Followers of Revival Records over on maston or, over time, various other social media sites will have seen me mention this obscure oddity before.

It was found in a box of 7-inch singles from an old record shop close down, in the days when they were closing down and not opening up like today! It looks, to me, handmade or at least home produced, and is possibly a promo single for something? It could just be a vanity project or a bunch of kids having a laugh and self-recording for fun.

The ‘label’ is Idiot Records but not sure that means anything concrete.

I have/had it pinned to my profile for a while now in the hope somebody will eventually come across it and have an aha! moment. Last night, somebody requested the audio to see if it rang any bells, and it reminded me that I did record it and clean it up a bit many years ago – luckily I found it easily this morning as I’d also imported it into iTunes back then.

So here it is in all its glory. It’s been years now so I’m not expecting anybody to suddenly recognise it, but if anybody does know, or remembers a time when they were young, foolish and in a daft band called The LDV’s, then please do let me know!

The post The LDVs – Video It! appeared first on SoundHog.

I have been messing around with apple shortcuts lately and now have three I’m really quite pleased with – I am sharing them here with the caveat that they may not do what you need or want them to do! Please do use them as a base for your own though, or as inspiration for other stuff. The more I think about and get to know how shortcuts work the more things I think of adding in or creating. For example I haven’t even started looking at APIs yet, and if I can get the Discogs API working with it then that opens up many possibilities.

For now though, here are the three I am regularly using.

Create Songlink URL & Copy To Clipboard

This I find really useful for hashtag games on mastodon, or for simply sharing a track with family friends via Signal etc.

The basic flow is:

• Get details of now playing track in Apple Music
• Build URL based on songlink syntax and in markdown format
• Copy URL to clipboard

Then you can paste that URL anywhere you like – I use it for music hashtag games and it saves a lot of typing!

Grab it here

Post Now Playing Track to Mastodon & Buffer

This takes the songlink URL further and uses it to post details about the currently played track in Apple Music.

The basic flow is:

• Get details of now playing track in Apple Music.
• Build URL based on songlink syntax
• Uses a few regular expressions to clean up artist and track names for hashtags
• Checks if the file is local or cloud and sets that to a MusicLocation variable
• Prompt for extra comments (or leave blank)
• Build the post body
• Post to mastodon via Mona

Grab it here

Music Recognition to Mastodon & Buffer

This does a similar job but takes the track details from Shazam.

The basic flow is:

• Open Shazam and recognise music (error if no song found)
• Save track to playlist of your choice
• Get current location
• Read in tracks in Apple Music playlist and get latest item
• Get track details
• Save track artwork to local folder
• Create basic Alt Text for image (working to improve this)
• Use regular expressions to tidy artist name for hashtag
• Prompt for music recognition source – user can put things like a TV programme or venue/restaurant etc.
• Create image attachment from local folder (based on artwork above)
• Build post
• Post to mastodon

Grab it here

I’ll build some more out over the coming weeks and months and post them here if I think they will be of interest.

Let me know if you use them and if you find them useful!

The post No Shortcuts In Life appeared first on SoundHog.

My physical media of choice happens to be vinyl LPs. I have waxed lyrical (no pun intended) on why this is before, here and on mastodon, so I won’t go into the reasons for choosing this format. Suffice to say vinyl is very important to me for many reasons.

So here are my ten albums.

The Who – Quadrophenia

This is the album I have had and held the longest. My brother took me into Our Price records in Croydon for my birthday (I was 14) and told me to choose a record. I went straight to this, and I still have that copy on my shelves. I have had it for 40 years and have never, ever grown bored of it. You’ll have to prise this album from my cold dead hands when I’m gone.

The Who – Tommy

I flip flop between Quadrophenia and Tommy when asked what the best album of all time is. It all depends on when I listened to each one last, or how I’m feeling, or the weather or something. I don’t know, but they are both truly excellent and groundbreaking in their own ways. Tommy is a masterclass of telling a story through music, an art form that few have ever matched.

The Jam – All Mod Cons

For me this is the moment The Jam came of age. The first two albums are excellent and an undeniable tour de force from a band and songwriter so young, but All Mod Cons remains my favourite. Weller’s genius at song crafting is obvious throughout. The iconic imagery on the cover and inserts shaped how me and my mates dressed for quite some time!

Billy Bragg – Brewing Up With Billy Bragg

I think I have seen Billy Bragg live the most of any artist. From his early days carrying around his amp and speakers in his rucksack, I followed him on Red Wedge tours with The Style Council, The Communards etc. and, latterly, on solo gigs. His music was an absolute eye opener and a breath of fresh air. It’s not an exaggeration to say Billy shaped my political views, as well as sang the most perfect and painful love songs. He understood a generation perfectly.

Secret Affair – Business As Usual

I realise as I type this that this list is fuelled by nostalgia. Secret Affair were part of my youth in a big way. I was quite young when the whole mod revival thing kicked off, but just old enough to be enthralled by it all. I went all in. There are many, many exceptional albums from that era and that movement, but this is the one that means the most to me.

Jethro Tull – Thick As A Brick

I came to Tull relatively late. I had heard them before but for some reason had always dismissed them as slightly odd or a bit stuffy. I was SO wrong. When I got them, I really got them, and I became obsessed for a while. Thick As A Brick (another concept album – a definite theme developing) is by some way my favourite of theirs.

The Smiths – The Queen is Dead

A remarkable album from a seminal band. Yes, Morrissey is a shitty person now. I don’t know how or why that happened but I still believe he wasn’t a shitty person back then. Either way, I choose to ignore that and continue to love this album, and I make no apologies for that decision.

XTC – Skylarking

I could have chosen any XTC album, especially English Settlement, but Skylarking is the one I have the most nostalgia for and memories of. I have mentioned a few times that one of my best friends’ dad managed XTC so I had early access to this album, and others – we absolutely played it to death all summer. A great, great album.

Green Day – Dookie

This album coincided with me falling in love. My now wife and I would listen to it back to back in the car and it holds a special place in my heart because of this. It’s a great album, but it wouldn’t be on this list without those memories. As it is, I couldn’t be without it. I didn’t get this on vinyl until relatively recently.

The Beatles – Abbey Road

Over time, Abbey Road has become my favourite Beatles album. It’s a masterpiece. The medley on side 2 is some of the best music I have heard. In any case, I couldn’t in all consciousness leave The Beatles out and this album pips the other ones to the post, which is no mean feat.

So that’s it. An exercise in futility, maybe, these lists always are, but those are the ten albums I’d currently save from a burning house. They have been with me through thick and thin, are old friends, and I hope remain friends for many years to come!

The post Ten Albums To Take To The Grave appeared first on SoundHog.