DavidNichols

the video is amazing

Dusken Lights are playing at the Grace Darling in July.

Listening to On the Media right now!!!

these guys are now in dusken lights

Two of them are, anyway.

What is this image meant to convey!!!

Well, when you're a member of a band you know they have new records coming out before you read about it on the internet. That's how I'd define it, anyway.

Thanks for your interest electricsound. Yes there was also a vinyl version mastered (and test-pressed in 1991) of the third album Caveat Emptor which has fewer tracks but is all the superior versions of the songs - the CD, which is the only thing that was issued ultimately, was the afterthought and a dog's breakfast. However, as yet no-one has expressed much interest in releasing that - it's a catch 22, the CD album wasn't much good, so no-one loves it, so no-one's that excited by the notion that the LP's a lot better - the archetypal polished turd.

Talks ongoing about reissuing the first two Cannanes albums on vinyl and CD via very fine US label. I have not been a member of the Cannanes since 1996 btw - getting close to twenty years.

OK, it IS just a preference and/or a state of mind.

I gave this some further thought when I was in the supermarket this morning and got some almost ripe bananas. I think Tom Verlaine is incredible, and I'd be very interested to hear what he thought was a good song for Television in 2013, ie. I would be very up for new songs, not just and perhaps not even old songs. I am a fan of Television, I like Pere Ubu even more (Modern Dance is not my favourite of their albums though) and the notion of David Thomas thirty five years later with people he has hired to be a band called Pere Ubu play songs from that album is just a freaky idea of either a nutty joke or just not entertainment, so I would put Television playing Marquee Moon in the same category. But I had my moment of enlightenment seeing The Fall in 1983 when people were calling out for Totally Wired which was probably about 18 months old at that point and the group refusing to play it, and instead playing songs either from Room to Live (which had yet to come out) or maybe at a pinch Hex Enduction Hour but nothing older. It was a really good lesson in how, if you want to stay relevant, you have to keep moving forward. I guess my attitude is that this should go for audiences as well as performers.

About ten years ago I went to see a reformed Models with the pre-Mushroom line up (Ash Wednesday, Mark Ferrie etc) and it was definitely a great show but a friend I went with joked about how for a really authentic experience what you'd do is have people 20+ years younger playing the members of the pre-Mushroom Models (and that they should act out throwing Ash Wednesday out of the band as part of their show). Young men with a bit of gumption and spirit could probably do that material as well if not better than the original men (except of course part of the gumption and spirit of the original men was related to the fact that they were doing something new and bold). So what is 'Pere Ubu' circa 2013 in relation to Pere Ubu circa 1978? There is one person in common, and in that case it is a man of enormous talent and capacity whose recent work is excellent - but that's by the by - in terms of the 1978 PU he was one member, NOT the only songwriter and in fact that group was a democratic institution in its creative output and running. That group no longer exists.

Television 2013 I guess is a different phenomenon, 1/2 the original band and 3/4 of a long standing lineup. For what that's worth. So when you see them on stage, you know that three of them were actually there when those songs were originally recorded. I couldn't care less about these things but I assume that's part of what people want to experience? This is what I'm grappling with, and while this might look like a diatribe, frankly it is just born of confusion and incomprehension. If they're valid artists, they're valid artists, and their work as they choose to perform it is interesting in itself. If they're a cover band of their younger selves, what is good about that? Why is it better than listening to the record? And what does anyone get out of listening to old songs in an album track sequence played by some or all of the people who originally played them?*

Oh, and also, when it comes to live music, isn't new stuff (particularly by 'new people') better than old stuff? I mean, as a general rule. Maybe that's at the heart of my failure to understand the appeal. And probably just a personal preference.

*Also if someone acted as Richard Hell and tried to get the band to play 'Blank Generation' and then got thrown out of the group, would that enhance the experience?