Kane Gang – THE NEW VINYL VILLAIN

Art of Noise, Big Country, Bronski Beat, Dead Or Alive, Frankie Goes To Hollywood, Human League, Kane Gang, Lloyd Cole & The Commotions, Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark, Redskins, Scritti Politti, Strawberry Switchblade, Tears For Fears

WHEN THE CLOCKS STRUCK THIRTEEN (November)

4-10 November

The highest new entry on the singles chart back in the first week in November 1986 belonged to Depeche Mode, a favourite of many TVV regulars but a band that your humble scribe has never taken to. Which is why there’s no link today to Blasphemous Rumours or Somebody, a double-A sided single which came in at #29 en route to becoming their 11th successive chart single going back to Dreaming Of Me in early 1981, (of which five had gone Top 10)

I’ve had to go all the way down to #54 to find a new entry worth offering a listen to:-

mp3: The Kane Gang – Respect Yourself

The trio’s third hit of the year, thanks to a cover of 1971 R&B/gospel number originally written and recorded by the Chicago-based Staple Singers. One of the highlights of the debut album The Bad and Lowdown World of The Kane Gang, which would reach #21 on its eventual release in March 1985.

Just two places further down the singles chart this week was another gang who often inhabited a bad and lowdown world, certainly in the eyes of the tabloid media:-

mp3: The Redskins – Keep On Keepin’ On (#56)

A real favourite in the student union discos among us who were of a left-wing persuasion. The Redskins delivered a fine mix of pop, soul, blues, folk, punk and politics, who, if it hadn’t been for the fact that collectively the idea of a career in pop music was not their idea of fun, would surely have enjoyed a run of great albums beyond their sole offering, Neither Washington Nor Moscow, which would eventually appear in early 1986. Keep On Keepin’ On would eventually reach #46, and the offering today is the 12″ version as that’s a bit of vinyl I proudly still have all these years later.

mp3: Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark – Never Turn Away (#70)

Probably the least-remembered of the twenty-two singles released by OMD during the 80s, it was also the one which performed the worst as #70 in the first week in November 84 was as good as it got. It’s one of those rare 45s on which Paul Humphreys rather than Andy McCluskey delivered the lead vocal.

11-17 November

The highest new entry on the singles chart back in the second week in November 1986 belonged to The Riddle by Nik Kershaw, someone who has his admirers among fans of 80s synth-pop. I always felt he was synth-pop with a soft rock edge, and while he may perhaps feature via guest postings, he’s not showing up today. This one came in at #17 and would peak at #3. It was his fourth smash hit of the year, and his success would continue throughout the following year.

mp3: The Human League – Louise (#36)

I think it’s worth lifting some stuff about this one from wiki:-

The lyrical story telling of “Louise” superficially seems to be a story about a chance encounter between a man and a woman on a bus who seem to be on the verge of a lover’s reconciliation. But like much of Phil Oakey’s songwriting, what seems ‘sugary sweet’ on the surface actually has a much darker subtext. Oakey points out that the story is actually about the original protagonists from “Don’t You Want Me” meeting up 4 years later. In “Louise” the man sees his lost love again and still cannot deal with reality. The anger that drove the earlier song has dissipated, and is replaced with a hopeful fantasy that his ex-lover is drawn to him all over again. So “Louise” is really about self-deception, delusion and eternal sadness. Oakey says about “Louise” in interview:

It’s about men thinking they can manipulate women when they can’t, even conning themselves that they have when they haven’t.

However, like the less savoury premise of “Don’t You Want Me”, the darker side of the “Louise” story went over the heads of the record buying public, who misinterpreted the lyrics as “sweet and upbeat”.

Louise would eventually reach #13 and still features in the band’s setlists to this day.

mp3: Strawberry Switchblade – Since Yesterday (#63)

I can’t claim I came up with this description, but it is so accurate:-

“From the ominous shadows of Goth suddenly appeared two young girls in polka-dot dresses, flaming red lipstick, and hair ribbons. Looking like the brides of Robert Smith, Strawberry Switchblade made a brief splash on the U.K. charts and then abruptly vanished in the mid ’80s, leaving their fans with a handful of collectible singles and one LP of deceptively sweet-sounding dance pop.”

Jill Bryson and Rose McDowall were very well-known figures in Glasgow in the early 80s. The look they had for their pop success was how they walked the streets of my homw city – everyone, while not knowing exactly who they were, certainly recognised them. Since Yesterday is a very 80s sounding song, and there’s an argument could be made that it hasn’t dated brilliantly thanks to its rather lightweight production. But I’ll always a have a soft spot for it….it’s just one of those songs which sound tracked the festive period of 84/85, eventually peaking at #5 in late January and spending an incredible 17 weeks in the Top 75.

mp3: Lloyd Cole & The Commotions – Rattlesnakes (#65)

The third and last single to be lifted from the debut album. Maybe it was all down to all the band’s fans having bought the album the previous month that this single, a genuinely outstanding song, stalled at #65.

mp3: Scritti Politti – Hypnotize (#67)

The third hit single of the year for Green Gartside & co, but #67 was as high as it got, coming nowhere near the success of Wood Beez (#10) and Absolute (#17). The band would bounce back in great style in 1985, with The Word Girl delivering a #6 hit and the album Cupid & Psyche ’85 going Top 5.

18-24 November

It was probably inevitable that after such a fine run of new singles the previous two weeks, the well would just about dry up completely this week. You could tell the Xmas marketing campaign was getting into full swing as the novelty records began to make showings – yup, this was the week We All Stand Together by Paul McCartney and The Frog Chorus came into the charts at #50, going on to reach #3 and particularly annoy the hell out of me for the many months it was never off the bleedin’ radio.

Having said that, there’s probably many fans of the lovable mop top who would have got annoyed with this one:-

mp3: The Art Of Noise – Close (To The Edit) (#62)

The ZTT collective’s music hadn’t struck a chord with the record-buying public. Debut single Beatbox had failed to chart in Aril 1984 and debut album Who’s Afraid Of The Art Of Noise had languished at the very lower end of the chart. But for whatever reason, and I think a lot had to do with the imaginative video(s), Close (To The Edit) found favour. It was also released in a ridiculous amount of formats – standard and picture disc 7-inch versions, five 12-inch singles (one a picture disc) and a cassette single – and would enjoy a 20-week residency in the Top 75 right through to the end of March 1985, peaking at #8. It did lead to a Top of the Pops appearance that they wasn’t taken too seriously while illustrating the actual size of the synths that were required back in those days:-

Anne Dudley would later say:-

Top of the Pops was one of the worst experiences of my life. We’d done so many edits of the single I wasn’t even sure what its final structure was. We just stood there behind three keyboards. The director saved our bacon by cutting away to the animated video the record company had commissioned – they hadn’t liked the original one made by Zbigniew Rybczyński, featuring a punkette girl and three blokes in tails dismantling musical instruments with a chainsaw. It was the polar opposite of Duran Duran on a luxury yacht.

25 November – 1 December

The Art of Noise might not have been making much money for ZTT but this lot were:-

mp3: Frankie Goes To Hollywood – The Power Of Love (#3)

The Xmas single – not an obvious one but the nativity-themed video, which was being aired everywhere, even on news programmes, made it clear what the marketing campaign was. It was all set to spend umpteen weeks at #1 and confirm the band’s total dominantion of the singles charts on the back of Relax and Two Tribes. It did reach #1 the following week, but then Band Aid came along………

Fun fact…..The Power Of Love was re-released just before Xmas 1993 and again went Top 10.

mp3: Big Country – Where The Rose Is Sown (#35)

The second single to be lifted from the #1 album Steeltown. Kind of feels strange that the record label pushed out a new 45 at this particular time of year. It certainly didn’t do anything to lift the album back up the charts and in reaching just #29, became the poorest-performing 45 of what was ‘peak’ Big Country.

mp3: Tears For Fears – Shout (#45)

I may have mentioned previously in this series that I couldn’t for the life of me recall Mother’s Talk which had charted in August 1984. But I certainly can’t say the same about Shout, which thanks to its boombastic chorus easily lodged into my brain. I recall being very disappointed with this. I had so much love and time for Tears for Fears when they emerged, and I still think the debut album The Hurting is a masterpiece. But Shout felt like synth pop with a stadium-rock edge and not for me, but loads of others loved it and took it to #4 in January 1985.

mp3: Bronski Beat – It Ain’t Necessarily So (#53)

A lot different from the previous two hit singles of Smalltown Boy and Why?, this inventive cover of a song written in 1935 by George Gershwin for the opera Porgy and Bess would spend 12 weeks in the chart, reaching #16. It helped further establish Bronski Beat as one of the best new arrivals in the UK music scene in 1984.

mp3: Dead Or Alive – You Spin Me Round (Like A Record) (#55)

I hadn’t, until now, appreciated that Pete Burns‘ biggest hit single actually dated from 1984. Turns out it came into the chart at the end of November 1984 and then spent another 11 weeks stuck in the lower regions of the Top 75 before bursting into the Top 20 and eventually reaching #1 in early March 1985. Say what you like about manufactured pop music and be as critical as you want to be, but this makes for a majestic, magnificent and memorable single. I will not tolerate any dissent!!!! Wylie, Cope and McCulloch must have been looking on in bewilderment.

So there you have it. November 1984. A month in which the singles chart, certainly at the lower end of things, was worth recalling in some detail. Keep an eye out later on for Part 2 looking at the new indie singles from the era.

JC

Blancmange, Colour Field, Divine, Echo & The Bunnymen, Everything But The Girl, Joe Jackson, Kane Gang

WHEN THE CLOCKS STRUCK THIRTEEN (July)

July 1984. I spent most of the month inter-railing, myself and two girls using youth hostels en route to go from Glasgow to Rome, via London, Paris, Marseilles, Monte Carlo, Genoa and Viareggio where we realised we were running low on funds and so headed back via Venice and then overnight trains through Switzerland and Belgium before the boat back across the channel. As such, I can say with all honesty that I had no idea who was enjoying chart hits back home.

Thinking back to that trip, it’s unthinkable really to realise it was done without any sort of mobile technology and that all our cash was in sterling which was later exchanged at different times to francs and lira. We were also totally dependent on old-fashioned guide books and hostel info that we had borrowed from public libraries. Sadly, I’ve no photos at all from the adventure – I was in a relationship with one of the girls that later turned nasty, after which she destroyed almost everything that we collectively owned.

Anyways, back to the music.

1-7 July

Frankie Goes To Hollywood occupied #1 and #2 with Two Tribes and Relax. Nick Kershaw and Cyndi Lauper, sitting at #3 and #4, may well have been a tad upset that the mania engulfing the UK record-buying public prevented them hitting the top.

I do recall throughout my teen and youth years that the summer months were often quite barren in terms of new music and the first chart of July 1984 does nothing to distil such memories. The Thompson Twins had the highest new entry at #28 with Sister Of Mercy, which I had to look up on YouTube to be reminded of. It’s an overwrought ballad whose subject-matter was domestic abuse, seemingly based on a real-life murder case in France. Worthy but dull would be my verdict.

Ultravox were the next highest new entry, in at #33 with Lament, while the only other song to breach the Top 40 was State of Shock, a collaboration between The Jacksons and Mick Jagger. I have no recollection of either of these hits. The only two new entries further down that I can recall were ballads:-

mp3: The Kane Gang – Closest Thing To Heaven (#56)
mp3: Joe Jackson – Be My Number Two (#72)

The former would spend a couple of months in the chart, eventually peaking at #12 and is, by far, the one song most people of a certain age will recall when thinking of the Kane Gang. The latter is not one that I’m particularly enamoured by, but it’s on the hard drive courtesy of a cheap ‘best of’ CD’ picked up in a charity shop quite a few years ago.

8-14 July

The top four were still the same, albeit Nik and Cyndi had switched positions. The highest new entry was a novelty comedy record; actor Nigel Planer had released an album in his guise as the character Neil from the sitcom The Young Ones. The joke being that Neil was a peace-loving hippy, and the album was a mix of spoken tracks and 60s cover versions. Hole In My Shoe, originally recorded by Traffic in 1967, came in at #5. It would then spend three weeks stuck at #2 and if nothing else, we should perhaps be grateful that Two Tribes sold so heavily each and every week and prevented yet another novelty #1 single.

In among the dross was this at #26:-

mp3: Echo and The Bunnymen – Seven Seas

The Bunnymen‘s sixth successive Top 40 hit single and the third and final one to be lifted from Ocean Rain. It’s decent enough albeit far from a classic, but it did lead to a stupidly amusing appearance on Top of The Pops which I saw on VHS tape, courtesy of a flatmate, on my return from Europe:-

Introduced by John Peel. And there’s Bill Drummond down the front of the audience, looking geeky and awkward but ready to play his part in making waves. The big question, though, is how did Les Pattinson manage to avoid being part of all this? Oh, and just to mention…..my hair at this time was very much modelled on Mac’s look.

Keeping up the fun was this new entry at #38:-

mp3 : Divine – You Think You’re A Man

Bronski Beat were the serious side of gay culture in the pop charts. Harris Glenn Milstead, aka Divine, was the fun, cartoon-side of things back in 1984, with his drag-queen persona having long made him a film star prior to his pop/disco career. Divine brought his/her/their stage show to student venues in the UK in 1985, and I was lucky enough to see a performance at Strathclyde student union. It proved to be an outstanding night – the first time I realised live gigs delivered solely by backing tapes were not the devil incarnate! You Think You’re A Man would eventually reach #16 and be the biggest hit for Divine, who sadly died in his sleep of a heart attack, aged just 42, in March 1988.

15-21 July

Just as it was looking as if the Top 40 this week was totally stagnant:-

mp3: Blancmange – The Day Before You Came (#39)

Neil Arthur and Stephen Luscombe‘s sixth Top 40 hit, but their first with a cover version, being a slightly unusual take on the Abba single released just two years previously. Kind of hard to believe given how successful Abba were, but the cover version charted the highest of the two. The Swedes peaked at #32, while Blancmange’s take climbed to #22, a chart position it held for three successive weeks.

Worth mentioning, perhaps, that two very old songs entered the singles chart this week, thanks to then being re-released. A Hard Day’s Night by The Beatles came in at #54 (peaking the following week at #52) while Brown Sugar by The Rolling Stones was a #59 entry, peaking the following week at #58. It was also the chart in which Ben and Tracy enjoyed a second success of the year:-

mp3: Everything But The Girl – Mine (#58)

Fair play to the duo, and the record label, for not lifting a second single from the Top 20 album Eden, but my recollection at the time when first hearing it was that it was a bit of a letdown, not having too much of a memorable tune. I’ve grown to appreciate it more over the years, but it really felt like an outlier back in 1984. #58 was as high as it charted.

22-28 July

Ridiculously slim pickings this week. It’s A Hard Life by Queen was the highest new entry at #23, with the next best newbies being Hazell Dean, Rod Stewart and Tracey Ullman at 25, 42 and 51 respectively. I know I’ve featured Tracey Ullman before in this series, but Sunglasses, the song with which she entered the chart this week is one I just do not recall and having just gone again to YouTube to see if my memory could be jogged. Turned out that it couldn’t, and I only managed to watch about thirty seconds of the video before hurriedly hitting the stop button.

And just as I was to completely give up and write-off this week’s chart:-

mp3: The Colour Field – Take (#70)

The only week in which the band’s second single breached the Top 75.

Looking back over all of this, it does seem that I picked a good month to be out of the country.

JC

Bronski Beat, David Sylvian, Everything But The Girl, Human League, Kane Gang, Lloyd Cole & The Commotions, Marc Almond, Orange Juice, Public Image Limited, Siouxsie & The Banshees, Smiths, Style Council

WHEN THE CLOCKS STRUCK THIRTEEN (May)

The month of April hadn’t been too shabby, and indeed the first of the charts being looked at this time around (29 April – 5 May 1984) kind of illustrates this, with OMD, Blancmange, The Bluebells and New Order all sitting in the Top 20, where they were joined by another synth band with this week’s highest new entry at #19:-

mp3: The Human League – The Lebanon

It was their first new music in over a year, and was on the back of their past six singles all being Top 10 hits, including a #1 and two #2s. What only became clear a short time later, when the album Hysteria was finally released in mid-May, a full two-and-a-half years since Dare, was just how less immediate and pop-orientated the band had become during what had turned out to be fraught times in the studio. My memories of this one still centre around the incredibly negative press reaction to the song, much of which centred on the seemingly trite lyrics. It has to be said, it sounded back in 1984, and it hasn’t really aged well.

6 May – 12 May

The first thing I noticed about this chart was that nine of the Top 10 from the previous week were still up there in the higher echelons. Duran Duran, Phil Collins, Queen, Pointer Sisters, OMD, Bob Marley & the Wailers, The Flying Pickets, Blancmange and Lionel Ritchie were keeping their major labels feeling good about life. It must have meant the Top of the Pop programmes around this time were very much on the repetitive side.

Looking further down, it was a good week for lovers of dance-pop, or disco-lite, as I used to refer to it. Somebody Else’s Guy by Jocelyn Brown, Let’s Hear It For The Boy by Deniece Williams, Ain’t Nobody by Rufus and Chaka Khan and Just Be Good To Me by the SOS Band, were all in the Top 20 and to do this day can still be heard regularly what now pass as the easy listening/nostalgia radio stations. I can’t deny that I would have danced to these when they aired in the student union discos….iy wasn’t all Bunnymac and flailing raincoats y’know.

Highest new entry this week belonged to Marillion, in at #23 with Assassing, which is one that I genuinely cannot recall in any shape or form. Unlike the song which came in at #49:-

mp3 : Everything But The Girl – Each and Everyone

Tracey and Ben‘s first chart hit. It would reach #28 later in the month. But it wasn’t the best song to break into the Top 75 this week….

mp3: Orange Juice – What Presence?!

By now, the band had been reduced to a rump of Edwyn and Zeke, augmented by Clare Kenny on bass and Dennis Bovell on keyboards and production duties. The record label had given up on them but in the midst of it all, they not came up with this memorable 45 but a ten-song album filled with brilliant moments. What Presence?! eventually claimed to #47 when it deserved so much more.

13-19 May

The inertia at the top end of the charts was maintained, with yet again nine of the previous week’s Top 10 staying up there. The highest new entry was at #29, and belonged to Ultravox whose Dancing With Tears In My Eyes made it eleven hit singles in a row stretching back to 1981. By contrast, the song coming in at #60 meant a debut hit for a group signed to one of the best independent labels in the UK at the time:-

mp3: The Kane Gang – Small Town Creed

This would be as good as it got for Small Town Creed, but Martin Brammer, Paul Woods and Dave Brewis and Kitchenware Records would enjoy bigger successes before the year was out, so stay tuned.

One more 45…..

mp3 : Public Image Ltd – Bad Life

I’ve always thought of this as the ‘forgotten’ PiL single. For one, it was a flop, with its #71 placing this week being its peak, and secondly, it was later left off The Greatest Hits, So Far, which was supposed to have compiled all the band’s singles from 1978 to 1990 along with a new track, Don’t Ask Me. It’s not the most obvious of memorable of the PiL songs, and it suffers from a typically OTT 80s style production, but there’s a fair bit of interesting bass slapping along with Gary Barnacle‘s contribution on sax to make it worth a listen.

20-26 May

I’m not a music snob. Well, that’s a bit of a lie. A bit of a big lie. But sometimes a song so catchy and poppy and ultimately timeless, that it has to be given due recognition on the blog. And so it is with the highest new entry this week, in at #4, eventually going on to spend two weeks at #1 and selling umpteen millions.

Just kidding. And apologies for those of you desperate to hear Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go by Wham!

Not too far lower down was the new entry at #11, and that rare thing of a double-A sided single:-

mp3: The Style Council – You’re The Best Thing
mp3: The Style Council – The Big Boss Groove

The ballad had been one of the most well-received songs on the debut album Cafe Bleu, and for its release as a 45, a saxophone solo was added. The more upbeat number was a brand-new composition, and one of the more obviously political numbers of the early TSC era. Funny enough, the radio stations rarely played The Big Boss Groove, while You’re The Best Thing was omnipresent.

I’ve written before that Best Thing, without fail, takes me back to what was a very happy time, travelling with my girlfriend across Europe on cheap student railcards visiting cities that previously had only been figments of our imagination. This was very much ‘our song’. The relationship was a very happy one for a decent enough time but sadly it turned sour before 1985 was over. I’ve always associated Best Thing was all about that particular relationship and so even when I’ve tried to woo subsequent girlfriends with the help of with compilation cassettes which showed off my musical tastes, I never once included this absolute classic on any of them.

It climbed to #5 the following week, which proved to be its peak position.

Passing mention of a few other new entries this week, most of whom are still going strong today (and I’ll leave that to you to judge if it’s a good thing or not). Bruce Springsteen, Rod Stewart and Elton John with Dancing In The Dark, Infatuation and Sad Songs (Say So Much). A slightly longer mention of the new entry at #71:-

mp3: Lloyd Cole & The Commotions – Perfect Skin

The debut single. Perfect Skin was a genuine slow-burner. It actually fell out of the Top 75 the week after making its initial entry, but then went on to enjoy placings of 54, 45, 40, 30, 26, 32, 44 and 57, thus ensuring it is another that I very much associate with the wonderfully romantic summer of 1984.

27 May-2 June

The chart which crosses over into the month in which I celebrated by 21st birthday. In at #19 was a song I very much associate with the day and night of that event.

mp3: The Smiths – Girl Afraid

OK…..this didn’t actually chart, but Dirk just last week featured Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now, so please indulge me as I recall and feature what I feel is that the far superior and danceable b-side. A song that was very drunkenly played very loudly on repeat back in the flat after a few too many had been had while out in Glasgow. Lots of hugging, lots of dancing etc, etc.

mp3: David Sylvian – Red Guitar (#21)

Not so much frantic dancing to this one, for the first solo hit single from the former frontman of Japan – his previous 45s had been collaborations with Riuichi Sakamoto – but there was a fair bit of posing to it down to the student union, which by now was incredibly quiet with so many folk returning home for the summer. It was just the diehards hanging around, especially on Thursdays, but that meant all requests tended to get played. More happy memories.

This week’s chart also saw the appearance of what I have long believed to be one of the most important 45s of all time:-

mp3: Bronski Beat – Smalltown Boy (#35)

I again make no apologies for repeating myself. It is all too easy to forget, from the distance of more than 40 years, of the extent of the bravery of Jimmy Somerville and his bandmates for being so open about their way of life and their views. Their records, and those of such as Pet Shop Boys and Frankie Goes To Hollywood took the celebration of queer culture into the mainstream, and made many people realise, probably for the first time, that homophobia was every bit as distasteful as racism and apartheid. A genuine came-changer in terms of altering a lot of attitudes, Smalltown Boy would reach #3 during what turned out to be a thirteen-week stay in the Top 75.

Two more before I sign off.

mp3: Siouxsie & The Banshees – Dazzle (#38)
mp3: Marc Almond – The Boy Who Came Back (#63)

A couple of ‘blink and you might miss them’ hits. Dazzle was the fifteenth chart hit for The Banshees, but its stay in the charts was a mere three weeks.

Just three months after the final Soft Cell single, Marc Almond released his first solo effort. With a lyric that possibly hinted at his thinking for wanting to leave Soft Cell behind him, the tune was less immediate and struggled for radio airplay, a big factor in it spending five weeks in the lower end of the hit parade – 63, 59, 54, 52 and 70. Nobody knew it, but that would more or less be the story of the solo career until Marc went down the route of collaborations or cover versions.

Couple of things to mention. This morning sees me off on my travels again, back one more time to see some friends in the Greater Toronto area. While I’ll do my best to drop in over the next week or so, there’s every chance the comments section in particular will get a bit messy with loads of anonymous/unattributed contributions that I’ll tidy up as best I can as and when I’m able.

And of course, Part 2 of the May edition of When The Clocks Struck Thirteen will be offered up over the next couple of weeks.

JC

Kane Gang

THEY CAME FROM A BAD AND LOWDOWN WORLD

There’s been many mentions on this blog about Kitchenware Records, including a guest ICA by David Ashley back in June 2018. I’ve reflected a fair bit on Prefab Sprout and Martin Stephenson & The Daintees, but there hasn’t, until now, been a posting solely on The Kane Gang.

David’s ICA opened with a track by The Kane Gang and he summarised things by saying they were a three piece and much more soul than jangly guitar based, while making the observation that some of their songs hadn’t dated well.

He’s bang on the money with the former in that the trio are one of the few white acts to ever enjoy success on the American Black R&B chart but maybe a tad harsh about the songs dating, notwithstanding there is very much an 80s production style to the fore, as some of their numbers still fit in perfectly nowadays with the music you hear on easy-listening stations such as Smooth Radio.

So….who were the Kane Gang?

They were a trio of lads from the north-east of England, consisting of vocalists Martin Brammer and Paul Woods, plus multi-instrumentalist Dave Brewis. The three had been together from school, originally as The Reptile House and then as The Kings Of Cotton, the latter playing live around the Sunderland area with the aid of backing tapes. They eventually attracted the attention of the 23-year old Keith Armstrong who had not longed founded Kitchenware Records and thought their take on soul and gospel music had commercial potential.

Their debut 7” single, in 1983, was fourth release on Kitchenware (it had the catalogue number SK5 but that was because SK1 had been a video of a live gig featuring none of the band of the label!).

mp3 : The Kane Gang – Brother Brother

Like all the early Kitchenware releases, it didn’t do very much in terms of sales outside of the north-east but the follow-up, in reaching #60 in May 1984, provided the label with its first taste of chart success, albeit minor:-

mp3 : The Kane Gang – Smalltown Creed (12″ version)

It was a song that, in part, celebrated their northern roots and the fact that singers and bands didn’t have to venture to London anymore in order to get music out to the masses. There was an eventual downside to this song in that a Radio 1 DJ, who attracted a large audience to his daily lunchtime shows, felt there was a great jingle to be made out of the chorus and, rather sadly, it is that snippet of music that most folk will recognise rather than any of their songs.

Just two months later, Kitchenware finally hit payola when The Kane Gang took a mournful and soulful ballad, complete with tear-jerking harmonica moments into the Top 20:-

mp3 : The Kane Gang – The Closest Thing To Heaven

The trio were already at an advanced stage with their debut album but instead of it being released in time for the Christmas market, a decision was taken to delay it until early 1985 and instead to go with a further single in November 1984 around which they undertook a live tour, including a gig at Strathclyde University Students Union that I managed to get along too. The new single, which would peak at #21, was a cover of a song by the Staple Sisters, an American gospel/soul band who had enjoyed commercial success in the last 60s and throughout the 70s:-

mp3 : The Kane Gang – Respect Yourself

I was really excited about the gig at the student union as it had been announced beforehand the trio would be accompanied by a full band, including Donald Johnson from A Certain Ratio on drums. It turned out to be a disappointment and my overwhelming feeling from the night was one of boredom and being underwhelmed. Maybe the expectations were too high and I was anticipating some sort of fast-paced and energetic show from start to end, but for a group who had been in the singles charts for the best part of the previous five months, there felt like there was a lack of conviction or belief in the performance.

Having said that, maybe I was in the minority as it turns out that a recording of the gig was made available many years later as a bonus disc in the 30th anniversary re-issue of their debut album.

The Bad and Lowdown World of The Kane Gang hit the shops in February 1985. It’s a decent enough record but the problem was that it contained only nine songs, of which its three strongest had all been released previously as singles. It did enter the charts at a respectable enough #21 but quickly dropped away, with the accompanying flop single not doing much to help matters:-

mp3 : The Kane Gang – Gun Law

The strange thing about The Kane Gang is that as they drifted further away from view in the UK, they began to make inroads in the USA.

The follow-up album, Miracle, didn’t appear until August 1987, on the back of what had been another single that stalled outside the Top 40:-

mp3 : The Kane Gang – Motortown

The single did go Top 40 on the other side of the ocean and its follow-up, a cover of a single by Dennis Edwards (ex Temptations), took The Kane Gang to the top of the R&B charts:-

mp3 : The Kane Gang – Don’t Look Any Further

Things somewhat stalled after that and the trio called it a day at the beginning of the 90s. Martin Brammer has now forged a career as a songwriter for hire, being responsible for chart hits by the likes of Lighthouse Family, Mark Owen, Rachel Stevens, Tina Turner, James Morrison, Beverley Knight, Ronan Keating and Olly Murs, all of which means he could have a Golden Hour on Smooth Radio devoted entirely to his work. Not that I’d be tuning in…….