Where we’re we?  Organ? Bag loads of music flooding in here, anything worth sharing today? Another five? Five slices of music that have come our way in the last few fractured disjointed days, five things picked out from the hundreds (and hundreds) of things that flow our way every single bleedin’ week of the year (for years), most of it sent in by people, bands, labels, PR companies who have clearly never bothered to read a page of the website, or picked up a copy of Organ back in the day, or listened ot the radio show or anything else; “you’ll love this one, perfect for Organ” – No! We won’t love it,  that kind of thing sounded bad in the 90’s, it sounds even worse now, stop sending us silly e.mails and time-wasting press releases, and especially stop sending the same press and the same link again two days later and again three days after that with the “in case you missed it” headline. No we didn’t miss it, no we don’t need it again, go away.  Five more slices of music then, five more slices we did think worth sharing, five slices that did grab our overworked ears and excited someone here a little. Five pieces of music we wish to share with you, five tasty slices of music and one big pile of steaming sexist limp-dick bulshit that really needs calling out. Is it really 2018? Or did we fall through a time hole? No, can’t just let that one quietly slice by, most of the time we just hit the delete button, but no, that one was simply not acceptable, it wasn’t in 1983, it isn’t now, it needed calling out.  Here then, in no particular order, are five slices of music we think worth explore in one set of embarrassing arseholes who need calling out. Here we go then, in no particular order, your recommended five,,,

1: Silverbacks  – “Dublin art-punks Silverbacks combat marital strife and boredom via tense, methodical beats and prickly guitar riffs.” said someone from somewhere or other. “Dublin art-punks Silverbacks stomp back into action in 2018 with the release of their new single produced by Girl Band’s Daniel Fox ‘Dunkirk’ through their own PK Miami Records” says the press release, I get the idea they’d maybe like us to describe them as “art-punks”, .you’ve got a link to the Dublin art punks back there, here’s a taste of the music

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We do really get hundreds of e.mails every week, most of it really is a waste of our time and yours, I don’t care if your gallery has another Banksy print release this week (that’s the third this month, he’s a great situationist polite prints in white frames? Really not that exciting), and I don’t care if some band who should have packed it in twenty five years ago have reformed to play Bloodstock in 2018 (tickets are still on sale now, are you sure they’ll all still be alive in 2019? Oh, hang on, there’s only one member of the “classic line up” in the band anyway), we really don’t care if some band from Denmark think the time is right for a “brit Pop revival” (yes, we really did get that one this week along with some sub-Blur junk that wouldn’t have got them a third on the bill at the Barfly in 1996, stop sending us this crap).

So we left the e-mail in-box alone for a couple of days and the damn thing is clogged up with all kinds of musical poop again, what gives anyone the idea we might be interested in a solo album from someone who bored everyone to tedium in Death Cab for Cutie bac kthere? Next please… Hockeysmith sounded okay for a moment with her 80’s synth pop, but no, not really… Next…. is there anything less enticing than a headline that reads “Includes guest appearance by Colin Edwin of iconic UK prog-rockers Porcupine Tree”? About as prog rock as, nah, let’s not waste our time there again, Porcupine Tree started off rather well, they even played the second day of our tenth birthday Organ party gig back in the last century, but hey, did they get boring or what!? I bleedin’ well ‘ate it when people pass these things off as “prog rock”, pass me the new Cheer Accident album before something gets smashed around her….

Hang on, things just got worse, who the hell are this lot? Do they even deserve a namecheck here? Is this press release a joke?  D you know how offensive, how sexist and more than anything, just plain unacceptable this is in 2018?  Are you still in 1984 watching embarrassingly glossy Whitesnake videos on MTV?  This offends me as a male, as a human, this embarrasses me as a music fan and and besides everything else do you know how offensive this is to those of us who constantly try to argue the positives of this much maligned thing we call prog rock?  Actually this is probably about as far away from what progressive rock actually is as you could possibly get (gawd, this makes the things Porcupine Tree do these days sound almost interesting).  This is turgid, this is flat, fat, musically this is very very obvious, this is lifeless, this is embarrassingly cliched crap,  this really is a tediously boring piece of music, this is cowardly music, this is not in the least bit progressive and well really this is just not very good   Actually I’d love to meet these sad sack of shits down a dark back alley with a baseball bat or two for a talk about how offensive this sad sad video is, how sad this crap about strip clubs is , and a note to whoever it was at the music PR company who sent this in, come on, have a look in the mirror, you should be ashamed to be sending out this press release and a link to this sad sack of poop you say is their new video! You can be sending out videos and press releases like this in 2018.you can’t be objectifying woman and celebrating strip clubs like this for gawd sake!

Last night I had the pleasure of being at a gig that celebrated the wonderful music of Lindsay Cooper, her beautifully complex progressive compositions, her lyrics, a gig that featured various members of the band she featured so prominently in, Henry Cow. Various member of Henry Cow were celebrating her music, it was a gig organised by a famale musician, featuring a female DJ playing a set of the music she loves – prog rock – the gig featured a balance of male and female musicians (unfortunately Dagmar Krause was taken ill and couldn’t appear),  Yumi Hara was her wonderful self jumping around her keyboards, her harp, her vocals, a grand piano, as was the always impressive, always creative Chlöe Herington (her solo set before hand was rather fine as well), and getting a chance to watch the balletic movement of Chris Cutler as he paints with his drumsticks is just something very very special indeed, watching his movement is almost addictive, listing to him is thrilling, just brilliant.  Now if there is such a thing as prog rock then that was prog rock in very very best sense last night, that was powerful, thoughtful, engaged, beautiful, a celebration of one of the finest  prog rock musicians ever,  (it was probably far too adventurously progressive to call it prog rock these days, Henry Cow were always far to interesting to be tagged a prog Rock band).

If there is such a thing as prog rock in 2018 (and there most certainly is), then you find it via the new Cheer Accident album, through the things members of Sleepytime Gorilla Museum are currently doing with Free Salamander Exhibit or Yowie or that remarkable band Koenjihyakkei and their wonderful new album that’s out in a couple of weeks. If you want prog rock then you find it via the new Piniol album or the new Star Period Star album, you don’t find it via these bloated sack of sad sexist shitheads and their pathetic video that they proudly boast is currently being shown at strip clubs all over the USA!  Oh how I’d like to meet these shitehawks down a back alley for a talk with my baseball bat about what prog rock is and how they’re nowhere near the beautiful artform, Mr baseball bat would like a quick chat about just how offensive their piss-poor video and their turgid music is, how wrong it is in so so many ways – it was offensive before we even got to the sad sexist crap and the objectification that just isn’t acceptable any more (not that it ever was). The video  was offensive on musical grounds, the claims made in the press release about the music offended, the fact that they claim the label of prog rock offends me, everything about them offends me. And people like those people at Prog magazine who champion things like this, or the people in the bands who are being quoted as supporters of this lot in this press release should be ashamed of themselves (really Spocks Beard?).

We really shouldn’t be giving this lot the oxygen of publicity, I really should just delete the press release and try to erase the video and the music from my mind, but no, this sexist crap needs calling out, can’t just ignore it. here’s the press release, the headline in the e.mail in box reads “Prog Ensemble 41POINT9 Premieres Risqué New Video “Confessions At Midnight”

And to directly quote the press release the misguided PR company sent out, “Prog Ensemble 41POINT9 is premiering the first video and single from the band’s forthcoming album “Mr. Astute Trousers.” “Confessions At Midnight” is the risqué new video that has been accepted into a service providing music to over 2500 strip clubs in the US making the single the first ever Prog Rock single and video to be accepted into this type of market. Yes, you heard that right, for the first time thanks to 41POINT9 you can hear Prog in a Strip Club. Gentlemen, you’re welcome”.

Frankly I’d be embarrassed and ashamed to send a press release like that out, besides anything else it discredits anything else you might send us, it discredits anything else you might say, I wonder if the other bands and clients you work with, Gin Blossoms, David Cross, Sonja Kristina and the others are happy about things like this? I wonder what Faust would say, I see you just sent us a press release about their forthcoming US tour?  .

“you can hear Prog in a Strip Club. Gentlemen, you’re welcome”, did I really just read that bit!! For flip sake, who are these tossers! “Gentlemen”!?  Just listened again, it really is musical shit on a stick, I mean, c’mon, musically, lyrically, before we even get to the embarrassing visuals, it really is the shitty end of a shit stick video, badly edited, awfully shot, terrible music, these people really do just need to f**k off.  And it really is time people who, like me, champion prog rock, called out this sexist shit, this offensively sad objectification of women. You simply can’t be making videos like this in 2018 for gawd sake!,

Actually the more I listen to this turgid soft rock pop crap, the more offended I am that they even have the audacity to call this limp-dick shit “prog rock”, this really is dreadfully tame, this is flacid limp-dicked soft rock bulshit, this is bad sub Duran Duran from the days when when the once rather decent pop band were well past their sell-by date, (actually weren’t Enchant a half decent band for a moment back there? Apparently there’s people from Enchant in whatever this band who really don’t serve a name-check are called). Did they really seriously write those lyrics down on paper and think they were good?  Apparently this is a “Concept video for first single from 41POINT9’s upcoming album “Mr. Astute Trousers”. These people are the enemies of anyone who has a love for prog rock, bulshit like this does far more damage that a two hour Rick Wakeman solo (on ice) ever did, I’m off to lie down with The Lamb for a bit, no I’m not, I’m off to play some Tribe 8 really loudly, this is not how you treat women you sad sack of sad overweight old men, and get the flip away from prog rock you embarrassing limp-dick shitheads – if you must dear readers then here’s the video, I really wouldn’t bother though, they don’t deserve you time

Here, if you want to listen to prog rock in 2018, have some of this, this is the new Cheer Accident album that just came out, now this is what we call prog….

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Where were we? Searching through the in-box for the positive music things, shall we go on with all this…

2: Dame Area are a band from, well I’m not sure where, no idea what they’re saying, chanting, singing, all sounds rather like the kind of thing you might encounter at a Summer Solstice gathering, some band who’s name you never quite catch, sounds like they’d be rather excellent live just before the sunrise or in some old squat, hope those lyrics aren’t of a dubious nature, always a little worried about covering something when we don’t quite know who they are or what they’re saying, they say they’re “Inspired by Coil, Suicide, Gary Numan, Franco Battiato, Throbbing Gristle, Dino Buzzati…”, here it is…

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Oh look, I’ve lost the enthusiasm today, that band up there really have knocked any notion of searching through millions of e.mails to find the good ones on the head, I love prog rock, I hate tedious crap like that. Sorry Silvervacks, Sorry Dame Area, we’ll start the page again in a bit….. rather like both bands…