July 2015 – Page 2 – THE NEW VINYL VILLAIN

NEXT YEAR’S NOSTALGIA FEST (Part 25 of 48)

Two weeks ago it was Fizzbombs who had plenty of links with Shop Assistants from seven days ago. This week’s CD86 song has links with Shop Assistants as was explained when they featured in the Scottish Singles Series back in February 2014:-

Meat Whiplash from East Kilbride were amongst the first to be signed to Creation Records.

The line-up was Paul McDermott (vocals), Stephen McLean (guitar), Edward Connelly (bass guitar) and Michael Kerr (drums). They took their name from a B-side track by The Fire Engines. They then became The Motorcycle Boy when Alex Taylor (of The Shop Assistants) joined the group in 1987.

Meat Whiplash only ever released one 7″ record. It was in September 1985 with a sleeve featuring actor Robert Vaughan that had been printed up by Bobby Gillespie and hand-folded by their record label’s owner, Alan McGee.

The band were the opening act at North London Polytechnic on 15 March 1985 on the occasion of the infamous “riot gig” by Jesus and Mary Chain.

That one 7″ single was included on CD 86 and here it is along with its b-side. It’s a bit high on the noisy and tuneless scale:-

mp3 : Meat Whiplash – Don’t Slip Up
mp3 : Meat Whiplash – Here It Comes

Enjoy

Barn Owl

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #19 : BARN OWL

Today features a song that I have downloaded from somewhere at some point. They are a Scottish band and they are a band I’ve actually seen play as a support act at one time or another (when and where I can’t recall) but bear with me as you have a listen to a song from the mid 2000s which more than reminds me of Arcade Fire:-

mp3 : Barn Owl – When No-One Is Around

The thing is, I recall downloading it when it was a song by a band called Gambas Pil Pil (named after a prawn based tapas dish) and then I heard it played live a few years later but by a band called Barn Owl. From what I can tell, the bands are one and the same with just a name change. But trying to track down a photo of the band, far less any relevant info has proved beyond me.

I’m guessig that they may well have formed around a group of friends who were studying togeher at University and then when the time came to use thier hard earned degrees to make an honest living the band fell by the wayside. But that’s just idle and unsupported speculation on my part.

Anyone out there any knowledge?

Robert Smith, Twilight Sad

SOME NEW MUSIC FOR A CHANGE

It’s been kicking around the internet for a few months now that Robert Smith of The Cure had been asked and agreed to do a cover of a song by The Twilight Sad.

He has been a fan of the band for years and there had been hopes that he would have been able to get involved in the remix version of the No One Can Ever Know LP but that didn’t work out due to work and touring commitments. However, having been given a copy of the band’s newest LP Nobody Wants Be Here And Nobody Wants To Leave and described it as ‘BEAUTIFUL’ he was then approached with what the band thought was an audacious request to cover one of their songs for inclusion as a future b-side. And to their great delight he said yes and selected There’s A Girl In The Corner which is the opener on the latest LP.

The version has been available to listen to on the web for a long while now, but knowing that I was going to physically get a hold of the track via the purchase of the single, I decided I would wait until I had the piece of plastic in my hands before ever my first ever listen. I wanted to hark back to those days when buying 7″ singles provided a sense of adventure as playing a new song by a much-loved singer or band via a b-side provided real excitement.

I was pleased to read that the version Smith had recorded was brand new – I had a fear it was going to be karaoke by numbers with him just supplying a new vocal to the Sad’s music. But there it was on the sleeve : “Voices and Instruments by Robert Smith. Engineered, Produced and Mixed by Robert Smith at Homestudio. Assisted by Bunny Lake.”

This however, only provided a new fear.

What if it was rubbish in comparison to the original?

I should remind regular readers that I went for The Twilight Sad very early on in the Imaginary Albums series specifically to avoid the dilemma of having to include songs from their then upcoming album. It was a great move on my part as it is a really mature and classy record that also sounded magnificent in the live setting with a gig in Stirling last December rounding off what had been an exceptional and i doubt ever to be repeated year of live music thanks in the main to so many special events that supported Glasgow staging the 2014 Commonwealth Games. The song the band had chosen for this single – It Was Never The Same – is a standout from the album as indeed is the song Smith had selected.

mp3 : The Twilight Sad – There’s A Girl In The Corner
mp3 : The Twilight Sad – It Was Never The Same

These were high standards…….and so just seven days ago, at the end of what has been a trying and difficult few days, I gave it a spin:-

mp3 : Robert Smith – There’s A Girl In The Corner

If I had heard this without knowing the original then I’d have been hugely impressed with the fact that the best part of 40 years on since bursting onto the scene that Robert Smith still had a great ability to deliver marvellous music.

In other words….I was impressed. Very Impressed.

But to add some additional other words…..it ain’t as good as the original. Which confirms the conclusion I’ve been coming to over the past nine months or so since the fourth album was released and on the back of what have been some unforgettable live outings in different formats over the past few years.

The Twilight Sad are the best band going right now.

No arguments please.

Altered Images

THE ALTERED IMAGES SINGLES (8)

The next single was even more surprising than the last….

Bring Me Closer was released at the end of May 1983 just as Don’t Talk To Me About Love was easing its way out of the charts. This was a sound even more unlike Altered Images than could ever have been imagined. It was also interesting to see that having already worked with one of the giants of lush production in Mike Chapman the band had gone for the double whammy and roped in Tony Visconti for the latest 45.

I wasn’t sure if I liked this single much when I first heard it. It felt too cluttered with so much going on including synth strings and prominent backing singers whose delivery was every bit on the edge as Clare’s normal singing style. To be honest, I’m still not sure if I like it all that much and I’d have no hesitation in ranking it as my second least favourite 45 by them.

The other thing that struck me was when I first causght sight of the single in the racks of the local record shop. Up until this point the sleeves of the 45s had almost always featured unique and stylish artwork from David Band, an illustrator who came to prominence via Altered Images but had since gone on to see his work used by, among others Aztec Camera while in future years he would be commissioned by Spandau Ballet for the multi-million selling True. This time however, it was a photograph of a young lady with stylish black clothes and an exceedingly modern and fashionable haircut. It was only at the second or third glance did you realise you were looking at a new-look Clare Grogan…

Which leads me to the bizarre story behind the writing of True as told by the songwriter Gary Kemp:-

“I wrote the song at my parents’ house, where I was still living at the time. As a working-class boy, I wouldn’t think of moving out till I got married. I was infatuated with Clare Grogan. I met her on Top of the Pops and, at one point, travelled up to Scotland to have tea with her and her mum and dad. Although my feelings were unrequited and the relationship was platonic, it was enough to trigger a song, True, which became the name of our 1983 album, too.

True is about how difficult it is to be honest when you’re trying to write a love song to someone. Hence: “Why do I find it hard to write the next line?” The lyrics are full of coded messages to Clare. I’m still berated for the line “Take your seaside arms” but it’s straight out of Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov, which she had given me as a present – although in the book, it’s “seaside limbs”. The line “With a thrill in my head and a pill on my tongue” is also a bastardisation of Nabokov. I don’t want to embarrass Clare. I was 22 and she was 18. True was really a song about me and my idea of love.”

This only emerged some three years ago and I’m guessing that the decision to use David Band’s terrific artwork on the sleeve of True was Gary Kemp sending a subliminal message to Clare who by this time had now met Stephen Lironi who she would go on to marry in 1994.

But back to the matter in hand….the feelgood factor from the previous single helped Bring Me Closer reach #29 two weeks after its release but unusually for an Altered Images 45 it immediately dropped down the following week but selling enough to hang around in the thirty-somethings for a short while before disappearing just as the parent album was released.

This 45 was released in 7″ and 12″ editions:-

7″

mp3 : Altered Images – Bring Me Closer
mp3 : Altered Images – Surprise Me

12″

mp3 : Altered Images – Bring Me Closer (extended version)

The 7″ and 12″ also came as picture discs. The 12″ pic disc is one of just two pieces of plastic originally released by the band in the singles format that I don’t own.

Enjoy

SBTRKT

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM : #23 : SBTRKT

Just Two Guys Messing Around

(An Imaginary Compilation of sorts – Part 2) by S-WC

I should start by stating two things, firstly, The Duckworth-Lewis Method has ruined 20/20 cricket. There was no way that team was going to get 77 runs in 5 overs. Secondly, my iPod has what I call a ‘safe playlist’ this contains a number of tracks that I wouldn’t listen to normally but the entire playlist is there for background entertainment at parties and such like. Mrs S-WC quite often identifies tracks that she likes and they too go in the safe playlist. These two things will become relevant in a short while.

So we are travelling back from the beautiful city of Worcester to Devon, it is my turn to have a random act picked for me to design a compilation on them. Secretly I am quite worried about what act I will get – but obviously I pretend that I don’t care. Personally I hope I get something good, I really want it to be Teenage Fanclub, The Beta Band or The Libertines just because I think it would be fun to do anyone of these. I hope it’s not Primal Scream, Spiritualized or PJ Harvey because it will take me about 17 years to finally decide on the tracklist. Anyway the music has started….

First track is Blur – Trimm Trabb from their album 13. Blur would be easy to do because I only like about ten of their songs. Next up is Dubstar and their wonderful cover of St Swithians Day. I miss Dubstar. Years ago when Dubstar were quite popular I hung around with a chap called Chris, he and I had a massive argument over the singer in Dubstar, Sarah Blackwood, which revolved around whether or not she was born in Gateshead or Halifax (he said Gateshead, I said Halifax, seriously it literally went on like that for like an hour Gateshead, Halifax, Gateshead, Halifax then after about thirty minutes it was Gateshead you twat, Halifax you knobhead etc). He has not spoken to me since that argument. Chris if you are reading, she was born in Halifax you turdball. I really miss Dubstar. Erm where was I…

Next up was the Hives, and some song of theirs that I’d forgotten almost as soon as it was finished, I like the Hives it’s just that they have one truly memorable song and lots of good but identical songs. Track four was She Bangs The Drums by the Stone Roses, now they would be a difficult band to do an Imaginary Compilation for because basically everything after the first album is shocking. Then we get an album track by brilliant dub pioneers Renegade Soundwave and my phone rings. It’s work and it’s a matter of National Importance, or that is how they justify phoning me in the evening (it wasn’t but it did involve a Hornby Train set so it was fairly important). The phone call takes a while and Tim turns the stereo down but not off. Keep count I tell him. He nods.

Track Six fades into the memory, track seven is definitely Reverance by the Jesus and Mary Chain, and then I kind of switch off and have to actually listen to the phone call and do a lot of talking. Eventually I finish the call – just as the last ten seconds or so or Flowers and Football Tops by Glasvegas is on the stereo. What number are we on I ask the Badgerman.

He says (and this is important) ‘This is Number Ten’. Wow that was lucky I think, here comes track 11, I haven’t had time to get nervous or anything I can take this in my stride, the iPod is being nice today as well – so I am confident.

Ahh, shit, no, please, no, that’s a plinky plonky piano, that goes on and on and then about thirty seconds in my fears are confirmed.

Fuck.

Its Coldplay. Fucking Coldplay and the insufferable bollocks that is The Scientist – now dear reader – scroll back up – Mrs S-WC likes this song, solely for the reason that the video for it is filmed about three miles from our house, at a place called Haldon Moor. She refers to Chris Martin as ‘Whiney Balls’ but this song sits in the safe playlist and now this safe playlist has kicked me squarely in the balls. I sigh, then I sigh louder as Badgerman taps along to the song on the steering wheel, probably just to annoy me – he looks very smug. Why have you got Coldplay on your iPod he asks. For the same reason you have Maneater by Hall and Oates I say. Ah, the wife, he says.

I sit glumly, its fine, I’ll write up an imaginary compilation by Coldplay and then I’ll vanish into the distance, there is a placement coming up in St Helena that looks inviting – if I can keep this secret from future job interviews I might be able to show my face on the Internet in about twenty years time. But there by the pick of an iPod the day, the month, the year is ruined. I now have to listen to Coldplay, properly, and I will probably have to buy some of their bloody annoyingly dismal records to actually do it properly instead of just sending JC a recording of a buffalo grunting ten times over the same piano loop. Its been nice knowing you all.

Coldplay has finished and then the strands of New Dorp, New York by excellent dance guru SBTRKT comes on. Never has a song sounded so fantastic, never has a record been so welcomed. Tim looks at me and grins ‘Well that’s not so bad’ he says ‘Much easier than Asian Dub Foundation’ he says. Yeah. I reply. Hang on. What. Rewind. Say that again. He looks at me strangely, ‘The 11th track. SBTRKT’ he says. What. It was Coldplay wasn’t it. ‘No that was tenth I told you that’.

No you didn’t. You said Glasvegas was tenth. An argument ensues for about three minutes – after which we are silent largely because Howling Bells have come on the iPod. Then we laugh and double check by clicking the back button and obviously Tim is right. For those of you who really want to know, track six was an album track by much missed and under rated weirdoes Wu Lyf, track seven was indeed ‘Reverence’ by JAMC and track eight was Wasted Hours by Arcade Fire

Readers with children will know this feeling, the lovely feeling you get when you get back into bed after sleeping on a floor under a rug or blanket next to your childs bed because they are poorly or upset or just a bit scared, that wonderful indescribable comfy feeling of a duvet and soft mattress. That’s how I felt when I realised that I didn’t have to do a Coldplay compilation. To the point where the journey and the Coldplay thing became more important than actually writing about SBRKT.

SBTRKT are the work of the bemasked and supposedly anonymous chap Aaron Jerome and have released two albums, the first one (SBTRKT) is perhaps one of the most important dance releases of the last five years or so. I heartily recommend it to you. I’m not going to write about each song on this compilation because its insignificant right now. Just enjoy the fact that it is not Coldplay. Saying that Tim and I are off to the cricket again on August 17th – and we have agreed to do this again – so let’s rewrite that last sentence to enjoy the fact that it is not Coldplay for now.

In honour of the confusing Duckworth Lewis Thing I have compiled this in concept album style.

The Duckworth Side

New Dorp, New York (featuring Ezra Koenig) from ‘Wonder Where We Land’

Hold On (featuring Sampha) from ‘SBTRKT’

Pharaohs (featuring Roses Gabor) from ‘SBTRKT’

Look Away (featuring Caroline Polacheck) from ‘Wonder Where We Land’

Sanctuary (featuring Jessie Ware and Sampha) from ‘SBTRKT’

The Lewis Side

Wildfire (featuring Little Dragon) from ‘SBTRKT’

The Light (featuring Denai Moore) from ‘Wonder Where We Land’

Problem (solved) (featuring Jessie Ware) from ‘Wonder Where We Land’

Higher (featuring Raury) from ‘Wonder Where We Land’

Heatwave from ‘SBTRKT’

Take care out there.

S-WC

Cats On Fire, Magic Numbers, Sundays, Teenage Fanclub

SUNSHINE AND SADNESS

Last week saw much of the UK bask in warm, glorious sunshine and record temperatures. Here in Glasgow it wasn’t quite like that although it seemed pleasant enough and the dry spell was very welcome after what had been a largely damp, dreich and often cold May and June.

The thing is, I didn’t notice it all that much as the good weather coincided with a great deal of sadness in as much as I was at two funerals in the space of 48 hours. The first of them was for a talented young man in his early 20s who was killed in a road accident and the second was for a wonderful lady who wasn’t that far off her 100th birthday but whose latter years were ruined by the onset of various illnesses including dementia.

All the while, the world was coming to terms with the latest of what are increasingly scary terrorist attacks in Tunisia just as we are getting our heads around the horror of the attack on a black church by an extremist in South Carolina in the USA.

I don’t know how the rest of you cope with trauma and adversity but you won’t be surprised to learn that I try to do so through music. And this past few days instead of relying on the shuffle feature of the iPod as I normally do when I’m on my way to work I’ve found myself searching out songs that make me smile and which can form a perfect soundtrack to a normal summer. Here’s four that have stood out:-

mp3 : The Sundays – Summertime

Harriet Wheeler and the boys have made more important and indeed essential indietracks but this single from 1997 is a real standout for me partly as it is a perfect love song but mainly because it is so full of warmth and vitality that it is impossible not to smile and sigh as you listen.

mp3 : The Magic Numbers – Forever Lost

A hit single from the summer of 2005. It doesn’t seem as if was as long as ten years ago. A bittersweet break-up song clothed in a ridiculously upbeat and zestful tune. The Magic Numbers never bettered this, their debut single.

mp3 : Teenage Fanclub – Sparky’s Dream

No way is this 20 years old. Noooooooooooooooooooooooooo waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyy.

I’ve said before that I can be a bit ambivalent about Teenage Fanclub but the thing is, when they’re good, they tend to be exceptionally good. It’s impossible to listen to this and not do a wee imaginary dance in your head as you stare at your fellow commuters.

mp3 : Cats On Fire – I Am The White-Mantled King

I don’t know all that much about pop music and Finland. But I do know that Cats On Fire have been doing tremendous things for well over a decade now and ought to be better known and more appreciated than they are. If they are new to you, then you could do worse than head over to somewhere like youtube and watch some of their wonderful promo videos. This is the opening track to the 2007 LP The Province Complains, a record that every fan of intelligently crafted indie pop should own.

Coming up tomorrow…..something else that cheered me up in the middle of last week.

Enjoy

Tilly and The Wall

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM : #22 : TILLY AND THE WALL

Another very fine guest contribution today, this time courtesy of someone who rather shyly has asked to be known as Strangeways. He/she is someone who I’ve got to know and befriend over the time since I began this blog and he/she has superb taste in music going by the tunes he/she unearths at DJ spots in and around Glasgow. So when the idea of a compilation album by a band I know nothing about was offered I had no hesitation in accepting….

Hi JC

I hope this finds you well.

As threatened, here is a pop at a contribution. Give it a read when you get time, but please feel no obligation to include it.

As you’ll see, it is one intended for the Imaginary Compilation Albums files. Like a lot of readers I think this is a superb series.

I noticed that Tuesday’s featured a mocked-up sleeve, so I had a go at that too as I thought it was a great addition to the overall idea. If you like this I can email the tunes to you if you need them.

Also – could I go by the bashful pen name of Strangeways?…..

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM

TILLY AND THE WALL: HARD TO HOLD WITHOUT SHATTERING

Note: This compilation draws only from Tilly’s four LPs so far – Wild Like Children; Bottoms of Barrels; O and Heavy Mood – as I’m not yet familiar with B-sides or the early, funny Woo! EP.

I’m awful at writing about music.

That’s not a sentence designed to attract reassurances to the contrary. I really do struggle with writing about music, particularly songs I love. And it takes me ages too. So hats off to this blog, its captain and its contributors. Here’s my go at it:

Tilly and the Wall is a band from Omaha, Nebraska. And the whole thing really ought not to work. It sounds like an X Factor disaster: a bunch of brightly dressed energetic young Americans who, instead of lugging a drum kit around, often rely on one of their number, Jamie Williams Pressnall, to tap-dance upon an amplified box. It’s not a gimmick if it works . And it does. They always look so happy too.

But perhaps that’s the secret right there. Perhaps Tilly – collectively Kianna Alarid, Neely Jenkins, Derek Pressnall, Jamie Williams Pressnall and Nick White – are an antidote to the cool cynicism that can sometimes characterise the genre the band broadly fits into. I mean, they’ve even appeared on Sesame Street. It’s difficult – but fun – to imagine The Fall doing that.

Either way, I feel lucky to have seen Tilly a couple of times at King Tut’s in Glasgow. Both were joyful, incendiary shows.

I missed them when they played a festival in a park just down the road from my old secondary school though. It’s mind-boggling to think of their tunes drifting along the old number 35 bus route. Just how did a band from so far away end up playing in that truant spot of choice, where the top boys would smoke, tie the swings in knots and write all over the roundabouts?

Side A

1. Nights of the Living Dead (Wild Like Children, 2004)

I first heard the band maybe ten years ago. It was by happy accident – on a CD mix that a friend had left at my house. The Tilly song on the disc was called Nights of the Living Dead and it instantly knocked my socks off.

I was hooked by its relentless drive, its manifesto-posing-as-lyrics and that tap-dancing stapling everything together. A parent-puzzler of the You Made Me Realise variety, I always thought it was a Teenage Riot of its day.

So I bought the Wild Like Children LP expecting more of the same. But it turned out Nights… was the exception, not the rule. Wild Like Children was kind of folky in parts. Slow to mid-tempo. For someone on the lookout for nine more Nights of the Living Dead it didn’t deliver and I didn’t get it. At least not immediately.

The truth is that actually it’s a cracking record. And as for those fast, fizzy numbers I’d expected, the band would go on to supply plenty of those on their subsequent releases.

2. The Freest Man (Bottoms of Barrels, 2006)

A great lyric about the troubles of the eponymous freest man is sung drily over an incessant, insistent and twitchy tune. This one’s inclusion came down to a last-minute battle with Pot Kettle Black which, on another day, could have won out.

3. All Kinds of Guns (Heavy Mood, 2012)

Brash, bratty, swaggering and dirty, this song from the band’s fourth initially-awkward-but-really-worth-sticking-with LP is terrific. The Spector/girl-group influence looms large from beyond the cell door, and the punny chorus is helped along, appropriately, by some great machine-gun drumming.

4. Falling Without Knowing (O, 2008)

Shimmering, shuffling and superclean, Falling Without Knowing gleams and glistens. This is Tilly in Space. It’s smooth as silk. Had her haircut allowed for headphones, it’s the kind of thing the formative Princess Leia might have listened to on her Walkman.

5. Let it Rain (Wild Like Children, 2004)

Perhaps an older sibling to Lost Girls (see Side 2), Let it Rain opens with a sly homage to Madonna‘s Into the Groove then develops into a haunting, melancholy number complete with boy/girl harmonies, flute and cello. Glasgow’s own Butcher Boy, really ought to have a crack at this one.

Side B

6. Tall Tall Grass (O, 2008)

A screech of guitar towards the close of this otherwise gentle and heartfelt song catches you unawares (although for new listeners I’ve rather given the game away now). A great opener to the economically titled O LP.

7. Sing Songs Along (Bottoms of Barrels, 2006)

The starting-gun scream will likely annoy you. But get past that and you’ll be treated to a joyful riot that doesn’t stop for tea even once. Its funny video shows the band gadding around in a gym. Let (let) Us. (us) Be. (be) Free! (free!)

8. Defenders (Heavy Mood, 2012)

Another earnest call-to-arms. Just like in the film The Wild One, I can imagine someone posing the question “Hey Tilly, what are you rebelling against?” To which the band would shrug “What you got?” Despite the rallying cries at its heart, Defenders actually sounds quite commercial in parts, but it makes the cut for its spirit.

Thicker Than Thieves from the same LP is probably a better song. Echo My Love is riskier and shows the group unafraid to progress considerable distances. But Defenders employs a children’s choir. And no, it’s not the one from Saint Winifred’s.

9. Blood Flower (O, 2008)

For its tempo changes and the kind of four-letter horticultural advice that you just won’t ever find on Gardeners’ World, the slightly nuts, subtly menacing Blood Flower earns spot number nine.

10. Lost Girls (Bottoms of Barrels, 2006)

My favourite from the Bottoms of Barrels LP – and favourite Tilly tune full-stop – is a slow one: Lost Girls. A beautiful song with a curious, autumnal, American-school-band-playing-at-parents’-night feel to it. You can almost smell the varnished wooden floor of the assembly room. It’s The Virgin Suicides, Molly Ringwald, The Wonder Years, Meadow Soprano, Twin Peaks, ghosts at the prom.

Hidden track: Echo My Love (Heavy Mood, 2012) – just to showcase a quite different sound and direction.

mp3 : Tilly and The Wall – Nights Of The Living Dead
mp3 : Tilly and The Wall – The Freest Man
mp3 : Tilly and The Wall – All Kinds Of Guns
mp3 : Tilly and The Wall – Falling Without Knowing
mp3 : Tilly and The Wall – Let It Rain
mp3 : Tilly and The Wall – Tall Tall Grass
mp3 : Tilly and The Wall – Sing Songs Along
mp3 : Tilly and The Wall – Defenders
mp3 : Tilly and The Wall – Blood Flower
mp3 : Tilly and The Wall – Lost Girls

mp3 : Tilly and The Wall – Echo My Love

JC adds……

“Had her haircut allowed for headphones, it’s the kind of thing the formative Princess Leia might have listened to on her Walkman”

And this one claims he/she isn’t a writer????? What a magnificent sentence…..

Enjoy.

Shop Assistants

NEXT YEAR’S NOSTALGIA FEST (Part 24 of 48)

As I said last week, there’s an incredible amount of the CD86 bands who came from Scotland…and here’s yet another.

Shop Assistants first came to some sort of prominence back in November 1984 with the release of the Stephen Pastel produced single Something To Do under the moniker of Buba & the Shop Assistants. The line-up as well as the name was to change quite dramatically shortly afterwards with the recruitment of a striking looking new vocalist and a critically acclaimed EP released by the Subway Organisation in August 1985 with lead track All Day Long much championed by Morrissey.

The band was now a seemingly settled line-up of Alex Taylor (vocals), David Keegan (guitar), Sarah Neale (bass), Laura McPhail (drums) and Ann Donald (drums) although the last of these names would leave and join Fizzbombs (as featured last Sunday).

In February 1986, bass player Keegan and the afore-mentioned Mr Pastel decided to found 53rd & 3rd Records to try to promote the work of up and coming Scottish bands and the first release on the label would be the song later included on CD 86:-

mp3 : Shop Assistants – Safety Net

It’s a tremendous piece of pop which, and although very much of its time complete with an inexpensive, fuzzbox production, it still sounds great almost 30 years on. It would be voted into the Peel Festive Fifty at #8 at the end of the year and spend more than four months in the indie charts. This was a band brimming with talent and confidence, helped along the way by the NME including one of the Subway tracks as the opening song on the b-side of the C86 tape, and therefore it was no surprise that the major labels were quickly knocking on their door.

They signed to an offshoot of Chrysalis Records and in 1987 they released a single and self-titled album before they surprisingly decided to split up with Ms Taylor taking her talents to Motorcycle Boy who themselves would end up on Chrysalis via a one-off single on Rough Trade.

Shop Assistants tried a comeback in 1989 with Sarah Neale taking on vocal duties and Margarita Vasquez-Ponte (supplying another Fizzbombs connection) joining the band but the two subsequent singles didn’t do much.

I’ve tracked down the two b-sides to Safety Net and I’ve no doubt you’ll like them.

mp3 : Shop Assistants – Somewehere In China
mp3 : Shop Assistants – Almost Made It

Oh and yes…..this single did feature previously in the blog back this time last year in the Scottish Singles Series.

Enjoy

Ballboy

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #18 : BALLBOY

Saying that Ballboy are a four-piece indie-band from Edinburgh just doesn’t do them justice.

They’ve been with us for more than 16 years now during which time they have recorded and released five albums and eight EPs/singles as well as recording a number of Peel Sessions back in the days as the famous DJ was a huge fan of their music.

I feel like being lazy today so I would simply ask you to have a look at their webpage if you want or need more info. Just click here.

They are one of Scotland’s best kept secrets. They haven’t released a proper studio album since 2008’s I Worked On The Ships but there have been some suggestions that new material is in the pipeline. I certainly hope so.

So many great songs to choose from today. Given it is Independence Day over the pond, this seems appropriate.

mp3 : Ballboy – Born In The USA

Enjoy.

Soft Cell

GETTING JULY OFF TO A POPULAR START (Part 3 of 3)

This is where the original plan to feature all the Soft Cell 12″ efforts ran into problems as I’m missing some of the later releases. I wasn’t all that keen on Numbers, the second and final single to be released from The Art Of Falling Apart and made the decision that I’d wait until I saw it in a bargain bin before picking up a copy. Unfortunately, I never did…as I was to learn that the 12″ effort was again a work of art with an extended opening sequence while the b-side was a very fine electronic ballad.

Before the calendar year of 1983 was out the boys brought out a new single which turned out to be a taster for a forthcoming LP that would ultimately be released in March 84 around a month after the band had confirmed their break-up. I didn’t make the same mistake as I had with Numbers – not that I wanted to as I think Soul Inside is one of their most underrated 45s and certainly deserved a much better chart position than #16. And at almost 12 minutes long, the extended version is truly epic.

The final Soft Cell single is another that I don’t have a copy of. I certainly bought Down In The Subway but it is missing from the bits of vinyl stacked away in the cupboard. I’m guessing that it ended up, by accident, in the collection of one or other of my student flatmates when our lease came to an end and we packed up our belongings and went our separate ways.

But rather than have a poor ending to the series I’m going to offer up the tracks on the UK and Canadian versions of Soul Inside as I picked up a copy of the latter when I was living in Toronto a few years back as well as the tracks on the bonus 12″ single that came with the initial copies of the second LP:-

mp3 : Soft Cell – Soul Inside
mp3 : Soft Cell – Loving You Hating Me
mp3 : Soft Cell – You Only Live Twice
mp3 : Soft Cell – 007 Theme

mp3 : Soft Cell – Numbers
mp3 : Soft Cell – Barriers
mp3 : Soft Cell – Her Imagination

mp3 : Soft Cell – Martin
mp3 : Soft Cell – Hendrix Medley

Martin is a magnificently twisted and dark composition regarded by many fans as one of the best things David and Marc ever recorded and while it is a bit of mystery as to why it wasn’t part of the proper album it shouldn’t be forgotten that at 10 minutes long it fitted better as a bonus 12″ single and was provided as special reward to those of us who bought a copy of The Art Of Falling Apart at the outset.

Oh and you’ll notice that my Canadian purchase negated my need to find a copy of Numbers/Barriers as well as providing a copy of the song that had only been made available in the UK as part of the 2×7″ release of Soul Inside.

Enjoy!!

Soft Cell

GETTING JULY OFF TO A POPULAR START (Part 2 of 3)

It was right on the back of the success of Say Hello, Wave Goodbye, that Soft Cell returned with a new self-written song and what in retrospect many consider to be their finest 45. It was a trumpet-led effort that had class and style written all over it; it reached #2 in the UK singles chart but really did deserve to have taken the top spot.

Next up was their take on another largely unheralded single, originally recorded by Judy Street in 1968 and re-released in 1977 after it had become a staple of the Northern Soul scene here in the UK. The b-side is interesting as it as its an instrumental which gives an early indication that Dave Ball was getting bored writing catchy hits.

Finally for today, the lead-off 45 from the duo’s second LP, The Art of Falling Apart, a record which upon release would alienate many of those who saw Soft Cell purely as a pop band and delight those of us who loved their deeper, darker and more experimental side.

mp3 : Soft Cell – Torch
mp3 : Soft Cell – Insecure Me

mp3 : Soft Cell – What
mp3 : Soft Cell – So

mp3 : Soft Cell – Where The Heart Is
mp3 : Soft Cell – It’s A Mug’s Game

Enjoy.

Soft Cell

GETTING JULY OFF TO A POPULAR START (Part 1 of 3)

I had thought about following up the ongoing Altered Images singles series with a look back at the 12″ versions of the 45s released by Soft Cell in the 80s. The snag however, being that I don’t own absolutely everything by them. Instead, I’ll use the next three days to offer those bits of plastic that I do own, starting with the first three singles taken from Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret:-

mp3 : Soft Cell – Tainted Love/Where Did Our Love Go
mp3 : Soft Cell – Tainted Dub

mp3 : Soft Cell – Bedsitter
mp3 : Soft Cell – Facility Girls

mp3 : Soft Cell – Say Hello, Wave Goodbye
mp3 : Soft Cell – Fun City

All three singles reached the Top 5 in the UK and all three 12″ versions expand and improve on the better-known 7″ or album versions. The b-sides are also in extended form.

Parts 2 and 3 will appear over the next two days.

Enjoy.