I've decided that blogging in the deep north must be a winter pastime, for when the nights are long and even us hardy souls begin to miss the light nights of summer.
So after a weekend of surprisingly heavy snow I'm in the house with the heating turned up (might as well be burning money, not oil). And the product of all that was one of those google sessions that led me round some pretty obscure 80's indie bands (The Shop Assistants, The Fizzbombs, The Flatmates, The Cateran) til my head swam.
I did like the Cateran. Possibly because they were from Inverness, and they released some pretty sparky stuff. According to one site they were Scotland's answer to Husker Du, which puzzled me slightly, so I had to go back and re-listen to both Cateran and Husker Du stuff. Little Circles was the Cateran's LP I owned, and Last Big Lie the 7" single I really liked. And it still crackles in all the right places, driven by the bass of the late Kai Davidson. He was by all accounts a pretty remarkable man: influential, friend to Nirvana, manager of the proclaimers. And when I listen back to Husker Du's New day Rising LP (still my favourite) I can see what they mean. Same urgency, same bleak impact.
I never saw The Cateran live, and was surprised during my internet trawl to find that a work colleague of mine was Kai Davidson's brother. It is indeed a small world etc etc.
Deep into November in the north we will put on some more supposedly obscure music and see where it takes us next....
