This year sees the inaugural award of The Scottish Album of The Year. With just days until the longlist is whittled down to a shortlist, the general public are being given a chance to have their say with a nomination for one album to go on the judges final list.

The list can be viewed on the SAY Award website or on the iphone/android app. And public voting is open TODAY ONLY, so get involved!!

A month or so back, we put together a little mixtape including some of the nominated artists which you can stream over here.

I’m quite enjoying putting the mixtapes together and hopefully a couple of people will give them a listen at some point, we’ve even installed a wee link at the top of the page where all the mixtapes are stored.

The mixtapes were originally going to be weekly but I sometimes find it quite a task to put together each week depending on what I’ve got on and at the end of the day there’s no point in putting undue stress on yourself, something I’m trying to manage both personally, and on the blog.

In which long winded way takes us back to the point of this post. I’ve been really enjoying some albums recently and find myself on NPR quite a lot streaming forthcoming releases so I guess this post is another one of those semi-regular posts that we have which will appear when we deem there to be enough information to post!

First up is the album which along with Lightships has the potential to my album of the summer, who knows, maybe even year. ‘The Only Place’ by Best Coast follows the same patterns and themes of the first album but there’s just something a bit more shiny and polished about it. That’s not to say that because the lo-fi scuzzy-ness has gone that this album is any less charming.

Best Coast – The Only Place – stream on NPR

Next up, also on NPR, is the band I used to frequently mix up with Best Coast, Beach House. Coast-Beach-Best…you get the idea. We featured the track ‘Myth’ on our most recent mixtape. You can stream the full album, ‘Bloom’ from the link below.

Beach House – Bloom – stream on NPR

The aforementioned Lightships’ album ‘Electric Cables’ can still be streamed over at the Guardian, and like I said, this is up there with one of my favourite albums this year.

Lightships – Electric Cables – stream on the Guardian

And finally, a little closer to home, you can hear Glasgow-based French Wives debut album ‘Dream of the Inbetween’ streaming on The 405. This is a really enjoyable album and got my feet tapping under a pile of spreadsheets in the office the other day.

French Wives – Dream of the Inbetween – stream on The 405

As some people may have picked up on from some photo’s Phil has posted on my behalf, over the past 5 months I have been travelling around Europe & North America. Just before I left, over a beer, Phil & I discussed how we could incorporate my trip into the Elba blog with me writing about gigs i’d been to or any new music that i’d got into whilst on my trails…well things don’t always pan out how you expect and travelling can be unpredictable so this is a post to let you know how difficult I found our plan and how one man and his iPod (or mp3 player of your choice) can form a bond over hidden gems & unsuspecting tuneage (that’s a word!)…

So, obviously from my lack of posts our grand plan didn’t come to fruition, this isn’t due to not going to gigs or looking for new music but more to do with the digital age we live in. Any new music I came across was already out and about before i’d even had the chance to mention it to someone it was already appearing somewhere else. Conversely in Berlin & Toronto I was pleased to see Glasgow-based artists being the hidden gems getting promotion from local magazines & websites (RM Hubbert & Chris Devotion respectively).

Then the mp3 generation came to bite me on the ass when we were out near The Bowery in Manhattan and got ‘conned’ into some local hip hop by buying a CD of some guys before realising I had nothing to play it on…you never know it may become a hidden gem when I finally have a CD player again.

What I also found was that songs followed me about literally everywhere I went, yes Adele i’m looking at you! Not all were that horrific though… in the tracks of the year I surprised Phil with Kanye West & Jay-Z, but that stemmed from the album & specific tracks meaning so much to me last year after appearing in different locations. The biggest track that seemed to be everywhere for me from November onwards was M83 – Midnight City. In clubs, pubs, shops, this track appeared and stuck in my head, a band I admittedly knew very little about and still know nothing outwith this one track (I’ll need to see Kim for some tutoring)

And finally my iPod came to my rescue, here I listened to full back catalogs from start to finish, had eerie moments when listening to Bon Iver when on a bus through snow covered country roads when Perth came on whilst driving through the small town of Perth in Ontario and of course had some special times with Mr Springsteen like visiting Erie Canal in Buffalo & driving up to NYC whilst listening to New York City Serenade…

… which brings me to an interesting point, and one I couldn’t resist posting about. Bruce Springsteens new album ‘Wrecking Ball’ is released today… you didn’t think I could write a post without mentioning Springsteen did you, especially after seeing his performance on Jimmy Fallon the other week!

Where and when did the initial idea for Seen Your Video arise?

I’d been doing Left Of The Dial, my show on Subcity, for three years and reached 100 episodes, which seemed like a nice round number to finish on. I was really proud of what we’d achieved in that time, but kind of felt like the show was getting a bit formulaic week in, week out – I’d developed a structure that I could essentially just slot bits into: song, talk, song, song, talk, song, etc. On top of that, I’d started working shifts, which made it really hard to stick to one timeslot in which I would definitely be able to put on a show weekly. So a podcast seemed like the easiest way to get around both problems: the change in format would shake me out of my rut, such as it was, and I’d be able to record it at any time during the week that suited me and stick it up whenever.

The name Seen Your Video is, like Left Of The Dial, borrowed from a Replacements song – I wanted to keep some kind of continuity between the two shows, but make sure people knew that this was very much its own thing. Plus, because I’m now covering film as well as music, it felt right to have a title that referenced the visuals as well as the sounds, in however derogatory a fashion.

Has your involvement with Left of The Dial and Scots Whay Hae influenced the direction of the project?

Mainly in trying to maintain the eclecticism of what gets covered. Left Of The Dial didn’t really fit in with a lot of Subcity programming when we started it, because whilst we weren’t a niche show like the kind Subcity has historically done really well – we weren’t just playing Northern Soul, or 90s American indie (even if that was originally going to be our pitch and we were considering calling it Chasing Pavement), or chiptune, or grime, or whatever – we also tried not to be as haphazard as other shows that didn’t have that one laser-focused area of expertise. We played a broad range of stuff, but that’s only because our record collections contained a broad range of stuff, and we loved it all. We still tried to give it the care and attention and thematic links of a niche show, only our niche was everything – one of my proudest moments was playing “Sister Ray” by The Velvet Underground in its entirety one Friday morning in October, but a week or so before I’d done a potted history of the Wu-Tang Clan, later mounted a spirited defence of “Maggie May” by Rod Stewart, and on a few occasions crammed local bands (Admiral Fallow, John Knox Sex Club, Johnny Reb – not all at once, sadly) into the studio for some shambolic knees-ups. With Seen Your Video, I wanted to keep that same attitude of everything being worthy of consideration: if something catches my interest, or I feel there’s something worth saying about it, or see or hear something that I think deserves wider attention from people, then it gets covered. That’s all there is to it, regardless of what genre it is or where it comes from.

As for Scots Whay Hae!, that’s how I cover my arse for not exclusively covering Scottish stuff, which seems to be de rigeur for a lot of Scottish blogs and podcasts. My mate Ali writes it all single-handedly, and he hosts all the podcasts too – I only chip in now and again as a guest – and he does a brilliant job of it. There’s a lot of great music being made across Scotland, and better films than we’ve made in years, but I think I – and everyone else, frankly – would be lying if I said that’s where my interests lay exclusively. There’s not really a Scottish equivalent of Pitchfork (thank fuck, says the readers), one site that covers stuff from all over the place with a very distinctive, recognisable voice. That was the kind of thing I was interested in doing – approaching global pop culture in a Scottish voice, and talking about it in terms that might make it more meaningful to a local crowd than an American blogger who’s been raised on a completely different indie tradition (like being able to compare The Weeknd to an R&B Arab Strap). Not that I want Seen Your Video to be completely free of Scottish content, but doing Scots Whay Hae! means I can feel free to talk about Yo La Tengo on Seen Your Video and rest easy knowing that I can continue to talk up The Twilight Sad next time I record with Ali.

How do you feel leaving the music content behind and moving to an almost exclusively dialogue based podcast?

An hour suddenly feels like it takes much longer to fill when you’re not stopping every five minutes for a song. Honestly though, this is a direction I’m happy to move in. As Left Of The Dial progressed, the episodes I was most pleased with were usually episodes like our year-end best-ofs, where we’d get a few guests in and just talk for most of the episode about what we’d been listening to and watching, in a bit more detail than we’d be able to get into when we were trying to cram it all into the links between songs. My only worry is that it turns into a monologue – I’ve only done one episode so far that didn’t have a guest on it, and while it was only about half the length of a usual episode, I was still very self-conscious about potentially rambling. And besides, who wants to hear another guy on the internet’s opinions about movies and music? At least with a guest there’s a hook for the conversation, whether they’ve got some kind of qualifying credential or you just know you’ll be able to get something of interest out of them.

The content so far has been quite diverse depending on who you are speaking to, despite some loose ideas of what you want to cover, are you pleased with how well it is developing organically?

Yeah, I am. The original plan – which seems to have been deviated from quite quickly, I have to say – was ‘inspired’ (ahem) by Julie Klausner’s podcast, How Was Your Week?, in which she literally sits her guests down, asks them what they’ve been doing lately, and then takes the conversation from there. I wanted to do something similar, but specifically ask what they’d been watching, reading, listening to, etc., and then let it spin off at any tangents that may arise. I think on some level I haven’t been confident enough to let that happen yet, just because I’ve been keen to avoid the above-mentioned just-another-guy-who-has-opinions label, so most of the guests have had some sort of hook to their interview related to their own areas of expertise. Ali came on to talk about what the STV series Scotland’s Greatest Album had got wrong. My friend Anthony, who writes horror movie reviews for eatmybrains.com, came on to talk about all-night horror movie marathons at Halloween, The Skinny’s film editor, Jamie Dunn, came on to talk about British film off the back of The Deep Blue Sea and We Need To Talk About Kevin. But yeah, I don’t go into any of the chats with any kind of structure in mind, so I suppose the principle is the same as the original plan: find a starting point and take it from there.

Are there any areas that you haven’t yet managed to cover that you would like to become a regular focus of the podcast?

Maybe other podcasts, actually, but that might be too meta. I listen to a lot of American alt-comedy stuff – Comedy Bang Bang, Who Charted?, The Pod F. Tompkast, all that kind of thing – so in any given week they’re comprising anywhere between five and ten hours of my cultural intake, depending on how much solo travelling I have to do (they’re my commute accompaniment). That’s a pretty big chunk of time to devote to a medium that I’ve barely mentioned on my own podcast, when I could fit roughly five movies or ten records into that same space of time. Even if I just spent one episode getting into some recommendations or something, I could see that working. Other than that, I’d mainly like to get back to the above-mentioned original idea, and let the guests dictate what gets covered. I’d quite like to find a co-host too, to stave off the fear of monologuing, and also because I feel like I’ve already worked my way through everyone in my immediate circle of friends who’d be comfortable talking about something on-mic for up to 45 minutes at a time. If I’m going to have to start bringing in repeat guests anyway, might as well make one of them a regular.

Are there any guests planned for the coming year?

I haven’t actually put out an episode in 2012 at all so far, and whilst that’s largely because I’m trying to figure out just what the hell I want to do with the damn thing, it’s also down to trying to arrange what I think has the potential to be a really cool segment. I used to write a webzine with my mates Steve and Gavin, who have both since moved to London for work and subsequently found themselves out of the loop musically. So last summer, in a bid to get back in the game, they asked me to e-mail them one album recommendation a week, that, being as disconnected from the blogosphere and the hype machine as they are, they would come at with completely fresh ears and no idea what to expect. I sent them recommendations for both new titles (Real Estate, The Roots, Fucked Up) and classics that, knowing their tastes, I didn’t think they’d have heard (Guided By Voices, The Dismemberment Plan, The Feelies). What we’re hoping to do is find a time that suits all three of us to get on Skype and talk about what they thought about each of the recommendations, and stick it up on the pod. The only problem is we haven’t yet been able to find that particular time, and there’s no sign of it on the immediate horizon either. So other than that, guests-wise, I’m not sure. Any takers?

Looking ahead, is there anything that you already hope to feature?

Put it this way: if I make it along to a particular gig, or I see a film on which I have a strong opinion, or there’s some zeitgeist-capturing album doing the rounds, odds are it’ll get covered, at least in some fashion. When I finally get round to putting a new show up, I’ll have at least two months worth of stuff to cover. I’ll probably look at albums like the new Cloud Nothings record, which I love, and maybe Craig Finn’s solo album, because The Hold Steady are one of my favourite bands currently working. Gigs-wise, I’m heading down to London to see Jay-Z and Kanye West at the O2 in May, then rushing back home later that week to see Philip Glass and the Kronos Quartet play his soundtrack to the Bela Lugosi Dracula live alongside the film. So that should be a particularly eclectic episode. If I get my shit together enough to be able to record interviews or sessions with touring bands that’d be cool too, but I think I’ll have to do a bit more to build an audience before that happens.

Today’s example of a cover version comes courtesy of Portland’s Chromatics and is a re-working of Neil Young’s Hey Hey My My (Into the Black). I’ve heard a couple of covers of this in the past, by some pretty below average bands which haven’t really done very much for me but Chromatic’s echoey and sparse take on it has certainly got me repeating it on my iPod. This is the second single to be taken from their forthcoming album, Kill For Love. I hope you enjoy.

I’d started writing this post in the first week of January and had got to 800 words but now it’s Feb, I’m not going where I was going when I wrote it anymore but I am keeping the title to this post, cos I like it. If you don’t know it, it’s the title of a Willie Nelson song.

I liked the idea that at the start of the year when we are besieged by ‘ones to watch’ lists that we have no idea what’s selling this year. In fact, I hope sad songs and waltzes are selling this year, because those type of songs are fucking great.

That’s all really, we just wanted to say hello, for the new year, assure you that we hadn’t nicked off anywhere and we’ll try and write about better stuff this year. I’ve added some things from Jan that I’ve enjoyed below and we’ll resume normal service over the next week

* Go and download yourself the latest single from Dad Rocks! It’s free to do so.

* Check out new albums from RM Hubbert, Django Django and Chris Devotion & The Expectations

* On that last point Chris Devotion and the Expectations are launching their album tonight at Captain’s Rest in Glasgow. If you’re on the east coast, they will be playing at Henry’s Cellar Bar in Edinburgh on Feb 18th as part of Song, By Toad’s ‘Ides of Toad‘ gigs.

* And finally, whilst mentioning Song, By Toad. His latest Toad Session with Josh T Pearson is available for download/perusal over this direction

You may remember a few months back we talked about a couple of releases from South Coast based Lynched Recordings. We thoroughly enjoyed the Clowns 7″ and you can still pick up a free Masked Eldorados of the Americas track here. Anyhoo, the label has come up trumps with a lovely little EP by Birdengine. Turn your pointers here for a little listen and more importantly to buy the digital or 7″ version.

Closer to home, Olive Grove Records have released details of the forthcoming album by The Moth & The Mirror. ‘Honestly, This World’ will be released on October 10th through the usual good record buying channels.

It’s been a while since we dipped our toes in the promoting waters, nearly a year since our voluntary sabbatical, but news of a return to gigging is imminent, so keep your peepers open for that.

In the past, The Liquid Ship has been our home and hopefully we’ll return one day but alas, The Ship has closed and is undergoing a bit of a refurb. We hear it will open again soon under the name The Roxy 171. You can keep up to date with happenings on their facebook page.

We’ve got a theme going here, so, even closer to home, Elba Studio’s have let us know about a wee autumn deal they are running, should you be looking to get some stuff recorded. I’ll leave it to Stephen, heid honcho at the studio, to tell all…

“Hey folks, we are running an Autumn recording deal of 3 days in The Tracking Room at Elba Studios for £450 (usual price £540) or 2 days in The Tracking Room at Elba Studios and 1 day mixing at Underworld Mixing & Production for £480.”

Sounds like a good deal and it’s a cosy wee studio to work in. We record our podcast s there which brings us on to the final piece of housekeeping.

You can hear September’s podcast with Andrea Marini on the mixcloud player below and look out for October’s podcast with Sparrow & The Workshop who are popping down to Elba tomorrow before their jaunt to Europe.

There’s always plenty to tell but that’ll do us for now. Look out in the next few days though, for a post about the aforementioned gig we’re helping to put on with one of our favourite bands and labels. It’s exciting stuff!

Anyway, the title of the post isn’t about rap music, it’s about noisy stuff.

Firstly, we were delighted to see that our friends at Brain Burner, after a brief hiatus, have returned to The Liquid Ship for some more experimental noise gigs. The first in the current run will take place on Aug 14th with a 9pm start. On the bill are Now Wakes The Sea whose ‘lush ambient folk drones’ we gave a live debut to at one of our Elba gigs last year. There’s some free NWTS downloads here if you wish to have a listen. Also in the line-up is Boom Edan, Neil A.Simpson, Falconry and Uzuruzu. These nights are always ‘a little different’ and they’re free so get yourself along to it if you’re stuck for something to do on the 14th! The event page is here.

Keeping on the same lines, we picked up this free download by The Masked Eldorados of the Americas recorded at the School of Noise in Falmouth. Now, that’s the second mention of Falmouth on this blog in the past few weeks, which is a bit strange for a blog based in Glasgow, but we came by this download after a recommendation from Lynch(ed) Records who are based down there. It turns out now that Lynch(ed) have ‘signed’ them up and they’ve got an EP out called If You Are Prepared To Eat It You Can Kill It.

The members of the band have been kept under lock and key with their live performance being performed by two men behind animal masks. Their numbers have now swelled to four and the EP sounds rather different to the live drone improvisation mentioned earlier. What we have on the E.P. is four instrumental ‘pop’ tracks lasting around 3-5 minutes each. It was absolutely not what I expected to sound like but it’s enjoyable listening with riffs and hooks abound. The tracks were all recorded remotely with each member retreating to their own home studio to bash out their parts of the record. It’s a worthy listen from a label who seem to really be putting out a really varying selection of music.

As a footnote, after going on to Lynch(ed) bandcamp I notice that they have the new single from Birdengine coming out at the end of this month. If you aren’t already familiar with Birdengine, we’d recommend you right that wrong.

First up we have the now famed 7″ Chocolate Vinyl release from FOUND. There were only 50 copies of this up for grabs so I suspect not many of our readers own one but with the medium of youtube, you can watch Edinburgh band Eagleowl listen to and then eat the record here. I suspect the remaining 49 have gone the same way and been melted down for hot chocolate or something.

Keeping the theme with the edibles is the rather swish looking clear vinyl package from Japanese War Effort. The EP, Surrender to Summer which is out on Edinburgh’s Song, By Toad Records comes equipped with a bag of those lovely sweets that you see on the front cover. You can pick up a copy of the record here, it’s limited to 250 i think.

Rounding up this post on novelty releases is Glasgow’s Mitchell Museum who recently released their new single on a 16-note keyboard. The download code for said single is hidden inside the keyboard so you can either systematically dismantle the keyboard to preserve it or if you feel like smashing the living daylights out of it, get yourself a mallet from the shed, both methods are recommended on the Mitchell Museum website. There’s still a couple of them left here for a fiver.

I received this little gem in the post today courtesy of Falmouth based Lynch(ed) Recordings. It’s the label’s recent release, a 7″ by Brighton band Clowns.

Clowns came together a while ago now and are made up by bits and pieces of Electric Soft Parade, Field Music, Brakes and Garageland. A fairly impressive list really. The A-Side ‘Idiot Bouncing’ is a melodic riff filled three and a half minutes of garage rock which asks ‘Do you wanna bounce?’. Yep, we do actually.

The 7″ comes in a limited run of 250 and you can have a wee listen for yourself and buy it here.