neild reports:
Jon Langford is a man of many bands. In addition to his long tenure as a founding member of the Mekons, the Three Johns, and the Waco Brothers, he’s had a busy solo career since his first album under his own name, 1998’s Skull Orchard, which was recorded with the aid of fellow Wacos Steve Goulding, Alan Doughty, and Mark Durante. He’s since performed regularly with his New York-based band the Ship & Pilot, consisting of Goulding, Pere Ubu bassist Tony Maimone, and violinist Jean Cook.
This show was part of a mini-tour in support of Langford’s new album Here Be Monsters, recorded as Jon Langford and the Skull Orchard, this time consisting of Cook, Doughty, vocalist Tawny Newsome, Zincs guitarist Jim Elkington, and part-time Wacos drummer Joe Caramillo. (For good measure, the album also includes reproductions of paintings that Langford did for each song; his day job is as a fine artist, painting mostly music-related works, prints of many of which are for sale at the merch table at his shows.) The band that showed up at Bell House, though, was yet another iteration: Langford, Cook (filling in more than capably on Newsome’s backing vocals), Camarillo, Meat Purveyors guitarist Bill Anderson, and occasional Langford touring bassist Ryan Hembrey.
Any Jon Langford show, regardless, is first and foremost a Jon Langford show: hard-rocking, political, as likely to drop a reference to Joe Strummer’s time spent as a grave digger in Wales as to take time out for a terrible joke. (This is a man who once worked the line “Zen buddhist hot dog man/Make me one with everything” into a Mekons song.) The hour-and-a-half set included a mix of songs from Here Be Monsters (including the standout “Drone Operator,” featured in a haunting new video with Moroccan filmmaker Hassan Amejal), his previous solo release Old Devils, Skull Orchard, and a handful of other tracks, culminating in the Mekons anthem “Memphis, Egypt,” for which Goulding emerged from the audience to play drums and Camarillo strapped on a guitar, which he later described as “the most fun I’ve ever had standing up.”
This was recorded with a mix of the Bell House soundboard feed and Church Audio CA-14 cardioid mics mounted on the wall behind the board. Enjoy!
Stream the Complete Show:
This Recording is Available to Download in FLAC and MP3 at Archive.org [HERE]
Jon Langford
2014-04-04
Bell House
Brooklyn, NY
Source: SBD > iRiver H320 + AUD > CA-14 cardioids > MM-EBM-1 battery box (bass rolloff off) > iRiver H320
Transfer: iRiver H320 > WAV > SoundStudio > FLAC
Recorded by neil d
01. intro
02. Summerstars
03. Drone Operator
04. Mars
05. 1234ever
06. Haunted
07. Tubby Brothers
08. Pill Sailor
09. Sugar On Your Tongue
10. Little Ray of Light
11. What Did You Do In The War?
12. Streets of Your Town (Go-Betweens)
13. I Am The Law
14. Are You An Entertainer?
15. X-Ray Style (Joe Strummer)
16. Deep Sea Diver
17. Sentimental Marching Song
18. Homburg
19. Luxury
20. Getting Used to Uselessness
21. Memphis, Egypt
If you download this recording, please support Jon Langford. You can buy Here Be Monsters at jonlangford.de, and the rest of his many, many albums scattered across the Internet, though Bloodshot Records’ Langford page isn’t a bad place to start.
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