I’m going all the way back to March 2013, to bring you this profile that was published in The Guardian. I really should have paid attention.
————
Hometown: Glasgow.
The lineup: Sam Smith (vocals, guitar), Edward Wood (guitar), Peter Masson (bass), Chris McCrory (drums).
The background: Casual Sex are a Glasgow outfit in the Orange Juice/Franz Ferdinand tradition rather than in the Alex Harvey sense. Theirs is a spiky, tart pop music inspired by that moment in early 1981 when the penny dropped and UK post-punk bands began to realise one way out of the art of darkness was through the charts. They have a singer whose voice channels Lou Reed‘s droll spirit and some of Edwyn Collins‘s arch wit, and the way their players negotiate their instruments suggests an affinity with all manner of pop and rock styles and eras from glam to white reggae.
The joint CVs of these late twentysomethings include stints in record production, studio engineering, other groups as well as “the fashion and telecommunications industries”, as their press release has it. They were brought together through chance meetings (and other Josef K song titles) before gathering at Glasgow’s Green Door Studio, where the idea of Casual Sex took shape. Observers reliably inform us they “look like they’ve walked out of Edinburgh/Glasgow circa 1979”, a reference to the formative stage of the careers of Orange Juice, Josef K, Fire Engines et al when Scottish bands resembled sexily dishevelled bank clerks straight out of the pages of a Franz Kafka novel.
Fortunately, the music backs up the playful hyperbole. Their single Stroh 80 – “about being caught doing the nasty with your girlfriend’s pal in the aftermath of a drug party on the floor of a local occultist”, according to frontman Sam Smith – is great. Based on a Velvets-simple chord sequence that Charlie Boyer and the Voyeurs, to name but one of their peers, would kill for, it features handclaps and feedback, and elements of disco and discord. Smith’s voice is quite Steve Harley – Dylan at his most cynical put through a louche glam filter – and the music is equal parts Chinnichap and CBGBs. The other track on the single, Soft School – inspired by Smith’s dad’s exploits teaching in the rough classrooms of the 70s – opens with choppy Police-circa-Roxanne guitar, which is then overlaid by a menacing, angular riff worthy of Magazine as Smith does his best impression of Jarvis doing Bowie. It sounds like funk as played in 1975 by white rock musicians, or the Glitter Band impersonating Neu! at the height of punk. Extra track National Unity is excellent, with its echoes of white post-punks high on dub and a rhythmic propulsion that conjures the title of XTC‘s album Drums and Wires, all tinny clatter and a guitar line so wiry and thin it could pierce your skin. Casual Sex? We predict a long-term romance.
———–
I knew of the band. But I never, as far as I can recall, ever got round to seeing then, nor did I buy anything. The long-term romance predicted in the above profile came to an end in under two years. Discogs lists six releases between 2013 and 2015, all of them singles, EPs or promos.
However, earlier this year, Past Night From Glasgow (part of the set-up at Last Night From Glasgow) issued a double LP, Collected Works 2008-2014, containing 23 tracks, all of which have been re-mastered by Sam Smith.
All of the 14 songs listed on Discogs are included, along with nine others, some of which pre-date the release of Stroh 80 while others seem to have been made available for the first time. All in all, it’s an excellent release, one that I really should have included within my favourite albums of 2024. Here’s all three of the songs referred to in the Guardian profile.
mp3: Casual Sex – Stroh 80
mp3: Casual Sex – Soft School
mp3: Casual Sex – National Unity
Click here if what you’ve heard has made you want to pick up The Collected Works.
I’m going all the way back to March 2013, to bring you this profile that was published in The Guardian. I really should have paid attention.
————
Hometown: Glasgow.
The lineup: Sam Smith (vocals, guitar), Edward Wood (guitar), Peter Masson (bass), Chris McCrory (drums).
The background: Casual Sex are a Glasgow outfit in the Orange Juice/Franz Ferdinand tradition rather than in the Alex Harvey sense. Theirs is a spiky, tart pop music inspired by that moment in early 1981 when the penny dropped and UK post-punk bands began to realise one way out of the art of darkness was through the charts. They have a singer whose voice channels Lou Reed‘s droll spirit and some of Edwyn Collins‘s arch wit, and the way their players negotiate their instruments suggests an affinity with all manner of pop and rock styles and eras from glam to white reggae.
The joint CVs of these late twentysomethings include stints in record production, studio engineering, other groups as well as “the fashion and telecommunications industries”, as their press release has it. They were brought together through chance meetings (and other Josef K song titles) before gathering at Glasgow’s Green Door Studio, where the idea of Casual Sex took shape. Observers reliably inform us they “look like they’ve walked out of Edinburgh/Glasgow circa 1979”, a reference to the formative stage of the careers of Orange Juice, Josef K, Fire Engines et al when Scottish bands resembled sexily dishevelled bank clerks straight out of the pages of a Franz Kafka novel.
Fortunately, the music backs up the playful hyperbole. Their single Stroh 80 – “about being caught doing the nasty with your girlfriend’s pal in the aftermath of a drug party on the floor of a local occultist”, according to frontman Sam Smith – is great. Based on a Velvets-simple chord sequence that Charlie Boyer and the Voyeurs, to name but one of their peers, would kill for, it features handclaps and feedback, and elements of disco and discord. Smith’s voice is quite Steve Harley – Dylan at his most cynical put through a louche glam filter – and the music is equal parts Chinnichap and CBGBs. The other track on the single, Soft School – inspired by Smith’s dad’s exploits teaching in the rough classrooms of the 70s – opens with choppy Police-circa-Roxanne guitar, which is then overlaid by a menacing, angular riff worthy of Magazine as Smith does his best impression of Jarvis doing Bowie. It sounds like funk as played in 1975 by white rock musicians, or the Glitter Band impersonating Neu! at the height of punk. Extra track National Unity is excellent, with its echoes of white post-punks high on dub and a rhythmic propulsion that conjures the title of XTC‘s album Drums and Wires, all tinny clatter and a guitar line so wiry and thin it could pierce your skin. Casual Sex? We predict a long-term romance.
———–
I knew of the band. But I never, as far as I can recall, ever got round to seeing then, nor did I buy anything. The long-term romance predicted in the above profile came to an end in under two years. Discogs lists six releases between 2013 and 2015, all of them singles, EPs or promos.
However, earlier this year, Past Night From Glasgow (part of the set-up at Last Night From Glasgow) issued a double LP, Collected Works 2008-2014, containing 23 tracks, all of which have been re-mastered by Sam Smith.
All of the 14 songs listed on Discogs are included, along with nine others, some of which pre-date the release of Stroh 80 while others seem to have been made available for the first time. All in all, it’s an excellent release, one that I really should have included within my favourite albums of 2024. Here’s all three of the songs referred to in the Guardian profile.
mp3: Casual Sex – Stroh 80
mp3: Casual Sex – Soft School
mp3: Casual Sex – National Unity
Click here if what you’ve heard has made you want to pick up The Collected Works.
THE NEW VINYL VILLAIN 