Love is the Message: Dance, Music and Counterculture

In this episode we continue our trio of episodes on Punk by examining some crucial mid-70s proto-Punk antecedents. Via the lean funkiness of Dr Feelgood Jeremy and Tim explore the interesting British formation of pub rock, with its R’n’B roots and distinct danceability. This leads to a discussion on the slipperiness of Rock’n’Roll as a term and its tensions with ‘rock’ proper. We also hear an early influence on Post-Punk and meet the influential Stiff Records at its foundation.
In the second half of the show we make a second encounter on the show with the Ramones, and ask: what were they really up to? Authenticity, performance, historiography and hagiography all come under the microscope as we lead to the first definitively British Punk record: New Rose by The Damned.
Join us next time for Blondie and the Sex Pistols.
Produced and edited by Matt Huxley.

Tracklist:
Dr Feelgood - She Does it Right
Dr Feelgood - Keep it Outta Sight
Nick Lowe - So It Goes
The Ramones - Blitzkrieg Bop
The Saints - (I’m) Stranded
The Damned - New Rose

This is an excerpt from a patrons-only episode. To hear the whole thing and a huge number of other conversations, head to Patreon.com/LoveMessagePod.

In this patrons episode Jem and Tim once again share what’s been on their turntables recently. We hear two tracks - one contemporary and one not - from the UK Asian Underground, along with a consideration of the cosmopolitan aesthetic of artists like Bally Sagoo and Nitin Sawhney. Tim reflects on trips to the WOMAD festival and digs into trip hop while Jem shares a powerful Qawwali cut. Elsewhere we hear Swedish afrobeat, extremely psychedelic roots reggae, free love, a compilation for Gaza, Messages from the Stars and more…

Tracklist:

Books:

Sanjay Sharma, John Hutnyk, Ashwani Sharma (Eds) - Dis-Orienting Rhythms: The Politics of the New Asian Dance Music 

Welcome to Series 6 of Love is the Message! We hope you enjoyed the series of conversations with writers and academics that comprised Series 5, but now we are returning to our usual format to examine a watershed year: 1977. 

In this first episode we are unpacking Punk. What is it? A musical style, a subgenre of rock, a fashion sensibility, an attitude, a structure of feeling? In the first of three shows on Punk, Jeremy and Tim unfurl a general genealogy of the term as we build towards the release of Anarchy in the UK in two episodes’ time. They discuss where the term came from and how it was codified; the importance punk placed on realness and spontaneity; and contrast Punk’s nostalgic and avant garde modes. 

Tim and Jeremy make reference to three bands not immediately thought of as Punk - The Seeds, The MC5 and The Stooges - to uncover what musical work was taking place in the late 60s and early 70s that could be viewed as proto-punk, and use these bands to show the problems of rock historiography in recounting the history of Punk. And, this being LITM, we of course spend some time untangling the Punk vs Disco dichotomy. 

We hope you’ll join us as we continue our long march through the 1970s and beyond!

Become a patron at patreon.com/LoveMessagePod.

Produced and edited by Matt Huxley.

Tracklist:

This is an excerpt from a patrons-only episode. To hear the whole thing and a lot more besides, head to Patreon.com/LoveMessagePod.

In this patrons’ episode we conclude our trio of episodes on Glam Rock.

Tim and Jeremy pick up where they left off with a walk on the wild side. This leads to a discussion of the relationship between Lou Reed, Bowie and Iggy Pop in the early 70s. They discuss the undisputed glam anthem Cum on Feel the Noize from Birmingham’s finest Slade, replete with its football terrace chant and fist-pumping energy. And on the mellower side, explore the idea of glam as torch song, with entries from international treasure Elton John and a return to the show for Roxy Music.

Jeremy and Tim conclude the episode with an acceptance of the might of Queen and a brief scintilla of postmodernism - much more of that to follow.

Produced and edited by Matt Huxley.

Tracklist:

Lou Reed - Walk on the Wild Side

David Bowie - Moonage Daydream

Slade - Cum On Feel The Noize

Suzi Quatro - Glycerine Queen

Elton John - Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

Roxy Music - In Every Dream Home a Heartache

Queen - Killer Queen

This is an excerpt from a patrons-only episode. To hear the whole show, and a whole lot more besides, head to Patreon.com/LoveMessagePod to sign up.

In this patrons’ episode we move into the second of three episodes on Glam. The third part of this trilogy will be dropping in your feed sooner than our normal schedule so hold tight for that.

Produced and edited by Matt Huxley.

Tracklist:

Roxy Music - Re-Make/Re-Model

Roxy Music - Virginia Plain

David Bowie - Ziggy Stardust

T.Rex - Children Of The Revolution

In this episode Jeremy and Tim are joined by writer, historian, and friend of the show Simon Reynolds to discuss British musical trends of the 1970s and his life as a music journalist. Simon is arguably the most important music critic writing today, having penned seminal books on post-punk, electronic dance music, feminist rock and much more. In this interview he mostly talks about his most recent book, ‘Shock and Awe: Glam Rock and Its Legacy, from the Seventies to the Twenty-First Century’, sharing stories from his childhood interest in the decadent world of Glam.

The three discuss how so many artists came to aestheticise a rejection of suburbia, the purply gauze of Top of the Pops, and thinking the Situationists were a band. They unpick how Punk is imagined and historicised versus how it was experienced, how Simon came to reappraise the 60s against a hostile critical culture, and consider the role of the music press historically and today.

For patrons, our extended edition also includes a discussion around Simon’s 2011 book ‘Retromania: Pop Culture’s Addiction to its Own Past’. Tim, Jeremy and Simon recount the particular conjuncture from which the book arose, tease out its key theses, and apply those to contemporary music culture.

Simon Reynolds is the author of ‘Blissed Out: The Raptures of Rock’, ‘The Sex Revolts: Gender, Rebellion and Rock 'N' Roll’ with Joy Press, ‘Energy Flash: A Journey Through Rave Music and Dance Culture’, ‘Rip It Up and Start Again: Postpunk 1978–1984’, ‘Bring The Noise: 20 Years of Writing About Hip Rock and Hip-Hop’, ‘Retromania: Pop Culture's Addiction to Its Own Past’ and ‘Shock and Awe: Glam Rock and Its Legacy, from the Seventies to the Twenty-First Century’. His next book, ‘Futuromania: Electronic Dreams from Moroder to Migos’ is forthcoming.

Tracklist:

Led Zeppelin - Whole Lotta Love

UNLOCKED - We've made public this previously patrons-only episode following the death of Can singer Damo Suzuki. If you'd like to become a patron, visit Patreon.com/LoveMessagePod.

W do you call it? Krautrock, space rock, the Great Komische Music? It’s all German to me. In a little under two hours the guys cover the history of post-WW2 Germany (East and West), anti-Communist geopolitics, what you want to hear when you’re tripping, Pop Art, post-rock and playfulness, all in reference to the music of Can, NEU!, Ash Ra Tempel and more.

We hear about the characteristics of the German counterculture from which many of these players came, the various tendencies of revolutionary European socialism, the Green Party, and the problems of De-Nazification. We consider the avant-garde compositions of Karlheinz Stockhausen, the impact of American acid rock, Ancient Egypt, and the many ways James Brown’s funk filtered into the motor rhythms of Dusseldorf 1971. More than anything, we survey a formidable body of work that is at once mesmeric and danceable - both things we like here at Love is the Message!

Produced by Matt Huxley.

Books:
Julian Cope - Krautrock Sampler: One Head’s Guide  to the Great Kosmische Musik
David Stubbs - Future Days: Krautrock and the Building of Modern Germany

Tracklist:
Ash Ra Tempel & Timothy Leary - Timeship
Karlheinz Stockhausen - Spiral (Realization A)
Amon Duul ii - Yeti (Improvisation)
Ash Ra Tempel - Amboss
Kraftwerk - Stratovarius
Tangerine Dream - Genesis
Tangerine Dream - Flute Organ Piece
Can - Halleluwah
NEU! - Hallogallo
Can - Moonshake
Kraftwerk - Autobahn
Harmonia & Eno '76 - Atmosphere
Kraftwerk - Trans Europe Express

This is an excerpt from a patrons-only episode. To hear the whole thing, plus dozens of hours more discussion and conversation, head to patreon.com/LoveMessagePod.

In this patrons’ episode we continue our look at musical currents of the 1970s by pulling on our platform boots, pasting on some eyeliner and getting ready for Glam Rock. In the first of two episodes, Tim and Jeremy excavate the pre-history of this strange trans-Atlantic phenomenon, which expresses both fascinating cultural insights and some pretty bad music (to our ears).

Tracklist:

Books:

To hear an extended version of this conversation, become a patron at Patreon.com/LoveMessagePod.

In this episode Jeremy and Tim are joined by historian and New Yorker Kim Phillips-Fein to discuss a crucial event in the Love is the Message story: the 1975 New York City fiscal crisis. Kim’s book ‘Fear City: New York’s Fiscal Crisis and the Rise of Austerity Politics’ is widely regarded as the definitive text on the matter, so she was the perfect person to talk to, and she brought some great music recommendations to boot.

The three discuss both the long- and short-term backdrop to the crisis, charting how the city’s unique social democratic municipal system of rent controls, hospitals and education changed across the twentieth century, before examining how the centre of international capital came extremely close to bankruptcy. Kim explains the financial mechanisms which animated the crisis and the political choices that precipitated it. She elucidates President Ford’s predicament during the crisis, the effects of ‘white flight’, and reminds us that New York was itself an industrial city rapidly de-industrialising. 

This being Love is the Message, naturally we also hear about the extraordinary cultural creativity of the time and examine its material causes, including changing democraphics and the transformation of Soho. Finally, Tim Jeremy and Kim consider what happened next, and how the fiscal crisis has been historicised to serve a particular ideology.

Kim Phillips-Fein is the Gardiner-Kenneth T. Jackson Professor of History at Columbia University. Her book ‘Fear City: New York’s Fiscal Crisis and the Rise of Austerity Politics' was named a finalist for the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for History. She is also the author of ‘Invisible Hands: The Making of the Conservative Movement from the New Deal to Reagan’.

Tracklist:

Television - Venus

The Dils - Class War

The Rolling Stones - Shattered

Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five - The Message

This is an excerpt from a patrons-only episode. To hear the whole show, plus much more, head to Patreon.com/LoveMessagePod.

On this festive edition of What We’re Listening To, Jeremy and Tim share selections from their turntables alongside thoughts on religion, atheism, death - and Blondie. We hear psychedelic jazz from north India and northern England, a brace of uplifting Gospel anthems from Pastor T.L Barrett, and some free-wheeling spiritual jazz from the Bronx via Puerto Rico. A smattering of seasonal song is dispersed throughout the selections, and with an eye on the horrors of the last two months in the Middle East, an uplifting call for peace to sign off on.

Produced by Matt Huxley.

Tracklist:

Manish Pingle - Raga Puriya Kalyan