THE NEW VINYL VILLAIN

CAN YOU TAKE THE FULL 12 INCHES?

Soft Cell were a hugely underrated duo. They made some incredibly innovative bits of electronica music in the early 80s. They conquered the charts with catchy pop tunes and filled their LPs with edgier, grittier material that must have scared the weans.

I was always on the lookout for the 12″ versions of their hit singles as they often turned the track into masterpieces and rarely fell into the trap of simply padding the songs with a bit of electronic doodling. I’ve still got most of those 12 inchers sitting in the cupboard. Here’s some of the best:-

mp3 : Soft Cell – Say Hello Wave Goodbye

mp3 : Soft Cell – Bedsitter

mp3 : Soft Cell – Torch

And just in case there’s some of you out there who aren’t familiar with their unique 10-minute take on Hey Joe, Purple Haze and Voodoo Chile:-

mp3 : Soft Cell – Hendrix Melody

Bit more difficult to set fire to a synth mind you……

Enjoy

Strangelove

FROM THE SOUTH WEST CORRESPONDENT…WHAT’S IN YOUR BOX (5)

mp3 : Strangelove – Living with the Human Machines

Strangelove were one of those bands that should have but never did. Formed in 1991 they centred around singer Patrick Duff. They release three albums before splitting in 1998. This comes off their second album ‘Love and Other Demons’ and was the first single from it (and its not the best song off it – see Beautiful Alone for that – if that was released today Radio 1 would play it every twenty minutes). It peaked at Number 53. They were good mates with Radiohead and Richey Edwards from the Manic Street Preachers. That is kind of reflected in the sound, it’s a bit like Radiohead, a bit like Suede, a bit like Gene, a bit like this and a bit like that, a lot like The Smiths.

I have very fond memories of Strangelove and Patrick Duff in particular. When this record came out I interviewed them before a gig at the London Astoria where they were supporting the wonderful Whipping Boy (hope they are in this box!) and Patrick Duff spoke openly about his problem with amphetamines and a growing thirst for vodka. He needed half a bottle before going on stage just to calm his nerves, despite the blatant alcoholism he was articulate, intelligence, and very witty. He had a habit of falling asleep through interviews which I think didn’t help him that much (or maybe, probably, I was just a terrible interviewer). I think I wrote once that if it wasn’t for the alcoholism, then their first two albums would have been masterpieces, and I maintain that view today . The gig at the Astoria was packed for Strangelove and they were tremendous (not as good as Whipping Boy, but who was?). Patrick Duff released a solo record in 2005 and it’s worthy of a listen. I’m told he lives in Devon now on the wilds of Dartmoor, I’m kind of hoping I bump into him next time I’m in Chagford.

Note from JC

I only have two Strangelove singles in my vinyl/CD collection but what I do have is Quality with a very large capital Q…

mp3 : Strangelove – Beautiful Alone

mp3 : Strangelove – Sway

The latter is extremely lovely. It also has a very fine cover on the b-side:-

mp3 : Strangelove – Moon River (live acoustic version)

Oh I forgot about this – a track from some compilation LP given away by a magazine back in 1994:-

mp3 : Strangelove – Time For The Rest Of Your Life

Essential listening if you’re a fan of Suede and Moz. As the SW Correspondent says, a band that should have but never did….

Enjoy.

Echo & The Bunnymen

LAY DOWN THY RAINCOAT AND GROOOOOOVE…

Back in the early 80s, I spent almost every Thursday, Friday and Saturday night within the student union at Strathclyde University, I wasn’t a fashionista – I probably had about ten different shirts to choose from (five of which were black) and maybe three pair of jeans (two of which were black). But no matter what clothes were nearest to my skin I never went anywhere without my fabulous olive-coloured raincoat that I’d persuaded my dad to give me….

The raincoat was in homage to Ian McCulloch who I thought was one of the coolest men on the planet. He, along with his bandmates, always seemed to be photographed wearing some sort of coat although thinking back that’s probably more to do with them insisting their photoshoots take place in the likes of Iceland.

Without fail the student union ‘disco’ would feature at least one Echo & The Bunnymen song during the course of the evening and without fail it was cue for me to get up on the dancefloor and do my thing. Sad poseur that I was, I inevitably tried to dance while wearing my raincoat. It might have been draped over a chair or wrapped under a nearby table, but the second a Bunnymen track began to blast out, I’d race to where the coat was and put it on. I now accept that I must had looked like a dickhead…..

Then in 1983 I saw the video to the new Bunnymen single, and wouldn’t you know it Mac was on the stage of the Albert Hall doing his thing – but without a coat. From that moment on, the raincoat never again was seen on the dancefloor….

All of this came back to me the other day when the single from 1983 came on via shuffle as I sat on a train heading to the football. I smiled at the memories. It was also a sharp reminder that it’s a belter of a track:-

mp3 : Echo & The Bunnymen – Never Stop (Discotheque)

That’s the 12″ version which I bought on vinyl at the time and still have all these years later. The b-sides were a ifferent version of a track that had featured on the 1982 LP Porcupine as well as what I assume is an early demo-type version of what would later become a hit single:-

mp3 : Echo & The Bunnymen – Heads Will Roll (Summer Version)

mp3 : Echo & The Bunnymen – The Original Cutter

I’m very fond of Heads Will Roll, so I thought I’d also add the LP version to this posting.

mp3 : Echo & The Bunnymen – Heads Will Roll

Admit it. It does make you want to dance.

Enjoy.

Butcher Boy, Captain America, Champion Doug Veitch, Cinematics, Clare Grogan, Clean George IV, Close Lobsters, Cocteau Twins

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SINGLE (Parts 28-35)

Back on 8 October 2011, I started a series called ‘Saturday’s Scottish Single’. The aim was to feature one 45 or CD single by a Scottish singer or band with the proviso that the 45 or CD single was in the collection. I had got to Part 60-something and as far as Kid Canaveral when the rug was pulled out from under TVV.

I’ll catch up soon enough by featuring 5 or more at a time from the archives..

(28) Butcher Boy – Imperial b/w Juicy Fruit : Damaged Goods 7″ (2011)

One of my all time favourite bands. That I was able to promote one of their gigs in Glasgow in 2011 will always be a memory to treasure.

This is the thing they’ve ever made available on vinyl. Still not prepared to make Juicy Fruit available on the blog as the 500 copies of the single have never sold out….

(29) Captain America – Flame On b/w Buttermilk b/w Indian Summer : Paperhouse Records CD (1992)

Between calling themselves Captain America and ripping off the logo from a chain store, it can’t come as too much of a surprise that all sorts of injunctions soon forced changes and led to this 1992 single being deleted very very quickly. Captain America arose from the ashes of The Vaselines and sound a bit like the way Teenage Fanclub sounded in 1992. The name was soon changed to Eugenuis which was the nickname some had given to frontman Eugene Kelly

(30) Champion Doug Veitch – Margarita b/w Margarita (Mix Mescales) b/w One Black Night (remix) : Conga Records 12″ single (1986)

Read more about Champion Doug Veitch here

(31) Cinematics – Be In The World (demo) : Promo one-sided 7″ bought at a gig when band supported Editors : (2005)

AN INDIE BAND FROM SCOTLAND IT TOOK ME NEARLY 25 YEARS TO CATCH ONTO

The front and back of the three-track 7″ debut single for Sarah Records by The Orchids. Worth well over £100 if you’ve still got a half-decent copy. Released in January 1988 and has the catalogue number of SARAH 2.

Being lazy, let me just lift from wiki:-

The Orchids are a Scottish band that achieved success with Sarah Records. Formed near Glasgow in 1986, the Orchids released a series of underground singles on the influential Sarah Records . The group’s line-up comprised James Hackett (vocals), John Scally (guitar), Chris Quinn (drums), Matthew Drummond (guitar) and James Moody (bass). Their producer, Ian Carmichael, often played keyboards on their records. The group split up in 1995, playing their final gig at the Sarah Records farewell party.

The Orchids were musically one of the most interesting Sarah bands and certainly developed far more on that label than any band except, perhaps, The Field Mice. Starting with a fairly conventional melancholy guitar pop sound on Lyceum and contemporaneous singles, they moved on to become more keyboard and sample/effects-based for their second and third albums, Unholy Soul and Striving For the Lazy Perfection, developing a more electronic sound, possibly as a result of their producer, Ian Carmichael, who was a member of dance band One Dove.

Their entire back catalogue was re-released on CD on LTM in 2005. The band had already reformed in 2004 with new bassist Ronnie Borland, and released their fourth album Good to Be a Stranger in February 2007. The album was issued on Madrid based label Siesta, with the band playing live gigs for the first time in twelve years. In 2010 the group released a fifth album, The Lost Star through Pebble Records, mixed by a returning Ian Carmichael.

A few friends over the years had mentioned The Orchids to me, but having completely missed out on them in their day, and not willing to pay the really silly money that come with any material released on Sarah Records, I never chased things up. A while back tough I stumbled across a posting about them elsewhere and that’s when I found out about the re-releases on LTM so I promptly sent off for all three of the LPs.

The great thing is that they also include the very hard to find 45s that weren’t ever made available on the original LPs meaning I’ve had almost 60 songs to learn and love. Not surprisingly I suppose, I’m finding myself much more attracted to the earlier material – the stuff described as having a fairly conventional melancholy guitar pop sound, and have certainly fallen for the charms of SARAH2:-

mp3 : The Orchids – I’ve Got A Habit

mp3 : The Orchids – Give Me Some Peppermint Freedom

mp3 : The Orchids – Apologies

Great mention of Irn Bru in the lyric of the lead track…….

All of this leads me to announce that as of tomorrow, the Saturday Scottish single returns, with more re-posts from the old blog until I catch up with things again later this year

Enjoy

Tindersticks

I’M GETTING SO FORGETFUL IN MY OLD AGE

Can’t believe that I didn’t include this in the list of songs about wanking the other day:-

I’m crawling, I don’t know where to or from
The center of things from where everything stems, is not where I belong
I have the city sickness growing inside me
So this is where I ran for freedom where I may not be free

I have these hands beating with love for you
You’re not here to touch
Sent you away, what else can I do
When I need something that much?

I’m hurting, babe, in the city there’s no place for love
It’s just used to make people feel better, it’s not like us
I got this sickness as I got off the train
Now it chafes away at my heart, until nothing remains

I have these hands beating with love for you
And you’re not here to touch
Sent you away, what else can I do
When I need something that much? That much

I’m okay afterwards, afterwards lasts for minutes only
I’m okay during, you kind of fill up my mind
It’s just that, before may last forever
It’s just that, before may just fuck my mind

I have these hands beating with love for you
And you’re not here to touch
Sent you away, what else can I do
When I need something that much? That much

From 1993, one of my favourite ever songs by one of my favourite ever bands:-

mp3 : Tindersticks – City Sickness

I have to admit however that the band’s best days are behind them. Between 1993 and 2003 Tindersticks released some astonishing bits of music via LPs, singles and soundtracks. As a live act they were a truly special spectacle, especially when they were accompanied by an orchestra.

There was a five-year hiatus until 2008 but what has been released since then is a shadow of the past triumphs. The departure of half of the band to has left a huge vacuum that hasn’t been filled. It’s still lovely to listen to Stuart Staples extraordinary vocal delivery but the music has been too much of a letdown.

City Sickness is a great single. It also has a wonderful sleeve (front and back) as pictured above, Here’s the other tracks that came with it:-

mp3 : Tindersticks – Untitled

mp3 : Tindersticks – The Bullring

Enjoy

Fatima Mansions

BLOWS ME AWAY EVERY SINGLE TIME

Someone on Discogs described this 1990 single as having the voice of an avenging angel having a bad day and guitar chords like a firing squad.

I wish I could sum up songs as brilliantly as that.

The only reason this never made my 45 45s at 45 countdown all those years ago is that I missed out on it when it was originally released. My first exposure came via an end of the year round-up on some late evening show on Radio 1. I bought the CD single the next time I was in a shop and paid almost £5 for the privilege.

Since rekindling my love for vinyl I’ve got my grubby hands on bits of plastic both here and over in Canada. This is a record that should be in every music fan’s collection:-

mp3 : Fatima Mansions – Blues For Ceausescu

That’s the version on the 7″ double A side Kitchenware Records single…..it’s lyrical genius with Cathal Coughlan reflecting on how a popular uprising in Romania brought down a dictator yet closer to home in the UK and Ireland nothing changes……..

Flip over to the other song on this double A side effort and you’re in for a laugh:-

mp3 : Fatima Mansions – 13th Century Boy

It is scarily reminiscent of the chart-topping sounds of Stock, Aitken and Waterman until the last 30 seconds or so when it goes weirdly out of tune. I only wish that somehow Radio 1 had picked up on this as a potential chart-fodder, played it to death on daytime shows and propelled it into the higher echelons of the chart. Imagine the shock of all the kiddies and their mums and dads as they flipped over to hear what other poptastic stuff this new band were capable of and Ceausescu came blaring out of the speakers.

Here’s the even more bizarre offering that was on the 12″ single:-

mp3 : Fatima Mansions – On Suicide Bridge

In 2008 while browsing around a record store in Toronto, I came across a 12″ bit of vinyl on Radioactive Records that included this remix of the single, which isn’t all that great but one for the completists:- :-

mp3 : Fatima Mansions – Blues For Ceaucescu (Only Solution Mix)

Meanwhile, here’s an ever darker and rockier version recorded as a Peel Session – with amended lyrics (including no direct mention of the assassination of Lord Mountbatten at the request of the BBC):-

mp3 : Fatima Mansions – Blues For Ceaucescu (Peel Session)

Immense.

Beautiful South, Billy Bragg, Nubiles, Squeeze, Vapors

FROM THE SOUTH WEST CORRESPONDENT….WHAT’S IN YOUR BOX (4)

mp3 : The Nubiles : Tatjiana (all over me)

The Nubiles for those of you who have never heard of them or, like me, forgot they ever existed, were formed in 1993 in Oxford, when Tara Milton, former bass player with Five Thirty (nope, me neither) joined forces with some other faces from Oxford bands. Their sound can best be described as indie with a slightly punk edge, in that their songs sneer a little bit. Their website stated that they displayed the kind of primal energy not seen since The Who. To be honest, that’s pushing it a bit. These Animal Men, perhaps, but certainly not The Who.

They split, (combusted if I remember rightly) in 1998 after releasing, one relatively well received album Mindblender on which this song features. Tatjiana is their best song by a country mile (that country being, the size of Brazil). They reformed briefly in 2007, but quickly realised that they all hated each other still and that the tunes sounded even less like The Who than they did in 1995. They are apparently on ‘a hiatus’ at the minute. Oxford is slowly weeping into its Pringle sweaters I would imagine.

Now Tatjiana is a great two and a half minutes-ish of music, listen to it, you will hum for the rest of the day I guarantee it. It’s a sneering ode to the five knuckle shuffle (sorry). It contains the immortal lyric,“Just a Dream and a Tissue and you are all over me”. I mean what’s not to love about that.

BUT (it is a big one) the problem is, that as everyone knows, the only timeless song about er, bashing the bishop, is Orgasm Addict by Buzzcocks (come on name another one – JC – here’s another series for you – “songs about wanking” and no I Touch Myself by The Divinyls doesn’t count). In this case, The Nubiles are trying really hard to be The Buzzcocks, and if they tried that instead of the nonsense about The Who people might have got it a bit better.

Note From JC

Two songs from the New Wave era immediately sprung to mind:-

mp3 : The Vapors – Turning Japanese

mp3 : Squeeze – Touching Me, Touching You

Then there’s a song from 1990:-

mp3 : The Beautiful South – Tonight I Fancy Myself

Billy Bragg has also referenced the act:-

mp3 : Billy Bragg – St Swithin’s Day

I’m sure there’s a few others out there….I once heard it argued that Pump It Up by Elvis Costello & The Attractions was about wanking but I’m not convinced.

All yours dear readers…..

New Order

IN BETWEEN DAYS (Part 2)

Interesting debate last week when I suggested that In Between Days was not only the finest moment of The Cure but also the best New Order song that New Order never wrote and recorded,

I hung my hat on it being the Lowlife era….others have thought it was more Power, Corruption & Lies. Thinking more about it, it’s probably a mix of the two as the tremendous opening tracks of both LPs illustrate:-

mp3 : New Order – Age Of Consent

mp3 : New Order – Love Vigilantes

And when featuring those two songs on the blog, I really can’t let the occasion pass without listening to their other great LP opener of that era:-

mp3 : New Order – Dreams Never End

It really doesn’t seem like 32 years ago. It too sounds a big influence on In Between Days

Enjoy

Uncategorized

APOLOGIES FOR THE EARLIER FUCK-UPS….

Sorry folks.

The posting on Fatima Mansions was in draft form and shouldn’t have been published

The links to to the Abbey Road EP were mistakenly left off.

Blame tiredness. Oh all right then, blame carelessness….that’s really what it was.

Hope I didn’t ruin anyone’s day.

Spiritualized

ABBEY ROAD EP

Christmas 1997.

Santa, via Jacques the Kipper, brings me a copy of Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space, the hugely acclaimed LP released a few months earlier by Spiritualized.

Sadly, it’s an LP I can’t quite take to albeit there were a couple of songs I thought were more than half-decent….but despite maybe a dozen or so efforts, I still didn’t get what all the fuss was about.

Fast forward fifteen or so years. Decide to give it another go. This time I do get it. I can’t put my finger on other than acknolwedging that, even as I hit my 40s, my musical horizons continued to expand. Let’s just say, it was like discovering a lost masterpiece in the attic.

It’s an LP in which just about every musical instrument and every musical genre seems to have been thrown into the mix. Much of the material is about a painful and messy end to a relationship, with the basis being the real-life events that surrounded the band’s frontman Jason Pierce and the band’ keyboard player Kate Radley.

My favourite song on the album is Broken Heart which must be one of the the most gut-wrenching, emotionally-draining but defying songs ever written and recorded. The fact the person who the song was written about contributes so much to its haunting sound just seems incredible.

I hadn’t realised until very recently that this was one of two songs later re-recorded and put out as EP in August 1998. I was delighted therefore to come across a second-hand copy of the 12″ of Abbey Road EP and rushed home to play this version of Broken Heart.

And to my astonishment and delight I discovered that it’s even better than the LP version with the addition of what sounds like a full-blown orchestra and gospel choir to the mix.

mp3 : Spiritualized – Broken Heart (Abbey Road Mix)

The leads track on the EP was this:-

mp3 : Spiritualized – Come Together (Abbey Road Mix)

One of the most accessible tracks on the album but it couldn’t get any airplay thanks to the regular use of the word fuck/fucked/fucker. It therefore made sense to all and sundry to have a fresh stab at it, but the use of mess/messed to replace the swear words, to my ears, diminish it somewhat.

The EP was completed by something which wouldn’t have been out of place as the credits roll on a movie where the very final scene has left the entire audience in a state of shock and tears:-

mp3 : Spiritualized – Broken Heart (instrumental)

The Abbey Road EP didn’t sell all that well, only reaching #39 in the singles chart. But then again, none of the singles from Ladies and Gentlemen…. went Top 20.

Enjoy

Cure

THE BEST NEW ORDER SONG THEY NEVER WROTE

R-384978-1271341071

it can’t be denied can it?

mp3 : The Cure – In Between Days

Quite possibly my favourite few minutes from The Cure. And yes, it is because it so reminds me of Lowlife era New Order. A #15 hit in the UK back in the summer of 1985. Still sounds gorgeous after all this time.

It’s one I’ve had on 12″ vinyl since its initial release. Here’s yer rather splendid b-sides :-

mp3 : The Cure – The Exploding Boy

mp3 : The Cure – A Few Hours After This

Three excellent tracks on one 12″ single. What more can you ask for?

Enjoy

Go-Betweens

A SPLENDID SAMPLER

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

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

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

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

mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Cattle and Cane

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

mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Bachelor Kisses

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

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

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

mp3 : The Go-Betweens – Bye Bye Pride

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

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

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

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

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

PJ Harvey & John Parish

FROM THE SOUTH WEST CORRESPONDENT….WHAT’S IN YOUR BOX (3)

mp3 :PJ Harvey and John Parish – Heela

Now then, this song or rather the album that its from, brings to mind a story.

In 1996 we lived in Plumstead, a suburb of London. A crap one at that – a breeding ground for far right extremists, nutjobs, the depressed and masses of people with chips on their shoulder about something. It was horrible. Anyway at the time I was doing a bit of DJing and a bit of writing so I was sent CDs and the like. After being in the flat for about a month – I got burgled,

it’s a horrid experience as anyone who has been burgled will tell you. Luckily we didn’t lose that much, a mountain bike, an unused boxed stereo, some clothes and my electric razor (I mean who steals a man’s razor, come on!).

When the dust had settled, about a week later, we gave the house a thorough clean to make ourselves feel better. Now I was cleaning and tidying the sofa and I took the cushions off to you know, fluff them up, (yes, fluff them up, shut up) and down stuffed behind the seat was an envelope. It was from one of the promo companies that sent CDs to me and it had been opened. I didn’t put it there and I didn’t open it. So it must have been the burglar(s).

Inside was the album Dancehall at Louse Point by PJ Harvey and John Parish – from which Heela is taken. On that album written in black pen (MY PEN!) were the words “This looks shit got any Phil Collins”.

I photographed it – I’ll dig that out.

Now, being burgled I can, kind of understand and accept (well get over), people do that to one another, its not right but you know worse things happen in life.

But to slate PJ Harvey and to prefer Phil Collins, PHIL COLLINS instead is just unacceptable. I won’t have it.

So my burglar was a dick, and ill-informed one with lousy taste in music at that and I hope he drove off a cliff somewhere in a stolen van with an endless tape loop of ‘Another Day in Paradise’ ringing in his stupid ears.

Incidentally at the time I had about £5000 worth of music in the house, not one other CD or record was touched, not even my signed copy of ‘One Way’ by The Levellers.

Heela is lovely, a bit different from the usual PJ standard and the album is recommended. She made a few records with John Parish, none of the others spring to mind as much as ‘Dancehall..,’ though.

See you next week

Note from JC

I laughed out so loud when I first read this in the e-mail that I had snot coming out of my nose. I thought I’d round off this truly tremendously contribution with one for the burglar just in case he happens to be reading:-

mp3 : Phil Collins – Just Another Day In Paradise

Fuck….the link appears to have been stolen.

R.E.M.

AS SEEN OVER AT THE OLD PLACE : JUNE 2007

I was reasonably prolific in June 2007 with 24 posts in all. The month began as May 2007 had ended with a daily series called ‘Holiday Hymn’ in which I provided a daily series of postcards from the island of Aruba.

These were followed by a tale of a journey home that turned bad with alcohol confiscated by customs as I fell foul of the recently introduced no liquids in hand luggage rule; some posts about covers (inevitably!), stuff about bands that were largely forgotten; a post for turning 44 and others that I think still read well. Oh and a few words at the end of the month to say that just as the blog was really hitting its stride I was having to put things to one side for a bit as I was going over to Toronto to work for 16 weeks.

There was also a a rant about From The Jam (which I’m now a bit embarrassed about given that Bruce Foxton has since done a really nice and thoughtful thing for a dear friend of the blog),

Here’s the full list of songs that were featured in June 2007….I don’t think I’m wrong when I say it would make for a great Radio 6 show or a jukebox that would be eternally blasting out music:-

Belle & Sebastian – Another Sunny Day
Super Furry Animals – Hello Sunshine
Billy Bragg – That’s Entertainment
Curve – What A Waste
Aztec Camera – Sunset
Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers – That Summer Feeling
Josh Rouse – Sunshine (Come On Lady)
Alexi Murdoch – Orange Sky
The Adventure Babies – Camper Van
Malcolm Middleton – Stay Close, Sit Tight
Tindersticks – Until The Morning Comes
REM – Electrolite
The Monochrome Set – Jet Set Junta
Blancmange – Waves
The Wedding Present – Back For Good
Simple Minds – I Travel
Beck – Devil’s Haircut
Beck – Devil’s Haircut (Remix by Noel Gallagher)
Lloyd Cole – Butterfly
Lloyd Cole – Butterfly (Planet Ann Charlotte Mix)
R.E.M. – Radio Song
R.E.M. – Radio Song (Tower of Luv Bug Mix)
Giant Sand – Red Right Hand
Lambchop – (Get A) Grip (On Yourself)
Lambchop – The Theme From The TV Show ‘Dallas’
Jackie Lee – White Horses
The Trash Can Sinatras – White Horses
The Wedding Present – White Horses
Primus – Wynona’s Big Brown Beaver
Pete Wylie – Sinful (Tribal Mix)
The Smiths – This Charming Man (New York Vocal)
Prefab Sprout – He’ll Have To Go
Scritti Politti – Faithless (Triple-Hep N’Blue)
Care – My Boyish Days (drink to me)
Care – Flaming Sword
Care – Whatever Possessed You
The Lightning Seeds – Flaming Sword
The Jam – Away From The Numbers
The Jam – In The Street Today
The Jam – Down In The Tube Station At Midnight
The Jam – Strange Town
The Jam – Thick As Thieves
The Jam – Scrape Away
The Jam – Tales From The Riverbank (fan club flexidisc version)
The Jam – Happy Together
Moby – Sunday (The Day Before My Birthday)
New Order – 1963
James Kirk – Old Soak
Blink – Happy Day
Family Gotown – Box
The Frank & Walters – Fashion Crisis Hits New York
Arab Strap – There Is No Ending
The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu – The Queen and I
The KLF – Kylie Said To Jason (full length version)
Graham Coxon – Freakin’ Out
Foil – Are You Enemy?
The Pixies – Velouria
Queens Of The Stone Age – No One Knows
The Clash – White Man In Hammersmith Palais
The Clash – Stay Free
The Clash – Straight To Hell (unedited version)
The 1990’s – Pollokshields
Morrissey – Come Back To Camden
Cornershop – Heavy Soup
The Weather Prophets – Well Done Sonny
Malcolm Middleton – A Brighter Beat
Elizabeth – (Dance) Into The Heart Of Your Enemy
Billy Bragg – Ontario, Quebec & Me (live)
Prefab Sprout – Goodbye Lucille #1
The Breeders – Safari
Arcade Fire – Wake Up
Leonard Cohen – Suzanne
St Etienne – Only Love Can Break Your Heart
Martin Stephenson & The Daintees – In The Heal Of The Night
British Sea Power – Remember Me
The Lilac Time – The Girl Who Waves At Trains
St Vincent – Now. Now.
I Am Kloot – Over My Shoulder
Neil Young – After The Goldrush
Edwyn Collins – Don’t Shilly Shally
The Wedding Present – It’s For You
The Trash Can Sinatras – Only Tongue Can Tell
Martha Wainwright – Bloody Mother Fucking Asshole
The Wannadies – Hit
Grinderman – Love Bomb

In addition to that rather exhausting list, there were three other songs wthin the posting I’m revisiting in full. It dates from 21 June 2007 and is one in which I give a big shout out to ctel.

Thursday, June 21, 2007

SONGS FOR YOU

Judging by the comments that he often makes afterwards, one of the regular and long-standing visitors to TVV – Ctel – seems to enjoy when I post rare tracks by the best band to come out of Athens, Georgia.

Yesterday, I picked up second-hand copies of a couple of 12″ singles from the IRS days. Maybe Ctel already has the tracks, but if not, what follows are for mostly for him, but I’m sure he’ll be happy for you all to share:-

mp3 : R.E.M. – Finest Worksong (Lengthy Club Mix)

This single was released in April 1988, a full 7 months after the album Document came out, and so it was given a different recording and mix featuring a horns section. A shorter version of this was later put on the compilation LP Eponymous, but to the best of my knowledge the track in all its glory is only available on the 12″ single. The band left IRS two days after the UK release of Finest Worksong and signed for Warner Brothers.

mp3 : R.E.M. – Time After Time etc.

This is the b-side to the Worksong single. It’s a live medley taken from a recording made by Vara Radio in Holland of the band’s concert in Utrecht on 14 September 1987. According to the set-list reproduced in the book Adventures In Hi-Fi : The Complete R.E.M. by Rob Jovanovic and Tim Abbott (Orion Publishing 2001), the three-track medley, which comprises Time After Time, Red Rain (a cover of the Peter Gabriel song) and So. Central Rain was the fourth and final encore of the show. Much of it is Michael Stipe singing acapella, with Peter Buck seemingly the only other band member on stage. It’s a very quiet recording, so you may have to crank up your volume for best effect.

mp3 : R.E.M. – This One Goes Out (live)

In other words, an early version of The One I Love, the song which brought the band to the attention of a wider audience. It was actually the first ever public airing of the song and was on 24 May 1987, a full three months before it was issued as a single. It’s taken from the 12″ release of It’s The End Of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine).

The record sleeve tells us that the recording is from a show at McCabes Guitar Shop in Santa Monica held as a benefit for Texas Records who had been hit with a lawsuit. The Jovanovic/Abbott book reveals that the show opened with four songs by Steve Wynne of Dream Syndicate, followed by a couple of songs by a ‘tipsy’ Natalie Merchant of 10,000 Maniacs (the latter of which she was joined on stage by Stipe), before the main R.E.M set.

This One Goes Out was in fact the first full R.E.M. song of the evening. However…..it’s a recording with a difference. When Merchant left the stage, it wasn’t Berry, Buck or Mills who joined Stipe but Geoff Gans, a member of staff at IRS Records.

The book says…’Gans started some acoustic strumming and the unlikely pairing served up a stunning version…’.

And it is.

The other track on the b-side of the single is a live version of Maps and Legends from the same how, but this can also be found on the CD of the re-released Fables of the Reconstruction that came out in 1992.

So thanks Ctel for coming by so often – and thanks for inspiring these rare and great songs.

2013 update

Little did I know when I wrote these words that we would one day meet in the flesh and that he would be single-handedly responsible for saving the blog a few years later when I got quite overwhelmed with things happening in my real life…but’s a tale for another day.

If any of you are keen to hear any of the songs in the list, please let me know and I’ll get round to reposting them.

David Bowie

DAVID BOWIE – THE CASE FOR THE DEFENCE

Following my less than flattering words of yesterday, it would be remiss of me not to allow an opposite point of view to be articulated. In this case, the words are supplied by Friend of Rachel Worth:-

Okay case for the defence – I think you’ve missed some great stuff.

There seems to have been before the last LP a bit of view of Bowie that echoed the “What have the Romans Ever done for Us”, but in his case it is “He’s been shit since Lets Dance and in fact that wasn’t that good anyway”. Admittedly there have been some misfires and glass spiders , duets with Tina Turner , gurning with Mick Jagger , Tin Machine , stabs at Techno were all pretty horrendous. However, there have been moments of magic which , whilst not up there with the best of his 70s output still knocks socks off a lot of what else was around at the time. So here are my 10 for you to give a go or revisit without the ghosts of Ziggy, Aladdin etc.

1) Absolute Beginners – a fantastic song ruined by an awful film. Sinatra crossed with his own Heroes (I didn’t read Heroes at Live Aid at all like you did, I saw it as being much more universal – but then I still maybe naively view the whole thing as magical , flawed yes but magical still). Among lots of stuff that sounds like he was treading water for once a vocal that sounded like he meant it

2) Loving the Alien – I was so disappointed with the LP this came from. The awful Police-lite type reggae on a couple of tracks, a going-through-the- motions Beach Boys cover and that awful Tina Turner duet of the title track Tonight. However the opening track is majestic, hypnotic and epic. Starting the LP off with it only made what was to follow even more of a disappointment.

3) Thursdays Child – He has a habit with later LPs to include one lush ballad on each of them and here is another one from 1999’s Hours (another recording that was referenced as a return to form) . The best song Morrissey never wrote. The rest of the LP is okay even if a bit stodgy in its backing but this is one long melancholic sigh.

4) Pablo Picasso – he can spot a good cover and this is a bit of a mess , but it is a fun mess. The album it came from (2003 Reality his last before the new one) is a mixed bag of sounds and styles from buzzing guitars to jazzy piano.

5) Everyone Says ‘Hi’ – Heathen is probably the best of his later records and if you were going to give one a go it would be this one. Whereas Reality is a an interesting mess, Heathen is one of those proper grown up LPs – adult without ever being AOR. The one bit of light is Everyone Say Hi, a song to his son and the older brother of Kooks.

6) Buddha of Suburbia – I’m sure the BBC couldn’t believe it when he agreed to do the soundtrack for the tv adaptation of Hanif Kureishi’s novel. Often overlooked and little heard it is the sound of someone rediscovering his mojo.

7) Outside – first thing you have to strip away the annoying concept dialogue tracks – wonder how many people who bought the CD have recut it on their mp3 players. There is a sense that in the 90s Bowie has been looking back , seeking out old collaborators to rediscover something. This was Brian Eno’s turn. It has some great songs on it (the industrial slab of Heart’s Filthy Lesson , the jittery We Prick You , the straight forward Strangers When We Meet, the pre-Pet Shop Boys Hello Spaceboy , the frankly- odd Have Not Been To Oxford Town, all of which can hold their heads high in the company of his 70s output) all with interesting backing.

8) Jump They Say – Nile Rogers is all over this slab of polished pop

9) This is Not America – it’s with a jazz fusion guitarist , its got one of those naff pointless key changes to keep things going – but I love it

10) The new LP is a strange one. It has some great moments (Stars Are Out , Dirty Boys , Where Are We Now especially). Maybe not one of the best 12 LPs of the year ( but then not sure any of the nominations can give claim to that any year). What was odd was the complete lack of hype has led to it being over-hyped. I love the fact that relatively no one knew it was coming, an announcement just appeared.

The press then had 2 choices. Having been caught out they could either slag it or praise it hell. Whichever choice they made the column inches and airtime grew and grew. It’s pretty good, runs out of steam a bit – no better than Heathen , but much better than what most other pensioner pop stars have been churning out, and if it had come from a bunch of skinny white boys playing guitars then they would be being hailed as the next big thing.

The best thing are his lyrics and his voice , both of which are dark enough to feel dangerous , well as dangerous as a 66 year old can make you feel. Listen to the LP and you do start to worry about his state of mind… ever the frustrated actor

So there you go , trying not to and failing to damn with the faint praise of “its good but not as good as his old stuff”. There is enough here for a mighty fine spotify playlist, and re-listening to these songs has been much more enjoyable than the work I should be doing.

FoTR

Note from JC

It was unfair of me to dismiss Absolute Beginners as it’s one of the 6,000 odd tracks on the i-phone. Of the others mentioned, I’m only familiar with a handful – none of Loving The Alien, Buddha of Suburbia and Jump They Say do anything for me.

However FoTR, as much as you had me thinking you had made a decent case you make a very bad error of judgement with the inclusion of This Is Not America. Next thing you’ll be saying Under Pressure is a work of genius!!

Have tracked down some of the tracks you mention:-

mp3 : David Bowie – Everyone Says ‘Hi’

mp3 : David Bowie – Thursday’s Child

mp3 : David Bowie – I Have Not Been To Oxford Town

Enjoy.

Bauhaus, Billy MacKenzie, Black Box Recorder, David Bowie, Franz Ferdinand, Vivian Girls

PENSIONER POP

As has been widely reported this past week, 66 year old David Bowie has made the twelve-strong shortlist for the 2013 Mercury Prize. It would therefore seem, as far as the critics and others who make up the Mercury judging panel that his latest LP, The Next Day, is one of the best 12 albums released in the UK this past year.

I can’t say whether this is the case, although I strongly suspect not. I’m more inclined to think that his inclusion is more to do with giving a high media profile to this year’s award than the merits of what was his 26th studio LP. The reason that I can’t say for sure is that I’ve given the LP a total bodyswerve, as I have all his new material ever since the travesty that was Tin Machine in the late 80s and early 90s. If any of you have remained loyal and faithful to his output in recent years, please let me know if in fact the latest LP is worth investing in….after all, I’m going to be bombarded with it on displays any time I venture into any High Street music store between now and the awards ceremony at the end of October.

Bowie is a performer who I’ve long felt ran his course in the mid 80s. Just about all of his albums from the 70s have more than stood the test of time – it should also be recognised just how prolific he was in that decade with an an album in every year except 1978 – but then again there had been two absolute classics in 1977 in the shape of Low and Heroes. I also remain fond of parts of Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) from 1980. The worldwide phenomena of Let’s Dance in 1983 was truly something to behold with the production and sound capturing the popular music of the era quite perfectly, albeit it was a long long way away from the music I was listening to. It’s a recod which made Bowie the #1 box office attraction for a few years – the royalties from the classic rock stations playing the hit singles from that era must still be mega given how often I stumbled upon them during my recent few weeks in Canada.

My admiration for Bowie began to fall away around the time of Live Aid. Many have said that he was one of the outstanding performers that day but I was disturbed by the fact that out of all his back catalogue he chose to perform Heroes and in a way that seemed congratulatory to all the rock stars who had shown up that day in London and Philadelphia.

What I find interesting about his career, which now spans a jaw-dropping 46 years, is that so many modern musicians cite him as a huge influence and have covered his songs, either in concert or as b-sides or album tracks. But almost inevitably, these covers are of songs from the 60s and 70s with scant regard to the later material. And instead of me posting some great songs from the 70s which I’m sure are well-known to all readers of this blog, I thought I’d share some of the covers I’ve most enjoyed:-

mp3 : Black Box Recorder – Rock ‘n’ Roll Suicide

mp3 : Vivian Girls – John, I’m Only Dancing

mp3 : Billy Mackenzie – Secret Life of Arabia

mp3 : Franz Ferdinand – Sound & Vision

mp3 : Bauhaus – Ziggy Stardust

Actually, the only reason I’ve included that FF cover is that the dooh-doohs at the start are supplied by Girls Aloud…..very bizarre!

And here’s a cracking acoustic C&W version from Mr Bowie himself:-

mp3 : David Bowie – Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) (live and acoustic)

Enjoy.

Justin Currie, World Party

A POLITICAL PROTEST SONG (10 & 11)

Actually….the image I’ve selected for today is a bit misleading. The songs, as the author says, are rants…..but they are very quier rants and excellent songs to listen to. Over to long-time friend of this place and the old blog, Friend of Rachel Worth:-

Mixing pop and politics, I tend to be the one asking “what the use is?” I’m not sure whether it was growing up and seeing the disappointment of Red Wedge, watching pop stars meeting presidents or a general dislike of being preached to or feeling like I’m being told what to think. I’ve more than often found myself loving the sentiment but feeling strangely untouched by the song . If I think of all my favourite songs they tend to be less rally cries of big political statements and more the personal politics of love gone wrong. Where they do work for me is if they are more social politics ( Town Called Malice spring to mind) or subtle and ambiguous in what they are trying to say (10000 Maniacs Whats the Matter Here the Housemartin’s Flag Day are good examples of where you listen and think with a somewhat dark message hidden in a pretty tune)

Having said all that my favourite political song is still The The’s Heartland but Matt Johnson seems to have developed an odd belief in 9/11 conspiracy theories and The the tracks seem to attract the take down notices., so I’ve picked up a couple of others. Both arent subtle as both are personal rants set to music. One is full of weary angry disillusionment built on somewhat hippy ideals and the other is bile and bitterness at the hopeless of everyday life. What they have in common is a set of fantastic lyrics and like all rants they maybe outstay their welcome , building until they burn themselves out.

First up is No, Surrender from Del Amitri’s singer Justin Currie

Big Macs for the fat, lo-cal wraps for the call centre battery hens,
Japanese snacks for the choice-spoilt citizens, caviar kickbacks for the citadel denizens.

Airport shoeshines servicing the suits among the little silver stereos and hand-rolled cheroots,
First class passengers file on last after the scum are packed in with their tax-free loot.

Checkout calamity, you’re cheated out of loyalty points, ten more years at this joint you’d be home & dry,
Beggars beat round the cash machines but you just slip between them with the usual lie.

Terrible tales of kidnapped kids keep you focused on the family and filling up the fridge,
Neighbourhood watchers shop dole dodgers, stick their semis on the market & start racking up the bids.

Should you stand and fight, should you die for what you think is right
So your useless contribution will be remembered?
If you’re asking me I say no, surrender.

Constant growth the cancerous cure, a swarming race of profiteers ensure
Cheap cars for the rich, cheap lives for the poor, cheap weeks in the sun, free drinks at the door.

Puerile propaganda plugs up the TV, keep folk following the money so they’ll never be free
Keep them swallowing the swill, the celebrities, the paedophiles, the immigrants invading from the
camp over the hill.

War talk, the big debate, footsoldiers in the capitol liberating new kinds of hate
Cum-shots of human dots caught in the spotlight’s glare; he dies who dares.

Fatuous fast-trackers sneering at the shelf-stackers, little Middle-Englanders can’t stand the backpackers,
Fortress Freedom, come on in, take your chances-you might win.

Should you stand and fight, should you die for what you think is right
So your useless contribution will be remembered?
If you’re asking me I say no, surrender.

Sunset beaches security patrolled, keep out the undesirables who don’t accept the code
Equal opportunity to live in total poverty, execute the ignorant incarcerate the slow

Car caressing managers choking up the avenues, brain dead patriots standing in salute
Paperwork raining again and again so that billionaires can claim there’s an enemy to shoot

Pill pushers, doorsteppers, personal goal shoppers, lifestyle trendsetters, meditating mindbenders,
Hare-brained share sellers pumping out stocks til you’re choking on a chain-letter avalanche of dross.

God squads trawling through every country tracking down fools who are bullshit hungry
Blinded by divinity followers fall into the man-traps set along the Wailing Wall.

Athletes compete in grand charades while tanks flatten streets and a nation laughs,
Visa holders gape at the changing guards while creeps bribe bums to take their photographs.

Film fans flock to the latest schlock, blockbusters block out even the vaguest thought
Bankrupt schools grind out fool after fool then feed them to a system where idiots rule.

Polling booths, phone votes, bogus questionnaires, you get a say as if anybody cares
Joe Public doesn’t want to play so liquidate his life as he looks the other way.

Don’t get sick, don’t get wise or they’ll gut you with a *justice* where everything is lies
March down Main Street, complain if you want but it’s twenty years straight for the losers at the front.

mp3 : Justin Currie – No, Surrender (Part 1)

mp3 : Justin Currie – No, Surrender (Part 2)

Second up is World Party and Always on My Mind

Where do you begin to explain the mess,
The mess you made of it?
I was only out for half an hour,
I said “please look after it”.
You had to think that you know best
And forget all the golden rules,
You ignored the difficult truth
And opened the door to fools.

Now I see the strong ones make,
I see the weak ones break,
I see you running out of time.

You got a finger in every pie,
Well what did I expect?
You made an art-form out of talking shit,
And partying ’til you’re wrecked.
In the small hours it’s so easy to feel
You’ve got some big ideas,
But in the morning you should put them away
Cos’ you know they’ll end in tears.

I see the strong ones fake,
While the weak can’t stay awake,
You know you’re always on my mind.

And football’s all about training shoes
Yeah, it’s added up to this.
And religion’s all about bums on seats.
And if you’re livin’ in the West
Mum’s apple pie is full of ‘E’s,
And Dad ain’t at his best;
His new car was designed by God
But Jesus, he looks a mess.

I see the strong ones take,
I see the weak, the weak ones ache,
You know it’s always on my mind.

While we’re busying ourselves with mines,
The chemists are working late.
They gotta breed an indestructible gene
To wipe us all away.
They’re just following their inquisitiveness,
Well that’s what they like to say.
But it sounds like they’re just following orders
Like the Nazis used to say.

I see the gas clouds shake,
I see the rivers ache,
You know it’s always on my mind.

What kind of music are you playing there, son?
What is that old machine?
Doesn’t matter I can’t hear the words,
Cos’ I don’t care what they mean.
Yeah I believe you,
You’re a real street fighter,
Gonna change the system from within.
Hey watch this guy, he’s a bare faced liar
Yeah, that’s, that’s him in the limousine.

I hear your bullshit take,
I hear your drum-machine break,
You know it’s always on my mind.

If Jesus came now
He’d say “Lord get me outta here,
Cos’ I, I just can’t handle this”.
The Lord would say
“Hey Jesus what d’ya mean?
It was always going to be this way”.
“All Mighty Father, you are full of shit,
Cos’ the folks down here, don’t wanna be saved.
Why have they forsaken themselves?
And used hypocritical armour-plating”.

I see the strong ones take,
I see the weak ones break,
You know it’s always on my mind.

If you were passing in a space vehicle,
And you came close to Planet Earth,
You wouldn’t stop by for tea
Cos’ of the screaming that you heard;
And the lying, and the cheating, and the gnashing of teeth,
And the straight-ahead mental deformation.
You’d head on to Venus
With its welcoming sulphuric acid precipitation.

Who’d want to stop where the strong ones reign,
But they won’t ease the weak ones pain?
You know out of sight would be really out of mind.

Well I’m sittin’ here watching little kids starve,
And worlds get thrown away.
I’m thinking there’s just gonna be more
Before any goodness has its way.
I’m sick of feeling sick of you,
You’re too smart to be like this.
But you’ve got no legends that will guide your soul,
Now you’re really taking the piss.

I see the weak ones strong someday,
Not in any silly Communist way,
More like in the movement of Elvis’ hip-sway,
When civilisation comes and stays,
When all the corporations have gone away,
When laughing gas is handed out on the Big Love Day,
When egos are driven underground cos’ they get no approbation,
When boys and girls are laughing in every nation,
When the Truth is pursued for relaxation,
When living with the world is our aspiration,
When there’s no mileage in hate, and no gas-stations,
And the creatures are protected from mammals to crustaceans,
And the soul has found it’s LIBERATION.
You know this is always on my mind

mp3 : World Party – Always On My Mind

Note from JC

And with that, I’m ending this short series of political protest songs. HUGE thanks to everyone who submitted their thoughts and words – lots of great tunes as well.

Jon Spencer Blues Explosion

FROM THE SOUTH WEST CORRESPONDENT….WHAT’S IN YOUR BOX (2)

Firstly – two confessions

1) I cheated – this is the third CD I pulled out of the box, the second was one the JC had featured only a short while ago.

2) Its not in alphabetical order – but I think that is because someone in Kent has played them as on this occasion the CD was placed the wrong way round in the case (the pictured side should face out ). Anyway….CD Three is…

Jon Spencer Blues Explosion – Now I Got Worry

This is the 6th studio album from New Hampshire noise merchants the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. Although my CD is an album sampler with only 4 tracks on it. Spencer had been around for a bit before the Blues Explosion, he was in the tremendously named Shithaus and then in Pussy Galore and Boss Hog. The names of the bands suggested that Spencer had a habit of being controversial. The sound that they make was according to Spencer ‘punk blues’ – I remember reviewing this with a guest reviewer (some indie upstart from Camden) who said it was a ‘racket’. Personally I loved it (at the time and its aged well). The sound that Spencer makes I think can be heard in some of the White Stripes music around the time of White Blood Cells perhaps.

The lead track was 2 Kindsa Love which was released in the UK as a single and reached the giddy heights of Number 122. I expect Jon Spencer would have been a bit ‘Meh’ about that, but it deserved to go higher in my opinion. A live version of this album and some other tracks was circulated in May of 1997 called Controversial Negro the cover featured (a drawing of) Mick Jagger with tape across his face. I have that somewhere and to be honest that really was a racket, about 36 minutes of shouting, feedback and white noise – but again, Spencer probably wanted it that way.

mp3 : Jon Spencer Blues Explosion – 2 Kindsa Love

File under criminally ignored if you ask me.

Note from JC

The original second posting would have been Fashion Crisis Hits New York by Frank and Walters, but seemingly the day SF sat down to type his words was the very day it appeared on the blog.

As for Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, they’re a lot that I tried but never quite managed to be wholly enthralled by and other than a couple of tracks included on compilations I don’t have any of their songs. So I’m one of the criminals who ignored them…but I do see why the music appeals to so many. I’ll also add that I’m with SF that a lot of the material has aged well which should be taken s a reflection of quality….but still not my cup of Darjeeling.

Outside

A SAD, TRAGIC AND VERY SCARY TALE

An e-mail recently arrived from one of the most frequent visitors to the blog asking if I’d consider some of his words as appropriate for the series on political protest songs. Having read what Luca had to say, I was so moved, shocked and angered that it felt it best it should stand out as a posting on its own rather than within that series. Please read on……

Hello JC,

When I read your invitation to help with the choice of a political protest song to your blog I immediately thought it was an opportunity to write about a subject that is very important for me, and likewise it immediately came to mind to me which song I would have chosen.

Still, I thought long and hard about doing this. The main question was: why should anyone be interested in what I write? In the end I decided to give it a go for two reasons.

The first one should be clear at the end of this post.

The second is that the issue I wanted to write about is only partly about me and my family (believe me, if it affected only me, I wouldn’t have bothered you and all the readers with it, still I guess it’s only human to be more directly interested in those matters that affect us personally).

It is about my hometown.

Since the end of World War II onwards, Casale Monferrato’s most important factory was called Eternit. Its main product was a kind of fibre cement, often applied in building and construction materials, mainly in roofing and facade products.

The fibre component was asbestos.

From: http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternit (translated by G****e, with some corrections by me):

“Although since 1962 it was known all over the world that asbestos dust generated by wear of the roofs and used as background material for paving, causes a severe form of cancer, pleural mesothelioma (in addiction to asbestosis), in Casale Monferrato (Alessandria), Cavagnolo (Turin), Broni (Pavia) and Bari Eternit and Fibronit continued to produce manufactured goods until 1986 (1985 for Bari and 1992 Broni), trying to keep its workers in a state of total ignorance about the damage (especially long-term) that asbestos fibers cause, in order to prolong the activity of the plant and thereby increase profits.”

I come from a working-class family. My father was a cook in a rest home. My mother worked at Eternit for twenty years.

By the beginning of the eighties, people started dying.

The factory was forced to close.

My mother was diagnosed with pleural mesothelioma in 1987. She was told by doctors she had three months to live. She died one year and a half later, in 1989.

I started going out with the girl that would later become my wife on October, 31th, 1992.

His father was already ill with the same kind of tumor which killed my mother, even though he never worked at Eternit. He died twenty days later.

The exposure to asbestos was starting to affect even the non-workers.

As one is supposed to say, life goes on. That girl and me got married (I proposed to her on October, 31th, 2002, that’s how boring I am..), we have now a beautiful daughter and I must say that I never thought that I could be as ridiculously happy as I am today.

Still, as the years went by, people kept on dying.

From: http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternit:

“In the area of Casale Monferrato and in the whole area of the Alessandria province there have been about 1,800 deaths from exposure to asbestos.”

Casale is a small town. It has less than 35,000 inhabitants.

It means that almost everyone had to cope with the loss of someone to mesothelioma. A father, a mother, a brother, a sister, a daughter, a son. A friend, like my good friend Anna who died this year aged 49.

Some families have been simply destroyed.

And the worst is yet to come.

Since pleural mesothelioma has an incubation period which goes from 15 to 40 years, it is believed that the number of deaths per year will peak in 2020. The ones who will die will be usually non-workers, basically because those who have worked at Eternit will be mostly already dead by then.

By that time, me and my wife, we will both be 48 years old and our daughter will be 13.

I’m not going to lie: I do have fear. And my wife feels the same, although she never admits it.

But we both know that it’s useless to live in fear and regret.

It’s better to live in love. And hope.

If any reader is living or working in an environment where there’s asbestos, with the risk of inhaling its fibres, I strongly suggest to have it removed immediately.

The political protest song (in the most loose sense of the word) I have chosen has got no lyrics.

Still I hope I will be forgiven for saying that when I first listened to it I immediately thought that its message was one so universal that so many people of Casale Monferrato could have made it their own.

mp3 : Outside – To Forgive But Not Forget

The main reason I decided to do this post this should be understandable by now.

Sometimes I tend to adhere to that theory that the more people will be aware of issues, more people will remember, the less likely it will happen again, someplace else.

Or maybe, it’s just something that periodically I need to get off my chest. To let off some steam.

About the Eternit trial:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17016110;
http://www.corriere.it/International/english/articoli/2013/06/04/eternit.shtml.

Luca