And So It Goes

Tony Wilson has died. It didn't really come as a great surprise but it's still sad news. He was someone whose work I admired greatly even though I couldn't really say I always admired the personality behind the work. To be sure, the world would be an even more interesting place to live in with more Tony Wilsons about. I'm inclined to either pull out 24 Hour Party People on DVD to watch this weekend or better still line-up all the Factory Records material on my external HD and cherish his memory through a clear understanding that he facilitated everyone of those recordings to enrich the musical tapestry of so many alternative music lovers.

I had hoped to write a bit about the Beached Festival taking place this weekend in Scarborough but Tony Wilson's passing has put me in a weird mood. Yes I'm sad but I'm not really depressed. I'm not overwhelmed either, mostly because I hardly knew the man and his death won't really change anything around me. Regular readers of my blog know how fascinated I am by death, even if I'm not obsessed by it in any morbid way. At least I hope not.

Producing the 78th edition of my weekly Mużika Mod Ieħor podcast should take my mind off these thoughts not unlike the way a fine bottle of red wine can make an ordinary evening pleasant after a hard day's work. The opening track from Skorba is just the ticket for this mood I'm in. Ħaġar Qim is one of several tracks from an upcoming album by this Australian band featuring at least two musicians of Maltese descent; Andy Busuttil and Angela Grima. I'll let the music speak for itself this time as I'm sure I'll be playing another track from them once the album is released.

Staying outside the Maltese islands for the second track, I turn to one of the latest songs recorded by Londoner Charlie Calleja. He has appeared on a previous episode of MMI and its with great pleasure that I discovered this week that he has been recording new songs, which you can hear on his MySpace page. I've selected one called Swimming with Dolphins, which to me evokes a subtle desire to reconnect with his Mediterranean roots.

Rachel Fabri is making the South East of London home as she starts attending the Guilford School of Acting for a Master's degree in Musical Theatre. Not too long ago she contributed some distinctive vocals (for a snippet from Lucia Dalla's Caruso) on a new recording by Maltese hip hop act Sixth Simfoni called Breakthru. When I last played Sixth Simfoni on my podcast I mentioned that I knew David Leguesse's father back when I was very active in Malta's theatre scene, some 20 years ago. Since then I've received an email from Jon Mallia's mother, Frances, pointing out that he's her son, so as it happens I know his parents too. Truth be told I remember meeting Jon (a.k.a. Pendemonium) a number of times when he as just a little boy in Mosta and I never really imagined back then that he would blossom so nicely as an adult. Malta really is such a small town of a country.

So to keep things familiar I close this week's podcast with a track from The Vagabond Project, which is the name Gavin Borg is now using for his dance-driven recordings. The style feels more retro than that he adopted as Gavinizer not so long ago. Deep Heat is a pleasant track with hints of early 1980s synth pop, I style I know Gavin is too young to remember clearly first time it came about, but captures and twists quite nicely in his most recent recordings.

Next weekend I'll return with another edition of the Mużika Mod Ieħor podcast since I'm still not planning to take a break this summer. Meanwhile I hope to find the time to blog again about other things.

The RSS feed for the Mużika Mod Ieħor podcast is available here or you can simply click here to subscribe directly with iTunes. You can also add the latest episodes to your My Yahoo! page. If you have no idea what any of this means, just click here.