An excellent cumbia-inspired track from Seattle-based Terror/Cactus titled Descalzo. We originally picked this up on the Names You Can Trust Bandcamp (here) earlier this year and recently rediscovered while putting together an upcoming shortwave mix. Ace stuff! Over and out for Boxing Day.
The other month we heard from Wlad in Kyiv (here), where he shared some pictures from his friend Sergiy, who has been growing an impressive collection of plants on his balcony—everything started from seeds of whatever he eats, the last time it was photographs of his avocado plant. We’ve got more this month!
The avocados (above) that featured the other month are growing really well with strong stems, big leaves, and looks like they have no intention of slowing down. On top of that, he experimented with the seeds from a pitaya he bought and they’ve started to germinate (below). We had to look up what a pitaya was as we never heard of it before, it’s also known as the strawberry pear or dragon fruit. More on growing those here. Good luck with those, Sergiy!
And to add to those bits of tropical delight, he also decided to try growing pineapples (below).
It’s hard enough as it is to grow stuff like that anyway but at the moment in Kyviv electricity and heating have been unreliable again, so he improvised: he built a small stove on the balcony and added a new battery-powered lamp.
And that is some bulb!
And if you love a bit of circuitry as we do, here’s what’s inside it:
Now that’s what it’s all about, being inventive and making use of what you you can get your hands on. Great stuff Sergiy! Thanks again to Wlad for sending us the pictures, it’s appreciated. Keep safe the both of you, and do send us more updates.
As always, it’s good to hear from Wlad (US7IGN) in Ukraine. If you remember, Wlad was featured in a Radio 4 documentary called Lights Out in an episode called Call Signs (here) which was about life as a radio amateur living and working in Kyiv during the Russian invasion. He also has two books out about his experiences and they’re well worth reading if you want an insight on what is life is like out there. More about the books here.
Wlad was telling us that his good friend Sergiy (UT3UFD) is not only growing a banana tree (more on that here) and bonsai but he’s also growing seeds from fruit he eats. The photos above and below are his avocado plants, brilliant stuff. Thanks for keeping us updated, Wlad, and as always, our best wishes to you and Sergiy over there.
We’ve found something on the RHS website about growing avocados plants from seed here. It’s interesting stuff.
Cheers to our mate Nic G across the pond for letting us know that the thing we found in the skip the other night is more than likely an example of sand-casting leftovers.
We’ve now got it as a sculpture at the bottom of the garden (just by the part under fence that is used as a cat/fox run) and with the sunlight on it this morning looks like a fox looking up at the sky.
We are hoping to pass it off as a mini-Barbara Hepworth next time Antiques Roadshow visits Catford and give the “specialists” some spiel about “Dame Barbara gifted it to my late father after he tidied up some flower beds in St Ives.”
We do think it looks similiar to a fox today. Who knows what it may look like at 3pm, sand casting leftovers perhaps? We do hope not.
This was found in the skip the other evening. It’s a heavy old thing, some sort of sculpture just under a foot high. What is it? Where can it go in the garden? Any ideas?
We’ve just returned from a couple of days in Brighton where when we arrived, there was a mad sea mist which engulfed all of the seafront. It lifted late afternoon to reveal a wave-free sea that looked like glass as there was zero wind which made for a very out of this world sunset (above).
On the evening we witnessed an appearance of the one and only Tunng. This was after having a couple of pints in a pub which was from a long lost world where The Incredible String band and psychedelia were playing from a free juke box. The barman sat on a stool behind the bar rolling a couple of roll-ups (and one for ron of course), brought your pint over to your table with the card machine and popped out for a fag every now and again leaving the bar area unattended. A different (pub) world all together.
As for Tunng they were excellent, playing tunes from their new LP “Love you all over again” (an LP well worth investigating here) peppered with some old favourites. Acoustic guitars, a banjo, a melodica, woodwind instruments and some very strange sounds thrown over the top. Wonderful stuff!
The day after we found a market we never knew that existed which had a free shop. That’s right, a shop where all things were free. As the owner told us “I was so fed up that the charity shops were charging so much we decided to give things away” and as the sign says on the wall “Please don’t be greedy”.
There’s a simple rule: “No drugs. No guns. No animals. No BIG things. Everything else is welcome!” We picked up a handful of small pots which will come in handy at Weeds HQ and an old-school ladle. A super place to visit and more on the shop here.
Hope everyone out there is enjoying this great weather we’re having at the moment!
A big thanks to our musical mate Gerry Hectic for this ode to “a mind and body practice that can build strength and flexibility”. It’s by the wonderfully named Odion Livingstone and called simply Yoga. Excellent stuff which will make you smile, the mention of “Do the handstretch” and “Chest expansion” cheered us up no end. And as it says on his Bandcamp “Odion Livingstone is a Space Station chanelling signals and sounds from the past to the future.” Now there’s a nice description of an artiste.
And another Yoga influenced track by The Dubvisionist with Deva Dub.
And let’s not forget Tai Chi which is not Yoga. Here’s a nice bit of pushing hands with Lou Reed and Master Ren.
NEWS FLASH • NEWS FLASH • NEWS FLASH • NEWS FLASH • NEWS FLASH
Tomorrow morning (Wednesday 20th November 2024) our good friend The Rhythm Doctor will appear on Gilles Peterson’s show on Worldwide FM at 11am UK time. Tune in live here.
After a text alert to Weeds HQ this week that records were dumped locally, we found a 1970’s shopping bag with rope handles with “Lanzarotte” enblazoned on it containing some LPs outside a garden wall down the road. No A&M God Save the Queens or Bullet Dubs in there but the record above stood out for us on the bizarre sleeve stakes. We’ll be bringing the battered 1970’s Lanzarote shopping bag with miscoloured thick rope handles next time BBC Antiques Roadshow hits the Horiman’s Museum and see what they think about that great piece of antiquity.
By the way our favourite specialist on The Antiques Roadshow is the glass expert Andy McConnell. And here’s something we didn’t know about him until we read about it this morning here: “A trained journalist, Andy spent 1972-76 in California, interviewing & touring the US with many of the greatest rock & folk bands. The theme continued into the early ‘80s when he produced promo videos at Island Records, for acts including Tears for Fears, Kid Creole & The Coconuts and Steve Winwood. Leaving Island in 1983, he production managed a black music series for Channel 4, Rockers Roadshow.” The above is one of the said shows which contains some great footage of Mikey Dread and others we’ve never seen before. Andy has gone up even more in our estimations now!
As for the Lanzarote bag we also found this great LP from Milt Raskin in it which has an excellent sleeve and is a nice bit of exotica well suited for this sunny summer. More on this LP here. DJ Frederick and Gerry Hectic, do you know this one?
Here’s to more sunshine!
Happy Solstice to all! Rather than bunking the train down to Wiltshire, English Heritage has got tonight’s sunset and tomorrow morning’s sunrise on a live stream. Sadly there won’t be Hawkwind playing Silver Machine live, Ken Barlow in full druid gear and you can’t sit on top of the stones but we are sure it will be an event. Tune in as from now to hear some ambient classics and enjoy!
It looks great, we’ve just seen a bloke walking around carrying a union jack with an acid house smiley face in the middle of it, some people eating cheese sandwiches, some sort of giant made out of bedsheets and wood and we’re loving the comments “Dave in Atlanta – Stonehenge doesn’t exist, it’s all done by projections, can you see people actually touching the stones?”
We’ll be up with the postman at 4 am for the sunrise.
Weeds up to me knees 