Griff says; The best of all possible worlds?

Last year Meg Hentges (formerly of Two Nice Girls), along with her partner Jude O'Nym, delighted me, and hopefully you too, by releasing, to absolutely no fanfare at all, the amazingly good track 'Think Big, Henry'. I featured it 'here' on The Streetlamp and was so enamoured of it that I also included it in my 'deal breaker' selections for our 2010 Streetlamp Festive 30. That track was released last July and I had high hopes of many such treasures following but, disappointingly, heard absolutely nothing. Then last week, Meg got in touch to let me know that she had a new song posted to bandcamp. I eagerly scooted across to the Hentges/O'Nym page and the reason for the delay between song releases became immediately apparent. The statement accompanying new song Parallel reads;

"I expected this site to be full of music by now, but a diagnosis of cancer in August has taken the wind from my sails.

Parallel was recorded in small pieces between rounds of chemotherapy- a few hand drums, guitars, jude's bass and a delay pedal.

More sad songs to come."

To further press the message home, the cover art for Parallel features an ultrasound image of a breast lesion, featuring two intense and menacing Doppler vascular signals, pulsing like twin malignant suns in a distant galaxy. I was genuinely jolted and dismayed to see and read this, and I'm sure that you will join me in wishing Meg a safe and speedy recovery. I also would like to, at this point, express my admiration at Meg's frank and honest courage in revealing so much of herself within her art at a time when she must feel understandably sensitive and vulnerable. This new song, Parallel, is absolutely superb. It has a stripped-down, almost bare, arrangement and a brooding, perhaps even pensive, inclination that presumably captures Meg's mood perfectly. The lyrics make a thoughtful and clever comparison between the parallel universes theory (many world's interpretation) of quantum physics and the cell division process of the cancerous cell. As each (the cell or the universe) splits, or doesn't split, it can create a better/worse world with which each person must come to terms. What can I add? This is a true and moving piece of art and incredibly generously it is avaialable as a free download at bandcamp.




I'd also like to take this opportunity to re-post Meg and Jude's song from last year; 'Think Big, Henry'. For those of you who are not such political anoraks as the current writer, the phrase 'Think Big, Henry' is a quotation from former US President Richard Nixon, which was revealed within the infamous Nixon/Kissinger phone tapes. The context of the remark can be seen in the following partial transcription of that conversation;

Nixon: I still think we ought to take the North Vietnamese dikes out now. Will that drown people?
Kissinger: About two hundred thousand people.
Nixon: No, no, no, I'd rather use the nuclear bomb. Have you got that, Henry?
Kissinger: That, I think, would just be too much.
Nixon: The nuclear bomb, does that bother you?...I just want you to think big, Henry, for Christsakes.

Outrageous, isnt it? For those of you unfamiliar with the character of Nixon, a quick look at his Wikiquote page should soon inform you of the paranoid and corrupt administration which he led, and also reveal his own astonishing penchant for casual sexism, racism and anti-semitism. Frightening stuff indeed, and a timely reminder that we should remain suspicious of those in Western governments who seek to cover up the truth and who attempt to silence sources who can reveal them for the undemocratic, perfidious and self-serving elites that they really are.




Griff
xx

Griff says; Don't let these slip under the radar.

I've a mixed goodie-bag of cracking tunes for you this evening. These are all songs I've been enjoying for the past week which I wanted to ensure got a little exposure on Streetlamp.
First up is a reminder to check out the latest releases from WeePOP! Records. As promised previously, WeePOP!'s bumper summer of great music continues with EPs from folk-pop exponents Stars of Aviation and wistful, indie-poppers Let's Whisper. As always, the kind people at WeePOP! have provided a free MP3 track from each of the EPs for your listening pleasure. You'll find both on the release page 'here'.

Next up is an EP from februaryrecords. The Almost Verbose EP by Brilliant at Breakfast is a fantastic slice of breezy, twee-pop from Indonesia. The band aims to "take bedroom musicianship further with cheap instruments, cookies and coffee, and riddles with no answers", and the EP has been a particular favourite of both mine and Ray's this week. I'm not sure why there are so many great twee-pop bands from this part of the world at the moment. Perhaps the Streetlamp should do a South-East Asia twee-pop article sometime soon to get to the bottom of it. In the meantime, you can download the EP for free 'here'.

Last, but not least, is an amazingly good, unheralded, single release, which I came across on both Soundcloud and Bandcamp. The song is called 'Think Big, Henry' and there's little to no detail on either site about the musicians involved except for the song-writers' names; M Hentges and J O'Nym. I suspect that this is a late flowering of the song-writing talent of Meg Hentges - formerly of "the lesbian Beatles", Two Nice Girls - and her song-writing partner Judith. Two Nice Girls were a lesbian rock band who released a couple of albums on Rough Trade all of twenty years ago. This song, however, inspired by the Nixon/Kissinger phone tapes, is a wonderful piece of thoughtful, folky, indie-pop. Given the sheer volume of free music downloads flooding the internet, I'd hate to see this overlooked as it really is very classy indeed. Have a listen below:

Think big henry mix 02 by hentges-o'nym


Griff
xx