U2 - 'The Joshua Tree'

God knows when I bought this. I'd guess it's another record I brought back from New York with me - the fanmail info address is in NYC. And God knows why I bought it - listening to it know, and looking at the Ansell Adams-styled cover shot, where the band are attempting to recast themselves as white boy soul icons, I would, to paraphrase Frankie Boyle, quite happily punch every one of them in the face.

Does it remind me of anything? It reminds me that U2 have made some great records. But for me, this is quite far down the list.

Radiohead - 'OK Computer'

What an amazing record. What a massive, mindblowing, perfect record. All the way through, I keep thinking 'this is the best bit of the record yet', time and time again. It's a rock record filtered through every studio device and human foible imaginable, and what emerges at the other end is damn near perfect.

It's odd that I think all this, and have absolutely no desire to go and see them live. I happily watched them tear the roof off the universe when they played Glastonbury, but I did it on TV, from my sofa, possibly from the far end of a bottle of really good white wine. I wonder why that is? Maybe if I don't go and share the experience with thousands of others, then Radiohead still belong to me, and me alone. No one else really understands them like I do. I LOVE YOU RADIOHEAD!

Anyway, as awesome as this album is, it reminds very clearly of one road trip that Rob, Aidan and I made from Leeds to Salisbury. We'd each made a mixtape for the journey, and at the time, Rob and I were really going to town on ours, using samplers to loop bits, overlay several tracks and so on. About halway through Rob's mix, the familiar computer-generated vocal of 'Fitter, Happier' started up. After a few lines of the acual lyrics, just as the mournful piano starts and the synths start to smother themselves to death, something weird happened. The voice started to go off message: 'when the seagulls follow the trawler...an elephant with his trunk stuck up his own dung funnel...' and so on. Basically, Rob had performed a slavish recreation of the track, and then changed the vocal into meaningless drivel from the end of the 20th century. The effect was uproar: I remember wiping away tears of laughter and looking at Aidan doing the same, while he somehow managed to keep driving and not kill us all, with Rob in the back seat looking delighted and laughing at our reaction. It was the most brilliant, perfectly-timed and unlikely cover version I think I'm ever going to hear.

Killdozer - 'Uncompromising War On Art Under A Proletarian Dictatorship'

What a great title. What a great cover. Surely it can only go downhill from here?

Well, yes and no. Musically, this is now a pretty unappealing record, sounding a bit like Tom Waits fronting a shoegaze Cardiacs - cement-mixer vocals over wall of guitar noise, tempo shifts and angular guitar lines aplenty. And if you don't get the joke (such as it is, that the band are a group of disaffected communists seeking to overthrow the system via sludge-rock), then this isn't a very good album. Actually, I get the joke, and I still don't think it's a very good album.

But the thing that totally redeems them for me is when they played at Salisbury Arts Centre, mid-90s. They came bounding on stage and launched into a note perfect interpretation of 'Unbelievable' by EMF. The place went mental, and in terms of an unexpected icebreaker cover to start a gig with, it was inspired, the lollopping bassline with the gravelly vocals over the top. And Then they launched into one of the tracks from this album, and it all went a bit less mental.

Good concept, average execution.

Cat No: TG82A

Tracks: Final Market. Knuckles The Dog (Who Helps People). Turkey Shoot. Grandma Smith Said A Curious Thing. Hot 'N' Nasty. Enemy Of The People. Earl Scheib. Das Kapital. The Pig Was Cool. Working Hard, or Hardly Working?

Lou Reed - 'Rock n Roll Animal'

I've no idea when, where or why I bought this. I'm not a huge Lou Reed fan. I mean, I love 'Transformer', but who doesn't? I think I just like the idea of Lou Reed more than the reallity of buying his records, although I have listened to 'Metal Machine Music' all through, once, just to see if it was rubbish as people said (it is). And I read William Burroughs' 'Naked Lunch' for pretty much the same reason, but at least Naked Lunch has the redeeming feature of being horribly perverted. 'Metal Machine Music' is just noise.

I don't get this album at all - it pretends to be all nihilisitc, but it has the most god-awful stadium-prog feel to it. In fact, I'd guess this is only the second time I've played it - and possible the last.

Next.

Tracks: Intro/Sweet Jane. Heroin. White Light/White Heat. Lady Day. Rock n Roll

Cat No: NL83664

The Hardknox - 'Coz I Can'

Hardknox is Lindy Layton, the artist better known for being the voice on Beats International's single 'Dub Be Good To Me'. I remember seeing her DJ in the bar of Back To Basics, late 90s. I was there with Aidan, and it was frankly a bit of a slow night. We were talking about leaving when Ms Layton hit the decks and tore the roof off the place with a mammoth breakbeat/hip hop/drum and bass set. Yes, people really did mix it up like that back in the day.

I remember that she had Skint label boss Damian Harris behind the decks with her, and about 10 minutes into her set she pulled out a record and showed it to him. He looked at it, looked at the dance floor, and gave her a proper 'yeees maaate' grin. She then dropped a white label drum and bass remix of 'Funky Beats' - the one with the cut up of Chuck D saying 'IF YOU REALLY WANT TO ROCK THE FUNKY BEATS, SOMEBADY IN THE HOUSE SAY YEAH'. Chuck D does actually rap in capital letters, by the way - it's what makes him so awesome. The place went mental, and we stayed.

If you're a studio geek, there's something irresistably sexy about women messing around with technology - just go to a Juana Molina gig and watch all the tight-jeaned geeks fidget uncomfortably. So the thought of Lindy Layton actually having spent time in a studio making this filthy slab of distorted electro breakbeat hip hop is quite appealing. Weirdly, I thought I wasn't going to like this, thinking that I'd bought it after being seduced by all the distortion and the thought of a woman's hand setting the attack levels on a bank of compressors, but actually this is enjoyably filthy and raucous.

Tracks: Because I Can. Because I Did. Fire Like Dis. Hip Hop Pranksters.

Cat No: SKINT 15

The Lovely Genette - 'Dreadnaught EP'

This reminds me very clearly of an afternoon at Moose's airy, sun-dappled flat. We went round to listen to the upcoming Soundclash releases - I vaguely remember that it felt a bit like a team-building day - and The Lovely Genette (John Bolton) was there, looking like a speed-fuelled postindustrial Tintin. It was mainly the steel toecapped boots, blond cowslick and rockabilly styling that gave this impression, with his baggy clothes hanging off a skinny drummer's body. Me, Rob Overseer John and Moose listened to a load of DATs, and when we played John's (it was the DAT master of this EP), Rob laughed and said 'Zak, meet your long-lost brother'.

Basically, we were both using a sampler trick to create a feel. You take a drum loop, but then move it up and down the keyboard, altering the tempo and feel of the drums. It gets irritating if overused, but at the time it sounded fresh and weird, again going back to Mixmaster Morris's assertion that no two records would ever sound the same once sampler technology became affordable and widespread.

Musically, this is a weird gospel-dub hybrid, starting out like the coolest record you've ever heard, but not moving on from that. You'd think that sounding like the coolest record you've ever heard would be a good thing - an enormous breathy organ bassline, stomp-clap drums and sampled 'trouble, trouble, trouble' blues-gospel vocal line - but it doesn't really progress over the four tracks of the EP.

Cat No: SOUND 010

Tracks: Well Boss. No More. DiscoHead. Kick Their Booty.

Cornershop - 'When I Was Born For the 7th Time'

I like this album, but it really groans to support the weight of the opening two tracks. 'Brimful of Asha' was a big chart hit, and although the original version seems a tad languid compared to the Fatboy Slim remix that took it to the top of the charts, it's still a great pop song.

However what totally ruins this album for me is the the first four bars of 'Sleep on the Left Side' were used as a backing track for the talkie introduction to their daytime Radio 1 show by DJs Marc Riley and Mark Radcliffe. So every time I play this, I'm instantly taken back to a halcyon period where Radio 1 had two hilarious (but largely inappropriate to the demographic) chaps at the helm of their lunchtime show. They were dry, sardonic, intelligent and totally at odds with the rest of the DJ roster. It was as though the controllers of the station thought that their listeners gained 20 IQ points for a couple of hours at lunchtime.

The PRS alone for that snippet of backing track must have made Cornershop a fortune.

Cat No: WIJLP 1065

Tracks: Sleep on the Left Side. Brimful of Asha. Butter the Soul. Chocolat. We're in Yr Corner. Funky Days are Back Again. What is Happening. When the Light Appears Boy. Coming Up. Good Shit. Good to be one the Road Back Home Again. It's Indian Tobacco My Friend. Candyman. State Troopers. Norwegian Wood.