Author Archives: dan

Sunday Afternoon Vinyl – Pearl Jam – Ten

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Pearl Jam - Ten

Pearl Jam

Ten

Discogs: https://www.discogs.com/release/11116451-Pearl-Jam-Ten

Year Of Release: 1991

Review

Some of you might be surprised to learn that I enjoy the music of Pearl Jam, but it shouldn’t be that surprising. Grunge was a nice escape from country and western when I was growing up in a small town in the early nineties, and Pearl Jam and Nirvana were tremendously popular, with their music videos enjoying relatively frequent airplay. So popular in fact that for some reason I found the need to sell my Nirvana CDs in the late nineties to somehow rid myself of the popular grunge thing (I probably just needed beer money). So while I enjoy Pearl Jam, I don’t have many of the band’s studio albums, and I seem to prefer to pick up the various concert bootlegs on vinyl and CD. I don’t get it either, but I’m working on filling in the gaps as best I can.

When Alive was released I remember I bought the CD single (remember CD singles? Almost as weird as cassingles). For some reason I didn’t buy a copy of Ten for many years after that. I don’t know why. I really enjoyed Alive, and I figured I’d probably enjoy the rest of the album too, but for some reason I could never commit. I do remember one of my classmates at the time commenting on the titles of the album all being one word only and maybe that was something we should think was weird. That’s right, super insightful stuff from fifteen year olds there.

This is a great album from start to finish, and has become my favourite album to listen to on repeat when I’m on a long-haul flight across the Pacific. I don’t know how that tradition started, but I imagine it had something to do with the limited range of albums available on the in-flight entertainment during the strange ten years or so where I was travelling to the US four to six times a year. Nowadays I need to listen to it on my phone as the airline I use has removed it from the music catalogue.

Standout tracks are the aforementioned Alive, Once, Black, and Release. But as I said this is very much a no skips album.

Rating: 9/10

Sunday Afternoon Vinyl – Transplants – Take Cover

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Transplants - Take Cover

Transplants

Take Cover

Discogs: https://www.discogs.com/release/11157876-Transplants-Take-Cover

Year Of Release: 2017

Review

Come on Dan, I thought you weren’t reviewing singles and EPs? Well, firstly, I never set out to exclude EPs. And there aren’t really any rules with this weblog anyway. But I’ll keep it brief, like the EP. In any case, I really enjoyed the two albums put out by Transplants, and so this EP of cover songs was a bit of a non brainer. I’ve got a real soft spot for well done covers, and this EP delivers. But of course, the first track isn’t a cover, just to keep you on your toes. Could you go past a version of Seeing Red by Minor Threat being done by Tim Timebomb and Skinhead Rob? No, of course you couldn’t. Nor could you not listen to a version of Baggy Trousers that Madness could have only dreamed of doing. You want to ride the bike off a cliff? How about Nothing But A Heartache by The Flirtations? Sure, it’s rough, but it’s real. Live Fast Die Young by The Violators is a brilliant version, and you can’t go wrong with Gratitude by Beastie Boys. The EP is ably rounded out by another Transplants track, Won’t Be Coming Back.

I told you I’d keep it relatively short. If you like Transplants, and you like covers, this is the perfect album for you. I just wish there was more of it.

Rating: 8/10

Sunday Afternoon Vinyl – Urban Dance Squad – Persona Non Grata

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Urban Dance Squad - Persona Non Grata

Urban Dance Squad

Persona Non Grata

Discogs: https://www.discogs.com/release/9211916-Urban-Dance-Squad-Persona-Non-Grata

Year Of Release: 1994

Review

Persona Non Grata is my favourite album from Dutch group Urban Dance Squad. A few years prior to its release I’d heard (and enjoyed) Mental Floss For The Globe. This album, however, seemed a lot heavier on the guitar which fit in well with my fascination with many of the rap / rock bands that were doing the rounds at the time.

Urban Dance Squad was also the first real gig I went to see, having the opportunity to see them play at Le Théâtre Barbey in Bordeaux in November, 1994. They were amazing live – full of energy and so loud (maybe they seemed so loud because I wasn’t bright enough to use ear protection in those days).

Urban Dance Squad concert ticket - 1994.11.02

They put out six albums (I’m not counting the Singles Collection released after they split up) in their time together and I recommend you go check them out. There’s a massive variety of musical styles being incorporated into the songs, and it’s fascinating to compare what they were doing in Europe at the same time as bands were doing something similar in the U.S.

Standout tracks on this one are Demagogue, Good Grief!, (Some) Chitchat, and Hangout. I used to really enjoy Downer, but nowadays I can’t come at it. Anyway, check out Urban Dance Squad if you haven’t.

Rating: 8/10

Sunday Afternoon Vinyl – The Cramps – Bad Music For Bad People

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The Cramps - Bad Music For Bad People

The Cramps

Bad Music For Bad People

Discogs: https://www.discogs.com/release/12794668-The-Cramps-Bad-Music-For-Bad-People

Year Of Release: 1984

Review

I was given a taped copy of this compilation in 1995/96 by the little sister of one of my flatmates. It was the first time I’d had a chance to listen to The Cramps, although not the first time I’d heard of them, thanks mainly to exposure via t-shirt ads in Thrasher Magazine. I hadn’t had much exposure to “psychobilly”, but when I heard this album I knew I wanted to hear more.

It’s a compilation that was apparently somewhat controversial at the time, given that The Cramps had finished up with I.R.S. and it seemed like the label was milking the sacred cow for all it could. Regardless, I thought it was a great compilation, and it certainly sparked a fascination and enjoyment of The Cramps and their music that persists to this day.

Standout tracks on this one are New Kind of Kick, Garbageman, She Said, and Human Fly. But they’re really all great. Additionally, if you’re into random stuff, there’s a terrific version of Garbageman done by William Shatner that’s out in the wild too and definitely worth checking out.

Rating: 9/10

Sunday Afternoon Vinyl – Prefuse 73 Featuring Ghostface And El-P – HideYaFace

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Prefuse 73 Featuring Ghostface And El-P - HideYaFace

Prefuse 73 Featuring Ghostface And El-P

HideYaFace

Discogs: https://www.discogs.com/release/402412-Prefuse-73-Featuring-Ghostface-And-El-P-HideYaFace

Year Of Release: 2005

Review

Dan, I thought you weren’t going to be doing reviews of 12″ singles? I’m not really, but I had to mention this one. And I’ll keep it really short. An absolute banger of a track that I stumbled upon randomly at a record fair a few years ago. It’s a fantastic Boom-Bap track featuring Ghostface Killah and El-P. I bought the album that it’s off, and wasn’t super excited by it, but I did really enjoy the Extinguished: Outtakes album from Prefuse 73. He’s done a bunch of stuff that’s worth checking out.

Rating: 8/10

Sunday Afternoon Vinyl – Dead Kennedys – Plastic Surgery Disasters

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Dead Kennedys - Plastic Surgery Disasters

Dead Kennedys

Plastic Surgery Disasters

Discogs: https://www.discogs.com/release/1575148-Dead-Kennedys-Plastic-Surgery-Disasters

Year Of Release: 1982

Review

Dead Kennedys is one of my favourite punk bands of all time, and this is probably my favourite album from them. Which is unusual, as I owned copies of both Fresh Fruit For Rotting Vegetables and the excellent compilation Give Me Convenience Or Give Me Death before I owned this one, but this one is still my favourite. It might be a question of time passing and having some more opportunities to listen to the album. Dan, what are you on about? Let me explain. I first owned Plastic Surgery Disasters on cassette, and not long after I bought it, my cassette player chewed up some of the tape. Fortunately, I was able to unscrew the shell and cut out the chewed up tape and re-tape it. Whilst I was able to save the cassette, it did mean that Trust Your Mechanic always sounded messed up, as did Bleed For Me (on Side B). I’ve since purchased a copy on CD and a vinyl pressing and am thus able to listen to the album more frequently. The joys of fragile cassettes!

Dead Kennedys - Plastic Surgery Disasters cassette

In any case, this is a brilliant hardcore punk album, and one that I think stands up well over forty years later. And I’m not the only one to think that – there’s a great (and gushing) review over here. Dead Kennedys is, and always has been, an absolutely fascinating band. And whilst I’m sad that Jello and the rest of the band could never work out the issues they had, I’m beyond stoked that they managed to put out what they did in the brief period they were making records together.

Standout tracks on this one are the aforementioned Trust Your Mechanic, Terminal Preppie, Halloween, and Riot. Special mention goes to Moon Over Marin, still one of my favourite DKs tracks, and one that I play at least once a week. I haven’t posted a photo of the cover – but you can see it here if you really want to.

Rating: 9.5/10

Sunday Afternoon Vinyl – Shootyz Groove – Jammin In Vicious Environments

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Shootyz Groove - Jammin In Vicious Environments

Shootyz Groove

Jammin In Vicious Environments

Discogs: https://www.discogs.com/release/2402222-Shootyz-Groove-Jammin-In-Vicious-Environments

Year Of Release: 1994

Review

I was fortunate enough to see Shootyz Groove perform live in 1995 at Le Théâtre Barbey in Bordeaux, supporting downset. They were amazing live, and I very happily bought their live EP on CD from the merch table.

Sadly, I don’t have a lot of information to share about the band, but I do know that things didn’t last as long as they perhaps should have, and the band never seemed to reach the heights that they possibly should have either. It’s almost as if they were about five years too early to gain mainstream (or at least broader) acceptance. But I remember there was some great rap / rock crossover happening in the early to mid-90s, and Shootyz Groove deserve to be mentioned among the big names like downset., Rage Against The Machine, Dog Eat Dog, and the like.

This is a fun album, and is one that is best played loud. I had a copy on tape for many years before tracking down a CD version and, eventually, a vinyl pressing (thank you Japanese record sellers with reasonable shipping prices and a Yen in decline). Standout tracks are Respect, In The Ocean, Soulfreak, Walkin’ In The Fog, and R.I.T.W. If you can get hold of this album, and you like rap / rock crossover bands from New York, and songs about disco cigarettes, I think you’ll really enjoy this album.

Shootyz Groove - JIVE cassette

Rating: 9/10

Sunday Afternoon Vinyl – Def Leppard – Hysteria

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Def Leppard - Hysteria

Def Leppard

Hysteria

Discogs: https://www.discogs.com/release/10660430-Def-Leppard-Hysteria

Year Of Release: 1987

Review

I was given a copy of this album on cassette for Christmas in 1987. I was still at primary school, but starting to appreciate the finer things in life, like hair metal. And this album really delivers when it comes to that. I’ve not purchased a Def Leppard album since – why push your luck when you’ve already found perfect?

I didn’t know much about Def Leppard back then, and I’m still woefully ignorant. I did hear something about the drummer’s accident around the time, but will likely still go to Hell for giggling hysterically when I first heard it referenced in Bloodhound Gang’s Why’s Everybody Always Pickin’ On Me? There’s something about the British metal bands – they seemed really prominent in my youth. But that might just be because down here in the colonies we’re raised on more British than American fare.

Lyrically, there’s not a lot going on here, but that’s perfect for this kind of album. Pour Some Sugar On Me? Super catchy track, but no idea why anybody would pour sugar on someone. Other stuff, sure, but sugar? Is it a euphemism? We’ll never know. I didn’t understand then, and don’t really understand now. Even Kurt Loder noted in his Rolling Stone review that this album struggled with lyrics, but that didn’t matter. What matters is that this album is filled with tracks that you’ve likely already heard, and maybe even sung and danced to.

Standouts for me are the aforementioned Pour Some Sugar On Me, as well as Rocket, Women, Hysteria, Love Bites, Animal, and Gods Of War. It’s a fun album, and one that I still have on semi-regular rotation.

Rating: 8/10

Sunday Afternoon Vinyl – AC/DC – Blow Up Your Video

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AC/DC - Blow Up Your Video

AC/DC

Blow Up Your Video

Discogs: https://www.discogs.com/release/16120715-ACDC-Blow-Up-Your-Video

Year Of Release: 1988

Review

I have no idea why AC/DC is as popular as it is. I mean, it’s honest, blue-collar rock and roll, but a lot of it sounds the same (according to my wife). I do know that anytime I travel overseas, people ask me about them. The French seem to really love them. “Australien? AC/DC?” Oui, oui. Regardless, I enjoy listening to them from time to time, but I’m a casual (albeit staunch) supporter at best. I was first introduced to them in primary school via the father of my best friend at the time (shout out to Richard). I remember watching the back catalogue of music videos on Rage one night at a sleepover at his house. I was young, but I knew this is what rock and roll was all about.

I had limited exposure to the early stuff (only coming to appreciate it much later), but I do remember on my 12th birthday my parents gave me a John Farnham LP. I received some of the folding stuff from friends and family and went down to Chandlers to pick up a copy of Blow Up Your Video. The second side promptly got a scratch on it (during Nick Of Time) and it wasn’t until around 2020 that I picked up a new pressing. My parents’ turntable was quite unforgiving when it came to dishing out punishment for careless operation.

If the Internet is to be believed, this is the last AC/DC album that Brian Johnson received a writing credit on. This album is all balls to the wall rock and roll, and standout tracks for me are the aforementioned Nick Of Time, Heatseeker, That’s The Way I Wanna Rock ‘n’ Roll, and This Means War. Probably not the best AC/DC album out there, but it’s my favourite. I won’t be accepting questions at this time.

Rating: 8.5/10

Brisbane VMUG – September 2026

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The September 2026 edition of the Brisbane VMUG meeting will be held on Thursday 24th September at Christie’s, 320 Adelaide Street, Brisbane from 4pm to 5:30pm. It’s sponsored by Canonical and Broadcom and promises to be a great afternoon.

Here’s the agenda:

VCF with Ubuntu (Peter Hauck – Broadcom and James Gill – Canonical)
Secure platform deployment with secure package management for the private cloud.
  • Secure Automated Deployments for Complex Workloads
  • Building custom secure VKS platform based on Ubuntu.
  • Ubuntu fun with Automation
Architecting for Failure: A Deep Dive into VMC on AWS’s Multi-AZ Resiliency (Dan Frith – Broadcom)
Multi-AZ SDDCs promise continuity when an Availability Zone goes dark – but what actually happens in the seconds and minutes after that failure domain disappears?
  • How a Multi-AZ SDDC distributes management and compute across independent failure domains, and how vSAN managed storage replication keeps data consistent across AZs before failure occurs.
  • VMC on AWS instance types
  • Roadmap (Version updates, vSAN enhancements, and more!)

Canonical and Broadcom have gone to great lengths to make sure this will be a fun and informative session. You can find out more information and register for the event here. I hope to see you there. Also, if you’re interested in sponsoring one of these events, please get in touch with me and I can help make it happen.