A certain bleak grandiosity.

Mmm, bleak grandiosity.

Bill Nelson

Whoa, talk about a name I don't hear thrown around much anymore. Now I suddenly feel a need to dig out those solo and Be-Bop Deluxe (and Red Noise) albums.

Now I suddenly feel a need to dig out those solo and Be-Bop Deluxe (and Red Noise) albums.

Julian Cope's mash note to the first Be Bop Deluxe album Axe Victim.

But it’s the final song ‘Darkness’ with its sub-title ‘L’Immoraliste’ that really nails the gonzo medal to the gatepost, and I can’t blame the raggedy ass backing band for this winner as the performance is Bill’s and Bill’s alone, well, along with a norkestra or three. Cringe you may for the first coupla listens to words such as ‘darkness, you are my true love’, especially as the tune is deffo ripped off Neil Sedaka’s ‘Solitaire’. And when Bill proclaims ‘darkness, you’re with me most every night,’ you gots to wonder what the nights are like when he manages to banish her. I wanna be there! I wanna be there! And yet even here at his closest moment to taking a massive Brechtian Brel-y flop off the nearest bridge, it still fucking works! Am I the most compassionate dupe alive or is this a really beautiful song? I think the latter. And when Doggen says to me occasionally: Explain Goths, I just don’t geddit. Well, I tell him that if he digs this song (which he does) then he understands Goths. For this little jewel sums up Goth in a nutshell and five years before the phenomenon was named. The Hollywood choirs of angels, the Gallic subtitle, the detectable northern accent, the portentous key changes, the French horn, the stops and starts, it all works and shows that it is (as he shamelessly proclaims) ‘no fashionable disguise’. Gimme William Nelson on the record because he approaches humanity in a disarming and delightedly unnerving manner.

Listening to the new Peter Wolf CD, "Midnight Souvenirs." Not a groundbreaking work, but good stuff. I have to admit that I have a soft spot for Wolf, as he used to live near my old neighborhood in Cambridge, almost 20 years ago now, and he was always really friendly.

I passed him while walking through Harvard Square just the other day.

Velvet Underground vs. Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell (Video)

My pal Tara over at Dangerous Minds found this mashup of Velvet Underground's "Venus in Furs" and Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell doing "Ain't No Mountain High Enough." As someone who considers VU one of the greatest bands of all time, and also has a lifelong love of old soul, I was expecting the worst but hoped for the strange. On that, I think it delivers.

Yep. Very strange.

"There She Goes" by the VU directly cops the opening to Marvin's song "Hitch Hike" so there is a connection there.

Did Brian Eno produce Clegg-mania?

Britain's gone mad for Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg over the past week, elevating the onetime longshot to frontrunner status in Britain's election. As it turns out, like David Bowie and U2 before him, Clegg had help from a good producer.

Pioneering glam rocker, ambient composer and pop producer Brian Eno signed on with Clegg as an advisor in 2007. Somewhat bizzarely, the 59-year-old was brought on to advise the Liberal Democrats about youth issues, but once again, it seems like Eno spotted a trend before it got big.

A-ha Breaking Up After Three Decades Together

Which prompts me to say I didn't realize A-ha was still together....

iTunes takes over a quarter of 2009 US music sales

The iTunes Store was the source of more than a quarter of US music sales during 2009, even when squared off against combined digital and retail competition, figures from the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry show. Apple contributed to a modest 1.1 percent growth in domestic digital sales, and a 9.2 percent increase for digital internationally, pushing the sector to $4.3 billion. The music industry as whole has continued to decline however, falling 7.2 percent to be worth $17 billion.

Sales have been slipping every year since 1999. The IFPI cites piracy as one of music's "biggest obstacles," and suggests that local government clampdowns could help restore the industry to profit. 2009 sales dropped the most, proportionately, in the United States and Japan, which together accounted for 80 percent of the $1.3 billion in global losses.

Apple has few challengers in the digital arena; even Amazon and Microsoft are believed to have just fractions of Apple's share. Microsoft has not published much data from the Zune Marketplace, making it difficult to do an accurate comparison. At the same time though, iTunes is estimated to account for 69 percent of online music sales.