R.E.M.

THE SINGULAR ADVENTURES OF R.E.M. (Part 31)

Up until now, both myself and The Robster have been pulling these pieces together weeks and sometimes months in advance. It’s been an absolute joy to have embarked on this particular adventure in hi-fi and having been lucky enough to read what’s coming up over the next few weeks, all lovingly composed by my better half, the quality is going to be maintained.

It would have been last October or November when I would have insisted that the look back at the 31st UK single from R.E.M. would be my responsibility. At which point I got writer’s block that I’ve only managed to overcome as a result of an impending deadline.

Cards on the table.

Electrolite is my favourite single of them all. Back in 2008, when I pulled together my 45 45s at 45 series, nothing from R.E.M. made the cut, but as a preface to the actual series I did say that the five songs which would have taken things up to #50 were, in alphabetical order, :-

Billy Bragg – Levi Stubbs’ Tears
Morrissey – November Spawned A Monster
REM – Electrolite
Stereolab – Ping Pong
Violent Femmes – Blister In The Sun

This was done to demonstrate just how hard it had been to come up with the final list of 45 singles, all bought at the time of their original release, with only one song per singer/band.

So why do I have such a love for Electrolite?

The writer’s block I feel is an illustration that I have a real difficulty putting it into words.

The first time I heard it was as the closing track to the album. I got a real sense of melancholy as the tune and lyrics just seemed to capture a frame of mind I was in…looking back it was a wee crisis of confidence more than anything, but for the first time in my life I actually felt I was about to take a mighty tumble, with hopes and aspirations for my career suffering a setback. There were also a few things going on with friends that were a bit of a concern, although thankfully Rachel (aka Mrs Villain) was proving to be a rock.

New Adventures In Hi-Fi helped me immensely at the tail end of 1996 – a sprawling, ambitious and hugely unexpected record requiring a high degree of dedication to be fully appreciated. Over an hour in length, it was a diverse and, at times, audacious listen, constantly shifting direction and pace. It was a demanding listen, best appreciated through a set of headphones, whether for the loud rock-out moments or the beauty of the quieter songs, some of which, if developed fully, could easily have delivered another hit as monster as Everybody Hurts.

By the time the album rolled around to track 14, the album closer, I’d often be exhausted and exhilarated in equal measures. And then the sound of what I later learned was a guiro would kick in and the song I cannot but think of as a companion piece to (Don’t Go Back To) Rockville would start to wash over me:-

mp3: R.E.M. – Electrolite

A few years short of the millennium and Stipe has composed his farewell to the 20th Century, name checking three of the coolest lead men in Hollywood history, backed mainly by a magnificent piece of piano magic from Mike Mills, but on which there is also the most perfect playing of a banjo, a violin and various pieces of percussion to be found on any CD/record that I’ve ever owned.

I think it’s fair to say that I immediately put this song on a pedestal. Any thoughts that it might ever be removed dissipated around a year later when Bill Berry announced he was leaving R.E.M., which means that this holds its special place in history as the last song on the last album recorded by the four-piece.

Here’s another thing I need to mention.

The series of ICAs that this blog has become ‘best known’ for has long given me a real sense of pride. I don’t know how the other composers go about their work, but with almost every ICA I’ve ever written, I think to myself ‘Is this as good a closer as Electrolite?’ Is it a song that makes me want to immediately go back and listen all the way through the album again?’

Electrolite, like the two other 45s taken from the album, came out in cassette form as well as a standard and ‘Collectors Edition’ CD (the only difference being the packaging) on which you could find two live tracks taken from a gig in Atlanta on 18 November 1995:-

mp3: R.E.M. – The Wake-Up Bomb (live)
mp3: R.E.M. – Binky The Doormat (live)

As The Robster mentioned last week, the former had been the song the record label most wanted as the follow-up to E-Bow The Letter and the live version does demonstrate both how well it would have sounded coming out of radios and how much it would likely appeal to those whose interest in the band was beginning to diminish.

The latter is one of those tracks on New Adventures that grew on me with each listen. I can give it no higher compliment than it wouldn’t have been out of place on Monster, and the live version captures the band at their best, albeit a long way removed from the Murmur/Reckoning/Fables era of less than 15 years previously.

The fourth track was a remix of one of my own favourites from Monster:-

mp3: R.E.M. – King Of Comedy (808 State Remix)

It was wholly unexpected to read of the collaboration on the sleeve notes of the CD single.  I went in with a bit of fear and expecting the worst, but came out with a smile on my face. As Bones might have said in the early days of Star Trek, ‘it’s R.E.M., but not as we know it, Jim.’

And in this case, that’s something to enjoy and appreciate.

Stats wise, Electrolite reached #29 in the UK singles chart in December 1996. It would be almost two full years before the next 45. The Robster will take your hand and guide you through it, as he will with all four singles from Up.

I’ll see you all again in due course. Thanks for your continued support, and hopefully enjoyment, of the series.

JC

Plastic Animals

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #246: PLASTIC ANIMALS

Plastic Animals are an Edinburgh-based band.  I use the present tense as I’m not sure if they are still on the go, but given that they haven’t ever been one for moving things quickly, then there’s every possibility they will record and release some music in the near or distant future.

Consisting of Mario Cruzado (guitar and vocals), Ben Slade (guitar), Jean Michel Morin (keyboards), Dave Wark (bass) and James Lynch (drums), they released an EP in each of 2011 and 2012 before signing up with Song, By Toad Records where they contributed two songs to a split 12″ EP in 2013 (four bands, eight tracks) before debut album Pictures From The Blackout was issued in 2016. While there has been no new material made commercially available since then, the band has played gigs in their home city in 2017 and 2018, but I can’t find anything more recent than that.

Which is something of a shame as Plastic Animals, in the live setting, were always great value and the material on Song, By Toad is quite decent, albeit without being ground-breaking. Most reviewers back in the day were content to describe the music as being flavoured with krautrock and shoegaze.

I thought I’d share one of the tracks from the album:-

mp3: Plastic Animals – Demmin

The early material is on their own bandcamp page while the album can be found at Song, By Toad.

JC

 

Elliot Smith

RIPPING BADGERS CDs (Part 4): ELLIOT SMITH

Ripping Badgers CDs
The nearly finished A to Z Charity Shop CD Challenge #4

XO (1998, Dreamworks)
Bought from Oxfam, Teignmouth for £1.50

Before I start with my normal wittering on I want to say something that is connected to Elliot Smith, and it feels wrong of me to shove down at the bottom of this page, so I’m doing it at the top.

Tim Badger was introduced to the music of Elliot Smith by a friend of his who worked with a charity called CALM – The Campaign Against Living Miserably. It’s a charity who are leading the fight against suicide, particularly male suicide. It’s a charity that Tim supported wholeheartedly and one that I also support and promote wherever I can. Their website is below. If you do only one thing today, before you download the music or read the rest of this page please check out their website. Thank you.

https://www.thecalmzone.net/

(JC adds……I thought I’d lead by example and chip in a tenner.  Seems like an appropriate way to thank SWC and the late Tim for everything).

Trev is not happy. Trev is the captain of the 5 a side that I am part of and in less than 6 days we are taking part in a work tournament. The reason that Trev is not happy is that Tony has just withdrawn from the team. Tony was pretty much our best player, despite being in his late 40s (This is about fifteen years ago) he is fitter than the rest of us, stronger than the rest of us and has more footballing talent in his left leg than the rest of the team put together. If Tony plays we stood a chance of not being humiliated.

I ask Trev why Tony has withdrawn from the team.

“He’s Injured himself changing a lightbulb, silly twat”. Its fair to say that Trev is not sympathetic. It later transpires that Tony didn’t injure himself changing a lightbulb, he fell off a ladder and ruptured his bowel and needed emergency surgery and couldn’t, at the time of this conversation, actually walk. This would still make him a better player than Trev though.

I tell Trev that I’ll ask Badger to play. Badger is, I tell him, a decent footballer, has a fairly good right foot, is as strong as an ox and I tell him with a wink, “He’ll cheat like buggery”. It will be like having a sixth player. Trev nods and tells me to sort it. Some of that might have been a lie. Badger did indeed have a good right foot. He just couldn’t kick a football with it. He will cheat though.

Badger agrees to play. At a price. It costs me a bottle of rum. A good bottle at that and I have to promise Lorna that I will help him paint their front door, which is what he should have been doing on the day of the tournament.

The tournament is on Saturday and we all meet up in the car park and Trev hands out our kit. It is red. Badger immediately complains that Arsenal play in red and its pretty much against his religion to wear anything red (this is true, Badger refused to wear anything red, he also told me that he had it written into his marriage contract that if Lorna ever bought him anything relating to Arsenal he could divorce her. She on the other hand had it written into the same contract that he could ‘never ever, buy her a novel written by someone called ‘Danielle Steel’.)

We get changed into the kit, Badger begrudgingly agrees to only wear his red top when we are actually playing, and we traipse over to the pitches. We have been put into a group with three other teams, Badger tells me he is going to go and psych out the opposition and he wanders off.

Badger’s attempts at psyching out the opposition didn’t go very well, largely because he used it as an excuse to buy a pasty from the handily placed takeaway van at the side of the pitches. We lose our first match, although that was, I think more to do with our goalkeeper, Jason, not understanding the rules of five a side. Midway through the second half with the score 1 nil to us, he comes rushing out his area to boot the ball as hard as he can in the direction of the M5 motorway and concedes a penalty, which they score. Something they do again about thirty seconds later, on this occasion, Jason lets the ball slip out of his hands and it rolls asthmatically across the line, as he lies on the ground watching it. Badger is not happy with Jason, and I decide to not tell him that Jason is an Arsenal fan.

The second and third matches do not go very well either we draw one and lose the other, I say lose, we are thrashed in the third match. I touch the ball once in the whole game and that is when it bounces off my shin and past the hapless Jason in the goal. We are out and its not even lunch time. Badger smiles and says at least we can go to the pub early. This cheers me up, that is until Trev tells us that we are entered into the penalty shoot out contest. Trev failed to mention the penalty shoot out competition.

The penalty shoot contest consists of the team taking 20 penalties in no more than ten minutes, each player has to take 4 penalties each. The team that scores the most wins a prize. It turns out that they have roped in a former Plymouth Argyle goalkeeper to try and stop the goals. Like pretty much everything connected to Plymouth, he is useless.

Which might be why we turn out to be quite good at the penalty shoot out. Badger decides to adopt the same tactic for each of his kicks, this consists of him giving the keeper the skunk eye before belting the ball at the goal as hard as he can. I adopt a more thoughtful approach of trying to place the ball in the bottom right or left corner. Weirdly both are successful as neither of us have missed any of our kicks, although the goalie was about 60. Badger tells everyone who can be bothered to listen that he based his tactic on something he read in a Hotshot Hamish comic strip once and therefore knew it would work. For the record I based my tactic on another famous Scottish footballer – Ray Stewart of West Ham.

We end up scoring 16 as a team and finish up third in the contest. We win an amazing prize for coming third, a pair of football socks, which were red.

All of which Saint and Greavsie’s inspired activity bring us to the fourth CD in the Nearly Finished A to Z Charity Shop Challenge. It is ‘XO’, by Elliot Smith. I think of penalty kicks when I see X O written down, not sure why, but that’s why I went on about football.

Badger was a huge fan of Elliot Smith, far bigger than I am, although I have to say, I love this album, and have played it regularly since the CD was lifted from the box before Christmas. If like me, you’re not really familiar with his work, this is a great way to immerse yourself into his work, the whole album is stunning. Its full of wonderfully wry lyrics, clever one liners, cries of despair all laced together with some soft beautiful melodies, like these two for instance:-

mp3: Waltz #2
mp3: Baby Britain

‘XO’ is still a heartbreaking listen at times, roughly around the time of this release Smith struggled with depression and tried suicide at least once (he threw himself off a cliff whilst drunk and impaled himself on a tree). I’m not sure if this made worse by us all now knowing how things turned out for Elliot Smith, doesn’t matter I suppose. It’s a great album, I urge you all to take the time to listen to it.

mp3: Amity

SWC

Paul Haig

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM : #276 : PAUL HAIG

“The more I think about it, the more I come to the conclusion that Paul Haig is just about the most important Scottish musician of my generation. He’s really proved to be our equivalent of Bowie, with his constant shifting of musical genres over a career that stretches back more than 40 years, albeit with a very small minuscule of commercial success in comparison

“I really must get round to finishing that long-delayed Paul Haig ICA.”

Those were my opening and closing paras last November when I featured him in the long-running Saturday Songs series. The reason it has been so long-delated is the amount of choice.  I’m not including any of the Josef K material, nor anything that he released alongside the late and great Billy Mackenzie, but I was still looking at a long list of more than 40 potential songs for inclusion.

It’s been a labour of love.  Again, I’m not going to argue these are the ten ‘best’ Paul Haig songs, but I do feel they hang together as a fine compilation album.

SIDE ONE

1) Heaven Sent (single, and opening track on Rhythm of Life, 1983)

A song dating from the Josef K days, and one which the band had performed in their trademark way, complete with angular, jarring guitars that meant a raincoat was essential if you really wanted to get on the floor and give it a dance.  This radical transformation, with production duties handled by Alex Sadkin, (a person mentioned in the Chris Frantz book I reviewed last week) who was probably best known for his work with Grace Jones, showed how much and how quickly Paul wanted to move on and do something totally different.  All of his early solo work formed part of the soundtrack to my student days, and I make no apologies that a few songs from that era will feature in this ICA.

2) I Believe In You (single, and opening track on Coincidence vs, Fate, 1993)

No matter how hard Paul Haig tried, he just couldn’t ever get that elusive hit single.  I Believe In You was his 14th go at things, and this marvellous, radio-friendly pop/dance effort, with more than a hint of house high up in the mix, was another instance when justice wasn’t done,  Talking of which….

3) Justice (single and track 8 on Rhythm of Life, 1983)

A version of Justice had been recorded in 1982, with the aim of having it issued as a single via Belgian label Les Disques du Crépuscule.   The big contract with Island Records put a spoke in that wheel, meaning that a track which sounded in many ways like the New Life/See You era of Depeche Mode, was given the Sadkin treatment, and became, arguably, the most instant and accessible of all the tracks on the debut album.  The label likely had high hopes for this to be a big single, ideally coming on the back of a previous hit, but given that the radio stations and the record-buying public were proving to be disinterested, it was given just a low-key release.  Another that should’ve been much better known…

4) Over Over (track 3 on Cinematique 3, 2003)

Cinematique 3 was the final in a series of three instrumental albums subtitled “Themes to Unknown Films”. The previous two volumes had been released in 1991 and 2001, the first on Les Disques du Crépuscule, but the final two volumes came out on Paul’s own label, Rhythm Of Life (which was, of course, the title of the debut album on Island Records back in 1983). RoL had actually been the name under which Paul had issued a number of side projects immediately after the break-up of Josef K, and such was his love of the name that he resurrected it at the tail end of the 20th Century and has used it for all his releases ever since.

5) Something Good (10″ version, 1989)

Lifted from a previous blog post:-

In 1988, Paul Haig took a very bold and brave step by fully financing the recording of his next album himself without the safety net of a guaranteed release. He again worked with Alan Rankine and thankfully for all concerned, it was picked up by Circa Records, an offshoot of Virgin. Hopes were high, particularly for the release of an outstanding and poptastic leadoff single, Something Good, which was released in 7″, 12″ and 12″ remix form and tailor-made for radio play and an appearance on Top of The Pops. But….once again, Paul was denied by the pop gods with him again being in the wrong place at the wrong time with Madchester all the rage and synth-pop well out of fashion. And yet, when you listen to Something Good, and indeed some of other tracks on parent album Chain, it’s not a million miles away from some of the less clubby tracks on Technique by New Order (e.g. Run).

SIDE TWO

1) Round and Round (track 6 on Relive, 2009)

Come the early years of the 21st Century, a few members of the emerging bands were making noises that Paul Haig had been something of an influence in their formative years.  This led to a bit more interest in the great man and he released two albums in quick succession – Go Out Tonight (2008) and Relive (2009) with the guitars more to the fore than recent years, albeit there remained a very healthy dose of keyboards/electronica.  He was also more than happy to go back to old material and give it a fresh update, such as this one, co-written with Malcolm Ross, his mate from the Josef K days, which had already seen light of day on one of Ross’s solo albums as far back as 1995.

2) Big Blue World (12″ single, 1984)

3) The Only Truth (single, 1984)

The cut-throat nature of the record industry meant that Island Records weren’t the slightest bit interested in Paul Haig after the debut album had stiffed.  Even when he came up with the very radio-friendly Big Blue World, on which he worked very closely with Alan Rankine not long after he had taken his leave of Associates, they turned it down which meant he was free to issue it as a 45 on Operation Afterglow, an offshoot of Les Disques du Crépuscule, but inevitably things were done on a shoestring budget and nobody got to hear it.  Mind you, the fact it came out on such small label did make it eligible for the indie charts and it managed to reach #19.

Work on the follow-up, The Only Truth, saw Bernard Sumner (New Order) and Donald Johnson (A Certain Ratio) take on joint production duties.  Sniffing a commercial opportunity, Island Records decided this one should go out on license, thus it was given an Island catalogue number, but the label in the middle of the record indicated it was another Les Disques du Crépuscule, albeit it was very much bankrolled by the major.  After it flopped, Island decided to drop Paul Haig and shelved the plans for a second album, much of which had already been recorded.

4) Chained (track 10 on Chain, 1989)

The first hook up with Billy Mackenzie came in the mid-80s, and was the kindling of a close friendship over many years until Billy’s sad demise.  They decided that each would write a song for the other’s next LP, and the quite majestuic Chained subsequently was included on Chain in 1989 – an album that just happened to be produced jointly by Paul Haig and Alan Rankine.

NB: Paul’s song for Billy was Reach The Top, which was recorded for the Associates album The Glamour Chase, due also for release in 1989 but shelved by the record label, and only given a posthumous release in 2003.

5) Chasing The Tail (opening track on The Wood, 2018)

This ICA closes off with some music from the most recent album.  His ability to still astound, astonish and delight can be evidenced by this review from Louder Than War:-

It’s a long time since Paul Haig split from Josef K. In the fact he’s been producing solo records since 1982, so perhaps it’s high time to put the post-punk spectre to one side and look at what is happening in the here and now because Paul’s new record shares next to nothing with that band. Maybe a similar spirit of adventure, but sonically a world away. The Wood finds Haig exploring samples, beats, electronics and ‘found sound’ to sculpt something that’s split into eight parts, but very much fit together as a whole. A soundscape of the strange and strangely danceable among the tranquillity in the forest, or of the mixed-up feelings of the soul, or both, well that’s what I think may be intended anyway.”

Whether that truly comes over is down to each individual listener to judge, but for me Haig has put together a work that’s in turns provocative, danceable, obscure, immediate and beguilingly rum, so I’m not sure it really matters. What The Wood actually consists of is eight pieces that mostly are dance/trance-orientated with repeated vocal motifs. The concept gives it an added edge and with a little imagination you can feel the eerie peace of the Forest and the skips and dips of the mind. Aside from the concept there is plenty to get one to, cough, ‘cut a rug’. But everything here fits and you have to admire Haig’s craftsmanship in the way it has been put together – producing a musical storybook without words in effect. Forty years into his recording career he’s still breaking new ground. Long may he strive for the outer reaches, because those who want to be challenged a little in their listening will lap this up.

BONUS 7″ SINGLE: THE COVERS

a) Ghost Rider

b) Atmosphere

The former was the b-side to Big Blue World back in 1985.  It’s a hugely enjoyable trashy, electro-rockabilly take on the Suicide song from 1977 (and which last featured on this blog as the b-side to Orange Crush by R.E.M.)

The latter is, indeed, the Joy Division song. It was recorded more than a decade ago by Outernationale, which is the name used by Scots-born Derek Miller, with Paul Haig adding his distinctive vocal. The track would later be given a release on Hacienda Records, the short-lived digital label run by Peter Hook.  It’s brilliantly different…..

JC

Penetration

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (52)

I really didn’t mean for there to be a near four-months gap in this series, and so I’m returning with one which goes back to basics in that it’s a debut single which the band never topped at any time in the future.

Don’t Dictate was released in November 1977.  It was the work of Penetration, a band from Ferryhill, a small coal-mining town in the north-east of England, taking their name from an Iggy Pop song.   The line-up which recorded and released the debut single, on Virgin Records, consisted of Pauline Murray (vocals), Robert Blamire (bass), Gary Smallman (drums) and Gary Chaplin (guitar).

mp3: Penetration – Don’t Dictate

The single, and indeed its b-side, was credited to Chaplin/Murray, but just a few months later he left, to be replaced by Neale Lloyd and then Fred Purser was added as a second guitarist, seemingly at the insistence of the record company who wanted to flesh out the sound.

The line-up alterations fuelled a change in the group’s dynamics, and moved them away from what was a punk sound to one which was far rockier and harder in edge. Indeed, the all music review of Moving Targets, the debut album released in late 1978, states:-

In another lifetime, they could have given the likes of Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple a run for their money, at least in terms of demonstrating dexterity

The debut album did actually sell fairly well, reaching #22 in the charts, but the reviews of the live shows were increasingly highlighting the fact that many of the songs contained guitar solos, played by Purser with a high degree of skill and ability, to the extent that they bordered on metal and not punk. It was, admittedly, a fine line – I knew punk fans in Glasgow who loved Motorhead but who would scream blue murder if you played the classic rock stuff, so I guess it was down to just how fast a band played.

Anyways, Penetration’s popularity diminished very quickly and they broke-up soon after a second album, Coming Up For Air, was released in September 1979. Pauline Murray would later join up with The Invisible Girls, a group initially formed to provide a musical soundtrack to the poetry of John Cooper Clarke, recording a fabulous self-titled album in 1980.

Fun fact time. John Maher of Buzzcocks was the drummer on the Pauline Murray and The Invisible Girls album. When Penetration reformed in 2015, Maher could be found pounding the drums at the gigs and indeed in the studio as the band released a third album, Resolution, after a gap of 36 years.

Here’s the b-side of the debut 45, clocking in at just over 100 seconds in length:-

mp3: Penetration – Money Talks

Rather fabulous……..that’s if you want to my view on it.

JC

R.E.M.

SOME SONGS ARE GREAT SHORT STORIES (Chapter 43)

A couple of days ago, the latest instalment of the R.E.M. singles series made reference to the acoustic version of New Test Leper that had featured as one of the b-sides to Bittersweet Me.

I got thinking that perhaps not everyone will be familiar with the songs which appeared on New Adventures In Hi-Fi, and given that the original version of New Test Leper is such an outstanding piece of work, I’ve decided to feature it as part of this series:-

I can’t say that I love Jesus
That would be a hollow claim
He did make some observations
And I’m quoting them today
“Judge not, lest ye be judged”
What a beautiful refrain
The studio audience disagrees
Have his lambs all gone astray?

Call me a leper
Call me a leper
Call me a leper

“You are lost and disillusioned”
What an awful thing to say
I know this show doesn’t flatter
It means nothing to me
I thought I might help them understand
What an ugly thing to see
“I am not an animal”
Subtitled under the screen

Call me a leper
Call me a leper
Call me a leper

When I tried to tell my story
They cut me off to take a break
I sat silent five commercials
I had nothing left to say
The talk show host was index-carded
All organized and blank
The other guests were scared and hardened
What a sad parade
What a sad parade

Call me a leper
Call me a leper
Call me a leper
Mmmm
Mmmm

mp3: R.E.M. – New Test Leper

There’s a whole page on wiki devoted to the song:-

“It was recorded at Bad Animals Studio in Seattle, Washington, in March 1996, four months after R.E.M. completed their 1995 world tour in support of their previous album, Monster. On the track, Bill Berry plays drums and shaker; Peter Buck plays guitar; Mike Mills, bass and organ; and Michael Stipe provides the vocals, which were penned during moments of downtime at the studio.

The following month, on April 19, the band recorded an acoustic version of the song at the same location. That version was released as a B-side to the “Bittersweet Me” single. The video of the performance, directed by Lance Bangs, was used as the video to the album version of the song in the Bonus Videos section on the band’s In View DVD, released in 2003.

The first line of the song contains the lyrics “I can’t say that I love Jesus”, attracting some controversy. Peter Buck clarified the matter to Q magazine’s Tom Doyle in 1996: “It’s written from the perspective of a character that Michael saw on TV on a talk show. But are people going to think Michael’s talking about himself not liking Jesus? I don’t think that people will take us that seriously. It’s not like we’re tearing up a picture of the Pope on television.” He was referring to Sinéad O’Connor‘s 1992 Saturday Night Live incident.

“‘New Test Leper’ is something that we only played at soundcheck, like, twice,” Buck explained in another interview, this time to Addicted to Noise’s Michael Goldberg, also in 1996. “And for some reason, we just forgot about it and never really played it. I don’t know why. Michael just happened to luckily enough have it on tape. He says, ‘I’ve got this great stuff for that song and none of us even remember playing it.’ So we cut it here in Seattle when we did the record. I think it’s probably the most R.E.M.-ish sounding thing on the record. Literally, Michael was watching one of those talk shows and I think the subject was ‘People judge me by the way I look’ or something. Whereas I, when I have the misfortune to look for two minutes at one of those Oprah, Geraldo things, I just get revolted at everyone concerned: the audience, me. Michael actually looked at it and felt like, ‘Gosh, what if someone’s actually trying to communicate something to these people and this person who’s in this awful, tacky, degrading situation?’ So it’s written from that perspective. And I think probably having done press conferences in the past and being in those kinds of situations, there might be a little empathy from experience that we’ve had.”

According to Darryl White’s R.E.M. Timeline, “New Test Leper” received its first live airing on May 31, 1997, at the Variety Playhouse in Atlanta during the final show of The Magnificent 7 vs. The United States’ tour. The “Magnificent 7” was composed of Peter Buck, Mark Eitzel, Justin Harwood, Dan Pearson, Barrett Martin, Scott McCaughey and Skerik Walton, with other people performing occasionally. Buck’s R.E.M. bandmates were present, and the guitarist left Eitzel to perform the last encore to go backstage and talk with the trio. Berry, however, had already departed and was on his way home. “Bill phoned me after the show to tell me he’d loved it,” explained Buck. “But he had to leave halfway through because he was scared he’d be asked to play. It had taken him two hours to drive there; he stayed for forty minutes, and then drove home so he wouldn’t be asked to play one R.E.M. song.” The remaining threesome put together a short set and took to the stage.

During R.E.M.’s performance on VH1 Storytellers in 1998, Stipe explained the background of the song he described as his “crowning achievement”: how he initially (and, thankfully for him, erroneously) thought he’d stolen the song’s “biggest line” – What a sad parade – from his friend Vic Chesnutt; how he wanted to write a follow-up to the only other song he knew that contained the word Jesus in the first line – namely Patti Smith‘s re-working of Van Morrison‘s “Gloria” (“Jesus died for somebody’s sins but not mine”); how he “wanted to write a song that was in the 6/8 polka kind of thing, but wanted the vocal to be contrapuntal; and how he quoted his favorite movie in the second verse (“I am not an animal,” from The Elephant Man, a movie that Stipe says also inspired R.E.M.’s “Carnival of Sorts (Box Cars)”, amongst others).”

And, just to round things off……

I reckon this illustrates perfectly just what The Robster has been saying this past couple of weeks about how different NAiHF would have been regarded if certain other songs had been released as singles.

JC

 

Various

THE BEST OF SWEDISH MUSIC IN 2020

A GUEST POSTING by MARTIN ELLIOT

(Our Swedish Correspondent)

Jim,

I guess this mail has become a bit of a tradition, that I summarize last year from a Swedish music POV. As we all know 2020 went down as a year we’d probably most want to forget as quick as possible, very true also for us. I started working at home from last week of February, returning from the Milan area the same night as the first reports came of COVID-19 cases found in 10 smaller towns south of Milan… Immediate quarantine, and then remote working since. Soon celebrating a full year at the dining table. Pros, it’s been many a good year since I played so many of my vinyl records, and I’ve been much more physical active than normal, not spending time commuting – lost 5 kg so far! Cons, well most of all a non existent social life and a limited variation in environment I see.

Musically it became a bit of an in-between year here on the Eastern front, a lot of things postponed, delayed or just taking forever to complete with artists isolated (and not all enjoying being locked down in solitude). I’ve managed to scramble out a couple of decent tracks though, well in my eyes at least, for an EP of the best Swedish music from 2020.

Without further ado, let’s go.

1. Pale Honey – Bad Thing.

Just before Christmas Pale Honey dropped their 3rd album, and what an album it turned out to be. Ten sparkling, raw and self assured tunes. Highly recommended!

2. Kite – Hand Out The Drugs.

The synth-duo Kite has a history of releasing 4 to 5 track EP’s, six so far, rather than full length albums but 2020 saw them release three 7″ singles instead. All of them very good, Hand Out The Drugs was the last of the three, with a title apt for a year needing escape.

3. Twice A Man – Rain Of Shame.

T A M has been active for about 40 years now, they started in the late 70’s as Cosmic Overdose and then became Twice A Man. They have shifted between more pop oriented electronic music to music for plays or art exhibitions. Last year saw them release the album On The Other Side Of The Mirror, a darker version of their more pop oriented side and to me one of their best releases so far.

4. Kapitalet – En Förlorad Värld (A Lost World).

In Swedish, won’t make much sense for most of the TVV readers (sorry), but over here it had importance – since it was the first (and so far only) new song written and performed by one of the forming members of Kent. Kent was the biggest band over here for several years (their 2nd album and ALL 9 following studio albums has been number 1 here, one of the albums stayed 85 (!!) weeks in the charts) and when they March 2016 in a brilliant way announced their last album and tour the same year people cried.

The track isn’t too far away from what Kent sounded like the last few years, lyrically a bit more political, but didn’t make even close the impact in the charts as Kent used to do.

5. ionnalee – Mouth’s Open Sea (Kronologi version).

Jonna Lee Nilsson celebrated 10 years as multimedia artist last year by releasing a collection of reworked or re-recorded songs from her ionnalee and iamamiwhoami aliases. (Some of you might remember she’s been included also earlier years.) Open Sea was originally on 2019’s Remember The Future, this is still trademark ionnalee electronics, but a darker, more focused and beat driven version than the original.

6. Kleerup – I Hang On To My Vertigo (featuring Freddie Wadling).

Yes, the old Ruper Hine classic, by the same Kleerup that made Robyn into an international star with the track With Every Heartbeat. Kleerup has had some tough years suffering from drug addictions but seems to be back in shape. Last year saw the release of his album “2”, working with artists like AlunaGeorge and Rebecca&Fiona – and dusting off an older recording with Swedish punk legend Freddie Wadling.

Freddie sadly died summer of 2016 after a hard and destructive life. Maybe contradictary to his destructive life he was musically very active, at one time he was member of 12 different bands at the same time giving room for his varied creative styles. He played with The Leather Nun, Cortex and Blue For Two to mention the potentially more known bands outside our borders.

Bonus track:

Pale Honey – Set Me Free. I add this as bonus track for mainly two reasons; firstly it’s against the laws of mixtapes to include more than one song of the same band and secondly this was actually released late 2019 even if the album came a full year later – but I just can’t not let you hear the best indie dance intro since Fools Gold…

From the dining table, thanks for listening.

Martin

JC adds..…I always look forward to Martin’s end of year round-up as there’s inevitably something in there that grabs may attention, and this year is no different.  The two Pale Honey tracks are already on heavy rotation and I’m always grateful to hear more of ionnalee.

R.E.M.

THE SINGULAR ADVENTURES OF R.E.M. (Part 30)

Continuing on from last week’s theme of New Adventures In Hi-Fi being R.E.M.’s most overlooked record – commercially, the backlash started here. It was becoming clear there wasn’t going to be another Losing My Religion anytime soon, and commercial radio stations and bandwagon-jumping casual fans were not going to be playing new R.E.M. records like they had for the previous few years (despite the fact the band had existed for 10 years and released 6 albums before LMR came out).

One theory about New Adventures’ failure to capture the general public’s imagination is that it was entirely deliberate, that the band was beginning to tire of the fame. The story goes that following the esoteric choice of first single E-Bow The Letter, Warners were pressing hard for The Wake-Up Bomb to be the follow-up. And they had a good point. It was one of the strongest, hardest-hitting songs on the album, one that the critics had almost universally picked up on as a highlight. Fans loved it too. It really was an obvious choice. But the band dug their heels in – they wanted a different track and they got their way. Bittersweet Me was released on 27th October 1996 to a general malaise.

mp3: R.E.M. – Bittersweet Me

I was nonplussed by the decision to release Bittersweet Me. I can name, off the top of my head, at least four songs that would have made better singles – the aforementioned Wake-Up Bomb, New Test Leper, Be Mine, and my favourite track from the album So Fast So Numb. Of the album’s 14 songs, Bittersweet Me would probably have been my 10th or 11th choice. To be fair, it’s not a terrible song like Sidewinder or some of the guff they would conjure up over the next decade, it’s just a bit, well… meh. Unremarkable. Pretty standard quietLOUDquiet 90s alt rock.

Throughout this series we’ve bitched and moaned about the choice of singles from albums, often directing our disdain at the labels. But in this case, it seemed the band was deliberately sabotaging their own career. It’s not even as though they loved the song that much themselves – Bittersweet Me was never played live other than during soundchecks on the Monster Tour (one of which, recorded in Memphis, formed the backing track for the eventual album track/single).

In the UK, it charted in its first week at #19 before plummeting to #53 the following week and out of the Top 100 altogether after that. Proof, if any were needed, that the general public had lost interest by now, with only the true fans keeping the band’s chart profile alive. Those of us who did buy it however, were rewarded with some cracking b-sides. No vinyl again, but a pesky cassette single was put out with another fully live version of an album track. Undertow is one of New Adventures in Hi-Fi’s strongest songs, and here it’s even more raucous and dirty than the album version. It’s this version that features in the concert film Road Movie.

mp3: R.E.M. – Undertow [live – Atlanta]

Like last time, two CDs were released, both identical in content, but the so-called ‘Collector’s Edition’ had slightly different packaging. But whatever version you bought, you were in for a real treat. After the first two songs came what was at the time, and remains, a very sad track that makes me enormously happy and glad to be alive. R.E.M.’s take on Jimmy Webb’s classic Wichita Lineman is, frankly, beyond words. I love it so much, probably my favourite of the band’s covers. Just wonderful.

mp3: R.E.M. – Wichita Lineman [live – Houston]

Finally, another live version of a track from the album, but this time recorded acoustically in the studio. New Test Leper really is a highlight, not just on NAiHF, but of the band’s career. An immensely sad tale of character assassination via a TV talk show. You know – the kind that gave us Jeremy Kyle and Jerry Springer. Stipe’s lyrics are so poignant and tragic. This version doesn’t top the album take, but it’s still a bit of a gem. (JC adds….I think both versions are equally magnificent.  If you don’t know the album version, I do recommend you acquaint yourself with it as soon as you can).

mp3: R.E.M. – New Test Leper [acoustic – Seattle studio]

As the casual listener turned its back on the band, the fans took New Adventures In Hi-Fi to their hearts. It really is one of R.E.M.’s career highs and would have been perfect if it were a bit shorter, and more successful if better songs were released from it. There was to be one last single from New Adventures (making it their first album of the decade to contain fewer than four singles), and next week JC has the honour of talking you through it.

The Robster

Pictish Trail

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #245: THE PICTISH TRAIL

Edited from wiki:-

Johnny Lynch (born 28 September 1981, Edinburgh) is a Scottish musician who performs under the pseudonym The Pictish Trail. After graduation from the University of St Andrews, Lynch ran Fence Records from 2003 until 2013 and has since been running Lost Map Records. He’s also played as band member with other musicians, including James Yorkston and Malcolm Middleton.

Lynch released his proper debut album, Secret Soundz Vol.1, in September 2008, to critical acclaim. In February 2009, The Times named Secret Soundz as an “Essential Recording” of the Fence Collective. In 2010 The List magazine named Lynch as the 12th “Hottest Scot” in its list of creative Scottish people.

His 2010 album In Rooms (12″ vinyl) consists of 50 songs of 30 seconds each written as part of the “100 Days To Make Me A Better Person” project of 2009. Lynch also supported KT Tunstall throughout her 2010-2011 European tour in support of her 2010 album, Tiger Suit.

Secret Soundz Vol. 2 was recorded with Sweet Baboo taking up production duties, on the Isle of Eigg (where Lynch now lives). The album was released to critical praise in February 2013. and was re-released as a double CD set, with Vol.1, on Moshi Moshi in 2014.

In July 2014, the first Howlin’ Fling Festival took place on Eigg, with Lynch as organiser and performer. The line-up included, among others, Jens Lekman, Beth Orton and Sam Amidon, The Phantom Band and various bands from Lost Map Records. In September 2016, Pictish Trail (without “The” in its name) released a new album, Future Echoes, produced by Adem. It featured the singles “Far Gone” and “Dead Connection”. A full tour followed the released, with the band featuring members of Lost Map signees Tuff Love.

Thumb World released in February 2020, featuring the singles Double Sided, Lead Balloon and Turning Back. The album received positive reviews from critics, with Jamie Bowman of The Skinny describing it as “funny, beautiful and life-affirming”.

JC adds……

Johnny Lynch is one of the unsung heroes of the Scottish music scene.  I’ve never been to any of his Howlin’ Fling festivals, but those who have tell me they are always something quite special and memorable.  Maybe one day….

Here’s a track from the debut album:-

mp3: The Pictish Trail – Winter Home Disco

JC

Chris Frantz, John Cooper Clarke, Pete Paphides

THREE BOOKS READ THIS PAST MONTH

Loads more books arrived a few weeks back, courtesy of Santa Claus, among which were three autobiographical hardbacks related to the sort of stuff you’ll find on this little corner of t’internet.

Two of them, I recommend very highly, the other not quite as much.

First up is Broken Greek by Pete Paphides,  The author will be reasonably well-known to UK readers as a journalist, writer and broadcaster of many years standing.  He was born in Birmingham in 1969, the younger of two sons to Greek/Cypriot immigrants who had, like many others, come here in the hope of establishing themselves financially, feeling that there were greater rewards on offer than back home. Broken Greek will hopefully be the first of a number of volumes as it takes us up only to Pete’s early teenage years, and while the music is rarely more than a page or two away, there is equal joy from the family memoirs across its near 600-pages, most of which are recalled through the lens of childhood innocence.

But the real strength in the writing comes from the musical reminisces.  Paphides’ great talent throughout his career, be that with a specialist music publication or during his many years as the rock critic for The Times, has always been his willingness to accept the uncool and talk up singers or bands whose very names cause lots of us to squirm.  The book demonstrates he’s been like all his life, and he never shies away from outlining his love for the chart-fodder and middle-of-the-road stuff of the 70s. You are left with the feeling that he still owns those very same records, happy to give them a spin today. He is, however, quite lucky in that his older brother by five years is also a music fan and so, as Pete reaches the ages of 8/9, he is exposed to new wave/post-punk songs, many of which really have an impact on him, making him fall deeper and harder in love with singles and albums.

“Paphides can write like a dream and knows how to make his particular circumstances resonate for anyone who, when young, hungered for music;  if you have ever found solace in a song, you will relish this book; all the energy, thrill and immediacy of your favourite single; tender, heartfelt, humane and very funny.”

That’s just a few of the things the critics have said since Broken Greek was published in April 2020.  I’ll just add that it’s a gem of a read, one that I know will appeal to the entire TVV community.

Another essential read, as far as I’m concerned, is I Wanna Be Yours by John Cooper Clarke.  Unlike the Pete Paphides book, these 470 pages cover the punk poets entire life, from his birth in Salford in January 1949 through to his re-emergence in recent years as a cultural icon, beloved of many a 21st century musician or lyricist. Unsurprisingly, it’s a wonderfully told story, possibly slightly exaggerated in one or two instances for comic effect, and all the while it is near impossible not to imagine yourself sitting in an audience listening to the author reading the words aloud to you. As such, I found myself turning each page with a grin fixed firmly to my face.

I wasn’t aware of how rich and varied JCC’s life has been.  I had always imagined him as having hung around Salford/Manchester, as part of an arts scene, and being discovered in the late 70s when punk emerged.  Instead, I learned that, among many other things, he had served as a bookie’s runner, an apprentice mechanic, a cutter in the textile industry, a printer and a fire-watcher at a naval dockyard hundreds of miles south-west of where he had been raised.  Oh, and he also was a pet-sitter in Amsterdam, a period which provides a particularly amusing set of stories and incidents. As for the poetry, he first stood on a stage in the early 70s, appearing on bills alongside the club comedians whose repertoires were very much in tune with the sexism, racism and misogyny of the era.

It’s also a story of a junkie, and he doesn’t shy away from the things that went wrong in his life from his long-standing heroin addiction, but not in any harrowing or ‘woe-is-me’ sort of way, just an acknowledgement that he fucked it up big style, the consequences of which were inevitable.

JCC has had an extraordinary life, and he has written an extraordinary autobiography.  You really should track it down.

The third of the music books read in January 2020 was Remain In Love by Chris Frantz.  In some ways I should acknowledge that coming fast on the back of Paphides and Clarke, the autobiography from the Talking Heads/Tom Tom Club drummer had a lot to live up to.  The reviews, which had helped me to add it to Santa’s list, were almost all favourable, with the critics homing in on the fact that many of its words sought to destroy a few myths around David Byrne.

The thing is, the book isn’t really all that vitriolic in nature, but where an opportunity arises to set the record straight about who wrote what and who came up with an idea around the look or sound, it is taken.  And yes, there is the occasionally barbed passage in which the lead singer is held up to be a deviant or a liar, but all too often it is quickly followed by more words in which Byrne’s involvement is seen as pivotal to the success of the band.  As such, the inconsistencies got to me and spoiled my enjoyment.

The other thing I couldn’t really get out of my head was the fact that Chris Frantz had something of a privileged upbringing that seemed, to me, to give him a sense of arrogance and expectation from an early age which shaped how he went about his entire life.  He wasn’t slow in using his parents connections to make things happen for him, and he really had a wonderful safety net, should he have needed it, of being able to fall back on them at any point in time.  This realisation, again for me, made some stories of his life at art school and the early efforts at making it as a musician in New York ring hollow.

Like the JCC book, there’s plenty of references to drug consumption, but in a way that is almost boastful both in terms of the quantity and quality and the folk with whom he was surrounded while indulging.  In other words, it felt too often like a bloated, boastful bio of a rock star bore.   It’s also worth mentioning in passing that his lifelong partner, Tina Weymouth, also came from a well-connected and highly-talented family, and indeed there is an admission that when the going did get particularly tough in NYC, the two of them would retreat to the comfy abode of her brother.

I suppose I should have realised what I was letting myself in for from a few of sentences in the preface to Remain In Love:-

“You could say that Tina and I were the team who made David Byrne famous. We were very good at shining the spotlight on him.

“Anyone who has been playing music professionally for over forty years has lived a life with many twists and turns. In this book I will tell you all about them…

“A number of books have been written about us, but none of them are very good and none of them have given the reader the true inside story. With Remain In Love, I will do just that.”

I’d have preferred it if he had simply related the tale to his therapist.

mp3: The Jam – When You’re Young (BBC Session)
mp3: John Cooper Clarke – Beasley Street
mp3: Talking Heads – Road To Nowhere

JC

Various

GIVING THE PEOPLE EXACTLY WHAT THEY WANT: MIDDLE AGED MAN

A GUEST POSTING by MIDDLE AGED MAN

Lockdown 3 Reaction

A week past on Monday, watching ‘the man who doesn’t know how to use a comb’ announce Lockdown 3 was a depressing experience and led to a variety of emotions, which I think the following opening tracks convey.

Whilst side 1 reflects my immediate response, Side 2 is the sound of me picking myself up.

Special mention must go to the song chosen to close side 2 – if ever there was an anthem for current times this is surely it:

Side 1

Whitewater – Let’s Eat Grandma (from the album, I’m All Ears)

An instrumental opening track is a feature of many of my favourite albums and this conveys a amazing sense of forboding

Anxiety- Preoccupations (from the album, Preoccupations)

Previously know as ‘Viet Cong’ – Preoccupations self titled album didn’t quite hit the heights for me, but this is the feeling I experience whenever I go into a shop at the moment

Standing Still – Artery (from the album, Civilisation)

From their 2012 album, it is what the world is doing at the moment

Screaming In The Darkness – Pauline Murray and the Invisible Girls (from the album, Screaming In The Darkness)

To my mind Martin’s Hannett’ s greatest production – no need for further superlatives

Without An End – Reduction Plan (from the album, Somewhere)

Even without the lyrics the music feels right

Side 2

Don’t Fall – The Chameleons (from the album, Script Of The Bridge)

One of the great Manchester post punk bands who would have been so much bigger/respected if they had been on factory – the opening voice over recorded from the TV ‘what on earth are you talking about’ is what we would all have thought 18 months ago

Start Again – The Slow Readers Club (from the album, Cavalcade)

A current Manchester band who should be so much more successful than they are – so far

Jardin Botanique – Opera Multi Steel (from the album, Days Of Creation)

A band from France that a came across a few years ago when I discovered ‘Coldwave’ – I’m lucky to have a garden and it has been a place of joy and comfort during the lockdowns

Beautiful Day – Voom (from the album, Hello Are You There?)

I know nothing about Voom apart from they are from New Zealand,

All In It – British Sea Power (from the album, Do You Like Rock Music?)

An anthem for lockdown

middle aged man

JC adds…..Thanks to MAM for a very diverse and unusual mix of opening tracks.  My apologies that I didn’t have the time to pull these together into the usual Side A and Side B offerings.  I’ll look to add them at the weekend.

Bob Dylan

IN ITS FULL GLORIOUS MONO SOUND

It was a few years back that I picked up a copy of the album with the catalogue number CBS – PBG 62572. It’s the original Mono recording of Highway 61 Revisited, released on 30 August 1965 to this sort of acclaim:-

In the British music press, initial reviews of Highway 61 expressed both bafflement and admiration for the record. New Musical Express critic Allen Evans wrote: “Another set of message songs and story songs sung in that monotonous and tuneless way by Dylan which becomes quite arresting as you listen.” The Melody Maker LP review section, by an anonymous critic, commented: “Bob Dylan’s sixth LP, like all others, is fairly incomprehensible but nevertheless an absolute knock-out.”The English poet Philip Larkin, reviewing the album for The Daily Telegraph, wrote that he found himself “well rewarded” by the record: “Dylan’s cawing, derisive voice is probably well suited to his material … and his guitar adapts itself to rock (‘Highway 61’) and ballad (‘Queen Jane’). There is a marathon ‘Desolation Row’ which has an enchanting tune and mysterious, possibly half-baked words.”

It would go on reach #4 in the UK charts. His previous album, Bringing It All Back Home, released some six months previously, had reached #1. Is it fair to say that Highway 61 Revisited is now considered to have a greater legacy, notwithstanding that the former album included Subterranean Homesick Blues, Maggie’s Farm, Mr. Tambourine Man and It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)??   Over to those of you within the TVV community who are better qualified to articulate relevant views and opinions……..

The reason I’m posing a question rather than offering an opinion is that I’m not a huge Bob Dylan fan, but there’s an awful lot about this slightly crackly album that I like. And let’s face it, for a piece of plastic that is now almost 56 years old, it’s in decent condition:-

mp3: Bob Dylan – Like A Rolling Stone
mp3: Bob Dylan – Tombstone Blues
mp3: Bob Dylan – It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Lot To Cry
mp3: Bob Dylan – From A Buick Six
mp3: Bob Dylan – Ballad Of A Thin Man

mp3: Bob Dylan – Queen Jane Approximately
mp3: Bob Dylan – Highway 61 Revisited
mp3: Bob Dylan – Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues
mp3: Bob Dylan – Desolation Row

Side 1 of Highway 61 Revisited (mono)
Side 2 of Highway 61 Revisited (mono)

If you’d said to the 18-year-old me that, some 40 years on I’d be writing a few words in praise of Bob Dylan, I’d have laughed out very loud in your face and with a great deal of contempt.  I’m glad my tastes have matured to some degree.

JC

David Holmes, Serge Gainsbourg

SOME SONGS ARE GREAT SHORT STORIES (Chapter 42)

A GUEST POSTING by KHAYEM

Les ailes de la Rolls effleuraient des pylônes
Quand m’étant malgré moi égaré
Nous arrivâmes ma Rolls et moi dans une zone
Dangereuse
Un endroit isolé

Là-bas, sur le capot de cette Silver Ghost de 1910
S’avance en éclaireur
La Vénus d’argent du radiateur
Dont les voiles légers volent aux avant-postes

Hautaine, dédaigneuse
Tandis que hurle le poste de radio
Couvrant le silence du moteur
Elle fixe l’horizon
Et l’esprit ailleurs
Semble tout ignorer des trottoirs que j’accoste

Ruelles, culs-de-sac
Aux stationnements interdits par la loi
Le cœur indifférent
Elle tient le mors de mes vingt-six chevaux-vapeur

Princesse des ténèbres, archange maudit
Amazone modern style que le sculpteur, en anglais
Surnomme “Spirit of Ecstasy”

Ainsi je déconnais avant que je ne perde
Le contrôle de la Rolls
J’avançais lentement
Ma voiture dériva
Et un heurt violent
Me tira soudain de ma rêverie
Merde
J’aperçus une roue de vélo à l’avant
Qui continuait de tourner en roue libre
Et comme une poupée qui perdait l’équilibre
La jupe retroussée sur ses pantalons blancs

“Tu t’appelles comment?”
“Melody”
“Melody comment?”
“Melody Nelson”

Melody Nelson a les cheveux rouges
Et c’est leur couleur naturelle

And so begins the Histoire De Melody Nelson with another contender for an Opening Tracks ICA, Melody by Serge Gainsbourg. This is of course chapter one, so it focuses on the narrator’s first encounter with the titular character, knocking her off a bicycle whilst driving around night-time back streets in his Rolls Royce. The implication is there from the start, but the narrator is subsequently painted as an obsessive who seduces and objectifies the 15-year old Melody. I won’t spoil the ending if you’ve not listened to the album. Gainsbourg’s spoken word narration is underpinned by Herbie Flowers’ bass, with Jane Birkin briefly giving voice to Melody Nelson at the end. The original 1971 album version runs for seven and half minutes, but the 2011 deluxe edition includes an alternative version, extending the climatic wig-out for another two minutes.

Melody (Prise Complète)

Roughly a quarter of a century later, David Holmes covered Melody on his album Let’s Get Killed, albeit as an instrumental track retitled Don’t Die Just Yet. It was released as a single and the CD contained ‘remixes’ by Arab Strap, Delakota and Mogwai.

SWC posted about the Arab Strap version way back on Christmas Eve, 2013 as an example of a great remix, and he’s spot on. Each of the versions radically rework the song, taking it in very different directions. However, in a nod back to Gainsbourg’s original, each version reintroduces a new, spoken word narrative: Arab Strap recalls ‘The Holiday Girl’; Delakota recounts another tale of abusive, destructive love; Mogwai reads a transcript of US astronaut James Lovell’s alleged sighting of UFOs, set against a musical mash up of the Melody bass and strings with Slint’s Good Morning, Captain.

I’ll be honest, the transcripts are a bit questionable: a ropey Arab Strap version is ubiquitous on t’internet although I’ve tried to correct the mistakes where I can; Delakota’s narrative is a little more straightforward; I gave up on Mogwai completely after a few attempts. Musically, all of the versions are worth your time.

I’m telling you it’s the same girl
She’s always there on holidays when you’re wee
She never grows up and she’s everywhere
She was in the lift in Covent Garden underground last week and she was in Torquay when I was thirteen
She said she was called Tina then and she claims she was from Germany
I watched her from the balcony as she swam in the pool and tanned herself all day
And spying her from hotel windows when she played tennis with her mum and dad
I would try and impress her with my sensitive side by being unusually affectionate to my wee brother When she passed us in the lobby
There was a royal wedding, I dunno which one
But the hotel was having a fancy do, some sort of celebration thing
She sat at the table she usually sat at at dinner just across from ours
It was the first day I’d had a drink in the four of us
A champagne on ice cocktail affair
Later when there was a dance and all the parents were drunk
And her dad tried to make me dance with him in this conga
I wasn’t into it so I went outside and stood on the patio, staring at the night sea trying to look deep
She came out and she stood beside me
Her naked elbow touched mine, she turned round and smiled…but I couldn’t say a thing

The Holiday Girl (Don’t Die Just Yet) (Remix By Arab Strap)

“Hi man, I was just gonna leave a little message to tell you about a story that I just read
It might be of some help to you in your present predicament
I just read about this Australian couple, I don’t know, I think they were newly weds”

Well, I guess they must have been fighting for two or three hours
Before she reached beneath the seat, pulled out the knife and stuck it in his throat
And the car they were driving just came off the road as he was grabbing her
Holding her down and stabbing her back

Out in the middle of nowhere
Slumped in their seats like a couple of stuck pigs
Hand in hand, smoking away their time
As they know they’re dying

And they left the hospital, arm in arm, not long after they came round
And they’re rescued by some trucker guy, who was still shaking by what he found
And the doctor shook his head and turned to the man and said
“Oh, don’t worry son, these two do this all the time”

Hand in hand, we’re together, man
Yeah, hand in hand, we’re together, man
Hand in hand, we’re together, man
Yeah, hand in hand, we’re together, man
And hand in hand, we’re together, man
Yeah, hand in hand, we’re together, man
Ah, hand in hand, we’re together, man
Yeah, hand in hand, we’re together…man

“I believe that’s a real strong love
And if you ask for my advice
If I could find love as strong as that
I think I could be satisfied”

Don’t Die Just Yet (Delakota Mix)

Don’t Die Just Yet (Mogwai Mix)

KHAYEM

 

Police

ALL OUR YESTERDAYS : OUTLANDOS d’AMOUR

Album: Outlandos d’Amour – The Police
Review: Rolling Stone, 14 June 1979
Author: Tom Carson

On the Police’s debut album, Outlandos d’Amour, lead vocalist/bassist Sting sings in a sleight-of-hand variety of styles: there’s a high-pitched quaver reminiscent of Ray Davies on the love songs, some Jamaican patois trotted out for the reggae cuts, a bit of Roger Daltrey’s phlegm-that-swallowed-Kansas howling for a big rabble-rouser like “Born in the 50’s.” Sting sounds like a guy who’s just made sergeant and is looking for a voice to back up his new stripes.

His band, too, offers a little something for everyone. If the flexible, jazz-influenced flourishes of drummer Stewart Copeland, a reggae beat and guitarist Andy Summers’ finely honed attentiveness to nuance lend the Police a stylish art-rock elegance, their music still sounds unpolished and sometimes mean enough to let them pass for part-time members of the New Wave—even though it’s a brand of New Wave sufficiently watered down to allow these guys to become today’s AOR darlings. And yet their hybrid of influences has been fused into a streamlined, scrappy style, held together by the kind of knotty, economical hooks that make a song stick out on the radio. Musically, Outlandos d’Amour has a convincing unity and drive.

It’s on the emotional level that it all seems somewhat hollow. Posing as a punk. Sting, as both singer and songwriter, can’t resist turning everything into an art-rock game. He’s so archly superior to the material that he fails to invest it with much feeling. Deft and rhythmically forceful though they are, the songs work only as posh collections of catchphrases (“Can’t stand losing you” or “Truth hits everybody”) thrown out at random to grab your attention: lyrical hooks to punch up musical hooks, with nothing behind them.

By trying to have it both ways—posturing as cool art-rockers and heavy, meaningful New Wavers at the same time—the Police merely adulterate the meanings of each. Their punk pose is no more than a manipulative come-on. For all its surface threat, there’s no danger in this music, none of the spontaneity or passion that punk (and reggae) demands. Even when Sting says, “There’s a hole in my life,” he can’t convince us it’s keeping him up nights—we know it’s just another conceit. And the larger the implied emotions, the tinnier he makes them sound. A gimmicky anthem manufactured out of whole cloth, “Born in the 50’s” reaches for Who-style generational myth-making (down to its ringing, Pete Townshend-like guitar line), but Sting can’t make us see that there’s anything special about this generation, because he knows there really isn’t.

The lack of emotional commitment becomes truly offensive in the minstrel-show Natty Dread accent that Sting puts on for the reggae numbers. The Clash’s great “(White Man) in Hammersmith Palais” works as white reggae because it’s all about Joe Strummer’s painful awareness that he can never claim this music as his own. Sting simply co-opts the style without acknowledging that such questions exist. The Police’s reggae is an infuriating and condescending parlor trick—a kind of slumming that isn’t even heartfelt.

As entertainment, Outlandos d’Amour isn’t monotonous—it’s far too jumpy and brittle for that—but its mechanically minded emptiness masquerading as feeling makes you feel cheated, and more than a little empty yourself. You’re worn out by all the supercilious, calculated pretense. The Police leave your nervous system all hyped up with no place to go.

JC adds…….

This was actually drafted for inclusion over the Festive period but having miscalculated how many I actually needed, I put it to one side, initially for a rainy day and then chose to have it come back as the first of what will be an occasional series given the positive fedback for this sort of thing.

It is fair to say that most of the 1979 reviews were far from favourable to The Police but Rolling Stone was a bit more vitriolic than most, with it damning with faint praise (and as it is an American review I’ve posted, I’ve chosen the more common album cover to be found over there rather than the one UK folk will be more familiar with.)

As time has gone by, there has been something of a rethink about Outlandos d’Amour, with many more than happy to talk up the strengths of the hit singles, albeit the way Sting has gone about his solo career and the high-profile rock star lifestyle he’s pursued has meant he’s remained fair game for many.

Even Rolling Stone has changed its tune. This is from December 2010 when it placed it at #434 in the greatest albums of all time:-

They would get bigger, but they never sounded fresher. The Police were punks who could play their instruments, absorbing reggae into the spare, bouncy sound of their debut album. “Roxanne,” “Next to You” and “So Lonely” proved that Sting was already a top-notch pop songwriter.

Almost the exact same was said in March 2013 during a feature on Best Debut Albums of All Time:-

They would get bigger, but they never sounded fresher. From Sting’s smoothly syncopated bass to Andy Summer’s prog-rock guitar and Stewart Copeland’s precision drumming, the Police were post-punks who could play their instruments, absorbing reggae and jazz into the spare, bouncy sound of their debut album, a record that didn’t sound quite like anything before it. The risque “Roxanne,” ”Next to You” and “So Lonely” proved that Sting was already a top-notch pop songwriter and these songs are in the DNA of everyone from No Doubt to U2.

Outlandos d’Amour came in at #38 in that particular rundown…..which, even for a fan like myself, seems embarrassingly high.

mp3: The Police – Roxanne
mp3: The Police – Next To You
mp3: The Police – So Lonely
mp3: The Police – Born In The 50s

 

R.E.M.

THE SINGULAR ADVENTURES OF R.E.M. (Part 29)

If any album in modern history has been let down by the choice of singles released from it, it is ‘New Adventures In Hi-Fi’. Here’s a record which, in hindsight, has become something of a cult favourite. Michael Stipe says it’s his favourite of all R.E.M. albums, Mike Mills includes it in his top 3. Retrospective reviewers of it regularly speak of it extremely favourably, even more so than those at the time of release did, and even then it received more than its fair share of praise. It’s right up there on my personal list of faves too. Over the intervening 25 years, I’ve become even more fond of it. (JC adds……I’ve long-named it as my favourite of all the R.E.M. albums)

And yet, to many, it’s a forgotten album. Well, forgotten to those who knew about it at the time, anyway. Why? Well, in my view, it was chronically undersold. OK, it’s a tad long, but that aside, it has some of the band’s finest songs of their Warner Bros. period. Yet when it came to promotion, it was left floundering. There was never going to be a tour – the Monster tour completely drained the band, to the extent that it nearly killed one of its members and the band came very close to breaking up in its aftermath. So it was left to radio play to help sell it. And with so many great songs, that would be a piece of cake right? So what happened?

I should point out, lead single E-Bow The Letter is a fabulous track, for a number of reasons. Firstly, it doesn’t sound like anything else the band ever made, despite sounding exactly how an R.E.M. song should sound. Secondly, it featured long-time friend (and major influence on both Stipe and Buck) Patti Smith on vocals. That latter point is enough in itself to make E-Bow a classic. But can anyone honestly, honestly say that E-Bow The Letter, as brilliant as it is, is really a single? And the lead single from a new album at that? Honestly?

mp3: R.E.M. – E-Bow The Letter

Lyrically, the song is about what Stipe describes as a “letter never sent” to his recently deceased friend River Phoenix. It’s full of dark imagery and tension; yearning and regret. There are references to fame, drugs, alcohol, fear. On the surface, it sounds like stream-of-consciousness, but study those words and you can tell they are very carefully constructed. It‘s beautiful, but heavily doused in horror and sorrow.

But it’s the backing track that really makes E-Bow so special. There’s a lot of praise for Mike Mills’ bassline with many citing it as one of his very best. Buck’s use of the e-bow to create the ominous drone that drives the song is the big selling point here. It’s one of his most unique contributions, setting the mood for the song and allowing the emotion of Stipe’s vocal to become highlighted when set against it. To me, this song sounds a bit like a cross between two of Out Of Time’s best songs – Belong and Country Feedback. It actually sounds like neither, yet you can’t deny the similarities. But, sadly, New Adventures would never receive the commercial acclaim of that earlier record.

Perhaps rather incongruously, E-Bow The Letter became the band’s highest-charting single at the time, entering the UK charts at #4 in its first week (it also made top 10 in Ireland, Iceland, Canada, Norway and Poland). A feat perhaps, but by week two it plummeted out of the top 20 altogether, proof if any were needed that the fans were buying it in droves, but few others were interested.

In the UK, vinyl was practically dead by this time, so no 7” or 12” formats were commercially issued here (though I do have a 7” produced for jukeboxes). Instead there was a two-track cassette featuring this instrumental recorded, like many of NAIHF’s tracks, live during a soundcheck whilst on the Monster tour:

mp3: R.E.M. – Tricycle

It’s a surfy guitar-led track in the vein of Rotary 10 and Rotary 11, and in total contrast to the a-side is upbeat. Certainly not the worst instrumental b-side of the band’s career, but nothing to write home about either.

There were also two CD singles issued, one of which was labelled as a “collector’s edition”. Bizarrely, both had identical content, the differences purely being the packaging (the collector’s edition was housed in a jewel case with a four-page insert as opposed to the standard slim case and j-card insert). As well as E-Bow and Tricycle, two additional tracks were included. Departure was to appear on the then-forthcoming album, but the single included a rollicking live version which I really like.

mp3: R.E.M. – Departure (Rome Soundcheck)

A cover of Richard & Linda Thompson’s Wall Of Death rounded things off. Originally released on the Richard Thompson tribute album Beat The Retreat in 1994, it kind of languished unnoticed by most until this single. I really do like the original, but (and I know I’m risking a thumping from the folkie purists here) I actually prefer R.E.M.’s countrified version here. One of their better covers I reckon.

mp3: R.E.M. – Wall of Death

The release of ‘New Adventures In Hi-Fi’ revealed R.E.M. had probably made one of their very best albums, bursting at the seams with good songs. Obviously, they were saving its best track for the next single, right?

The Robster

Phantom Band

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #244: THE PHANTOM BAND

Edited from wiki:-

“The Phantom Band are a Scottish indie rock band based in Glasgow, consisting of Duncan Marquiss (guitar), Gerry Hart (bass), Andy Wake (keyboards), Rick Anthony (vocals and guitar), Iain Stewart (drums) and Greg Sinclair (guitars). They are often generally described as indie rock but are known to utilize a variety of genres and styles. The band’s debut album Checkmate Savage was released in January 2009 (re-released on vinyl in January 2019) and the follow up The Wants in October 2010. In June 2014, the band released their third record, Strange Friend, followed by Fears Trending in January 2015.

The band initially performed and released material under various names, never sticking with the same band-name for long. In 2005, using the adopted name Robert Redford, the band released a one-off CDR titled The Mummy and Daddy Dance on their own temporary label Extreme Nudity, self-distributed to independent record outlets in the UK, before removing all reference to it from their online presence and reforming under a new name, Robert Louis Stevenson. The sought-after release now only changes hands on online auction sites, and the only element traceable from the band’s current incarnation is the presence of the track “Crocodile” (formerly “Crocodile Dundee”) on their 2009 album Checkmate Savage.

In 2006, the band began using The Phantom Band as their name (apparently in reference to their elusive activities up to that point) and, in 2007, released a 7″ single, “Throwing Bones”, on the London-based Trial & Error Recordings. The critical acclaim of this single, their first fully distributed release, was the impetus for their signing to Chemikal Underground.

The band began recording their debut album early in 2008. Despite planning on recording it in a few weeks in the labels Chem19 studios in Blantyre, the whole session ended up spanning many months and was mixed at Franz Ferdinand’s studios in Govan. Checkmate Savage was eventually released in January 2009 and it peaked on the UK Albums Chart at number 181 in February of that year. Early in 2010, the band once again returned to Chem19 to begin work on their second album.

The recording sessions for the band’s second album were quite difficult – even more so than the first record. Much of the music was written in the studio and under quite tight time constraints and this seems to have led to some difficulties within the band. Sometime in the summer of 2010, between the records completion and its release, the band parted ways with original drummer Damien Tonner.

The Wants was released in October 2010. On the day of its release the band travelled to the United States of America to appear at the CMJ festival in New York. Directly after this, the band supported Frightened Rabbit on a string of dates during their headline tour including shows in Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, New York and Chicago. On returning to the United Kingdom the band embarked on a small tour of their own culminating in a sold-out show at Oran Mor in Glasgow.

In March 2011, they completed a two-month tour of Europe. Beginning in Ireland at the end of January the group then travelled through France, Switzerland, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands and Great Britain.

Throughout the summer of 2011 the band appeared on the stages of many UK and European festivals including: Latitude (Suffolk), The Great Escape Festival (Brighton), Friends of Mine (Manchester), Walk the Line (Den Haag), A.F.F. (Genk), Tramlines (Sheffield), Camden Crawl (London), Summer Sundae (Leicester), Belladrum (Inverness-shire) and T in the Park (Kinross-shire).

The band returned to the studio in 2013 to record the follow up to The Wants. Largely self-produced, their third record Strange Friend was released on 2 June 2014 followed by a short tour of the United Kingdom and several summer festival dates. Later in 2014 the band announced the release of their fourth studio album, Fears Trending. The album came out on 26 January 2015. It was recorded during the same sessions as the band’s previous album.

In October 2015 the band embarked on a European tour. They played in Berlin, Munich, Vienna, Hamburg, Cologne, Luxembourg, Zurich, Paris and Lille. After the gig in Lille on 20 October 2015 all of the band’s equipment, worth over £13,000, was stolen from their tour van. The remaining dates of the tour in Brighton and Liverpool were cancelled and, despite strong support, the band have not played live since.”

JC adds……

I’m really not sure if The Phantom Band are still an entity, but I don’t think there’s ever been any formal announcement of a break-up.  But having said that, the official website is no longer active and, here’s a few words lifted from a newspaper interview given by Gerry Hart and Rick Anthony around the time that Checkmate Savage was given the vinyl re-release:-

Q: Is there any likelihood of the band adding to their four albums?

“Some people are keener than others,” says Hart, “but who’s keener depends what day of the week it is.”

“At that point in Lille we were thinking it would be good to have a break anyway,” says Anthony, who has released two solo albums under the alias of Rick Redbeard. “It was kind of cosmic. It was hard practising a couple of times a week and we were all working too.”

“When the band started it seemed to propel itself through whatever momentum was created by everyone getting together,” adds Marquiss, who also performs solo under his own name. “I think it’s good to allow it to tail off. The other challenge is it’s increasingly difficult to be able to afford to do it.”

“It would take a lot of energy to build it back up again,” concludes Anthony. “It’s nice to imagine we might release something ourselves but I don’t know if that’s likely.”

“That’s never going to happen,” Hart retorts quickly, smiling.

As such, the legacy is the four excellent albums alongside a couple of 7″ singles, all of which I reckon I’ll condense someday into an ICA.  In the meantime, here’s the single that was released on Trial and Error back in 2007:-

mp3: The Phantom Band – Throwing Bones

JC

New Order

40 YEARS AGO TODAY: FAC 33

It’s not 40 years since New Order‘s debut single was released, but it is 40 years to the day since it was recorded.

It’s times like this that I wish I had kept a diary with a log of all my purchases of singles and albums, as well as the gigs I went to.  I can’t recall when I bought my copy of Ceremony on 7″ vinyl, but I do know it was in the local record shop closest to my home in the east end of Glasgow.  I do know for certain that I didn’t get it on the day it was released……..

I was a regular browser in Tom Russell’s Record Shop on Shettleston Road, but I was more in the habit of picking up new singles from the city centre shops, or if it happened to be a 45 in the charts, I was likely to go to the local Woolworth’s as they could be a few pence cheaper in there.  I can’t ever recall seeing Ceremony anywhere until a copy found its way into the bargain bin at Tom Russell’s – even then I almost missed it as the bronze-coloured sleeve, with its difficult to read bronze coloured writing, was such that it didn’t automatically make me want to pick it up for a close glance (in my defence, at 17 years of age, all browsing was done at speed, and it was an era when I took my time over any non-picture sleeves so as to not miss out on something that I’d read about in one of the music papers that were the occasional reading material in the 6th Year common room at school.)

I’m sure it was down to 40 pence, which would have been less than half price.  I took it home with no great expectations. As with the Joy Division singles of previous years, there was only the very basic and minimal details on the sleeve.  The info on the label was, however, interesting, with each of FAC 33A and FAC33B being written by Joy Division which clearly meant Ian Curtis had been involved in some way.  I gave FAC33A a spin……and then another and another and maybe even one more, all the while wondering why the band had gone to the bother of changing its name.  Ceremony was an astonishing and moving piece of music, way better than I could ever have imagined, and it also sounded like a tribute to Ian, which is why my mind reckoned its writing had been attributed to the old band.  It sounded as if it had been written as a belated follow-up to Transmission, but with the tempo slowed down, possibly from Bernard not having the vocal capabilities of his late friend.

Flipping it over (eventually) and finding that In A Lonely Place sounded like a Joy Division out-take was one of those moments that froze me.  Singles, even their b-sides, aren’t supposed to be this morose and funereal, and I was sure on the second or third listen that I could make out Ian Curtis on backing vocals.   It was like a song that felt it should be used in conjunction with a Ouija Board, with the refrain of ‘How I Wish You Were Here With Me Now’  being genuinely terrifying to my teenage mind and imagination. I couldn’t have given an honest answer there and then if I had been asked ‘Do you like it?’

I took it to school the next day and gave it to a close friend whose musical tastes were more or less identical to mine.  He, too, was bemused by the sleeve, but I told him it would all make sense once he played it.  He brought it back the next day and when we spoke about his experience, it was clear his reaction to the A-side had been similar. But when it came to the b-side, he was quick to declare it a classic that wouldn’t have been out of place on Closer, offering the opinion that it was one which had maybe been recorded by the band but left off the final running order.  I think it’s fair to say that his initial view has stood the test of time.

After school, we took a bus into town and to track down another copy, finding success at Listen on Renfield Street, albeit he had to pay full price as this was a shop which had the space and capacity to store singles for extended periods of time long after their initial release.  The ancient bloke behind the counter (who was likely aged about 21) also told us it was out on 12″ vinyl but that the shop was currently out of stock which led to the two of us heading round other record shops, finally coming good at 23rd Precinct on Bath Street, a location that is now home to one of the best beer and spirits shops in all of Scotland.

I’ve still got my copy of that 12″ but the 7″ was lost in the great debacle of 1986 when the midnight flit from the rented accommodation was done in such a hurry/panic that boxes of 7″ singles were stupidly left behind in a cupboard.  I have, however, long since picked up a second-hand copy, from which these two bits of music have recently been ripped at 320kpbs.

mp3: New Order – Ceremony
mp3: New Order – In A Lonely Place

JC

Hardy Boys

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM : #275: THE HARDY BOYS

Scottish Melancholy : The Lives and Times of The Hardy Boys

A guest posting by flimflanfan

(L to R: Ian, John, David, Derek, Kate and Michael)

Isn’t it funny how you can connect with a band but few, if any, or your friends can? You think you’ve found the second coming but all you receive in return from those friends is a collective shrug of the shoulders? That descriptor epitomises my initial relationship with The Hardy Boys. It’s a relationship that has proven considerably stronger than most of those other relationships and one that I am immensely thankful for.

The first time I saw The Hardy Boys live was supporting The Sandkings, at Rico’s, Greenock (1989). I was quite The Sandkings fan; however, my relationship with them was short-lived. The Sandkings, as I recall, were superb (worth the travel and sleeping on a friend’s floor) but The Hardy Boys were a revelation. I won’t do this description justice but … it was like watching The Smiths in a feisty punch-up with The Wedding Present.

The set that night was a thing of beauty – raw, rough, gnarly – but beautiful nonetheless. After the gig ended, I was introduced to the band by my friend who knew them well. I can only imagine how fawning I would have been. Jeez!

To end what was a superb night my friend gave me a copy of the Safe Houses (the previous incarnation of the band) flexi If I Should Die (it remains a firm favourite). I can’t for the life of me recall if I owned Wonderful Lie (Stella 5, 1989) prior to the gig or bought it immediately after – the latter seems more likely.

Wonderful Lie

Copies of the Stella 5 version of Wonderful Lie can reach eye watering prices but I wouldn’t part with mine. It was an e.p. I would constantly play to those I thought may be seduced by its charms and while there could be the odd appreciative nod, I never did get that ‘wow’ response I thought the e.p. deserved.

How Can You?

When the band split (1990) the proposed second single Let the World Smother You (Egg Records*) was shelved and didn’t see the light of day till 2005! However, songs from that single did appear on a cassette compilation of The Hardy Boys songs, Five Years of Boring Pop Songs (Elefant Records, 1992) and subsequently a download only reissue (Talent, 2010) with 4 less songs than the Elefant edition.

Let the World Smother You

The involvement of Elefant brought with it a whole new swathe of indie pop fans; one of whom would actually be asked to sing on what is, for now, the first and final studio l.p.

Fifteen

The collective interest I had wanted for the band in 1989 was, it would seem, a tad delayed but no less enthusiastic; over 20 years later, online indie and indie pop fanzines and forums were abuzz. The release of another compilation cd Songs from the Lenin and McCarthy Song Book (Zzzing Recording Company, 2010) consisted of songs from previous compilations and capitalized on this new found interest. It was a shrewd move by a band who had previously fallen foul to bouts of bad timing.

Wet Wednesday Evening

Although new Hardy Boys music was all but non-existent band members had been consistently pursuing other interests. The band reformed as Flame Up in 1991 splitting up in 1994 after releasing one 7” single, Mr God / Need I Say More (Talent, 1992). In 1995 Flame Up was somewhat resurrected with the release of a cdr entitled Nova Scotia. I can find no reference to this l.p. or another cdr the band refer to as Crank It but Discogs does list Studio Sessions 1991-1997 and Right Nelson Toronty!!! (both from John’s VivaGenius imprint). Michael, now living in Canada, continued his involvement with The Hardy Boys mastering and remastering releases.

John and David were both members of Mouse Eat Mouse – John leaving soon after David joined. They both played in Spy Movie and John went on to play bass with Wake the President.

Harbour Lights

John and I bumped into each other at a Spy Movie gig (13th Note, Glasgow I believe). He had no idea who I was (why would he?). As he uttered his first backing vocal, I knew immediately who he was. I remained mesmerised for the rest of the gig. I wasn’t entirely convinced by Spy Movie but that voice – I’d know it anywhere. I did speak with him re: our previous meeting – all those years ago – and the flame I continued to carry for The Hardy Boys. He was entirely aware of a resurgence in interest in the band and it was clear it was something he wished to explore.

Dear Seamus Heaney

In 2010 The Hardy Boys released their 2nd single (e.p. for the purists) Under the Piccadilly Clock (Bubblegum Records, 2010). I was utterly delighted with this pop tour de force. Yet another stunning piece of pop music and those vocals. Oh, those vocals. I was fortunate enough to hear a demo version (just John and guitar) of Dear Seamus Heaney; the hairs on the back on my neck stood to attention. Just wonderful.

Is It Really Four Years?

To think that British Melancholy is the band’s first and last studio l.p. is remarkable. Like Wonderful Lie before it, I had hoped for so much more for the band.

In 2011 the band played live in Glasgow. The last time I saw them live. While I have seen the band on a number of occasions this particular performance was just mind-blowing. There was what seemed like friction between David and John before the performance (which was later confirmed) and to be able to perform as well as they did – as astoundingly well as they did – in the circumstances speaks to their skill as musicians. Fans like me, those who had travelled from France, Spain and Germany just gushed. Rightly so. I was truly honoured to be in the audience.

Pole Star

A follow-up to British Melancholy was discussed. Sadly, Scottish Melancholy never materialised.

David had slated an l.p release ‘On the Road with the Enemy of God’ (Caroline True Records, 2013) under the moniker The Dark Mile. As far as I’m aware the l.p. was never released.

The Hardy Boys continued to simmer releasing a 12” vinyl copy of Wonderful Lie (Firestation Records, 2015).

Late in 2019 the original drummer, Ian McLachlan, died. Ian played drums with the band for three years between 1988 – 1990. He played on the ‘Wonderful Lie’ e.p., ‘Let the World Smother You’ and the majority of ‘The Hardy Boys Play the Lenin and McCarthy Songbook’. The band arranged a gig in memory for Ian in March 2020. For reasons we are all too familiar with the gig had to be postponed but will hopefully be rescheduled.

My reason for writing this piece about The Hardy Boys was borne from me citing (within this very blog) John White as my second favourite, Scottish, male singer after Billy MacKenzie. A statement I stand by. I have absolutely no understanding as to why a certain singer, songwriter, guitarist etc. can make such a significant, emotional, impact on individuals and I don’t feel I need to understand it. I just need to enjoy what is a highly personalised experience.

What I think is essential to say is that Misters David McArthur and John White are two of the most incredible songwriters that it has been my absolute pleasure to have stumbled upon. Lyrically, musically there’s few that come close.

The band always seemed so cohesive – a gang – a brood of brothers and sisters.

With Derek Mullen (bassist) consistently onboard they really made live performances seem such fun. There was always a sense of camaraderie, and I don’t doubt animosity, but as cliched as it sounds, they were very much a family with all the good and bad that that entails.

If the notion of hearing The Smiths in a feisty punch-up with The Wedding Present sounds intriguing then this is the band for you.

Rest, My Beautiful Muse (live)

Band members:

David McArthur guitars/vocals/bass
John White vocals/guitars
Ian McLachlan drums
Alan Bannister guitar/vocals
Michael Bonini keyboards
Derek Mullen bass
Kate Baker violin
Fiona Knowles cello
Paul McArthur drums/guitars/vocals
Karlyn King vocals

* Interestingly, the man who was behind Egg Records, Jim Kavanagh, was also the man behind the Glasgow based fanzine Simply Thrilled (’86 – ‘89), which was also resurrected as an online fanzine, in 2003, a year after he reprised Egg Records.

An informative interview (Penny Black Music, 2006) with Jim can be found here.

Flimflamfan

JC adds..

The Hardy Boys passed me completely by back in the day.  My first time hearing them would have been at one of the Little League nights that are always so much fun – I wouldn’t have known them while the song was being played (this being the pre-Shazam app era), but John would post his full playlists a few days later.

It was my dear friend Carlo, my sidekick at the Simply Thrilled club nights, who aired Wonderful Lie a few years ago after which I went out and obtained a copy of the Firestation Records reissue from 2015.  In recent times, I have been gifted copies of the releases on Bubbblegum Pop to my great delight.  The Hardy Boys were on the radar for an extensive posting during 2021, but given flimflanfan‘s extensive knowledge, it made sense to ask him to do the honours.  I really hope that, for those of you who are unfamiliar, The Hardy Boys are your ‘new’ favourite band from olden days.

Cud

BURNING BADGERS VINYL (Part 13): CUD

Burning Badgers Vinyl – The Lost EPs #3

Oh No Won’t Do – Cud (1991, A&M Records)

SWC writes……..

“He’s definitely still looking for us” I tell OPG, peeking out from behind the pillar behind the saucepans towards the security guard, who stupidly is looking the other way. If he turns around he will see my head looking at him. He doesn’t and I take cover again.

We are in Woolworths, the much-missed mish-mash of a store that sold everything from brightly coloured screwdrivers to the latest releases by Destinys Child. Woolworths also sold Pick n Mix, a hugely tempting collection of sweets in various flavours and wrappers. Woolworths in their wisdom stuck the Pick N Mix right at the front of their store. Meaning its perfectly possible to grab a handful of sweets on the way out of the store and leg it around the corner with your stolen booty.

OPG is not so subtle though. There is a reason for this. Neil. This is all his bloody fault.

Neil works in Woolworths. He and OPG have history. Sort of. In 1990 She got drunk on cheap cider at a Rotary club disco and snogged Neil outside the Salvation Army café in the High Street, before vomiting on his shoes. Neil apparently didn’t mind this though – OPG was his first love from the moment her cider stained lips touched his.

Neil has since asked OPG out some seven times and been rejected by OPG some seven times. This hasn’t stopped her using Neil’s vulnerable side to her advantage. Especially where the pick and mix are concerned. OPG simply wanders up to them and starts eating them right in front of Neil knowing full well that he won’t do anything about it. She does it every time. Only this time Neil wasn’t working, off sick with a cold apparently and as we stood there casually unwrapping our second or third green triangle and flicking through the music sections bargain bucket. I am just about to grab a 7 inch by The Candyskins when OPG whispers in my ear, “We need to move, now”.

The reason is that the security guard has been talking to one of the women who work in the store who has spied us gobbling down stolen bonbons, jelly snakes and the occasional fancy chocolate and is now on his way over to the music section. The obvious way out is blocked. Luckily for us, the Woolworths in Chatham High Street has an upstairs, housing a café and some toilets, so our plan is to hide in the toilets for ten minutes and then make a break for it. Which is what we do.

By the way, this is the second time (and last time) I’ve ever been inside a ladies toilet, with a young lady, the first being about a year earlier at a hotel in Rochester, at a birthday party, my girlfriend at the time, Claire, dumped me and ran into the ladies toilets crying. Then a lad called Danny (the same one who interrupted my first kiss) pushed me into the toilet so I could sort it all out. An act which did save that relationship for about a week. Both toilets were an odd shade of pink.

Anyway, I digress, there we sat, literally no one came in. Ten minutes past and we decide to make a break for it. The new plan was to get to the big pillar and starburst (if that’s possible in a group of two) out of there and meet up by the cinema in fifteen minutes. OPG went first, cleverly she spied an old lady coming out of the lift and ran over to it and leapt inside. The doors closed and she was gone. Now I was on my own, my hands were sweating, I felt like a criminal on the run.

Which I suppose I was.

I hold my breath and literally creep towards the stairs, an unsuspecting old couple provide me with a nice bit of cover before I dart behind the stationary shelving. There I pause, briefly noting the price of a New Kids on the Block pencil case, in case my sister wants one for Christmas (£3.99) before I walk out into the open. There is about 50 feet or so between me and freedom, I can smell it, although I reckon that the smell might be the KFC three doors up. There is a guard is to my right so I stay as far left as I can (good advice, in general, that) and edge closer and closer. I am twenty feet away when the guard looks up and shouts “STOP”.

Then the unbelievable happens.

A kid about five foot away, drops about a kilo of Pick n Mix and turns and absolutely legs it towards the exit, crashing through a display of plasticine related goods as he does. The guard looks at me, shouts “Next Time!” and legs it after the kid. I nonchalantly look around as if to see who the guard was speaking at and stroll out of the doors a free man and into the arms of the waiting OPG at the cinema.

All of which Bonnie and Clyde related shenanigans bring us to the third EP in the series of Lost EPs that I have found in Badger Big Box of Records. It is ‘Oh No Won’t Do’ EP the (I think) debut major label EP by everyone’s (well, nearly) favourite quirky indie band, Cud.

I’ve said before about how OPG loved Cud and in the late eighties and the very early nineties Cud were something like the best-kept secret in indie-pop. In the early 90s Cud, sort of emerged from the cupboard and were on the cusp. The band were somehow teetering on the edge of stardom. They went from making stupid (yet brilliant) indie-pop songs about ‘Prawns in Whitby to full-on pop classics like ‘Robinson Crusoe’.

Their fanbase had suddenly grown legs and the Top 40 was beckoning them like a Black Friday Mega Offer. The band signed to a major label (A&M) with one intention. Megastardom.

‘Oh No Won’t Do’ was supposed to set the groundworks for the band’s attempt at megastardom. It got radio play, it was released in a limited box set (more of that later) and a tour was launched to support its release.

But, this is Cud, and it didn’t happen. The EP stalled at around Number 50 and no amount of sales gimmicks and radio play was going to push it any higher.

Now back to that limited-edition box set. OPG owned the boxset I remember her playing it in her bedroom one night before we went to a party. The boxset looks massively different to miserable looking 7” than was inside Badgers Box. The limited-edition box set came in a little cardboard box. Inside the box was the 7”, a set of Cud postage stamps and a ‘Map of the World According to Cud’.

I sort of miss the nonsense you used to get with records. They were all blatant attempts by the record companies to sell you records. The cynical part of me used to think that if a record needed to add a map of the world to it to make people buy it then it probably wasn’t worth buying but some of them were fun.

I remember another Cud record (‘Through the Roof’ perhaps?) that came with one of those dangling mobile things that babies have above their cots. I used to own a Pulp CD that came with a free sewing pattern and the quickly forgotten Kent band, Airhead, used to produce a comic with every 12” they released. I’m not sure records come with all that sort of stuff anymore, which seems a shame.

Here are the four tracks from the ‘Oh No Won’t Do’ EP.

mp3: Oh No Won’t Do
mp3: Ariel
mp3: Profession
mp3: The Price of Love

SWC