and he's already up and gigging. So I can't say 'these things take time'. And it's not like Alex is doing anything that's more accessible than us, and he's pretty much a one-man-act these days, so it's not even because we're just a duo.

I wonder if duos are seen as bad-form these days? Do people think Autechre are naff? Or Soft Cell?

However, I must plug and thank the following people: North London's All Manna, Brighton's Spirit of Gravity, and top Leeds Glam-Goth-Disco www.sheepish.net.


Meanwhile, I've been thinking about the way that the music you are influenced by and what you enjoy listening to aren't always the same thing.

Influences: Curve / Garbage / PiL / Kate Bush / Talk Talk / Meat Beat Manifesto / Scorn / Prodigy.

Listening to: Jon Hassell / Ladytron / Hafler Trio / Coil / Kate Bush / Curve / Autechre / The Cocteau Twins / Tom Waits / Nina Simone / Scott Walker / MC Solaar.

See what I mean? I don't listen to Scorn, Prodigy and Meat Beat much these days but I know they're still a massive influence on what we do.

I'm currently on a real Jon Hassell t[r]ip at the moment. That sound [a breathy, alien-raga-husk] just feeeeeds me something I've been starved of. Him and Kate Bush - music that literally sends shivers down the spine. How do they do that???

I've had to stop myself from uploading 'Come On, Behave', 'Sadim' and 'Not Face' {the results of the previous weeks recording binge} as they're not quite mixed, but I'm 'dead chuffed' with the way they sound and I can't stop playing them. Beth tends to look at the details but I enjoy the overall picture {and what that really means I'm more reluctant to tidy up mistakes than she is}. They still have all the usual ingredients {distorted vocals, unecessarily loud drums and bass, dismantled guitars} but they seem to be a little more tragic / introspective rather than the usual mix of spite and seedy sex stuff.

It's all a healthy measure of our current mental and physical well beings {or lack of} I'm sure.

In other news, the tracks that people have been downloading off my computer via P2P software are versions of 'Thirst / alias Kathryn Hulme' {a really early pre-Brighton idea} and 'Blue Eyed Christ' {a new idea which, at the moment, is just the product of a one-take jam of white-noise guitar and Joy Division / New Order style bass noodling}. Work in progress in-deedy.

Former pieces of The Mekano Set Nodule and J. Howell are working on a new project known only as 'Shrinking Sixpence'. They will be making their live debut at The Freebutt in february.

By the way, apparently whenever Beth posts to this Blog it never appears. But she really does exist, honestly, ask The Steam Age, who really does exist too {long-term visitors to the Scholtz Vitrine site will have probably figured out by now that not everything that goes on within its virtual walls is entirely real}.

"So come on girl."

Current repeat plays: Ladytron, MC Solaar, Idlewild, Dusty Springfield.

Error
Mail could not be sent using the account "Milk"

Explanation
Entourage is crap.

Error 54541


For someone who is still plodding along in the antique world of G3 and pre-pentium computing, something like the new Mac Mini [I'm not linking to it - it's not like Apple are struggling for attention] seems like a tempting offer. But there's no audio-in for starters, which would make it pretty much useless in a live situation [wot no live-sampling / effects processing?], plus the fact that we'd have to lug a monitor around etc. And yeah, you can use a Firewire or USB audio device, but that means purchasing one of those as well, and setting up the in's and out's of dozens and dozens of virtual drum kits etc.

I'm quite wary of falling into the technology trap, [oh look, it's now available in a slightly different shade of blue, how have I managed to survive for so long without it?!] but being surrounded by a number of computers that at times struggle inexplicably to do the most simple of tasks [Eject the 4ucking CD already!!!], I'm certainly getting tempted to take the plunge and get hold of a machine that doesn't require the shoveling of large amounts of coal or the sacrifice of a number of small animals just to open a Word .doc file. [right now I'd personally like to take the makers of Entourage outside and drown them in a puddle of warm piss [send the 4ucking email already!!!]- an idea totally at odds with my pacifist leanings]


CD Drive (F:)

Windows can fail to perform the same action each time you naively attempt to insert a disk or foolishly attempt to connect a device with this kind of file:

Open writable CD folder
and then just sit there and freeze up.

Fail to Create a CD using iTunes
and just freeze up and refuse to eject the CD whatever happens.

Keep on pestering me with these useless messages
until I try and switch this computer off, which will prove surprisingly difficult.

X Always fail to do the selected action.
X Always try and get me to use inferior native Windows programs instead of more user-friendly ones.
X Always attempt to connect to the internet at the most inappropriate times, regardless of User defined settings.
X Always try and switch on in the middle of the night or when I least expect it regardless of User defined settings.

OK? Cancel? Or just throw me out the window?


In other news, last night I realized I came up with exactly the kind of guitar sound I've been questing after for years, on a track we did months ago, and I've no idea how I did it. I can tell that it was made just using stomp boxes rather than computer processing, this big wave of Wah-filtered white noise, but now I can't replicate it.

"How do?!"

A load of CD's have gone out this week to various parties, I've been finishing off a couple of new tracks, including the previously mentioned 1920's rendition of Probably Not, and we're recording a load of vodka... erm, I mean vocals, over the weekend.

We're hoping to start gigging again ASAP. Any suggestions would be gratefully received! The Marlb gig was so much fun, even if it was a bit quiet, and we're itching to get back on track.

I remember hearing a story concerning a certain uber-industrial-guitars-and-drum-machines band that had a competition where they put on a gig in the winner's home. Too good to be true?

Oh and Blanket are on Resonance FM on saturday {their totally unplugged mini-gig was ace by the way - no mics, no amps, no fx, just three guys and a girl with a plastic spring-reverb style child's microphone}.

I'm really in the mood to watch Fright Night. Maybe Ghostbusters...