Longpigs

22 YEARS IN A MOBILE HOME

A  GUEST POSTING by FRASER P

A worthwhile album sees its vinyl release on October 29, a little after the CD came out. Well, 22 years after the CD actually…

The story of Longpigs is the story of the unluckiest band in rock history. It’s a tale of bad timing and bad faith. It tells of a music industry that took their early promise and then spat on its fulfilment after holding it back until everyone’s goodwill was exhausted. And the final nail was an epidemic of shoddy journalism that denied us all the proper chance to appreciate one of the great lost albums of the 1990s.

Longpigs signed first to Elektra in 1993 after only a few months of live appearances. The Sheffield foursome were on their way to releasing their first single when frontman Crispin Hunt was injured in a car crash and spent three days in a coma. Before he had recovered long enough to rearrange a release plan, Elektra’s UK operation was closed down and Warner‘s, the US parent company, demanded £375,000 from anyone wanting to buy out their contract.

Faced with such a demand, it was well into 1994 before U2’s Mother label stepped forward to free them from their bondage and things finally seemed to be heading in the right direction. Extensive gigging through 1995 pushed their fourth single ‘On And On’ into the Top 20, followed there by a re-release of their first single ‘She Said’. The debut album The Sun is Often Out was released in April 1996 and reached 26 in the album charts, with a further single from the album, ‘Lost Myself’ making it to 22 in July.

Normal practice would see a band touring for a few months to promote the album before settling down to generate material for its follow up. For Longpigs instead, 1997 saw them still on the road, but now across the Atlantic, bending their shoulder to the fabled task of ‘breaking America’. Support slots with Echo and the Bunnymen, The Dandy Warhols and U2 pushed ‘On And On’ into the US Alternative Top 20, and after a Glastonbury appearance they were finally able to start work on the second album in early 1998.

By this time however, the band was shredded after more or less five years of constant gigging. As Hunt later said, touring starts out like a great idea but eventually the strain shows: “You go on to the tour bus and it starts like Summer Holiday, but two weeks later it’s like Das Boot.” Drummer Dee Boyle was jettisoned before work on the album began. He later repaid Hunt at a chance meeting by smashing a beer glass into his face.

They were under pressure to produce the new work, and Hunt himself is not particularly complimentary about it now. Nevertheless, despite Hunt’s sense that it wasn’t as melodically engaging as his lyrics deserved, it should have been recognised as one of the finest LPs to come out of the decade. But once again, record company mismanagement delayed its release and all the while Mother Records was secretly struggling to survive.

It wasn’t until September of 1999 that Mobile Home finally saw the light of day, but Mother put absolutely no effort into promoting it, and a few months later the label itself folded. The patience of the music press had been stretched and when the follow up to The Sun is Often Out failed to satisfy the hacks who expected and wanted another chapter in their own contrived narrative of Britpop, they dismissed it in a slew of petulant and dismissive reviews that read as though they had hardly even bothered to listen beyond the first couple of tracks.

Music journalists are like any other branch of the profession. There are a few competent and diligent practitioners and a mass of journeyman hacks whose expertise in the field of music may be liminal. When I look back to the days when I used to read Sounds and the NME regularly, from the late 70s to early 80s, I realise what a bunch of pretentious adolescents were filling their pages with copy, drunk on the heady elixir of an audience. Self-publicists on the make like Julie Burchill, Tony Parsons and Danny Baker pontificated weekly in their contrarian or smart-arsed fashions, their future careers shaped by the repeated indulgence of their auto-inflated egos.

So I shouldn’t be so surprised or disappointed that the response to Mobile Home from the journalist Class of 1999 was as ignorant, petulant and dismissive as it was. They had been kept waiting a long time, Longpigs were hardly The Stone Roses promising the Second Coming, and when Mobile Home finally arrived it committed the cardinal sin of not fitting neatly into the juvenile reviewers’ pre-prepared pigeonhole. In other words, it didn’t breathe new life into the rapidly decomposing corpse of Britpop, that Frankenstein’s monster stitched together from disparate parts and originally animated by the necrophile music press itself.

Nevertheless, the cursory attention paid to the record shone through in contemporary reviews, and in one case the sheer stupidity of the assessment has done lasting damage to its reputation.

I know that Allmusic.com is a pompous farrago of a website, but in the absence of readily accessible archives from other media it forms an unmerited critical reference point for a great many people. Their imbecile reviewer Jason Damas, for he shall not remain nameless, still seems happy to lay claim to this gem of an insight 20 years on: “Longpigs have also picked up on the slower side of trip-hop and techno, letting it rule, rather than accentuate, their material.” As a result of this enduring record of one man’s aesthetic disability, I have seen more than one classification of Mobile Home as ‘trip-hop’. Even now I can scarcely prevent my jaw from dropping and my eyes from rolling painfully in their sockets. God alone knows what Crispin Hunt thinks of it, though if you asked him he’d probably tell you.

Jason Damas is a prick, that much I can tell you, and once you listen to Mobile Home you will quickly discern why his entire brief dismissal of the album is a testament to his boundless ignorance. There is a brief moment at the beginning of the song ‘Baby Blue’ where an introductory synthetic figure hints momentarily at the kind of ‘scratching’ effects found plentifully in the work of Portishead. And that’s it. That is the entire sum of ‘trip-hop’ influence in Mobile Home. No matter that tracks such as ‘Blue Skies’ could be straight out-takes from The Sun is Often Out with its raucous grungy guitar attack, or that ‘Dance Baby Dance’ is as great a slice of rock-disco crossover as you’ll hear, or that no fewer than three songs on the album employ a waltz rhythm. By rights that should make Mobile Home, by Jason Damas’s stunted frame of reference, either a carbon copy of their first album, or a disco album, or perhaps a collection of folk dances, or a ballroom compilation.

It’s almost as if Damas was too busy making his tea when he was supposed to be listening to the album, stuck his head round the door at the start of ‘Baby Blue’ and composed his review while waiting for his pot noodle to steep. In consequence, anyone ever since looking for a critical evaluation of Mobile Home is directed by Google to his retarded misjudgement, effectively obscuring the thrilling diversity of styles and poignant melodic beauty that it actually contains. What should be cited as one of the best albums of the decade saw out its final months in obscurity thanks to Mother Records’ inability to do its job properly, and has languished ever since in the garbage bin of posterity thanks to the grave unsuitability of one reviewer for his job.

So now, after twenty-two years suffering the cultural equivalent of living in a caravan park, Mobile Home is finally released on vinyl for the first time. Typically, it comes on transparent vinyl, and is housed, apparently, in a ‘glossy UV Sleeve’ whatever the fuck that is. If you stare at it too long, do you get sunburnt? I might buy a copy, though by the time it arrives in New Zealand it’ll probably be twenty-four years since I bought the CD. And the 180gsm clear vinyl and UV sleeve will probably push the price up to about the sum total that Longpigs ever saw from the original release.

The band, exhausted and riven by the tortuous journey of getting it made, broke up shortly after the album was released, further ensuring its descent into utter obscurity. It all makes you wonder what the point is in re-releasing it now. Richard Hawley doesn’t need the money. Crispin Hunt has a day job these days. I don’t know about the other two, but they’ll get nothing in royalties since they didn’t write any of it. All the same, somehow I’m pleased it’s seeing the light of day again, if only to give me the opportunity to sing its praises and help to right the wrongs done to it in 1999. If you were around at the time and revelled in the sounds of Suede and Mansun and Super Furry Animals and heard The Sun is Often Out and liked it, but then understandably missed out on Mobile Home… well, it’s probably about time you rectified that oversight, and I promise you, you won’t be disappointed.

mp3: Longpigs – Baby Blue

the offending (to Mr J Damas) ‘trip-hop’ track. Judge for yourself – just how ‘trip-hop’ do YOU think it is?

mp3: Longpigs – Blue Skies

the most ‘first-album outtake’ track, shouty, art-grunge, as Crispin Hunt described the band’s early style.

mp3: Longpigs – Dance Baby Dance

the disco-rock crossover track. This must be what J Damas thinks is ‘techno’. Dance music is really not his strong point. Fortunately Longpigs had a stronger grasp.

mp3: Longpigs – Free Toy

gentle major key intro sucks you in and then stabs you in the heart with a delicious change to minor for the verse. ‘Should have changed the world by now, but I’m too busy milking the Holy Cow…’

mp3: Longpigs – Dog Is Dead

best of the waltz-time songs, a bit of knackered bar-room piano, echoes of choral evensong, poignant, beautiful. A song about his dead dog, as far as I can make out.

FRASER P

Wedding Present

SOME IDEAS FOR CHRISTMAS 2021 (#1)

I don’t really like posting up links to songs that are relatively new – and by that I tend to think of as having been released in the previous 12 months – but for this occasional and temporary series, I’m going to make exceptions on the grounds that the mp3s will be low-res and if anyone giving them a listen happens to like then, then there’s every possibility that they will go out of their way to make a purchase.

If, like me, you’re already beginning to think of some items to put on a list for Santa to leave in your stocking on the morning of 25 December, then I’ll be offering up a few suggestions for your consideration, consisting of albums that have been released during 2021.  Oh, and it’s a series that I really want to open to guest contributors who themselves might have some brilliant ideas.

You really shouldn’t be all that surprised to find that The Wedding Present are first up.

It was back in February that Locked Down And Stripped Back was made available.

It’s an album recorded during lock-down in the summer of 2020, with each band member playing, and indeed, filming their parts at home under the restrictions in place at the time.  David Gedge has said that the recording process was far from easy, but ultimately proved to be rewarding.

The album consists of 12 tracks, of which ten are re-recordings of classic Wedding Present tracks of old, along with two completely new songs.  The project began with long time band member Terry De Castro heavily involved, sending her guitar contributions over from her Los Angeles home, before everyone reluctantly accepted how particularly difficult it was to co-ordinate and arrange.  David Gedge then asked an old friend, Jon Stewart, formerly of Sleeper, to come on board.   The finished album has four songs on which Terry plays and eight which feature Jon.

More than that, however, is that Jon Stewart has got involved in the songwriting process, with one of the new songs, You’re Just A Habit That I’m Trying To Break, being credited to Gedge/Stewart/Howard/Hardwick, with Melanie Howard being the bassist/keyboardist/vocalist throughout the project, and Chris Hardwick being the drummer.

The other new song is credited to Wener/MacLure/Stewart.  In other words, it’s a song written by Sleeper, one which was fairly new, being included on This Time Tomorrow, an album released in December 2020.

mp3: The Wedding Present – We Should Be Together

And yup, Louise Wener has come on board for a guest co-vocal, and in doing so, helped to create one of my favourite musical moments of recent years.  This is pop, and perfect pop at that.

As if having the opportunity to hear some wonderful new versions of songs such as A Million Miles, California, Blonde, Crawl, You Should Always Keep In Touch With Your Friends and My Favourite Dress wasn’t a good enough reason to want to pick up a copy of Locked Down And Stripped Back, then surely having the ability to put the needle into the groove of We Should Be Together should be the clincher.

Interestingly, The Wedding Present are not, currently, offering the album via their own website, and instead are encouraging would-be purchasers to do so from a local record shop.

You know the script……………………….

JC

Edwyn Collins

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM : #298: EDWYN COLLINS (Vol 2)

It’s been more than seven years since Volume 1, so I think it’s fair to say that this is long overdue. Indeed, the first Edwyn Collins ICA was #2 in the series, and here we are fast approaching #300.

I think everyone who visits this corner of t’internet knows the backstory, but just in case, here’s the abridged version.

Edwyn Stephen Collins, born on 23 August 1959, first came to fame as the lead singer with Orange Juice, who began life as the Nu-Sonics in 1975, changing their name in 1979 and disbanding in 1985. Edwyn would later embark on a solo career which, until 1994, was a commercial failure in terms of hitting the charts, albeit his loyal fanbase ensured his records sold in reasonable enough numbers, all the while supporting his live shows. All that changed with the worldwide success of the single A Girl Like You, which went Top 10 in almost every European country as well as selling very well in Australia, Canada and the USA. The proceeds from the hit allowed Edwyn to invest in a studio of his own, from where he would sporadically release further new material while also embarking on a parallel career as a producer. He even found his songs appearing on the soundtracks of major Hollywood movies.

In February 2005, at the age of 45, he was in hospital, after two cerebral haemorrhages in quick succession. He suffered a stroke, was in a coma and required major brain surgery to stop internal bleeding which threatened to kill him. His recovery was then hampered by him contracting MRSA. All this was followed by a lengthy programme of neurological rehabilitation owing to right-sided weakness and difficulty with speech. The aphasia he suffered allowed him to repeat only four phrases, over and over again: “yes”, “no”, “Grace Maxwell” (his wife’s name) and “the possibilities are endless”.

Somehow, he made a remarkable recovery to the extent that he was able to take to the stage again in late 2007 and to go on tour in the summer of 2008 to promote Home Again, an album he had recorded largely in the winter of 2004 but whose mixing and completion had to await him getting over the very worst of his illness.

Since then, with the help and support of his family, not to mention the huge number of friends he has made through his work as a musician and producer, Edwyn went on to release three more albums between 2010 and 2019, including the most recent two on a new label which he owns, runs and manages. He and his wife also returned to Scotland after decades in London, making their home in Helmsdale, a coastal village about an hour’s drive from John O’ Groats, the most northerly point in the country, and where he has built a new studio and where he recorded his most recent album, Badbea, which was released in 2019.

Like many others, he’s been quiet in recent times, but he’s already announced plans to play shows in Glasgow and Edinburgh in 2022. And who know, there might well be plans in place to release some new songs written during lockdown.

These were the songs selected for ICA#2 all those years ago.

A Girl Like You; The Beatle$; In Your Eyes; If You Could Love Me; Don’t Shilly Shally; Judas In Blue Jeans; Means To An End; Keep On Burning; 31 Years; and Searching For The Truth (b-side version)

None were considered for this volume.  And what follows aren’t necessarily the very best of the rest….but I do think, like some of the very best ICAs, it holds together as a stand-alone record.

SIDE A

1. 50 Shades of Blue

Edwyn’s post-Orange Juice career began with a couple of collaborations with Paul Quinn, released on Swamplands, a label run by Alan Horne, his old sparring partner from the Postcard days, via a partnership with the major label, London Records. He was then signed by Alan McGhee to the short-lived Elevation, a joint venture between Creation Records and WEA which only lasted a year before WEA pulled the plug due to poor sales of the six singles that had been issued, two each by The Weather Prophets, Primal Scream and Edwyn. The better of these two efforts was Don’t Shilly Shally which was on the previous ICA.

So it makes sense to kick this one off with his first release for Demon Records, a label that had been founded back in 1980 by Jake Riviera, Andrew Lauder and Elvis Costello, and on which most of the latter’s 80s singles and albums had been issued (do you see what I mean about how many friends the incredibly affable and easy-going Edwyn was able to make in the music industry?)

50 Shades of Blue is a great pop song which bound along at a fair pace. Released in October 1989, it was recorded in Koln, Germany and produced by Phil Thornalley, known best at the time as a producer but past member of The Cure, playing on and producing their most unusual pop hit The Lovecats.

2. Won’t Turn Back

One of Edwyn’s oldest friends in the business is Vic Godard, who is a veteran of the punk and post-punk scene going all the way back to the late 70s with Subway Sect. Alan Horne briefly resurrected Postcard Records in the early 90s, and one of the albums to come out was The End Of The Surrey People, a solo album by Vic which was produced by Edwyn. The flop single from the album was the toe-tapping Won’t Turn Back, a song which Edwyn would later record himself as a b-side in 1996.

3. Losing Sleep

Losing Sleep was Edwyn’s seventh studio album, released in 2010 on Heavenly Records. It was the first completely new album after his illness and while it was magical and amazing to be able to see and hear him again, there was an acceptance that the brain injury meant he was now singing a bit differently than before. There is no doubt that the process of going back into the studio again was a difficult time, especially as Edwyn was no longer able to play his guitar due to a paralysis, but many friends and contemporaries offered their services to help make sure the album would be a triumph.

It was recorded in West Heath Studio, the place owned and run by Edwyn in London. The mainstay of his band were musicians who had been with him for decades, including ex-Sex Pistol Paul Cook on drums. Roddy Frame had been part of the touring band in 2007/8 and he made a guest appearance on the new album, as too did Alex Kapranos and Nick McCarthy (Franz Ferdinand), Johnny Marr, Ryan Jarman (The Cribs), Romeo Stoddart (The Magic Numbers) and Jacob Graham, Connor Hanwick and Jonathan Pierce, all members of The Drums and whose work on In Your Eyes was included on the previous ICA.

The title track was also released as the advance single, and it is another foot-stomper, with a great backbeat, complete with a lyric referring to all his been through but without an iota of self-pity, which is how Edwyn has gone about his life this past decade and a half.

4. Love’s Been Good To Me

Casual listeners might be surprised at just how many slower songs Edwyn has written throughout his career. Sometimes they are out-and-out ballads or love songs, while at other times there’s a quirk or two, such as in North of Heaven from the 1994 album Gorgeous George in which the acoustic tale of a singer down on his luck, contains lines in which there’s a sweary dig at Guns’n’Roses.

This one is a much more straightforward effort, taken from Understated, his eighth solo album, released in 2013. It closes the album, and the guitar work is courtesy of Carwyn Ellis, who is more or less Edwyn’s right-hand man in the studio these days. The lyric? It tells of past love affairs but comes round to the fact that the protagonist is happy with his life nowadays; it really does seem to be his public thank you to his wife Grace Maxwell, who nursed him back through those very dark, difficult and painful years, and without whom there would have been no comeback.

5. Glasgow to London

From Badbea, the ninth and most recent album. Edwyn’s illness robbed him of so many memories, and he’s had to rebuild things in a painstaking way, often through reading old press cuttings and watching old TV appearances. He would have seen a great deal about the Orange Juice days when he and all who were part of the Postcard scene, the Sound of Young Scotland, were prepared to take on the world with youthful exuberance and supreme self-confidence. These days?

Now I note I must admit
I couldn’t give a fuck

A very autobiographical song, in which he says ‘look at the state of me’ before immediately adding ‘but I don’t mind’ and accepting that it’s all in the past.

SIDE B

1. Liberteenage Rag

The previous side closed with a track taken from the three most recent albums.  You can get a sense of the more fragile nature nowadays of Edwyn’s voice when you compare it to the way he sounded on one of the songs recorded a few weeks before his illness.   The image at the top of this posting is taken from the inner sleeve of the album Home Again, released on Heavenly Records in 2007, a full three years after most of the work had been done.  It’s inside the studio at West Heath and if you look closely you’ll see Edwyn’s right fist balled up as he’s unable to straighten the arm and hand.  Now look at all his guitars sitting behind him…..how hard must it have been for him to realise that he’d never be able to play any of them again nor use any of them to write songs like this.

2. Make Me Feel Again

From his most successful album, Gorgeous George, released in 1994 on Setanta.  It was, of course, propelled into the charts from it having A Girl Like You on it, but aside from that, it is a consistently excellent record. The allmusic review captures it well:-

A consolidation of Collins’ skills as a songwriter, demonstrating both his vicious wit and his effortless melodicism. Working with former Sex Pistols drummer Paul Cook and bassist Claire Kenny, he develops the hardest-hitting musical attack of his career, but it’s also surprisingly versatile, capable not only of glam rock, but also jangle pop, folk-rock and blue-eyed soul.

I could have included any number of tracks from it, but Make Me Feel Again I reckon works best at this juncture. Great guitar work and a vocal which lives on the edge of his range….I’ve never claimed Edwyn to be one of the truly great singers of the Scottish pop world, but for some reason, even going back to the Orange Juice days, it’s when he appear to be in danger of losing it that I seem to most enjoy.

3. Seventies Night

The hit single changed everything.  It led to a much increased budget from Setanat for the next album, I’m Not Following You, which came out in 1997, the delay being down to Edwyn globetropping the planet to cash in on his unexpected ‘overnight’ success.  He threw the kitchen sink at the new record, with brass, flutes and strings popping up in the most unexpected and delightful ways. He also paid homage to 70s disco with this appropriately named effort.  Oh, and it has Mark E Smith on lead vocal while Edwyn decides to put his own voice through a vocoder.  Funktastic stuff.

4. Outside

Edwyn was fast approaching his 60th birthday when he was recording Badbea.  It’s a very reflective album in many places, with Outside really being just the one fast-paced number – and coming in at just about bang on the two-minute mark, it’s almost the most punk thing he’s done since the era of the Nu Sonics.

5. Take Care Of Yourself

Hellbent on Compromise, the second solo album released back in 1990, sold dismally.  No singles were taken from it and two of its eleven tracks were cover versions.  A further song, A Means To An End (included on the previous ICA), was Edwyn’s take on a tune co-written with Paul Quinn who himself would slow it right down, retain part of the chorus and add his mighty vocal talents to create A Passing Thought.

So, it’s fair to say Edwyn was struggling a bit for tunes and inspiration and yet the album has some tremendous moments, including the acoustic ballad Graciously which I really should have found space for, as well as Take Care Of Yourself, a near seven-minute number in which Edwyn pleads with folk to be careful with their lives.  Part anti-drugs song, part warning about AIDS, it’s a moving number in a number of ways, not least in what lay ahead for Edwyn some 15 years down the line, where even the cleanest of living couldn’t prevent a near-death experience.

I do hope you enjoy this latest ICA.  It brought me great joy in that I spent days listening to the entire back catalogue again, but it also brought a great deal of angst as I anguished over what to include and how best to complete the running order.  It provided a reminder as to why I don’t do so many ICAs nowadays.

JC

 

Cure

THE MONDAY MORNING HI-QUALITY VINYL RIP : Parts Thirty six and seven: TWO FROM THE CURE

So, I went into the cupboard to pull out the 12″ single that I was going to put onto the turntable and do the whole ripping at 320kpbs for this series.

But the single was sort of sticking to the one sitting next to in the cupboard and the two of them kind of came out together, and thus I found myself in a dilemma as I now wanted to feature both of them.

Dilemma solved.  Two for the price of one today.

Some words written previously back in April 2015:-

The Cure have released 41 singles going back to Killing An Arab in 1978 right through to The Perfect Boy exactly 30 years later. But I would never have guessed that Lullaby was the one that performed the best in the UK singles chart when it crawled its way up to #5 in 1989.

I would have put a fair amount of money that The Lovecats was the holder of that title, but it only scratched its way to #7 in 1983, although I’m guessing that in terms of actual sales it in fact outsold Lullaby.

And even if you told me that the biggest success wasn’t The Lovecats, I’d have then placed whatever was left of my cash on Friday I’m In Love, but this only swooned its way to #6 in 1992.

So the best performing 45 turns out to be the one about the creepy and haunting tale of an eight-legged creature which frightened Robert Smith is in his nightmares as a youngster. Or, is in fact the song, as has been suggested in some places, really about drug addiction and dependency but written in such a way that it gets past the censors at the BBC for the all important airplay?

Either way, I think it’s one of the most inventive arrangements to feature on any record by The Cure.

mp3: The Cure – Lullaby (extended version)

And from December 2013:-

The Best New Order song that Bernard, Hooky, Stephen and Gillian never wrote??

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.

Apologies for the use of repeat postings for the words. I’d like to think you’ll forgive me, given how good the songs are.

JC

Fall

THE WONDERFUL AND FRIGHTENING SERIES FOR SUNDAYS (Part 19)

This week, a single that made it into the Top 75 in September 1986, thanks to a song that could and did pack the floor at indie-discos.

mp3: The Fall – Mr Pharmacist

The first Fall song which Mrs Villain ever admitted she liked, thanks to me constantly including it on all the mix taped we would pack into a suitcase to take with us when we went away on holiday.  It’s amazing to think back and realise how much space was needed for a box of 24 cassettes, and how often the batteries would need replaced on whatever cheap version of the Sony Walkman was being taken down to a beach or pool.   I don’t miss those days now that there’s almost 50,000 songs each on a couple of i-pods which quickly charge up in a matter of hours overnight.

Enough of me wallowing in nostalgia. Here’s the press release issued by Beggars Banquet:-

The 1st of September heralds the release of The Fall’s version of MR PHARMACIST, a superb break-in taster for, and from their next LP.

Recorded straight onto master tape at Abbey Road Studios, MR PHARMACIST is the first record by THE FALL to contain new ingredient ‘JOHN’ S. WOLSENCROFT (ex-Weeds) on the drums who replaces much loved Karl Burns (now of the group ‘Thirst’).

MR PHARMACIST was an afterthought during the recording, being one of Mark E. Smith’s FAVOURITE songs by The Other Half – coincidentally, M.E.S. was ill with a chest infection during part of the recording.

HEAR live bass of Super Hanley on vinyl! NOTE phlegm vocal rattle! WITNESS earscorch of Brix Guitar, unfettered by tedious modern mixing methods. If only all cover versions were like this.

Companion track ‘LUCIFER OVER LANCASHIRE’ would not fit onto (blank space) but it is too good to store. The subject of much debate, ‘LUCIFER OVER LANCASHIRE’could refer to:-

A. Recent Commie cloud and complaints of aching bones in the health-conscious Fall camp.
B. The Erasure of good manners and good groups in that holy county or
C. A trailer for Pashion Religious Whodunnit due December
‘I tell you no lies.
Completely blind/are the Sentinels
Eyes/At the back of his mind/
This demon’s hip.

Bonus track ‘AUTO TECH PILOT’ features horror machine FX by Simon Rogers, and offers weirder territory in THE FALL legacy – where delirious commentary meets modern classical at the Eighties Trash-Gate.

Get It.

Regards,
Edward M. Cohort II
Hotel Cohesion
Hampstead
M/CR

There’s no point in adding anything to that is there??

mp3: The Fall – Lucifer Over Lancashire
mp3: The Fall – Auto Tech Pilot

I love Lucifer Over Lancashire. Another example of the weird and wonderful stuff that was stuck away on b-sides over the year (and yes, I’m thinking that’s a subject matter for a future ICA….). Auto Tech Pilot, on the other hand, I can happily live without.

Mr Pharmacist entered the charts at #75.  It dropped out after one week.  The song was, in due course, played more than 400 times at Fall gigs, the first being on 9 November 1986 in Birmingham and the last being on 23 October 2017 in Newcastle, the second to last show they ever played, and was, by far the song most aired. Maybe an indication that MES wished he had written it?

For those who are interested, The Other Half was an American psychedleic/garage band from San Francisco in the mid-late 60s.  They were largely unknown at the time, but the inclusion of Mr Pharmacist, a single back in 1966, on a Nuggets compilation in 1985 from which it is likely that MES picked up on it, finally got them noticed.

mp3: The Other Half – Mr Pharmacist

John Leckie was on production duties for The Fall on this occasion, as he would be for the album Bend Sinister released just three weeks after Mr Pharmacist.  But by the time of the next single, he would have been usurped……

JC

Sacred Paws

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #280: SACRED PAWS

From this very blog, back in January 2020

“Sacred Paws is made up of Rachel Aggs (vocals, guitar) and Eilidh Rodgers (vocals, drums) who have known each other for years through various bands they have been part of.  It was back in 2015 that they decided to work together, although things were complicated a bit by the fact that Rachel was living in London and Eilidh was in Glasgow. The development of technology and home recording has perhaps made such geographical issues less than a problem than they were a few decades ago, but it still meant that things weren’t rushed.

The duo were signed to Rock Action, the label owned by Mogwai, and the first fruits of their labour was the Six Songs EP, released to a fair bit of buzz round these parts thanks to an energetic blend of spiky guitars, funky drumming/percussion lines and vocals that were chanted as often as they were sung which really made for a breath of fresh air. Throw in the fact that the girls were clearly enjoying themselves on stage, and you had a decent recipe for success.

The debut album, Strike A Match, took over where the EP had ended, delivered with just a bit more polish and confidence. It gave a few nods to the 80s female-led bands such as The Slits and The Raincoats while the increased use of upbeat African-style drumming provided a real energy that bordered on the infectious. It made for a hugely entertaining listen and was a deserving winner of the Scottish Album of The Year award in 2017, albeit the vast majority of people in the country had never heard of them nor, with next to radio play, had heard any of the songs.

Sacred Paws had a rather quiet 18 months on the back of winning the award, with just a handful of live appearances and no new material.  Rock Action didn’t try hard to cash in on the increased profile with a re-release of earlier material and instead encouraged the duo to go about things in the way they themselves most wanted. Rachel re-located to Glasgow which meant they could spend more time writing and arranging the new material, but it did take until the end of May 2019 for the follow-up Run Around The Sun to hit the shops.

Having said that, it had been preceded by a couple of digital singles and a BBC Radio 6 session with Marc Riley, who in effect is becoming a part-replacement for John Peel in terms of providing a platform for bands to come into a studio to band out three or four songs in one go to be broadcast to the nation. I was delighted with the singles which indicated that the duo weren’t tampering with what had made them so interesting to begin with. The album proved to be a huge delight, again full of bright, sunny and infectiously happy songs that were very welcome in a year when so many events and happenings seemed to cast a long shadow.

It’s an album that I’ve found myself prone to putting on while I’m embarking on a road or rail journey, and outside the skies are dark and brooding while the rain batters off the windows – it is the perfect antidote to such situations and as I sit back and close my eyes, I’m transported thousands of miles south to where the sun is beating down and the mood and vibes are carefree. And when the last of its ten songs comes to an end after a little more than 32 minutes, I’ll hit the repeat button.”

Unsurprisingly, the duo have been quiet these past 18 or so months, but they did return to live performances in August with a show in Edinburgh, since when a few more have been announced.  With a bit of luck, there’ll be some new music to enjoy before too long.  In the meantime, here’s one song from each of their three releases:-

mp3: Sacred Paws – Try Again (from 6 Songs)
mp3: Sacred Paws – Stars (from Strike A Match)
mp3: Sacred Paws – Life’s Too Short (from Run Around The Sun)

JC

Lightning Seeds

INSPIRED BY ECHORICH

Just over a week ago, I posted Pure, the debut single by The Lightning Seeds.  It went down well with most of you, and  I was particularly struck by the comment left behind by Echorich:-

Pure is a great song, but I have always been partial to Joy. Broudie’s writing partner on some of the early tracks was Lotus Eater, Peter Coyle – a genius move really. Broudie would bring on heavyweight songwriter (IMO) Terry Hall to collaborate on the brilliant Sense single and album. As an artist he was a very, very smart producer…

Which led me to dig out my lesser-played 12″ early Lightning Seeds single.

Joy was the follow-up to Pure. While the debut went to #16, the follow-up bombed to the extent it didn’t graze the Top 75. Maybe it’s not quite as immediate as Pure, but there was no reason for Joy to stiff so spectacularly, obviously not getting any radio play.

Indeed, I can’t remember it being issued as a single, only knowing the song through its inclusion on the debut album Cloudcuckooland, which I bought on CD back in 1990. It was only a couple of years ago that I came across the 12″ of Joy in a second-hand store, going for £2. I almost didn’t buy it, as one of its b-sides was also on the album, meaning it was just one new song I was getting my hands on. When I say ‘almost’, it was a thought that lasted a nano-second:-

mp3: The Lightning Seeds – Joy
mp3: The Lightning Seeds – Frenzy
mp3: The Lightning Seeds – Control The Flame

It is the last of these which is also on the album. It wasn’t the b-side to the 7″ and thus was just a way of adding to the 12″. It’s a song written solely by Peter Coyle as referenced in Echorich’s previous comment, and it is a very fine and unusual number.

Incidentally, I had forgotten that another of Cloudcuckooland’s songs was a co-composition involving Ian Broudie and another much-mentioned person on the blog:-

mp3: The Lightning Seeds – Sweet Dreams

An absolute belter of a song, and the one from the album that I have always thought would have been perfect for a single.

I bet you’re surprised to learn that it is Richard Jobson who has the co-credit.

Yup, THAT Richard Jobson of Into The Valley etc. fame.

JC

Fine Young Cannibals

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (61)

And an equally cracking b-side as well.

Released in June 1985 and going all the way to #8 in the charts, this is one of those records that I had on 7″ vinyl back in the day, but which would be lost with many hundreds of others after a disastrous and misguided effort to do a runner from a rented flat in Edinburgh.  It’s one that I liked, but didn’t love enough to ever go chasing any replacement, but when a 12″ copy showed up a few weeks back, I decided to take it home and give it a listen.

mp3: Fine Young Cannibals – Johnny Come Home (extended version)

I was quite bemused to find that the first minute or so is merely an extended noise before the music begins. Even then, it takes the form of an extended drum roll and some incidental music before the familiar trumpet solo eventually begins. As a result, it doesn’t feel as immediate or as sharp as the 7″ version as can be heard in this promo video which, if memory serves, was made for showing on The Tube on Channel 4:-

I was also struck by how much of the sound on the 12″ would be ripped-off by Communards for their cover of Don’t Leave Me This Way, which would go to #1 the following year.

I’d also forgotten how much I had enjoyed the b-side, re-discovering it again after such a long time:-

mp3: Fine Young Cannibals – Good Times And Bad (extended mix)

The song is credited to Andy Cox, the guitarist with FYC and who had, along with bassist David Steele, on the demise of The Beat, joined forces with vocalist Roland Gift to form this new band. But the lyric doesn’t feature Gift; instead, it is the work of Douglas Kahn, an American-born but Australian-based academic who is renowned for his writings on the use of sound in the avant-garde and experimental arts and music.

It had been back in 1980 that the then 29-year old Kahn had, through the use of a razor blade and a reel-to-reel player, created a tape called Reagan Speaks for Himself, taken from a media interview given by the then presidential candidate. All these years later, and such things are easy enough to pull together, but this was genuinely well ahead of its time, and it was released by Sub Pop on a compilation cassette in 1981 before being given away as a flexidisc with the March 1982 edition of RAW, a comic magazine from the USA.

Either way, Andy Cox was obviously aware of the work, and in adding a funky, jazzy, poptastic soundtrack, he helped to create something that was, certainly back in 1985, far from the norm.

JC

Broken Chanter

THAT RARE THING ON THIS BLOG……

……………..a recommendation for an as-yet unreleased album.

I think I’ve mentioned before that I’m on the receiving end of loads of e-mails on a daily basis in which I am asked, in the most polite way imaginable, if I’d care to offer up a single/album/forthcoming release from a singer or band.  More often than not, the requests come from established pluggers, with my e-mail address obviously being on a long list of those being targetted.  Sometimes, someone will reach out on the basis of what they may have previously found on the blog, more often or not through some sort of search engine.  My practice, which has been consistent going all the way back to 2006, is not to do so.  In the beginning, I would often respond to each individual e-mail, but the quantity just became too much, and now they are treated like junk mail.

The problem is that I often miss out on some things which later prove to be something of a success, with one recent example being Dry Cleaning, whose early material was certainly fired over here a couple of years back (I remember thinking it was a fine name for a band), but who were ignored.  Turns out, I’m a big fan of what they do, with the 2021 album New Long Leg being on heavy rotation, and if I’d been smart enough to have picked up those early self-released singles, then I’d have a couple of pieces of valuable vinyl.

All of which is a boring preamble as to why it is unusual that I’m giving you all a suggestion to place an order for Catastrophe Hits, the new album from Broken Chanter which will be released on Friday 29 October through the joint efforts of Olivegrove Records and Last Night From Glasgow.

A quick recap.

Broken Chanter is the name used by David MacGregor, one of the mainstays of the much missed Kid Canaveral, for his solo material.  The debut material, back in 2019, was very well received and the self-titled album, got loads of great end-of-year mentions in Scotland, paving the way for David and the musicians he had brought together for studio and touring purposes to take the place by storm in 2020.  COVID put paid to those plans, with a tour cancelled, as well as hopes to get back into the studio for a follow-up.

David spent a bit of time recording mainly instrumental material purely for digital release on Bandcamp, as well as coming up with a few merchandising ideas to keep the Broken Chanter name out there, all the while working on new material with the hope of one day getting the band back together and into the studio.

I’ll declare an interest here.  I’ve known David for the best part of a decade, and as he lives not too far away from Villain Towers on the south side of Glasgow, we’ve bumped into one another occasionally.  I’d been very keen to hear the new songs and David was kind enough, a few months ago, to share them with me knowing full well that I’d give him an honest reaction.  Here’s what I sent back to him, saying that I would use it as the basis for an album review when the time was right:-

“Given everything the world has had to face up to over the past 18 months, it surely is a stroke of genius that Broken Chanter’s new album, written and recorded under the lockdown restrictions, goes by the title of ‘Catastrophe Hits’.

It seems particularly apt given that COVID struck just as Broken Chanter were about to take full advantage of the wonderful critical and fan reaction to the debut album by undertaking their biggest ever and most ambitious set of live shows.

But if you’re expecting this sophomore effort to be a self-pitying roll call filled with tales of doom and gloom, then prepare yourself for a big surprise as Catastrophe Hits turns out to be a tremendous antidote to all of the stress, worries, concerns and heartaches we have had to endure in recent times.

And while Broken Chanter might be regarded from the outside as a vehicle for the solo talents of David McGregor, this is an album truly of a tight and very talented band of musicians, with lots of very pleasant surprises throughout.

The tone is set by the two ridiculously catchy opening numbers, ‘Dancing Skeletons’ and ‘Allow Yourself’, both of which would be hit singles if these things really mattered anymore. The latter in particular is a real joy, thanks to the call and go vocal, and harmonies, courtesy of David and Jill O’Sullivan, from the much missed Sparrow and The Workshop.

David switches to Gaelic for the mid-tempo ‘Ith Lan Do Bhith’ and while I might nor have a clue what he’s on about, I can vouch that his words are accompanied by a tune which brings back some very welcome reminders of Frightened Rabbit, particularly on their latter albums.

The quality then just keeps on coming, with ‘Extinction Event Souvenir T-Shirt’ offering a wry social commentary on modern society but with the sort of chorus that will surely lead to a mass sing-along once we can all get back to live gigs again.

‘Filaments’, a ballad at just over two minutes, is the shortest track on the album and offers the first opportunity to draw breath after such a frantic opening but just as you think it has faded out too soon, it leads perfectly into ‘A Sad Display’, a song which will bring huge delight to those who think Broken Chanter are equally as fabulous and entertaining when they do folk music.

‘So Long’ sees us back firmly on indie rock territory. It feels, to this long time fan, as being one that the bosses of the labels Olive Grove Records and Last Night From Glasgow, on which the album will be jointly released, could make the case for being the early taster for the new material, given that it is the closest to any of the songs on the debut record.

The album closes with the triumvirate of ‘Horse Island’, ‘Fast Food Parked Car’ and ‘Rubha Allain’ which capture, in microcosm, everything that makes Broken Chanter such an intriguing and enjoyable listen. The pace of things slows right down, allowing the genuine beauty in David’s voice to come to the fore while his bandmates demonstrate their own individual and collective talents; but just as you anticipate the album is going to fade away gently and leave you sighing wistfully at the outcome, the second half of the instrumental closing track speeds up and becomes the sort of music you hear as the credits run over a film that has provided an upbeat, triumphant but unexpected happy ending for the underdog, in a ‘Local Hero’ sort of way, where you find yourself smiling and simultaneously wiping away a wee tear of joy.

Catastrophe Hits? It may well have done in 2020 and 2021, but this new Broken Chanter album could well be the musical equivalent of the vaccination programme. Overdue, much needed, and a real shot in the arm.”

So there you have it, an actual TVV review of an about-to-be-released new record.  One that has been superbly produced by Paul Savage, once of The Delgados and the in-house producer at Chem 19 studios, just outside of Glasgow.

As it turned out, those in charge of these things decided to go with a different song as the lead-off single, one which was made available in digital format back in mid-August and which I’ve been giving regular airings in the build-up to matches at Stark’s Park, the home of Raith Rovers FC.

mp3: Broken Chanter – Extinction Event Souvenir T-Shirt

I’m delighted that a few fans, having heard the song, went out of their way to make a purchase.

So, if any of the above has whetted your appetite, then click here for a pre-purchase.  More about Broken Chanter can be found at this bandcamp page.

VIDEO BONUS…..

COMPETITION BONUS

Although Catastrophe Hits isn’t officially out yet, the CD version was made available to the 130 or so people who were present last week at a small venue when David, as the support act, played his first show since February 2020.

I purchased a copy of the CD with the specific intention of giving it away to one lucky TVV reader.

To be in with a chance, all you need to do is to leave behind the comment ‘Extinction Event Souvenir CD’ in response to this posting.  You can do so with those words alone or a part of any wider comment or observation.

Assuming more than one person enters, I’ll make the draw towards the end of next week.  And you can enter no matter where in the world you live, as I’ll pick up the delivery costs, even in this expensive post-Brexit world.

JC

Pink Kross

AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM : #297 : PINK KROSS

PINK KROSS – NOISE UP : AN IMAGINARY COMPILATION ALBUM

by flimflamfan

Not since The Hook ‘n’ Pull Gang had a band made such an immediate and full-throated impression. I take that back, Glen or Glenda really knew how to grab me by the throat and did so, often. As mighty as they were their majesty paled somewhat in the shade of my new best friends, Pink Kross.

My first dalliance with The Hook ‘n’ Pull Gang was via a tv programme called FSD (Full Scale Deflection, BBC Scotland). As The Hook ‘n’ Pull Gang began I recall thinking “this is special” – it was like a jolt of primal happiness. Thankfully, I recorded the tv show and still had the VHS, which was fortunate, as it endured repeat plays as I searched without success for the single, eventually buying it 10, probably more, years later when that internet thing allowed such treasures to be unearthed.

I’m certain I’ve bored you all before about my marathon visits to The 13th Note in the early to late-90s. For anyone uncertain please email: absoluteboringnumpty@runitshim.com. I’ve attempted to write my reminiscences from memory, rather than check dates religiously – although I have asked for ‘hawners’ (broad, Glaswegian slang for help), on occasion. I apologise in advance if some dates, especially the important ones, are incorrect.

I first saw Glen or Glenda at the 13th Note and within a few minutes of them playing I was lost in their world – a psychedelic world in which Janis Joplin and Big Brother and the Holding Company held court in a realm that gave birth to one Marc Bolan (not the first time I’ve made that comparison). Musically, what a fantastic trip. Much as with Mr. Bolan himself, the preening wannabe-Marc hammed it up to perfection. What a gorgeous racket.

And then into this story strides the colossus, Pink Kross.

1. Dinahmite

Imagine, if you will, me sitting in an angular armchair, in a beer-soaked dive, enveloped in the all-encompassing onslaught of Pink Kross – kind of like Peter Murphy in that Maxell advert, sans his cheek bones, musical ability or general good looks. I think the best description I can give of how I felt is … bliss. Why had nobody warned me? How had I not guessed that when the trio, based on their dress sense, took to the beer-soaked carpet-stage, they meant business – garage-punk, filthy-glamour business.

Jude, Vic and Geraldine

2. Chopper Chix (From Teenage Hell)

I’ve always had a ‘thing’ about groups that only have women in them, I’m trying not to use the reductive ‘Girl Groups’ to describe female bands. I appreciate it can prove to be good short-hand but, for me, I think it time to consign the descriptor to history. When Pink Kross finished their all-too-brief set my friend just looked at me and smiled. He knew. He knew! I’m guessing I became a wee bit incandescent with delight and began to babble about what I had just witnessed. Many others were also babbling. The venue was small and many attendees knew each other and it didn’t take long for me to be introduced to Geraldine and Vic. Jude was otherwise engaged. I have a painful memory of gushing at them before they escaped to ready-poured drinks. That was me hooked, not by a Pull Gang but by Pink Kross.

3. Scumbag

I’m all but sure I attended every Glasgow gig bar one, loving the songs I had come to know and feeling privileged to be in attendance as they unveiled new material. It was about this time that John Peel could be spotted irregularly in local Glasgow haunts. Subsequently, several bands were asked to ‘do’ sessions. In 1995 Pink Kross recorded 5 songs for a Peel Session.

4. Skinhead Pearson

Hidden Track – Abomination (Peel Session)

For personal reasons the wonderful Geraldine reluctantly decided that she would leave the band (1995, I think?). I was gutted. Selfishly, I thought this might mean the break-up of the band but I also knew that she’d be less likely to be on the ‘scene’. We were never friends, just friendly. I hold her in high regard.

5. A-Bomb Prom

Later that year Jane joined Pink Kross. This was a double-thrill for me as 1. Pink Kross would continue, and 2. Jane was someone I had know for a long time. Yippee! The band began to play live and record (with Rick Flick and one RM Hubbert at the production desk).

Vic, Jude and Jane

6. No Time For Bimbo

And this is where is gets a little silly … the band decided to film a video for A-Bomb Prom, (The Active Dalmation e.p., 1996). The venue for filming was Nice N Sleazy – (the venue area). I don’t recall receiving an invite but there I was “ready for my close-up”. Not quite. A murmur went around the venue that we could be in the video if we wanted. I chose not to and stood at the bar – my eyes affixed to something, something not quite ‘right’. Just in front of the stage sat – I’m sorry to say this – a rather ugly woman, in a garish pink, silk-ish dress and wearing an ill-fitting blonde wig. The back of the dress was low-cut allowing her to show off her back and shoulder hair to full, mesmerising effect. She turned. I could now see her in profile. That’s when it all made sense. The ugly woman in the pink dress was a he, a he who would soon become one of my closest friends. He didn’t make a convincing woman but … I suppose that was the point. It must have been the point, surely? I’ve never asked my friend if he still has the dress or wig. Somethings are better left unasked. I’ve made irregular enquiries over the years to ascertain what happened to the video. Was it ever completed? No-one I’ve spoken to has a definitive answer.

7. Do It Joseph

From the initial release on their own Bouvier Records the band continued to release new, superb singles with Glasgow labels, Teen-C Recordings (run by members of bis), Modern Independent (run by members of Urusei Yatsura) and Flotsam and Jetsam (run by members of The Amphetameanies / The Poison Sisters). They also released with non-Glasgow labels on several split 7” and numerous compilation albums. These releases included the Hacksaw e.p. (Teen-C Recordings 1997), Tension Toy (Sweet Pea Records, 1997) and Tension Toy, again (Flotsam and Jetsam.1997), as part of the Club Beatroot series (this was No. 5) and was split with The Radio Sweethearts. Club Beatroot included contributions from many of Glasgow’s music-scene luminaries of that time.

8. Mommy Is A Punker

As a live band Pink Kross really knew how to present themselves. Serious about their music they were also relaxed enough to have some fun too – something some of their contemporaries could have learned from. Often as not costumes would be worn that would raise smiles, even in ‘normal’ stage clothes the band exuded an edgy garage-punk-chic that reminded me of the playful Space Kittens and the more menacing, The Social Lepers. I’ll move on quickly before I get all gooey-eyed about The Space Kittens. Occasionally, at later gigs, Fraser (P.H. Family) would join the band for a thoroughly riotous version of Smug and I’d be in the audience, looking on, feeling lucky, elated and just a tad smug, just because I was there. In that room, at that moment. Ahhh … Pink Kross.

9. Hacksaw

In 1998 the band released the phenomenal album Chopper Chix from V.P. Hell! (Teen-C Recordings). Oh. My. Good. Goddess. 19 sublime tracks over an almost break-neck thirty-seven and a half minutes. New. Pants. Pleeeez! This was followed in 1999 by the e.p. Wanted for Dogz Dinner (Bouvier Records) which saw the band return to their familiar ‘stage’ names: Janie -C-, Vice Blue and Jude Fuzz. It seems a tragedy that this was to be the final release but a larger tragedy befell the band.

Like the sound of her very own bass reverberating news of Geraldine’s death began to echo through the ‘scene’. Most people were shocked, some upset. I was both.

I’m ashamed to say I can’t recall the year – I think it late 2000s, maybe 2008? Geraldine wasn’t someone I knew particularly well but as far as I’m concerned, she was a lovely woman and a great musician who was always very kind to me. Her son has a lot to be proud of.

10. Drag Star Racin’ Queen

In 2009 Vic, Jude and Jane played their last Pink Kross gig (as far as I’m aware) at Glasgow’s Stereo. It was a triumph. A glamorous, garage-punk, fuck you triumph.

11. Tension Toy

From time to time The Kross could be found enjoying other pursuits. I’ve added my dollops of interest, and possible distraction, below. Your views may differ?

V.P. refers to visible pantyline – or so I was told. I’m laughing as I write this as I’ve always thought that’s what V.P. stood for. Vic told me. Now I’m wondering if my leg was being pulled?

12. Supersucceeder

Vic was also a member of one of my all-time favourite bands D.P. Lé Odd who released one of my all-time favourite singles – the 7” split single with Glue: Prehumous / Posthumous. D.P. Lé Odd featured on the Prehumous side (Flotsam and Jetsam, 1995). D.P. Lé Odd was, what I referred to jokingly as, the ‘scenes’ super-group. I use this term not because they all featured in other bands but because they were most definitely super and for a very short time, a group that, despite an almost mayfly existence, appeared on a Peel playlist (Deeply Ode To Politeness, 7th July, 1996). For those with the keenest of ears, yes, that is Hubby (RM Hubbert) providing the vocal. He also provided the cough etc. on My Fist, Your Face and was (as far as I’m aware) the only band member to appear on both the a and b side of the split single – and unusually playing drums, with D. P. Lé Odd.

13. Smug

Many moons ago I cajoled D.P. Lé Odd to play live. After much deliberation it remains unclear if it was for an anti-Clause 28 gig or The Big Bang (a World AIDS Day fundraiser which spanned a few days). The year eludes me. Either way it was their only live appearance. What joy!

14. PMT

In 1996 Pink Kross refereed the split Lugworm versus bis single (Guided Missile Recordings). They featured on Pop Song by bis.

Jane was also known as Jane Strain while in Pink Kross. She was a busy bee and has been in a number of bands most notably, The Amphetameanies.

15. Dogz Dinner

16. Noise Up

My love of Pink Kross remains undiminished. I hope some of you will take time to have a wee listen and more importantly, enjoy.

To Jude, Vic, Geraldine and Jane … thank you!

17. Pussy Cat A-Go-Go

flimflamfan

Half Man Half Biscuit

THE MONDAY MORNING HI-QUALITY VINYL RIP : Part Thirty five : VENUS IN FLARES

I thought to myself that this Monday morning thing got rather serious and downbeat last week.  Here’s your antidote.

A million housewives every day
Pick up a can of beans and say:
“What an amazing example of synchronisation”

He looked out of the aeroplane
And he saw the Alps way down below
He fixed his gaze on the white terrain
And he could see a portrait in the snow
And he shouted: “Hey look down there, I can see Robert Powell”
That’s an ominous example of the power of TV

And I went la la la la la la la
La la la la la la laaa
Oh la la la la la la la
Just like everyone else does when they can’t think of any more words

Yeah OK I had a Kojak mac
By Christ they were trendy at the time
I got it into my head that I had to stamp out crime
The man behind the mask at C&A’s was quite polite
He said that when I wore my mac I wouldn’t have to fight

And I went yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah (sure George)
Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah (Oh God)

Well the Grand Old Duke of York
Well, he had ten thousand men
And he marched them up to the top of the hill
And he had them all again

mp3: Half Man Half Biscuit – Venus In Flares

As first heard back in 1985, when I bought the debut album Back In The D.H.S.S.

Loved it then, love it still.

JC

Fall

THE WONDERFUL AND FRIGHTENING SERIES FOR SUNDAYS (Part 18)

The sixteen-month period from October 1985 – December 1986 was a busy, yet reasonably stable one for the band.  They were being well-supported by Beggars Banquet and seemed to be happy with the label.  There were sell-out tours of the UK. The core of the band remained the same – Mark E Smith, Brix Smith, Craig Scanlon, Steve Hanley and Simon Rogers, with just the drummer’s chair becoming a touch on the hot side. Karl Burns left the band, again, in April 1986 shortly after a month-long tour of the USA and Canada, and was replaced, but only always on a temporary basis, by a returning Paul Hanley, proof again that even those who had left before under the darkest of clouds were always prepared to help out whenever the need arose.

But, come the summer, a new drummer, in the shape of Simon Wolsencroft, was drafted in. ‘Funky Si’, as he was commonly known, was a familiar figure in the Manchester and wider indie-scene having been a contemporary of the likes of Ian Brown, John Squire, Johnny Marr and Andy Rourke, as well as being a member of The Colourfield, the group formed by Terry Hall after the break-up of Fun Boy Three.

Over the course of the final six months of 1986, there would be three 45s and the album Bend Sinister, and while Wolsencroft drummed on most of the songs, some of the material completed prior to his arrival was issued, meaning Paul Hanley got a few final credits with the band, including the tracks on the next flop single in July, released only on 12″:-

mp3: The Fall – Living Too Late
mp3: The Fall – Hot Aftershave Bop
mp3: The Fall – Living Too Long

Have a look at the cover of the single at the top of this post, and you’ll see a man who has an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other.  Combine it with the downbeat nature of the lyric and the almost funerial pace of the music on the a-side, then it was no surprise that at least one interviewer thought it might be a sign that MES, with his 30th birthday just a year away, was beginning to plan some sort of exit from the music industry.  In response, he said it was really his attempt to write a song about upper-class suburbia and how pissed off folk must be about the routine and dull way it was all panning out. Not exactly the sort of things that make for a good single is it?, albeit it remains a song I still enjoy all these years later.

The b-side, Hot Aftershave Bop, is a faster-paced number  that wouldn’t sound out-of-place down at the local indie-disco, albeit not when the DJ really wants to pack the floor out. It’s more than worthy of a listen, albeit it does have an almost throwaway near-nonsensical lyric in which the song title, or a slight variant on it, appears regularly.  The extra track on the b-side, Living Too Long, is an extended yet different version of the a-side, with a lot more going on in the playing.

Fun fact 1: There was actually a limited edition 7″ promo single issued, omitting Living Too Long but offering a miniature bottle of Hot Aftershave Bop aftershave.  I’m guessing MES wouldn’t have been best pleased with the marketing folk

Fun fact 2: Living Too Late was reviewed in Smash Hits magazine, possibly the first (and last?) time that the Beggars Banquet promotional folk got a 45 into the pages of the UK’s biggest selling music weekly.  There was always a guest reviewer, who that week happened to be Samantha Fox, whose initial claim to fame had come through regular appearances on Page 3 of the tabloid papers in which there was a daily photo of a woman with her tits out, but who had, in early 1986, embarked on what would become a successful, if short-lived, career as a pop star.

Cutting-edge criticism, indeed.  MES, many years later, would look back and laugh at it all:-

“That’s as good as it got inside Smash Hits: Page 3 birds airing their views. I think it’s great, actually — better than being harangued by Tony Parsons and Julie Burchill.”

Living Too Late reached #97 but was voted in at #15 in the Peel Festive 50 at the end of 1986.

Next up……an actual appearance in the Top 75, thanks to a song that could and did pack the floor at indie-discos.

JC

Rutkowski Sisters

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #279: RUTKOWSKI SISTERS

From the booklet with the Park Lane Archives compilation CD (2009):-

Dee and Louise began as backing sisters in Bourgie Bourgie, then shared vocals with Paul Quinn in the early Jazzateers line-up.

They formed Sunset Gun with Ross Campbell, releasing an album on CBS. They then became best known for their participation in This Mortal Coil, featuring heavily on ‘Filigree and Shadow’ and ‘Blood’ as well as Louise on the follow-up The Hope Blister. 

Dierdrie later worked with Eyeless In Gaza.  Louise formed The Kindness of Strangers with Craig Armstrong and both sisters remain active. This lovely rendition of Nick Drake‘s classic recorded in 1985 remained unreleased until now!

mp3: Rutkowski Sisters – Riverman

While this is the only track I have under the name of Rutkowski Sisters, there’s quite a few from their later days with the bands named above.  It won’t be too long before they make a return to this series.

JC

Frank Black

HANG ON TO YOUR EGO

You would be a brave person to state that Frank Black solo is better than the Pixies. He isn’t and this single is nowhere as good as the majority of the Pixies back catalogue. It is however a pretty good song, and it’s certainly worth four minutes of your life listening to it.

SWC on 22 October 2013, when offering some thoughts on Men In Black by Frank Black (and no, it wasn’t a cover of the Will Smith song).

The same words could be applied perfectly to the lead song on the one 12″ single I have in the collection:-

mp3: Frank Black – Hang On To Your Ego

If it sounds, in places, Pixies-ish, then that’ll have a lot to do with the fact that Joey Santiago is guesting on lead guitar.

I bought totally on spec back in 1993.  I wasn’t picking up too much vinyl at the particular time, so I’m guessing it must have been in a bargain bin.  I played it and thought it was a shade above OK, but then again, I was expecting something fairly sensational given how much I had loved just about every track released by his old band.  I remember being intrigued that Hang On To Your Ego had been written by Brian Wilson, but beyond that I couldn’t have offered many thoughts as Beach Boys are another of the bands from the golden era of pop music that I just haven’t ever been able to take to (and I have really, really, really tried!)

Wiki is mine and your friend:-

“I Know There’s an Answer” (alternately known as “Hang On to Your Ego”) is a song by American rock band the Beach Boys from their 1966 album Pet Sounds. Written by Brian Wilson, Terry Sachen, and Mike Love, the song was inspired by Wilson’s experience with the drug LSD and his struggle with ego death.

Wilson and Sachen wrote lyrics to the song that criticized people who abuse LSD as a form of escapism. After Love voiced objections to its drug references, Wilson allowed him to revise the message to be about finding meaning within oneself. Although the references to “ego” were eliminated, the key line “they trip through the day and waste all their thoughts at night” remained. In 1990, an earlier mix of the song, featuring the group singing alternate lyrics, was released as a bonus track on the album’s CD reissue. Cover versions of the song have been recorded by artists such as Sonic Youth and the Pixies’ Frank Black.

Wilson’s 2016 memoir briefly references this cover version, stating only that “Someone played me a song once by Frank Black. He was in the Pixies, a band I don’t know very well, and then he had some solo albums. On one of them he did a cover of ‘I Know There’s an Answer’ where he put the original lyrics back in …” In 2012, this version was ranked at number 10 on Paste magazine’s list of “The 25 Best Beach Boys Covers”

The single didn’t crack the UK charts, and I’m guessing 4AD, here in the UK, and Elektra, in the US, were bitterly disappointed given they were convinced they had a solo star in the making and had allocated substantial budgets to the recording and promotional processes. The debut album did go top 10 in the UK but flopped to #117 on the US Billboard chart. It was a sure sign that no matter the name adopted by Charles Thompson IV, he was never going to be a chart-topper.

The two b-sides on the single are instrumental cuts that weren’t included on the debut album:-

mp3: Frank Black – The Ballad of Johnny Horton
mp3: Frank Black – Surf Epic

The former is a mid-paced number, with the piano quite prominent to begin with. The latter has a title that promises much but in all truth, the only thing epic about it is the fact it is almost eleven minutes long. Neither sound like anything he had previously done with the Pixies.

JC

Robert Forster

CALLING FROM A COUNTRY PHONE

Oops!

I didn’t mean to take five full months to make good on my promise, as a follow-up to this post on Danger In The Past, the debut solo album by Robert Forster, that I’d offer up some thought on its follow-up, Calling From A Country Phone, which originally came out in 1993, again on Beggars Banquet the long-time home of the Go-Betweens.

Again, I’ve picked up a copy thanks to it being reissued, on vinyl, by Needle Mythology in 2020, with the bonus of an additional 7″ single.

The first thing that has to be mentioned is that it is a totally different beast from the debut which had been recorded at the famous Hansa Studios in Berlin and the backing musicians were all part of The Bad Seeds.  By 1992, Robert Forster was back in Australia, living again in Brisbane with his new wife Karin Baumler.  He had a bundle of newly written songs, which he felt had a similar sort of vibe as much of the earliest material he had written for the Go-Betweens.

He decided his needs would best be met if he could return to the same small studio where it had all began in Brisbane back in the late 70s but to do so with musicians he didn’t know.  Acting on advice and a tip from an old friend who ran a record shop in the city, Robert went to a well known pub venue, the Queen’s Arms, where he saw a band called COW who also had members of another band called Custard playing with them that night.  He liked what he was hearing, and he asked if they would like to work with him to make a new album. All the musicians were at least ten years younger than him, and he had no idea if they would be compatible in the studio environment. It’s probably best, at this stage, to let Robert explain:-

It was risky and deliberate. I’d written ten songs from mid-1990 to mid-1992 in the Bavarian farmhouse where I had been living with my German wife.  Moving to Brisbane. my aim was to make a record to the exact opposite of Danger In The Past.  Why? The songs led me there, and you always have to follow the songs.

The studio…..was funky.  I hired a Hammond organ for the session and a four piece band could record together in the room. We weren’t making a huge contemporary rock record; in fact it wasn’t much like anything anyone was doing at the time. Unadorned, raw, with a cracked seventies AM radio vibe to it. Listening now, I am struck by its boldness and beauty – we really did go out on a limb.

(taken from the sleeve notes to the reissued album)

The one thing I can say is that I’m pleased I didn’t buy the album back in 1993 as I would have been quite disappointed. Almost thirty years on, and my tastes are a bit broader than before and my tolerance levels that bit higher.  Oh, and there’s also the fact that I’ve enjoyed many of the subsequent solo albums, as well as much of the material from the period when the Go-Betweens reformed, which means a lot more slack can be cut knowing better records would follow rather than worrying, as I would have back in the day, that Robert had lost it forever.

Calling From A Country Phone feels more like a collection of songs rather than an album which hangs well together.  Most of the tracks have an Americana feel to them, with pedal steel and violin often to the fore, along with that honky-tonk piano sound that I associate with scenes set in saloon bars in films or TV shows set in the Wild West.  The musicians brought on board for the album are quite clearly very good, nay excellent, at what they do, but I can’t help but feel there’s no real chemistry with Robert.

The main man perhaps has a sense of this too, mentioning further in his sleeve notes that it was unfortunate the band never got the chance to play outside of Australia and that perhaps the live experience would have better explained the record and what he was doing.

Anyways, that’s my take on it and there will likely be many folk out there who disagree strongly.  The album certainly gets a very good write-up in a number of places, with references to a gentle acoustic sound melding perfectly with the wistfully rueful vocals, as well as fine country-rockers with some typically trenchant lyrics and cinematic choruses.

Judge for yourself:-

mp3: Robert Forster – Atlanta Lie Low
mp3: Robert Forster – Falling Star

I don’t want to leave anyone with the impression, however, that I thought this purchase was a waste of money. C’mon, it’s Robert Forster and there’s a few moments on the album which could just about find themselves on an ICA of the solo material; but overall, while it’s not one I’ve had on heavy rotation since it landed in Villain Towers, it hasn’t been put in the cupboard to be completely forgotten about.

If I was to use the ratings deployed by some of the monthly music mags, it would likely be three stars;  in other words, a borderline pass.

JC

Lightning Seeds

IT REALLY WAS A CRACKING DEBUT SINGLE (60)

Sometimes, I find that pieces that have previously appeared on the blog would work perfectly for some sort of series that has been thought-up and introduced many years later.  These are my words from 17 September 2014:-

Ian Broudie was a big part of the Liverpool new wave scene in the late 1970s. A member of Big in Japan (which also featured Holly Johnson and Bill Drummond) he then formed The Original Mirrors in the early ’80s, and was credited as a member of Bette Bright and the Illuminations on their lone album from 1981.

In 1983, he formed the band Care with vocalist Paul Simpson and the duo released three outstanding singles before breaking up. Though he was a busy writer, performer and session musician through the 1980s, Broudie was much more well-known a producer, working with Echo and The Bunnymen, The Icicle Works, The Colourfield, The Pale Fountains and The Fall amongst many others, often using the pseudonym “Kingbird”.

In 1989, Broudie began recording alone under the name The Lightning Seeds – he has since said it was an experiment to see if he could cut it as a muso – and in this guise as a singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist/producer, he would achieve much success beginning with this wonderful debut single:-

mp3 : The Lightning Seeds – Pure

A #16 hit in the UK, the two follow-up singles from debut LP Cloudcuckooland failed abysmally and like most folk, I reckoned that could very well have been the end of The Lightning Seeds. But two years later, he/they returned and hit the Top 30 with Sense and for much of the rest of the decade became chart regulars, picking up lots of new fans in particular after the huge success of Three Lions, the official anthem of the England football side for the Euro 96 championships.

Some later material might have been bigger hits, but I don’t think there was ever anything better than that debut single. Here’s the excellent b-sides from the 12″ copy that’s been sitting in the cupboard all these years after I picked it up for 99p in a bargain bin in Woolworth’s.

mp3 : The Lightning Seeds – Fools
mp3 : The Lightning Seeds – God Help Them

JC

Trashcan Sinatras

THE PERFECT REMINDER by CRAIG McALLISTER


A pal of mine, and of this blog, has written a book.

But not just any book.

It is called The Perfect Reminder, and it is 350 pages wholly devoted to I’ve Seen Everything, the second album recorded by Trashcan Sinatras which was released in 1993.  The book has been written and published to coincide with the remastering, repressing and reissuing of the album by Last Night From Glasgow.

LNFG is a not-for-profit label that was founded in 2016, since which time it has done a ridiculous amount of great work to promote and support some of the best new music coming out of Scotland and further afield.  More recently, the label established Past Night From Glasgow (PNFG) as a way to make it easier for fans to pick up vinyl copies of some classic albums from years gone by.  It was always a dream of LNFG founder, Ian Smith, to be able to re-release I’ve Seen Everything as it’s his favourite Scottish album ever, and having been given the green light to do so, he then turned his thoughts to create a book telling the story of the making of the album, of its songs, of its artwork and to link all this into some of the backstory of the band itself.

Ian turned to Craig McAllister and asked if he would take on the task.  Craig, as any of you have ever visited the blog/website Plain or Pan will know, is a tremendously gifted and able writer, someone who really could have made a name for himself if he’d ever looked to be a music journalist.  He’s also from the area in which the Trashies grew up and, back in the early 90s was himself a budding musician whose band had rehearsal space at Shabby Road, Kilmarnock, the very studios in which I’ve Seen Everything was mostly recorded. As such, he was around when the songs were developing from demos into fully-formed things of beauty, all of which made him the ideal person to take on the task.

As the blurb on the LNFG website states, the book features interviews with the band and the likes of Chas Smash, Pete Paphides, Gideon Coe, Emma Pollock, Roddy Hart, Eddi Reader and many more.  I happen to be one of the ‘many more’ as Craig also sought out contributions from fans, and my musings have been given over to all of Page 275.

The Perfect Reminder is an absolute gem, perfect itself in every way imaginable as it’s the sort of book that you don’t have to be a fan of the band to enjoy.  What it most certainly will do is make you want to own a copy of the album so that you can listen to what all the understandable fuss is all about.

Craig has done an incredible job in knitting it all together, ably editing down what must have been endless hours of chats with not only the five members of Trashcan Sinatras,  but also the many others involved either on the creative side of things or who were part of the supporting network/entourage in the early 90s.  Alongside the words you’ll also enjoy portraits and images, most of which have been taken by Stephanie Gibson, herself a very well-known face across the music scene in this part of the world, while the contribution of Brooklyn-based, and long-time band associate, Chris Dooley, in the design process has helped create something more akin to a piece of art rather than a mere book.

There’s so many parts of the book that I want to share with you, but in the end I’ve settled on the backstory to The Hairy Years, the last but-one track on the album, as told by its co-writer, John Douglas:-

When I was 12 or 13, the family went on a summer holiday to Pontins in Filey, a seaside holiday camp with amusements, funfairs, various sports halls and probably bars, although I was too young to notice.

I was always a sucker for twinkly lights, so as soon as I was set free from parental gazes, my savings were flung into the nearest exciting flashing lights machine, promising fun and prizes…delivering neither.

The first day ended with me knowing heart-sinking skintness, a larger than usual burden of guilt and a lingering anger at being taken for a ride. The seriousness of my situation was mainly because I knew I was on a promise to bring my Gran home a present.

My cashlessness and the frightening thought of not returning with a present for my expectant, formidable Gran became a constant time bomb ticking throughout the holiday as it slowly passed to its last day.

In desperation, I decided to nick a snow scene from the souvenir shop and, somehow, I found the nerve to do it and the skill to get away with it.

Thus, with a swipe of a souvenir, my first autonomous ‘adult’ act was committed. I did not do as I was told. I did not do as I was brought up to do. I stepped into a kind of independence…criminally so, but there we are.

A small, guilt-driven, event became a milestone. I was no longer a frightened wee boy. I was on my way to something else. As the song says…’Here began my hairy years….’

mp3: Trashcan Sinatras – The Hairy Years

The Perfect Reminder will soon be available to buy in stores and via the online markets, but you can pick it up now by clicking here for the link at the LNFG website, and at a price which is 20% cheaper than what will be the RRP.  You can also pick up a specially designed t-shirt and tote bag if you like.   Elsewhere, you can click here to purchase the album, while a good browse around the website will also show what other goodies are on offer, including membership of LNFG for 2022, which itself comes very highly recommended.

I just want to show you the way…..

JC

Twilight Sad

THE MONDAY MORNING HI-QUALITY VINYL RIP : Part Thirty Four : THAT SUMMER, AT HOME I HAD BECOME THE INVISIBLE BOY

This was very much a candidate for the ‘Cracking Debut Singles’ series, but in the end it nudged its way into the list of those songs that I want to offer the opportunity to listen to at 320kpbs, straight from the vinyl.

mp3: The Twilight Sad – That Summer, At Home I Had Become The Invisible Boy

It first appeared, in November 2006 on the US-only release, on CD, of a self-titled EP containing five tracks.  Here in the UK, we had to wait until early April 2007 when the band’s label, Fat Cat, issued the debut album Fourteen Autumns & Fifteen Winters, although quite a few fans (including yours truly) had previously been able to give it a listen thanks to the EP being available in some indie record shops – whether it had come in on import or whether Fat Cat had sent out copies direct from their base in Brighton, England, I have no idea.

It was then chosen for release as a single, some two weeks after the album had appeared in the shops, via a relatively limited pressing on 7″ vinyl, with a previously unreleased track on its b-side.

More than fifteen years later, it still has the ability to make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, especially when it is played live with the full band.  I never experienced the full weight of the My Bloody Valentine sonic experience, but the occasions when ‘That Summer….’ has been blasted out, particularly at the Barrowlands in Glasgow, surely must have come close.

JC

Fall

THE WONDERFUL AND FRIGHTENING SERIES FOR SUNDAYS (Part 17)

Another song that I only picked up on a few years after its release as a single in October 1985.  My excuse being that I had graduated from university a few months previously, moving almost immediately to Edinburgh to start my first job in July 1985.  Money was tight, and much of my salary went on the rent for a room in a shared flat, albeit in a very nice part of the city.  The three of us all worked – mine was office based with regular hours, but the flatmates worked in hotels and bars, often on night shifts, which meant there was little opportunity to play records or tapes without causing a disturbance.  It proved to be the beginning of my drifting away, for the most part, from music for a few years.

I was also not yet familiar with the alternative scene in Edinburgh, and so wouldn’t know the clubs or places that would likely play The Fall or indeed any of the music I liked.  Besides, most other folk in my office (i.e 100%) were a tad more straight-laced when it came to music….something that only changed when Jacques the Kipper appeared on the scene some five years later.

Why am I telling you all this?  I suppose it is partly confessional as Cruiser’s Creek is up there as one of my favourite of all the songs written and recorded by The Fall and I really wish I had been aware of it at the time of its release, and not a few years later when I got my copy of The Fall 45 84 89 compilation. I have, however, danced to it loads of times over recent  years as I always made a request for it at the Little League nights when they used to take place, and John was always willing to indulge me.

Cruiser’s Creek is brilliant.  It’s also bonkers.

Putting the backstory together nowadays is much easier, thanks to the internet and the various fan sites devoted to The Fall, but trying to work it all out back in 1985 was a very tough task. Mark E Smith, in a contemporary interview with one of the music weeklies, said ‘it’s a party lyric with a party twist’.  I’m thinking he was referring to the utter danceability of the song, with a pacey riff and sing-along-chorus, albeit so many of the words in the verses are hard to pick out or fathom.  Reading them written down many years later and there’s confirmation that MES is having a sly dig at two of the year’s biggest happenings in the music world – Red Wedge and ZTT Records.

One of the most astonishing things to emerge in later years is that Cruiser’s Creek was the name of a library on a ship on which MES had spent time with Brix’s family after her grandparents had taken all the relatives on a fiftieth wedding anniversary cruise.  It seems that MES, in trying to escape all the fuss that was happening throughout, retreated to Cruiser’s Creek where he did some writing, seemingly using the location for the title but making the narrative about an office party.  Whether he was comparing the agonies of an office party at one of his former places of employment on Salford Docks with having to spend days at sea with the extended Salenger family, we can only make an assumption……

mp3: The Fall – Cruiser’s Creek

The version on offer today is taken from the compilation album, and it is a couple of minutes shorter than the original single, which ran to over six minutes in length, released on 7″ and 12″ vinyl, with the 7″ playing at 33 ⅓ RPM.  But never fear, I’ve the promo video to provide the full version:-

Here’s your b-sides:-

mp3: The Fall – L.A.
mp3: The Fall – Vixen

The former, which is mainly an instrumental with a few snippets of lyrics/dialogue thrown in. The tune was written by Brix, as a homage to her home city. It seems that MES leaned on the TV series TJ Hooker, starring William Shatner as a cop, for inspiration. Unusually for a Fall 45, it wasn’t a new song, as it had been one of the tracks on the album This Nation’s Saving Grace, released the previous month.

The latter, only found on the 12″, is a Brix song on which her vocal is very prominent….it becomes a Mr & Mrs Smith duet in due course….and while it’s harmless and inoffensive enough, it doesn’t stand up to repeated playings. I do wonder if any other member of the band had presented it as a tune whether it would actually have seen light of day.

Fun fact, specifically, for JTFL-Ahh.

Vixen was never played live, but seemingly a snippet of it was played by Brix during an in-store appearance by The Fall at Texas Records, 2204 Pico Boulevard in Santa Monica on Saturday 23 March 1985.

Your musicians on this one were Mark E Smith (vocals), Brix Smith (guitar, vocals), Craig Scanlon (guitar), Steve Hanley (bass), Simon Rogers (bass, guitar, keyboards) and Karl Burns (drums).  John Leckie could again be found in the producer’s chair.

Cruiser’s Creek reached the giddy heights of #96 in the UK singles chart.

JC

Rote Kappelle

SATURDAY’S SCOTTISH SONG : #278: ROTE KAPELLE

From wiki:-

Rote Kapelle were a post-punk/indie pop band from Edinburgh, Scotland, active during the 1980s. Its band members included musicians who were also members of Jesse Garon and the Desperadoes and The Shop Assistants.

The band was formed in the early 1980s by Andrew Tully (vocals) and Marguerite Vasquez-Ponte (vocals), both of whom would also form Jesse Garon and the Desperadoes, with Chris Henman (guitar), Ian Binns (keyboards, also a member of The Stayrcase), Malcolm Kergan (bass, also a member of The Thanes), and Jonathan Muir (drums).

The band’s debut release was The Big Smell Dinosaur EP in late 1985, after which they were signed by Marc Riley’s In-Tape label. Tully described the band’s sound in 1987 as a blend of noisy post-punk and anorak pop. Vasquez-Ponte was also a member of a third band, The Fizzbombs, alongside the Desperadoes’ Angus McPake and The Shop Assistants’ former drummer Ann Donald. They released two further singles and two more EP’s, one of which featured tracks from their Peel Session, before splitting when Vasquez-Ponte joined the re-formed Shop Assistants. An LP, No North Briton, was released in 1990.

I’m sure I saw Rote Kapelle play live in Edinburgh in the mid 80s, but I don’t recall ever getting round to buying any of their records.  Thankfully, they have become something of a staple across various box sets/compilations harking back to the era, and I’ve been able to acquaint myself with four of their songs, including this wonderful piece of noise from the C88 box set issued a while back by Cherry Red:-

mp3: Rote Kapelle – Fire Escape

JC