Category: Go-Betweens

All three of these songs have been featured on this blog in the past, but not as one posting.

The single was released in October 1988 but again failed mysteriously to give The Go-Betweens a hit single.

mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Was There Anything I Could Do?

As the heading of the post indicates, the single came with more than decent b-sides. Here’s those from the 12″ release:-

mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Rock n Roll Friend
mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Mexican Postcard

Enjoy

PS

The blog has sort of taken a bit of a back seat in recent weeks as I’ve spent loads of time either watching football on the telly or making the most of the light nights and playing golf.  With Euro 2016 coming to a conclusion soon (i.e. there’s not games on the telly every night!), I’m hoping to crank things up again in the coming days including a few guest ICAs that have been sent in.

Cheers.

JC

 

ORIGINALLY POSTED ON WEDNESDAY 7 MAY 2008

(8 years ago to the day!!)

On many an occasion in this rundown, I’ve mentioned that I had major problems narrowing down which particular song should be chosen for a band. I reckon the biggest dilemma came with The Go-Betweens. How can I possibly ignore the merits of the genius, majesty and sheer beauty of Cattle and Cane – the track that is probably their best-known and best-loved song? Not to mention the gorgeous vocal delivery of the much-missed Grant McLennan.

The answer is that the follow-up single just means an awful lot more to me.

It was at the age of 20 that I finally moved out from underneath my parents’ protection and branched out to a place of my own. It was a student residency flat on campus in Glasgow City Centre. It was a two-bedroom job, complete with kitchen, toilet and shower. I had the single room, while my two flatmates shared a larger space. The rent for each of us was £510 – for a full year including the summer months.

I had a reasonable record collection, but one of my other flatmates had a collection that I reckon was probably only second to that of John Peel (for instance, he had every single that had come out on Postcard Records). It was a time when my musical tastes broadened more than ever before, thanks to hearing some old stuff for the first time, but also on account of new and emerging bands throughout the early and mid 80s. This was where I first learned about, among others, The Go-Betweens.

The location of the flat was incredible, a mere stone’s throw from the student union where we seemed to spend most of our free time. We’d spend hours every weekend getting ready to go out, taking turns to play some of our favourite songs, often dissecting the lyrics and melodies in a way that seemed very important and meaningful.

Every Friday and Saturday, the set-lists for going out would change, but there was one single from October 1983 that always seemed to get played – as indeed was the b-side:-

mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Man O’ Sand To Girl O’ Sea
mp3 : The Go-Betweens – This Girl, Black Girl

Robert Forster’s manic delivery of the line ‘I feel so sure about our love I’ve wrote a song about us breaking up’ is one of the finest moments in pop history. As is the chorus that isn’t a chorus – ‘I want you baaaaaack.’ And don’t get me started in the great backing vocals.

There’s also a little footnote to this particular single that also helped it clinch selection ahead of Cattle and Cane.

This was another 7” which was ‘lost’ in Edinburgh all those years ago, although I did still have copies of the songs on a double compilation LP called 1978-1990. However, by the early part of this century, it was all CDs or digital and I just couldn’t get my hands on a copy of the b-side.

But….there came a day when, after much humming and hawing, I plucked up the courage to ask a bloke called Colin who at the time had a great blog called Let’s Kiss And Make Up that had previously featured The Go-Betweens if he could post an mp3 of This Girl, Black Girl. He willingly obliged.

Colin also later replied to other e-mails from me in which I asked for advice in setting up my own blog – and without fail he was always courteous, charming, witty and hugely supportive, especially in the very early days when I was unsure of what I was doing and terrified that I was out of my depth, making a fool of myself and wasting my time.

So if there’s a song from this rundown that I’d like to dedicate to anyone, then its this particular track.

Thanks comrade. I’m proud to call you a mate.  Real proud.

PS

How uncanny is it that, having more than six months ago set out to look back at this old series that the entry for The Go-Betweens would happen to fall just one day after the 10th anniversary of the sad and untimely passing of Grant McLennan……

 

Completing the look back to 1978 – 1990, a 2 x LP compilation from The Go-Betweens released just after they had initially broken up.  Sides 1 and 2 were more or  a ‘Greatest Near Hits’ comprising flop singles and some of the best-loved album tracks (and can be found in postings earlier this week)

Sides 3 and 4 however, are a bit different consisting of some rarities, radio sessions and previously unreleased tracks and is what made the purchase of the record so essential back in the day.  Side 4 was curated entirely by Grant McLellan and he supplies the liner notes.

Side 4

1. Dusty In Here

This song is about my father who died when I was four.

(Recorded in October 1982 in Eastbourne, England. Originally released on the LP Before Hollywood in May 1983 on Rough Trade)

2. A King In Mirrors

Emmylou Harris meets The Velvet Underground. I sang this is a French toilet during the Spring Hill Fair sessions but I prefer this earlier version. It’s spookier and more languid. I’m very happy with the lyric.

(Recorded in December 1983 in London and broadcast on 5 January 1984 on the David Jensen Show on BBC Radio 1)

3. Second-Hand Furniture

I had a dream about a divorced man who looked into a shop window and saw his old bed. I think it was snowing. The catalogue of objects was an ad lib. For some reason this song is popular in Stockholm.

(Recorded in October 1984 in London and broadcast on 29 October 1984 on the John Peel Show on BBC Radio 1)

4. This Girl, Black Girl

There was an annual event in north Queensland country life called the Oak Park Races. People came together to race their horses and to congratulate each other on a good year or to console each other if it has been a bad one.  I had just returned from a trip which included a recording session in Scotland, a close shave in Egypt and a six-week hangover in New York. I found myself in a tent three hundred miles from the nearest bookshop. My relatives asked me to play the guitar for them but I knew it was impossible to dance the gypsy tap to “I Need Two Heads” so I wrote this song.

(Recorded in August 1983 in Sussex, England.  in Brisbane.  Originally released in November 1983   as the b-side to on the 7″ only release of Man O’ Sand to Girl O’ Sea. It’s also, indirectly, the song that led to me starting up a blog, the original TVV, back in September 2006)

5. Don’t Call Me Gone

I’ve always liked country music. This is a typical mix of pathos and sentimentality in the tradition of George Jones and Tammy Wynette. It comes close to pastiche but The Go-Betweens seldom genre hop so this is what it is.

(Recorded in January 1987 in London.  Originally released in November 1983  as a bonus track on the 12″ release of Right Here)

6. Mexican Postcard

This is a super 8 film about a country I have never been to. For further reference listen to the soundtrack for “Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid”.

(Recorded in August 1988 in London. Originally released in October 1988 as a bonus track on the 12″ release of Was There Anything I Can Do?)

7.  You Won’t Find It Again

This is an acoustic version of a song that never made it onto “16 Lovers Lane”. It was a great summer and you could see the Sydney Opera House from the window. It was also only twenty minutes walk to Bronte Beach.

(Recorded in January 1988 in Sydney. Previously unreleased)

Just click on the song titles to get the mp3s.

Hope you’ve enjoyed the past four days.  I have.

Continuing the look back to 1978 – 1990, a 2 x LP compilation from The Go-Betweens released just after they had initially broken up.  Sides 1 and 2 were more or  a ‘Greatest Near Hits’ comprising flop singles and some of the best-loved album tracks (and can be found in postings over the past two days)

Sides 3 and 4 however, are a bit different consisting of some rarities, radio sessions and previously unreleased tracks and is what made the purchase of the record so essential back in the day.  Side 3 was curated entirely by Robert Forster and he supplies the liner notes.

Side 3

1. 8 Pictures

Christmas 1978. The family are all around the tree and gifts are being given out. My brother has bought me the fourth Velvet Underground album “Loaded”. I’m walking around the house with the ugliest guitar in the world – a black Ibanez Les Paul that I wrote far too many good songs on, one of them being 8 Pictures.

(Recorded in July 1981 in Melbourne. Originally released on the LP Send Me A Lullaby in February 1982 on Missing Link Records)

2. I Need Two Heads

Grant and I leave Brisbane in late 1979 for London, then Paris, then London , then Glasgow where we record this song for Postcard. I wrote one song on the first six months of 1980. This.

(Recorded in April 1980  in Castle Sound Studios in Pencaitland, Scotland. Originally released as a single in June 1980 on Postcard Records – and for nearly 20 years was the only version of the song I had until I found a mint copy of the 45 going very cheap on e-bay – changed days now that vinyl is back in fashion)

3. When People Are Dead

I wish I’d written this two months earlier so it could have been included on “Tallulah”. The words are by Marion Stout, an Irish poet I met in London. The band sounds absolutely great.

(Recorded in January 1987 in London. Originally released in February 1987  as the b-side on the 7″ and 12″ release of Right Here)

4. The Sound of Rain

We were living in this house by the Brisbane river that had a very thin roof (or the rain was harder that year). This is a very pretty, soft tune about crossing that river and killing a girl in the West End.

(Recorded in November 1978 in Brisbane.  Raindrop guitar by Peter Milton Walsh and drums by Tim Mustafa.  Previously unreleased)

5. People Say

A classic 24 carat. An old school friend of mine is on piano and hammond organ. We were going for that ‘wild mercury sound’. Sometimes I think that this is the best song I’ve ever written.

(Organ and piano by Mal Kelly. Recorded in May 1979 in Brisbane. and originally released as a single the same month on The Able Label)

6. World Weary

Recorded in Sydney 1981 as a b-side to “Your Turn, My Turn”. Our first session with Melbourne engineering genius Tony Cohen. I have no idea what the song is about.

(Recorded in April 1981 in Sydney. Originally released a b-side in July 1981 on Missing Link Records. It’s just over 90 seconds long…..)

7.  Rock and Roll Friend

Self-pity is a beautiful well to repeatedly dip in and find more reasons not to live, more reasons not to cheer. And the well is an illusion until the well runs dry and then you’re ready for another song.

(Recorded in August 1988 in London. Originally released in October 1988  as the b-side to on the 7″ and 12″ release of Was There Anything I Could Do?  Robert would later re-record the song for inclusion on his solo LP Warm Nights, released in 1996.)

Just click on the song titles to get the mp3s.

Enjoy – Part 4 will wrap up the series tomorrow

As I mentioned yesterday, Domino Records are about to release G Stands For Go-Betweens – Volume One. which is a very thorough look back of the band’s output from 1978 through to 1984.

I’m giving it a bodyswerve as I can’t really justify the price tag of £120 but it has inspired me to feature all of 1978 – 1990, a compilation which looked back at the band just after they had initially broken up. Here in the UK, it came out on a single CD with 22 tracks and a double album with 28 tracks.

Today it is the turn of Side 2 which is again more or less a ‘Greatest Near Hits’ comprising flop singles and some of the best-loved album tracks, this time from 85-88.

Side 2

1. The Wrong Road

We lived in London for almost six years. I shared a dark flat with a painter and then a comedian. The painter was obsessed with grey. The comedian loved Tommy Cooper. This song fits somewhere between these two things – GM

(Recorded in November 1985 in London. Originally released on the LP Liberty Belle and the Black Diamond Express in March 1986 on Beggars Banquet)

2. The Clarke Sisters

Old friends of mine originally friends of my mothers. They adopted me as some lost son. I spent many afternoons in their splendid company. They had a magnificent house that sadly was pilfered by antique dealers in their last years – RF

(Recorded in January 1987  in London. Originally released on the LP Tallulah in June 1987 on Beggars Banquet)

3. Right Here

Two friends of mine once worked in a funeral parlour. Constant exposure to the chemicals used in the preparation of the bodies turned them into addicts. I thought this would be a good subject to write about in a pop song. My friends heard it, and I’m happy to say, are no longer working for the Ministry of the Dead – GM

(Recorded in December 1986 in London. Originally released on the LP Tallulah)

4. Bye Bye Pride

Cairns is a lazy, small town full of boats and cane fields. It is also unbearably hot. An old army officer once said to me that the heat took away his pride. He then sucked loudly on the straw in his gin and headed out to the first hole.  I was his caddy so I followed him – GM

(Recorded in January 1987  in London. Originally appeared on Tallulah but released as a single later on in August 1987)

5. The House That Jack Kerouac Built

My Irish phase. Unfortunately I’d been in London long enough to be on the edge of a truly appalling crowd of people. Bad bands, theft, sad energy and general devil-may-care attitudes that amount to nothing. I left them early and then in November 1987 we left London for Sydney – RF

(Recorded in January 1987 in London. Originally released on the LP Tallulah)

6. Streets Of Your Town

A pop song. A song written with car stereos in mind. Amanda doesn’t like the backing vocals. She says she sounds too Jane Birkin. I love them. I also love the guitar break by John Wilsteed. The BBC would only play this on sunny days – GM

(Recorded in May 1988 in Sydney. Originally released a single in July 1988 on Beggars Banquet and included on the LP 16 Lovers Lane one month later)

7.  Love Is A Sign

There is a museum on the outskirts of Oslo that holds much of the best work of the Norwegian artist Edvard Munch. We were touring there in 1987. A married couple asked me if I would like to visit the museum. I went with them, got inspired and wrote this songs in the backseat of their car as we drove back to Oslo. I played it to them in my hotel room. The man smile. The woman said it sounded like a Blood on the Tracks out-take. They were a great couple – RF

(Recorded in May 1988 in Sydney. Originally released on the LP 16 Lovers Lane in August 1988 on Beggars Banquet)

Just click on the song titles to get the mp3s.

Enjoy – Parts 3 and 4 are on their way

Later this month Domino Records will be releasing a tremendous artefact called G Stands For Go-Betweens – Volume One. Containing four vinyl albums, four CDs and a 112-page book complete with liner notes and guest essays, it captures the band’s output from 1978 through to 1984. The vinyl consists of the first three studio LPs plus a specially compiled record entitled The First Five Singles while the CDs contain rare, hard-to-find and unreleased demos, recordings, radio sessions and a live gig. There’s also a few other things thrown in such as prints, posters and a reproduction of a 1978 press release while the first 600 folk to order through the record label will receive a randomly selected book from the late Grant McLennan‘s personal collection with a bookmark signed by Robert Forster (from now on referred to in this post as GM and RF)

It really is an enticing package but it comes with a hefty price of £120…and no doubt the same again for Volumes 2 and 3 for the later stages of the band’s career. And so with a heavy heart, I’ve passed on the chance to purchase. I’ll regret it in times to come but other than the majority of tracks on the CDs there would be nothing I don’t already own and I’d be shelling out for what would quickly become a lovely ornament.

I’m sure also that I will own some of the tracks coming onto the CDs thanks to my purchase some 25 years ago of 1978 – 1990, a compilation which looked back at the band just after they had initially broken up. Here in the UK, it came out on a single CD with 22 tracks and a double album with 28 tracks. It’s the latter which sits in my collection and which I’ve dug out for a bumper posting over the next four days.

It’s a really neatly packaged record. Sides 1 and 2 are more or less a ‘Greatest Near Hits’ comprising flop singles and some of the best-loved album tracks. Sides 3 and 4 contain some rarities, radio sessions and what had been previously unreleased tracks….and there were liner notes from the band’s two front men. In essence, it was an affordable prototype of the Domino Records release….

Side 1

1. Karen

Nineteen Years old, depressed, nervous and probably distrustful. I wrote this, Lee Remick and 8 Pictures in what seemed like a month, after making the decision not to write about Universal Themes but about my feelings in the bedroom, Brisbane, driving my car and anything from overheard conversations – RF

(Recorded in May 1978 in Brisbane. Originally released as a single that month on the Able Label in Australia. The sleevenotes add ‘apologies for crackles on this track as it had to be dubbed from a disc)

2. Hammer the Hammer

Too many late nights in St Kilda, Melbourne. An incomplete meditation on loneliness and violence, sometimes mistakenly thought to be about drugs. Recorded during a lull in The Birthday Party’s “Junkyard” session. This was the last song we cut in Australia before moving to England – GM

(Recorded in January 1982 in Melbourne. Originally released as a single in July 1982 on Rough Trade)

3. Cattle and Cane

Written in summer on a borrowed guitar in a Paddington bedroom, London. The other rooms were occupied by unconscious friends. The rhythm struck me as strange, the mood as beautiful and sad. The song came easily, was recorded quickly and still haunts me – GM

(Recorded in October 1982 in Eastbourne, England. This version was released as a single in February 1983 on Rough Trade with the LP version, with a slightly extended intro, appearing on Before Hollywood, released in May 1983)

4. Man O’ Sand To Girl O’ Sea

In rock’n’ roll terms The Go-Betweens always take the checkered flag. This road running slice of beauty and mayhem – I can distinctly remember turning to the band and saying “let’s burn this land”. And by Jesus we did – RF

(Recorded in August 1983 in Sussex. This version was released a single in November 1983 on Rough Trade with the completely different LP version appearing on Spring Hill Fair, released in September 1984)

5. Bachelor Kisses

We came back from Christmas in New York having lost our record company somewhere along the way. I wrote this in Immigration having been refused entry to the United Kingdom. The first person who heard it was my sister. She said that Marianne Faithful should sing it – GM

(Recorded in July 1984 in London. Originally appeared on Spring Hill Fair but released as a single later on in November 1984)

6. Draining The Pool For You

I wrote this melody in ten minutes in a London Hotel while waiting for Lindy Morrison to put on her lipstick. The lyric takes place in either Sydney or L.A. – a big mansion, an idiot movie star, luxury parties and the only intelligent, talented person there being me and I’m the hired help cleaning this guy’s pool – RF

(Recorded in May 1984 at Studio Mirival, France. Originally appeared on Spring Hill Fair)

7.  Spring Rain

London, summer 1985. This seems a rough description of me around the time I started writing songs. There’s some Creedence Clearwater Revival in here – RF

(Recorded in November 1985 in London. Originally released a single in February 1986 on Beggars Banquet and included on the LP Liberty Belle and the Black Diamond Express one month later)

Oh….you just need to click on the song titles to get the mp3s.

Enjoy – more to follow the rest of this week

Dear Friend

I am respectfully asking that you take a few moments to have a read over this very distinguished list of songs:-

Cattle and Cane
Man O’Sand to Girl O’Sea
Bachelor Kisses
Part Company
Spring Rain
Head Full of Steam
Right Here
Cut It Out
I Just Get Caught Out
Bye Bye Pride
Streets of Your Town
Was There Anything I Could Do?
Love Goes On!

The songs have a few things in common:-

– every one of them was a single released by The Go-Betweens in the UK between 1983 and 1989
– every one of them was a flop with the best performing stalling at #80
– every one of them is a fantastic and timeless piece of music that shows no sign of dating
– every one of them is 80s indie-pop at its best

Sometimes I just don’t get it.

Yours

JC
————–

mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Spring Rain
mp3 : The Go-Betweens – The Life At Hand
mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Little Joe

This was the first single (and rather wonderful b-sides) lifted from the 1986 LP Liberty Belle and the Black Diamond Express, arguably the band’s most consistent album in terms of quality. Nearly 30 years on and I am still bemused as to why neither Spring Rain nor Head Full Of Steam, the other single lifted from the album, didn’t get the band an appearance on Top of The Pops.

Oh and while I’m here, I’m asking for your indulgence to post another non-single from the album on the basis that there are times when I hear it and think is my favourite ever Go-Betweens song:-

mp3 : The Go-Betweens – The Wrong Road

The addition of cello, violins and viola take this way out of indie-pop territory and into something quite epic.

Enjoy

One of my favourite LPs is 1978-1990, which consists of four sides of vinyl featuring 28 of the very best songs from The Go-Betweens.

What makes the double album that wee bit more special is that every song gets a little commentary from either Grant McLennan or Robert Forster which taken together provides a potted bio of the band. While going through the CDs the other day I stumbled upon this 4-track sampler issued by Beggars Banquet.  Like the LP, the songs have notes attached.

I’m not sure if it was ever made available commercially…I picked mine up from a shop in Glasgow that was well-known for putting promotional material on general sale to try to make a little bit more cash.  The sticker on the front reminds me I paid £2.49 which wasn’t bad at all.  It’s listed for sale at £6.99 plus postage on Discogs just now.

Here’s the songs and what can be found in the sleeve notes:-

mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Cattle and Cane

Written in summer on a borrowed guitar in a Paddington bedroom, London. The other rooms were occupied by unconscious friends. The rhythm struck me as strange, the mood as beautiful and sad. The song came easily, was recorded quickly and still haunts me: GM
(Recorded in October 1982 in Eastbourne, England. Originally released as a Rough Trade single)

mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Bachelor Kisses

We came back from Christmas in New York having lost our record company somewhere along the way. I wrote this in immigration having been refused entry to the United Kingdom. The first person who heard the song was my sister. She said that Marianne Faithful should sing it : GM
(recorded in July 1984 in London. Originally released on the Sire album ‘Spring Hill Fair’

mp3 : The Go Betweens – Man O’Sand To Girl O’Sea

In rock’n’roll terms The Go-Betweens always take the checkered flag. This road running slice of beauty and mayhem – I can distinctly remember turning to the band and saying “let’s burn this land”. And by Jesus we did : RF
(recorded in August 1983 in Sussex, Originally released as a Rough Trade single)

mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Bye Bye Pride

Cairns is a lazy, small town full of boats and cane fields. It is also unbearably hot. An old army officer once said to me that the heat took away his pride. He then sucked loudly on the straw in his gin and headed out to the first hole. I was his caddy so I followed him : GM
(recorded in January 1987 in London. Originally released on the Beggars Banquet album Tallulah)

It’s hearing these songs again that remind me of the heights that this band were capable of reaching. The notes also show just how talented they were as wordsmiths, both in song and in prose. It is a mystery as to why they never crossed over to obtain the commercial success that they so deserved.

Cattle and Cane in particular is a very very special song. Nowadays, it makes me sad as it reminds me of Grant’s sudden and very unexpected death. But at the same time, it is a song I associate with some of my happiest days, weeks and months on Planet Earth when I fell properly in love for the first time.

Man O’ Sand….made my 45 45s at 45 list back in 2008 – as much for the cracking b-side that accompanied it as the single itself. Two songs that play a major part in my decision to start a blog all those years ago.

RIP Grant. Thank you and your comrades for such amazing and timeless tunes.