Rather than posting everything here, now that I've split the various strands off onto separate themed blogs, I'm thinking in terms of using this as a sort of index, with links to the new content rather than publishing everything here, and duplicating the content on the other sites. Comments on how this works welcome, but I'm not holding my breath...
So, to see if it'll work out that way...
New on the Little House of Concrete Bookshelves:
Graham Hurley "Deadlight"
Magdalen Nabb "The Inspector Makes His Report"
Fred Vargas "Seeking Whom He May Devour"
New samplings from The Little House of Concrete Wine Rack:
Baileys of Glenrowan Founder Liqueur Muscat
Baileys of Glenrowan 2008 1920s Block Shiraz
Baileys of Glenrowan 2009 Rutherglen Durif
Tahbilk 2010 Everyday Drinking Riesling
and the most recent musical treats that've attracted my attention:
Gregg Allman "Low Country Blues"
Various Artists "The Amazing ZigZag Concert"
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Monday, February 14, 2011
A slight readjustment
First there was the actual Little House of Concrete, a masonry block structure that derived its name from a suggestion from The Woodman on the Elvis Costello Mailing List circa 1997, along with subtitle A Very Fashionable Hovel.
EC afficianados would, of course, recognize the Little Hands of Concrete as a self-derived descriptor of EC's guitar technique, and the quote from Beyond Belief in the subtitle.
When Australia was being filmed in downtown Bowen in 2007 i wanted to write a blog about the shooting and related matters, and figured that the LHoC was a suitable blog title. That Telstra BigBlog went the way such things go when I changed ISPs, but the text and photos ended up here.
By that stage I'd already signed up for .Mac to give email continuity in the event of a change in ISPs, and a copy of iWeb had me thinking about a website, and the LHoC concept again came to the rescue when I was looking for some sort of structure for the thing.
That Little House of Concrete is still there, but, like Topsy, it just growed to the extent that I had to spin off a number of sub-sites dedicated to, among other things, Books and Reading, Music, Travelogues and Wine.
Another spin-off from that website is the bi-monthly Little House of Concrete newsletter, which, with a distribution list of fifteen of my friends and acquaintances, mightn't have set the digital publishing world on fire but virtual arson was never the point of the exercise.
Investigating the blogosphere, I thouight that the easiest way to keep track of wine blogs, for example, was to have a blog yourself and read the ones you're interested in from the Blogger dashboard, which explains the decision to start this one, but again it hasn't taken long to discover t the original notion needed refining.
The result is the following redistribution of content from this particular blog to:
The Little House of Concrete Bookshelves
The Little House of Concrete Music
and The Little House of Concrete Wine Rack.
The original Little House of Concrete's going to be sitting right where it is for the forseeable future, though I've relocated some of the older posts to the relevant newer versions.
EC afficianados would, of course, recognize the Little Hands of Concrete as a self-derived descriptor of EC's guitar technique, and the quote from Beyond Belief in the subtitle.
When Australia was being filmed in downtown Bowen in 2007 i wanted to write a blog about the shooting and related matters, and figured that the LHoC was a suitable blog title. That Telstra BigBlog went the way such things go when I changed ISPs, but the text and photos ended up here.
By that stage I'd already signed up for .Mac to give email continuity in the event of a change in ISPs, and a copy of iWeb had me thinking about a website, and the LHoC concept again came to the rescue when I was looking for some sort of structure for the thing.
That Little House of Concrete is still there, but, like Topsy, it just growed to the extent that I had to spin off a number of sub-sites dedicated to, among other things, Books and Reading, Music, Travelogues and Wine.
Another spin-off from that website is the bi-monthly Little House of Concrete newsletter, which, with a distribution list of fifteen of my friends and acquaintances, mightn't have set the digital publishing world on fire but virtual arson was never the point of the exercise.
Investigating the blogosphere, I thouight that the easiest way to keep track of wine blogs, for example, was to have a blog yourself and read the ones you're interested in from the Blogger dashboard, which explains the decision to start this one, but again it hasn't taken long to discover t the original notion needed refining.
The result is the following redistribution of content from this particular blog to:
The Little House of Concrete Bookshelves
The Little House of Concrete Music
and The Little House of Concrete Wine Rack.
The original Little House of Concrete's going to be sitting right where it is for the forseeable future, though I've relocated some of the older posts to the relevant newer versions.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Pfeiffer 2008 Chardonnay
A visit to the cellar door at Pfeiffer Wines at the end of 2006 left us extremely impressed, and apart from signing up for the C2 Wine Club (two shipments a year, a dozen at a time) there have been regular reorders of the Gamay and Ensemble Rose. Apart from the fortifieds, which are very much in the mould you'd expect a regional trademark to be, the rest of the range is generally more than acceptable and the C2 parcels usually throw up a few other order possibilities.
Pfeiffer 2008 Chardonnay (4* $17) Pale straw in the glass, some varietal character on the nose and across the palate, and a touch of oak as well. Workman-like style that's pleasant enough drinking but wouldn't have prompted a reorder, and, in any case, the winery's sold out of this vintage. Maybe there are others out there who liked this more than I did.
Pfeiffer 2008 Chardonnay (4* $17) Pale straw in the glass, some varietal character on the nose and across the palate, and a touch of oak as well. Workman-like style that's pleasant enough drinking but wouldn't have prompted a reorder, and, in any case, the winery's sold out of this vintage. Maybe there are others out there who liked this more than I did.
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Gregg Allman Low Country Blues
Gregg Allman Low Country Blues (4.5* if you're a Gregg fan, 4* otherwise)
A glance at the track listing for Gregg Allman's first album of new material since 1997's Searchin' for Simplicity might have the average blues fan scratching his head with a What? This lot again? Floating Bridge? Devil Got My Woman? I Can't Be Satisfied? Checking On My Baby? Rolling Stone?
Sure, the album's largely comprised of covers that may or may not have been done to death already (mileages will vary on that, of course) but there's a warmth to the performances that has me putting another large tick beside the name of producer T-Bone Burnett, who's done a wonderful job of matching Allman's world-weary drawl to classic material that fits him like a well-worn overcoat.
Cut in L.A. studio with a classy assembly of musos (most notably Dr John/Mac Rebennack on keys, Doyle Bramhall II on guitar and Dennis Crouch on upright bass) there's a comfortable retro warmth to a set of performances that were recorded live in the studio and sound that way. Crouch, in particular, shines (as he did on the most recent Elvis Costello waxings, also Burnett-produced). Can’t beat that slap bass. Watch your back Danny Thompson...
A glance at the track listing for Gregg Allman's first album of new material since 1997's Searchin' for Simplicity might have the average blues fan scratching his head with a What? This lot again? Floating Bridge? Devil Got My Woman? I Can't Be Satisfied? Checking On My Baby? Rolling Stone?
Sure, the album's largely comprised of covers that may or may not have been done to death already (mileages will vary on that, of course) but there's a warmth to the performances that has me putting another large tick beside the name of producer T-Bone Burnett, who's done a wonderful job of matching Allman's world-weary drawl to classic material that fits him like a well-worn overcoat.
Cut in L.A. studio with a classy assembly of musos (most notably Dr John/Mac Rebennack on keys, Doyle Bramhall II on guitar and Dennis Crouch on upright bass) there's a comfortable retro warmth to a set of performances that were recorded live in the studio and sound that way. Crouch, in particular, shines (as he did on the most recent Elvis Costello waxings, also Burnett-produced). Can’t beat that slap bass. Watch your back Danny Thompson...
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Brown Brothers 2004 Shiraz Mondeuse & Cabernet
Some things stick with you.
On my first visit to Brown Brothers in January 1980 I ran across this blend with the helpful and very informative bloke in the cellar door giving me the drum on Mondeuse. I'd already let him know I was interested in varietal wines, and Brown Brothers seemed, at the time, like Varietal Central. That's changed a little over thirty years, but the changes have largely taken the form of other people heading down the varietal path rather than Brown Brothers changing direction.
Inquiries as to the possibility of tasting Mondeuse on its own produced an explanation that the variety was far too muscular as a stand alone proposition unless you were going to give it an extended spell in the bottle to settle down, but in a blend it adds intense colour and substantial tannin. I haven't run across this one all that often over the intervening decades, but I managed to fit a bottle into an order placed in May '09 and while it could have sat quietly in the wine fridge for another couple of years,
(a) I needed the room for a Houghton C.W. Ferguson;
(b) It's coming up to seven years, not optimal perhaps but it's had some time; and
(c) I was disinclined to wait much longer.
Brown Brothers 2004 Shiraz Mondeuse & Cabernet (4.5* $40) Deep full-bodied red, complex notes on the nose, focussed, smooth and balanced across the palate with everything playing nicely together. At just over 50% Shiraz, with the other two sharing the rest close to evenly you can taste what the Mondeuse brings to this rather wonderful blend. I would love to have the wherewithal to try one of these at fifteen, twenty or twenty-five years.
On my first visit to Brown Brothers in January 1980 I ran across this blend with the helpful and very informative bloke in the cellar door giving me the drum on Mondeuse. I'd already let him know I was interested in varietal wines, and Brown Brothers seemed, at the time, like Varietal Central. That's changed a little over thirty years, but the changes have largely taken the form of other people heading down the varietal path rather than Brown Brothers changing direction.
Inquiries as to the possibility of tasting Mondeuse on its own produced an explanation that the variety was far too muscular as a stand alone proposition unless you were going to give it an extended spell in the bottle to settle down, but in a blend it adds intense colour and substantial tannin. I haven't run across this one all that often over the intervening decades, but I managed to fit a bottle into an order placed in May '09 and while it could have sat quietly in the wine fridge for another couple of years,
(a) I needed the room for a Houghton C.W. Ferguson;
(b) It's coming up to seven years, not optimal perhaps but it's had some time; and
(c) I was disinclined to wait much longer.
Brown Brothers 2004 Shiraz Mondeuse & Cabernet (4.5* $40) Deep full-bodied red, complex notes on the nose, focussed, smooth and balanced across the palate with everything playing nicely together. At just over 50% Shiraz, with the other two sharing the rest close to evenly you can taste what the Mondeuse brings to this rather wonderful blend. I would love to have the wherewithal to try one of these at fifteen, twenty or twenty-five years.
Friday, January 28, 2011
Tahbilk 2000 1927 Vines Marsanne
Back in November 2009 Tahbilk was offering a Marsanne Trophy Six Pack for $115, three wines, two bottles each and remarkable value with two $45 bottles included. The day after the order arrived, this one appeared in Halliday's Hundred, which may explain why it took me so long to get to it...
Tahbilk 2000 1927 Vines Marsanne (5* 20 points $45) Almost transparent pale straw colour, but there's nothing pale or insipid about the nose or the flavour of this one. Complex notes of honeysuckle and citrus up front and a long finish mean that in Marsanne terms this is probably about as good as it gets. Still another bottle to go, probably somewhere around 2015....
Tahbilk 2000 1927 Vines Marsanne (5* 20 points $45) Almost transparent pale straw colour, but there's nothing pale or insipid about the nose or the flavour of this one. Complex notes of honeysuckle and citrus up front and a long finish mean that in Marsanne terms this is probably about as good as it gets. Still another bottle to go, probably somewhere around 2015....
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Rick Koster "Louisiana Music"
Under normal circumstances you'd expect to be finished a book before you set about writing a review, but I doubt that I'll ever be finished with Rick Koster's Louisiana Music.
With an interest in the music from around the mouth of the Mississippi that dates back to a various artists' compilation called Another Saturday Night, and Dr John's piano-powered R&B revival Gumbo, and progressed through the Meterfied fonk of In The Right Place and Robert Palmer's blue-eyes Sneakin' Sally Through The Alley, Professor Longhair and assorted bits and pieces, I've always wanted to explore the subject more thoroughly. There are gaps in the collection that could accommodate a transitory Mack truck.
The problem, of course, is always where to start, how to separate the wheat from the chaff, and if it's all good, sorting the stellar and sublime from the merely excellent.
Louisiana Music may not be the only reference volume out there, but it's the only one I've run across to date and certainly offers plenty of jumping off points for further investigation.
The subtitle: A journey from R&B to Zydeco, Jazz to Country, Blues to Gospel, Cajun music to Swamp Pop to Carnival Music and Beyond says it all really, as Koster, who's also the author of Texas Music, takes the reader through the genres one by one, starting with Jazz, as one might expect and moving through Rhythm & Blues, The Blues, Music of Southwest Louisiana (Cajun, Creole and Zydeco), Louisiana Rock and a final section labelled The Wondrous Sounds (Voodoo, Swamp Pop, Mardi Gras and Carnival, Gospel Country, Rap and Hip-Hop, Classical and World Music).
Within each section, he starts with the major names and then trawls back through their antecedents and successors, influences and legacy, linking each into the tradition they've emerged from and referencing the cross pollination you're going to find in a musical environment like Louisiana. At $9.99 for the Kindle version it's remarkable value as a reference and will be sitting on the iPad for the duration.
Unfortunately, 2000's Texas Music isn't available in the same format yet, but I'll be on the lookout for a copy (after I've got into tackling the backlog of music from Louisiana that needs to be explored, of course).
With an interest in the music from around the mouth of the Mississippi that dates back to a various artists' compilation called Another Saturday Night, and Dr John's piano-powered R&B revival Gumbo, and progressed through the Meterfied fonk of In The Right Place and Robert Palmer's blue-eyes Sneakin' Sally Through The Alley, Professor Longhair and assorted bits and pieces, I've always wanted to explore the subject more thoroughly. There are gaps in the collection that could accommodate a transitory Mack truck.
The problem, of course, is always where to start, how to separate the wheat from the chaff, and if it's all good, sorting the stellar and sublime from the merely excellent.
Louisiana Music may not be the only reference volume out there, but it's the only one I've run across to date and certainly offers plenty of jumping off points for further investigation.
The subtitle: A journey from R&B to Zydeco, Jazz to Country, Blues to Gospel, Cajun music to Swamp Pop to Carnival Music and Beyond says it all really, as Koster, who's also the author of Texas Music, takes the reader through the genres one by one, starting with Jazz, as one might expect and moving through Rhythm & Blues, The Blues, Music of Southwest Louisiana (Cajun, Creole and Zydeco), Louisiana Rock and a final section labelled The Wondrous Sounds (Voodoo, Swamp Pop, Mardi Gras and Carnival, Gospel Country, Rap and Hip-Hop, Classical and World Music).
Within each section, he starts with the major names and then trawls back through their antecedents and successors, influences and legacy, linking each into the tradition they've emerged from and referencing the cross pollination you're going to find in a musical environment like Louisiana. At $9.99 for the Kindle version it's remarkable value as a reference and will be sitting on the iPad for the duration.
Unfortunately, 2000's Texas Music isn't available in the same format yet, but I'll be on the lookout for a copy (after I've got into tackling the backlog of music from Louisiana that needs to be explored, of course).
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