Terminates Here

229 posts

Update – January 2022

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Hi everyone, and a belated Happy 2022.  I haven’t posted much on here lately, whilst the emergence of the Omicron variant has kept me from picking up the DJing once again.  I have, however, been writing.  I’ve decided that I’ll never have time write every listeners guide I want to, so have instead decided to change course and once again attempt to write a print-to-paper book. 

This is my third attempt at such a thing, but this time I’m 20,000 words in and with plenty more to come, I’m confident of success this time.  The underlying concept is ‘Songs that defined a scene’.  I’ll reveal more as writing progresses.  As for publishing – I’m hoping that aspect can be crowdfunded, but I won’t ask for any money until the first draft is mostly complete. 

I’m otherwise alive and well, and happy to continue with this project at my own pace.  I’ll post updates when there’s news.  Until then, I wish you all the best with whatever it is you’re all doing these days.  Hopefully we’ll all meet again soon.

Diary of Dreams – A Listener’s Guide

Article Listeners Guide

The second consecutive Listener’s Guide to be about a band from Deutschland beginning with ‘D’, but that’s the point at which the similarities end.  The DAF listener’s guide was written as a somewhat delayed tribute to Gabi Delgado, who died on the eve of the initial COVID lockdown (thankfully not from said disease itself), only for my writing to get totally derailed as my creativity ground to a standstill along with the rest of the world.  I eventually completed it, but the significance of the timing was lost.

This guide, however, has been a long time coming.  It’s about a band who have featured frequently in my DJ sets and past playlists.  I wrote about them frequently back in my EOL-Audio days.  And yet I’ve found their works remain somewhat under-appreciated amongst many of those who’s tastes I otherwise share.  Too “goth” for the industrial kollectiv, too electronic for the goth-rock puritans.  Too dark in tone for the casual listener, but too song-oriented for experimental elitists.   

It’s time to tell you all what you’ve been missing out on.

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Listeners Guides Updated

News

Hello, anyone out there?

Despite the reopening of the outside world, I for one am not ready to rejoin it.  The next listeners guide is well underway at least.  However, I’ve taken a short diversion to bring two of the existing guides up to 2021 spec.  It’s a pity I didn’t have more interesting material to work with, but for those who care one way or the other, you can read what I thought of the recents Wumpscut and Fear Factory albums.  These are not ‘reviews’ as such, just updates to the story I’d already told.  

Anyway, back to the next epic.  Who was it who said “You Cannot Help, Where Your Help Is Not Wanted”?  That’s both a massive hint, and the story of the past few months.  See you on the other side.

Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft – A Listener’s Guide

Article Listeners Guide

I’ve long had issue with how poorly bands from continental Europe are covered when the Anglo/American music journos cover a particular genre.  Even when the bands in question sing in English.  Bands singing in any other tongue are a particularly hard sell, but every now and again, a notable project breaks through.  And Deutsch-Amerikanische Freundschaft (DAF from here on) stand out in this very small grouping due to the way they achieved a cult following in the UK a couple of decades before anyone had heard of Rammstein.  This achievement was not despite the fact that they sung in German, but in many respects because of it. 

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Fear Factory – A Listener’s Guide

Article Listeners Guide

What do you mean, Fear Factory?  Why are you profiling a METAL band, Jonny?  Has the Listener’s Guide series jumped the shark already?  I’m pre-emptively calling out these potential criticisms, because I’ve got the rest of this guide to prove to you all that this is a band worth writing about. 

And they are a band with significant links to my own musical journey.  The first “metal” band I developed a taste for, and the first I saw live.  “Saw” is actually an understatement – heard, felt, smelt and otherwise lived through in every possible sense.  It was thanks to Rhys Fulber’s involvement on some of their most notable albums that I discovered Front Line Assembly, an act who themselves were hugely influential in the development of my tastes in the years to come.

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Update – April 2021

News

It’s been a while since I’ve even logged into this site. Curiously, the DJ Terminates Here Facebook page is still getting likes despite me having done nothing to earn them in recent times. I thought you all at least deserved an update. I’m still alive and so far avoided the Coronavirus. However, long-running mental health issues, which are only partially related to the pandemic and subsequent lockdowns have results in a severe hit to my productivity in the past year.

I’m beginning to find a route out, but it’s early days. DJ Terminates Here will as a result remain closed until it is possible for full-audience events to be safely held once more – indeed, my lack of activity and personal circumstances mean I’m unlikely to be first in-line for a real-world return. The good news is – the writing it on its way back. I have a half-finished Listeners Guide which should be published here soon.

In the meantime, I have updated the half-dozen existing guides to 2021-spec, so there’s something new to read, even if you’ll have to scroll a lot to find it.

Update – August 2020

News

Hi, thought I’d write a little here as I seem to be getting ‘Likes’ on Facebook despite zero activity! I’m still alive and staying out of harm’s way – however, I decided some time ago that DJ Terminates Here will remain “Closed for the Duration”.

I will return once full-audience events are once again possible in a safe manner – however. I find it difficult to gain any satisfaction from playing in empty rooms, and as the online audience has been well catered for so far by others, I don’t feel any need to cram another event into the virtual schedules.

I do hope to resume writing about music soon, with the focus on what I think I do best, long-form ‘deep dive’ articles, going places where the music journo establishment dares not go (or doesn’t even acknowledge the existence of). One may ask why I haven’t spent lockdown obsessively doing so already – I would only request “No questions, please” on that one.

Similarly, my plans to write a print-to-paper book (focusing on the UK scene post-1991) were hit on several levels by the pandemic. It’s still possible that some of the text will appear in article form but the project as original mooted simply isn’t possible in the current environment.

40 Albums – 40 Days

Article

Terminates Here DJ activity has obviously had to stop due to the COVID-19 outbreak. Whilst I did consider the idea of DJ sets delivered remotely, it seems every other DJ in London has had the same idea, and without an established club to back me up or even access to a decent camera, I doubt I could sell it well. So instead I went back to writing. In early March, I was challenged to do the “10 Albums – 10 Days” meme on my personal Facebook. I’d done it before back in 2018, and the results became an article on this site, but with little else to do with my evenings, I decided to go for another round. Only not stop at 10, eventually clocking up 40 before deciding to call it quits.

A few points – firstly, as I chose albums around which I could spin a tale, there’s relatively little recent music covered here. If you wish to read about albums dating from the past decade, there’s a countdown of 2010s albums over at A Model Of Control. Also note that these albums are in no order – I simply picked one each day, listened to it a couple of times, then wrote the story. To preserve the writing and allow a wider audience to enjoy the journey, I’ve turned this series into an article here. A few have been modified for accuracy and to reflect changed context, and I’ve added explanations where a couple of selections coincided with certain events. But the text is essentially intact. So let’s begin…..

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DJ Terminates Here vs DJ The Scot – March 2020

DJ Setlist

And then over the road for our Open Request List event….all except the first few and final run are requests.

Set 1

The Velvet Underground – Venus In Furs
The Beatles – While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Bonzo Dog Band – I’m The Urban Spaceman
The Rolling Stones – Paint It Black
Patti Smith – Dancing Barefoot
Lene Lovich – Lucky Number
Kate Bush – Running Up That Hill
Depeche Mode – Black Celebration
Japan – Quiet Life
Siouxsie & The Banshees – Cities In Dust

Set 2

Tool – Schism
Lindemann – Knebel
Die Krupps – Vision 2020 Vision
Liaisons Dangereuses – Los niños del parque
Black Light Ascension – Club Death
The Sisters of Mercy – Marian
Killing Joke – Love Like Blood
The Cult – Resurrection Joe
Thin Lizzy – Jailbreak
T.Rex – Children Of The Revolution
The Leather Nun – Ride Into Your Town
Metallica – For Whom The Bell Tolls
Soundgarden – Black Hole Sun
Alice In Chains – Rooster

Set 3

Iris – Closer To Real
Wolfsheim – Once In A Lifetime
Project Pitchfork – I Live Your Dream
Alexander Veljanov – The Wind
The Sisters Of Mercy – The Damage Done
The Pretenders – Stop Your Sobbing
Florence and the Machine – Shake It Out
The KVB – Captives

Final Tag-Team

Scott’s tracks are in italics.

Soviet Soviet – Rainbow
Agent Side Grinder – Life In Advance
NIN – The Lovers
:Wumpscut: – Hold (Kirlian Camera Remix)
Radiohead – Idioteque
Underworld – Stagger
Leftfield – Swords
Faithless – Drifting Away
Portishead – The Rip
Bat For Lashes – In God’s House
Goldfrapp – Annabel

Outro: Ramin Djawadi feat Serj Tankian – The Rains Of Castamere

Alternative Bring’n’Buy Sale – March 2020

DJ Setlist

Back for the first daytime set of 2020 (actually the first anywhere).  As the event fell on International Women’s Day, Scott and I both played a larger-than-usual number of tracks featuring female artists.

Set 1 – 10:20am-11:45am

Underworld feat. Evelyn Glennie – And I Will Kiss
Kruder & Dorfmeister – Original Bedroom Rockers
Massive Attack – Inertia Creeps
Sneaker Pimps – 6 Underground
:Wumpscut: – Wreath Of Barbs (Violet Remix)
Kirlian Camera – Ascension
Jean-Michel Jarre – September
Niels Gordon – Chloro
V-Zylanz – Jet Set Willy A8
Off – Electric Salsa
Confettis – The Sound Of C
Nux Nemo – Hiroshima
Tragic Error – Klatsche In Die Hande
Amnesia – Ibiza
Cassandra Complex – Moscow Idaho

1pm-2pm

Light Asylum – Heart of Dust
Rein – There Is No Authority But Yourself
Invasion of Female Logic – Trendsetter
//TENSE// – Chain
Randolph & Mortimer – Enjoy More
Malaise – Something Else
Mao Tse Tung Experience – Irregular Times
Noxious Emotion – Mass
Strvngers – Nostalgia
Statemachine – Thermal Noise
Echo Image – Standing Alone
Les Anges De La Nuit – The Apocalypse
Machine Rox – Bring Back Reality
Ayria – The Gun Song
Angelspit – 100%

3pm-4pm

Death In Vegas – Dirt
Two Lone Swordsmen – Sex Beat (Andrew Weatherall Tribute)
Moby & The Pacific Void Choir – Don’t Leave Me
Earth Loop Recall – Optimism Creeping In
Action Directe – UK
Unit:187 – Capital Punishment
Luxt – American Beast
L’Âme Immortelle – 5 Jahre
Within Temptation – Stand My Ground
Pythia – Army Of The Damned
Leaves Eyes – To France 
The Birthday Massacre – Video Kid
Helalyn Flowers – Kamikaze Angel
Propaganda – Dr.Mabuse
Parralox – Headhunter

And then over the road for more….