Always For You - The Album Leaf

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I seem to be drawn to autumn the most. Maybe because it's such an onomatopoeic month and I love words and sounds and wordsounds, sound words, wound sords and probably everything in between. Historically, it's not been the greatest time of year for me. With the loss of close friends, babies and relationship breakups I'm surprised I don't take after the monarch butterfly and choose to migrate and hibernate until the spring brings its warmth and promise. Maybe misery loves company? Maybe the long shadows, low light, drawing nights and eerie mists bring another type of hope? Maybe you have to see the darkest hour in order to know dawn's going to break? Maybe the scents of autumn carry the strongest nostalgia, and signify warm, cosy winter is ahead?

I like my music to be rich like a low autumnal sunset, dark like a Northern winter night and filled with pirouetting leaves as the sky seems to be. Here's one that landed, and it was always for you.

Green Grass of Tunnel - múm

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There are two reasons why I've chosen múm to post today. The first largely due to the Iceland volcano situation. The cloud of ash is so dense it has caused obstruction in the airways. There are pictures all over the internet of the volcano at Laki, where the eruption started. The cloud contains particles so small they are liable to clog up engines; rendering ALL UK and some Northern European flights cancelled and obstructing train services which are struggling to meet high demand.

I visited Iceland before Christmas - as many of my previous posts suggest - and wrote this piece about the landscape. I was struck by how stunning it was, but seemed to completely match the mood I was in during this time. This photo was taken after I'd been for a morning swim at The Blue Lagoon near Reykjavík. The soft moss covering the lava fields had all frozen over in the cool morning frost. The irony of which earns the country the name land of fire and ice.

The long-term effects of the explosion are not yet known, but it's predicted they could be severe. The reports documenting Iceland's volcano are amid election fever in the UK, prompting prophecies of doom.

My other reason for this post is that today is my niece Iris's birthday and so it marks the fifth year in which my sister has been a Mum to our beautiful rainbow girl.

Miss You - Trentemøller

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Anders Trentemøller has the slickest looking website I've seen in a while. The animated letters call to mind a poetry installation I came across through Twitter. Today I am experiencing the pain of missing someone. And I'm starting to overlook it. At first long hours needed to be filled. And these were consumed heavily by sleep. The perfect escape. MOST of my dreams reunited us. Apart from the crazy symbolic ones about wandering around houses like this one and searching for they key to locked doors within the house...

Summer in the City - The Lovin' Spoonful

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Another one of my posts where the photo pertains to the band name more than the choice of song, but to me this is the Lovin' Spoonful track, and was immediately what was called to my mind when I was regaled with this easter gift this morning.
I've been working away on a performance piece for a poetry evening some friends and I are putting on. It's exciting times. I can't say too much now, but watch this space for dark/glitchy things... Which in many ways is the total antithesis to this! I'm in a dancing party mood after hotfooting it down to Eden on Friday night - dressed as a March Hare/ White Rabbit/ Easter Bunny - for The Mad Hatter's Tea Party at The Eden Arts Café. This fine evening of dance was to launch The Underbelly's new album and was a SELL OUT. Funking good times were had by all with some delights from resident turntablists Jelly Jazz. Click Here to have a listen to The Underbelly on BBC 6 Music's Craig Charles's Funk/Soul Show. Complete the review form to help try and Save 6 Music.

More Lovin' Spoonful Goodies can be found at Amazon or itunes.

Such Great Heights - The Postal Service

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Everything looks perfect from far away...

This might be my favourite love song ever. I first heard The Postal Service in about 2005 when I got back from a trip travelling around Central America. I was immediately seduced by the beautiful lyrics 'I'm thinking it's a sign/ That the freckles in our eyes/ Are mirror images/ And when we kiss they're perfectly aligned' and the blips and pops of the keyboard which eases us into and back out of a well crafted electropop song. The band were a unity of Ben Gibbard (Death Cab For Cutie) and Jimmy Tamborello (Dntel, James Figurine)

I can remember hearing their cover of Phil Collins's Against All Odds when I was dribbling into my breakfast in a canteen tent for Workers Beer at Glastonbury 2007. It was named as one of the top 100 covers in The New York Post.

The photo was taken from out of my plane window on my way back from Iceland, but it's actually Scotland underneath that blanket of snow.

Lightworks - Astrobotnia

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This track actually always reminds me of the Whistler painting The Falling Rocket which I saw at an exhibition in The Tate Britain about 5 years ago. It seemed relevant for today because I have just observed Earth Hour. It was very tranquil inside the house because I decided to switch everything off. I have quite a noisy house - with the hum of the fridge and the pc and the rattling flatulence of the Saniflow system - so it was a relief to be at peace; as the Earth was, with all of those lights off.

And it was by the light of several candles that I sat down and wrote the first of many letters I won't send. Writing in the dark, with no sound was a very cathartic experience and one I hope to repeat as regularly as is possible.

I first came acrossAstrobotnia a.k.a. Ovuca through @Innit on Blip.fm and have listened to various projects he has worked on since. I'm from Cornwall, home of Aphex Twin and Luke Vibert who have both been associated with the Warp label and Aphex's label Rephlex. Where Aleksi Perälä's music can be found. To buy Astrobotnia albums click here or check the above links to appropriate websites.

Money - Pink Floyd

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Money, so they say, is the root of all evil today

It's budget day so this seems an obvious one.

This morning I got a cheque I've been waiting for for some time. I've felt like Adrian Mole waiting for the Giro; checking the post obsessively. And now I have it. And nothing's changed. The things that matter still matter. And it's not with all the money in the world I can change the things in the past. I can use it to pay for therapy to make them easier.

What I really wanted to see on my doormat wasn't there.

This was taken at Banksy's awesome exhibition last year; in which he took over the Bristol Museum. He said "This is the first show I've ever done where taxpayers' money is being used to hang my pictures up rather than scrape them off." here. I'm quite excited about when the film: Exit Through The Gift Shop comes to Cornwall.

I'm a massive fan of Pink Floyd. You couldn't grow up in the household I did and get away with not being. I tried when I was a young teen - just to be contraversial - but as I got older I appreciated their originality and the lyrical diversity between the different writers. Just don't get me started on the Gilmour vs. Taylor debate when I've had one too many Old Rosies

Unless you were born on another planet - or perhaps fairly recently - you will already know this track comes from Dark Side of the Moon. If you've got a spare 45 mins the best experiment on the internet is watching the mash up of this album with The Wizard of Oz and trying to find the similarities. Loads of blog posts discuss this further or give you a helping hand. Like this one.