La Lucha Continua

Reasons to be cheerful Pt 12: The Law of Historical memory

Heard this this morning and it made me stop then and stop again just now. Tales of the International Brigade have been putting something in my eye since I was 15 and they still do to this day.

I can think of fighting for my own freedom but going all that way to country you didn't know for a believe is always inspiring particularly when you know all the terrible betrayals they received from Stalin and his chums. Anyway have a listen.

Nice sleeve shame about the song.

I'm not sure if Thor Heyerdahl
who was one these names of my childhood along with Jacque Cousteau and Doug Scott knew what he was doing when he unleashed the name kontiki it's everywhere.So I'm happy to bring this choice example of what only I'm calling the "wild pop from the Costas" I'm strangely drawn to these records safe in knowledge that most of their tunes are rotten, it's just that the sleeves look so optimistic. I know that Spanish tourism sank into egg & chips and cheap lager clichés but there was a naive charm to the early developments which probably weren't that bad in that they had nice beaches, warm sea and friendly Spanish people staffing them. For people reared on wet weekends in Morecambe, potatoes omelettes and weird ham washed down with local cava must have a refreshing change even if the band in the bar were a bit pony. Sadly none of the tunes are worth sharing.

Scans from seven inch singles of Kontiki Hotel Majorca house band'

Great Record Sleeves of our time

Shame about the Music :(

here's a gaggle of great sleeves...... not a great tune among. sadly.

"Schlager" apparently means hit, shame the producers put more effort into the sleeves than the songs.

Anyway here's a brace of eager beach babes on a rather chilly looking Baltic beach.

I think she needs to watch out "Hi Ho silver lining" about to finish and she hasn't cued up a slowy yet.....

This one I was hoping was a saxtastic sleezeathon burlesque lp, it's in fact lift music with a slightly care worn glamour model on the cover....

Here's Marlon Brando getting to grips with I think Vivien Leigh!

This bunch of 'ombres I had high hopes for and their crack at La bamba is not bad it's just too crackly to post sadly. one song starts well like the theme from "Peter Gunn" al twanging guitars and horns and then sadly fizzles out into Costa Brava show band blandness, it's really sad.

Anyway enjoy the sleeve art!

Ps. Can I recommend some ace free software; scanning record sleeves is a bit of pain because my A4 scanner is 23 cm wide and of course lp sleeves are 24 cm wide so you have to stitch 4 scans together, which is is time consuming but I had seen on flickr people using Auto-stitch to put together panoramic shots.

So I downloaded it and it's excellent ,almost magical give it a go it's very easy to use.

you'll find it here!

Easy like Sun....

¡HOLA!

Here's a gentle tune for you, this blustery miserable morning, I've been learning Spanish again recently which is muy bien? We learnt this week that you need to be careful saying how old you are in Spain (and not for the obvious reasons)

Apparently "años" means year and has one of those long n sounds that I fear I'll never master where as "anos" means something entirely different (try swapping the "o" for another vowel!).

Anyway this morning's tune is in Spanish and would fit in with what my old flatmate would call "Sunday morningish music" (which is something to do with Van Morrison and cafetieres).

It's by the Sandpipers who I know very little about, I bought the vinyl thinking they might be like the The Sonics which is ironic as this tune is a gentle vocal reworking of "Louie Louie". It starts off like "you lost that loving feeling" and has some nice flamenco style guitar flourishes.

Anyway the toast's popped up and as Mike D never said it's time to get Illy! have a good Sunday.

The Sandpipers : Louie Louie.

GOOOOAAAALLLLLL!!!!

spain blurry
Originally uploaded by bltphoto

go here for excellent Spanish comentary

Come on you er er Spanish...

May be this time:
I'm not a big one for changing allegiences but the European Chamionship are on and so more in a spirit of hope over exepriences than anything else, I'm going with the Spainsh. Seeing as I've just won 0p on the Derby it's probably not worth following . Internationally Spain flatter to decieve but you never know.

We are getting the opening ceremony now which as usual is a waste of time, the football ones are always crap. The end of the champions league was just pointless the winning team drenched in a blizzard of red confetti a sort of visual admission that the sponsors never really get football.
What is this nonsense dancing fridge boxes! just start the game.....

La infanta....

Pavement Art: gallery lost and found # Cinco!
Barcelona Doll Sept 9th 2001.

All this talk (sorry shows about Spain and pictures that are in Spain) has made me a little wistful. With the police sirens wailing off along the south circular, my ropey fridge rumbling away in the background, it would be nice to be sat in warm Spanish square, the swifts flying over head, your table in the harsh (goya black shadows), the grumpy patron bringing out a cool beaded glass of Estrella and putting it down on a mat on the slightly wonky table, you've a plate of pata Negra (well you're on your holidays)and some olives (that always taste better abroad). You let the beer stand sweating for a moment and then lift it up and take a good swig. A swift swoops down after a fly and all you can do is smile at whomever you are with (or just to yourself ).......

Now of course I'm even more wistful, obviously the revere above wouldn't be possible in the Placa Reial just off the ramblas where I found the doll above. Apart from the other tourists your morning (or in this case night time) beer would interupted by some drug and drink addled lost soul or just a passing busker. That said it would be nice and maybe later you could wander up to Gracia for some Absinthe or maybe or maybe or ....

Spain!

Just watched the last episode of the Andrew Graham Dixon's Art of Spain on BBC4 I-play. The whole series was excellent, with obvious problem of having to cover Goya, Picasso, Miro, Dali and Brunel in one hour long programme aside, the last show was full his usual thoughtful engaging passionate stories.

The section about Luis Brunel reminded me that although Feb is my year anniversary over here at chez blogger I had another blog in another life over at casa yahoo. (it was a pain to use, the whole structure was annoying comentators had to sign up to yahoo etc).

Being a pretentious git or just at loss what to write my first ever blog post was a review of Brunel's most famous film 1960 Viridiana.
here's what I wrote. I seem to have not liked it which isn't what I remember which is the good thing about diaries I suppose.

It contains description of the plot not sure I'd heard of SPOILER at the time! Oh and bad joke to start with.

"Entry for November 02, 2005
did ya hear the one about the dyslexic pimp who bought a ware house?

Just got back from seeing a Luis Brunuel film "Viridiana".
It was a dark satire ie it wasn't very funny. I think if you were a very devote catholic in1961 you would be really shocked but it is less striking now. Basically it is parable about how trying to do good can prove the undoing of even the most pure of heart. The main character is trainee nun sent home on the eve of her marriage to Christ to see her Uncle. He is obsessed by her and after drugging her and attempting to rape her, tops himself . She along with her cousin inherit the uncle's estate and she sets about turning it into her own religous comunity, peopled by the local down and outs.
In the end her good intentions come to nought in an orgy of violence, booze, sex and custard (all to the tune of Handel's Messiah).There are allsorts of codes and messages in the film as well as the general onslaught against organised religion. Scenes where you get to see a nuns legs must have been totally new in 1961 , but are now the stuff of bad light entertainment. Even socialism doesn't get off lightly the poor and the oppressed are shown to be offish, venial and amoral not your upstanding chiselled saints pictured in soviet art. In fact all humans are shown in pretty poor light."

Ps . I included Goya's May 3rd at the top as it was conspicuous by it's absence from the programme. Goya's "black paintings " are great and weird but I found this as moving, although it was included in the excellent secret life of masterpiece series from year ago, so we'll let Andrew off.