Super Furry Animals

45 45s @ 45 : SWC STYLE (Part 18)

A GUEST SERIES


28. Slow Life – Super Furry Animals (2004, Placid Casual Records)

Released as a Free Download EP in April 2004 (Did not chart)

For such a small place, the Devon market town of Bovey Tracey holds a great deal of history. Firstly it is half named after the chap who is linked to the murder of Thomas Beckett. Secondly, it is where Cromwell ransacked a few armies and stole quite a lot of horses and changed British society for ever. It is also the gateway to the Moor, Dartmoor that is, the only place in Britain where you can genuinely get all four seasons in one day, whatever time of the year you go there.

But, all that is knocked into a cocked hat because when history is evaluated and assessed Bovey Tracey will only ever be remembered for one thing.

Badger falling off a bar stool in the Cromwell Arms, after a goat bit him on the arm.

The goat bit him on the arm because Badger had refused to allow the goat to have a bit of his prawn and lettuce sandwich.

The thing was the goat was a more of a regular in the Cromwell that Badger was. The goat belonged to a chap who I only know as ‘Puffin’, I have no idea why they call him Puffin. The goat would pop in after a hard day’s erm, goating, in the town, he would then be presented with a bowl full of Guinness and a packet of steak flavoured crisps. Puffin would follow him in and the two would sit (or stand, in, the goats case), have their drinks, chat to their mates, have a game of darts and then leave around dinner time.

Badger was in there having some late tea with Mrs Badger, when the goat was denied his pre-dinner snack. The goat having finished his crisps decided that the prawn sandwich looked rather tasty. According to Mrs Badger, it ambled over to Tim, nudged him a bit and tried to nibble the end of the sandwich. Tim fearing for his tea lifted the plate above his head with his left arm, and tried to shoo the goat away with his right arm. This annoyed the goat, who promptly bit him on the shooing arm.

This caused him to drop the plate and allowed the goat to nimbly take the lettuce out of the sandwich are return to his place by the fire. Badger declined the offer of a fresh sandwich but did take up the local doctor’s advice of having a free dose of tetanus. Puffin apologised to Badger for the bite, and told him that the goat only did it because the barman poured him Beamish instead of Guinness and Beamish apparently made the goat ‘rowdy’.

Bringing this back to the reason why I am here. A few years ago, as some of you will remember, a blog I wrote ran down a list of 200 songs that according to Badger and I were the ‘Greatest Songs in the World’ – we called that list rather arrogantly The WYCRA 200. That list was largely conceived (if that’s the right word) in the Cromwell Arms. Additionally, the follow up blog to WYCRA, The Sound of Being Ok had its inaugural blog summit, in the same place and in Badger’s coat pocket that lunchtime was a copy of ‘Phantom Power’ which contains of course ‘Slow Life’

I found the original list for the WYCRA 200, a few weeks back and on reviewing that list, I found it was staggering how much of that list I would change if I ever did that list again (and I won’t be). I mean this would be in the Top 50 for a start

So Few Words – Archive (1996, London Records, Unknown Chart Position)

It didn’t even make the Top 200 at all last time around.

In fact quite a lot of the entire list would have moved around considerably. That, I guess is joy and frustration of music. I think that most of the bands would have been the same, but the songs would I think be different and in a different order, if that makes sense.

For instance – on that list somewhere (its number isn’t really important) was ‘Ice Hockey Hair’ by Super Furry Animals. A track which I still love for lots of reasons but if I were to redo that list Ice Hockey Hair would be booted out for ‘Slow Life’.

Ice Hockey Hair (1998, Creation Records, Number 12)

SWC

 

 

Memphis

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #205 : MEMPHIS

I can do no better than offer a repeat post from February 2014:-

James Kirk wrote the finest single ever recorded by Orange Juice. In fact, as regular readers will know, it is my strongly-held view that Felicity is the finest single ever recorded by any Scottish band or singer.

In 1985, James Kirk rather surprisingly came out of his self-imposed retirement and, adopting the name Memphis, wrote and recorded what rather sadly turned out to be a one-off 45 for the Swamplands label that was being run by Alan Horne (ex Postcard).

mp3 : Memphis – You Supply The Roses
mp3 : Memphis – Apres Ski

Here’s the instrumental version of the a-side that was made available on the 12″ release.  It was sent to me back in 2014 by Hugh, a then regular reader from France, and it was in response to my general plea for a digital copy as I only had the 7″ version in the collection.

mp3 : Memphis – I’ll Supply The Wine

Cheers.

JC

Various

THE END OF AN ERA?? WELL, IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN!

This one is a tad self-indulgent.

I graduated from university on Friday 5 July 1985.   I started work on Monday 8 July 1985 – it was a time in history when, without the help of the old-school tie, it was difficult to land a job that was compatible with your degree and so when I was asked, following what I recall being my fourth job interview, to join a local council in Edinburgh at the earliest opportunity, any plans for a few weeks of down time were put to the side.  It’s a decision I’ve never regretted.

Today, Friday 27 March 2020, I will enjoy my last day of paid employment, after my application for early retirement through voluntary redundancy was accepted.

It’s been an incredibly strange and frustrating end to my career as I’ve mostly been working from home these past two weeks, taking part in regular conference calls with my fellow managers, doing our best to keep things ticking over and trying to keep staff morale as high as is possible in such challenging and uncertain times.

From a selfish point of view, the planned night out has, of course, been cancelled but I’ve undertaken to go back in for one last time when this all eventually calms down and to do my very best to have a leaving do that will be legendary.

I have no intention to work for a living in the future, and the plan, eventually,  is to devote as much time as possible to travel, music, Raith Rovers and golf. Oh, and I have good intentions about trying to pass my driving test!

EXCEPT………..in such challenging times everyone had to be less selfish and so I’ve offered to stay on, free of charge on a voluntary basis, to continue to help and support my colleagues as we implement business contingency plans, including, eventually, preparing for how best to get going when there is some sort of return to normality.

I did think about changing the intended piece of music that has long been scheduled for today, but will stick with the latest one-hour mix tape, with most of the song titles having some sort of link to the past 35 years.  The opener is one that myself and Jacques once danced to at the Xmas Party that we organised jointly on behalf of our colleagues – the one piece of music we decided should clear the floor for a couple of minutes.

I’m happy to say that I have had many more good than bad days during my career and have made a number of lifelong friends along the way.  I’ve been lucky that way.

mp3 : Various – The End of an Era

Tracklist

Pixies – Debaser
The Wedding Present – What Did Your Last Servant Die Of?
The Rakes – Work Work Work (Pub Club Sleep)
The Clash – Career Opportunities
Idlewild – You Held The World In Your Arms
Fun Boy Three – It Ain’t What You Do
R.E.M. – Finest Worksong
Buzzcocks – Everybody’s Happy Nowadays
The Jam – Just Who Is The 5 O’Clock Hero?
Le Tigre – Deceptacon
Magazine – Model Worker
Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci – Patio Song
Electronic – Getting Away With It
The Fall – Fantastic Life
International Teachers of Pop – The Age of The Train
Stereolab – Ping Pong
Lloyd Cole – Don’t Look Back (original mix)
Otoboke Beaver – 6 Days Working Week Is a Pain
PJ Harvey – Big Exit (edit)
Young Marble Giants – Final Day

A new life beckons.  Eventually.

JC

Breeders

45 45s @ 45 : SWC STYLE (Part 17)

A GUEST SERIES


29 : Cannonball – The Breeders (1993 4AD Records)

Released as a single in August 1993 (Reached Number 40)

Another record I can’t play on guitar and for the second post in a row I get to say that something rocks like a bastard, which is exactly what ‘Cannonball’ does. It is also bloody brilliant, but I’m kind of figuring that you all know that by now. You mustn’t whatever you do confuse this track with the David Gray track which has the same name. They are very different. Gray’s ‘Cannonball’ doesn’t rock like a bastard, it more sways like an abandoned windbreak at a lonely Welsh beach. It’s shit as well.

In my second year as a student I was asked by the Students Union to be a judge at a ‘Battle of the Bands’ kind of contest (I suppose that my editing of the music pages gave me some form of experience). Something which I reluctantly agreed to do. I mean, secretly I was honoured and amazed that they even asked, but I nonchalantly said that I would check my schedule and get back to them. Which I did twenty minutes later, saying yes.

The event itself was pretty awful. There were ten or so entrants, mostly pub rocking student bands who could neither play, sing nor write their own material. I’ll bypass most of them if you don’t mind, but I will touch briefly on ‘Anita’. Anita was a dance student, who played an acoustic guitar, well, she knew two chords, and thought she could sing. Worse than that she thought she could sing Joni Mitchell songs. She couldn’t. She was embarrassing the entire human race by just being there. The fact that she lived next door to the future Mrs SWC, was something I ignored when I was asked to comment on her performance by the compare (a fat oaf who genuinely changed his middle name to ‘Disco’ when standing for the Entertainments Chair Position). I told her that she should stick to dancing. She didn’t speak to me or Mrs SWC again from that afternoon.

Anyway, the two best student bands around were (and I’ve changed their names because one of them got signed and did quite well) my mates band ‘Tea Towel’ – who didn’t get signed – and ‘Knobheads’, who did. I think you can work out which band I thought I was better. Knobheads sounded like Pearl Jam and in comparison Tea Towel sounded like Radiohead. I couldn’t understand the appeal of Knobheads, also they all had the looks of models, and were way more talented than I would ever be, but you know, Pearl Jam.

The problem was that Knobheads were playing their own material and Tea Towel were not, they were doing cover versions of songs like ’Breakfast at Tiffanys’ which didn’t help them. Still, apart from that they were better musicians, had a better singer and had bought me at least two bottles of Becks that day.

Anyway, it came to the final, a shoot off between these two bands. They had thirty minutes to wow the audience and the judges. I mean I’d already nailed my colours to the mast by telling Knobheads that I would ‘actually rather read The Sun on a bus to Woking’ than listen to them again. I mean, it’s hardly Simon Cowell is it?

Anyway Tea Towel come on and do very well, they ended with a new song, a cover of this as it happens,

Grassman – Dodgy

But without the gospel choir. A song which itself very nearly made this list. It was remarkable, but not remarkable enough.

Knobheads strode out full of confidence, wearing shades, and looking it has to be said, like an actual band. They were a five piece, only one of whom was actually a student, something, I tried in vain to point ou.  They had a singer, a lead guitarist, a rhythm guitarist, a bassist and a drummer. They played twenty five minutes of their Pearl Jam inspired angst rock and I tried to not yawn too obviously. Then they said for the last song they were going to end with a cover. Which is when they blew the roof off the place.

The singer grabbed another guitar and the rhythm swapped his guitar for a Gibson Flying V, and they launched into a full on enslaught of ‘Cannonball’ and I have to say it sounded bloody amazing. Three lead guitars, a crashing bass, stage divers, and trashed speaker at the end. If they did that all the time instead of having seven songs that sound exactly like ‘Even Flow’, then I might have upgraded The Sun to the Guardian.

It was, and believe me, if you knew the back story about me and that band (another time), you would understand how much it pains me to even type it, the best thing I’d seen live for some time. The bastards.

The B Side of ‘Cannonball’ contains an Aerosmith cover version – an ode to Chris Hoy, so I’m told.

Lord of the Thighs

SWC

 

 

McCarricks

AS MENTIONED YESTERDAY

The McCarricks are the husband and wife duo of Martin McCarrick on cello and Kimberlee McCarrick on violin. They have collaborated and performed with many well-known musicians including Kristin Hersh, Sinéad O’Connor, Gary Numan, Marianne Faithfull and Patti Smith.  Their own performances are usually in front of silent films produced specially for their performances.

It was back in 2007 that I saw them play live, possibly in the company of Mike from Manic Pop Thrills and possibly as support to Kristin Hersh. The music in the live setting was mesmorising and engrossing and led to my purchase, before leaving the venue, of a mini-album on CD, which turned out to be not quite so mesmorising and engrossing once I got home. But it did have a fabulous cover on it:-

mp3 : The McCarricks – Your Ghost

Here’s the original

mp3 : Kristin Hersh (feat Michael Stipe) – Your Ghost

JC

JiH

35 YEARS TOO LATE

Scotland is not a large country by any stretch of the imagination. As such, it should always be relatively easy for music fans (or indeed fans of any cultural activity) to keep tabs on what is happening outside of their own local community.

The release of the Big Gold Dreams boxset has highlighted just how much I managed to miss out on over the decades, even the periods when I was paying particular attention. It is only now that I have learned of the brief existence of an 80s band from Dundee:-

JiH revolved around the voice, attitude and style of Grant McNally, who was part of the same Dundee society frequented by mercurial Billy MacKenzie. Indeed, various live incarnations of JiH featured Billy’s brother Jimmy MacKenzie on bass. This debut single was a string-laden slice of epic 1980s pop produced by Dave Ball of Soft Cell, and which showed off McNally’s own vocal ambitions in impressive fashion. An album, The Shadow to Fall, followed, as well as two singles. The last of these, Take Me to the Girl, was a cover of an Associates song produced by MacKenzie, who also provided backing vocals. McNally continued to perform for a time as Jesus in Heavens, but sadly died in September 2018.

A band championed by Billy MacKenzie, based in a city just 70 miles to the north-east of Glasgow and I knew nothing……I am hanging my head in shame. My only defence is that they emerged just as I had left Glasgow to live and work in Edinburgh, and while I kept an eye on much that was happening in the capital, it was with less enthusiasm than before and indeed music would become, temporarily, less important to me for a while.

All of the JiH output came via the singer’s own label, Breadth of Vision Records (no other band would ever release anything on the label):-

1985 : Big Blue Ocean (7” and 12” single)
1986 : This Gift (12” single)
1986 : The Shadow to Fall (LP)
1988 : Take Me To The Girl (12” single)

The album had nine tracks, three of which (including the first two singles) were produced by Dave Ball, with the remaining tracks seeing Grant McNally at the helm. There is a very serious mistake in the text on the reverse of the sleeve in that the production credits are all wrong, leading at least one contemporary review to accuse Dave Ball of falling asleep on the job when in fact it was his songs that had found most favour!

Looking back, there was a decent degree of support and positive media locally for JiH but not a huge amount beyond its boundaries, which is perhaps the main reason it all passed me by. I’ve managed to find a few things to share with you today:-

mp3 : JiH – Big Blue Ocean
Mp3 : JiH – This Gift
Mp3 : JiH – Shadow to Fall
Mp3 : JiH – Take Me To The Girl

Listening now, I’ve a feeling I would have really appreciated them far more back in the day on account of the music now sounding a bit of its time from the production dating somewhat. I do, however, enjoy the fact that there is use made of strings, which came courtesy of violinist Virginia Hewes, the then wife of Dave Ball and cellist, Martin McCarrick, who had previously worked with Marc Almond.

Tune in tomorrow for some more songs featuring Mr McCarrick……………………….

JC

Woody Guthrie covers

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM : #245 : WOODY GUTHRIE REVISITATIONS

Woodie Guthrie Revisitations: A Semi-Synthetic ICA

Your “So Michigan Calls THIS Spring?” Correspondent
The Hybrid Soc Prof

I considered a long, rambling account of
• my frustrations around hearing great Billy Bragg singles in the 80s but not being able to find his LPs,
• seeing the Beatnigs/Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy when Camper van Beethoven had to cancel a show for which I had tickets,
• the connection between Bragg and the Disposable Heroes initiated at the celebration of the 80th anniversary of Woody Guthrie’s birth – realized in a performance of “Vigilante Man,”
• the way that performance led Nora Guthrie to open up Woody’s archives to Bragg as a means to set to music songs Woody had only written lyrics for,
• Bragg’s invitation to Wilco (and Natalie Merchant) to join the project, and
• the eventual generation of what is now the three CD/album set, Mermaid Avenue.

This was going to be followed by a look at the more recent New Multitudes double album by Will Johnson, Jim James, Jay Farrar and Anders Parker (set in motion and organized by Farrar) where I would
• look askance at Farrar’s claims that he was contacted by Bragg before Wilco while claiming to be uncomfortable with the idea of a collaboration,
• call bullshit on his assertion that he never listed to the Mermaid Avenue albums – or, at least, that he didn’t listen to them to keep form being influenced, and
• acknowledge that, despite all this, I like New Multitudes a little better than Mermaid Avenue.

All that would have taken too long, classic Hybrid Soc Prof tl;dr…

There have been two other recordings of songs from Guthrie’s archives… one by the folk/jazz artist Jonatha Brook (yes, Jonatha) and another by a Native American “alternative” band, Blackfire. Neither are my cup of tea. By contrast, the New Multitudes and Mermaid Avenue collaborations make me really happy.

As many people – from performers to reviewers to me – have noted, what people who think they know Woody Guthrie songs aren’t always expecting is the sheer amount of love, sex and drugs… it’s almost like people did those things before the 60s (the sociologist writes shaking his head…)!

I tried somewhere between five and nine – depending on how you count such things – different approaches to selecting and ordering songs from these collections and I always ended up losing songs I wasn’t willing to cut. In the end, I opted for alternating selections from each set. It’s imperfect (I left out Natalie Merchant for goodness sake!), but in the end I’m quite happy with it. Enjoy.

1. California Stars (Wilco, Mermaid Avenue, v.1, 1998)
2. Jake Walk Blues (Jay Farrar, vocals, New Multitudes, 2012)
3. Another Man’s Done Gone (Wilco Mermaid Avenue, v.1, 1998)
4. I Was A Goner (Anders Parker, vocals, New Multitudes, 2012)
5. Go Down to the Water (Billy Bragg, Mermaid Avenue: The Complete Sessions/v.3, 2012)
6. Angel’s Blues (Anders Parker, vocals, New Multitudes, 2012)
7. Black and Blowing (Billy Bragg, Mermaid Avenue, v.2, 2000)
8. Fly High (Jim James, vocals, New Multitudes, 2012)
9. Remember the Mountain Bed (Wilco, Mermaid Avenue, v.1, 1998)
10. Chorine, My Sheba Queen (Will Johnson and Jim James, duet, New Multitudes, 2012)

HSP

 

Teenage Fanclub

45 45s @ 45 : SWC STYLE (Part 16)

A GUEST SERIES


30. God Knows It’s True – Teenage Fanclub (1990 Paperhouse Records)

Released as a single in November 1990 (It did not chart)

Another day, another record that I was introduced to by OPG. I was a huge Teenage Fanclub fan, I guess I still am, although I admit, that as part of the same pointless space saving exercise that I referred to in Number 41, I sold three of their albums on vinyl for vast amounts of cash. Apparently original Creation Records vinyl releases are worth money, who knew…? As brilliant as ‘Grand Prix’ is, I wouldn’t pay £54 for a slightly battered vinyl copy (but still in good condition and playable) of it but some fool from Cheltenham did exactly that.

Anyway, ‘God Knows It’s True’ was one of the songs that convinced me that I should pick up a guitar and learn how to play it, rather than actually just pretend I could in front of the mirror and say I could to impressionable young ladies in pubs.

I can’t remember exactly where I was when I first heard it, but I know it was on a tape that OPG did for me, which was called ‘Shoplifters Paradise Vol.2’. It was compiled entirely from songs that she had nicked from the shelves of Our Price and then returned a few weeks later when no one was looking.

Anyway, I found myself an old acoustic guitar and found a bloke who could teach me the basics. My plan was to master the acoustic, upgrade to Fender or something cool, form a band and headline Reading (not Glastonbury) before 1995. Easy.

I walked into my first lesson, guitar slung over my shoulder, charity shop shirt unbuttoned down to the pubis bone, like the troubled troubadour I was, and my teacher, Mr Hawkins, looked at me over his half-moon glasses and sighed, loudly. The first words to me were, “You’re not Jim Bloody Morrison”. His second words to me were “If you tell me you want to learn how to play like Kurt Cobain, you can leave right now. I’ll give you your money back.”

Now. I sort of did want to learn how to play like Kurt Cobain, but I said, “No, not at all. I want to learn how to play like this” and thrust a tape with ‘God Knows It’s True’ at the start of it into his delighted hands. He put it on and sighed loudly again. He went to a cupboard and pulled out a piece of vinyl and put that on. It was “The Whiter Shade of Pale” by Procol Harum.

“It’s fundamentally the same record” he said (it’s not, clearly) “But, we can work with that”.

Six weeks later I’d mastered the basics, well I knew three chords. Eight weeks later I formed my first band.

I’ve realised that the version of ‘God knows Its True’ that I truly love is the Peel Session version because it in the words of Badger “Rocks, like a bastard” so in fact it’s that version I’ve picked. Both the single and the Peel Session are backed with versions of this

So Far Gone

Oh and I still can’t play ‘God Knows It’s True’ on the guitar.

SWC

JC adds

Here’s the studio versions of both songs:-

God Knows It’s True
So Far Gone

 

Meat Whiplash

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #204 : MEAT WHIPLASH

I previously wrote about today’s featured bandback in 2015.  There’s little I can add to what was said before. There’s a lot of name-dropping for such a short piece.

Meat Whiplash from East Kilbride were amongst the first to be signed to Creation Records.

The line-up was Paul McDermott (vocals), Stephen McLean (guitar), Edward Connelly (bass guitar) and Michael Kerr (drums). They took their name from a B-side track by The Fire Engines. They then became The Motorcycle Boy when Alex Taylor (of The Shop Assistants) joined the group in 1987.

Meat Whiplash only ever released one 7″ record. It was in September 1985 with a sleeve featuring actor Robert Vaughan that had been printed up by Bobby Gillespie and hand-folded by their record label’s owner, Alan McGee.

The band were the opening act at North London Polytechnic on 15 March 1985 on the occasion of the infamous “riot gig” by Jesus and Mary Chain.

That one 7″ single was included on CD 86 and here it is along with its b-side. It’s a bit high on the noisy and tuneless scale:-

mp3 : Meat Whiplash – Don’t Slip Up
mp3 : Meat Whiplash – Here It Comes

JC

Inspiral Carpets

SOME SONGS ARE GREAT SHORT STORIES (Chapter 32)

30 years since this was composed and recorded.   It’s a shameful indictment of successive governments, in both London and Edinburgh, that so little has changed across many communities with the result that the issues raised in this pop hymn to isolation, depression and utter misery are just as abundant as they were after a decade of Thatcherism.

Husband don’t know what he’s done
Kids don’t know what’s wrong with Mum
She can’t say, they can’t see
Putting it down to another bad day
Daddy don’t know what he’s done
Kids don’t know what’s wrong with Mum

So this is how it feels to be lonely
This is how it feels to be small
This is how it feels
When your word means nothing at all

There’s a funeral in the town
Some guy from the top estate
Seems they found him under a train
And yet he had it all on a plate

So this is how it feels to be lonely
This is how it feels to be small
This is how it feels
When your word means nothing at all

Husband don’t know what he’s done
Kids don’t know what’s wrong with Mum
She can’t say, they can’t see
Putting it down to another bad day

So this is how it feels to be lonely
This is how it feels to be small
This is how it feels
When your word means nothing at all
So this is how it feels to be lonely
This is how it feels to be small
This is how it feels
When your word means nothing at all

mp3 : Inspiral Carpets – This Is How It Feels

There is also a radio mix of the song, concerning two lines of the second verse.

‘There’s a funeral in the town’ was changed to ‘Black car drives through the town’, while ‘Seems they found him under a train’ is replaced by the less gruecome but arguably more chilling and moving ‘Left a note for a local girl’

mp3 : Inspiral Carpets – This Is How It Feels (radio mix)

And while I’m here…..from the 12″ vinyl sitting in the cupboard:-

mp3 : Inspiral Carpets – This Is How It Feels (extended)

JC

They Might Be Giants

45 45s @ 45 : SWC STYLE (Part 15)

A GUEST SERIES


31. Birdhouse In Your Soul – They Might Be Giants (1989 Elektra Records)

Released as a single in March 1990 (Reached Number 6)

A song that reminds me of being a school and in particular about a girl who I’m going to call Lucy. Lucy was the first girl I ever kissed. A rather fumbled affair which took place on the corner of the road that leads to my dad’s house. About ten people inadvertently witnessing this embarrassment, including a lad who lived three doors down, Paul, who took great pleasure in telling literally everyone in the street what he’d witnessed. I didn’t mind really, my social status climbed about three rungs that week.

Another witness was Danny. He actually managed to break the kiss up (which lasted about ten seconds) by crashing his bike into us and laughing at me. Danny was an arse, and I am confident, that, despite not speaking or seeing him for 29 years, he is still an arse right now. I think he will still have the same high pitched squealing laughter and will probably have the same rubbish haircut and still be wearing chinos that are took small for him. Two years from that kiss, by the way, and it’s not relevant, I’m just sort of proud of this fact, my brother beat the shit of out Danny in a park. I say ‘the shit’ he hit him three times, once, in the stomach, once on the shoulder and third one in the face, before Danny ran off crying for his mother. I forget the reason why, it was probably something to do with football. That or the fact that my brother just didn’t like him.

Anyway, back to Lucy. We got to together on a school trip to a farm, about seven days before that kiss. It was dead romantic, I stood in a barn full of cows and shit whilst Lucy’s best friend, Penny, asked me the question. This was because Lucy had lost her voice. She genuinely had. I hadn’t really ever been out with girls at that stage, I kind of shrugged my shoulders and said “If you like”. For the next few days at school we walked around holding hands, and stuff, quickly shoving them in our pockets when the teachers ambled past.

One evening, the evening before the kiss, we went on our first (and last) date. This was to the Ice Rink, the place where everyone in the Medway towns goes on a date. We had a burger (or a cheese sandwich in my case, as I was proudly pushing my new found status as a vegetarian) and then held hands as we tip toed around the ice rink, trying not to fall over and trying not to embarrass ourselves. We had both ignored the fact that neither of us could ice skate or had any interest in it.

Eventually we gave up and we sat together in the little café on those rubbish plastic chairs that make it sound like you are farting when you wriggle around, we talk about life, parents, school, music, as I nervously pushed the tomato shaped sauce bottle around on the table.

It was then that I realised that Lucy’s favourite band on the planet was Bros. Something which you can’t ignore even when you are 14 and trying to be cool. I mean I don’t think Bros had been in charts for a good six months at this stage. Still she was my girlfriend and I could probably change rubbish tastes. I told her that Bros were shit and that there were a million better things to listen to (even back then I was a wannabe music critic)

When I got home after the date at the ungodly hour of seven pm, I made her a tape, with all my favourite songs on it – I mean that’s what you do when you have a girlfriend – right?

Side One – Track Two – was this song, because at the time it was one of my favourite songs in all the world. The next day I proudly handed the tape to her – which had a crappily drawn heart on it or something and she hugged me. After school I walked her home and the kiss happened.

The next day in the middle of a history lesson about Florence Nightingale, she sat behind and handed me a note. It said “Sorry, but it’s over.”

That is exactly what it said. Still eight days was my new record for how long I’d had a girlfriend for.

Let’s fast forward a bit.

Lucy for her sins, moved away at the end of 1991 (and I barely spoke to her after she dumped me in double history) but she stayed in touch with Penny. One lunchtime, towards the middle of 1992 Penny came up to me in the common room at school and handed me a tape and a little letter. It was from Lucy. I was surprised because I’d literally not given her a single consideration since she left the school.

The mixtape contained some fairly decent indie bands and such like (ok, it had The Mission and the Sisters of Mercy on it, but you know decent enough). The letter said (amongst other things), ‘I never got the chance to say thank you for the mixtape, it changed my taste in music totally. Bros were shit.” And there on Side One – Track Two, was ‘Birdhouse In Your Soul’.

This was also on the cassette, can’t remember exactly where though.

Box Set Go – The High

SWC

 

 

Various

THE BIG HITS…..30 YEARS ON (3)

 

The third month of the new feature. The charts of March 1990 had Beats International at the top for a while, but from the aspect of singles making their entry during the month, one act kind of stands out….and they are actually up first.

Elephant Stone – Stone Roses

Three months after Fool’s Gold had given Stone Roses a first major hit, a re-issued Elephant Stone matched the achievement with a #8 placing on the week of entry, 3 March 1990.  Rather surprisingly, it dropped down two places immediately after, eventually slipping out of the Top 75 altogether after six weeks.

A Lover Spurned – Marc Almond

In at #32 on 3 March and managed to crawl its up three more places the following week. A very rare instance of a Marc Almond-penned single cracking the top end of the charts. This was his 14th such single and only his third to reach the Top 40, with his other hits all being covers.

Love Shack – B52s

A band that had enjoyed minimal success prior to this over the previous 12 years, with just a 1986 re-release of a double-A single consisting of Rock Lobster/ Planet Clare selling in any sort of numbers. Tailor-made for radio with its catchy and shout-along chorus, it was no surprise that after entering the charts on 3 March at #33 it hung around for almost three months, peaking at #2 for three weeks, kept off the top spot initially by Beats International and then by German dance-act Snap, whose song The Power would first enter the charts later in the month and enjoy two weeks at the very top in late March/early April.

Loaded – Primal Scream (single version)

A band that had been regarded as something of a joke throughout the late 80s. This was something completely different. It’s an example of a song that actually didn’t do all that much sales-wise but whose influence would prove to be so much greater. It came in at #47 on 3 March and just over a month later it reached its peak of #16. It was out of the charts by the time the summer arrived, but it proved to be a massive hit in the clubs all year long, setting the tone for the huge sales of the album Screamadelica when it hit the shops some seven months later.

De-Luxe – Lush (from the Mad Love EP)

I didn’t think I was going to be able to salvage any new entries from the chaert of 10 March until my eyes got all the way down to #55. The debut EP disappeared as quickly as it had come in as would be the case throughout Lush’s career. Eight times they made the Top 75, not once did any of the singles stay longer than three weeks – even the big hits from the mid-90s which developed the habit of coming in high on the week of release (Single Girl : #21, Ladykillers : #22, 500 (Shake Baby Shake): #21) before crashing and burning.

Strawberry Fields Forever – Candy Flip

One–hit wonders with this debut effort, with the follow-up stalling at #60 and two further efforts not cracking the Top 75. In at #18 on 17 March and it eventually got as high as #3. The duo of by Danny Spencer (vocals, keyboards) and Ric Peet (keyboards) named themselves after candyflipping, the name given to the taking of ecstasy and LSD at the same time. It’s no surprise that they turned their attention to a rave/acid house take on the Beatles song

Made of Stone – The Stone Roses

The cash-in continues. At least Elephant Stone hadn’t been on the debut album so there perhaps were legitimate reasons for its re-issue so that folk could own and enjoy it.  Made of Stone had bombed exactly 12 months later with a placement of #90. This time around, it came in on 17 March at #20, which proved to be its peak as it dropped down immediately.  Silvertone Records weren’t quite finished mind you…..

This Is How It Feels – Inspiral Carpets

Having been linked into the Manchester/baggy movement, it was no real surprise that Inspiral Carpets were next to come off the conveyer belt as far as the charts were concerned. This Is How It Feels is an almighty piece of music, one that I featured just yesterday on the songs as short stories series. It’s a disgrace that the sentiments from the song are just as applicable today as they were 30 years ago. Entered the charts at #22, got up to #14 a couple of weeks later and was only ever bettered, performance-wise, by Dragging Me Down two years later.

Chime – Orbital

Further evidence that dance music from the clubs and the fields where the raves were happening was crossing over into the mainstream. Orbital, consisting of brothers Phil and Paul Hartnoll, took their name from the M25, the orbital motorway that circles Greater London and which was central to the rave scene and party network in the South East of England during the early days of acid house. Chime was the debut single and its appearance in the charts, initially at #28 on 24 March led to an invite to appear on Top of The Pops during which the brothers wore t-shirts making a protest about the impending introduction of the Poll Tax in England, a measure that had, on its earlier introduction in Scotland, created civil unrest, as it would also do in England later that very same week of the TOTP appearance (the director avoided any close-up shots of the brothers, concentrating instead on the audience….the single climbed to #17 the following week)

Orbital would prove to be one of the biggest, most important and influential dance acts to emerge out of the UK at any point in history – but that’s really for friends of this blog to highlight rather than me.

Your Love Takes Me Higher – The Beloved

The success of Hello, as covered in the first entry of this series, led to the label opting for a re-release of a single that had flopped in February 1990. An absolute belter of a track, one that found favour with the ravers and the indie-kids alike in terms of dancing, it didn’t transfer to sales as it came in at #40 on 24 March, going up one place the next week and then disappearing.

Pictures Of You – The Cure

The 18th successive single to go Top 50; there would be a further eight such successes before the release of Gone, which stalled at #60 just before Xmas 1996. It’s actually quite astonishing that Pictures Of You charted as well as it did, coming in at #28 on 31 March and inching its way up to #24 a couple of weeks later as it had been around for the best part of 12 months as a track on the Disintegration LP. Fans of The Cure again demonstrating brand loyalty, and even today the second hand market for many of their singles is a healthy one in terms of the price they fetch.

She Bangs The Drums – The Stone Roses

First released in July 89 when it made #36, a fairly decent showing for an underground band with no track record of success, Silvertone decided to re-issue She Bangs The Drums just two weeks after the re-release of Made of Stone. It meant that the chart of the final week of March 1990 had two Stone Roses 45s inside the Top 50. World domination beckoned, didn’t it?

Cobra Bora (Call The Cops Mix) – 808 State (from The Extended Pleasure of Dance EP)

Between November 1989 and March 1991, 808 State would release six singles/EPs, all of which, with the exception of The Extended Pleasure of Dance EP, went Top 10. I’d love to have been able to give you a reason but I can, in all honesty, say that I didn’t even know this EP existed until typing these words out. When I later go and track down a copy, it’ll be the first time I’ll have ever heard it.

Hope some of these bring back good memories.

JC
(aged 56 years and 9 months)

 

Beatles

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM : #244 : THE BEATLES

A GUEST POSTING by JULES

As a kid (I’m 59) I was sort of aware of The Beatles; All You Need Is Love, Here Comes The Sun, and of course Yellow Submarine but it was listening to the Ray Moore late night show on Radio 2 under the bed covers on a transistor radio that I had my epiphany.

The theme music was an instrumental version of Here, There and Everywhere.

Enthused with the knowledge that my top sleeping song was by The Beatles I saved up my pocket money and bought Revolver. Wow what a cracker not a duff track on it (er well see above) but this one made realise that popular music can be different

Tomorrow Never Knows

Next step down to the record shop for the “Blue” album – oh my what treasures as I discovered all the hits and random good stuff.

Back In The U.S.S.R.

Hey mum it will soon be my birthday any chance of the “Red” album? Well, what the thunder and lightning is this? No odd cool stuff just songs hmm…..Oh hang on these are good as well.

I Should Have Known Better

Back to the record shop

Sgt Pepper, later on at school we could bring an album to play at music class, never the coolest kid but this boosted my street cred (remained a virgin). Like a lot of things some lyrics ain’t aged well but at least we do try to improve.

I used to be cruel to my woman
I beat her and kept her apart from the things that she loved
Man I was mean but I’m changing my scene
And I’m doing the best that I can (Ooh)

I admit it’s getting better (Better)
A little better all the time (It can’t get no worse)
Yes I admit it’s getting better (Better)
It’s getting better since you’ve been mine
Getting so much better all the time

Getting Better

It was around this time that Dad informed me that Paul wrote all the music and John all the words, also if he wants to be Back in the U.S.S.R. no one is stopping him. As for myself I was getting to like George.

If I Needed Someone

Started trawling through The Beatles section on a more regular basis along with the discount box where I bagged Magical Mystery Tour double e.p. along with The Clash e.p. The Cost Of Living. And John Lennon’s Live Peace In Toronto. Sadly didn’t have enough cash for The Beatles In Italy, went back next week….

I’m A Loser

Some of the early LPs had good selection of covers for me the stand out track on their first album was a slow love song penned by Lennon and McCartney.

Ask Me Why

The last “proper” album I bought was Let It Be mainly because it was universally slagged off, and for good reason, Paul was pissed about the strings imposed on The Long And Winding Road (rectified with the horn section on Wings Over America) plus a rehashed charity song (Across The Universe) and studio out-takes and an old composition not considered worthy before, but on one track they got their mojo back and played like a rock band.

I`ve Got A Feeling

Oh bugger I forgot Ringo

The last album recorded was Abbey Road and featured the only Beatles drum solo.

The End

And his dulcet tones on the final obvious track

Goodnight

As a bonus bonus track The Rutles did the “Blue” album in one song.

Shangri-La

Goodnight and Good-luck

Love, Jules

Dracula Legs

45 45s @ 45 : SWC STYLE (Part 14)

A GUEST SERIES

32 – Heartburn Destination – Dracula Legs (2014 Too Pure Records)

Released as a single March 2014 – Unknown Chart Position

I’ve told some of this story before. A few years back I had to pop over to a place called Dayton, which is a city in Ohio (and the birthplace of Kim Deal, Pixies fans) for a few days. I arrived around 10pm in the evening and after a quick pit stop at a bar for a spot of dinner I end up at my hotel. The hotel is ok, its downtown and in a relatively nice area. I decide that having been up for about 26 hours, I should try and get some sleep.

Try as I like, I can’t, as the moody bloke from Faithless, sang, get no sleep. For two hours I look out of the window at my surroundings, I take a few photos out of the window of things like traffic lights, a passing truck, I unfold and refold my tshirts and I still refuse to feel tired.

I think about going for a walk, but as I get to the hotel door I see a police car tear along the road and I think better of it. So I check out the hotel, the pool and gym are both shut. The lounge reserved for residents is pitch black. There is a small bar downstairs, which is empty, but open. I ordered a rum and coke and watch what I assume is a re run of baseball game (one of the teams are the Cubs). By now it’s about one am, still not tired (on reflection I was massively over tired). It was then I spotted the staircase.

When I’m away from home I tend to take a running kit with me. Running is a great way to see a city, especially if it is just waking up. However, in my sleep deprived state, call it delirium if you like, I thought for some reason at one thirty in the morning, it would be a really good idea to change into my running gear and run up and down the fire escape stairs in this hotel.

So that is what I did. There were eight floors, twenty four flights of stairs, and at first slowly I begun to trot up and down them. By the fourth loop I’d got the time down to just under 5 minutes. I was having fun. Then the somewhere between the fifth and sixth floor I was told to knock it off by the night duty security guard.

He marched me back to my room – gave me the number for room service, and wished me good night. I switched on my ipod and within an hour I fell asleep, which I probably should have done about five hours ago. The first song I heard was ‘Heartburn Destination’ by Dracula Legs.

Dracula Legs are a five piece band from London who burst out of nowhere back in 2014. They play a brand of indie rock that I once described as sounding like the kind of music that Nick Cave would make if he moved to countryside and took up organic gardening. I’m still not quite sure what I meant by that but I stand by it, because that it is what it sounds like. A rollicking four minute rockabilly indie stomper. The organic gardening analogy sounds better I think.

The single was backed with this

Cold Licks

 

SWC

 

 

Luke Haines

THE SINGULAR ADVENTURES OF LUKE HAINES (23)

And now the end is near……and I think it’s fair to say that this series has demonstrated that Luke Haines will do things his way.

I’m a fan going back decades, but there have been times in listening to the back catalogue where I’ve been bemused and borderline-bored and so my thanks to those of you who have refrained from offering up your words of criticism when confronted by some more nonsense on recent Sunday mornings.

2016 saw the run of concept albums come to a halt with the release of Smash The System. One of the most noticeable things about this collection of songs is the comeback for the singing voice – there’s hardly any mumbling or whispering and next-to-no spoken word. It’s an album that initially leans on electronica, but before too long the acoustic and electric guitars are picked up and deployed to great effect….only for it all to descend into what could be a parody or tribute (it’s hard to tell with Mr Haines) of folk rock. The album veers all over the place, often catching even the most keen interested listener off-guard, and as such it provides further evidence to those who don’t like his stuff that Haines’s head remains wedged firmly up his own backside.

Maybe I expected a bit too much from the album as I wasn’t entirely convinced by much of its contents on initial listens – but at the same time I felt there were a handful of outstanding efforts that would always find a place on the i-pod. Over the past couple of years, my tolerance levels have increased and I can now listen to all the way through without reaching for the skip button, albeit the temptation is still there.

I think that there’s just too much going on lyrically, with countless references to real people, some of whom have featured in previous albums recorded by Haines in one guise or other. The song titles alone namecheck Ulrike Meinhof, Vince Taylor, Bruce Lee, Roman Polanski, Marc Bolan and The Incredible String Band, with many others featuring in the lyrics. As I mentioned earlier, the music is incredibly varied, ranging from experimental electronica to fill-on power-pop that, in a different period, would have earned regular exposure on the radio.

The title track was released as a single:-

I can’t, however, not let this review pass without drawing your attention to the best impression of glam-rock I’ve ever had the pleasure of listening to. If they still made the show Stars In Their Eyes, then Mr Haines would surely win…….

mp3 : Luke Haines – Marc Bolan Blues

Smash The System got a few songs out of Haines’s system and it really was no surprise that he returned to the challenge of more concept albums about fantastical subject matters and situations with the release of I Sometimes Dream of Glue in 2018. In these situations, it’s best to let the record label PR provide the explanation:-

It started sometime after World War II – in the late 1940’s. A convoy of British Special Services trucks had been dispatched to RAF Middlewych, their cargo – 10 tonnes of experimental solvent liquid. Sticky and deadly. The mission – to drop the toxic liquid over Germany and finish the job of carving up Europe for good. The trucks never made it to their airfield destination, coming off the road – most probably helped by saboteurs – some five miles out of London…

Just off the Westway, in the motorway sidings, you can see a small sign. Actually you probably can’t see the sign as it is the size of a child’s fingernail clipping. The sign says ‘Glue Town.’ The name of a village. There is little or no documentation of Glue Town. You will not find any information about it on the 21st Century internet. Gluetown is a rural settlement born out of mutation. Of the estimated 500 or so dwellers, no one is thought to be over 2 1⁄2 inches tall. The citizens of Glue Town exist on a diet of solvent abuse and perpetual horniness. The residents only leave to carry out daring night-time ‘glue raids’ on Shepherds Bush newsagent shops. On a tiny screen in the town centre, an old Betamax cassette of ‘Michael Bentine’s Pottytime’ plays on a loop all day and all night. The reduced size villagers go about their daily business pondering whether the lessons of Pottytime can show them a way out of their drudge lives of sexual abandonment and human sacrifice…”

All of which means it’s no surprise that the album is a bonkers listen. 25 years on from The Auteurs bursting onto the scene and the frontman is regaling us with strange tales of the unexpected in which sex and glue sniffing feature prominently. There’s also another ode about football hooliganism, but in a surreal way in which the boot-boys are Subbuteo figures come to life, with everything sung over what some reviewers at the time perfectly described as pastoral music – the sort of stuff that, as a non-Englishman, I associate with Morris Dancing….of the type in the Smash The System video.

Only one of the fourteen tracks on ‘Glue’ extends much beyond a duration of two-and-a-half minutes which means everything skips along at a decent enough pace. It also means that just as your brain is coming to terms with what you’ve just listened to, it’s time for the next one to begin. Overall, it feels like a creepy soundtrack to an X-rated version of Camberwick Green, Chigley or Trumpton, a series of stop-motion animated TV series for children aired by the BBC in the 60s and 70s…..and it provides fans with another decent enough listen without ever threatening to make a high appearance in a rundown of favourite albums of all-time. Much like almost all of the Haines solo releases.

mp3 : Luke Haines – Everybody’s Coming Together For The Summer

The year ended with a low-key digital only release of the Glue EP, three tracks that were possibly inspired by the process of piecing together the concept album. Here’s a fun filled few minutes from it:-

mp3 : Luke Haines – Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue

There were no releases in 2019 but this year will see the release of an album on which Luke Haines has collaborated with someone fairly well known. Here’s the promo blurb:-

Beat Poetry For Survivalists is the new collaboration between Peter Buck & Luke Haines.

Peter Buck was the guitarist for the biggest band in the world – REM.

Luke Haines was the guitarist for the Auteurs. The Auteurs were not the biggest band in the world. They were pretty good though.

Luke Haines also does paintings of Lou Reed.

One day, Peter Buck bought one of Luke Haines’ Lou Reed paintings. They had never met before but decided that the fates had brought them together and they should write some songs together and make an album.

‘Beat Poetry For The Survivalist’ is that album. With songs about legendary rocket scientist and occultist Jack Parsons, The Enfield Hauntings (of 1978), a post-apocalyptic radio station that only plays Donovan records, Bigfoot, and Pol Pot.

Luke Haines and Peter Buck will be touring the UK in April 2020, including Hebden Bridge Trade’s Club on 13th April and two shows at 100 Club in London on the 15th and 16th April.

I’ve got tickets and made travel and accommodation arrangements to go to the show at Hebden Bridge, which happens to be on Easter Monday. Jacques the Kipper is coming along for the adventure. It was only after doing all this and paying for everything up front was it announced that extra shows were being added……including Glasgow on 12th April! Typical isn’t it???

That’s the end of this particular singular adventure series. I’ll be holding off starting a new one for a short while as Sundays, for the next few weeks at least, will become a day in which SWC’s 45 45s at 45 will feature….which I’m sure will come as a welcome change to most of you.

JC

 

McCluskey Brothers

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #203 : THE McCLUSKEY BROTHERS

from Discogs:-

The McCluskey Brothers, Ken and David, are one time members of 80’s Glasgow band the chat-topping The Bluebells. The brothers released their first album “Aware of All” in 1987. It had to be deleted two weeks after release as the brothers found out that they were still officially members of The Bluebells group from which they had parted company with amicablly in 1986. Although still signed to the London Records label the Brothers toured widely until eventually released from London in 1990.

1992 saw the launch of the “Favourite Colours” album on their own label Kingfisher Records followed two years later by “Wonderful Affair”. In 1993 they were honoured to play for Nelson Mandela when he visited Glasgow to take up his Freedom of the City award. In 2000 the brothers released the compilation “Housewives Choice” (Linn Records, Glasgow).

David is currently a music therapist working with Sense Scotland and Ken is a music business lecturer at Stow College, Glasgow and contributes towards the college label Electric Honey Records.

Here’s one from the Favourite Colours album….one that reminds a lot of Roddy Frame:-

mp3 : The McCluskey Brothers – Better Days

JC

Massive Attack

45 45s @ 45 : SWC STYLE (Part 13)

A GUEST SERIES


34. Safe From Harm – Massive Attack (1991 Virgin Records)

Released as a single May 1991 (reached Number 25)

For some reason I always associate this song with Gulf War 1, even though it came out a good three months after that invasion had ended. It’s probably to do with the title of the song and because during the war, Massive Attack were forced by Virgin Records to drop the word ‘Attack’ from their name otherwise they wouldn’t get radio play. I think I assumed that this was the song that was released during Gulf War but in reality it was ‘Unfinished Symphony’ I think. Which seems as good a reason to post that as you are ever going to need.

Unfinished Symphony

Anyway, let’s talk about war. That’s a happy and cheerful subject for those of you with a morning head. During the 1990 oil sponsored invasion of Kuwait and Iraq, a few of us wrote to a couple of chaps who were out in the Gulf. They were both local lads, one of whom, strangely enough, went to school with OPG’s brother, and we used to write to them about what was going on in Gillingham, sending them snippets from the local paper about the footballs fortunes (or lack of…) and scandalous gossip that we’d heard.

My mate Richard wrote to a lad who I’m going to call Wayne, I’ve changed his name, he was 21 years old and had been in the army for 3 years before heading out to the Gulf. He was in the Royal Engineers and used to write to Richard about the heat, the lack of alcohol, the terrible food and being spat at in the street. He seemed happy though.

In January 1991 it snowed in the UK, it snowed a lot – I mean those of you in Canada and parts of American and Scandinavia can understandably thumb your nose at that, but for us in the South East of England anything more than 2 inches of snow in a single morning causes society to breakdown. Actual fist fights break out at the Co-op for the last loaf of Morning Pride and thefts of goats rocket so that people can still drink milk.

Anything more than 3 inches and the Daily Mail goes into an apoplectic meltdown and rages about “Snowmageddon” and how it was all Neil Kinnock fault (they actually said that).

Where was I..? Oh yes, snow, Richard wrote and told Wayne about the snow and how we’d all found an old car bonnet in some woods at a place called Darland Banks in Gillingham and we were using the car bonnet to charge down the slopes of the Banks at breakneck speed before crashing through the hedge at the bottom onto the road. It was deliriously funny.

Normally Richard would get a response in a couple of weeks, but he got nothing this time, February came along, the snow all melted and the war ended in a 3 all draw. Still no response from Wayne. Richard sort of forgot about him – I mean we were 15 and 16 years old and we probably thought we had better things to think about.

March comes along and one morning I am out delivering copies of the Medway Times and there on the front page is a story about a Gulf War Soldier from Medway, aged 21, who lost both of his legs in an incident involving a mortar bomb and an army jeep. He’d been driving the jeep to try and assist some of his colleagues who had become stranded in a dangerous part of town. They’d come under attack and the result of that is what is documented above. It also pointed out quite angrily that this chap was being denied the services that he deserved.

I mean a Conservative run service treating people badly, who’d a thought it.

Of course, it was Wayne, you’ve guessed that. Richard, was deeply upset about it and decided to do something about it. He tracked him down and with the help of his parents and the local paper and about a thousand other people. Collectively they managed to get him some support, they got him some specialist housing, they got him some work. A women cleaned his house for him for free for two years, just because she could.

I’ve met Wayne, I’ve spent a good deal of time with him, through Richard, and he’s lovely. He is totally humbled by what people did for him. He still goes to see Gillingham on a regular basis, in fact the last time I saw him was down at the stadium, although that was some time ago. He also set up and runs a charity for people like him who have suffered horrific injuries through warfare. He does that in his spare time.

Wayne now works in IT, he is married with children (one of whom is in the navy, not that its relevant). Richard was his best man at his wedding. Which I think is lovely.

SWC

 

 

Associates

MOTOR VEHICLES OF A CERTAIN COLOUR IN CENTRAL EUROPE

This 45 from 1981 was, unsurprisingly, included in my stab at an Associates ICA. I don’t think I can better my words from that occasion.

A moody, majestic and magical few minutes to open things up, it demonstrates just how important both Alan Rankine and Billy Mackenzie were to the sound and feel of this band. My first exposure to the Associates, and one that was suggested by someone thanks to my love of Magazine – the eerie horror-movie soundtrack keyboards are akin to those of Dave Formula and the seemingly nonsensical lyrics would be the stuff Howard Devoto would have been proud of. Name-checking Aberdeen, Dusseldorf, Zurich and Munich in the opening few lines and giving us the wonderful rhyming couplet of “Anonymous as bathrooms, Androgynous as Dachshunds”. All albums, ICAs or not, should open with something as memorable as this.

I’ve plucked out White Car In Germany to commemorate the fact that, in the company of Rachel, I’m off to Munich for a few days – it was our Christmas present to one another. I’ll be going back to a city that I haven’t visited since 1995 when Raith Rovers played the mighty Bayern Munich on the UEFA Cup while Rachel gets to cross somewhere she has long wanted to go.

There’s actually a football element being incorporated into the trip with us taking in a game on Saturday. Not for us the glamour of the Bundesliga, with Bayern having an away game. Nor are we going to seek out any other teams in the immediate vicinity of Munich. We will be making our way to Ingolstadat to watch a third-tier game, which just happens to be against the second-string of Bayern. The link comes from the town of Ingolstadt being twinned with the town of Kirkcaldy in Scotland, and Kirkcaldy being the town in which Raith Rovers play. There are long-standing connections between the Ingolstadt and Rovers fans and we are meeting up with a big group of locals and spending the day with them. Ingolstadt, on the banks of the Danube, looks lovely judging by the pictures – the team is currently battling for a spot at the top of their league for promotion to the second tier of German football, in the same way the Rovers are here in Scotland. I’m so looking forward to it.

I’m also very hopeful that this won’t be my only visit to Germany in 2020. All being well, I’m soon to take my leave of work, leaving me with a considerable amount of free time in which to enjoy myself. I haven’t forgotten the efforts made by Dirk, Walter and Brian to come to Glasgow for a Blogger’s get-together a few years back and I’m determined to make my way to their parts of the world in the not too distant future. The UK-based bloggers can also expect to hear from me soon enough – life is too short to put off the things you’ve always really wanted to do.

White Car in Germany is a great example of how only Billy Mackenzie was truly capable of singing his lyrics without sounding like a total prat:-

Aberdeen’s an old place
Dusseldorf’s a cold place
Cold as spies can be

Lisp your way through Zurich
Walk on eggs in Munich
Rub salt in its knee

I’m not one for surgery
Premature senility
White car in Germany

Anonymous as bathrooms
Androgynous as Dachshunds
Try them out and see

If some brat annoys you
Do what’s felt impromptu
Kick them in their own

Is this your infirmary
On the road to recovery
White car in Germany

White car
White car
White car in Germany

mp3 : Associates – White Car In Germany

Here’s your b-side of what was a flop single.

mp3 : Associates – The Associate

Oh, and while I’m here:-

mp3 : Editors – Munich

See you all when I get back – in the meantime, there’ll be a few postings to keep you amused.

JC

Neutral Milk Hotel

THIS WAS MY BEST OF 2007

I was searching through what is left of the archives of the old blog – I reckon about 75% of the old posts are missing altogether and I’ve already mined the best of what is left and re-posted them at some point in recent years.

I’m not saying that this blast from the past is any sort of memorable or worthy post, but it’s interesting in that I picked out five of my favourite new songs that had been released during 2007 and a further five that I had only just picked up on or that they were old favourites given some sort of fresh life via a re-release.

From 30 December 2007:-

Just a quick final posting for 2007. Everyone seems to do extensive lists of what have been their particular favourites of the past 12 months. Here’s mine, and it consists simply of what I reckon have been the five new songs to give me most aural pleasure:-

Arcade Fire – Intervention
Frightened Rabbit – Be Less Rude
Grinderman – No Pussy Blues
Malcolm Middleton – Superhero Songwriter
The Twilight Sad – That Summer, At Home I Had Become The Invisible Boy

And among the albums I picked up years after they came out and the various boxsets/re-issues/Peel Sessions that appeared in 2007, I’m rather fond of these:-

Cinerama – Apres Ski (Live At Maida Vale, June 2000)
Jans Lekman – A Higher Power
The Lucksmiths – There Is A Boy That Never Goes Out
Prefab Sprout – Faron Young (acoustic version)
Tindersticks – Tiny Tears (Mark Radcliffe Show – October 1993)

But above all else, I at long last latched onto an album released back in 1997:-

Neutral Milk Hotel – In The Aeroplane Over The Sea

2007 was the year that I spent a fair bit of living and working in Toronto and there was a big chunk of time when I didn’t buy much as I would have had issues trying to ship it all home with me on my return to Glasgow after 18 weeks away.

I bought the Neutral Milk Hotel CD after hearing it played in a record store in Toronto and while I was all over it for maybe the best part of six months after I came home, I soon found myself fully immersed again in the local music scene, and in particular making up for lost time by going to see bands that were emerging or growing in popularity, and it soon began to gather some dust on the shelf. I still enjoy giving it a listen every now and again, but I don’t hold it in as high a regard as I did 12 years ago.

mp3 : Neutral Milk Hotel – King Of Carrot Flowers
mp3 : Neutral Milk Hotel – Two-Headed Boy
mp3 : Neutral Milk Hotel – Holland, 1945

JC

National

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM : #243 : THE NATIONAL (2)

It was back in November 2016 that I pulled together a 10-song ICA featuring The National.

It was a tough task; at the time, the band had released six albums and I decided to go only with tracks from the third, fourth and fifth albums as I felt that was the era when they were truly at the top of their game and nobody came close to matching their quality and consistency over the five-year period concerned.

There were a handful of very positive responses which delighted me. As always, there were suggestions about songs that didn’t make the cut while some folk felt there should have been room for some earlier material along with songs from Trouble Will Find Me, the album released in 2013, the most recent at the time I pulled together the ICA.

The National have since released Sleep Well Best (2017) and I Am Easy To Find (2019), a situation which more than enables me to have a stab at Volume 2. This can also be taken in lieu of me wanting to talk positively about the most recent album and the fact that their live show, outdoors at the Kelvingrove Bandstand in Glasgow during an unrelenting downpour, was another highlight of the gigs in 2019.

None of the tracks on the previous ICA – Secret Meeting, Mistaken For Strangers, Apartment Story, Conversation 16, Abel, Daughters of the Soho Riots, Slow Show, Bloodbuzz Ohio, Start a War, and Mr November – are eligible today.

Side A

1. Fake Empire (from Boxer, 2007)

The difficulty last time round was there were just too many tracks that I wanted to include but couldn’t.  Fake Empire, from 2007’s Boxer went head-to-head with Secret Meeting from 2005’s Alligator for the right to be Track 1 on Side A, and whoever lost out wouldn’t get in as that was the only place they would have fitted.  In the end, Secret Meeting got the nod for the ICA only on account of it being followed immediately by Mistaken for Strangers and I didn’t want to open with the first two songs off Boxer.

Fake Empire gets in this time round with no doubt at all.  If you hadn’t by chance ever heard The National before this song, it offers a perfect introduction of intriguing and inventive music, topped by a voice that melts hearts.

2. Don’t Swallow The Cap (from Trouble Will Find Me, 2013)

Last time round I said that songs from Trouble Will Find Me hadn’t made the cut as I felt the album was just too much like the band going through the motions somewhat – it just didn’t match the really high standards of what had come before.

The gig last summer, and believe me when I say that the rain was of biblical proportions that somehow just added to the occasion, brought home the fact that some of the songs on the album were as good as any throughout their entire career.  Don’t Swallow The Cap came very early in the set, just at the point when the rain got so hard that if the band had been any less than stellar, it would have been tempting to go home.  They had opened with four tracks from the new album and just as everyone was wondering if it was going to be a show in which all the new material was played before old favourites were dusted down…..this gave everyone such a huge lift and it got as loud a cheer as anything else until…..

3. I Need My Girl (from Trouble Will Find Me, 2013)

….a few songs later when they introduced local heroine Lauren Mayberry of Chvrches who sang backing vocals on this and then stayed on for a one-off performance in which she and Matt Berninger paid tribute to the late Scott Hutchison with a rendition of My Backwards Walk, a song by Frightened Rabbit.

It was a two-day stint at Kelvingrove and I consider myself very lucky to have been there on the night this took place (the following night, the show was bathed in glorious sunshine!).  I Need My Girl sounded lovely and it feels just perfect to slow things down at this juncture.

4. Rylan (from I Am Easy To Find, 2019)

I Am Easy To Find was a very different sort of album. There was a bit of electronica (more on that later) but most noticeable was the cast of female musicians playing and singing alongside the regulars.  Matt Berninger even handed over lead vocal duties on a few numbers and it did take a bit of getting used to.  It’s one of those albums that improves on repeated listens, with many of the songs having nuances best appreciated when they become familiar.

Rylan was unusual for the fact that it sounded like vintage-era The National and was quite different from the other 15 tracks.  I took an instant liking to this one and it remains a favourite of all songs from all bands in 2019.

5. England (from High Violet, 2010)

In response to one of the comments last time out, I confessed that if the ICA had been 11 tracks in length, then England would have been included.  It’s one that highlights what’s so good about the band.  It’s a complicated and ambitious number that sees changes in tempo accompanied by all sorts of instrumentation, and a vocal delivery that goes from reflective and morsose to celebratory and joyous.  It’t the sort of song that ends one side of a piece of vinyl and demands that you flip it over.

SIDE B

1. You Had Your Soul With You (from I Am Easy To Find, 2009)

Curveball time. The opening track of the latest album was like nothing they had done before. Initially unsettling, it soon becomes intriguing and magnificent.  The co-vocal on this one comes from Gail Ann Dorsey, familiar to many as part of David Bowie‘s touring band for some 20 years from the mid-90s.  This is a band who have produced some very beautiful slow songs. Just feels right to start the second side with one of their finest.

2. Blank Slate (b-side of Mistaken For Strangers, 2007)

Regular readers will know of my love for the vocal style and delivery of Paul Quinn.  Let’s simply say that the first time I heard this, it took me back.  It’s also a more than decent tune and all told, far too good to have been thrown away as a b-side.

3. The System Only Dreams In Total Darkness (from Sleep Well Beast, 2017)

Sleep Well Beast is a very fine album and I found myself wanting to find room for four tracks but they ended up, as so many songs under consideration for the previous ICA, on the outside looking in as they just didn’t fit into what I think is a well-structured and balanced running order.  This track was the first single lifted from it, preceeding the album by a full four months, and its multi-layered sound gave everyone an idea of what to expect with the subtle use of the trumpet behind the piano, guitar and drums harking back to the classic era albums.  There’s a wee bit of noodling mid-track, but I can forgive them as it just provides a platform for a great vocal finish.  I can’t explain it any other way.

4. Graceless (from Trouble Will Find Me, 2013)

Another which owes its incusion to the Glasgow live show.  Matt Berninger is famed for leaping off the stage singing songs while making his way through an auditorium, but the weather on the night meant that wasn’t on the agenda.

Or so we thought……for the next thing we know he’s donned a rainmac similar to what we were all given free of charge on arrival and he’s on his way, not giving a care for his well-being or safety.  And the band are going full-tilt at one of the fastest and most energetic songs they’ve ever recorded.  He eventually got back to the stage in one piece…..looking quite stunned!

5. Ada (from Boxer, 2007)

The final words come from my dear friend Echorich from his gentle admonishment last time around:-

The National are one of those bands that keeps me interested in homegrown music. I am a shamless Anglophile, if that wasn’t already pretty evident, but there is something about The National that really hits that sweet spot for me. This is a great selection JC. My ICA would have to include Ada from Boxer the use of brass on the song provides a wonderful, timeless quality to the song. It would definitely be my song # 10 to close the set.

He’s right……….he usually is.

JC