THE NEW VINYL VILLAIN

BANG-BANG-BANG-BANG : 4 IN 10 MINUTES

Shop Assistants are probably best known for Safety Net, the first single to be released, back in 1986, on the Bellshill-based 53rd & 3rd Records. This was actually the band’s third single, following on from the late-1984 debut, Something to Do (which was by Buba & The Shop Assistants and is extremely rare and hard to find) and a four-track EP, Shopping Parade, which was issued by The Subway Organisation.

Worth mentioning that the line-up for the debut single consisted of Aggi (vocals), David Keegan (guitar), John Peutherer (bass) and Moray Crawford (drums) with Stephen Pastel on backing vocals and production duties.

By the time they were in the studio for the follow-up, there had been huge changes with only David Keegan still around, joined now by Alex Taylor (vocals), Sarah Kneale (bass), Laura MacPhail (drums) and Ann Donald (drums). The EP was recorded for their Bristol-based label in Edinburgh in April 1985 with the results being energetic and tuneful lo-fi indie-pop, mostly fast-paced (apart from the one that sounds like a Velvet Underground outtake) that provided the introduction to the vocal talents of someone who was being increasingly talked of as the new face and voices of the independent Scottish music scene in the mid-80s.

mp3 : The Shop Assistants – All Day Long
mp3 : The Shop Assistants – Switzerland
mp3 : The Shop Assistants – All That Ever Mattered
mp3 : The Shop Assistants – It’s Up To You

For the avoidance of doubt, All That Ever Mattered is a totally different song to the one of the same name later recorded by Orange Juice. Oh, and All Day Long is one of the best and most enduring songs to come out of Scotland the entire decade.

JC

Blow-Up

KNOWN ONLY FROM COMPILATION ALBUMS

I was cleaning up some music files on the laptop the other day, mostly involving the deletion of duplicate tracks. It’s quite astonishing just how often some songs have been licensed to appear on mumerous compilation CDs, especially those that celebrate UK indie-musicin the mid-late 80s.

In carrying out the clean-up, I noticed I had three songs by Blow-Up, courtesy of them being on both the multi-label C87 and C88 boxsets and also from being on Ambition (Volume 1), a 1991 compilation of 24 songs that had been released by Cherry Red. The band were a total mystery to me, being one that I couldn’t recall at all. Here’s wiki:-

Blow-Up was formed in Brighton, England in 1986 by former 14 Iced Bears member Nick Roughley (vocals), along with Alan Stirner (guitar), Whirl frontman Trevor Elliott on Bass, and The Milk Sisters Drummer Chris Window (drums).

Signing to Creation Records at their first gig by an awe-struck Alan McGee they gained exposure with two singles on the label, 1987’s 1966-Nuggets-style “Good For Me” and the epic “Pool Valley” (the latter taking its name from Brighton’s bus station and featuring new bassist Aziz Hashmi).

A BBC Janice Long live session at the legendary BBC Abbey Road studios in 1987 brought the outfit well needed publicity with the help of Dave Nimmo on percussion. A tour of the Netherlands and Belgium was followed by their early recordings being collected on the Rollercoaster compilation issued on Megadisc in 1988. After two further EP’s, the Pixies-influenced first album proper, In Watermelon Sugar, was issued in 1990. This line-up featured Justin Spear, son of Roger Ruskin Spear of the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band and ‘Paul’ Reeves, who as Billy Reeves formed theaudience with Sophie Ellis-Bextor in 1997. An ambitious further album, Amazon Eyegasm (featuring the former 14 Iced Bear Will Taylor on guitar and ‘Red Ed’ on drums) followed in 1991.

Blow-Up were described as ‘the best band I ever signed, and the worst band I ever signed’ by Alan McGee.

So there you have it….and here’s the three songs that I have via CD compilations:-

mp3 : Blow-Up – Good For Me (Creation Records, 1987)
mp3 : Blow-Up – Forever Holiday (Ediesta Records, 1988)
mp3 : Blow-Up – World (Cherry Red Records, 1991)

All three were released as singles. All three are quite different in tone and feel. And maybe that’s the issue at hand…they sound like a band that was constantly searching for a sound they were comfortable with. None of the songs are dreadful, but none of them are particularly memorable or distinctive.

JC

Martha & The Muffins

I KNOW IT’S OUT OF FASHION AND A TRIFLE UNCOOL

Martha and The Muffins were the subject of this outstanding guest ICA by Alex G away back in July 2015.

As Alex G reminded us, Martha and the Muffins formed in Toronto in 1977 and within a year had settled down to a line-up of Martha Johnson (vocals, keyboards), Mark Gane (guitar), Carl Finkle (bass), Andy Haas (sax), Martha Ladly (backing vocals, keyboards) and Tim Gane (drums). A self-financed 7”, Insect Love, brought them to the attention of Virgin Records, who signed them up to their new DinDisc label and brought them to the UK to cut a debut album Metro Music (Canada 1979, UK release 1980) from which a first single was identified:-

mp3 : Martha and The Muffins – Echo Beach

It would prove to be their only hit in the UK, and indeed outside of Canada, the band has long struggled for any recognition beyond Echo Beach. It must be a a bit bewildering for the band, as they went on to release a number of critically well-received singles and albums in later years but the record buying public seemed determined to have them firmly in the category of one-hit wonders.

The single is a great example of new wave in its broadest definition. It’s not a rock song, it’s not a punk song and while it has a pop feel to it, it can’t be classified as pure pop. It also makes much use of keyboards but not in any sort of way that you would associate with prog or the emerging electronica. It’s also ridiculously catchy and tailor-made for radio, still often heard on the numerous stations devoted to nostalgia. Kind of hard to accept that it is coming up for its 40th birthday.

Here’s your b-side:-

mp3 : Martha and The Muffins – Teddy the Dink

Fun filled fact.

In June 2011, a 4,000 capacity outdoor concert venue opened in Toronto and it was decided to name after this hit single…and yes, it is on a waterfront loaction!

JC

Luke Haines

THE SINGULAR ADVENTURES OF LUKE HAINES (14)

Last week’s posting featured the final single to be released by The Auteurs, which was June 1999.

April 2000 saw Black Box Recorder hit the charts with The Facts of Life single. The album went Top 40 in May 2000 but the follow-up single, The Art of Driving, ground to a halt at #53 in July 2000.

It was around this time that the budding secret romance between John Moore and Sarah Nixey became known to Luke Haines and he got mightily pissed-off….perhaps a bit hypocritically given that he and Alice Readman, the bassist in The Auteurs, had been an item throughout the period that the first three albums had been recorded.

He decided he needed to go off and do his own thing and there would be two releases in 2001, albeit one of them featured music that had been recorded more than a year earlier for a soundtrack to an as yet unreleased album and on which chaval will ruminate in due course.

The other album from 2001 proved to be the first time that David Boyd, supremo at Hut Records, had doubts about Luke Haines, with the tale of the album playback told in its full toe-curling detail within the pages of Post Everything.

The Oliver Twist Manifesto was, an still is, nothing like anything else Haines has ever recorded. He was obsessed at the time with concept art and rap music, and in particular falling for the charms of Dr Dre/Eminem. He decided to make a high-art-hip-hop pastiche concept album on which he opens with the line ‘This is not entertainment, don’t expect me to entertain you’.

The album has a pop at many things, and the best thing I can do to sum it up is provide the NME’s review from the time….one which gave album fours stars out of five:-

The erstwhile Auteur loves saying the unsayable, and the bizarre Dickensian Slim Shady character that glowers through the music on ‘The Oliver Twist Manifesto’ – his first ‘proper’ solo LP – is his most hateful invention yet. This is Haines as cultural dilettante – a murderous misanthrope who brings fear and doom to all.

While he wastes valuable bile on worthless art bores (‘Death Of Sarah Lucas’), when he finds something to get genuinely upset about, Haines is a genuinely stunning writer. His unusually affecting treatise on mortality ‘What Happens When We Die’ is exceptional – the primitive synth-march of ‘England Vs America’ is possibly even better.

However, if you want evidence of what bitterness can do to a person, it may be worth tracing the manner that Haines’ voice has degenerated to a hoarse whisper as his albums have become more spiteful. He hisses like a pantomime villain throughout this bizarre, uneven assault on popular culture: [I]”You’ve gotta believe me when I say I never wanted to be liked”,[/I] he coughs on the title track. If that was his aim, then with the most unlikeable album of his entire career, he’s going the right way about it.

Here’s the opening and closing tracks of an album that clocks in at just 37 minutes. It’s still a fascinating if rather odd listen…..one that has come to make more sense in later years but was so out of leftfield in 2001 that it jarred somewhat.

mp3 : Luke Haines – Rock’n’Roll Communique No. 1
mp3 : Luke Haines – The Oliver Twist Manifesto

JC

Lord Cut-Glass

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #192 : LORD CUT-GLASS

From the Chemikal Underground website:-

In 2009 Lord Cut Glass, the alter-ego of our very own Alun Woodward (label boss and ex-Delgado), delivered us an album that had been four years in the making; written, arranged and largely performed by Woodward, the album was a beguilingly eclectic and hugely flamboyant affair.

Sometimes bashful, occasionally imbued with curmudgeonly bluster, and yet always lifted by humorous life learned truisms, Lord Cut-Glass struck a dashing figure of musically inventive bravado. Galloping percussion, waltzes and marches, promenades of male and female harmony: delicate and serene creations punctuated by casual profanity and shot through with brazenly hilarious words-to-the-wise. It was one of a kind and quite brilliant.

That last sentence nails it. One of a kind and brilliant. An album that never gets boring and throws up something new with every single listen.

Here’s the debut single that was lifted from it:-

mp3 : Lord Cut-Glass – Look After Your Wife

And the animated promo for its equally fabulous follow-up….although it was never given an actual physical release as a single:-

Note the use of the word ‘motherblaster’ in this version (just after the 1:30 mark); it wasn’t the word used on the album version……

JC

Siouxsie & The Banshees

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (43)

Today’s featured 7” piece of vinyl was seemingly named as ‘Single of the Week’ in August 1978 within the pages of all four of the main UK music papers – Melody Maker, NME, Record Mirror and Sounds, something I find hard to believe given that the papers projected themselves towards slightly different audiences and it was incredibly rare for all of them to simultaneously champion one band or singer.

But such was the fate of this:-

mp3 : Siouxsie and The Banshees – Hong Kong Garden

In an era when many a new band sounded fresh and exciting, particularly to my teenage ears, there was something about Hong Kong Garden that made it stand out even more so, that, of course being the Oriental sounding opening. The reviews in the music papers, to their credit, did nail things very well, offering the sort of soundbites that could be added to a poster if it was being used to attract further custom:-

“a bright, vivid narrative, power charged by the most original, intoxicating guitar playing heard in a long, long time”.

“strident and powerful with tantalising oriental guitar riffs”.

“ catchy, original….coupled with an irresistible sing-along chorus”.

“I love every second”.

The introductory notes come courtesy of a xylophone. The song had originally been aired on the John Peel Show on Radio 1 some six months earlier, with a quite different sound courtesy of a toy glockenspiel. The drums were also quite different….

mp3 : Siouxsie and The Banshees – Hong Kong Garden (Peel Session)

Ah, the drums. The instrument that played a huge part in making Hong Kong Garden one of the earliest smash hits of the new wave era – it’s #7 placing made it one of the few to go Top Ten in those days. Polydor Records had hooked the band up with an American producer named Bruce Albertine and had hired the expensive Olympic Studios in London for the sessions. The band didn’t like the results and the decision was taken to work with a little-known producer in a tiny basement studio in London. The producer got it done and dusted in two days, concentrating on the drum sound, insisting that Kenny Morris play the bass and snares first of all and then cymbals and tom-toms later on. These were matched up, with a bit of echo added, thus giving the song a bigger, fuller and more ambitious sound, arguably making the first new-wave single that didn’t sound just one step up from a great, live sounding demo.

The producer’s name was Steve Lillywhite and Hong Kong Garden was his first hit in that role….the first of many hundreds.

You can get a real sense of the difference that Lillywhite made by flipping it over to the b-side:-

mp3 : Siouxsie and The Banshees – Voices

This was salvaged from the Olympic Sessions with Bruce Albertine. It is distinctly average……(feel free to differ!!!)

The band would return to the studio with Steve Lillywhite to record debut album The Scream. As it was a separate session, and in a different studio to where they had first worked on the single, the decision was taken to leave Hong Kong Garden off said debut album. An act of artistic merit, but something of a commercial folly.

JC

Wire

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (42)

I had a quick look on Discogs to see if there were any second-hand copies of today’s debut single, by Wire, up for sale.

There’s loads of them, ranging in price from £50-£350, although the seller who is seeking the highest amount seems a bit ambitious, given that all he/she is offering is the 7” plastic in a generic record company sleeve while others, who are looking for a bit less, do have the single available in the picture sleeve from 1977.

I’m prepared to guess that maybe 15-20 years ago, you could have picked up Mannequin for £25 tops, but such has been the recent explosive growth in the demand for original vinyl from the good old days that sellers are asking a premium and there’s folk out there willing to pay. I sort of get it, but as I get older, it is decreasingly so.

I started this blog 13 years ago, ostensibly to try and post songs that were almost impossible to find, usually consisting of b-sides only issued on vinyl or different mixes of singles, again otherwise not available other than vinyl. Things have been overtaken with just about every singer/band from the punk, post-punk, new wave and 80s era being happy enough for old albums to be re-released, often with additional material, such as demos, b-sides and single mixes, to be tagged on. It’s a clever way to continue to extract money from fans and there’s a certain democratic element to it as it means that fans can complete their collections without having to fork out silly amounts of money.

My best personal take on it is that my hunt for a copy of the debut Orange Juice single slowed down once the tracks were made available via a CD reissue of all the Postcard Records material and it ground to a halt when the vinyl revival saw the price for the original artefact go through the roof. In some ways, getting your hands on original vinyl from the 70s/80s, especially those which weren’t pressed in any significant amounts, has become like collecting pieces of visual art such as paintings or sculptures, where all too often, it is only the moneyed and privileged who can participate.

I’ll now get off my soapbox and return to the business of the day.

Wire weren’t loved by many back in 1977. They were critically lauded in some places but there was little in the way of mass appeal. The debut album, Pink Flag, didn’t chart. It was, in many respects, ahead of its time as there can’t have been many prior LPs that contained 21 songs but with a running time of just over 35 minutes. It was music of a different quality and distinction and although it has retrospectively been lauded as one of the most original pieces of work to emerge out of the UK at any point in time, and has proven to be a huge influence on so many acts who would find fame and fortune in future times, hardly anybody knew it.

I’d be very surprised if the debut single was ever played on mainstream radio, other than by the usual suspect, John Peel:-

mp3 : Wire – Mannequin
mp3 : Wire – Feeling Called Love
mp3 : Wire – 1.2.X.U

More than 40 years on, these three songs still sound fresh, vibrant, edgy and exciting. They also sound familiar as so many bands would appropriate the Wire methodology in later years, often making a fair bit of money in the process.

All the tracks were available on Pink Flag, itself an album that has never been too difficult to find, having had its first re-release on CD in 1987, which also coincided with the label re-issuing it on vinyl. As such, none of the three songs were ever really obscure, and yet you have the situation of the 7” single fetching silly amounts. The original pressing of the album, which although not a great seller would still have found its way into more homes than the debut single, can be got for as ‘little’ as £60 or as much as £450, with the seller advising the vinyl and its sleeve are near-mint. Just as incredibly, a copy of the cassette version from 1977 is also up for grabs….£80 and its all yours with the seller saying “Tape looks in excellent condition, artwork is lovely, very slight corner wear. IS in original case, which is a bit worn, happy to replace with a new one, but it will be all clear, and this one has a black back”

Would it really be any better to hear the songs via these high-priced medium than any other?

JC

Wedding Present

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (41)

The Wedding Present released 29 singles and 3 EPs between 1985 and 1997. Today looks back at where it all started and my words below rely very heavily on an interview given by David Gedge to the folk involved with this wonderful piece of the internet

https://gedgesongs.wordpress.com/

It was 1985 and The Wedding Present were in a position to release a debut single. The choice came down to either Go Out and Get ‘Em Boy or Will You Up There. No worries if you don’t recognise the latter, it never got an official release!

The debut single turned out to be quite unlike almost all that would follow. One of the surprising things is that it was a deliberate effort by David Gedge to compose a political song, in this instance as his response to the Falklands conflict of the early 80s which had already inspired Elvis Costello to compose Shipbuilding. I genuinely had no idea about the intention behind the lyric, even though I had seen the words on paper before, assuming that it was another of the tangled lovelorn songs at which he frontman would become famed for over the ensuing decades. David Gedge does admit that the message is a little unfocussed and it’s an approach to song writing that he soon moved away from.

You were a survivor after all; you never even called!
I didn’t expect you to
Now, oh, there’s such a lot you’ve done and you’re only twenty-one
Yes, you’re only twenty-one

Oh, oh, there’s just something, something I noticed
That there’s a whole world out there but it’s shrinking fast
You want to take it all and make it last forever
Or maybe just a lifetime

Now, oh, you’ve gone to fly the flag from some pinprick on the map
Oh, won’t you ever bring it back?
Tonight, when you hold her in your arms and you prove that you’re a man
Oh, well, I hope she understands

Oh, some things just don’t ever go away
Some things, you know, are just here to stay
And in a golden field there is a little girl left with a union jack
And there’s a price to pay, no matter what you say
There is no going back today

And if we’re worlds apart, then I’ve still got a heart
Can you imagine that?
“Another wasted day”, yes, I can hear you say
But I’m afraid it means much more to me than that

There’s also an admission that the music, with an unusual structure and multiple parts, was a tad on the ambitious side, but the defence being that nobody was sure if the first single would prove to be the last, so everyone involved wanted to pack it full of hooks while having a frantic pace that grabbed the listeners attention.

The single came out on Reception Records on 24 May 1985 (slap bang in the middle of my final exams at university, so I can be excused for not paying attention!). The label had been set-up by the band, solely with the intention of getting the single out there and into the shops. Just 500 copies were pressed, but such was the demand that they soon agreed a deal with City Slang, a new label that had been established by NME writer, Neil Taylor who was an early champion of The Weddoes. The second pressing of the single came with different artwork, the results of which had the band recoiling in horror, and determined not to cede control over such things ever again.

The second pressing also sold out quickly and by now the band were getting aired increasingly by John Peel. Rather than have fans shell out huge sums on the second-hand market or more likely relying on copies recorded to a hissy cassette tape, it was decided that all of the songs that comprised the first two singles should be put on a new EP, via Reception Records, which is why most folk (including myself) who have vinyl cuts of the song have achieved it through the Don’t Try and Stop Me, Mother EP.

mp3 : The Wedding Present – Go Out and Get ‘Em Boy!
mp3 : The Wedding Present – (The Moment Before) Everything’s Spoiled Again

I think it’s fair to say that The Weddoes would go on to make better and more polished singles, but as an opener, particularly as it was wholly self-financed, recorded and released, is worthy of being described as cracking.

JC

This Mortal Coil

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (40)

When I’m penning a bunch of similarly themed posts, such as this consecutive run of Cracking Debut Singles, the occasional lazy shortcut is needed to save time and energy. Here’s a re-post from September 2014, which was Part 110 in the very long-running series entitled ‘Saturday’s Scottish Single’

“Some of you might think I’m cheating this week, but with a bit of music that is this exceptional, I’m prepared to bend the rules a bit.

This Mortal Coil are NOT a Scottish band and so shouldn’t really be in this alphabetical series.

This Mortal Coil was a project led by Ivo Watts-Russell, co-founder of the 4AD record label. Although Watts-Russell and John Fryer were technically the only two official members, the band’s recorded output featured a large rotating cast of supporting artists, many of whom were signed to, or otherwise associated with 4AD.

One of the label’s earliest signings was Modern English. In 1983, Watts-Russell suggested that they re-record two of their earliest songs, Sixteen Days and Gathering Dust as a medley on the basis that the band was closing its sets with such a medley and the label owner thought it was strong enough to warrant a re-recording. When Modern English rebuffed the idea, Watts-Russell decided to assemble a group of musicians to undertake the task and a 12″ EP, Sixteen Days/Gathering Dust, resulted from the sessions.

Recorded as a B-side for the EP was a cover of Tim Buckley‘s Song to the Siren, performed solely by Elizabeth Fraser and Robin Guthrie of the Cocteau Twins. Pleased with the results, Watts-Russell decided to make this the A-side of the 7″ single version of the EP.

Cocteau Twins were a Scottish act, and I therefore claiming this version of Song To The Siren as eligible for this series.

mp3 : This Mortal Coil – Song To The Siren

A work of genius. Watts-Russell originally wanted it to be a cappella but ended up including what was a one-take of Guthrie, and I quote ‘leaning against the studio wall bored out of his mind playing these chords’.

Fraser’s vocal was also, quite astonishingly, recorded in one take.”

It is utterly sublime and totally overshadows its largely instrumental reverse side:-

mp3 : This Mortal Coil –Sixteen Days (reprise)

JC

Raveonettes

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (39)

The job I was holding down in the first few years of the 21st century involved long hours, a fair bit of travelling and a requirement to drop things/change plans at very short notice. I loved it, but the downside was that there wasn’t a great deal of leisure time and it was a period when, for instance, I was going to very few football games as my Saturdays and Sundays were precious.

One of the few ways I was able to keep up with new music was through flopping down on a couch and turning on the television to browse through the video music channels, more often than not settling on MTV2 which was best for the sort of indie/alternative nonsense that was my forte.

It was via this medium that I came across this piece of music:-

mp3 : The Raveonettes – Attack of The Ghost Riders

The video was something to be behold, being a horror/ghost/revenge story, shot entirely in black and white with the two singers/performers looking as if they had just stepped off the catwalk of some fashion show in a top class European city. I had no idea who The Raveonettes were – my hunch was that they were American, mistly likely from either NYC or LA – but I made a mental note to buy something the next time I was in a shop. Of course, nowadays I could just press a few keys into a search engine to find out more and then a few minutes later place an order which would come to my house or place of work within a couple of days, but this was the prehistoric era back in 2002……

It was a huge surprise to learn that The Raveonettes were from Denmark. It was less of a surprise to learn that this was their debut single that had been lifted from a mini-album that had crept out a few months previously. The biggest surprise, however, was seeing that the band were on Columbia Records, one of the largest multi-national labels on the planet, although I should have realised that no small and independent label would have been able to fund the promo video:-

The single was issued on 7” vinyl and on CD. Here’s the various, and all highly enjoyable, b-sides:-

mp3 : The Raveonettes – Rebel Invasion
mp3 : The Raveonettes – Go Girl Go
mp3 : The Raveonettes – Demon’s Fire

The Raveonettes blend of surf/garage/indie proved to be reasonably popular, slightly above mere cult status but never gaining full commercial acceptance. Columbia let them go in 2005 after two albums, but there have been six records since, initially released on the Canadian-based Vice Records and more recently on their own Beat Dies label. There’s been some more than decent stuff over the years, but nothing has ever quite grabbed me in the same way as the debut.

JC

Auteurs, Luke Haines

THE SINGULAR ADVENTURES OF LUKE HAINES (13)

The Auteurs broke up in the summer of 1996.

A few months later, the Baader Meinhof LP was released, a period of time wonderfully recalled in the pages of Bad Vibes, including the revelation that someone high up in Virgin Records, the parent label of Hut Records with whom Luke Haines had a contract, sent this in a fax to David Boyd, the head of Hut:-

“I would like to remind you that Virgin Records did not sign Luke Haines to make political statements. He is signed as an entertainer.”

In response, Boyd sanctioned a photo call at the Munich Olympic stadium where, in 1972 at the adjacent Games Village, 13 Israeli athletes had been killed after a terrorist attack. Haines really was testing everyone’s patience and understanding.

The Baader Meinhoff album gets mixed reviews in that it was loved and loathed in equal measures, best summed up by UK broadsheet newspaper The Guardian stating that Haines had wasted some of his best music on an impenetrable subject matter. No single is released to accompany it…. but there was a one-sided etched single given away free with vinyl copies of the album:-

mp3 : Baader Meinhof – I’ve Been A Fool For You

1997 proved to be a quiet year, but it was at this point in time that Haines formally hooked up with John Moore and Sarah Nixey to create Black Box Recorder.

Chrysalis Records signed the band, something which Hut Records seemed OK about, and in 1998 there were two flop singles – Child Psychology and England Made Me – before the release of a poorly selling album, also called England Made Me.

At the same time as this was happening, The Auteurs had come back together again….I’m guessing it was to fulfill a contractual obligation for a fourth album, as the reasons aren’t quite ever explained in Post Everything, the second volume of Haines’s memoirs, published in 2011 and covering the period 1997-2005. There are a number of aborted efforts at getting the recording process going, but eventually, from August – October 1998, things take shape.

The crazy thing is that the subsequent results yielded next to no reviews when the LP, How I Learned To Love The Boot Boys, was released in July 1999, but those who were paying attention, rightly recognised it as a masterpiece, such as this from Michael Hubbard in musicOMH, a London-based online magazine:-

If you’re going to be influenced by the music of decades other than the present one then you may as well allow that music to emphasise your own work rather than making your own music emphasise someone else’s.

Bjorn Again are great, no doubt about it – but they emphasise Abba. Who would they be otherwise? It has, in the recent past, been something of a conundrum; lots of ’70s disco music revivalist tripe has been scribed and has spawned comeback careers for everyone from Martha Wash to Burt Reynolds.

All great stuff – I’m sure the ’70s were fun at the time and Boogie Nights was a refreshing film – but really, mes fruits, this is the ’90s. Why live in the past? Why not just learn from it and improve upon it? The case for evolution has not been stronger since Charlie D popped his clogs and finally we have, in the shape of Luke Haines, a man prepared to lead the fightback.

Haines last graced the Albums shelves with his side project, Black Box Recorder’s England Made Me, which I loved immediately. The atmospherics of that record are transferred to How I Learned To Love The Bootboys and given some spices to further improve the flavour. Haines claims this record to be twelve singles; “maybe not twelve hits”, says the nihilist, but we see – and hear – what he means immediately.

At once a personal album (1967 was the year Haines first looked upon the world) and a fusion of myriad styles (Asti Spumante and Your Gang Our Gang, for instance), there are tracks that remind one of everything from The Sex Pistols to Ziggy Stardust, Gary Numan to Blur, yet I suspect that this eclectic record conjures different bands for each listener, depending on what they’ve heard before. Haines refines Numan’s atmospherics, he plays Johnny Rotten subtlely, he uses one or two Bluresque riffs rather than songloads and everything somehow works. In fact, in works bloody brilliantly.

Although every one of these songs shrieks CLASS!!! at the eardrums, stand-out tracks must surely be Asti Spumante, Your Gang Our Gang, Johnny and the Hurricanes, The Rubettes and title track How I Learned to Love the Bootboys. If you don’t yet own this album then you are missing out. Go buy.

In recent years, more writers haved belatedly heaped praise on the album, especially when it was reissued in 2014 as a 3xCD expanded edition in which the original 12 tracks were joined by an album of b-sides and rarities, along with a live album from November 1999, recorded at the London School of Economics, on the occasion of The Auteurs final UK gig.

There was one single taken from the album, complete with two new b-sides All three tracks are very listenable:-

mp3 : The Auteurs – The Rubettes
mp3 : The Auteurs – Get Wrecked At Home
mp3 : The Auteurs – Breaking Up

The a-side featured backing vocals from John Moore and Sarah Nixey, thus providing a neat bridge between what had just come to pass and what would prove, the following year, to be the commercial high point of Luke Haines as an entertainer.

I’ve previously said that Black Box Recorder wouldn’t feature as part of this series, and I’m keeping it that way. The series will continue, running through early into the new year, with this idiosyncratic look at the solo career of Luke Haines, very little of which has seen the release of singles or EPs, but something in the region of 12 albums. You’ll be pleased to learn that chaval will be lending his talents to this venture…..

JC

PS : I might be away oh holiday just now, but I was reliably informed that an old friend was intending to come out of the woodwork today. If my intel is good, then clicking here should do the trick.

Long Fin Killie

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #191 : LONG FIN KILLIE

From wiki:-

Long Fin Killie was a Scottish experimental rock/post-rock band, which released three albums and several EPs on the British avant-rock label Too Pure in the 1990s.

Long Fin Killie’s core line-up consisted of Luke Sutherland (vocals, violin, guitar, mandolin, bouzouki, saxophone, hammer dulcimer, thumb piano, etc.), Colin Greig (electric and upright bass), David Turner (drums/percussion), and Philip Cameron (electric guitar). Sutherland had previously been in a band called Fenn, based in Glasgow, who played many support gigs, including Ride and Catherine Wheel. Their name was taken from a family of ornamental freshwater fishes known as killifishes, noted for their interesting drought survival and reproductive habits.

The members were all highly trained, enabling them to create complex, atypical music which usually featured hypnotically-bowed violins/celli, jazz-influenced drumming, and meandering ambient passages. Allmusic cited them as having “staggering levels of musicianly talent”.Vocalist Luke Sutherland often delivered his cryptic, highly literate lyrics in an androgynous falsetto voice.

Their debut EP Buttergut was released in 1994, with debut album Houdini following the next year. The band’s sound, though diverse, was influenced by the likes of dream pop mainstays A R Kane, Cocteau Twins, and Slowdive, 1970s German krautrock groups like Can, and labelmates Moonshake, Pram and Laika. Mark E. Smith of The Fall contributed “guest rants” to the song “The Heads of Dead Surfers,” which appeared in 1995 on the EP of the same name, as well as on Houdini. (Listeners to British DJ John Peel’s radio show voted this the No. 10 best song of 1995 in the “Festive Fifty” list of that year.) LFK toured America in 1995 with the band Medicine; a split EP was released to promote it.

The band received widespread critical acclaim, but little to no radio play, though they did tour on the 1996 edition of Lollapalooza as part of its “second stage,” in support of their 1996 second LP Valentino. While driving from Sweden to Norway in late 1996, the band’s tour bus was involved in a major accident on a patch of ice, causing Sutherland to suffer a collapsed lung, broken ribs and collar bone, and other injuries. He began writing his first novel while recuperating from the crash. In 1997, Turner was replaced by Kenny McEwan on drums. Subsequent album Amelia (1998) featured songs of shorter lengths and more conventional structures, but it proved to be their last. The group disbanded shortly afterwards, to little mainstream notice, in 1998 or 1999.

All I have in the collection are the four tracks from the Hands and Lips EP, that was released in 1996. Here’s the title track:-

mp3 : Long Fin Killie – Hand and Lips

I have picked up at some point, from another blog, the track that made it to the Peel Festive Fifty of 1995. It’s rather unusual:-

mp3 : Long Fin Killie and Mark E. Smith – The Heads of Dead Surfers

JC

Bjork

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (38)

“After The Sugarcubes, I guess I had a mixture of liberation and fear. It had been obvious for a while in the band that I had different tastes than the rest. That’s fair enough – there’s no such thing as correct taste. I wrote the melody for “Human Behaviour” as a kid. A lot of the melodies on Debut I wrote as a teenager and put aside because I was in punk bands and they weren’t punk. The lyric is almost like a child’s point of view….”

Nobody anticipated the sounds that Björk would bring to the party with her first solo material after The Sugarcubes had called it a day. There was a fair chance that it would be a touch different from the music she had made over the years with her band, but surely it was still going to be indie-schmindie with the emphasis still being on a traditional line-up of a guitar, bass and drum, with a flavouring of keyboards……so it was something of a shock to the system to hear this:-

mp3 : Björk – Human Behaviour

The single was released in June 1993. My first recollection of hearing it would have been at least a month later when I was browsing in a record shop I was known to frequent on a very regular basis (although to be more accurate, it should have been called a CD shop as about 90% of the stock was in that format), when my ears picked up that Björk was singing over what seemed to be an experimental trip-hop outfit. I hung around for a bit and found myself intrigued and enjoying the music, although I still wasn’t sure what was going on and whether it was a new record or was it something on which the chanteuse was guesting. A chat with the sales folk established that what was playing was an album, appropriately called Debut, which was the new material from Björk. I mentioned that I was a fan of her former band but was told that this was nothing like the old stuff, but in a good way. I was also, very kindly, offered the chance to take the CD home with me for free, on the proviso that I would return it after the weekend if I didn’t like it or pay for it the next time I dropped in. The cash was handed over a few days later………

I think I would have struggled if I had heard Human Behaviour in isolation – I certainly wouldn’t have forked out the money for what would have been an expensive single. It’s not the most commercial sounding piece of music and was from a genre of which I knew very little, albeit the stuff I had managed to pick up, such as Massive Attack, was finding favour…..but deep down, I was still an indie-boy at heart. It was only hearing it in the wider context of the album and taking the time to luxuriate in all that was coming out of the speakers that I was able to realise just how special the debut solo single had been.

Here’s the mixes that were made available on the 12″/CD singles:-

mp3 : Björk – Human Behaviour (Speedy J. Close To Human Mix)
mp3 : Björk – Human Behaviour (Underworld Mix)
mp3 : Björk – Human Behaviour (Dom T. Mix)
mp3 : Björk – Human Behaviour (Bassheads Edit)

All are at least six-and-a-bit minutes in length. The Underworld mix extends to over 12 minutes. They are all worthy of your considered attention.

JC

Normal

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (37)

Today’s cracking debut single is one with a difference in that it proved to be the only single recorded by the act in question. It’s also one where the b-side subsequently became much better known than the a-side.

mp3 : The Normal – T.V.O.D.
mp3 : The Normal – Warm Leatherette

I’m sure the vast majority will know the backstory, but please, indulge me anayway.

The Normal was the performing name adopted by Daniel Miller in 1978 and under which he wrote, recorded, produced and distributed a 7” single that were quite unlike anything else happening at that time across UK music. The two songs were hugely influenced by the novel Crash, written by J.G. Ballard in 1973, with Miller being inspired to compose minimalist electronica to be played on what is today described as a ‘limited and quirky little synth’.

Daniel Miller never thought of himself as a musician, so it can be no real surprise that other than a 1980 live LP that was recorded in conjunction with Robert Rental (a Scots-born pioneer of electronica), there was never any other product from The Normal. Miller’s energies went into Mute Records, the label he had established to release the single, using its proceeds to run it as a full-time professional operation, primarily as a home for other experimental electronica artists and bands. The fact that he would discover Depeche Mode in 1980 changed forever his life, and the route the label was pursuing.

Huge credit has to go to Daniel Miller for the fact he stayed true to his principles as the money began to flow into the label, still seeking out and giving a home to acts that others shied away from on the basis of them being far from commercial and/or confrontational. It’s worth pondering just how different the music landscape in the UK would have looked in the 80s and beyond if The Normal’s one-off single hadn’t been issued and been enough of a success to allow its composer to fulfill his ambitions of an involvement in the industry.

JC

PS…..the reason the b-side became better known?

Teardrop Explodes

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (36)

I’ve said it before, but I think it bears repeating.

One of my fondest live experiences was a gig played by Queen at Ingliston in Edinburgh in 1982.

Don’t rush to judge me on the basis of that sentence as I went along purely to see the support act which was The Teardrop Explodes. The booking agent either had a sick sense of humour or hated Queen fans, or both.

Julian Cope took to the stage to a barrage of abuse, the intensity of which I’ve rarely witnessed, but he was ready for it and up for the fight. He continually taunted the crowd and the band (which was more or less session musicians as The Teardrop Explodes had more or less imploded by this point in time) treated everyone to some real obscurities. My favourite moment was when St Julian said “Here’s the one of mine that I’m sure you all know and love’ and as fans roared in expectation of hearing Reward, he launched into an acoustic and quiet version of Use Me, the b-side to Treason, and sung it in French!

It had been just three years earlier that The Teardrop Explodes came onto the scene, one of a number of Liverpool-based acts who were on Zoo Records, a venture formed and fronted by Bill Drummond who also seemed to have a role in each of the acts on the label, either as a performer or manager.

The debut consisted of a three-track 7” single:-

mp3 : The Teardrop Explodes – Sleeping Gas
mp3 : The Teardrop Explodes – Camera Camera
mp3 : The Teardrop Explodes – Kirkby Workers Dream Fades

It was a fine way with which to announce yourself and it would receive the biggest compliment imaginable in that Tony Wilson, who generally took an immediate and pathological dislike to anything that emerged out of Liverpool, gave it high praise. There was also some favourable coverage in the music papers with a number of journalists predicting that the band, and label mates Echo & The Bunnymen, stood on the cusp of greatness with long and successful careers inevitable.

Like many other acts who were attached to small labels at that particular time, the production values are basic and far from polished, but there’s certainly a noticeable spark about the music while there’s enough intrigue in the lyrics, certainly on the a-side, to make the most causal listener sit up and take notice.

Zoo Records eventually wound up and The Teardrop Explodes landed a contract with Phonogram Records, resulting in two very fine albums in Kilimanjaro (October 1980) and Wilder (December 1981), with three singles also hitting the Top 30. Indeed, the debut is one that has aged magnificently and is up there with the finest of all albums from the decade in which it was released. A re-recorded and more polished version of that early Zoo single was included:-

mp3 : The Teardrop Explodes – Sleeping Gas (album version)

I’ll finish off with a lift from a piece that appeared in The Guardian back in 2010 when a 30th Anniversary edition of Kilimanjaro was reviewed:-

The 30th anniversary reissue recently spurred one heritage-rock magazine to ask the band’s former frontman Julian Cope if he would ever return to writing pop music. It seems a fair enough query given Kilimanjaro’s success: it spawned a top 10 hit in Reward, spent 35 weeks on the charts and displayed such commercial promise that both U2 and Duran Duran apparently considered the Teardrop Explodes their only real competition. You might also feel compelled to ask in light of Cope’s latter- day musical output. That variously includes an hour-long homage to the late Princess of Wales called She-Diana; a live recording of his “proto-metal” band Brain Donor; and Spades & Hoes & Plows, a self-styled “masterpiece of agrarian doom-clod-plod” that features Cope accompanying singer David Wrench on “Mellotron and 26-inch marching bass drum”, and culminates in an 18-minute instrumental inspired by a series of road-toll protests in 19th-century Wales. Alas, Helyntion Beca (The Rebecca Riots) seems to have been overlooked by the programmers of the Radio 1 playlist, a fate that also befell such other recent Cope numbers as All the Blowing-Themselves-Up Motherfuckers….(Will Realise the Minute They Die That They Were Suckers).

Actually, Cope told the magazine, he’d just written a pop song, inspired by the mid-60s baroque style of the Left Banke, a band not so wildly removed from the kind of influences that powered Kilimanjaro – the blasting brass arrangements of Forever Changes-era Love, the Seeds’ reedy garage rock, the sunshine pop of the Turtles. “It’s called,” he added, “The Cunts Can Fuck Off.”

He’d obviously been listening to early Jesus and Mary Chain

JC

Kate Bush

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (35)

Yesterday’s posting involved a lot of research and work. Today’s is a straight lift from wiki, albeit in edited form:-

Wuthering Heights is a song by Kate Bush released as her debut single in November 1977 and re-released in January 1978. It appears on her 1978 debut album The Kick Inside. It stayed at number one on the UK Singles Chart for four weeks, and remains Bush’s most successful single. The song received widespread critical acclaim, with Pitchfork naming it the fifth greatest song of the 1970s.

Bush wrote the song aged 18, within a few hours late at night on 5 March 1977. She was inspired after seeing the 1967 BBC adaptation of the 1847 novel Wuthering Heights. She then read the book and discovered that she shared her birthday with author Emily Brontë.

Wuthering Heights is sung from the perspective of the character Catherine Earnshaw, pleading at Heathcliff’s window to be allowed in. It quotes Catherine’s dialogue, including the chorus lyric “Let me in! I’m so cold!” and “bad dreams in the night”. Critic Simon Reynolds described it as “Gothic romance distilled into four-and-a-half minutes of gaseous rhapsody”. The vocal was recorded in a single take.

Bush’s record company, EMI, originally chose another track, James and the Cold Gun, as the lead single, but Bush was determined that it should be Wuthering Heights, which in due course was scheduled for release at the beginning of November 1977. However, the singer was unhappy with the images chosen for sleeve and demanded that it replaced. Although some copies of the single had already been sent out to radio stations, the label did relent and rescheduled the release for mid-January 1978, a move that actually was of immense and unforeseen benefit as a November release would have seen it clash with Mull of Kintyre, the new single by Wings that subsequently became the then biggest-selling single in UK history.

Wuthering Heights proved to be something of a slow burner, with most of its early plays being restricted to the London-based Capital Radio. It took a full month to reach the charts, but after a debut appearance on Top of The Pops, it went on an upwards spiral, hitting the top spot in mid-March, where it stayed for four weeks. It wouldn’t drop out of the Top 40 until May 1978, and come the end of the year was certified as the tenth highest-selling single of 1978, with sales of well over half a million.

mp3 : Kate Bush – Wuthering Heights
mp3 : Kate Bush – Kite

Little known fact….and one which is a damning indictment on the pop industry.

Wuthering Heights was the first UK # 1 to be written and performed by a female artist.

JC

Dead Kennedys

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (34)

I’ve decided to have a bit of a breather from the normal run of things as I’m off on holiday for a wee while (Barbados since you’re asking, Dirk) and have decided that while I’m away, and for a few days beyond so that I can recover from the jetlag, I’m going to resurrect the ‘Cracking Debut Single’ series (albeit the usual Saturday/Sunday features will still be delivered in the usual way…..)

Here’s what you’ve had thus far:-

1. Lloyd Cole & The Commotions – Perfect Skin
2. PJ Harvey – Dress
3. Six Pistols – Anarchy in the UK
4. The Cure – Killing An Arab
5. The Sundays – Can’t Be Sure
6. Roxy Music – Virginia Plain
7. Orange Juice – Falling and Laughing
8. Teenage Fanclub – Everything Flows
9. Talking Heads – Love → Building on Fire
10. New Order – Ceremony
11. The Specials – Gangsters
12. Fun Boy Three – The Lunatics Have Taken Over The Asylum
13. Magazine – Shot By Both Sides
14. James – JimOne EP
15. Pavement – Slay Tracks 1933-69 EP
16. The Libertines – What A Waster
17. Aztec Camera – Just Like Gold
18. Curve – Blindfold EP
19. The Police – Fall Out
20. The Damned – New Rose
21. The Monkees – Last Train to Clarksville
22. The Skids – Charles EP
23. A Certain Ratio – All Night Party
24. The Strokes – Hard to Explain
25. The Waltones – Downhill
26. Violent Femmes – Gone Daddy Gone
27. The Who – I Can’t Explain
28. Nirvana – Love Buzz
29. Eels – Novocaine For The Soul
30. U2 – U2-3 EP
31. Subway Sect – Nobody’s Scared
32. Buzzcocks – Spiral Scratch EP
33. Suede – The Drowners

I really should feature The Smiths given that Hand In Glove was such an astonishing statement of intent, but this blog firmly remains a Moz-free Zone.

#34 in the series is a song released around the time of my 16th birthday in June 1979, to be later re-recorded for inclusion on the band’s debut album in 1980. It has a very distinct subject matter, being a satirical attack on a real-life politician. It was an incendiary and controversial release as the title clearly alluded to former stanzas within a national anthem that have been withdrawn in modern history due to them being linked with Nazism. It’s a song that was (and is), in its 7” vinyl form, quite rough and unpolished, and with the lead singer not making much of an effort at the time to explain himself, nor make any concessions to those who were incensed and offended by the name of his group it ended up being banned from most radio stations across the globe.

The song dated from 1977 when two members of The Healers co-wrote it for that band, but it was never properly recorded until the singer hooked up with another guitarist to form a new punk/surf band based out of San Francisco. The name they took caused controversy and led to difficulties in them getting bookings without the use of one or more pseudonyms. The singer had to explain that they were as far removed from a far-right, fascistic and hateful band as could be imagined and that their name was not meant as an insult to the memory of one of the great American political dynasties but simply drew attention to the fact that the late 70s were seeing the end of the American Dream.

Despite all this, no American label would touch them which led to the formation of Alternative Tenatacles on which the debut single (and all subsequent material for the next eight years) was released.

mp3 : Dead Kennedys – California Uber Alles
mp3 : Dead Kennedys – The Man With The Dogs

The single was licensed in the UK by the Edinburgh-based Fast Product, selling enough copies, without much radio support, to go Top 5 in the UK indie charts. It proved to be the only release by the band on Fast as the following year saw Cherry Red sign a deal to release a subsequent single and the debut album on which a harder and faster version was issued:-

mp3 : Dead Kennedys – California Uber Alles (album version)

Worth mention here that in 1981, Dead Kennedys recorded an EP entitled In God We Trust, Inc.. The first six songs were around a minute or so in length before the centrepiece was revealed, an updated version of the debut single, now specifically about President Reagan, with a lounge-jazz sound, alternative lyrics and a much slower pace (well for bits of the song, anyway):-

mp3 : Dead Kennedys – We’ve Got A Bigger Problem Now

There have been numerous covers/interpretations of California Uber Alles over the years, with many versions updating the lyrics so that they feature more contemporary politicians. Here’s a couple of my favourites, one being a straighforward cover and the other just a bit different:-

mp3 : The Delgados – California Uber Alles
mp3 : The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy – California Uber Alles

I promise something a little bit less frantic and controversial tomorrow,

JC

Auteurs, Luke Haines

THE SINGULAR ADVENTURES OF LUKE HAINES (12)

After Murder Park entered the album charts at #33, dropping down the following week to #52 before disappearing altogether. Sales are disappointing and Luke Haines decides to call a band meeting and to inform everyone that once all the touring commitments are over, firstly to the USA and then Europe, there will be no more Auteurs.

The front man was already planning his next move which was to take up the offer from the record label to work up the idea of a Baader Meinhof album, but there was to be one last hurrah for the band via the release of an EP about which one critic would later say ‘proved to be one the best things Haines has ever released… and probably the most miserable.’

Kids Issue features four songs, two of which, the title track and A New Life A New Family, hadn’t previously seen light of day. They were all taken from a John Peel session, recorded on 20 February and broadcast on 8 March 1996, just a week after the release of the new album and just as it was falling out of the charts.

mp3 : The Auteurs – Kids Issue (Peel Session)
mp3 : The Auteurs – Buddha (Peel Session)
mp3 : The Auteurs – A New Life A New Family (session)
mp3 : The Auteurs – After Murder Park (session)

Confession time.

Until getting things underway on this series, I had no idea whatsoever that this EP even existed. Wiki states that it reached #163 in the charts….I had no idea that the singles chart went so deep (or least it did in 1996)….which probably equates to sales of about 1,000 (which is a complete guess on my part!).

I did know the songs from their inclusion on a 3xCD retrospective Luke Haines Is Dead that was released in in 2005 but I’ve now managed to pick up a second-hand copy of the actual EP. These four songs are an absolute delight, and it is hard to reconcile them with the fact that they were recorded at a time when the band was about to give up the ghost………..well, for now anyway, as will be explained in Part 13 of this series which will be here at the same time next Sunday on this very same channel.

JC

Lonely Tourist

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #190 : LONELY TOURIST

Those of you who are able to cast your memories back to July 2014 will recall that the previous time this singer and song was featured. Today’s posting leans heavily on that occasion….

This song was brought to my attention via the exceptional Football and Music website. It is devoted to linking football and music and it does so to great effect, very often in the most entertaining and educational way and is the way that I came to learn about Lonely Tourist, the name adopted by Paul Tierney, a Glasgow-born singer/songwriter now based in Bristol (well, at least he was back in 2014).

mp3 : Lonely Tourist – The Ballad of Paul Tierney

The thing is, the song written by Paul Tierney the musician is about Paul Tierney the footballer. This is the summary from wiki:-

Born in Salford, Greater Manchester on 15 September 1982, Tierney signed for Manchester United as a trainee in July 1999 and as a professional 12 months later. He was loaned out to Crewe Alexandra (where he scored his first career goal against Blackpool), Colchester United, and Bradford City. He made his senior debut for Manchester United on 3 December 2003 against West Bromwich Albion in the League Cup. He signed for Livingston on 16 June 2005 having been released by Manchester United, but failed to impress in his first season at the club and they were relegated from the Scottish Premier League. He joined Blackpool on 2 June 2006 on a free transfer.

In July 2007, Blackpool manager Simon Grayson allowed Tierney to join Stockport County in a six-month loan deal. At Stockport he scored once against Macclesfield in the Football League Trophy. Tierney returned to Blackpool in January 2008, and in May 2008, he was released by the club. In September 2008 he signed for Conference National club Altrincham. However, he left the club after less than a month.

Tierney has also represented the Republic of Ireland at under 21 level.

Here’s the thing, Paul Tierney’s one first team appearance for Manchester United was alongside a few household names, with none more famous than Cristiano Ronaldo. As Webbie, the brains behind Football and Music said:-

Paul Tierney in his time did something we all dream about – playing football for an elite team. Playing football professionally and being paid for it.

It was during his spell in Scotland with Livingston FC that Paul Tierney the musician first noticed him and led to the writing of the song. It turns out that, via Radio 1 DJ Steve Lamacq, word got back to Paul the musician that Paul the footballer had heard the song, and not only did he like it, but he was flattered by it.

I picked up a copy of the song via bandcamp. If, having listened to via this posting and you find that you like it, I’d respectfully ask that you do similar.

https://lonelytourist.bandcamp.com/track/the-ballad-of-paul-tierney

Cheers

JC

Jesus & Mary Chain

LOTS OF PROFANITIES TODAY!

1985 was the year that the NME went nuts for the Jesus and Mary Chain.

Psychocandy was placed at #2 in the albums of the year poll, beaten to the top spot by Rain Dogs by Tom Waits.

As far as the tracks of the year went:-

#1 : Never Understand
#2 : Just Like Honey
#6 : You Trip Me Up

Interestingly enough, while three tracks from Psychocandy were among the best six songs of the year, none of the songs found on Rain Dogs made the Top 50. Go figure that one out……………..

You Trip Me Up was released as a single in May 1985. It was the band’s third 45 on the back of Upside Down and Never Understand.

mp3 : The Jesus and Mary Chain – You Trip Me Up

It’s worth recalling that the JAMC enjoyed a certain amount of notoriety at this point in time, partly from the violence that seemed to be present at almost of their live performances (and which was a huge factor in my decision not to venture along to see them) but also for them being bloody-minded and provocative when it came to getting product into the shops.

They had signed a fairly lucrative contract with Warner Bros. but through the subsidiary Blanco y Negro – bands hadn’t forgotten the backlash faced by The Clash when they had signed on the dotted line with CBS and the trick was to try and appear as if you were still of an indie-bent when in fact your paymaster was one of the biggest global operations imaginable.

Never Understand was only eventually issued as a single after much to-ing and fro-ing about the b-side with the label rejecting Suck, no doubt imagining and dreading the backlash from the tabloid press picking up on the closing line of Cunts!Cunts!Cunts!Fuck!Fuck!Fuck!……but eventually giving in when it was indicated that the only alternative would be a new song, still to be recorded, that had the title of Jesus Fuck…..

Everyone seemed OK with the fact that You Trip Me Up would the next single, but yet again the band, egged on by their confrontationally-minded guru Alan McGhee, wanted the newly named Jesus Suck as the b-side and while the record label eventually gave in, the folk at the pressing plant refused to authorise its pressing, on the grounds of blasphemy. It was all great publicity as far as McGhee was concerned and in due course, things were settled with the a much acceptable track offered up as the b-side:-

mp3 : The Jesus and Mary Chain – Just Out of Reach

The 12” came with an additional track, one that made an ICA as selected by swc in November 2016. Here’s his fabulous description:-

“Opening line ‘C…..F!

Some people say that the Marychain did thus sort of thing to be deliberately provocative and to show they were angry but I think on reflection it was weariness and frustration. Its songs like this that give us fans that were too young to witness the early chaotic violent gigs, some impression as to what they actually sounded like.”

mp3 : The Jesus and Mary Chain – Boyfriend’s Dead

It pains me to argue with swc – and I’m doing it from the safety of my bedroom and using a keyboard as he’d wipe the floor with me if we were sitting opposite one another and talking this one through – but it really was all down to provocation. In evidence, I present the song that could have, and in the eyes of the JAMC, should have, been a b-side, finally made available in 2011 when Pyschocandy was re-released as a two-CD edition with the extra tracks consisting of both sides of the debut singles, three separate John Peel sessions, demos and a small batch of previously unreleased material:-

mp3 : The Jesus and Mary Chain – Jesus Fuck

It’s fair to say that the lyric won’t be a candidate for the ‘Some Songs Make Great Short Stories’ series.