Category: #edwyncollins45s

#15:Ain’t That Always The Way : Paul Quinn (Swamplands, SWP6, 1985)

March 1985.  The latest single to come out on Swamplands Records.

mp3: Paul Quinn – Ain’t That Always The Way

It’s a song written by Edwyn Collins.  It’s a song co-produced by Edwyn Collins.  It’s a song on which Edwyn Collins definitely plays guitar, but isn’t credited as doing so.  It should be a song attributed to Paul Quinn & Edwyn Collins but couldn’t be for contractual reasons.

Last time out, I mentioned that the sleeve notes attached to Pale Blue Eyes advised that Paul Quinn appeared courtesy of MCA Records and Edwyn Collins appeared courtesy of Polydor Records. This time round, MCA isn’t mentioned at all, which would suggest Paul had extricated himself from the contract.  Edwyn was still attached to Polydor, and while there was no indication that funding was going to be given for any new recordings, there was an insistence that he couldn’t be on anything Alan Horne was issuing via Swamplands.

But let’s not worry too much about the legalities – this may well be a 45 on which Edwyn Collins’ name might not appear, but I’m firmly of the view that it belongs in this particular series. Besides, it’s again an ‘Original Sound Recording by Alan Horne from the soundtrack of Punk Rock Hotel’ which really does give the game away, as does the b-side:-

mp3: Paul Quinn – Punk Rock Hotel (closing time)

An instrumental on which Paul Quinn doesn’t appear. An instrumental written by Edwyn Collins and Paul Heard, who you may recall was part of the final live line-up of Orange Juice.

There was a 12″ version issued, but in this instance there is no difference in the length or mixes of the A-side and b-side of the 7″.  The bonus track was this:-

mp3: Paul Quinn – Corrina Corinna

A song first recorded in 1928 by Bo Carter, an American blues musician, but had earlier roots going back to 1918.  Like so many songs of that era, no writer is given clear acknowledgement, and so the credit on this single goes to ‘Trad’, just as it did when Bob Dylan recorded it in 1963 for The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan LP.

Ain’t That Always The Way failed to chart.  Indeed, none of the six of the singles released on Swamplands became hits, and unsurprisingly, in the cut-throat music industry, London Records stopped its funding and closed it down.  It’s more than likely that Edwyn thought he might end up on Swamplands after eventually freeing himself from Polydor, but kind of ironically, he instead would end up on a label whose arrangements weren’t too dissimilar to the way Swamplands had been set up.

 

JC

#14: Pale Blue Eyes : Paul Quinn & Edwyn Collins (Swamplands, SWP1, 1984)

I mentioned last time out that Edwyn Collins likely knew the contract with Polydor wouldn’t be renewed, and I speculated that he was likely to receive offers from elsewhere.  My speculation was, based on events in 1984, fairly well-founded as Alan Horne, the man behind Postcard Records was very much back on the scene.

The first suggestion of them working together again can be gleaned from the sleeve of the Orange Juice single What Presence?!, released in March 1984, as the images of Edwyn and Zeke which adorned the sleeve are credited to Alan Horne.  Around the same time, Horne had been approached by London Records to ‘come out of retirement’ and run a new independent style label as an offshoot, with no strings attached as to who he could sign.  His first move was to name his label Swamplands and his second was to approach Paul Quinn, the vocalist who had quit Bourgie Bourgie just as that band were preparing to begin work on a debut album for MCA Records.

It has often been said, but I’m not sure if it’s true or not, that Alan Horne’s favourite song of all time was Pale Blue Eyes by The Velvet Underground.  If so, the fact that he was able to have a cover version released as the very first single on Swamplands, and that the two musicians involved were, in August 1984, technically, still the property of two other major record labels, is something of a coup.  Indeed, the credits on the single indicate that Paul Quinn appears courtesy of MCA Records and Edwyn Collins appears courtesy of Polydor Records.

mp3: Paul Quinn & Edwyn Collins – Pale Blue Eyes (7″ edit)

The single was produced by Edwyn but there is also a line within the centre labels stating ‘Original Sound Recording by Alan Horne from the soundtrack of Punk Rock Hotel’.  Said soundtrack was, more than likely, the intended debut album from the duo.

mp3: Paul Quinn & Edwyn Collins – Burro

This was the b-side. It’s less than a minute and a half in length, and is an instrumental credited solely to Edwyn Collins, and again it has been lifted from the soundtrack to the Punk Rock Hotel.

The 12″ version of the single included Burro as well as a fuller-length take on Pale Blue Eyes along with an alternative mix.

mp3: Paul Quinn & Edwyn Collins – Pale Blue Eyes
mp3: Paul Quinn & Edwyn Collins – Pale Blue Eyes (Western)

It’s a stunning cover version that should have been a huge hit.  But 1984 was a year when Lou Reed‘s stock was low and the ‘rediscovery’ of The Velvet Underground was still a few years away. It reached #72.  Just typing those three words make me want to weep.

 

JC

#13: Lean Period : Orange Juice (Polydor, OJ7, 1984)

The summer of 1984 saw the recording of what would be the third and final Orange Juice album, The Orange Juice, seemingly named that way as a nod to The Velvet Underground whose third album was an eponymous release.

Edwyn knew, in his heart of hearts, that the end was nigh and that Polydor wouldn’t be extending any contracts.  I don’t know if he was quite content with his lot knowing he was likely to receive offers from elsewhere, or extremely hacked off with how Polydor had mishandled things on so many occasions.  There were quite a few barbed quips in many of the new song titles and lyrics, but listening to the tunes, it kind of felt they were being sung by someone who felt he was going to have the last laugh.

What Presence?! was included on the album, but the remaining nine tracks were worked on with two different producers – Will Gosling and Dennis Bovell  – while Claire Kenny continued her studio involvement with the band, playing bass on all but one of the songs, with five other musicians, one of whom was Bovell, being credited in some shape or form.

Lean Period was chosen as the advance single, released in the first week of October, with the album scheduled for a month later.  In an ideal world, the single would have gone into the charts and still been there when the album hit the shops.  The packaging for Lean Period is one example of Edwyn still calling the shots, arranging to have it released in a brown paper bag rather than a normal sleeve…and this was the case for the 7″ and 12″ versions.

I want to testify, my love is bona-fide
This is the real thing, not just a casual fling
But please don’t expect consistency from me
I’ve been maimed and I’ve been chained before you see

But right now I’m
Going through a lean period
A decidedly mean period

Let’s talk things over in the ‘Old Rover’
Let’s drown our sorrows like there’s no more tomorrows
All those words that I have wasted in haste
Have left such a bitter aftertaste

The reason being I’m
Going through a lean period
A decidedly mean period

This joke I’ve made at my own expense
Has long since worn thin
And yet by way of recompense
You respond with a wink and a knowing grin

Going through a lean period
A decidedly mean period

The lyrics might look quite acidic, but the tune is upbeat and joyful, with Dennis Bovell bringing some keyboards on board to sound as if there’s a horn section involved, as well as adding his booming voice alongside Edwyn’s as the chorus is sung.

mp3: Orange Juice – Lean Period

A real toe-tapper and radio friendly as fuck!  #74 was a travesty…….but then again, the same could be said for almost all the OJ singles over the years.

The b-side was a track that had been recorded during the sessions with Will Gosling:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Bury My Head In My Hands

It feels as if it is still in the demo stages of development, and given it is quite different sounding from the other tracks, it is no real surprise that it didn’t make the cut for the album.

As usual, there was an extended version put on the 12″ vinyl:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Lean Period (12″ dub version)

The use of the keyboards to make it sound as if a steel drum band were playing is one of the big differences, along with the extra minute or so of music.  There’s a fair bit of studio gimmickry which ends up making it quite different from the 7″ version while many of the lyrics are omitted.

But wait……there’s one final thing to offer up before the series switches to the collaborative and solo years.

Some copies of the 7″ single came with a flexi disc offering up two live tracks that were, according to the info provided, were taken from ‘Soundtrack of the forthcoming Polygram video Orange Juice – dAdA With Juice’.  This turned out to be a VHS tape featuring 45 minutes worth of live footage that had been recorded at the Hammersmith Palais in June 1984.  Edwyn and Zeke were joined by Johnny Britton (guitar) and Paul Heard (bass), both of whom had been involved at different stages in the recording of The Orange Juice.

mp3: Orange Juice – Rip It Up (Live)
mp3: Orange Juice – What Presence?! (Live)

And that, brings an end to the first chapter of the Singular Adventures of Edwyn Collins.  The next chapter begins in seven days time.

 

JC

#12: What Presence?! : Orange Juice (Polydor, OJ6, 1984)

The one thing that has really hit me in pulling the first part of this series together is just how hard Edwyn Collins was working back in the early-mid 80s.

The Texas Fever mini-album had come out on in March 1984, recorded by a line-up that was no more.  Less than two months later, a new single was released, with the personnel consisting of Edwyn, Zeke Manyika, and a guest bass player in Claire Kenny, who was part of the reggae/ska band, Amazulu.

mp3: Orange Juice – What Presence?!

A personal favourite of mine – far removed from the sound of the Postcard era, but which felt totally different to what anyone else was doing in 1984.  It also seemed that Edwyn, at long last, had found a sound to best suit his voice, one in which louder guitars were to the fore and the solos were more than just the two-finger style that had been his calling card for much of his career – maybe the time spent hanging around with Malcolm Ross had seen things rub off on him in a very positive way.  The studio wizardry on the single was deftly handled by Phil Thornally, who at the time was producing The Cure as well as being part of their touring band.

Lyrically, Edwyn was going down a different road again, confident enough in his own abilities to share his wordsmith skills with the listening public, as the postcard which came with the 7″ copy of the single was able to demonstrate:-

There was some airplay, but most radio stations simply wanted a retread of Rip It Up and not this new, harder edged version of the band, and criminally, What Prescence?! only reached #47 in what was a four-week stay in the singles chart.

The b-side dated from the Texas Fever sessions, but this particular take saw Dennis Bovell bring his particular talents to the party:-

mp3: Orange Juice – A Place In My Heart (dub version)

There was also a 12″ release, on which there was an extended version of the A-side:-

mp3: Orange Juice – What Presence?! (extended version)

The thing is, it is only some eight seconds longer than the 7″, but the mix has a significant difference in that the section with the harmonica on the standard version which comes in around the 2:10 mark is replaced an extended guitar solo…and that’s precisely what accounts for the extra eight seconds!

The 12″ extra track is this:-

mp3: Orange Juice – What Presence?! (BBC session)

As recorded for the David Jensen show on 22 February 1984.  The producer was John Porter who, just two days previously, would have enjoyed the fact that an album he had worked on the previous year had finally reached the shops and had been well received in most of the music press…and that being the eponymous debut by The Smiths.

There is one final Orange Juice single left to cover, and as I’m not closing the blog down over this upcoming Festive period, it’ll be posted next Sunday.

 

JC

#11: Bridge : Orange Juice (Polydor, OJ5, 1984)

Before we get onto the next Orange Juice single, here’s some TV footage which is needed as part of the backstory.

It’s taken from a show called Switch, which aired on Channel 4 on Friday evenings between 25 March and 2 September 1983, filling in the gap between the first two series of The Tube. I can’t give you the precise date of the Orange Juice appearance, but you can see it is the Collins/McClymont/Ross/Manyika line-up playing the big hit and a new song, albeit it had been made available on flexidisc to readers of Melody Maker earlier in the year.

All appears well in the clip, but this masked reality

The band were working again with Dennis Bovell in the studio on the third album.  Plans were in hand to release A Place In My Heart as its lead single in October 1983, with the album to come out the following month, positioning itself well for the pre-Xmas market.  Out of the blue, David McClymont and Malcolm Ross decided to leave the band, citing ‘musical differences’.  The album was only half-finished……

A salvage job was put into operation.   A six-track mini-LP, Texas Fever was scheduled for release in March 1984, with things rounded off, appropriately given the circumstances, with the inclusion of A Sad Lament, the b-side a year earlier to Rip It Up.   The advance single was changed from A Place In My Heart to this:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Bridge

Given the band were somewhat at odds with one another during the recording process, it really is quite something that they delivered such a great sounding single, albeit Bridge was a song that had been part of their live sets for a while, with Malcolm Ross playing keyboards.  It was something new and different from what had come before, and I’ll happily admit that I really enjoyed this harder-sounding version of Orange Juice, and Bridge had a groove and rhythm that was infectious, not least the handclaps that made listeners (well, me at least) want to replicate if it ever got played on the disco floor. Not that the chance ever came, as DJs and indeed radio stations shunned it, leading to an undeserved #67 flop.

The b-side was another new, frantically paced number, one that wasn’t included on Texas Fever (but would subsequently be recorded in a much slower form and slotted into the final OJ album almost a year later).

mp3: Orange Juice – Out For The Count (single version)

Polydor‘s marketing people did their best.  A 12″ version was released, as was a limited edition 7″ version which came with an additional flexi disc.  The 12″ didn’t feature an extended version of Bridge, but it did add in a band-produced take on things, one that in effect was the demo provided to Dennis Bovell; please don’t be fooled by the crowd noise at the beginning and the end…this is a decades-old version of ‘Fake News’ as these were added to give the impression it was a concert recording….the rapturous applause at the end clearly gives the game away as Orange Juice gigs never got that sort of reaction!.

mp3: Orange Juice – Bridge (Summer 83 version)

The flexi disc claimed to be a live recording of a Postcard-era single when in fact it was a new studio recording, produced by Dennis Bovell.

mp3: Orange Juice – Poor Old Soul (flexidisc version)

The Polydor contract had been signed when the band consisted of Edwyn Collins, James Kirk, David McClymont and Steven Daly.  Only Edwyn remained, and there was just one other official band member in Zeke Manyika.  There was still belief that hit singles would come along, and rather than cutting their losses, funding was made available to have the duo, with guest musicians, go back into the studio.  The songs to emerge from those sessions proved to be among the best of Edwyn’s entire career…..

JC

#10: Flesh Of My Flesh : Orange Juice (Polydor, OJ4, 1983)

Let me begin this week by trying to explain why the first single under which Orange Juice has its own specific catalogue number, offered up by Polydor, carries OJ4.

OJ1 had been a 12″ promo featuring two non-singles, A Million Pleading Faces and Breakfast Time, given to DJs as a way of further plugging the Rip It Up LP.  OJ2 had been the number attached to the bonus disc included as part of the 2 x 7″ release of Rip It Up, while OJ3 had been a flexidisc of a previously unreleased song, The Day I Went Down To Texas, that was given away with copies of Melody Maker, one of the four weekly UK music papers, in March 1983.

OJ4 was released in June 1983.  A full eight months after Flesh of My Flesh had first been heard as an album track, the decision was taken to issue it as a single.  In order to tempt fans to buy it, a completely new mix was issued on 7″ (and also available as a picture disc), with production duties handled by legendary reggae and dub musician/producer, Dennis Bovell.

mp3: Orange Juice – Flesh of My Flesh (7″ version)

A decent enough pop effort, but it wasn’t one to get the sort of attention of the big hit a few months earlier, and despite a six-week stay in the singles chart, it peaked at #41 which, going by history, seemed to be the natural position for Orange Juice singles.

The fact that the band was struggling a bit for material can be seen from the b-side offering:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Lord John White and The Bottleneck Train

The writing credits are attributed to Manyika/McClymont/Ross.  It is a rollicking but strange almost surreal sort of tune in which Zeke tells the story of a train journey in Zimbabwe, but if you pay close attention, you can also make out a sort of wailing sound courtesy of Edwyn which turns out to be the vocal to Flesh of My Flesh played backwards.  Quite clearly, the band and Dennis Bovell were intent on having a bit of fun in the studio.

The 12″ version of the single added various studio effects to Flesh of My Flesh.  It is, in my view, a bit on the self-indulgent side, and does the song no favours at all.

mp3: Orange Juice – Flesh of My Flesh (12″ version)

One other thing to add…the picture disc version of the single for some reason had an edited version, by about 90 seconds, of Lord John White. So, for completeness:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Lord John White and The Bottleneck Train (edit)

What we didn’t know was that the band were already back in the studio, working on new material for a third album, and that the next single was at an advanced stage of planning.  But those of you who have been following the story of Orange Juice via this series will be well aware that things rarely go smoothly or as planned.

 

JC

#9: Rip It Up : Orange Juice (Polydor, POSP 547, 1983)

There’s still a part of me in disbelief that Orange Juice actually enjoyed a Top 10 single back in the early months of 1983.

The second album, Rip It Up, had been released in November 1982, a mere eight months after the debut.  The weekly music papers more or less gave it an absolute pasting, with many writers expressing sorrow that the once darlings, and indeed possible founders, of post-punk indie-pop had released such a hotchpotch of tunes, all of which had been subject to the production styles and values of the day.  There was one exception….Neil Tennant, a writer with Smash Hits (whose aim was very much at the pop side of music and a younger audience) awarded the 8 out of 10 and said “no one can accuse them of being twee anymore … a big step forward which they can be proud of and you can enjoy.”

While I wasn’t overly impressed with it on first hearings, there were a few moments worth listening to, including the opening track, after which the album had taken its name.  Rip It Up, certainly in the eyes of a major label, been a commercial failure, spending just two weeks in the chart and doing no better than its first week showing of #39.  Probably more in hope than expectation, the lead track was chosen to be the band’s new single, and given a release in the first week of February 1983.

mp3: Orange Juice – Rip It Up

There was probably some minor celebration in Polydor HQ when the single was listed for daytime play by Radio 1 which helped it enter the chart at #50.  When it climbed the following week to #42, the same position as that when I Can’t Help Myself hit its peak, everyone probably expected it to then fall away.  But the listening public had taken to the song, and by now it was being heard not just on Radio 1 but on the local BBC stations as well as the many commercial stations across the UK. It made its way up to #31.  And still it continued to sell….#22 the following week, which led to a Top of The Pops appearance in which Edwyn, David, Malcolm and Zeke did their best to enjoy their miming experience.

There were many viewers who, having just had their introduction to Orange Juice, went out and the 45 as it climbed to #10 the following week, and then up to #9.  This led to a second invite to Top of The Pops, one in which they would be introduced by none other than John Peel who had championed them in the Postcard days but had no love for the current music.  This appearance would subsequently go down in legend. Partly because Edwyn managed to get his good friend Jim Thirwell, who recorded under the name of Foetus, and was never a candidate to have a chart single, on to the show to mime the sax solo, but mainly for David’s antics.   The bass player had got shit-faced in the Green Room beforehand, upset and angered by the fact the producers were going to have dancers alongside the band tearing up bits of paper as they mimed away.

It might have been a performance that had the middle-classes tut-tutting in their living rooms, but it did lead to the single going up the charts yet again, just the one place to #8 which is where it peaked.  The story goes that the TOTP producers were so annoyed by the antics of the band that Polydor Records were called up and told Orange Juice were never be invited back onto the show.  Without giving away any spoilers, the chart performances of all their future singles never threatened to call anyone’s bluff.

Rip It Up was released in the usual 7″ and 12″ formats.  The 7″ version (which is near the top of this post) was an edited version of that which opened the album, about 1:40 shorter all told.  The annoying thing is that the single fades out much quicker than the album version, meaning the Paul Quinn backing vocal is very truncated.

The 12″ didn’t simply offer up the album version, however, being a different mix altogether:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Rip It Up (Punk Club Version)

The b-side to the 7″ was written by Malcolm Ross who also took the lead vocal:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Snake Charmer

The b-side to the 12″ was an Edwyn Collins song:-

mp3: Orange Juice – A Sad Lament

Neither track has the pop majesty of the A-side, and were so different from the polished sounds of the songs on the album that their inevitable fates were as b-sides, although A Sad Lament would later be one of the nine tracks to appear on the mini-album Texas Fever (which I’ll come back to in due course).

As part of the marketing efforts by Polydor as the single made its way up the charts, a ‘limited edition’ 2 x 7″ version was pressed up, complete with a glossy poster.  The bonus disc offered a shorter version of A Sad Lament, along with what was described as a live version of earlier Postcard era single Lovesick:-

mp3: Orange Juice – A Sad Lament (edited version)
mp3: Orange Juice – Lovesick (live version)

There was nothing live about Lovesick – it was simply a newly recorded and far more polished version featuring the current Orange Juice line-up. But it’s a decent enough listen and on its own made the purchase of the 2 x 7″ offering worthwhile.

The dilemma for the record label was how best to follow up the hit single and seek to maintain the momentum.

 

JC

#8:I Can’t Help Myself  : Orange Juice (Polydor, POSP 522, 1982)

The next single was another that had been debuted on the David Jensen Radio 1 show back in April 1982:-

mp3: Orange Juice – I Can’t Help Myself (Radio 1 session)

I had access to the four songs played at this session, courtesy of a hissy C90 cassette with a far from ideal sound quality, and I have to admit to being surprised when I read that I Can’t Help Myself had been slated as the next single as it had come across as a bit uneven and disjointed.

Thankfully, the time in the studio, along with the band becoming more familiar with the song, meant that the recorded version (jointly written by Edwyn Collins and David McClymont) proved to be something quite joyous, one which appealed immensely to the dance-side of this particular indie kid:

mp3: Orange Juice – I Can’t Help Myself

The funky/soulful nature of the song, combined with what is a very happy sounding and joyously delivered vocal makes for damn fine, near perfect for daytime radio pop single.  It surely had chart hit written all over it, but to everyone’s immense disappointment, it stalled at #42 in October ’82, meaning that the often-dreamt of appearance on Top of The Pops would have to be delayed till another time.

The writing credits on the b-side introduced a new name.  Collins/McClymont/Manyika/Quinn.    At this point in time, I knew of Paul Quinn having seen him perform with the French Impressionists and Jazzateers, and would fall deeply for his charms and talents in later years when Bourgie Bourgie formed.  This was, thinking back, the first of his vocal performances that I ever bought:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Tongues Begin To Wag

Four minutes and fifteen seconds of sonic magnificence, which is very much down to the singing as it has to be admitted that the 80s production style and value, particularly around the jarring synth, has dated things quite a bit.

The 12″ release of the single had an extended version of I Can’t Help Myself, with the extra two minutes being taken up by a sax solo to fade-out, all of which just adds an extra layer of funk to the song.

mp3: Orange Juice – I Can’t Help Myself (12″ version)

There was also an additional song on the b-side:

mp3: Orange Juice – Barbeque

A strange but not entirely unpleasant near five minutes of music, attributed to Collins/McClymont/Manyika/Ross.  It sounds like a jam in the studio, to which Edwyn has added a few lyrics recalling events at an actual barbeque in someone’s garden.   OK, it wasn’t Falling and Laughing or Blue Boy, but there was the consolation that it wasn’t Two Hearts Together.  Maybe there was some hope after all for the new album.

JC

#7:Two Hearts Together/Hokoyo : Orange Juice (Polydor, POSP 470, 1982)

I really don’t want to spend any more time than I need to on this one as it’s quite simply the worst 45 ever released by Orange Juice, and quite possibly the worst ever by Edwyn Collins including his solo career.

Malcolm Ross had joined the band and after a number of auditions, Zeke Manyika, a Zimbabwean who had lived in the UK for most of his life, was recruited as the new drummer.  Edwyn, in press interviews, was indicating that the band would be moving in a different direction, and that all four members, including David McClymont, would be involved in the songwriting process.

In April 1982, fans and the wider listening public were given the opportunity to hear this new brand of Orange Juice, with four songs debuted in a BBC Radio 1 session for the mid-evening David ‘Kid’ Jensen show.  One of the new songs was this:-

mp3: Orange Juice – In Spite Of It All

Fast-forward four months and the release of the band’s seventh single, their third on Polydor and their first without James Kirk or Steven Daly.

mp3: Orange Juice – Two Hearts Together

Turns out, In Spite Of It All had undergone a name change between the Jensen session and its recording as what turned out to be a stand-alone single as it was subsequently left off the sophomore album.   The photo of Edwyn and David, with Malcolm and Zeke in shadow, on the front of the sleeve, is perhaps as good an indication as any that this was very much aimed at the pop market and not the indie kids who had been the band’s mainstay up until now.  Indeed, it was very much a sign of the band jumping on the bandwagon of what would, in time, be called ‘sophisti-pop’ which was all the rage.

I hated it. Really, really hated it.  And feared that Orange Juice were a busted flush.  Turns out that Edwyn also accepts it was a misstep:-

“Two Hearts Together’ is the worst thing we’ve ever done. I really regret that now. We thought we were missing out on all this New Pop, we’d better get in on this.  It was staying in the same hotels as a lot of other rock groups like ABC.  You get to thinking, ‘well, maybe Orange Juice are reactionary old has-beens. We ought to get hip.’ So you start trying to do something that’s really current. I regret that.”

There were enough sales to take it into the UK charts at #60.

The double-A side on this occasion was a track written by all four members of the band, along with Zop Cormorant (someone whose name would later be credited as drumming on one of Edwyn’s solo albums but of whom I know nothing!).

mp3: Orange Juice – Hokoyo

If Two Hearts Together was in the vein of sophisti-pop, Hokoyo is bang in the middle of a world music track, with Zeke taking the lead vocal in his native Shona language prior to Edwyn joining in a bit later on.  It was very unexpected.  I’ll leave it at that.

The single was released on 7″ and 10″ vinyl, with both songs being extended a bit on the larger format.

mp3: Orange Juice – Two Hearts Together (10″ version)
mp3: Orange Juice – Hokoyo (10″ version)

Next week sees the lead-off single for the second album.

JC

#6:Felicity/In A Nutshell : Orange Juice (Polydor, POSP 386, 1982)

Possibly the only man who had any involvement with Orange Juice who was really smiling when 1982 rolled out was Geoff Travis of Rough Trade.  He had been conned out of the band’s debut album when they had taken the tapes he had funded to a major label, only for half of the band  – James Kirk and Steven Daly – to then abruptly quit just as the first single on Polydor was released and the marketing plans for the album were beginning to get into full flow.

The live shows were turning into a shambles, with most of the songs on which James Kirk took lead vocal being left off the set lists. The release date for the album, to be called You Can’t Hide Your Love Forever, was announced as mid-February 1982.  A second Polydor single was chosen, and released some four weeks in advance of the album.  There’s no doubting that it made for a great 45, being one of the band’s best songs of all, but the fact it had been written by James Kirk, (albeit one sung by Edwyn Collins) makes it a bit of a strange decision, almost as if everyone was in denial.

mp3: Orange Juice – Felicity

In at #63, and that was as good as it got, sliding down to #68 and #73 over the next two weeks.  There must have been a sharp intake of breath as the debut album hit the shops, but it came in at #21, reflecting perhaps that fans were really keen after such a long time to finally have an album’s worth of material, and it probably helped that the band had re-recorded Falling and Laughing for inclusion as its opening track.

But back, briefly, to Felicity.

No images of the band were used on the sleeve…no real surprise, given the fact the Orange Juice of January 1982 was not the Orange Juice that had recorded the single.  It also meant that what what should have been the b-side, an Edwyn Collins song, was promoted to function as a double-A side:-

mp3: Orange Juice – In A Nutshell

The two different aspects of the band are very apparent.  Felicity, one of their very oldest songs, has the rougher new wave feeling and energy.  In A Nutshell is a more polished offering with backing singers very much to the fore. In later years, a demo version of In A Nutshell would emerge, and other than the use of the backing vocalists, it wasn’t too different, so perhaps there were early indications that Edwyn, if not necessarily the rest of the band, was prepared to smooth out any rough edges.

The 12″ came with an extra song.

mp3: Orange Juice – You Old Eccentric

Not just another of the James Kirk songs dating back to the old days (and seemingly a piss take of their manager Alan Horne), but it also has James on lead vocal. Totally wasted as a b-side……but for me, the definitve version dates back to December 1980 with this highly energetic take was recorded for a Peel Session.

mp3: Orange Juice – You Old Eccentric (Peel Session)

All of what I’ve written above is very much with the aid of hindsight and the emergence of what was going on behind the scenes.  The 18-year old me just simply thought Felicity was one of the best records I’d heard in my then young(ish) life, and it’s an opinion I hold to this day.

JC

#5:L.O.V.E. Love : Orange Juice (Polydor, POSP 357, 1981)

As featured just a few months ago on the blog as part of the random 7″ singles feature….and prior to me coming up with the idea of this particular series.

The summer of ’81 and the news that Orange Juice had signed to Polydor.

They had actually, with the connivance of manager Alan Horne, who had a long-time dislike of Geoff Travis of Rough Trade, taken an advance from Travis to fund recording sessions in London in the summer of 1981, working with Adam Kidron who had also been producing Scritti Politti‘s debut album. The plan, as far as Rough Trade knew, was for the Orange Juice album to be distributed by them but to appear as if it was a Postcard album with full control being given to the band.

Instead, in what wasn’t the nicest of moves, Orange Juice took the tapes to Polydor, and the bosses at the major label made them an offer that couldn’t be turned down, even if it came with the loss of overall control that the indie label was proposing.

The last week of October 1981 saw the debut 45 for the major.

mp3: Orange Juice – L.O.V.E. Love

A cover of an Al Green song.

The 7″ single came with a fantastic b-side:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Intuition Told Me

Both had been recorded with Adam Kidron, but the wish of the label, backed by Edwyn Collins, to go with the cover as the new single was the final straw for James Kirk and Steven Daly as they had grown increasingly disillusioned with life in the band, notwithstanding they had been fully involved in the forthcoming debut album.

One of the decisions that had caused ructions was Edwyn Collins’ wish to recruit Malcolm Ross into the band.  You’ll hopefully recall from previous parts of this series that Malcolm had been involved in production duties with some early singles, and now that his band Josef K had come to an end, he was on the lookout for something new to get involved on.  It led to Edwyn and Malcolm, along with bassist David McClymont, undertaking tours in late 1981, with stand-in drummers to support the release of the debut single for Polydor and to showcase the album. By all accounts, the shows were shambolic……

Taking into account that copies of Falling and Laughing were already beginning to shift for considerable sums on the second-hand market, the decision was made to add its b-side Moscow as the extra track on the 12″ release of L.O.V.E. Love, albeit really is Moscow Olympics in a cleaned up and more polished version:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Moscow (alt version)

L.O.V.E, Love entered the charts at a rather underwhelming #68, climbing three places the following week before dropping out of the Top 75 altogether.

JC

#4: Poor Old Soul : Orange Juice (Postcard 81-2, 1981)

mp3 : Orange Juice – Poor Old Soul
mp3 : Orange Juice – Poor Old Soul (Pt 2)

Quite often, when a band releases a song in two parts, it’s down to the fact that it is too long to fit onto one side of a 7″ single, and so as part one fades out, you have to flip the single over and part two usually fades in.

Not in this case.

Poor Old Soul is about two-and-a-half minutes in length.  As is Poor Old Soul (Pt 2).   It’s a tune propelled in the main by its bass line, albeit there’s the sort of guitar ‘solo’ that was beginning to be associated with the band.  The ‘A’ side also has a wee bit of piano in the middle.  The biggest difference however is that Edwyn Collins, having written the song, fancied contributing the bass line rather than rhythm guitar, and so he and David McClymont swapped instruments for the take which became Part 2, with the other more distinguishing factor being that inclusion of the chant ‘no more rock and roll for you’. 

Did anyone feel cheated?  I don’t think so, although it was unusual not to have a distinct b-side as opposed to a different take, recorded in the studio on the same day.  It was released in February 1981, and included on the back of the newly designed company sleeve was info on the upcoming releases, which were set out as

81-3:  Aztec Camera : Just Like Gold/We Could Send Letters
81-4:  Josef K: Sorry For Laughing/Revelation (recorded in Bruxelles for Les Disques de Crepuscule (TWI 023) 
81-5:  Josef K  Chance Meeting/Pictures of Cindy 
81-6 : Orange Juice – Wan Light/You Old Eccentric

The first three would be issued, but before the summer was over, Orange Juice had signed to a major label, Polydor Records.  The big-time beckoned…..or did it?

 

JC

#3: Simply Thrilled Honey : Orange Juice (Postcard 80-6, 1980)

Postcard Records had come a long way in a very short space of time.  The first two Orange Juice singles had been critically acclaimed, likewise the two Josef K singles issued by the label and that of The Go-Betweens.  By the time it came to issue the third OJ single, the numbers being pressed were significantly higher than before, with the first 5,000 coming in a sealable polythene bag with the double-sided insert as pictured above.  A lot of the monies to support the expansion of the label’s activities came from a distribution arrangement with Rough Trade. And yes, the photo in the bottom right of the back of  the sleeve is that of Jill Bryson, then a very close friend of the band but soon to find fame as one half of Strawberry Switchblade.

mp3: Orange Juice – Simply Thrilled Honey

Once again, it was recorded at Castlesound Studios, but this time Malcolm Ross was on co-production duties alongside the band.  I’m not going to suggest that Simply Thrilled Honey is a duff record, but there’s something about it that comes up short in comparison to Blue Boy and Lovesick. In later years, James Kirk (not the Star Trek character), would accept the single fell a bit below expectations, possibly down to the fact that it was one of the band’s oldest and most-played tunes and the studio recording didn’t find the same levels of energy and enthusiasm of the live takes.

It was released in December 1980 and would make the Top 5 of the newly created Indie Singles chart.

mp3: Orange Juice – Breakfast Time

The b-side was a short and angular punky sounding effort, coming in at less than two minutes in length.  It would later, in 1982, be substantially re-recorded with some additional and different lyrics and in a cod-reggae style for inclusion on the album Rip It Up, running to more than five minutes in length:-

mp3 : Orange Juice – Breakfast Time (album version)

Nobody knew it at the time, but there would be just one more single for Postcard Records.

JC

PS : AND A VERY LATE ONE AT THAT……

It’s nothing at all to do with music….but it is something that absolutely and simply thrills me.  This particular post will appear as I set out on some travels again, and a trip that was arranged at extremely short notice.   I’m off, again, to Toronto, for what will be a very short visit – arrive at Sunday lunchtime and fly back on Tuesday evening – for the sole purpose of attending a significant baseball match on Monday for which a ticket was only picked up last Friday night.  It’s lucky I’m retired from work and can do things at the drop of the proverbial baseball cap, and also that I have a few pre-prepared posts to keep things ticking over for the next few days.  Only downside is that I’m dreading what it’s all going to do to my body-clock…………..

#2: Blue Boy/Lovesick : Orange Juice (Postcard 80-2, 1980)

Having been embittered a bit by the experience in the Strathaven studio with the debut, the band, in April 1980, headed east to Pencaitland, a village some 16 miles south-east of Edinburgh and home to Castlesound studios.  This time, Alex Fergusson, who had been part of various bands from the mid-70s onwards, including punk act Alternative TV, was in the producer’s chair. The session delivered two songs for a double A sided effort, including what many consider to be Orange Juice‘s most enduring song:-

mp3 : Orange Juice – Blue Boy

Released in September 1980, on the same day as Josef K‘s Radio Drill Time, which was just as well as the two singles shared doubled up picture sleeves. These were black and white, with the plan being to have them hand-coloured individually, using pencils.  The members of Josef K were meticulous in their approach, carefully adding relevant colours to a pair of shoes and a pot plant.

Orange Juice did things a bit differently. The band, and a few of their friends held a ‘colouring-in party’ at 185 West Princes Street in Glasgow, home of Alan Horne and the de facto HQ of Postcard Records at which, having discovered that doing things carefully and properly would take an incredibly long time, they all just scribbled lines, shapes and the occasional words randomly, meaning that no two sleeves were the same.  This Discogs page has a quite a few of the examples…just click the ‘More Images’ link.

mp3: Orange Juice – Lovesick

The flip side is also a bit of a belter.

In 1993, Postcard Records would be temporarily reactivated, and Blue Boy/Love sick was released as a CD single, along with a limited edition on 7″ vinyl (catalogue number DUBH 934), complete with a fully coloured sleeve:-

The CD would come with two additional and previously unreleased versions of Poor Old Soul, a single which will actually feature later on in this series:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Poor Old Soul (French Language Version)
mp3: Orange Juice – Poor Old Soul (instrumental version)

The latter is really quite strange……..

There would be one more single in 1980.

JC

 

#1: Falling and Laughing : Orange Juice (Postcard 80-1, 1980)

Earlier this week, Edwyn Collins embarked on The Testimonial Tour, a last lap of live shows around the UK before what can only be assumed is a well-deserved retirement.  The timing, last Sunday, of the end of The Robster‘s epic series on Super Furry Animals I felt offered the perfect opportunity to now turn this particular day of the week into a real nostalgia-fest by looking back at all the singles Edwyn has released over the years encompassing Orange Juice, the solo career and the occasional collaboration along the way.

I make no apologies in advance if much of the series proves to be retreads of material used on the blog before, which can’t some as a surprise to you given how often he has featured over the years.  But it will offer the opportunity to eventually have everything in one place under a new entry within the index system.

His debut appearance on vinyl launched a label as well as a career now spanning 45 years and counting.

mp3 : Orange Juice – Falling and Laughing

Recorded in December 1979 in a tiny studio in the town of Strathaven, some 25 miles south of Glasgow.  The studio owner, John McLarty, despite having little experience in the sort of pop music the band intended to lay down, insisted on handling the production duties. As a sop, he did allow Malcolm Ross, a friend of the band who had already been involved in making a single with his band Josef K, to sit in on the session and make some suggestions.

Edwyn sings and plays guitar, James Kirk plays guitar, the bass is courtesy of David McClymont and Steven Daly is banging the drums.  Legend has it that 963 copies were pressed up, with a free flexi-disc and an actual Postcard being included inside what was a strangely shaped folding sleeve rather than the standard type into which a record would fit.

Two tracks were included as b-sides:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Moscow Olympics
mp3: Orange Juice – Moscow

They are the same tune, with the latter being particularly rough and demo sounding while adding a few additional chants of the word ‘Moscow’, courtesy of Alan Wilde (a name adopted by the band’s manager Alan Horne) and Steven Daly.

In June 2023, I finally obtained a copy of the single, a 60th birthday present from Rachel, without whom this blog wouldn’t have got off the ground.  It was also fitting that the online sale of the single was drawn to our attention by our dear friend Comrade Colin, without whom this blog wouldn’t have got off the ground. It came with the flexidisc and a postcard, and it was in mint condition.

mp3: Orange Juice – Felicity (live)

As recorded at an early gig in April 1979 by the aforementioned Malcolm Ross.

JC