The music of men

Bill Callahan, the man behind Smog, pioneered the lo-fi genre of underground rock, with homemade tape-albums recorded on four track tape recorders. His music is said to draw on the guitar-wracking blues funk of classic americana and variously combines sampled noise, scratchy strings, moe-tucker-drumming (country-style) and beautiful piano arrangements. He's been around for a while, almost 20 years in fact, but is still growing from strength to strength. He recently performed in Reyjkavik alongside Joanna Newsom, an indication of his interesting take on life and music. Away from the limelight, he tells us about fragile emotions, loss, search and resilience, like in this video called Rock Bottom Riser.

Smog's record label, Drag City, is also behind a number of other interesting artists, but none as imposing as Will Oldham, aka Bonnie "Prince" Billy, Palace, Palace Music and Palace Brothers. Despite the confused personality and the austere busker's looks, he's considered the finest songwriter to come out of America in the past decade, and has worked - amongst others - with Johnny Cash, PJ Harvey, Björk and Matthew Barney. Yes F, Johnny Cash, who recorded one of Oldham's best and darkest songs, I See A Darkness, not so long ago. I tried to find some of his music on the world wide web, but his personal elusiveness extends to his songs too. Only a video, and not one of his best songs either. But it's a start.

Finally, in this tribute to male songwriters, I wanted to point out to you Mission of Burma, widely acknowledged as "one of the first groups to achieve the potential of modern alternative/independent rock, fusing punk and experimental music into some of the most influential music to come out of the American punk/no wave scene". First active in the late '70s, they re-grouped in 2002 and are now experiencing something of a second birth under Matador, the label of Belle and Sebastian and formerly of Boards of Canada. In honour of my friend PDF, or maybe not, they have just created their own wiki with stuff from their latest album - the Obliterati - slowly being released on the net. Avanguard, I say. And damn good music too. They're playing at Koko here in London tomorrow night. I might leave my Mac for the occasion...!