Audiobook - Lady Chatterley's Lover read by Lance Tibthorpe-Jones
14 year old public schoolboy Lance Tibthorpe-Jones was recently set the task of reading DH Lawrence's famous erotic novel Lady's Chatterley's Lover as an additional private study exercise by his English master. With a precocious eye to the potential revenue a recording of such a notorious work might net him amongst his schoolmates, he decided to record himself reading it and sell CDs under the counter of the quad tuckshop. The result is a triumphant mismatch of reader and subject matter unheard since Anne Widdecombe's version of JG Ballard's Crash. What is especially joyous about the endeavour is that young Lance appears not to have read the book before embarking on his performance, and we experience his reactions to the text as he encounters it for the first time. These range from halting confusion in some of the more abstract descriptive passages, to audible smirks and giggles (and even the spontaneous outburst "Gosh! That's quite rude actually!") during the more explicit sex scenes.
8/10
Floribunda - Summer’s End
We’ve had the animal kingdom with Caninus (a dog as lead singer) and Hatebeak (ditto, a parrot), now for the first time a member of the vegetable kingdom enters the realm of rock. Floribunda, with their debut album Summer’s End are the first band to feature a plant as a vocalist. Personally I was expecting nothing more than a novelty record, but I have to say I was impressed. The rose bush, known simply as Giselle, shows a sure touch on the Aeolian harp and its vocals, whilst quiet, are full of haunting melancholy. A grower.
7/10.
Reg Bordley - The Spot F/X Tour - Live at Manchester Evening News Arena
BBC backroom veteran Reg Bordley has been providing sound effects for radio and television shows for the best part of thirty years. This album captures him at his peak, performing a greatest hits set of door-openings, teacup-rattlings and newspaper-rustlings in front of a thrilled audience. The biggest cheer of the gig is reserved for the final sound effect, a barnstorming 12 minute version of "Feet crunching on gravel pathway". NB: crowd noise and poor acoustics make this CD useless as a source of sound effects for use in amateur dramatic productions.
9/10
Album reviews by L. Cash, G. Twang and P. Marlowe.
Sir Humphrey's Soul Ballads
Famed for his political chicanery and Machiavellian schemes, top civil servant Sir Humphrey Appleby here reveals his romantic side in an album oozing with raw sexuality. From the opening track It Would If I May Make Such A Comparatively Bold And Forthright Statement Appear Very Much To Be An Evening In Which One May Be Reasonably Confident Of Being Correct In Asserting That Some Variety Of Hot Loving Has Every Chance Of Taking Place Sir Humphrey creates a mood of sophisticated intimacy rivalled only by the later number As For The Matter Of The Duration Of The Current Bout of Coitus I Think I Can Safely Say Without Fear Of Contradiction That It Shall Be Sustained At The Very Least Until The Rising Of The Sun In The Usual Fashion Tomorrow At The Very Earliest. Only the bonus track, an ill-advised cover version of Napalm Death's Hang The Pope can spoil the mood.
8/10
HAVEN - Schroedinger's Album
Noise art star HAVEN's latest release might or might not contain an album. This foot square metal casket could well be his most challenging work to date...Some of the tracks - if it is an album - might be quite good, others might be terrible. There's simply no way of telling without opening the box and destroying the quantum state of the contents, thus invalidating the artist's intended statement.
Indeterminate.
Sister Maria Assumpta - Rejoice! He Is Risen!
I sighed and took a long slug straight from the bottle. She was a brunette. The kind of brunette who’d make a straight-edger reach for the happy pills.
So Sister Maria Assumpta had recorded an album of devotional songs? And track one says she’s been Blessed by the Pure Light of God? I’ve seen it all before, buster, way too many times to be taken in by that same old line. A broad’s a broad. And this one looks like she's all broad. Believe me, I know that look - the type of look that bypasses your brain and goes straight to your wallet.
Turns out I’m right. The final song, Enter Into Me O Lord, kind of makes you wonder how a good Catholic girl could end up peddling this sort of filth - but rock 'n' roll’s a dirty business, and mud has a habit of sticking to all the right places.
The broad can sing alright, sing sweeter than a canary with a candy apple, but I’ve got a hunch that if you were to take a bite out of that apple you’d find it was rotten to the core.
2/10