Disco Volante - Giving it all in Space and Time !

Listeners have waited a long time for the release of new Disco Volante material.

Ever since Medical Records re released No Motion in 2012 I have been working an new material for an album "The Last Days of Disco Volante"

Partly autobiographical the album looks at a journey through a life of hedonism and lost love.

The first track to this album is Space and Time, and on 2 February 2015, Disco Volante will be releasing the Space and Time EP. The EP includes both the original version of Space and Time and an edit, there is also a 9 minute electro trance remix. The EP is topped off with my version of the T.Rex classic Get It On, or Bang a Gong if you live in the US. There is a an edit and the 7 minute Hasta Fuego Revolution Mix. I actually recorded Get It On 3 years ago and now it has seen the light of day.

There will be 3 videos to promote the Space and Time EP and the first one, presented here is Space and Time. Look out for videos for the Space and Time Remix and Get it On in coming weeks.

Anyone who is interested in Disco Volante can write to me My Email Address.

Terry Tanx
http://www.discovolanteonline.com/

Never mind the bollocks here's the NME

I happen to follow the news headlines from the Enemy, oh sorry, I mean the NME, maan! One of the striking things is the comments added by other readers. For example when a news headline about, let’s say Cheryl Cole is published there will be about a dozen negative comments “manufactured crap” or such like. I’m not a particular fan of Miss Cole but she seems like quite a nice woman, she probably works very hard, I’ve no idea if she writes her own music, or produces it, I presume she is mainly a singer who works with other music industry professionals to make her records just like Frank Sinatra did and the majority of the great singing stars. Ms Cole’s records sell in large numbers and they must bring a lot of pleasure to the people . If one is in the entertainment industry ones job is to entertain. So I find the comments from the other readers to be infantile and immature, just like your sexuality if you are not at ease with your musical tastes there’s no need to offend other people.
Coming back to the NME, they recently had a poll for the best live act of all time. I decided to vote T.Rex, but it seems NME democracy is a bit more like Beijing democracy, as you were presented a selection to choose from, no T.Rex, oh well I thought, they can’t list everyone, so I thought I would vote for Robbie Williams, whose Knebworth concerts broke all records for a UK pop performance. No chance, most of the artist listed I have no experience of so can’t comment of their live performance abilities but so many artists were missing, the poll was a joke. Perhaps there had been earlier heats and these were just the finals, but if so this wasn’t made clear.
And today I discovered that NME have a new chart, which reflects NME type music, it reminded me of the “our kind of people” attitude you get in middle class country clubs. Once again I’ve no idea what the entry criteria is for this chart, maybe artists with wrangler jeans are in but artists with Levis are out, but it does seem like a pointless exercise which will just encourage the type of musical bigotry i mention in the first paragraph of this blog. I tried to make a comment about the new chart, but this won’t be published until it has passed the censors at NME.
The NME used to be a great publication; it had great writers and challenged the status quo of the music business and beyond. Now it seems more like a ghetto for the narrow minded and musically insecure.

My new video

I just made my video. It took six months to do, not that it was six months of work, just six months to get round to finishing it. I’m not really happy putting out old material, it’s a bit sad really that someone should be plugging a record made 25 years ago, even if it is brilliant ! But I am a bit pissed off that other people have been using Disco Volante, when I was using it first (as a band name). Don’t people have any dignity? Perhaps we should just all call ourselves the Beatles that would give Yoko a few headaches! Disco Volante is my territory, Disco Volante is mine , I’m staking a claim.
I enjoyed making the video, though I can hear Flash programmers everywhere howling laughter. My plan was, as I can’t afford Naomi and Kate ,to go for the so bad its good approach. Then after 24 hours nonstop tidying up I played it in QuickTime only to discover that although it was co-ordinated in Flash preview, in the final version the music and images were out of sync, so another four hours of extending scenes by a frame at a time until it worked.
I’m hoping for an Oscar nomination, for Best Short Animated Feature, I want to get invited to Elton’s party afterwards, perhaps Robbie will be there too.
Anyway, I’ve decided to try doing Click, the b side now, watch this space.

10 Days in 1977 – The last T.Rex tour

10 Days in 1977 – The last T.Rex tour.
Being Marc Bolan’s birthday today took me back to 1977, the last T.Rex tour. I was a sweet young teenager in 1977, at the age of 16 my parents had pulled me out of school to threw me into the workhouse. Mornings were cold in January 1977, a 7.30 am start was only brightened up by the hope every Wednesday or Thursday morning, when Sounds, NME and Melody Maker hit the shops.
There is was a 6 date tour announced for the middle of March, and the dates were such I could do it with just a little absence from the workhouse. Absenteeism was punished in those days by harsh beatings!
Planning has always been one of my obsessions so I set about planning my tour, I bought railway guides to plan the trains, hotel guides to plan my hotels. I had a cunning plan. Working in the workhouse and being a rather dull teenager had left me with a little cash, so I thought, I will stay in the best Hotel in each city, I’m bound to end up in the same hotel as Marc. Eventually I decided for fear of destitution and losing my position in the workhouse I would miss the first concert, Newcastle and do the remaining 5. This was later increased to 9 shows in total
Newcastle 10th
Manchester 11th
Glasgow 12th Postponed until 13th
Stoke 13th Postponed but never re-arranged
Bristol 14th
Birmingham 17th
London 18th
West Runton 19th
Portsmouth 20th

Manchester
The first show for me was to be Manchester Apollo, Friday 11th March 1977.
I set off with my mother’s green suitcase, leaving Leicester, via Stoke, so that I could be on the right journey back. I arrived at the Manchester Piccadilly Hotel at around 5pm. This was the most expensive hotel I had ever been in, a 5 star hotel, and at £17.10p per night it wasn’t cheap.
No sign of Marc or any of the usual Bolan fans, so I set off for the show.
I had seen T.Rex several times before but the support acts had been pretty dire in the past, this time when the Damned hit the stage I couldn’t believe my eyes or ears, this was a real change.
The show was great, as expected, a T.Rex has slimmed down from the Futuristic Dragon T.Rex the year before, but it didn’t matter to me which T.Rex it was. It was great.
I left the show and waited around outside the hall for a while, until most people had drifted away. A man left the Apollo and dropped his briefcase in the rainy street. I helped him pick up his papers, assuming he was from the entourage I asked him where Marc was staying, “Somewhere by the Airport, I think “was his reply. The man turned out to be Jake Riviera, the manager of the Damned, I didn’t know that then.
The next day I was due to take a fast train to Glasgow, (change at Preston). So I woke early and took a bus to the airport, (Manchester was a big city to a chicken like me) . By luck I found the hotel. I knew I was in the correct place as there were a couple of bitchy fans telling me to go away, they went leaving me alone. A while later out came Marc, alone but for his driver. I froze like a rabbit in the headlights, I didn’t know what to say, I got an autograph and regretted the time I was alone with Marc Bolan but could not say anything. At least a poor boy from the workhouse could afford 5 stars, unlike Marc only in 3 stars!
Glasgow
I got to Glasgow about 3 in the afternoon,(my first time abroad !!) the Hotel, only 4 stars this time. But only £12.00 per night, however there was a large crowd of Bolan fans waiting outside the door. I bet he’s here this time I thought as I smugly walk through the hotel entrance and check into my room. From my room I could hear “we want Marc” being chanted from the street below.
I stayed in my hotel most of the afternoon, and then went to the gig, it was a huge converted cinema, apparently the largest cinema in Europe, the tension mounted, fans waited with baited breath for the usual rush to the front.
Suddenly a young man with Bolan hair came and stood beside me, do you mind if I stand here he said, waiting to poise for his charge to the front. His name was Simon, later to be known as Simon Slider, who would become a good friend of mine.
Suddenly, an announcement, “Ladies and Gentlemen, unfortunately.........
It seems some daft roady had forgotten the cables and the show is off, for today at least, the show is re arranged for tomorrow, but what about Stoke ??? my plans ?? , my carefully schedule trains and coaches around the UK???. Oh well never mind!
Simon was touring with his friend Phil a policeman; they were touring in Phil’s car. They had been to Newcastle, they had discovered where the party was, they has been there, the one show I had missed... Bastards!!!!
It turned out Marc was staying in another Hotel, the other side of Glasgow, we spent all the next day searching, trying to get into the sound check etc.
The show finally happened as promised that day. After the show we did our stalking the stage door, followed by the entourage in Phil’s car to the Hotel. Now I got to meet Gloria Jones, and get her autograph.
It was then rumoured that the Damned were having a party in their hotel rooms, we were uninvited but determined to go, maybe Marc would be there!
So we gate crashed the party, I was a shy young teenager, just out of school, I had never met anyone famous before (except Roy Hudd at a garden fete in 1975), now I was on the bed drinking vodka with four pop stars, or that’s how it felt. After a while it became obvious Marc wasn’t coming. So we left.
Tomorrow we had the mammoth journey from Glasgow to Bristol in one day.
The second night in Glasgow hadn’t been planned and I had to check into a cheaper hotel. Simon and Phil slept on the chair or the floor.
Bristol
We woke up at 6 am and set off, by now we had acquired a fourth person, Pat a very nice girl from Broxtow, in Nottinghamshire.
So off we went, down the M6, we stopped at a service station near Preston and saw Mavis from Coronation Street, god, I was mixing with the stars these days !
We got to Bristol in good time, but not in time to check into my hotel, the Holiday Inn.
The show was great as usual. The next show wasn’t until Thursday in three days time; I was knackered but returned home feeling like I had lived for the first time.
I got told off at the workhouse for taking two days off but avoided a savage beating.
Birmingham
I left the workhouse at 4.50pm and was in Birmingham by 6.45pm. Simon and Phil were there as we had arranged, the show was great, we got crushed, but I always managed to get to the front at a Bolan gig, whenever I went to a rock gig in later life I never came across an audience as strong and determined as a T.Rex audience , and I always got to the front. Being petite, I managed to get through the gaps!
I hadn’t planned to stay in Birmingham, there was a late train and I had to show willing at the workhouse, it was payday the next day. So Simon and Phil left me at the station.
Now I was to get my biggest disappointment of all, as I say on that slow drafty train back to Leicester Simon and Phil were getting drunk in the toilets of Watford Gap Service station with Captain Sensible and MARC BOLAN!!! Double Bastards.
London
I finished in the workhouse at 12.30 pm on Fridays and with my pay packet and bag I boarded the train from Leicester to Saint Pancras and then to Finsbury Park where Simon and I were checking into a very nice cheap hotel. The concert at the Rainbow was a classic, what turned out to be the last ever concert by T.Rex in London and 5 years to the day after the “Born to Boogie” Wembley pool shows.
Also today was the day Dandy in the Underworld hit the shops, Simon had a copy.
West Runton
The next day was West Runton, the weirdest of all, set on the Norfolk coast in a cow shed a couple of miles from Cromer. It was, apparently a popular place for American Airmen and was the most intimate of shows , we got drunk, Simon got angry with a telephone box but had a great time, and a hangover.
Portsmouth
This was the last show ever by T.Rex in the UK, in a cheesy Mecca dance hall, the atmosphere was great, the damned came on stage for the encore, it was a significant moment.
After the show we tried following the tour bus but it was obviously heading back to London, so we turned back to Portsmouth and went to bed in our cheap guest house. I had gone from 5 star to no star in 9 days.
Phil actually lived in the Guildford area. He reported that the tour bus had in fact stopped at a service station just a few miles from where we had turned back. My chance to know Marc Bolan had slipped through my fingers again.
Six months later Marc died, I never knew him, only the person from the music and the interviews and stage, perhaps it’s better that way, they say never meet your heroes. By not knowing Marc, he remained perfect to me. But I gained a lot from those 10 days on the road, Simon became one of my best friends and introduced me to many important people in my life. Steev and Judy amongst others.
I also became friend s with the Damned, but that deserves another story.
And I discovered I loved adventure, an addiction I will never be cured of.
Terry Tanx 30 September 2009.

How to stop illegal filesharing – Charge the correct price for your music !

There has been more debate this week about the downloading of music
It is proposed that persistent file sharers have their internet service restricted in some way.
The problem is it isn’t persistent file sharers who are causing the decline of music sales.
Persistent file sharers download more music than they could ever afford to buy and so the economic loss the music industry may be minimal in these instances.
The real loss to the industry is from casual down loaders, I would guess that most people perhaps on overage bought an album a month. Just guests but close enough for this debate.
If the casual downloader downloads 6 albums per year then they may reduce their purchases by 50%.
Will the ISPs and music industry be able to monitor and punish every person who has downloaded an album every 2 months?
The best solution for the music business is to reduce its prices so that the illegal downloading of music is not worth the bother.
For Example:
A four piece band make an album
It takes 3 months to produce. ( Writing songs rehearsals etc)
It contains 10 tracks
Production costs (studio time etc) £5000 per track. Total Cost £50,000
Band members wages for three months * £60,000
(Based on average earnings of the top 10% of UK earners (£50,000 pa pro rata 3 months) + Pension and National Insurance contributions).
Admin costs say 10% £11,000
Advertising say 25% £30,250
Total Cost of producing Album £151,250
Assuming sales of 200,000 copies worldwide, the whole sales price of the Album could be 75 pence
Add ITunes and VAT costs say a sale price of £1.20.
This doesn’t take account of the income for a couple of singles pulled from the album, or fees from radio stations playing the songs, so a bit of a bonus for the band!
The above figures demonstrate that it’s possible to produces music much cheaper than the prices being currently charged, even with recent reduced prices, a new album on I tunes retails at £8.00.

The story so far

Well, where to start.
I am well over 40 now and no one wants to listen to my whole life story.
So here are the relevant bits.
At the age of 11 I discovered Marc Bolan and decided I wanted to be a pop star.
After Marc died in 1977, I got into the punk scene and moved to London. I tried to form groups but have always been a bit of a loner when it comes to work, so decided to work alone. I then became influenced by the early 80s electronic music such as Soft Cell, Human League and Depeche Mode as well as others and quickly put together a backing tape and started performing.
My first performance was in a wine bar near to Holborn tube station; I was determined to do it in style and spent my last £15 on a bottle of champagne. The weekly poetry and music club was run by my good friend Steev Burgess, and he put me top of the bill. The champagne worked, I did four songs and was very well received by the audience of mainly follow artists.
My performing career lasted 3 years with varying degrees of success, I am a shy person and needed a few drinks to get up on stage, and this didn’t help.
Musically I was working totally alone, there was no web to give advice, no tutorials and very little in the way of a support network for people working with sequencers and drum machines. I may not have had the sophisticated studio technology of Human League but considered myself a pioneer in a certain type of music.
My first single was released in June 1984, I am not naive and never expected a hit record, I just wanted one or two favourable reviews to help me get better gigs and perhaps get my money back, however fate wasn’t kind, a large part of music press went on strike and I didn’t get one review.
I then started visiting Ibiza and the record was given some attention by the radio there, this was a consolation prize.
Up until that point I had been working in part time jobs, living in a bedsit in Kensington. Now however I was in debt, I had borrowed money from friends and family to make the single and now had to pay it back. I had been in this bedsit for 5 years and needed something better. The worst thing that could have happened, happened, I had to get a proper job.
Now I was upwardly mobile, and it was nice having money, holidays, I got a nice flat and my interest in music was neglected as I got a career.
I never wanted to be a financial management consultant..... I wanted to be a lumberjack, sorry , a pop star.
In 2001 taking advantage of rising property prices I sold up in London and moved to Ibiza (my other passion), but carried on working from Ibiza, and in 2006. I sold up again. (pre subprime hehehe) and moved to Buenos Aires, where I now live a simple life but do not have the constraints of work.
Now I am too old and not pretty enough to be a pop star, but I still have to box in my head that needs to be ticked.
So now I have recently started my music again.
Times have changed a lot, and sequencers are housing in computers not in silver boxes, so I’ve had to re learn a lot.
My plan is to make an album, my current musical interests are consistent with what they were in 1984, electronic dance orientated. I have lived in Ibiza so hopefully have some feel for this music.
I expect to have some material by the end of 2010.
I was never a strong vocalist and was always a nervous performer so I will be looking for vocals at some point.
But for now in studying technique and technology and writing songs. I plan to have a selection of about 20 songs before working in more depth on the best.
I plan to update this weekly, however I won’t be putting any new music out until it sounds 100% professional. My 1984 single “No Motion” and the B side “Click” is available on I tunes.

http://www.discovolanteonline.com

Long live the music industry !

Although western economies are based on the concept of a free market, which entails the law of supply and demand when it comes to the idea of individuals downloading music from the internet it all seems to have gone out of the window. Although one can understand the record companies wanting protect their income as any powerful lobby will always do, why governments are getting involved?
Since the middle ages great music has been produced, there have been great composers, Mozart, Beethoven, Strauss the list is endless. There was also lively folk music tradition worldwide, applicable to its home culture. These great creative movements didn’t depend on a multi million pound industry. It s worth remembering that it was the modern record industry that gave us such classics as Mr Blobby.
In the 20th Century some enterprising businessmen got the idea to sell us our music pressed on plastic discs, this was great , it allowed ordinary people to hear the music of the day in their own homes at the time of their choosing, it gave the business men a great return and many musicians a vast income. They made even more money by changing the format occasionally and making is pay for the music again. (Often at full price). They didn’t care you had already paid them for that piece of work, you paid them again and again, if you wanted a new disc you had to pay.
The record industry would brainwash us in to believing file sharing is stealing? A teenager in his bedroom can download thousands upon thousands of song s from the internet and the record industry will claim they have lost thousands of pounds worth of sales. How could they have lost the sales if the teenager only has £5 a week pocket money, the most they could lose is £5 per week. The teenager couldn’t have spent more than that. Downloading the music gave him thousands of songs but the loss to the record industry was minimal.
I looked on the internet for the legal definition of stealing it said
The wrongful or wilful taking of money or property belonging to someone else with intent to deprive the owner of its use or benefit either temporarily or permanently.
When someone downloads a piece of music they create a new copy, they do not deprive anyone of it. Some may consider downloading wrong, it may be illegal, but it’s not stealing.
This brings me to my point.
In the 20th century record companies provided a service, they put the music onto a plastic discs and charged us a price which suited them to supply it. They kept prices high, claiming it was to invest in new talent (Mr Blobby). Some of the best talent most often comes from the independent music scene, the garage or home studio.
Well, modern technology has made this service redundant, just as the railways killed the canals and video killed the radio star. The Internet has killed the plastic disc. The market place finds its own value, people who value the music will pay, other s will not. The poll tax may have seemed like a good idea to Margaret Thatcher, but it was a bad tax because it was unenforceable. Prosecuting a few file sharers will not stop people downloading, and as technology advances, the chances of getting caught will diminish. Besides, I often now turn to legal forms of free music such as You Tube as its far more convenient that digging out a dusty record sleeve. The games up, accept it, have a decent period of mourning and move making ball point pens or something. I am now arguing that downloading is right or wrong, I’m just saying it is inevitable; the genie is out of the bottle, musicians need to look for new income streams and the record companies are terminally ill.And if the record companies say that downloading will kill music, tell that to Mozart and Beethoven.