Shut Up And Let Me Go

It has already been one week since George Carlin died. His death was announced after I had published my weekly podcast, so it was only this week that I could really pay tribute to this great American artist. Carlin was no ordinary stand-up comedian. He continued in the spirit of Lenny Bruce long after seeing him arrested for obscenity. Carlin was one of the most eloquent artistic voices of reality in America. To my mind, never was the image of the wise fool who helps others see the truth better embodied in American culture, except perhaps by Hunter S. Thompson on his good days.

The 120th podcast in the Mużika Mod Ieħor series opens with the voice of George Carlin just like the first fifteen editions did back in 2005-2006. His wonderful rant against commercial radio and the consumption of bland music comes from his audio book When Will Jesus Bring the Pork Chops?. His words and ideas were highly influential in the tone my weekly music podcast took when it first appeared.

The Feast of Avalon by Marco Ellul, better known as Larski, is the first piece of music hear on this week's podcast. I've been hoping to hear more stuff coming out of his studio for quite some time; including a renewed collaboration with Jody Fiteni and Kevin O'Neill. I'm a very patient man and sometimes it helps to keep hoping against all hope. I have a feeling that the inclusion of this track will prompt a response from Larski, which may include an update about more recent recordings.

Offset Collaborations is an interesting project led by Adrian Trevisan. Along with his collaborators Vinnie Skillz (one of the Leguesse brothers), Diane Castillo (also known as the lead singer for Stillborn) and Nik Poland (a finalist in this year's XFM Virtual Rockstar contest). Sweet Lips is the last in a series of tracks released by this group before Trevisan returns to London to study Audiological Science. Hopefully there will be further recordings as acts like Offset Collaborations are excellent ways for Maltese singers to sing songs that aren't the sort produced for the sole purpose of appearing in some song contest or other.

Veteran UK-based Maltese singer Jon Lukas reinvented himself as jon lukas woodenman a few years ago. This year he appears to be at it in full throttle. He has already appeared on a previous MMI podcast this year with his latest tune, but he has now just released a new song called My Time. I particularly like the long outro on this one and I'm sure it will delight the singer's many fans, particularly in some countries in the Middle East, where for a brief time (it is claimed that) he was more popular than The Beatles.

The end of June brings with it the great Glastonbury festival. In recent years I've been delighted to see some Maltese musicians perform at this amazing event. Mandala Malta and Tribali immediately spring to mind in this regard. This year we can add South Central to that list. Tomorrow (June 29) they're appearing in the Dance East at 16:30 and at 19:30 in the Silent Disco. Next month they'll be performing in Holland, France, Italy and Belgium before they return to Japan and more gigs in France after the summer. You can hear Golden Dawn, the single they released earlier this year, as the closing track on this week's podcast.

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