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ok, i’ll admit it. i’ve just bought tickets for the human league concert in paradiso. i hope they will play some of their early stuff, instead of ‘human’ and ‘together in electric dreams’.

there was an original copy of the joy division – licht und blindheit single on ebay. it was sold for 560 euro / $660,00, which i belief is not especially expensive. 1578 copies were produced of the original on the french sordide sentimentale label. even later bootleg copies are often quite rare and expensive. check […]

finally obtained the first sonne hagal release, the sinnreger 10″ on eis & licht. I realize that I almost have a complete collection of this label now, with 2 or 3 exceptions.

i was pleasantly surprised by the saturn recordstore in leipzig, not only by their large stock, but especially their listening facilities. all the cd’s are in their cases, and you can insert them yourself in one of the cd-players at the large listening stand, without having to beg the staff if you can listen to […]

dramatic news for all connaisseurs of fine music! the german duo modern talking has split up. dieter bohlen and thomas anders, who brought us such timeless classics as ‘brother louie’, ‘cheri cheri lady’, ‘you can win if you want’ and ‘you’re my heart – you’re my soul’, are apparently not on speaking terms anymore. the […]

Went to a Nick Cave concert yesterday in a sold-out Music Hall in Amsterdam. What a great energetic performer is that man! Nice moves and passionate vocals… The Bad Seeds were powerful too, despite the absence of Blixa Bargeld, to which Nick referred a couple of times at the beginning of the show. But two […]

now and then i discover a band which name i have known for years, but which music was fairly unknown to me. a while back i was pleasantly surprised by the australian group the triffids. their retrospective ‘australian melodrama’ has an appropriate title, with many great melancholic guitar tunes with nice classical elements. this week […]

now and then i can’t resist to the sounds of the neue deutsche welle. bought two records this week: fehlfarben – monarchie und alltag, with the classic hit ‘ein jahr (es geht voran)’ and the 12″ ‘der arbeiter’ by kowalski with a more steelwork industrial sound…

made a fruitful visit to the local secondhand stores yesterday. two bel canto cd ‘s, as well as vinyl from trisomie 21, click click, poesie noire, the invincible spirit & more…

i hope i’m not too tired to visit the electronation party (flyer) tonight in ekko, utrecht, with ‘the old fat sleazy synthesizer sound from the new wave 80s combined with the newest neo futuristic sounds and attitudes of electroclash’.

the pia fraus concert at the gruis party last saturday was very intense and original. so intense that a ventilator caught fire… unfortunately a belgian visitor tried to extinguish it with his hands, which resulted in some burn wounds. after a visit to the hospital and two bandaged hands he returned to the party…

daf has made a good come-back this year. just watched their nice video ‘der sheriff’, which you can view at the daf website.

a yearly event in holland is ‘queens day’, when we celebrate the birthday of the queen’s mother. one of the most popular happenings on this day are the ‘free fairs’, when everyone can sell his old junk in the streets. whole cities turn into bric-a-brac markets. of course i always wander around looking for some […]

in 1980 the joy division flexidisc ‘komakino/incubation’ was given away by factory records as a promotional gimmick. anyone who asked for it in a record store received a free copy. there were many thousands of copies pressed of the single, so there would be enough copies for ages. despite a statement on the cover that […]

at fabchannel.com you can watch live webcasts and archived complete concerts, of various artists that played in the paradiso club in amsterdam. some of the acts included are sonic youth, elastica, guided by voices, motorpsycho, nightwish, the residents…

visited a hekate concert at easter in the legendary zwischenfall in bochum. though i’ve seen better hekate concerts in the past, i appreciated the fact that they played quite some new songs, including a few good and surprising ones. a few pictures will follow later in the concerts section…

today it’s list mania on various dutch radio stations…unfortunately i have to work, so i can’t listen to the alternative kinky 101 of kink fm, the all-time top 100 of veronica, the album top 100 @ radio 2 or the best classic rock tracks at arrow…

just returned from the huge record fair, which is held twice a year in utrecht. all my muscles ache from bending and stretching to boxes with records in impossible corners on the floor… now listening to one of my acquisitions, siglo xx: re-released ’80-’82.

watched a fine documentary about syd barrett yesterday on tv. his story remains one of the most fascinating mysteries in rock history. syd wrote some of the best early experimental pink floyd songs (like ‘arnold layne’, ‘see emily play’ or the album ‘the piper at the gates of dawn’), but completely lost the track, probably […]

i love wandering around at fleamarkets. it always gives the feeling of treasure hunting. this weekend i found the original 1981 classic 7″ single of no more, ‘suicide commando’, for not more than 0,50 euro.