Why are we so awed and drawn to what we recognise? I just got an email from a production company boasting that their trade show would be visited by "big names". I fail to see the importance of this to an exhibition with the trade of goods at it's heart...and yet we see it all around us all the time - the cult of celebrity, of requiring recognition without necessarily having any substance to back it up seems to be where culture is at at the moment.

The festivals this summer seem to have become headline hunters again - whilst this has always been the goal of commercial festivals, it's disheartening to find that even the smaller, experience-orientated festivals have fallen foul as well...which of course is very bad news indeed for us and partially why you're unlikely to see Digitonal at any of the summer festivals this year (apart from the WAY cool firegathering which you should all come to anyway cause they are sound and experimental and don't give a toss if you've sold a million records and have your face in the magazines - as long as your vibe is right, you're booked!).

Maybe this all sounds like whinging from me, or maybe I'm totally wrong about it, but I can't help but think that the value of any piece of culture right now is directly linked to popularity or, even more importantly, recognition/fame...and I can't think of any creative period in history where this was of benefit to the work produced.

I'd be lying of course if I said I was disappointed with the response we've had from festival bookers. It's not like we're unproven in the live arena (unless of course our crapness on the Bays tour has been registered), and we've got a new lineup, new material, new product and lots of new things to say this year. But the silence has been deafening - almost all the major and indie festies contacted, and only one booking (and response in fact). I'm especially gutted because I'm really proud of this album and I think that those that hear us will love it (and therefore buy it!) and in these times of seriously dangerously low record sales, this will be vital for our future. But if people can't hear the music without having actively sought it out (which most internet solutions require), then how will they know to buy it, since we are not a recognised "name"? All the specialist radio shows that would have played us have gone (bar the Late Junction I suppose). There's no tv coverage for left of centre bands...and now even the festivals, which would have allowed us to play to a few hundred people that had never heard of us, don't want to know unless we are a "draw". Seems hard to know what to do to get this album heard. I suspect that some creative solutions are going to be required!

Some big changes in the planning for this site and for the band at the moment and more on those soon.

Lord Bunn does our cover art. Very beautifully I might add. He recently sent me some illustrated text for the new album...in amongnst the files, I found this:

Bless him...;op

I don't even know where to start:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdxcYHvseUA

On Saturday night, suffering from a lack of sleep due to a 4am gig at Synergy - more about that later...it was excellent but utterly baffling - I just didn't realise that parties like that still existed), I went to see Rachel Unthank and the Winterset at the Borderline in Charing Cross Road. The venue is a dive bar acoustic/folk/country venue that I hadn't been to in years and was basically the same as it always was, minus the smoke filled ceiling. Over the next few hours I was treated to an absolute lesson in how great live music is at it's best. First, courtesy of a young man called John Smith. He was one of those guys that you can't believe that voice is coming out of that face. Kind of like the guy from Gomez. Genius guitarist as well and a fine merchant of angry, melancholy murder ballads. Reminded me of Gravenhurst in places, without the soft sweetness that makes Nick Talbot's stuff so unnerving. Anyway, genius from start to finish.

Next up Rachel Unthank and her band. This is the 3rd time I've seen them live, once again with a lineup change, and playing to a bigger audience than I've been used to seeing them with. Once again though, it was impeccable. I've talking a lot about them here before so I won't go into it, other than to say that Becky Unthank did her cover of Robert Wyatt's Sea Song which utterly mesmerised me, despite it being one of my least favourite tracks from the last album. I've not stopped playing it today, and even wandered over to iTunes to pick up Rock Bottom, the Wyatt album that the original song is on. Beautiful stuff, with awesome lyrics...something that's lifting my spirit today as I sway along to it...

Sea Song by Robert Wyatt.

You look different every time you come
From the foam-crested brine
Your skin shining softly in the moonlight
Partly fish, partly porpoise, partly baby sperm whale
Am I yours? Are you mine to play with?

Joking apart - when you're drunk you're terrific when you're drunk
I like you mostly late at night you're quite alright
But I can't understand the different you in the morning
When it's time to play at being human for a while please smile!

You'll be different in the spring, I know
You're a seasonal beast like the starfish that drift in with the tide
So until your blood runs to meet the next full moon
You're madness fits in nicely with my own
Your lunacy fits neatly with my own, my very own
We're not alone

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cWq3mIp4cU

33 today...and more optimistic than I could possibly have hoped for on entering this year.

The album done, some very exicting bookings coming in, and some true romance in my life to boot! It's all good basically.

I got the train in this morning to the sound of Autechre's new album. Typically obtuse, despite opening with an awesome Amber-esque tune...and yet...there is something irresistable about Autechre, even at their most unlistenable. Something which keeps you from skipping on, and keeps it at the top of the playlist. I can't quite describe it other than to say that it's like listening to the future, always. In a time where mediocrity rules popular culture like never before, we need the Autechres of the world, forging a new idea of what music is. My guess is that we'll all catch up with them at some point in the future.

Bravo chaps!