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terzomondo's blog
| Wednesday, July 5th, 2006
China Crisis
 Interesting article this morning in, well, you know which paper I'm talking about. It seems that record labels in the U.S. are thinking of taking legal action against the Chinese Yahoo for what they call "deep links" to copyright material. Shame on them. You wouldn't find that happening on sites in the U.S., I'm sure ...
Actually, it says that pirated CDs and DVDs account for more than 85% of the domestic  market, which is incredible if you think about it. I recently visited the site of a distributor based in Hong Kong that promotes one of Mondo Blu's featured artists and they have a "No-CDR" guarantee. To western eyes, this is totally bizarre, but it does bring home the point. In short, there are lots of question marks surrounding Yahoo in China, especially if you haven't got the right fonts installed (see top right image)!
Posted By terzomondo @ 5:16 AM | Comments: 0 |
| Monday, July 3rd, 2006
Love Trap(p)
 Today's article is about the search for an unknown to play the role of Maria in Andrew Lloyd-Webber's production of The Sound Of Music. Not fascinating in itself, you may argue (I agree), except that it has been turned into a reality show, where the finalists take part in a "Maria School" and are then voted off by the panel of experts and the viewers. So a kind of Pop Idol / Star Academy / Operación Triunfo where they decide who does the best yodelling on The Lonely Goatherd (go on, do it, you know you want to).
But of course, this will all be done, as Kenny Everett used to say, in the best POSSIBLE taste, Michael. Ths is serious TV, here. And for the life of me I can't think of a good joke to make, because there must be a million hiding in there. Any ideas?
Posted By terzomondo @ 5:53 AM | Comments: 0 |
| Saturday, July 1st, 2006
Thin Line Between Love And Hate
Now, a mystery for you. This man over here  is Rainer Hardt, German guitarist, also known as Rainer Hass, which apparently means "Pure Hate" in German. While browsing around the isound website, I found a page about him, the story of a talented but unsuccessful musician, who was later diagnosed as schizophrenic and finally took his own life in 1943. It's a fascinating read and when you listen to the track provided there - Me and My Baby - you hear a man who played like Django Reinhardt and who could definitely turn a good tune. Which makes you want to find out more. The label that discovered his music (or what was smuggled out of Germany to the U.S., according to the bio) is one that specialises for the most part in cheerful, death-related bands and rejoices under the name of Deathwax Records. So far, so spooky.
The homepage for Rainer Hass includes more photos, more or less the same bio and another track from the classic that is "Live In Leipzig 1930". The site owners claim that the master copies of Hass's work are still being processed, which means that an eventual CD of his won't be released until later this year. Dead end, if you'll pardon the expression.
A quick look at the label forum pulled up a really strange result: Hass is the subject of a page on myspace, wih the now-familiar bio and a "new" track called "Death". It must be wonderful for him, 63 years after his death, to be part of such a great community and interact with so many people. Curioser...
To round off the search, the wikipedia, rare record dealers gemm and the Encyclopaedia Britannica (God Bless Her) have nothing on Rainer Hass / Hardt, so you're left with the overwhelming feeling that this is a beautifully-constructed hoax similar to a Zelig or Citizen Kane. In any case, the story is intriguing and the music is great. Whoever's doing it knows their stuff and I salute them.
If anyone finds out any more about Mr. Pure Hate, please let me know!
Posted By terzomondo @ 11:36 AM | Comments: 0 |
| Saturday, July 1st, 2006
Calling Elvis
First off, a couple of links for you to read later from my paper - a great blog post about the Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and his love for Elvis and then an article about French group / project Nouvelle Vague, who have reworked a number of 80s hits on accordion and suchlike. Not new but definitely new to me. Sounds like a lot of fun and will have to check that one out ...
 Now some more investigation, provoked by a "I-bet-you've-never-heard-of" comment from a student of mine. And they were right. Well, the band in question is The Chameleons and in fact, they did ring a bell, albeit rather a small, dinner table kind as opposed to an "Esmeralda". First stop: a fan site called rateyourmusic which has a very informative bio and discography of this Manchester group, also known as The Chameleons UK. Then there's artistdirect, whch I still consider to be a con because it has numerous pages without content and acts like one of those multi-link marketing sites. In this case, if you can fight your way through all the banners, I have to admit that their content is pretty good (bio and streamed song fragments). But no free music downloads, as their page titles state.
On isound, which I seem to be mentioning a lot recently, there's a rather strangely-written bio which is nevertheless interesting, plus links to Amazon and their reviews, but no music to listen to, unfortunately. A commendable also-ran is the Pride of Manchester site. This brings together links and comment from all walks of life related to the city and it's just a shame that this particular page has no content, because the idea is a great one. Somebody please go write a bio or something and fill that page!
Moving on, AOL Music, despite tons of banners again, also has songs you can listen to from a live album and surprise, a link to the official website, where you can find that they are actually back together now and touring. So how is it their website doesn't appear in the Top 100 or so results on Google for The Chameleons? They should know ...
Finally, RedSunRecords is an online store which has the best collection of band and solo projects for those interested in completing their discography.
After all that, all that's left for me is to go and listen to their music and when I do, I'll let you know!
Posted By terzomondo @ 11:30 AM | Comments: 0 |
| Sunday, June 25th, 2006
New Frontier
Well, after barely a day on isound, this is beginning to look like a seriously good decision. Thanks to the people who have already asked to be friends of Mondo Blu - this is why I'm here. I will drop by your pages soon and listen to your music.
Mondo Blu Radio is about 2 things: variety and accessibility, so I'm especially interested in work that can appeal to lovers of different genres.
Anyway, hope to see around here soon!
Posted By terzomondo @ 10:57 AM | Comments: 0 |
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