Issue 53 / March 2015

46
Bido Lito! March 2015 Reviews
DIGGING A LITTLE DEEPER
with Dig Vinyl
Bold Street’s latest wax junkies DIG VINYL know a thing or two about the weird and wonderful
depths of people’s record collections, and each month they’ll be rifling through their racks and
picking out four of their favourite in-stock records. Keep digging…
ELIVIS PRESLEY
ELVIS PRESLEY
What can we say about this, the record that propelled an exarmy
private to the first global superstar of rock and roll? The album
that defined a genre spent ten weeks at the top of the US charts
and made pop music THE big player in the major labels industry.
In the year of what would have been ELVIS’ 80th birthday, we’re
privileged to stock a HMV first UK press of this masterpiece. With a
sleeve that has been echoed on other album covers for decades, and is as timelessly iconic as the
man himself, this is a true statement piece that should command a place on any collector’s shelf.
Long live The King!
THE
FINAL
SAY
Words: Emma Brady / @emmabraydee
Illustration: Christian Davies
On Thursday 7th May our country will be taking to the ballot boxes and polling stations for a
general election that many are viewing as the most important for many years. Faced with the
prospect of a hung parliament and five more years of coalition rule, we think the time is ripe for us to
re-consider the value of our individual voices. Emma Brady gives us her thoughts on why we should
make our votes count this time round.
HORACE SILVER
HORACE SILVER AND THE JAZZ MESSENGERS
This 1955 Blue Note Records release was an essential
milestone in the formation of the hard bop style that became
such an important part of American jazz. The genre had started
to become exclusively associated with intellectuals and those of
high social standing, but HORACE SILVER and his quartet played a
huge part in returning jazz to its gutbucket bar room roots whilst
still ensuring evolution in a new direction. This bluesy classic is packed full of soul, and is an
aural delight that will never age.
STEREOLAB
ALUMINIUM TUNES
This double album of EPs and rarities from the post-rock
pioneers has something for new and hardcore fans alike.
Cataloguing the band’s early and formative years from 1990 to
1998, it serves as an ideal introduction to the group’s motorik
lounge synth sound, and has enough hidden gems to keep
the most avid listener hooked. Vocalist and keyboardist Lætitia
Sadier’s French roots weave into STEREOLAB’s sound, one that is dreamily reminiscent of 60s
yé-yé pop. We love their use of vintage Moog synthesisers too – keeping the old sounds alive!
THE MONKS
BLACK MONK TIME
Retrospectively described as “the first punk record” and “a
missing link of alternative music history”, this now-legendary
album is the godfather of garage rock. As American GIs stationed
in Germany, the group had little need to clean up the record’s
riotous musical discordance as The Beatles and other commercial
hits of the time had to after returning home from European tours.
The result is a hard-hitting and still unique unity of proto-punk power beats, sliding krautrock
bass and counter-culture sermons delivered by a satanic Beach Boys. Radical for its time and still
inspiring new musicians worldwide, this sometimes nightmarish, always unpredictable classic
deserves a place in any collection.
Head to bidolito.co.uk now to stream the latest Dig Vinyl Podcast, featuring a mixture of new,
old and half-forgotten classics.
I have to stop myself screaming every
time I hear someone say they won't vote in
the upcoming general election. Every time I
hear another case of under-excused political
apathy, I think of our loved ones under NHS
care: a bandage that won't quite stretch, a
level of care that falls short of peace of
mind. I think of children fed from food banks,
libraries closing down. All the while, the
older Labour-voting members of my family
will lament the lack of money in the system.
But no, there's plenty of money. The bankers
intermingling far too comfortably with the
politicians who make these decisions, they
have plenty of money. It's enough to make
you incensed. Incensed enough to vote.
They, the richest in our country, hope
that we believe this charade, that there's
no money in the system. They rely on us to
be dumb. The division between the rich and
poor, how this appears to be consensus,
how confounding this is – they're counting
on us to give up. Meanwhile, emerging leftwing
parties Syriza and Podemos, in Greece
and Spain respectively, are the loudest
voices there. They are heard when they say
that austerity isn't necessary, isn't working,
isn't fair. The consternation amongst
Spaniards is coming from the same place
in which our own fears lie, but there's little
emergence of a coordinated leftist response
in this country – our beautiful, fragile NHS
is being dismantled and we're not out in
the streets, right now, shouting about it.
And that time that we did, the broadcasting
company we own barely reported it. It does
feel impossible. But holding government to
account doesn't stop at the ballot box – it
turns into paying attention, understanding
the system a little more, imploring your MP
to attend parliamentary votes.
In Liverpool we have our roots in leftwing
political activism, with a strong social
conscience. But I checked – an alarming
number of people voted for Ukip in the
last European election (they received
27.4% of the North West vote – from a
33.5% turnout.) Ukip’s cavalier attitude to
women’s issues is alarming, even if they
have now parted company with former
whip Godfrey Bloom, who wanted to leave
it up to individual employers whether or
not they offer maternity leave. It doesn’t get
much better for the Conservatives, whose
employment minister Esther McVey, MP for
Wirral West, was embroiled in a row about
the link between benefit sanctions and the
deaths of people like David Clapson, who
died because sanctions meant he couldn't
pay for the electricity that kept his insulin
refrigerated. I sometimes imagine that Ukip
was created by the Tories to make them
look good. But they're real, and people
support their rhetoric that the only way we
can move forward is to remove that which
helps the most vulnerable people in society,
as well as the immigrant population. There
are people in this country who believe that
immigrants, not bankers, have destroyed
their entitlement to comfortable living. So
you have to vote, because they will. We
love our NHS, our children, our women, our
elderly, and our disadvantaged. We have to
vote, for them. As compassionate people, we
have to win this election.
If you’ve not registered to vote in the General
Election on 7th May, sign up now at gov.uk/
register-to-vote.