After a slow start I’ve finally, slightly reluctantly, got into the Edinburgh Festival spirit. Although I enjoyed covering shows as a reviewer for the Edinburgh Evening News many moons ago, I have to admit I also have mixed feelings about it – after all the huge influx of tourists and increased pedestrian and road traffic is an almighty hassle for residents who are working and trying to get on with their lives (of quiet desperation – or is that just me).

However a lot of this is just bitterness because every time I’ve gone out during the festival I’ve had a brilliant laugh, an it’s most likely that my mixed feelings are just based on my jealousy of all the lucky swines who are prancing around for  month getting boozed up while I have to get up for work.

Because of this I never really get round to sitting down and planning to attend any fringe shows, but if the opportunity comes up through a friend I’m more than happy to go along to something. And it’s hard to beat boozing outside, shaking random celebrities’ hands and telling them ‘I love your work’ (at the weekend I drunkenly accosted the bloke from the Gadget Show and renowned luvvy Alan Cumming both of whom were very friendly, if slightly terrified) and taking advantage of the extended opening hours (5am!) at least once during August.

BROKEN RECORDS & BART FROM EAGLEOWL AT LACH’S ANTIHOOT

As usual I’m more attracted to the music stuff that’s happening – the only actual show I’ve been to so far was Lach’s Antihoot on Saturday night – again it was unexpected, I’d been at the cinema and got a text from Dylan who told me Bart from eagleowl was playing. As the Antihoot only starts at half past midnight and goes on to 3, I couldn’t resist hopping on a nightbus after seeing the film at Ocean Terminal  (Inception – which I thought was very good indeed).

The antihoot is on at the Gilded Balloon Nightclub at Teviot (tickets), which was packed and really buzzing, and as well as Bart’s short but sinister song which I think was called ‘Don’t Put That in Your Mouth’ or something similarly suggestive (the video below was suspiciously similar),  the guys from Broken Records played a couple of songs from their new album, both of which sounded great.

We were also treated to an extract from the late night Fringe comedy show ‘Lesbian Bathhouse’ which featured some surprisingly raunchy wet t-shirt action, and other treats included an inspired monologue about vans by the bizarre comedian Paul Foot, a brilliant RnB parody by ‘HP’s mate whose name escapes me’ who has sadly not recorded any of his songs yet but MUST (Pub Grub is a classic) – and a really varied selection of stand-up and songs, most of which was very good, some of which was amusing for all the wrong reasons, but which ultimately led to an extremely entertaining night.

FAMOUS DRUNK & THE DEVIL’S BUTTERMILKERS DO LACH’S ANTIHOOT

Being a masochist, and despite being stressed to the max every time I attempt to play live (and never learning that if I actually practiced the guitar it might make it less traumatic) I’ve signed up to play the antihoot next Saturday night. Having played the Sidewalk Café in New York where the antihoot has been for years, I couldn’t really not take part when Lach brought it to Edinburgh. My friend Iain and I are playing as ‘Famous Drunk’ – and then he and his lovely lady Aileen will be taking to the stage as ‘The Devil’s Buttermilkers’ (you might guess the connection if you’ve been reading the blog recently!).

WITHERED HAND,  STEVE MASON & RETREAT!

I’m also hoping to go and see my favourite Edinburgh-based songwriter Withered Hand and the legend that is Steve Mason (The Beta Band/King Biscuit Time/Black Affair) who are playing as part of the Edge Festival. Also, hotly tipped locals The Last Battle are supporting Mr Hand, and I’ve not had a chance to see them yet so that would also be a good reason to go.

Then the following weekend is the return of the wonderful Retreat! Festival which has a stellar line up of Edinburgh’s best bands (including that bloke Withered Hand again).  I can’t overstate the importance of promoters like Bart and Emily from Retreat!, and Tallah from the Antihoot for making sure the best local acts are involved in the festival this year more than ever before, and actually convincing me to leave the house – not an easy task.

Free Retreat! Sampler:

I talked about the latest Fencezine on this month’s podcast and included King Creosote’s lovely version of Withered Hand’s No Cigarettes from the accompanying CD ‘On Behalf of My Wife and I’. Unfortunately it seems this issue has now sold out, so it seems rather cruel to be writing more about it, but at least one person (ok, one person) has asked for more info on the tracklisting so here goes (and get yourself over to the Beefboard on fencerecords.com to make sure you find out about the next issue before they sell out again).

other KC tunes on the album are the sprightly ‘Your Psycho Boyfriend’, and the more mournful ‘All I Ask’ and ‘Well Done’. Then we get some extremely lo-fi action from Mr Hand himself, with Panda Eyes, before No Cigarettes kicks in, and what an awesome version it is. 

Next we get Takeaway Food from the Religious Songs EP, a wee instrumental number and then three more KC tunes: ‘Only This Exam’, a demo version of Rims in which those DISGUSTING chorus lyrics are much more audible than on the album version, and ‘I Fall At the Last Hurdle’.

Oh and the last song will remain a secret because I’ve got the feeling KC would prefer it that way.. but I will tell you, it’s a lovely wee collection of songs by two of my favourite songwriters.

It has all of WH’s favourite themes, dysfunctional relationships, lapsed religion, and self-deprecation, not to mention beautiful banjos, harmonies and other such gorgeousness. Christmas starts here!

Get ‘It’s a Wonderful Lie’ Here.

 Clearly I have gone wrong with my writing style. From now on I will be including a bizarre mixture of praise and personal abuse in each review. Or maybe you have to be arch-drude/nutjob Julian Cope to get away with that kind of thing.

This review of Withered Hand by Cope is probably the strangest thing I have read for a while, in which the Cope calls him a “wimp singer” and says he needs a good slapping, yet appears to rather like him at the same time, saying he is both “heroic” and “a catchy bastard”. Read it yourself here (he also reviews WH’s mates Paul Vickers and The Leg)

p.s. I will be doing an update on my 100 Days efforts to ‘get my shit together’ at the weekend.

Update: Following on from Digital Plamf’s comment below, here’s a song from the Bill Drummond album Cope refers to:

Bill Drummond – Julian Cope is Dead

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