mp3 blogs, pearl jam and carl barat

I'm going to put aside some time this week to sort out and update my links column over there on the right - it's very out of date. In the meantime, why not trying saving money by not buying those new albums you want (The Streets, Flaming Lips, Vines etc - none are that good) and download some amazing and unusual stuff, instead. You do need to go and buy the Ghostface Killah album, however, as it's just stuuuuunnnniinng.

Places to go and things to download:

- r.bally.net; which is packed with great live sets from your indie rock heroes; a devastating Sonic Youth set has been a recent highlight, as were great performances from a youthful R.E.M and Neutral Milk Hotel, both of which are sadly offline now because of technical stuff. But this is one of the best music blogs going at the moment.

- Although Jennings, who runs rbally.net, says - not entirely without justification - that it's over at Heather Browne's blog, I am Fuel, You are Friends, that the best mp3 bloggage is going on. It's certainly worth a visit, although like a few of the blogs I'm mentioning, it does stray disconcerting into Pearl Jam / Soul Asylum territory occasionally. But she does have new Radiohead songs, for those of you who like that kind of thing, and some great old Evan Dando sets and great news for those of us who think that the Lemonheads were hugely under-rated.

- The ace Cable and Tweed is just a treasure trove of oddities and new bands, with new stuff worth looking at all the time. Definitely worth dipping into regularly. Plus they posted a couple of Silver Jews sets a while back, for which I will always be grateful.

- another great place for new stuff and some awesome live sets is the astonishingly detailed Bradley's Almanac, which provides so much useful information about Boston that I want to move there just to have a reference like that usefully to hand. Recent sets by the ever-present Silver Jews, The New Pornographers, and a wonderful, bruising set from the (hurray) reformed Th' Faith Healers, mark out the blog as probably the best place to download beautifully recorded live sets. Oh, there's a great, charming Billy Bragg set there, too.

- Elsewhere, I've been enjoying a vintage Juliana Hatfield set I downloaded from Sweet Oblivion, too. Ah. Juliana Hatfield.

- Again, tons of brilliant live shows available at Ear Farm, which I've only just discovered. I'm really taken with their 'Overlooked Albums of the 90s' feature, too. And, whooow, if you're anything like me, you REALLY NEED this 1992 My Bloody Valentine show.

- And lastly, I've been absolutely loving thursdayborn's stunning Awesome Tapes From Africa, which is exactly that, a selection of unique, fascinating music which the hiplife afficianado picked up on his travels in Ghana. It's only been going a month or so but so far there's been some dazzling stuff - my favourite so far being a raw and rich contribution from Karamoka Keita, which you must hear. Benn Loxo Du Taccu is brilliant for African stuff, too, incidentally.

I know I've said 'stunning' or 'dazzling' or whatever too many times in this post. I'm too gushing so I keep running out of superlatives. Bah.

Having slagged off Pearl Jam earlier - just 'cos I'd forgotten how it feels - they just played 'Alive' on Jools Holland's show, and I had more than a flicker of nostalgic pleasure. And now Carl Barat's new band, The Dirty Pretty Things, are on TOTP. Back in the heady days of the Camden Town mod revival, the one band we all quickly learned to laugh at (more than Menwear, I mean) was the flimsy and pissy Thurman, remember them? Well, Dirty Pretty Things sound just like them on the evidence of the song they just played. Ha ha. Nice work Carlos.