Archives for May 2010

As if Fridays ahead of a bank holiday weren't exciting enough, TeamLaverne doubles the excitment with a stack of free songs. The MPFree EP today contains some corkers collected across the week, and now they're all sat happily on this page so you can help yourself.

The art work for the EP was inspired by Jo's interview with Hay Festival director Peter Florence on Thursday. We asked for photos of the cover of the book you're currently reading, and melaniemmb send us a snap of The Whisperer in Darkness by H.P Lovecraft.

Here it is:

And your tracks are...

The Like - He's Not A Boy

Gayngs - Faded High

Catherine A.D - Missiveh

Twilight Sad - Reflection Of The Television (Errors remix)

Jinja Safari - Peter Pan

Some of the above free downloads are only posted for a limited amount of time; therefore not all may be available.

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Roll up, roll up - come get your free download for today.

It is... Twilight Sad - Reflection Of The Television (Errors remix)

This is a remix of the opening track from the album Forget The Night Ahead which was released last year.

Don't forget, if you've missed any of the MPFree from across this week, they'll all be available tomorrow on the EP.

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This week's Memory Tape is a special one. Tom Ravenscroft (son of John Peel for those not in the know) starts his new weekly show on 6 Music on Friday 4th June.

In honour of this event we asked Tom for an old mix tape, and he obliged. The story behind the tape is, in the words of Tom: "This mix tape is one of three that my brother was made to compile under strict observation from the rest of the family for the purpose of listening to in the car whilst on family holidays in the late 80's.

"As our dad refused to fly anywhere all our holidays tended to consist of stupendously long drives to the less interesting corners of Europe. If it had not been for the light relief that the music provided we would have undoubtedly all gone mad or else waited to an opportune moment to stow away in a strangers car pointed roughly in the direction of home. The tape was meant to appease all, hence the variety of music. My picks are probably the worst ones on there."

The tracks are:

Pocket Fisheman - Leader is Burning

Feargal Sharkey - You Little Thief

Madonna - Holiday

Pet Shop Boys - You Were Always On My Mind

Jimmy Reed - Too Much

Michael Jackson - Man in the Mirror

Golinski Brothers - Bloody

Neil Young - Cortez The Killer

Roy Orbison - Crying

Howlin Wolf - Going Down Slow

The Everly Brothers - Snow Flake Bombardier

The Hollies - I Can't Live

Rod Stewart - Maggie May

Matha Reeves and the Vandellas - Jimmy Mack

Lonnie Donegan - Lost John

Roy Buchanon - Lonesome Fugitive

Dire Straits - Sultans of Swing

Tune in to the show on Friday 28th May to hear which 5 tracks get selected, and don't forget to tune in to Tom's new show on 6 Music starting on 4th June at 9pm.

If you have a Memory Tape you'd like to submit, then email Lauren now...

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It doesn't feel like a week ago, but it was!

If you missed the show from Worthy Farm last Friday then unfortunately it's too late! It's gone, but you can enjoy a short film which sums up the experience. Enjoy!

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Who wants five free songs and some lovely artwork? That's right; everybody.

The MPFree EP collects together all the MPFrees given out during Workers' Playtime across the week and slaps them on this page to make your lives easier.

The artwork this week is provided by Matt Garbutt and is inspired by the Tom Jones MPFree from Thursday.

Here's your artwork to download:

And here are you tracks. Enjoy...

Underworld - Scribble

The Coral - Butterfly House

A Lull - Weapons Of War

Tom Jones - What Good Am I?

Some of the above free downloads are only posted for a limited amount of time; therefore not all may be available.

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So Memory Tapes is back to normal this week. Last week we changed it to a Glastonbury special, but this week Lauren is back celebrating the compilation albums in your life.

This week it's the turn of Anne Wilkins, who writes: "This tape was made for me by my teacher when I was at school, I think because I said something terrible like "I don't think I really like the Smiths", and because they were his favourite band he was upset and so made me a tape. (Just to verify - I do now love the Smiths, of course I do, but at the time I'd only really heard Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now, which is still not really my favourite Smiths song.)

"This collection of songs honestly changed my life (I know I sound like an idiot right now), and pushed my musical tastes towards 80s indie, where I have remained ever since. The tape's almost 10 years old, and I still have it on my stereo. Almost every song on here is one of my most favouritest songs, I really love them all - counting it up now, I ended up buying albums 13 albums from this tape alone.

"I played the tape over and over and eventually made a copy of it because I was scared I'd wear it out! I never told my teacher this though because I was too shy, and needless to say I developped a huge crush on him. Oh dear!!"

There was artwork too:

And the 'life-changing' tracks were...

Side A:

Deeper - Arab Strap

Bill Is Dead - The Fall

Red Umbrella - Kostars

Pop Queen - Ben Lee

1969 - The Stooges

Give My Love To Kevin (Acoustic) - The Wedding Present

The Beatles And The Stones - House of Love

Mercy Seat - Ultra Vivid Scene

Debaser - Pixies

Soul Auctioneer - Death in Vegas

Scholorship Is The Enemy Of Romance - Billy Bragg

Side B:

Life's An Ocean - The Verve

The Death Of A Disco Dancer - The Smiths

Cedar Room - Doves

Sunday To Saturday - The June Brides

Subterranean Homesick Blues - Bob Dylan

Add It Up - Violent Femmes

Thank You For The Music - Cornelius

North Country Boy - The Charlatans

The Rock - Delakota

Magic In The Air - Badly Drawn Boy

Song For The Lovers - Richard Ashcroft

So Hot - Spacemen 3

Tune in to the show on Friday 21st May to hear which 5 tracks get selected.

If you have a Memory Tape you'd like to submit, then email Lauren now...

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So as well as broadcasting live and taking some snaps, we also had a video camera with us. Across the next week expect to see lots of footage appear on this blog, along with a performance from The Drums.

But to kick things off, here's Michael Eavis talking to Lauren about 40 years of Glastonbury and future plans...

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It was Glastonbury, but not as we know it...

Six weeks ahead of the start of the festival, Lauren took the show to Worthy Farm to broadcast live from the festival offices.

Michael & Emily Eavis joined the fun with a couple of exclusive pieces of Glasto news and The Drums came down to play a couple of live tracks ahead of their first Glastonbury appearance. And speaking of first appearences, Ellen & The Escapades, who won Glastonbury's Emerging Talent Competition, also provided some live music.

If that wasn't enough, Lauren also announced 6 Music's plans for Glastonbury coverage this year, and Chris of Saturday-night-headliners Muse was on the phone. Plus, Memory Tapes took five memorable Glasto performances and played them back to back. Amazing Scenes.

Below are some photos from our trip, and if you missed the show make sure you listen to it on iPlayer within the next seven days.

See you all there at the end of June!

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In honour of our trip to Worthy Farm, we've thrown the usual format out the cow shed, and opted for a live Glastonbury special.

So, usually we pick five tracks from a listener's homemade compilation album and play them back to back on a Friday. This week however, we've picked five rather special Glastonbury performances to play.

Now, if I told you what they were going to be then that'd take the fun out of it, so tune in to Friday's show to potentially relive some of your finest Glasto moments.

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We here on Team Laverne were lucky enough to be joined by one of the world's finest bands yesterday for a live session in 6Music towers. Yup The National dropped by to perform some brand new songs that appear on their beautiful new album High Violet which is out next week (w/c 10th May).

And my word were they good, as you will hear for yourself by watching the video of Terrible Love below. Here lies a band that appear to be on the verge of greatness and it was rather special to have them on the show.

Enjoy; and after watching this, you can watch more performances from The National of Anyone's Ghost and Vanderlylle Cry Baby.

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Just like like former MPFreers 'Here We Go Magic' "we have a mild fascination for collecting..." so each Friday we collect together the MPFrees from across the week and make them all available right here. It's what TeamLaverne like to call the MPFree EP.

We also like collecting your artwork for said EP. This week the theme was 'X Marks The Spot' and we selected the handy work of Colophonius Regenschein. It's entitled Xperiment, and here it is:

Your MPFrees this week were...

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Friday means Memory Tapes, and Memory Tapes means Friday. We have a special guest this week - Angus from New York trio Liars will be talking about a couple of compilations he made for his sisters Lisa and Kyle.

He also designed the artwork for each compilation.

For those not in the know, Memory Tapes celebrates the compilations made for you, or that you made for others. We publish the full track listing, and pick five tracks to play on the show each Friday.

Anyway, back to Angus, he's submitted two compilations. Firstly, the one he made for Lisa...

The artwork looks like this:

And the tracklisting for Lisa reads...

OOIOO - Asozan

Afro Cuban All Stars - Fiesta De La Rumba

PJ Harvey - My Beautiful Leah

White Magic - One-Note

The Duke Of Stratosphere - Bike Ride To The Moon

Psychic TV - Just Drifting

Flying Lotus - Camel

Devendra Banhart - Samba Vexillographica

Ween - The Golden Eel

Alemayehu Eshete - Telatena Zare

Can - Sing Swan Song

Quixotic - Martal Mirror

Syd Barrett - Baby Lemonade

For Kyle, the bird moved a bit...

And the tracks were...

Cat Power - Nude As The News

Blonde Redhead - In Particular

The Knife - Heartbeats

Fleetwood Mac - Overcome

Portishead - We Carry On

April March - Chick Habit

Lil'Kim - Lighters Up

Beatific - Glass Candy

Bat For Lashes - Daniel

Birdland - Run Away

No Doubt - Hella Good

TLC - Creep

The Crystals - Then He Kissed Me

Tune in to the show on Friday 7th May to hear which 5 tracks get selected.

You don't have to be in Liars to submit a Memory Tape, email Lauren yours now...

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