THE NEW VINYL VILLAIN

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM : #344: CLOCK DVA

A GUEST POSTING by MIDDLE-AGED MAN

It almost reads like a typical band history: early independent label releases critically acclaimed music, drug overdose, major label signing, acrimonious band splits, dropped by major label after first album fails to sell millions, further band splits and subsequent releases on obscure labels with declining sales and gaps between albums lengthening.

But I can’t think of a band that is further from a typical ‘rock band’ than Clock DVA.

Whilst the musical approach and style has changed throughout their history, there has been one constant – Adi Newton and his vocals – which I think is what attracted me in the first place and remains so to this day. His voice is certainly deep and often hovers on the line between singing and talking but does so with an intensity which conveys an importance to every word, there are no throwaway or slight lines, everything is important. And it is not just the actual words that are important but also their meaning. (although most, if not all of the time, I have no idea what it is). Yes, if you haven’t already guessed I was a miserable raincoat wearing teenager.

The ICA pretty much follows a chronological order as it highlights the musical evolution of the band, and mixing up the different eras just didn’t work to my ears. The pre-Clock DVA history of Adi Newton is fascinating; based in Sheffield he was a member of ‘The Future’ along with a couple of the Human League and was clearly a key player in the industrial/electronic music scene that developed in the city. In recent years there has been a number of ‘re-issues’ of cassette tapes by Clock DVA that pre-date their vinyl releases but I have not included these.

Side 1

1. 4 Hours (single mix) (Fetish Records, 1981)

My first exposure to Clock DVA would have probably been on the John Peel show and/or reviews in the NME of which I would read every word . Famously, Paul Morley compared its parent album ‘Thirst’ as being a debut album on a par with ‘Unknown Pleasures’. Clock DVA had collected some well known supporters with the sleeve being designed by Neville Brody (art director for The Face magazine) and sleeve notes by Genesis P’Orridge. The music is definitely early 80’s post punk powerful and bass driven, but with a jazz twist – yes that’s right jazz, I can honestly say that I have never owned a jazz album, but this comes closest – Lyrically ‘In my dreams I am older’ stands out

2. Blue Tone (Thirst, Fetish Records, 1981)

A slightly gentler, almost romantic song, which features a lovely plaintive saxophone or clarinet by Charlie Collins. The parent album went on to top the Indie album chart. And then the band split up or to be more precise most of the musicians left to form another band ‘The Box’

3. Breakdown (Advantage, Polydor Records, 1983)

The major label album produced by Hugh Jones and not too surprisingly there is a more commercial feel to the band, Breakdown is one of the 2 singles released from the album, which sounds and feels like a concept album set in France during World War 2, Breakdown features a great vocal contribution from Katie Kissoon with the contrast between her and Adi’s tone working brilliantly.

4. Resistance (Advantage, Polydor Records, 1983)

Starting with the sound of a wartime radio, to my ears the verses manage to convey the tense, secretive atmosphere of the French resistance before a cheerful uplifting chorus. With vocals like this Adi Newton should have been a voice-over artist. Whilst touring the album, the band split up. (a pattern is emerging)

5. The Hacker (Buried Dreams, Interfisch Records, 1989)

After a lengthy break, Clock DVA returned with a completely new sound and reduced personnel – just a trio. The sound was now almost purely electronic, but the voice remained the same. The Hacker was the single lifted from the album and whilst Kraftwerk made computers seem upbeat and positive, Clock DVA convey a much more menacing outlook.

Side 2

1. Axiomatic and Heuristic (Man Amplified, Contempo Records, 1992)

Only one member departed and was replaced this time and carrying on with the electronic approach which remains the way forward to this day. I’m not too familiar with how electronic music developed during the 90s so am unable to say how pioneering this is, but it certainly sounded ‘new’ to my ears, today it sounds almost stately and soothing. And for those that are wondering, Axiomatic means ‘taken for granted and self-evident’. Heuristic means ‘the process by which humans use mental short cuts to arrive at decisions’. And yes I needed to look the meanings up

2. Transitional Voices (Man Amplified, Contempo Records, 1992)

Driven by a great bass riff and with the opening lyric of ‘Can you hear them?’ this has a brooding tone, the air heavy awaiting the thunderstorm.

3. Pool Of Shades (Sign, Contempo Records 1993)

Now down to a duo. I’m always unsure how much input the singer of a band has into the music of a band, I assume they will have written the lyrics and the melody of the lyrics, but do they contribute to the music being played? Obviously if I’ve seen them performing with a guitar or playing keyboards then yes, but if they just sing on stage? So the sight of Jarvis strumming a guitar or Dave Gahan always seems surprising. What I have no idea of is how much input Adi Newton has had to the musical side of Clock DVA, but I suspect it is significant.

4. Syndrome (Noesis, Armcomm 2023)

After a very long gap, Clock DVA were reactivated in 2010 making occasional live appearances, but only returned with an album featuring lyrics and songs earlier this year this time on their own label, which was the spark for this ICA. Adi’s voice and vocal style remains the same. This is the opening track from the album and what better way to start lyrical than after a gap of 2 decades than with ‘And it seems the same tune’

5. Return To Blue (Sign, Contempo Records 1993)

Piano led and more reflective, it makes the perfect closer to this ICA .

MIDDLE-AGED MAN

Orange Juice

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME…..

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The month of June 2023 will go down as one of the most memorable in my life.

I turned 60, a significant milestone which was marked by a long-planned event at which 26 family members and close friends came along to a dinner at one of my favourite restaurants in Glasgow city centre. This took place on the Saturday evening, the night before my actual birthday, with the Sunday spent catching up further with those friends who had travelled from afar and had needed to stay overnight in hotels, which meant they became the first to hear what had happened in the hours right after getting home from the restaurant…….

While we had all been enjoying the fine food and wine, Comrade Colin had got in touch via text – he had been invited along but was unable to accept as he was travelling back from an overseas holiday on the same day. Colin’s text referred to a Facebook posting within a group dedicated to Postcard Records.

Without going into too much detail, someone had taken the very difficult decision, for personal reasons related to ill-health, to sell off a substantial part of their record collection, including some very rare and hard to find singles. The plan was to put the 45s on Discogs and/or e-bay, but in the meantime an invitation was made to send PMs in which would-be buyers could express an interest in some or indeed all the items.

Falling and Laughing was on the list. Postcard 80-1. The holy grail when it comes to vinyl records. One that Rachel (aka Mrs VV) had thought long and hard about tracking down to give as her present for me turning 60, but in the end she had shied away as she couldn’t be sure if what was on offer on Discogs was even authentic, and if so, whether it was one of the estimated 200 copies that had come with the flexi disc and free postcard.

The one that was about to be put up for sale certainly ticked all these boxes.

Which is why, at just before 1am on the day I turned 60, I found myself half-drunkenly composing a PM in which I introduced myself, referencing the blog as evidence of my long-held desire to get my hands on a copy of Falling and Laughing and making what I felt was a realistic offer for the copy, all the while saying I was sorry the seller facing circumstances in which the various 45s were up for sale.

Within a couple of minutes of me sending the PM, I received a detailed reply, including the following.

“Hi Jim.

Thank you for your message. There have been an enormous amount of offers, but yours is most definitely acceptable. “

I won’t go into all the details of the reply, as to do so could reveal the identity of the seller. But it was quite clear I was now corresponding with a genuine lover of all things Postcard and that this copy was the real deal, and indeed had at one point in time passed through the hands of one of the label’s inner circle as the free postcard actually ‘had Robert Forster’s Brisbane address written on the back as part of Orange Juice or Alan Horne preparing the two heads deal.’

Within the hour, the deal was sealed, which is why, on the day I turned 60, I finally had the promise of getting my hands on a copy of the long-sought 45. And when I told Rachel, she immediately agreed to pay for it as she was still struggling to come up with the ‘perfect ‘gift, having now turned her attention to a possible holiday involving taking in a gig somewhere.

As I was about to head off to Toronto on the 20th, I asked the seller to hold back from sending it to Villain Towers, until I returned, which he was more than happy to do. It finally arrived safe and sound late last week. Here’s the vinyl rips.

mp3: Orange Juice – Falling and Laughing
mp3: Orange Juice – Moscow Olympics
mp3: Orange Juice – Moscow

Here’s the flexidisc, which carries the title I Wish I Was A Postcard:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Felicity (live)

Now that they’ve both been played once and at the same time ripped as mp3s, the vinyl and flexidisc have been carefully returned inside the protective sleeve and the single has been put in a very safe and secure place. I’m not saying I won’t ever play them again, but it’ll only be on special occasions.

I have to say that it crossed my mind that this would be just about the perfect way to call time on the blog after what is now coming up for 17 years, but with so much still going on, not least Dirk‘s fantastic ongoing rundown of 111 great 45s, I feel there’s still some life yet in TVV, albeit I might retire from buying any further second-hand records…..I said ‘might’ as no doubt something will tempt me…….

All that remains today is to belatedly thank all of you who offered up birthday wishes via the comments section and/or through e-mails and messages. You’ll hopefully understand why it has taken so long to get round to doing the birthday wrap-up, and agree that it’s been worth the wait.

Tune in tomorrow for a fascinating guest ICA, about a group never featured before on the blog.

JC

Various

SOME BLASTS FROM THE PAST

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In the spring of 2010 Drew from Across The Kitchen Table came up with the idea of some of the bloggers from Glasgow and surrounding areas hooking up and playing some tunes. He wasn’t only the brains behind the concept, but he was the workhorse, going out and finding the ideal venue, booking the dates and designing the flyers.

For this month’s marginally over an hourly mix, I’ve pulled out a selection from what was played on 12 June 2010.

It was a five-hour set, all spun on decks, as we were committed to using vinyl only.

The tunes on offer today are in sequential order from that evening and hopefully gives you an idea of how it all built up. In the main it was just Drew and myself, and while we turned up at The Flying Duck armed with vinyl we always intended to air no matter what, it became a night where we largely ad-libbed with the aim of satisfying those who were in the room.

mp3: Various – Songs From Blog Rocking Beats

BMX Bandits – Serious Drugs
Crystal Stilts – Love Is A Wave
Lone Justice – After The Flood
Pavement – Summer Babe (Winter Version)
Associates – 18 Carat Love Affair
Blur -Popscene
Orange Juice – L.O.V.E. Love
Johnny Cash -Ring Of Fire
The Clash – Bankrobber
Cameo – Word Up
Squeeze – Up The Junction
The Specials – Too Much Too Young (live)
Amy Winehouse – Monkey Man
Magazine – A Song From Under The Floorboards
R.E.M. – (Don’t Go Back To) Rockville
The Go-Betweens – Streets Of Your Town
The Wedding Present – Kennedy
Ballboy – All The Records On The Radio Are Shite

JC

Pet Shop Boys

PET SHOP BOYS SINGLES (Part Twenty-three)

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We’ve now reached 2013. The Pet Shop Boys announced that, after 28 years, they were leaving Parlophone Records and that their next album will be released globally on their own label x2 (pronounced “times two”) through Kobalt Label Services.

As it turned out, the next release was a digital single:-

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mp3 : Pet Shop Boys – Axis

Here’s the thing. I’m coming to this and subsequent eras of PSB completely fresh and hearing these songs for the first time. I’ll admit it was with a bit of trepidation as I wasn’t wholly enamoured by the music from 2012, much of which felt as if the duo were in the studios simply for the sake of it.

But I’ll hold my hand up and say that Axis is a real return to form. The sort of sound, beat and energy that first got me listening to PSB. It’s really interesting that this was issued in such a low-key way on 30 April 2013, with the digital-only release along with a promo video on their YouTube channel. In due course, (July 2013) there would be a physical release on 12″ vinyl, which came with a remix, so no bonus b-sides this time.

There was an equally low-key follow-up single on 3 June, again in digital format only.

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mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Vocal

One thing to note is that the digital download is more than six-and-a-half minutes long. The video version on YouTube is three-and-a-half minutes in length, which makes me think an edited version was provided to radio stations in case they wanted to air it.

Vocal is another great and joyous return to form that wouldn’t have sounded out of place in giant tents across various summer festivals in that or any subsequent years.

As with Axis, it didn’t chart. It also was given a later digital release, on CD and 12″ vinyl, being packaged with eight different remixes.

14 July 2013 saw the release of the new album, Electric, on x2 Records.

As mentioned, I wasn’t paying any attention. But in pulling this piece together, and having listened to the two download singles as I typed away, I looked over the reviews from 2013, and paid particularly close attention to what the great Alexis Petridis had penned for The Guardian. Here’s some snippets:-

Last September, Pet Shop Boys released their 11th studio album, Elysium. It was rather coolly received, perhaps as a result of its tone. It took its title from the afterlife to which the ancient Greeks thought the heroic and righteous were transported after death. Mostly written while touring Europe’s sports stadiums in support of Take That, its tracks chugged along at a genteel mid-tempo, its lyrics were sombre and sour.

The song, Your Early Stuff, bemoaned the downside of Pet Shop Boys’ longevity and ongoing national treasure status: even if everyone’s delighted to see you enlivening the Olympic closing ceremony by singing West End Girls while being pedalled around the stadium on an orange rickshaw, you might nevertheless feel a sense of diminishing returns setting in. In fact, Elysium could have been taken as the sound of Pet Shop Boys bidding their audience farewell. You were sighingly forced to conclude, perhaps it was inevitable: Chris Lowe is 53, Neil Tennant nearly 59; their work in recent years has increasingly looked beyond pop music, stretching into film soundtracks, ballet scores and orchestral works.

And so it comes as something of a relief to find Pet Shop Boys not merely releasing a 12th studio album, but promoting it with a photograph featuring Lowe with his head entirely encased in a disco mirrorball. As statements of intent go, it’s matched only by Electric’s opening track, Axis, five-and-a-half minutes of writhing Italo disco-influenced synth chatter and vocodered vocals issuing a series of dancefloor commands: “Feel the power … plug it in … turn it on.”

It’s not the last time Electric sounds like Elysium’s negative image. The album relocates a duo last seen sniping from the sidelines – albeit very wittily – at a world that seemed to be moving on without them to the centre of the action.

Quite what provoked all this is a matter for debate. Tennant has talked about being struck by a negative iTunes review of Elysium that demanded “more banging and lasers”, but it’s also worth taking into account the presence of producer Stuart Price, who helmed Madonna’s Confessions on a Dancefloor and is thus something of a past master at returning pop stars of a certain vintage to clubland. Whatever the reason, a band that sounded pretty weary eight months ago sound recharged and inspired.

At this point in time, I have no option other than to procure myself a copy of Electric. I’ll return next week with some thoughts on the later singles that were taken from it.

JC

Venigmas

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #361: VENIGMAS

This is a cut’n’paste repeat (with minor factual correction) from a post that was put together by a mate of mine called Michael Donnelly and which appeared on the blog in March 2014 as part of a short-live series called Cult Classics. Here’s Michael (please note that none of the info from 2014 has been updated):-

My pitch would be for Glasgow band Venigmas and their single Strangelove, backed by Souls on Fire.

Came out in early 80s on the short lived Biba music label, pressed by Mayking Records and was produced by Tony Spath.

At the time of release, the band were :

Owen Paul( McGee) -guitar and lead vocals who would become a one hit pop wonder with My Favourite Waste of Time and brother to Brian McGee, original drummer with Simple Minds. Owen provided some backing vocals on some early Simps recordings and is still gigging as Owen Paul and recently was part of XSM (Ex Simple Minds) with Brian and Derek Forbes.

Martin Hanlin – drummer who later played with The Silencers and is now a producer in The States.

Michael Campbell – bass player from Coatbridge , founder member of Strasse from the Iron Burgh. Michael would give up a career in local government in Monklands to head south with the band to promote the single. Now works for South West Trains and keeps his hand in via a couple of tribute bands in West London. He is my main connection with the band and we remain close friends to this day. He was my best man in 1984 and was a star turn at the wedding reception in Airdrie.

By the time of the release, Frank (Fruit) O’Hare had left the band and would later hitch up with H20 back in Glasgow. (and later work with Mrs Villain briefly). Frank has been involved in a number of band projects in Glasgow over the years and is currently part of folk-rock outfit Celtic Fire.

The single was part of a package; The Venigmatic Principle…..There were 3 elements TVP1 (the record) TVP 2 (a VHS video) and third was an electronic version of both songs on a cassette. All 3 failed to catch the attention of the public and despite getting some airplay via Billy Sloan on local radio and Peter Powell on national radio, the single did not chart. The band remained based in London and cut about the pub/club scene for a few years before they went their separate ways. They played the Marquee, 100 Club and had a brief residency at the Half Moon in Herne Hill.

The band’s strapline was Forever Crowding Mirrors, and it all seems rather pretentious now, but at the time I was excited because my mate was in London making records……

mp3 : Venigmas – Strangelove
mp3 : Venigmas – Souls On Fire

Enjoy!!

MICHAEL

New Order

A SMALL SELECTION OF NEW ORDER REMIXES

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New Order‘s 4 x CD box set Retro was released in 2002.

Each of the CDs has a theme. CD1 is Pop and was curated by the journalist Miranda Sawyer. CD2 is Fan and its tracks were chosen by a friend of the band, John McCready. CD3 is Club with the responsibility for the selection falling to Mike Pickering of M People/Factory Records/Hacienda fame. CD4 is Live was put together by Bobby Gillespie of Primal Scream.

It’s a nicely packaged artefact, complete with a 72-page glossy booklet, packed with snippets of info/commentary and some tremendous photos from throughout the band’s career to that point in time. It is all dedicated to Rob Gretton, the band’s manager whose initial idea it had been for the box set but who passed away some three years before it eventually saw the light of day.

The photo above provides details of the contents of CD3. Here’s three of them for your enjoyment.

mp3: New Order – Confusion (Koma & Bones Mix)

This is substantially different from the original version recorded and mixed by Arthur Baker back in 1983. This one dates from 2002 and it enjoyed a vinyl and CD release via Whacked Records. It’s got more of a classic New Order sound to it than the original.

mp3: New Order – Paradise (Robert Racic mix)

Robert Racic, who passed away from illness at the age of 32 in 1996, was an Australian DJ and record producer. He gave the remix treatment to the opening track on the 1986 album Brotherhood where it was used the following year as a b-side on the Factory Records Australasia remix release of True Faith.

mp3: New Order – Fine Time (Steve ‘Silk’ Hurley remix)

Steve Hurley is a Chicago based DJ/producer who came to prominence in the 80s thanks to his then unique mixing styles which went beyond the normal skill set of house DJs. He also has the distinction of being at the helm of Jack Your Body, which was the UK’s first ever house music #1 single. His remix of the first 45 to be lifted from ~~Substance~~ Technique in 1989 was originally available on the CD version of the single.

Happy to take requests for any of the others for a future posting if there’s any interest.

JC

Love Is All

SPINNING AND SCRATCHING

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It’s quite likely that there’s going to be a few posts over the coming weeks when the tracks will be sourced from various compilations. I’m not making it any sort of series…..it’ll be inane ramblings when I’ve a space needing filled.

I’ve got this absolute belter of a song from it being included on Rough Trade Indiepop 1, a 2xCD effort released and bought back in 2004.

mp3: Love Is All – Spinning and Scratching

Love Is All are from Gothenburg. The single was originally released in very limited numbers on the Swedish label Philosophy Of The World before being up by the NYC-based label, What’s Your Rupture. It was the band’s debut.

The bio over on allmusic reveals that Love Is All line-up is Josephine Olausson (vocals, keyboard), Johan Lindwall (bass), Markus Görsch (drums), Fredrik Eriksson (saxophone), and Nicholaus Sparding (guitar/vocals).

Olausson, Sparding, and Görsch had previously been members of Girlfriendo. The trio promptly regrouped after that band’s demise and added Lindwall, who had recorded in a side project with Olausson and Sparding called Cat Skills. They finally added the missing piece with saxophone player Fredrik Eriksson.

It goes on to state “While earning many rave reviews from the blogging community for its blend of art punk and indie rock, the band released several singles, one of which made single of the week in NME. The singles were collected on the debut LP Nine Times That Same Song, released by New York-based What’s Your Rupture? in late 2005. After much touring through 2006 and 2007, Eriksson left the band and Love Is All continued on as a quartet.

A Hundred Things That Keep Me Up at Night and the remix album Love Is All Mixed Up arrived in 2008, along with Eriksson’s replacement, Åke Strömer (saxophone, keyboards). The lineup stayed intact for the next record, Two Thousand and Ten Injuries, which was released on new label Polyvinyl in March of 2010.”

It would appear that the 2010 release was their last.

I’ve gone digging to find the other tracks from the debut EP.

mp3: Love Is All – Make Out. Fall Out. Make Up.
mp3: Love Is All – Ageing Had Never Been His Friend

I hope there will be much agreement that these are three damn fine, splendid cuts. On this basis, Love Is All should have been massive.

JC

Jesus & Mary Chain

THE 7″ LUCKY DIP (1)

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It was back in January this year that plans were revealed for a new Sunday feature, in which I’d pick out a 7″ single from the now dangerously overcrowded storage area here in Villain Towers.

The idea was quickly shelved and replaced by the weekly series on the Pet Shop Boys singles, but I reckon it’s a good time to bring it back, albeit with a new name. Given there’s so many bits of vinyl to choose from, it’s a real possibility that you’ll be confronted with many a Lucky Dip over the coming weeks and months, especially as I’m really running out of ideas to try and keep you entertained.

Today’s offering was picked up in a second-hand shop a few years back for only a couple of pounds, turning out to be a wee bit of a bargain as it actually contained two pieces of vinyl.

Here’s wiki:-

April Skies is a song by Scottish alternative rock group the Jesus and Mary Chain and the first single from the group’s second studio album, Darklands (1987). The song was released by Blanco y Negro Records in April 1987, reaching No. 8 on the UK Single Chart, No. 6 in Ireland, and No. 16 in New Zealand, making it the band’s highest-charting single in all three countries.

mp3: The Jesus and Mary Chain – April Skies

It is certainly one of the most recognisable and accessible of all the Mary Chain records, and it’s plain to see that it had all the makings of a classic hit single as there is very much a pop side to it, albeit the dark and scuzzy side of pop. If it was the first ever real exposure of the band to a number of folk who bought the 45, I wonder if they curled up and screamed when they played it’s b-side:-

mp3: The Jesus and Mary Chain – Kill Surf City

There was a very fine write-up of the song back in May 2017 on a now defunct blog, Sounds Of The Radio:-

The flipside of April Skies contained the track ‘Kill Surf City’, which was intended to be a parody of sorts of the track ‘Surf City‘, by Jan And Dean. Written by Jan Berry and Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys, the original track is, as you’d probably expect, a stereotypically ’60s track about surf culture.

The Jesus And Mary Chain, however, their track is completely removed from the original version. Musically and melodically, it’s relatively similar, however the original’s lyrics of “You know we’re goin’ to Surf City, gonna have some fun,” are replaced with “I’m gonna kill surf city with a loaded gun, got to hit surf city like a nuclear bomb.” Suddenly, the upbeat positive nature of the original is replaced by the dissonant droning of guitars and violent imagery.

Any ideas of romantic bliss are also completely removed, with the new track featuring lyrics such as “I hate honey and she hates me, but that’s the way it’s supposed to be. I’m gonna run, gonna run till I hit the sun, some evil cunt’s gonna get my gun.” If you were ever going to mix up two tracks on a mixtape you made for your crush, make sure it isn’t these two.

Indeed.

As I mentioned at the outset, the copy of April Skies that I have is the limited edition 2 x 7″ version. Here’s what you’ll find on the bonus piece of plastic:-

mp3: The Jesus and Mary Chain – Mushroom (live)
mp3: The Jesus and Mary Chain – Bo Diddley Is Jesus

The former, recorded at a gig in Nuremberg, Germany in 1986, but I haven’t been able to track down the exact date or venue. It’s a cover, with the original dating back to 1971 when Can recorded it for the album Tago Mago. The Mary Chain played it on most of their live shows in late 85 and early 86.

The latter, with its refrain of “Head To Toe, I’m Dressed In Black” is ostensibly about the Brothers Reid but with a nod to a musician who they long had been in awe of.

JC

Happy Mondays

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (73)

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I was tempted, for the second successive time in this series, to offer some question marks with the heading.

Last time round (which was away back in March) it was The Seahorses on the basis that I’m not the slightest bit enamoured by debut single Love Is The Law. Today, it’s the turn of Happy Mondays. I reckon not even their most diehard fan would want to claim that the three tracks which can be found The Forty Five EP, released as FAC 129 back in 1985, are their most enduring, but I feel they all do have something about them which makes them worth a listen, albeit they give no indication of the sort of sounds that would later go on to sell in the millions.

Here’s the track which introduced them to an audience beyond the Greater Manchester fanbase:-

mp3: Happy Mondays – Delightful

And here’s the slightly lesser-known ‘filler’tracks:-

mp3: Happy Mondays – This Feeling
mp3: Happy Mondays – Oasis

You could be cruel and suggest that they are of their time and should be consigned along other similar era indie-landfill, some of which was actually put out by other bands on the roster of Factory Records. But I reckon that would be a very harsh judgement. The songs certainly do show there is potential waiting to be tapped into.

JC

Altered Images, Aztec Camera, David Bowie, Elvis Costello, Orange Juice, Spear of Destiny, Yello

DON’T LOOK BACK IN ANGER (6)

I was obviously too busy getting drunk in June 83 to fully appreciate that the singles chart were particularly shite. Either that or being totally despondent from the results of the General Election that had taken place on 9 June 1983 – the first in which I had been of an age to cast a vote. Thatcher won in a landslide. It was fucking grim.

The chart of 19-26 June makes for equally grim reading. The Police were hanging on at #1 but Rod Stewart, with the atrocious Baby Jane, was poised to take over. The Top 20 was awash with mediocrity – Elton John, Wham!, Michael Jackson, Buck’s Fizz, George Benson, Kajagoogoo and Mike Oldfield among the better known names, while Flash In The Pan, Shalamar and Shakatak were also up there. So too was David Bowie, with his piss-poor cover of an Iggy Pop number, one that had become infamous thanks to a ‘racy’ video in which his bare arse was on display, along with the pubic hair of his Far Eastern dance-partner.

mp3: David Bowie – China Girl (#3)

Further down, likes of ELO, Imagination, Paul Young and Toto all had tunes that were airing regularly across the airwaves and shifting enough units to get mentioned in the Top of The Pops rundown. Thankfully, there was some respite via a hard-hitting anti-war song:-

mp3 : The Imposter – Pills And Soap (#27).

Elvis Costello‘s angry songwriting talents had previously taken Robert Wyatt back into the charts after many years (see last month’s piece). This time round, he penned another rant about the Tories in the forlorn hope that folk might hold a mirror up to Thatcher in the election. But at least he tried. (the song had actually been in the Top 20 a couple of weeks earlier).

Just outside the Top 40 were a couple of songs from much loved acts round these parts:-

mp3: Orange Juice – Flesh Of My Flesh (#41)
mp3: Altered Images – Bring Me Closer (#42)

Neither are among their best 45s.

Further down, just about dropping out of the Top 75 but having peaked at #64 a couple of weeks previously, was another local pop combo

mp3: Aztec Camera – Walk Out To Winter (#73)

A radically different mix than had been included on the album High Land Hard Rain.

And since I’m looking way down for crumbs of comfort in the lower ends of the charts in other weeks during June 1983:-

mp3 : Spear Of Destiny – The Wheel (peaked at #59)

And I’ll finish off with a song that was actually slowly climbing the charts in the last week of June 83, eventually making it to #41 in the middle of the following month.

mp3: Yello – I Love You

This was the first time the electronic group from Switzerland had come to any sort of recognition in the UK, having been on the go since the late 70s.

Come back next month. Things do get a fair bit better.

JC

Pet Shop Boys

PET SHOP BOYS SINGLES (Part Twenty-two)

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Last time around, I mentioned the performance at the closing ceremony of the 2012 Olympics in which Neil and Chris performed West End Girls as they were cycled around the running track on chariots. The photo above is the proof………..

In September 2012, the duo’s 11th studio album, Elysium was unveiled. Rather unusually, it was not accompanied by any new 45, although the Olympic-themed Winner, that had been released digitally back in July and physically in August, is one of its twelve tracks. The next single hit the shops on 12 October:-

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mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Leaving

A fine pop tune. The PSB website offers this take on it:-

“It’s looking at the old cliché of ‘love doesn’t die’, so familiar in pop songs, and looking at the death aspect of it. It’s comparing the idea of love not dying with the fact that when a person dies there’s a sense that they don’t really die because although they’re not physically present their memory is still present and therefore in a way they have a presence in your life.”

Given that the boys were now both comfortably into their 50s,it’s no real surprise that the subject matters being covered in their songs were now quite different from the era when they sat atop of the single charts.

Leaving reached #44. It remains the last time a PSB single cracked the Top 50 in the UK.

It was released in digital and physical formats (CD and vinyl), with a number of remix efforts made available. CD1 contained two otherwise unavailable songs:-

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Hell
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – In His Imagination

The former is a list song. Possibly the PSB equivalent of REM‘s It’s The End Of The World…..or maybe not!!! The named individuals are all folk who have their own place in hell (or in the instance of one person still alive will end up there – assuming you believe in Hell is an actual thing). Most are political despots/dictators, but mention is also made of a few serial killers. It’s an odd one…..but surprisingly catchy given the subject matter.

The latter is a short story of sorts in that it tells the tale of someone who is bored rigid with a dead-end job but dreams of better days. It’s a mid-tempo number that doesn’t really go anywhere special and isn’t one of the more memorable b-sides.

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The third and final 45 from Elysium was released on 31 December 2012, which meant it was lost amidst all that was going on, with everyone looking back primarily on the previous 12 months. It wasn’t a straight lift from the album as the track was given a different mix and its length was reduced by a minute or so.

mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Memory Of The Future (single mix)

It sunk without a trace, seemingly reaching #111 in the UK. To be honest, that’s about all it deserved. It’s not close to being a decent 45.

Again, there was a digital and physical release, with a number of remix efforts on offer alongside three two otherwise unavailable songs, all of which went to show that the duo were certainly still very prolific……or did it?

mp3: Pet Shop Boys -Listening
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – One Night
mp3: Pet Shop Boys – Inside

Listening was not an entirely new song. It had been written back in 2012 and offered to Morten Harket, best known as lead singer with A-Ha, the ~~Danish~~ Norwegian group that had enjoyed international success in the mid-80s. Harket had gone on to include the song on his solo album Out Of My Hands, with PSB offering their own take a couple of years on. Not knowing the original, I can’t offer any opinion on whether it’s an improvement or not…and it’s not a good enough song to make me want to go and find out

One Night was another old song. It seemingly dates from 2007 and was written with the intention of having it recorded by Kylie Minogue, but she (or her advisers) seemingly turned it down. It’s a more than decent romantic sounding ballad, so maybe it just wasn’t right for her at that particular time. It would, I reckon, have been interesting to hear her take on it.

Inside was an entirely new song, one that was considered for inclusion on Elysium but left off at a late stage. It’s another ballad and rather lovely; but ultimately, what you had to round off a busy and high-profile year in PSB world was a low-key release, sneaked out almost under the cover of darkness on the final day of 2012, with none of the energy and fun that had long been associated with the duo.

It also turned out to be their final involvement with Parlophone Records. As it turned out, there wasn’t too long to wait for the next instalment in the Pet Shop Boys story.

JC

Vaselines

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #360: THE VASELINES

One of the best to ever come out of Scotland. I could say loads more, and may well do so in a future posting. But for now, here’s wiki:-

The Vaselines are a Scottish alternative rock band, formed in Glasgow in 1986. Originally a duo between its songwriters Eugene Kelly and Frances McKee, but later added James Seenan and Eugene’s brother Charlie Kelly on bass and drums respectively from the band Secession.

Originally intending to create a fanzine, Kelly and McKee decided to form a band instead.Stephen Pastel of The Pastels is credited with coming up with their name.After playing their first gigs, they signed to Pastel’s 53rd and 3rd label and recorded the Son of a Gun EP with him producing, released in summer 1987.

The EP featured a cover of Divine‘s “You Think You’re a Man” on its B-side. By late 1987, Eugene’s brother Charlie Kelly had joined on drums with James Seenan on bass. With this line-up and with Stephen Pastel producing again, they recorded the Dying for It EP, released in early 1988. It featured the songs “Molly’s Lips” and “Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam,” both of which Nirvana would later cover. In June 1989 they released their first album, Dum-Dum, again on 53rd and 3rd but distributed by Rough Trade. The band broke up shortly after its release, due jointly to the dissolution of 53rd & 3rd and the end of Kelly and McKee’s romantic relationship. They briefly reformed in October 1990 to open for Nirvana when they played in Edinburgh.

Kelly went on to found the band Captain America (later renamed Eugenius after legal threats from Marvel Comics), supporting Nirvana on their UK tour. Following solo performances Kelly released the album Man Alive in 2004. McKee founded the bands Painkillers in 1994 and Suckle in 1997 before releasing her first solo album, Sunny Moon, in 2006.

In 1992, Sub Pop released The Way of the Vaselines: A Complete History, a compilation that contained The Vaselines’ entire body of work at the time.

In the summer of 2006, McKee and Kelly took to the stage together for the first time since 1990 to perform a set of Vaselines songs, as part of a joint tour to promote their individual solo albums.

The Vaselines reformed (minus the old rhythm section) on 24 April 2008 for a charity show for the Malawi Orphan Support group at Glasgow’s MONO venue. Invitation was by word-of-mouth with no press announcements and the band played to a packed, enthusiastic audience.

The band then played their first-ever U.S. performance at Maxwell’s in Hoboken, NJ on 9 July. The band also performed at Sub Pop Records’ 20th Anniversary SP20 music festival on 12 July at Marymoor Park just outside Seattle WA.

On 27 March 2009 they played their first London date in 20 years at the London Forum.

On 5 May 2009, Sub Pop released Enter the Vaselines. A deluxe-edition reissue of the 1992 Sub Pop release, it includes remastered versions of the band’s two EPs , and a remixed version of their sole album, as well as demos and live recordings from 1986 and 1988. The band toured the U.S. in May 2009, playing six dates, starting in Los Angeles on 10 May, then heading up the west coast to San Francisco, Portland and Seattle. Dates for Chicago, IL and Brooklyn, NY would end the tour on 18 May. The band finished their May tour at the Primavera Sound festival in Barcelona.

The Vaselines second studio album, Sex With an X, was released in September 2010.

The Vaselines announced their third studio album, V for Vaselines, in June 2014 which was released on 29 September 2014 on Rosary Music.

JC adds……..

They’re still very much on the go, and later this year will be going out on tour along with a reformed Soup Dragons. Can’t wait for that one.

mp3: The Vaselines – Teenage Superstars

From the Dying For It EP.

JC

Action Painting!

SARAH 28

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While doing a bit of tidying up, I stumbled across a small number of what I had thought were totally lost posts from the old blog that had been deleted back in 2013. This one, posted in October 2011, was written by Comrade Colin as part of an occasional series on Sarah Records.

‘A hundred mile smiles to bannister and bouncer’

This is the rather brilliant jingle-jangle A-Side from Sarah #28, the first single that Action Painting! had out with Sarah Records back in 1990. They released another couple of singles later on for the label (#73 and #87) and a couple of the stronger tracks also appeared on some of the compilation LPs that Sarah put out (for example, ‘Mustard Gas’ featured on ‘There And Back Again Lane’, an album that had the great honour of being Sarah #100). Anyway, the song below is a nice wee slice of classic indie-pop and ‘very Sarah’ if you ask me… meaning trebly guitars, sad boy lyrics and Robert Smith vocals. It still sounds great to me. 🙂

mp3 : Action Painting! – These Things Happen

JC adds……

It really was quite a joy to stumble on this, and the Comrade’s review is, of course, bang on the money. I’ve tracked down the other song on Sarah 28, as it does seem as if it was a Double-A single.

mp3 : Action Painting! – Boy Meets World

As our dear friend Dirk would say…..Enjoy!!!!!

JC

Curve

CURVE BALLS (1)

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I’ve previously featured, on more than one occasion, the Blindfold EP, the debut released by Curve in March 1991. I was rummaging around the cupboard full of vinyl recently and pulled out the various other Curve EPs that I’ve picked up at various times, all of them thankfully before the second-hand vinyl market started to get really stupid. Over the next few weeks, I’m going to draw each of them to your attention.

The Frozen EP was issued on 13 May 1991. The picture above is of the gatefold sleeve (which is the one I have a copy of). It was also issued with a standard 12″ sleeve, as well as on CD format and on 7″ vinyl. The 7″ had just two tracks on it, and was referred to as Coast Is Clear, after its A-side.

Here’s a review of the EP, lifted from Melody Maker, where it was made single of the week:-

YES, they really are that good. Oh, I had my doubts, believe me. I wasn’t convinced by their debut. In fact, I had a whole tirade worked out about age and beauty and opportunism and how people who once consorted with Eurythmics should on no account be allowed near our hallowed ground however good they sound, because pop is so much more than just noise and melody. But somehow I found myself swept away with the first rush of guitar, sucked under into this glorious whirlpool of sound.

I’m going to be tacky and blunt for one second. Forgive me. This is like Cocteau Twins, if they’d gone commercial, or Lush, if they’d ever made a record that lived up to their live promise. There’s a section on the second song, second side, where Toni sings “Why do you grow inside me?” and it’s either the sexiest or most disturbing thing I’ve ever heard. Both, probably.

It feels so dumb trying to explain Curve in green and blue and similes.

It reached #34, and took Curve into the higher end of the singles charts for the first time.

mp3: Curve – Coast Is Clear
mp3: Curve – The Colour Hurts
mp3: Curve – Frozen
mp3: Curve – Zoo

Four excellent pieces of music. But kind of like the MM reviewer, the one that really hits home most, as far as I’m concerned, is The Colour Hurts.

Here’s the promo video for the lead track

JC

Goon Sax

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM #343 – THE GOON SAX

It was only during a discussion with my mate Aldo a few months back that I found out The Goon Sax had broken up last year. We had been discussing Robert Forster‘s new album and I mentioned how his son Louis had appeared on a number of the tracks and wondered if his increasing involvement with his dad would mean a delay to his own band writing, recording and issuing their fourth studio album. That’s when Aldo pointed me in the direction of this statement that had been issued in July 2022:-

To all friends of the Goon Sax we have some bittersweet news…after nine years of giving it our everything we’ve decided to draw the curtain on this band. It’s taken us places stranger, more beautiful, and far beyond anything we could have imagined, and brought us to meeting and working with so many special and incredibly inspiring people. Our gratitude to everyone who’s been with us and allowed the madness of the last 9 years to happen is far beyond anything we can palpably express. Although this means we won’t be doing our US tour anymore, including the Interpol & Spoon tour and the Pavement shows, we promise we will play one or two more shows in Australia before we finally say goodnight. For us it feels like a happy ending. We love each other and we love you! thank you for everything ♥️♥️♥️✨
Riley, Louis & Jim

I was disappointed to finally learn this. While never a band who were going to change the face of indie pop’n’roll, they made some really great music in their time, getting better and more confident with each album, to the extent that they really did seem on the cusp of getting a substantial following well beyond their native Australia.

For those who don’t know the back story, Louis Foster and James Harrison formed a band back in 2013 when they were still in high school in Brisbane. Around a year later Riley Jones brought her drumming talents to the table.

They were signed by Chapter Music, an Australian-based indie label and debut album Up To Anything came out in 2016. It’s fair to say that it was the sort of album only a group of teenagers could make – the playing doesn’t edge towards any sort of technical brilliance while the lyrics have a degree of naive charm and innocence across all the subject matters that were are crucial to all kids who are 16/17 years of age. As the record company PR folk so accurately described it ‘….capturing the awkwardness, self-doubt and visceral excitement of teenage life, while in the thick of actually living it.’

I saw The Goon Sax in Glasgow when they toured the debut album in the UK. At that age, and with next to no experience, they had no right to be so tight, confident and able in the live setting. But they more than put on a show that had an audience, many of whom could have passed as their grandparents, nodding their heads in appreciation.

Their second album, We’re Not Talking, appeared in 2018. It was a step forward from the previous album, particularly from the fact that Riley Jones was more involved in the vocal department and helping with the songwriting for the first time. Again, the record company got it right.

“An album that shows how much can change between the ages of 17 and 19…..it takes the enthusiasms of youth and twists them into darker, more sophisticated shapes. Relationships are now laced with hesitation, remorse, misunderstanding and ultimately compassion. Delivering brilliantly human and brutally honest vignettes of adolescent angst, The Goon Sax brim with personality, charm and heart-wrenching honesty. “

At this point, the trio were offered a deal by the American-based Matador Records. It came at a time when the trio, along with some other friends, were all living together under one roof, working incredibly hard to improve in every aspect of their musicianship. The label teamed them up with John Parrish, best known for his many years working with PJ Harvey, and The Goon Sax would eventually head to Bristol in England to work on their third album.

Mirror II was released in July 2021 and proved to be the quantum leap that those of us who had followed the band were hoping for. It was a bolder, more ambitious, richer sounding set of songs than before – far more instrumentation to the extent that it was almost gothic in nature in places. It’s an album that I couldn’t wait to heat played live, but sadly the restrictions around touring in the wake of the pandemic meant that the proposed UK tour was shelved, and in the wake of the band’s decision to call it a day, cancelled altogether.

What they’ve left behind are three very different sounding albums, all of which have much to appreciate, as I hope to demonstrate with an ICA. The only thing is, with all three albums having such differences, it doesn’t make any sense to leap back and forth in time, and so what follows are 15 songs, five lifted from each album, in chronological order. Consider it a double-vinyl ICA, with the final side left blank.

Having given you so much in the backstory. I’ll leave the songs to themselves.

Side One : Five Songs From Up To Anything

The Goon Sax – Up To Anything
The Goon Sax – Telephone
The Goon Sax – Sweaty Hands
The Goon Sax – Boyfriend
The Goon Sax – Maggie

Side Two : Five Songs From We’re Not Talking

The Goon Sax – Make Time For Love
The Goon Sax – Strange Light
The Goon Sax – Get Out
The Goon Sax – She Knows
The Goon Sax – We Can’t Win

Side Three : Five Songs From Mirror II

The Goon Sax – In The Stone
The Goon Sax – Temples
The Goon Sax – Psychic
The Goon Sax – Desire
The Goon Sax – Til Dawn

JC

Drag Racing Underground

ONE HUNDRED AND ELEVEN SINGLES : #021

aka The Vinyl Villain incorporating Sexy Loser

#021– Drag Racing Underground – ‚Hellfire'(Snakeskin Records ’89)

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Dear friends,

now, let’s be honest: you had already thought of this, of course, but wasn’t it just a question of time until this series would feature a record which is, let’s say, only for those of you with “an appetite for the bizarre”?

Well, today is the day, folks! Me, I’ve visited The John Peel Music School from 1985 to 2004, and although I might not have learnt all too much there, there is one thing which stuck to my mind ever since: just because a tune might come in as a bit extreme at first sight, still you have to give it a chance. You can dislike it after you’ve heard it – but not before.

Which brings us to today’s choice: the mighty Drag Racing Underground. I’m willing to have a small bet you never heard of them, probably because in essence they are Big Stick, which solely consist of John Gill and Yanna Trance (pictured above in her natural environment), but Big Stick had to change their name for this record for legal reasons: JTFL can surely tell you more about the background and about US law altogether, should you be interested.

The thing is: I am willing to have another bet that you haven’t heard about Big Stick either, which is not your fault, of course: I mean, I do understand that you will most likely immediately skip song titles like “Do Not Rape My Sister At the Municipal Pool” or ones as nuanced as “Girls On The Toilet”, especially when they come from a combo by then completely unknown to you … well, NYC art-rock underground has never been everyone’s cup of tea, for sure! Nor John Gill’s statements, which might come in as a tad, uh, politically incorrect these days: “You go save the Rainforest and help the homeless, just stay the fuck away from my car.”

But that’s Big Stick, Drag Racing Underground are nothing like that, of course! No, they will not be seen leading the fanfare corps for the return of the rock opera, how could they when bands like Pussy Galore, Reverb Motherfuckers, White Zombie—or their high profile big mean daddies in Sonic Youth, the Swans, or Foetus come to mind when you try to pigeonhole them in one form or another?

And what do you get when subtle/fragile music is not to be expected? Right, lyrics which would entitle an inclusion in TVV’s ‘Some Songs Make Great Short Stories” – series any day of the week! And when Drag Racing Underground tell us a story, this story is bound to be based on cars and/or racing. Oh, and although I just drive a shitty Peugeot 208 myself, I still celebrate them all day long, simply and purely for this record alone … again, it is ‘just’ a B-Side:

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drag2

mp3: Drag Racing Underground – Hellfire

And, btw, If only I could decipher those two lines towards the end,

“And filling your mind with (?) her kind of thoughts” and “So just tell your ole’ sister (?) her mouth”,

I’d be a happy man for the rest of my life!! So, if anyone can help, please do: not understanding what he is saying there has been driving me mad for 34 years now!

Thanks …. and drive friendly,

Dirk

Various

SIXTY PLUS

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The morning after the day before.

Thanks for sticking with me during the 60 albums @ 60 rundown. Things will eventually return to normal, but I’m going off for a week-long break in Toronto as from tomorrow, so there will be a continuation of posts that have been prepared well in advance. I thought I’d kick things off post-birthday with yet another 60 minute long compilation, only as it felt like a good and appropriate idea.

mp3: Various – Nothing Lasts With Age (So People Say)

The Style Council – Speak Like A Child
Gorillaz (feat. Thundercat) – Cracker Island
Pop Will Eat Itself – Wise Up! Sucker
King Biscuit Time – I Walk The Earth
Pet Shop Boys – Sexy Northerner
The Fall – No Bulbs 3
Blondie – Dreaming
Dead Kennedys – Too Drunk To Fuck
Frightened Rabbit – Be Less Rude
Spare Snare – Have A Go
Go Home Productions – Making Plans For Vinyl
Sugarcubes – Birthday
The Brilliant Corners – Delilah Sands
The Wedding Present – We All Came From The Sea
Basement Jaxx- Where’s Your Head At
Elastica– Connection
Blur – Got Yer!

The Go Home Productions tune is a mash-up involving a well-known XTC tune and the lyric from Oops (Oh My), a Top 5 hit back in 2002 by Tweet feat. Missy Elliot.

And, as if by magic, the whole thing comes in at exactly 60 minutes and 0 seconds.

JC

#thoughts, Jam

60 ALBUMS @ 60 : #1

The Jam – All Mod Cons (1978)

It’s my 60th birthday today. I’m gifting myself the words of Charles Shaar Murray from the NME of 22 October 1978. I wish I was this talented.

—–

Third albums generally mean that it’s shut-up-or-get-cut-up time: when an act’s original momentum has drained away and they’ve got to cover the distance from a standing start, when you’ve got to cross “naive charm” off your list of assets.

For The Jam, it seemed as if the Third Album Syndrome hit with their second album. This Is The Modern World was dull and confused, lacking both the raging, one-dimensional attack of their first album and any kind of newly-won maturity. A couple of vaguely duff singles followed and, in the wake of a general disillusionment with the Brave New Wave World, it seemed as if Paul Weller and his team were about to be swept under the carpet.

Well, it just goes to show you never can tell. All Mod Cons is the third Jam album to be released (it’s actually the fourth Jam album to be recorded; the actual third Jam album was judged, found wanting and scrapped) and it’s not only several light years ahead of anything they’ve done before but also the album that’s going to catapult The Jam right into the front rank of international rock and roll; one of the handful of truly essential rock albums of the last few years.

The title is more than Grade B punning or a clever-clever linkup with the nostalgibuzz packaging (like the target design on the label, the Swinging London trinketry, the Lambretta diagram or the Immediate-style lettering); it’s a direct reference to both the broadening of musical idiom and Weller’s reaffirmation of a specific Mod consciousness.

Remember the Mod ideal: it was a lower-middle and working-class consciousness that stressed independence, fun and fashion without loss of integrity or descent into elitism or consumerism; unselfconscious solidarity and a dollop of non-sectarian concern for others. Weller has transcended his original naivety without becoming cynical about anything other than the music business.

Mod became hippies and we know that didn’t work; the more exploratory end of Mod rock became psychedelia. Just as Weller’s Mod ideal has abandoned the modern equivalent of beach-fighting and competitive posing, his Mod musical values have moved from ’65 to ’66: the intoxicating period between pilled-up guitar-strangling and Sergeant Pepper. Reference points: Rubber Soul and A Quick One rather than Small Faces and My Generation.

Still, though Weller’s blends of acoustic and electric 6 and 12-string guitars, sound effects, overdubs and more careful structuring and arranging of songs (not to mention a quantum leap in standard of composition) may cause frissons of delight over at the likes of Bomp, Trouser Press and other covens of aging Yankee Anglophiles, All Mod Cons is an album based firmly in 1978 and looking forward.

This is the modern world: ‘Down In The Tube Station At Midnight’ is a fair indication of what Weller’s up to on this album, as was ‘A-Bomb In Wardour Street’ (I can’t help thinking that he’s given more hard clear-eyed consideration to the implications of the Sham Army than Jimmy Pursey has), but they don’t remotely tell the whole story. For one thing, Weller has the almost unique ability to write love songs that convince the listener that the singer is really in love. Whether he’s describing an affair that’s going well or badly, he writes with a penetrating, committed insight that rings perfectly, utterly true.

Weller writes lovingly and (choke on it) sensitively, without ever descending to the patented sentimentality that is the stock-in-trade of the emotionally bankrupt. That sentimentality is but the reverse side of the macho coin, and both sides spell lovelessness. The inclusion of ‘English Rose’ (a one-man pick’n’croon acoustic number backed only by a tape of the sea) is both a musical and emotional finger in the eye for everyone who still clings to the old punk tough-guy stereotype and is prepared to call The Jam out for not doing likewise.

Weller is – like Bruce Springsteen – tough enough not to feel he needs to prove it any more, strong enough to break down his own defences, secure enough to make himself vulnerable. The consciousness of All Mod Cons is the most admirable in all of British rock and roll, and one that most of his one-time peers could do well to study.

Through the album, then: the brief, brusque title track and its immediate successor (‘To Be Someone’) examine the rock business first in a tart V-sign to some entrepreneurial type who wishes to squeeze the singer dry and then throw him away, and second in a cuttingly ironic track about a superstar who lost touch with the kids and blew his career. Weller is, by implication, assuring his listeners that no way is that going to happen to him: but the song is so well thought out and so convincing that it chokes back the instinctive “Oh yeah?” that a less honest song in the same vein would elicit from a less honest band.

From there we’re into ‘Mr Clean’, an attack on the complacent middle-aged “professional classes.” The extreme violence of its language (the nearest this album comes to an orthodox punk stance, in fact) is matched with music that combines delicacy and aggression with an astonishing command of dynamics. This is as good a place as any to point out that bassist Bruce Foxton and drummer Rick Buckler are more than equal to the new demands that Weller is making on them: the vitality, empathy and resourcefulness that they display throughout the album makes All Mod Cons a collective triumph for The Jam as well as a personal triumph for Weller.

‘David Watts’ follows (written by Ray Davies, sung by Foxton and a re-recorded improvement on the 45) with ‘English Rose’ in hot pursuit. The side ends with ‘In The Crowd’, which places Weller dazed and confused in the supermarket. It bears a superficial thematic resemblance to ‘The Combine’ (from the previous album) in that it places its protagonist in a crowd and examines his reactions to the situation, but its musical and lyrical sophistication smashes ‘The Combine’ straight back to the stone age. It ends with a lengthy, hallucinatory backward guitar solo which sounds as fresh and new as anything George Harrison or Pete Townshend did a dozen years ago, and a reference back to ‘Away From The Numbers’.

‘Billy Hunt’, whom we meet at the beginning of the second side, is not a visible envy-focus like Davies’ ‘David Watts’, but the protagonist’s faintly ludicrous all-powerful fantasy self: what he projects in the daydreams that see him through his crappy job. The deliberate naivety of this fantasy is caught and projected by Weller with a skill that is nothing short of marvellous.

A brace of love songs follow: ‘It’s Too Bad’ is a song of regret for a couple’s mutual inability to save a relationship which they both know is infinitely worth saving. Musically, it’s deliriously, wonderfully ’66 Beat Groupish in a way that represents exactly what all those tinpot powerpop bands were aiming for but couldn’t manage. Lyrically, even if this sort of song was Weller’s only lick, he’d still be giving Pete Shelley and all his New Romance fandangos a real run for his money.

‘Fly’ is an exquisite electric/acoustic construction, a real lovers’ song, but from there on in the mood changes for the “Doctor Marten’s Apocalypse” of ‘A-Bomb In Wardour Street’ and ‘Tube Station’. In both these songs, Weller depicts himself as the victim who doesn’t know why he’s getting trashed at the hands of people who don’t know why they feel they have to hand out the aggro.

We’ve heard a lot of stupid, destructive songs about the alleged joys of violence lately, and they all stink: if these songs are listened to in the spirit in which they were written then maybe we’ll see a few less pictures of kids getting carried off the terraces with darts in their skulls. And if these songs mean that one less meaningless street fight gets started, then we’ll all owe Paul Weller a favour.

The Jam brought us The Sound Of ’65 in 1976, and now in 1978 they bring us the sound of ’66. Again, they’ve done it such a way that even though you can still hear The Who here and there and a few distinct Beatleisms in those ornate decending 12-string chord sequences, it all sounds fresher and newer than anything else this year. All Mod Cons is the album that’ll make Bob Harris‘ ears bleed the next time he asks what has Britain produced lately; more important, it’ll be the album that makes The Jam real contenders for the crown.

Look out, all you rock and rollers: as of now, The Jam are the ones you have to beat.

—-

JC adds

Shaar Murray’s review just about captures everything I felt about this record back in the day, albeit I wasn’t fully up on his 60s era references, not being a fan of The Beatles or much that predated 1973.

I also remember reading this review thanks to the big brother of a friend who had heard me raving about ‘Tube Station’ and how it was by far the greatest song that anyone had ever written. I didn’t buy the NME in 1978 – music was now an increasingly important part of my life, but it was still mainly football and my newly discovered hobby of golf, but being passed a copy of the paper specifically to read that review had a huge impact on the way I began to engage with and consume pop music. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was just over six months away from seeing my first ever live gig, another seminal event in my development.

All Mod Cons is not the best album I have here in Villain Towers, but it is, and by some considerable distance, my all-time favourite.

And with that, the blog will return to the mundane and mediocre, beginning tomorrow. In the meantime, I’m off to find a bus driver to whom I can flash my newly acquired concessionary pass.

mp3: The Jam – The Place I Love

Thanks for all your thoughts, views and opinions over the course of the rundown.

JC

The rundown in full:-

1. All Mod Cons – The Jam
2. After The Fact – Magazine
3. Sulk- Associates
4. The Midnight Organ Fight – Frightened Rabbit
5. Technique – New Order
6. The Orange Juice – Orange Juice
7. Closer – Joy Division
8. Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters – The Twilight Sad
9. Hatful of Hollow – The Smiths
10. Songs To Remember – Scritti Politti
11. Mezzanine – Massive Attack
12. New Adventures In Hi-Fi – R.E.M.
13. Standing On A Beach – The Cure
14. Singles Going Steady – Buzzcocks
15. Seamonsters – The Wedding Present
16. Let Love In – Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
17. Rattlesnakes – Lloyd Cole & The Commotions
18. London Calling – The Clash
19. Parallel Lines – Blondie
20. High Land, Hard Rain – Aztec Camera
21. Philophobia – Arab Strap
22. Death To The Pixies – Pixies
23. Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret – Soft Cell
24. Soul Mining – The The
25. Will I Ever Be Inside Of You? – Paul Quinn & The Independent Group
26. Different Class – Pulp
27. 30 Something – Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine
28. Hypocrisy Is The Greatest Luxury – The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy
29. Heaven Up Here – Echo and The Bunnymen
30. Tindersticks (II) – Tindersticks
31. Steve McQueen – Prefab Sprout
32. Head Over Heels – Cocteau Twins
33. Pop Art – Pet Shop Boys
34. Boat To Bolivia – Martin Stephenson & The Daintees
35. Empires and Dance – Simple Minds
36. DAMN – Kendrick Lamar
37. Before Hollywood – The Go-Betweens
38. Surrender – The Chemical Brothers
39. The Great Eastern – The Delgados
40. You Had A Kind Face – Butcher Boy
41. Shag Times – The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu
42. Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not – Arctic Monkeys
43. Into The Woods – Malcom Middleton
44. Violent Femmes – Violent Femmes
45. Cafe Bleu – The Style Council
46. Trapped and Unwrapped – Friends Again
47. The Hurting – Tears For Fears
48. Debut – Bjork
49. Original Pirate Material – The Streets
50. Electronic – Electronic
51. Kilimanjiro – The Teardrop Explodes
52. A Certain Trigger – Maximo Park
53. Anthology : The Sounds of Science – Beastie Boys
54. Boxer – The National
55. Imaginary Walls Collapse – Adam Stafford
56. Beaucoup Fish – Underworld
57. Back In The D.H.S.S. – Half Man Half Biscuit
58. Love The Cup – Sons and Daughters
59. Talking With The Taxman About Poetry – Billy Bragg
60. A Secret Wish – Propaganda

(I’ve 51 of them on vinyl either as stand-alone LPs or as part of boxets.)

Magazine

60 ALBUMS @ 60 : #2

Magazine – After The Fact (1982)

That’s the problem with setting hard and fast rules – they inevitably come back to bite you in the backside.

The #2 position in this rundown should be occupied by The Correct Use of Soap, the album I reckon is as close to perfection as any that has ever been released – and yup, JTFL, I include the cover of ‘Thank You…..’ in that assessment. (Click here to be let in on that private joke).

The problem is that I didn’t buy said album in 1980. As I’ve said before, and it has long been a source of immense regret, I didn’t pick up on Magazine until the band had broken up.

After The Fact was my first purchase. It is therefore, along with some later Magazine material including other compilations, box sets and a much later reunion LP, eligible for inclusion in the rundown, and I’ve decided, after careful and due consideration, that it is just as worthy as slotting it at #2 as ‘Soap’.

Controversial? For sure. But it’s my party, and I can ‘cheat’ if I want to.

The ten tracks across the album offer an overview of the band’s career. Four of them had been released as singles, but at the same time, four other songs selected as 45s here in the UK were left off. Each album is represented – Real Life (1978) and Secondhand Daylight (1979) both have three songs, while The Correct Use of Soap (1980) and Magic, Murder and The Weather (1981) have two. The fact that my favourite record is relatively under-represented only added to the utter joy and elation I experienced when I finally bought myself a copy, which would have been just a matter of weeks after the compilation.

The back of the sleeve comes with a wonderfully-written essay from Paul Morley in which he reflects, in his usual rambling but engaging style, as to why Magazine were such an important, essential and always likely to be unappreciated part of the post-punk era. As you can imagine, the essay contains a number of magnificently structured phrases and sentences, but one of the more readily understandable is what really gets to the heart, as far as I’m concerned, about what made the group so compelling at the time and why they remain so relevant more than 40 years later:-

“Magazine took pop music in the direction of a new simplicity: that is, they sought to prove nothing, they were subtle, frank and alluring and there was every chance you would be amazed.”

All of this and more for this very impressionable late-teen. They became the second group, in very short times, to emerge out of Manchester and make me fleetingly yearn to live elsewhere other than Glasgow. Joy Division/New Order had been the first, and The Smiths would later prove to be a third. I had yet to fully discover the wonders of The Fall….and I suppose it’s at this juncture it is worth confessing that Mark E Smith is conspicuous by his absence from this rundown. I make no apologies and I make no excuses…it just sometimes works out that way.

For decades, I sneered at the idea of bands getting back together and reuniting after years apart. I never wanted to entertain the thought of going along and seeing old heroes in their dotage doing everything possible to ruin their legacy with a substandard and embarrassing performance in front of fans who really should have been, in the words of Lloyd Cole, old enough to know better.

I did a handbrake turn after the events of 14 February 2009. A Magazine gig, at the Academy in Manchester, after an absence of 29 years. My first time seeing and hearing the songs in a live setting. Two nights later, and I was in the audience in Glasgow. Later in the year, at the end of August, I’d see them in Edinburgh, on a night when they played two half-sets, with a break in-between. The first half, and I had no idea this is how it was going to pan out until about the third song in, involve playing The Complete Use Of Soap in its entirety in the same order as the record. Needless to say, I couldn’t stop smiling afterwards for weeks.

mp3: Magazine – A Song From Under The Floorboards

I wasn’t aware, when I first got familiar with Magazine, that this particular song was based on the novella Notes From Underground, written by Fyodor Dostoevsky back in 1864. Around the time that Magazine were undertaking the decades-later comeback, which culminated with the album No Thyself (2011), a piece in The Guardian newspaper suggested that basing on a song on a novel by Dostoyevsky was not the action of the typical pop group, but then again Howard Devoto was not a typical pop star. It was a sentence that made me wonder if Robert Forster had been thinking specifically of Howie when he penned these words in the song Here Comes The City, on the album Oceans Apart (2005):-

“And why do people who read Dostoevsky always look like Dostoevsky?”

I do have a quiet smile to myself every time I hear that line.

One more album to go, and the rundown is over. I’d like to think many of you might have worked out who is going to be responsible for it, and most likely the actual LP.

JC

Associates

60 ALBUMS @ 60 : #3

Associates – Sulk (1982)

Sulk was the third LP by Associates in as in as many years, albeit one of the previous LPs had simply brought together singles and b-sides. It was, however, the first to bring them commercial success to match the critical acclaim of the earlier releases.

My first exposure to the band came via a friend passing me copies of their singles and earlier material on a cassette tape, and initally it was the pulsing weird electronica of the likes of Transport to Central, White Car In Germany and Tell Me Easter’s On Friday that grabbed my attention. But gradually my ears attuned themselves to the strange vocals that accompanied the music and allowed me to fully ‘get’ what Associates were all about.

There was no way, however, that I thought they’d ever be a chart band which would attracted a teenybop following such as happened in 1981. Sure, both boys were handsome and photogenic, particularly frontman Billy Mackenzie and thanks to them being on WEA Records they had a big promo/marketing arm there to push them along. But these boys were just too weird to be pop stars weren’t they?

The stunning success of the singles Party Fears Two and Club Country changed everything. Looking back there’s a big hint that this was an unexpected development all round – neither single had an advance promo made in an era when this was just about the first thing any record label, and not just a major like WEA, considered when planning the release of a 45.

It can often be the case that the inclusion of one or two truly stunning songs can overshadow the rest on an LP and make everything else seem tame or even mediocre in comparison. But there’s no chance of Party Fears Two or Club Country having that impact or effect on Sulk, as all ten tracks really are something very special.

I know the LP was given a totally different tracklisting upon release in the USA – three of the tracks on the UK release were omitted and replaced with songs which had been singles, so what follows might not make sense to readers from that part of the world.

Rather unusually, Side A is devoid of the hit singles – indeed it is a side of an LP that goes out of its way to be often as far removed as possible from the jauntiness and joy of the music which had got the band radio airplay, appearances on Top of the Pops and those afore-mentioned Top 20 hits.

Having said that, it opens with an upbeat and incredibly catchy instrumental in Arrogance Gave Him Up that I can recall being a staple on the dancefloor of at least one alternative Glasgow nightclub. After that, the trio of No, Bap De La Bap, Gloomy Sunday and Nude Spoons are as astonishing a run of music as you can ever hope to hear as Alan Rankine demonstrates that top-quality electronica back in 1982 could be made without it sounding rinky-dinky, light, inconsequential or disposable.

Thankfully Sulk came with a lyric sheet as there’s no way that you’d have worked out what the hell Billy was singing. And it wasn’t that you couldn’t make out the words a la Elizabeth Fraser/Cocteau Twins, it was more like realising all the words on their own make sense, but in the order sung by Billy seem either nonsensical or inspired. Or both.

Oh, and the version of Gloomy Sunday, one of the most covered songs of all time, is surely among the best there is….

Side B opens with Skipping and It’s Better This Way – two of the best bits of music the band would ever lay down – and closes with firstly the hit singles and ultimately an instrumental that would later be extended and turned into a further hit single.

mp3: Associates – Skipping

Sulk is a work of genius. Actually, it’s the work of two geniuses.

It’s a work that veers all over the place and while it will often be labelled in with many other synth-led LPs of the era, it is nothing like those of Japan, Human League, Simple Minds, Ultravox or the rest of the bands who cracked the charts on a regular basis. The vocals are often unworldly, going from a low and creepy moan to the high falsetto of a 10-year old choir boy in the space of seconds.

Sulk has songs that will have you leaping to the dance floor, and songs that will have you cowering behind the couch in fear. The production is outlandish and at times stretched to breaking point, but never ever snaps into overwrought pomp and pomposity. It’s a record which hasn’t dated….indeed, if anything it has got better with age. It’s an album that could only have been made in the 80s, as only at that point in time could the music industry have really indulged the artistes to the extent they did. And there’s no way that Billy and Alan would have become pop stars in the 21st Century, as their essential rough edges would have smoothed down to make them mundane and mediocre.

Sulk, dear readers, is an LP genuinely like no other.

And in deciding that it fits at #3 in this rundown, it has the honour of being my all-time favourite album by any singer or group to emerge out of Scotland.