Overcoats play "Leave the Light On" at CPR's OpenAir

To give you a taster before the UK tour in May. Do check them out if you can.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Overcoats are coming to the UK!

...And what's more, the album is out now and it is FANTASTIC.

No Vacation - "Mind Fields" (Official Music Video)

...And right back to reality again

Given I've been writing about fanzines for weeks, this feels most apt. I am now wondering if Grace is having a Kate Nash moment, but not sufficiently to stop jumping around the living room to this.

Back to work again...

Unconventional writers desk, i.e. the kitchen table

I had actually intended to have the whole four days of the Easter Bank Holiday weekend off from writing, and have a mental health weekend, but instead I elected to dive headlong into a literary voyage and start reading all of the books on the reading list of Between Two Books, The Florence + The Machine book club. 

This is odd for me because I'm normally very wary of book clubs. I think it's because of having done an English degree and, while I always really enjoyed the socio-cultural discussions around the literature we were reading for the course, didn't actually enjoy many of the texts themselves much. The most profound, as in earth shattering, connection I had with a literary text that I was studying occurred right at the end of third year when we did Sarah Kane's 4.48 Psychosis. Which, of all the texts to latch on to, is probably the most troubling one, and probably something I should be really, really worried about. It didn't worry me though: Not in the same way that identifying with Prozac Nation years later did anyway, but I digress...

What attracted me to Between Two Books was the list of books that they had already read: Since 2012, they have read books by, amongst others, Gwendoline Riley, Emma Forrest, and Jeffrey Eugenides. As someone who has previously been obsessed with (at different times) Sick Notes (third year of degree, pre Sarah Kane) and The Virgin Suicides (at 6th Form college: I found it in the library one day and devoured it instead of going to Media Studies, then forgot about it until the film came out, read it again, and became obsessed by it all over again) and who has a particularly vivid memory of reading Namedropper aged 15 when it had just come out, liking it, and playing the 'spot who the real indie/pop star is' with it, it seemed almost unnerving to discover that someone else, especially someone whose work has become an integral part of my life, has been reading the same authors as me, albeit different works and at different times.

What with having finally finished my punk women and fanzines chapter for MUP, and having hit something of a wall with the current stage of my punk women book, a dive into a literary hinterland, particularly over a four day weekend, felt irresistible.

And so it has proved!

I started Gwendoline Riley's Opposed Positions mid week, finished it on Friday, and almost immediately started Kirsten Reed's The Ice Age, which has been my favourite so far. I'm currently about half way through Emma Forrest's Your Voice In My Head, which I'm also enjoying, to my surprise, as I haven't really got into any of her other books, post Namedropper.

But, today, I resurfaced from my literature drenched hinterland/cave to listen to the punk ladies on Radio 4's The Reunion, inadvertently breakfasting to the tail end of The Archers omnibus in the meantime. The punk ladies taking part were: Gaye Black of The Adverts, Gina Birch of The Raincoats, Toyah Wilcox, Tessa Politt from The Slits, and Vivien Goldman. I don't think I gleaned anything new from the programme (as opposed to the one on French punk, which was a revelation), but it was interesting, and I'm glad Radio 4 did it.

Afterwards, I somewhat guiltily thought 'I should get back to sorting out those literary agent submissions for the punk women book'. I've managed to get some work done this morning, so it was worth pushing myself.

As with the punk women and fanzines chapter with MUP, especially at the re-drafting/checking stage, you end up doing a lot of niggly work that isn't massively interesting and is, frequently, quite depressing. I was telling Paul about this one Saturday on the bus home from work, namely about how I was spending my time trawling through books looking for examples of sexism in the 1960s counterculture and, specifically, in underground comix of the period. It was really easy to find examples too: Not to mention incredibly depressing.

My current depressing task is to locate examples of songs from the late 1960s/early 1970s that were big hits while being incredibly sexist. I don't think it'll be hard... I already have one in mind that I know is on a sixties Sunshine Pop compilation my mum has, and which always makes my skin crawl when I hear it. The rest of the CD is fine, just that song...

So that will be a task for today, and I can cheer myself up afterwards with the Emma Forrest book, or dance around the living room to let off steam again. Whichever...

I'm going to continue with Between Two Books I think, but only in the reading sense, not the discussion sense as I tend to find I get bossy in discussions and, besides, it requires a Facebook account, and I don't do Facebook or, indeed, Social Media. I don't think blogging counts as social media anymore...

If you want to find out more about Between To Books, you can find them on Twitter, on Facebook, and you can read an interview with Leah Moloney, one of the girls who runs it, over on The Guardian. There's also an interview with Florence Welch about Between Two Books, and literature more generally, on W Magazine's website as well.

Harkin - "Independence Day" (Comsat Angels Cover)

This was recorded either at or following the LA Women's March, earlier this year. Katie Harkin picked the song because it felt like a real song of the times, despite it's historical position as post punk classic.

This version is fresh and, yes, feels very timely. You can watch an interview about the project over on YouTube. 

Noga Erez - Off The Radar (Single Stream)

This is the title track from Erez's debut album, and it's a very timely, not to mention highly infectious,  take on social media anxiety. The album, which is out on June 2nd, certainly promises to be a mighty beast.

She is playing a couple of UK dates in May in London at Village Underground (4th May, supporting Sylvan Esso) and in Brighton at The Great Escape, 19th May. Then she's back in London in August for Visions Festival (5th August). The evidence of this, and the three previous singles, suggest she is well worth checking out.

Getting there, with musical interludes

Regular readers of this blog (yep, all two of you..) may have noticed that I haven't been writing any long posts recently.

This is because I've been doing a lot of punk related writing work and haven't had time to do much writing outside of that. There's been a lot of music up here though, and that's to reflect all my 'take my mind off punk for a bit' listening lately, of which there has been A LOT.

Today, in-between punk chapter edits, I bought the XX album and pre-ordered the Overcoats album, which comes out on 21st April. I can't wait for the Overcoats album.

The XX I have been aware of for at least eight years I'd say but, while I quite liked them before, I never bought any of their records. The new album is a lot more dance orientated, and it's really struck a chord with me, and improves with each listen. I always liked the slightly melancholy minimalism of  the XX, but the dance element brings a whole new dimension to it.

I did see the band live in 2010 at ATP in Minehead, but I had to leave partway through the set because Sara and I were being tasered by the bass and felt too physically discombobulated by it to stay, even though we were enjoying the set aside from that. We subsequently wandered around outside for a bit, unsteadily wailing 'TASERED BY THE BAASSS!' to the tune of Manfred Mann and the Earth Band's 'Blinded by the light'. I think this incident occurred the same night as we went berserk at one of the club nights to Sonic Youth and then found ourselves sonically embarrassed when the DJ's switched over and didn't recognise any of the songs the new one was playing because they were all very student-y and hipsterish. Both incidents reflecting a growing sense of 'Am I too old for all of this?' which, I imagine, grabs anyone over the age of 25 periodically.

But anyway, I don't think the XX are in need of an endorsement from me, but I do so freely anyway. It's a great album.

Cold Comfort Lane - Holy Moly

'Cold Comfort Lane' is Holy Moly & The Crackers new single, and it's out this Friday (7th April). Some of their other songs sounds more Gogol Bordello than the swaggering garage punk you're getting here, but whichever way the majority of their oevre swings towards, they do promise to be a great live act.

They start their UK tour this week, and you can find the tour dates over on their website.

Leave The Light On (Official Audio)

I'm thinking of having a monthly, or perhaps weekly, feature on this blog called This Weeks Ace Song By Overcoats!

It's really nice to be receiving the bands increasingly excited emails ahead of this months album release, and the regular feeding of tracks is just making me long for the album more and more.

The band did a suitably enthusiastic performance of this track, along with others, as part of their recent Tiny Desk concert. Complete with mad dancing, of course.

Angel Olsen - Intern

So many people were urging me to get into Angel Olsen last year and, you know, sometimes you get a bit wary or suspicious when that happens but, in this case, everybody was right and My Woman is a great album.

Helen McCookerybook wrote a rave review of Angel's live collaboration with the Raincoats last year, which still sounds like the live billing from heaven for me.

I've gone for 'Intern' because I think it's the most 'stop-'em-in-their-tracks' song on the album.