sound of the suburbs

Holiday Six Pack

2007-07-09T15:13:00.000+02:00

Yes my friends it's that time of the year again. There is a ferry waiting for me in the port of Marseille, tomorrow morning I will be on the island of Corsica. Should things go well I'll be back at the end of the month with my batteries recharged and loads of new ideas.
Until then here's six songs for you with a holiday theme, see you soon!

Big Audio Dynamite - 'Everybody Needs A Holiday'
Marine Girls - 'Holiday Song'
Refused - 'Summer Holiday vs Punk Routine'
The Kinks - 'Holiday'
The Olivia Tremor Control - 'Holiday Surprise'
The Pixies - 'Holiday Song'

We'll Never Turn Back

2007-07-08T17:06:00.000+02:00

I guess I'm quite lucky as I can recognise what is good in most forms of music even actually appreciating some of it. despite my personal preferences I respect much traditional music and have long been a blues fan and of it's younger brother, rhythm 'n' blues. I've had the good luck to have seen some of the leading lights of these musical forms live: BB King, Buddy Guy, Dr John but the performer that left the strongest impression was Pops Staples who I saw at a Blues Festival in the early nineties when he was touring his first solo album 'Peace To The Neighborhood' released when he was in his seventies . He had not be non productive until then, far from it, he was the mentor behind the Staple Singer, one of the bands that were the foundation of Stax Records, if you don't know their take on the bands 'The Weight' where they made the song their own and to my mind recorded the definitive version, well stop what you're doing and go and buy it right now! The Staples singers as the name suggests were part of that long American tradition of family members singing together: The Carter Family, The Osmonds, The Partridge Family, The Jackson Five, Pops provided the musical backing for his four daughters. As is often the case there is one of the bunch that is just that little bit stronger and goes on to forge a respectable solo career, in the case of the Staple Singers this was to be Mavis. She has recently released her 9th solo album on as many different labels 'We'll Never Turn Back', this latest outing has seen the light of day on one of the coolest labels I Know of, Anti. Anti are the philanthropic side of US punk/skate label Epitaph whose rooster includes such delights as Tricky, Bettye Lavette, Michael Franti and Tom Waits. The album sees Mavis backed by one of the few guitarists capable of replacing her father Ry Cooder and one of America's greatest living drummers/percussionists Jim Keltenr. The results are more than satisfactory as Mavis goes back to her gospel roots and delivers 12 songs of strife and struggle that sadly seem as relevant today as they did back in the 20's or 30's, her gritty soul divas voice more than does justice to these songs and the sentiments that they convey. Not a duff song amongst the 12 tracks my current favorites are the funky sounding '99 And A Half' and the stomping 'This Little Light Of Mine'. An album that goes along way in proving that the devil does not have all the beat tunes!

These New Puritans

2007-07-07T10:02:00.000+02:00

A name that is enough to strike fear in these troubled times of religious extremism be it in the form of Christianity, Judaism or Islam, the name may one day have that effect of fear as these boys will be seriously bothering the pop charts in years to come if their is any justice. They are a four piece from Southend a town that today is little more than a satellite of the sprawling monster we call London. When I was a boy Southend was the seaside resort preferred by east enders, I still have fond memories of day trips there with my parents and grandparents, days that would inevitably end up with a fish and chip supper in a pub beer garden before returning home. This beer and chips attitude was prevalent in the music the town unloaded onto the world in the 70's as this was almost pub rock central often referred to as the Canvey Island Delta with bands such as Dr Feelgood, Eddie And The Hot Rods, Mickey Jupp, Lew Lewis and The Kursal Flyers. But all of that is history and I am more than pleased to see that town has made it's way into the 21st century in musical terms at least with this four piece. These New Puritans were completely unknown to me before I was contacted by their label Angular Recording Corporation who are based in south east London and sound like a good spirited bunch, who in much the same way as Factory Records before them, play artfully with image and traditional ideas, for example they have given catalog numbers to various map references! Amongst the artists that they have worked with are The Long Blondes and the Kaxons both of which have had singles released on the label, 'Separated By Motorways (Sexamatronic mix)' by the Long Blondes is up for free download. These New Puritans would appear to be one of the bands that they are developing along with the Fucks (?), our heroes are currently in the studios recording their debut album scheduled for a year end release.
At the beginning of the year the band were approached by the Dior fashion house with the idea that the band provide the music for their forthcoming men's fashion show. The band up until then had never composed a song longer than four minutes long, the result of this commission was 'Navigate Navigate' that provided the soundtrack for the full 16 minute shown. Written and recorded in just over a week the 12 minute version released as a 12"single and digital download from Rough Trade does not disappoint. The song is built on a solid marching beat, not that stupid a thing when you consider it was composed for top models to strut their stiff to, that is not a 1000 miles away from 'Sunday Bloody Sunday'. It is a nervous twitchy masterpiece that does not fail to keep your attention despite it's 12 minutes, a solid beat, abrasive treble heavy scratchy guitars and a solid pop hook that many a lesser band would kill for. If you want reference points, they have got me thinking of early Talking Heads and Edinburgh's post punk heroes Fire Engines and Franz Ferdinand despite this retro feel they manage to retain a modern edge. I for one am looking forward to their album hitting the stores. I have uploaded 'Navigate Navigate' as a 3 minute edit to give you an idea, to experience the full strength version you'll just have to dig into your pockets, that I'd say is normal. Now where are my jellied eels?

Sista India / Wrath Of The Blackman

2007-07-05T14:28:00.000+02:00

Not got a great deal to say today. After Mondays post I got round to digging out an old Fun Da Mental 12", and my memory did not disappoint me another great culture bending mix with good sentiments thrown in for good measure. I really find it hard to believe that this band have not made it gig time yet, maybe they've rattled too many cages.

1. 'Sista India (Education Mix)'
2. 'Wrath Of The Black Man (Oppressor Mix)'

With regards to the Monkeys song on the Shamen's 'In Gorbachev We Trust', it is 'Sweet Young Thing' that clocked in at under two minutes on their self titled debut album from 1966.

Peel Sessions 60

2007-07-02T14:36:00.000+02:00

If I'm to be honest I'm not the worlds greatest fan of electronic dance music, let's just say techno and rave has left be more or less cold. Having said that there are certain things that I do like I'm a big sucker for full throated house divas another is the way electronic music has proved to be crossroads for the meeting of western and eastern music and has, to my ears, largely succeeded something that cannot be said for guitar driven rock. A good example of this is Transglobal Underground, a collective that works together on an on-off basis, giving it's members the time to pursue other interests. Their manifesto is to use their love of dance music, avant garde, Arabic and world music to come up with their own highly listenable and danceable groove. The bands core is made up of Natasha Atlas, Alex Kasiek, Man Tu and Count Dubulah. The band recorded two Peel Sessions today's songs are taken from the first that dates from February 1983.
1. 'This Is The Army Of Forgotten Souls'
2. 'Yalla Chant'
3. 'Shimmer'

Gunman

2007-07-01T09:07:00.000+02:00

So has it really been 30 years since Bob Marley & The Wailers delivered 'Exodus', many people are saying it was his best album, I'm not too sure about that, it was though the album that took him over the threshold to international stardom. The late 70's were the hey day for reggae with Jamaican import being easily available in the UK and two majors heavily featuring the style, Island and Virgin with their Front Line sub label. It was also the era of the 12" single, a format that was not well suited to punk with it's short sharp shock songs though was made to measure for reggae and the the market was flooded with reggae 12", obviously not all of them were good. My personal collection include many expensive imports and importantly many UK releases from the blossoming UK reggae independent Greensleeves that had the good sense to licence many Jamaican releases. Such was the case with Michael Prophets 'Gunman' presented here in it's full almost 7 minutes. A topical song at the time relating the problems of the troubled times on the Caribbean island and a great song to boot.
Yesterday's Shamen post has proved to be rather popular and as such has used up almost all of my band width with File Den, if you get a message regarding lack of band width don't worry on Thursday 5 July my counter will be back to zero and the songs will be downloadable again. Someone has posed the question about the Monkey's song, if anyone knows the answer feel free to leave a comment, nothing to win just the glory of it, if no one comes forward I will reveal the song Thursday. On the subject of file hosting services, I recently received a message that the Head Of David links were not working, sorry but I tried them myself and there was no problem, if you are having problems try changing your browser, it is always a good idea to have two on your PC as for unknown reasons sometimes they bug, personally I use FireFox and Internet Explorer. Another point I believe the file hosting services that I use do not support download managers and so maybe your download manager should not be on default position? Last point before I run off to the kitchen to cook Sunday dinner, MyDataBus has recently changed a little and to be honest I not too sure that it's for the best so if any of you are having problems with files that are hosted there do let me know I can always find another service, any suggestions?

In Gorbachev We Trust

2007-06-30T09:37:00.000+02:00

Regular readers will know that it is rare that I post a whole album as one of the good things about Cd's is that much more old and rare albums are available than in the good old days of vinyl, downloading services have in the last year accelerated this phenomenon with certain titles now only available as downloads, the important point being that they are available and I do not consider it to be the place of serious music bloggers to post whole albums that are still commercially obtainable UNUSED. Every once in a while I will see an album sitting on my shelves and an Amazon and Google search will only drag up the second hand dealers, this was the case with The Shamen's 1999 album 'In Gorbachev We Trust'. The album is a snapshot of the band in transition between the 60's influenced psychedelic guitar rock and the full blown hip hop rave house nightmare that was to trouble the worlds charts. I am no great fan of what the band went on to become much preferring this very indie and DIY nature of things where the swirling and at times angry stabbing guitars were still present along with the newer elements of sampled and electronically created sounds. They were by no means the only band working in this new area that would become labeled indie dance, probably their closest contemporary was Pop Will Eat Itself another guitar band that got bit by the machine bug and to such good effect! The album's title sums up a feeling of hope that was prevalent at the time, the arms race was as good as finished, the USSR was opening up and the Berlin wall was soon to become history and for the first time since WWII the eastern bloc was no longer being portrayed as the baddies. Interestingly enough one of the album's strongest songs 'Jesus Loves America' is a very scary warning concerning religious fundamentalism that unfortunately was to become a reality with George Bush appearing to take orders directly from him above. All in all a very pleasing album, no need for me to rabbit on about it, a right click and save as and it can be yours.

1. 'Synergy'
2. 'Sweet Young Thing'
3. 'Rasberry Infundibulum'
4. 'War Prayer'
5. 'Adam Strange'
6. ' Jesus Loves America (fundamental)
7. 'Transcendental'
8. 'Misinformation'
9. 'Raptyouare'
10. 'In Gorbachev We Trust'

P.S. The album includes a Nesmith/Goffin/King composition that was originally recorded by the Monkeys,

The Ten Best Baggy Bands?

2007-06-29T13:14:00.001+02:00

It's Friday and so here is the famous list as decided by those taste makers at Uncut, despite the fact that they gave them a number from 1 to 10 I don't think for one minute that this is a strict classification.

1. The Happy Mondays, absolutely no surprise here as they are perhaps the band that best sum up the form of music. Originally from the harder side of Manchester, if they hadn't of made it in music they would probably all be in prison by now. Two albums that was them finding their direction in the late 80's that was followed by the genre defining album 'Pills Thrills And Belly Aches' to herald in the new decade, ever since then it's been downhill ropey live album, coke hell in the Bahamas and shit album, splitting up, pointless reunion tours. They back together again with a new album out next Monday, can't wait..............
2. Stone Roses, slightly less hedonist than the Monday's with a more laid sound probably due to their heavy consumption of grass. Hardly the most prolific of bands but they did manage to leave us one classic psychedelic guitar album in 'The Stone Roses' 1999 before smoking away a fortune at the expense of Geffen and taking 6 years to deliver the bloated 'Second Coming' that sounded like Led Zeppelin out takes. And they were gone after a dodgy Reading appearance, very little chance of a get back tour from this bunch.
3. Flowered Up, personal favorites of mine with their loopy songs sung in a typical East London voice with language that I last heard as boy in Green Street Market as barrel boys were selling their wares, they were the proof that southern boys could take drugs and make good music. Their debut single 'It's On' was originally released by Heavenly and drags you in with its stomping beat and use of flute, this is the original version far superior to that that would turn up on their sole album 'A Life With Brian' 1991. The following year they released their swansong in the 12 minute long 'Weekender' a tale of rave culture and it's ups and downs a very brave and pertinent song that has always made me think of film maker Ken Loach, this version of the song was recorded live at 1992's Glastonbury Festival. And they too were gone.
4. World Of Twist, see Tuesday's post.
5. Blur, hard to remember but at the beginning they were aligned with baggy circa 'Leisure' 1991, probably more out of journalistic laziness than anything Else. They were one of the rare baggy bands to survive the demise of the musical form by reinventing themselves and continually changing. Hardly surprising that in the 90's they were the only band capable of standing up to Oasis. Still together in an on off sort of way when Damon has time from his many other projects.
6. Paris Angels, who you may well ask, I checked out their "classic" 'Perfume' single again and can now remember why had already forgotten about them.
7. Inspiral Carpets, see last Monday's post.
8. New Fast Automatic Daffodils, already posted on them back in March 2006. An excellent band introducing a colder edge to the music with infectious rhythms and dogmatic vocals, three classic albums 'Pigeonhole', 'Bong' and 'Body Exit Mind' before disappearing due to a criminal lack of interest.
9. James, I never really liked the second hand folky Smiths influenced version of the band but I did love the funk inspired rebirth of the band with 1991 'Gold Mother' the album that gave us the incredibly sexy 'How Was It For You'. Success went to their heads and they trod the same path as Simple Minds that led to leaden indie stadium rock as could be found on their follow up 'Seven', they continued until splitting in 2001 though they were incapable of returning to their heady past glories. 2007 has seen a well received reunion tour, I for one remain dubious. James were also on the Bill of 1992's Glastonbury where they recorded this version of 'Gold Mother'.
10. The Farm, now here were a bunch that could be described as bandwagon jumpers but we can forgive them their sins for their beat heavy classic pop album 'Spartacus' featuring their house take on the Monkey's 'Stepping Stone'.
There is of course one very big omission from this list in the Charlatans who were as baggy as anyone else and of the highest quality and are of course along with Blur another band that survived the movement to go onto bigger things.

The Baggy Bad Bunch

2007-06-27T14:32:00.000+02:00

Uncut has listed the 10 worst baggy bands as being; Ocean Colour Scene, Northside, The Mock Turtles, The Soup Dragons, Airhead, My Jealous God, The High, Intestella, The Real People and The Bridewell Taxis. As with all lists there will be many people who would argue the errors and omissions, I have one question to ask what does indeed make a good baggy band? Is it the ability to consume large amounts of hallucinogenic drugs? Is it a penchant for dressing up like a football hooligan / brickie out on the piss? Or is to do with the music? Baggy it is largely accepted means psychedelic / acid house influenced guitar music with that funky drummer beat, so in musical terms our 10 unlucky bands were certainly baggy but was their music any good? Have their songs stood up to the test of time? Certain of these bands I still have fond memories of and others I have almost forgotten (The High?), and so it was that I dug out their CDs to give them another spin to see if they really were as bad as the revered journalists in Uncut Towers would have us believe..
Northside, a little bit harsh picking on there age, since when has youth been a problem in rock 'n' roll? And so what if Tony Wilson had proteges, someone had to nurture talent, and his track record is good enough that we should trust him more than the average second hand car dealer! I've given their sole album 1991 's 'Chicken Rhythms' another spin, having been produced by Lightning Seed Ian Broudie it still sounds fine to me and definitely does not suffer from the over familiarity that the closest of the baggy big boys to them, the Stone Roses does. 'Shall We Take A Trip' remains their crowning moment and should be taken as I believe it was intended, tongue in cheek. 'Moody Places' is a good example of why they were good with it's rolling bass line paving the way for the effect heavy weaving guitar lines over which we find the dream like vocals. It is true that they remained minor league, but since when has lack sales equated to low quality?
The Soup Dragons, we certainly can't say they lacked sales as their Rolling Stones cover, 'I'm Free' was a global smash, was it any good? Yes it was though as with many big hits familiarity has taken the sting out of it's tail. When we first heard it, it sounded fresh, with it's lethargic reggae beat, horns and toasting, I can remember it being a very big dance floor hit. The album from which it was drawn 'LoveGod', 1990 really embraced the rave led feeling of the times very well a still to this day sounds like a very good pop album with baggy influences. 'Sweetmeat' with its southern sounding slide guitar pointed the direction to their next album 'Hot Wired' where they took the Stones sound even further but in doing so lost record sales and fans by the truck load, similar to Primal Scream with their Dixie inflicted 'Give Out But Don't Give Up' follow up to 'Screamadelica'.
My Jealous God, are a band that I have already posted on in April last year. I still think that they are a band that could have gone further with their up front psychedelic groove rock if there had been a little bit more interest but by 1992 musical trends were changing and baggy was rapidly on it's way to the revival circuit. 'Everything About You (the Knowledge)' is an extended mix by Manchester's A Guy Called Gerald that shouldn't disappoint dance floor fans.
Undoubtedly some of you will disagree with me and a think that these bands deserve nothing better than a place in the musical scrap heap of forgotten bands, others will think, yes but what about the Mock Turtles?

World Of Twist

2007-06-26T15:15:00.000+02:00

No regrets, as the Walker Brothers would have said, for posting another Rolling Stones cover today, it comes in the shape of this amazingly danceable and uplifting reworking of 'She's A Rainbow (12" version)', a song that regularly filled the dance floor of Montpellier's Rockstore in the early 90's. This is signed by one of the good baggy bands, Sheffield's World Of Twist, contemporaries of that other band from steel city UK, Pulp, The original World Of Twist line up as formed in 1985 was short lived and failed to see the end of the following year. A new version of the band was to appear in Manchester around 1988, despite their obvious liking of bubblegum pop they were taken in with the blossoming Madchester scene and the band attracted good press and the inevitable record companies waving their cheque books. Described by Uncut as being the weird arty side of baggy it should come as no surprise that they teamed up with Manchester's maverick producer Martin Hannett for their take on the Stones song, this was to be one of his last credits. Their debut album 'Quality Street' released by Circa in 1991 suffered from lacklustre production that as with so many other bands before them and since failed to capture the bands live energy, despite this it an album well worth checking out as it is their only recorded legacy. They were never to finish their second album as lead singer and band leader Tony Odgen suffered a nervous breakdown and retired from the music industry. He was to resurface in 2005 displaying his love of bubblegum with a new project The Electric Bubblegum Pop Explosion, regrettably we were to be robbed of his talent as he passed away the following year.

Peel Sessions 59

2007-06-25T14:36:00.001+02:00

Lists, they are just about everywhere these days, you can't avoid them and music journalism seems to have made them almost the backbone of their craft. It all started with end of the year lists and has gradually overtaken some publications to the extent that the lions share of an edition is given over to Bob Dylan / Beatles / Rolling Stones 50 greatest songs or some other half baked idea, I guess it won't be to long before we get 50 songs to walk your dog to! Years ago I used to like the end of year best of listings finding them entertaining, though of late I have started to see this reliance on lists as little more than journalistic laziness, and it's annoying. Despite my feelings I often I find myself looking at them rather than ignoring them as maybe I should and it was in the July issue of Uncut that I came across the double list (new take on an old idea) of the ten best and 10 worst baggy bands lists. Now this was of above normal interest to me as Madchester and all things baggy corresponded with the period that I worked in local radio and many of the bands from this era I have kept a soft spot for, this has motivated the direction for this weeks posts which I rather feel is going to take an early nineties avenue.So who better for this weeks Peel session that Manchester's Inspiral Carpets, a band that to some ears might have more in common with garage, though they were definitely part of the movement, and yes, those trend setting journalists at Uncut put them on the good list. According to AMG they were the 3rd most popular baggy band, a position that they certainly merited as they were more than capable of throwing catchy foot tapping tunes in our direction. Personally I wouldn't consider them to be the archetypal Peel band despite the fact that one of their singles featured Mark E Smith on vocals, though as I have said before JP had wide personal boundaries for taste and had a good ear for recognising a good band and because of this the Carpets found themselves heading down south on four occasions between 1988 and 1990 to lay down tracks for his show. Three songs from the second session from March 1989, 'Out Of Time', 'Directing Traffic' and their surprisingly good cover of the Rollings Stones 'Gimme Shelter', I would say that they had a way with cover versions, their grunge inflicted reading of 'Tainted Love' remains a personal favorite to this day.

Guilty Pleasures

2007-06-23T09:41:00.000+02:00

Being part of the generation that was there and lived through the year zero mentality of punk, I as well suffered the same dilemma as many others, should I hide my pre 1977 records or should I burn them? Being rather young at the time and as my revenue was nothing to shout home about, I doubt that my record collection passed the 50 LP mark, amongst the problem artists were Status Quo, Mud, Sweet, Wings, Nazareth, Deep Purple, Slade, Led Zeppelin, Pretty Things. The last of the bands on the list was a discovery I had made in 1975. At this period like many an adolescent of my age I earned money by doing what was known as a paper round, I delivered newspapers to peoples doors before going to school, this was how I paid for my records and the rare concert that I went to. I was already an avid reader of the musical press, it was here that I read of the forthcoming British Musical Festival to be held at London's Earls Court (1975/1976), which interested me greatly as in featured one of my favorite bands at the time Nazareth as well as Bad Company. God Knows how but I managed to persuade by parents to let me go, I was a bit of a lone wolf as no one of my age likes what I listened to, I must have been 14 at the time. I would be lying to to say that I could remember a lot about the event excepting the lasting impressions that Bad Company were OK but ........ Nazareth lived up to my expectations and then as with most multi band line ups there were discoveries I saw Bill Nelson's Be Bop Deluxe who for me were a whole new take on things I also saw the Pretty things who as the expression goes, blew me away. They were touring 'Savage Eye' which was probably the very next album that I spend my hard earned money on. Truth be told some 30 years down the line listening to the album it's not the greatest committed to tape but it is certainly Superior to many others and contains a number of very good songs in different styles ranging from rock ballads that could almost have been written by Primal Scream 20 years later, to full ahead rockers. It is of interest when talking about the Pretty Things to remember that they were contemporaries of the Rolling Stones, both bands were from the same area and played a similar style of music, the Pretty Things were to have a number of chart hits with their turbo charged blues / R 'n' B covers in the early sixties. There is a comprehensive 2 part history of the band well worth reading on their web site. I have always liked the parallel between the Stones and the Pretties, despite Jagger and Co's bad boy image the Pretty Things were even badder, almost as if they were the real thing. In 1974 at a low point in their career the Stones recorded 'It's Only Rock 'n' Roll (But I Like It)' a song that was a long way from their former glory days. The following year we where to find 'It Isn't Rock 'n' Roll' on the Pretties 'Savage Eye', I think this was this a response to their peer's decline! regardless this song wins hands down with it's mix of swing and heads down no nonsense boogie.
After having discovered the band I went on the long voyage of digging up their past work and found many a nugget from their varied career. It was the Pretty Things who are credited with releasing the first rock opera not necessarily something to be proud of, though their offering 'S.F. Sorrow' is a fine example of late sixties UK psychedelic pop, check out the albums opener 'S.F. Sorrow Is Born'. The band were put on hold not long after I saw them when original vocalist Phil May walked out though by the end of the 70's he was back on board and the band have been an on off concern ever since. Their current set is a return to their roots, R 'n' B and blues based as would be suggested by their recent press photos where they come over as an ageing Blues Brothers.

Adam Franklin

2007-06-21T17:10:00.000+02:00

The name might just be stored away there somewhere in your grey matter, as he was indeed the guitarist / vocalist with the early 90's shoegazeing band Swervedriver that were signed to Creation B.O. (before Oasis). By the end of the decade the band had run out of steam and the members had gone their individual ways, the rhythm section were to play together as Skyscraper and Adam Franklin was to use the name Toschack Highway for his future projects until 'Bolts Of Melody', earlier this year in Europe and fresh out in the States, the first album to be released under his name. I've had two of the tracks sitting around in my e-mail in box for a little while and when I finally got round to listening to them I was more than pleased. Album opener 'Seize The Day' reminds me a lot of the much missed Eugenius with it's radical updating of all that was good with the Byrds. 'Syds Eyes', no surprise here is pure sixties psychedelia and as the title would suggest a tribute to the recently departed Pink Floyd founder. American readers will have the chance to catch him performing live as he will be on a short US tour in July. If what you've heard has whetted your thirst there are a number of other tracks for download on his site including a KEXP radio session from 2005.
Two bonus tracks for you 'Planes Over The Skyline' and 'Year Of The Girl' that I had as the B side Of Swervedriver's 1993 single 'Duel'.

Back To Back To The Planet

2007-06-19T13:55:00.000+02:00

It's a funny thing blogging, you spend large parts of your time either researching, writing or thinking about your posts and most them go without comment, while other touch a nerve and generate some feedback. Then there are posts that you had almost forgotten about, such as my thoughts on Back To The Planet that I threw at you back in July last year, which for some strange reason has motivated two responses this week almost a year after my original musings! First up anonymous, him again, informs us that the bands second non cassette album 'Back To The Beep' is the worst album he has heard in his whole life, pretty strong stuff that seeing as the competition for such a tittle is very strong, personally I'm in no position to judge as I don't know the album. What was more interesting was a mail that I received from Michael Reid who informed me that Back To The Planet have joined that never ending list of reformed bands, having got back together for a low key pub gig in Camberwell last December. They had always been very much a festival band, they were closely linked with the rave / free festival movement of the early 90's that led to the infamous Criminal Justice an Public Order Act, so it should come as no surprise to see that they are playing a number of festivals this year including the flagship of all festivals Glastonbury, this forthcoming week end and sold out, the playfully tittled Endorse It In Dorset festival, 10, 11 and 12 August along with the Undertones and Dreadzone, tickets available. The following week end they will be heading back down the M4 to Devon where they play Beautiful Days. This seems to have rather a crusty feel to it with The Levelers, New Model Army, Banco De Gaia and Radical Dance Fraction sharing the bill along with other artists including Boney M. Don't rush out and buy tickets as this is obviously a popular festival as they were sold out back in April!!!
When I recently converted some old vinyl to MP3 there were in this batch the 12" singles from Back To The Planet so for your further listening pleasure here are the remixed versions of three of them. 'Revolution Of Thought In Dub' comes from their 1992 debut single on Arthur Mix Records. By the following year they had been picked up by the major Parallel Records for whom their first single contained this extended mix of the naive 'Please Don't Fight'. The same year saw their final shot at major backed chart success with the pop inflicted 'Daydream' remixed here by non other than On U Sound studio wizard Adrian Sherwood, this had it have been recorded by Happy Mondays would have been a hit. These three songs will probably sound a bit dated and dare I say twee to younger readers, but just think this is what your parents or older brother and sister were grooving to 15 years ago.

Peel Sessions 58

2007-06-18T14:34:00.000+02:00

Something noisy for you today from a band that I don't often listen to, but when I do it's for real !!!!!! Head Of David were one of the pioneering bands that breached the gap between heavy metal and what we have come to label today as industrial metal such as played by Pitchshifter and Fear Factory. Coming from the Midlands region an area that could well be considered as the cradle of all things hard 'n' heavy in the UK. Sociologists would probably have you believe that the grim industrial landscape that was well into decline in the 80's was responsible for this doom laden aggression, I'm not so sure as the style of music they payed found a home with many an adolescent, their debut album even made it to no. 3 in the UK indie charts in 1986. Their experimental side can be borne out by the fact that they had been picked up by the UK left field label Blast First, label mates included Sonic Youth and Band Of Susans. The inter band chemistry proved to be volatile and bassist Dave Cochrane left after the Steve Albini produced second album 'Dustbowl' to play with Godflesh. The remaining trio crawled on to record a third album 'Seed State', 1991 before disappearing.
We all know that Peel had a wide taste in music and that he had a soft spot for noisy records and so it comes as no surprise that Head Of David were invited to record two sessions in 1986, these are the four songs that made up the first of them from July:

1. 'Tequila'
2. 'Snake Domain'
3. 'Skindrill'
4. 'Bugged'

None of these songs out stay their welcome as they all clock in under the 3 minutes mark. My personal favorite is 'Tequila' which boasts a chorus that you could almost imagine Jack Nicholson humming in The Shining! .

Good Music for A Sunny Sunday And Gardening !

2007-06-17T09:13:00.000+02:00

I must admit that I have been rather absent of late this has been due to a number of factors one of which is that I have a large garden that needs attention especially at this time of the year as the recipe of rain and sun does wonders for vegetation growing at phenomenal speeds. I could of course ignore the garden but this would lead to my house being enveloped in a mass of greenery in a few years. Seeing as the weather has been more summer that certain summers this has not been a disagreeable task though very time consuming. It was probably because of this that I decided to give 'The Good Seed' by Ellis Island Sound another spin, and at the end of the day I was very pleased to have done so. Many of you are probably scratching your heads and wondering who the hell they are, Ellis Island Sound are one of Peter Astor's two on going current projects the other one being Wisdom Of Harry. The band, if we can say that for two people, consists of Peter with David Sheppard who were assisted by Josh Hillman from Willard Grant Conspiracy on this album. The result is very pastoral very English without being at all quaint. They hid them selves away in a old church on the borders of the windswept English counties of Suffolk and Norfolk and let the countryside breathe life into their music, one can almost imagine them looking out at the scenery as birds sung along with their music while resting their wings on the churches ancient beams. The album manages a subtle mix of traditional acoustic instruments, ukulele, harmonium, dulcimer with well placed and non imposing electronics. I've had a problem getting 'Summoning The Pharoah' out of my head these last few days with it's mantra like drone that comes something like an unplugged early period Kraftwerk. Then there is 'The Villagers' that demands your attention with it compelling violin motif. I'm not quite sure why the album did not impress me on first listen maybe it's just meant to be listened to while being outdoors, those wishing to take the open air listening experience further can catch them playing at The Big Chill and Green Man festivals this summer.
Keeping with low key music I was recently very impressed with Blair, a 23 year old lady hailing from New Orleans. Very much in the mould of classic singer song writers she wins you over with her charming voice and dangerously subversive melodies that waste no time in occupying space between your ears 'Half Moon' is fine example of this where half way through the song you start wondering if you have heard it before. 'Wolfboy' illustrates that she is equally at ease with backing from a sympathetic band and her songs support this treatment while loosing none of their finesse. I found myself thinking of early Brenda Kahn and Heather Nova while listening, not such a bad thing. These two songs make up part of her debut ep 'Pluto' that is available from CD Baby.

Peel Sessions 57

2007-06-11T15:19:00.000+02:00

A little story. As I have previously mentioned I was born in Forest Gate in London's East End, and I lived there until I was 14 years old. My early child memories are very vague and tend to be limited to events that my parents or other adults talked to me about or events for which there exists visual proof. As I got older and changed schools I began to have more freedom and was allowed to wander off to school on my own, this would I am ashamed to report not always mean that I made my way to school for the allotted time as for a young lad even a suburban high street is a place of adventure. Forest Gate has two major roads, Woodgrange road and Romford road that meet to form a T junction. At this point was the main post office, telephone exchange and a large furniture store above which was situated the Uppercut club, a place that intrigued us as it smelt of forbidden fruit. We had heard, probably from our our parent, that this was not a nice place where nasty people went, it was in fact nothing else than a nightclub but back in 60's England to good hardworking folk going out and partying at night was a sin. At the time I was not aware of the significance of the club it was only many years later that I learnt that for a few years in the mid 60's it was an important venue on the club circuit hosting gigs by The Who and Otis Redding amongst others. The venue's real claim to fame dates back to December, 26 1966 when a certain Jimi Hendix was playing there. Legend has it that someone offered him some purple hearts, an amphetamine based pill much in vogue with mods at this period. It was while under the influence, backstage at the Uppercut club Hendix composed what was to become 'Purple Haze'. December 1966, I had recently celebrated my 6th birthday, so I guess mere yards away from this historic event I was well tucked up in bed and dreaming, excuse me while I kiss the sky indeed! I never got to set foot in the venue which If my memory serves me well became a well known reggae club before being destroyed in a fire.
During the early years of Radio One John Peel was the presenter of the Top gear programme, Hendix laid down tracks for two sessions for the show, October and December 1967. As a musician it goes without saying that Hendrix was extremely inventive and took enormous pleasure in his often improvised reinterpretations of other peoples songs. From the first session we find this good humoured romp through the 'Radio One Theme' along with a wink to his contemporaries the Beatles as he beefs up 'Daytriper' in this rough and ready version. Two months later they were back and seemingly enjoying themselves as they ripped through the 50's standard 'Hound Dog' given an almost surreal feel with halfhearted yelps.

Primavera Sound 2007

2007-06-10T10:11:00.000+02:00

So it's now a week since I've got back from Barcelona, and as they say the dust has settled, I've almost caught up with the enormous backlog at work and as far as sleep goes let's just say that I'm used to missing it, though this seldom leads to me being in a good mood!

My first thought is more of an observation, at my tender age, 46, this is the first time that I have attended more than one day at a festival, not everyone likes wallowing in mud, queuing hours for the toilets, paying inflated prices for a beer that is more often than not too hot or too cold and not your beer of choice. True these last two points are probably also true for most non bar concerts the difference being this negative side lasts for a few hours as opposed to god forbid a whole week end. Part of the problem with festivals is the sensory over load, I mean who really wants to see 30/40 bands over two or three days? Personally I get much more pleasure from a traditional concert where there is a headliner and one or two support bands, lets just say the rush is much more intense. The other problem with these multi stage mega line up festivals is more logistic, who should we go to see? And who will be sacrificed because of lack of time, tiredness, queuing to buy food..............? Despite these little moans me and my other half did enjoy ourselves and got to see some great sets and bands that I very much doubt will be playing our cultural backwater here in the south of France in the foreseeable future, we also got to discover some great new bands and for me that is what it should all be about.

Day 1: Thursday May, 31
Having already attended Prmavera Sound for just one day the previous year, we knew how to find the site and so were in no rush and the first artist of interest to us was programed for 20h, in Spain festivals start late afternoon and with the case of Primavera go on till 4 or 5am. Having been a long time fan of Nick Cave I have also followed the careers of those that form or formed the Bad Seeds with interest, it goes without saying that the music must be up to scratch. One such band is Warren Ellis's violin led The Dirty Three, in musical terms their set did not disappoint, they played 'Ocean Songs', a powerful, majestic performance proving that you don't need a vocalist to keep the audience's attention. What was a distraction was Ellis's habit of playing with his back to the public or if you prefer playing 90% of the set to his drummer, were we really that ugly?
I was looking forward to seeing new sensation Elvis Perkins who in case you are unaware is the son of Psycho actor Anthony Perkins. Musically we can situate him as occupying the space between traditional singer song writers and country tinged Americana. He has some very fine songs and a singing voice that totally suits his dandy persona, it was just a shame that their delicate songs were mired by feedback and other sound problems, I did get the impression that they were to fussy, maybe it was his son of a film star upbringing?
I know I've previously said that band names are important and to bear out this point were it not for their name I rather doubt that I would of made my way over to the CD Drome stage and this was where I was captivated by the stage presence of the Parenthetical Girls. Both in dress sense and in musical terms they came over as a relic from the Wiemar republic very cabaret very mechanical though despite this they manged to warm the audience to them. According to their press they were influenced by such divergent elements as post punk, Phil Spector and Brian Eno, and this makes for a fine mix. They finished their set with a blinding cover version of OMD's 'Joan Of Arc'. Those wishing to listen before taking the plunge can check out four down loadable tracks here including a remodeling of Wham's 'Last Christmas'.
We caught the tail end of the Comets On Fire, and I rather regret that I saw so little of them as the finale was a wonderful 101% sonic rock out. The Smashing Pumpkins were due on the main stage and we were able to get a good position, meaning we did not need the video projection screen to see what was happening on stage. Back in the early 90's I really liked the music that they produced, though since the band spilt I have got the impression that one time darling of US indie Billy Corgan has lost his direction, well this was very much confirmed by his bombastic over blown set even the older songs failed to impress. It is just possible as the gig was intended as a parody above all considering the ridiculous science fiction costumes they were wearing, reminding me of the excellent Brain DePalma film Phantom Of The Paradise, though sadly I rather doubt this was the case and the band came over as a bad relic of the worst of the pre punk 70's. Another disappointment was Mike Patton's new project Fennesz which despite being interesting on paper proved to be nothing more that noise without reason and totally lacking in any perceptible structure, tellingly enough the majority of those in front of the stage had their hands over their ears, strange behaviour for a concert!
We had to wait until 1.15am, the scheduled time to see the White Stripes, and well worth it was! I've never been a great fan, there have been isolated songs that yes I consider to be classics, but after seeing them live everything makes sense. In fact what they have done is very clever indeed instead of taking the accepted route and continuing from where the previous generation of artists left off they have gone back to the original source of rock, the blues and are taking us on their own voyage of discovery. I would go as far as to dare to compare them with another band that was influenced by the same music, Led Zeppelin, the difference being that the White Stripes stay very much down to earth being almost primal and thankfully have not taken the highway to pretentiousness. It amazed me through the length of their set how just two people could deliver such a full sound, Meg really is an accomplished and inventive drummer and as far as Jack is concerned a true guitar hero who also has a very varied and soulful singing voice. The sole down point was from Jack's voice that seemed to loose it's power as the evening drew on. Visually they managed fill the large stage with an imaginative use of lighting and Jacks very energetic stage presence, anyone know how many vocal microphones he uses on stage? The set was heavy in older songs though there were honorable outings for newer numbers including the nitro charged new single 'Icky Thump'. They encored with crowd pleasers such as the Burt Bacharach 'Don't Know What To Do With Myself' which induced a mass crowd sing a long before finishing with that song, 'Seven Nation Army'. A very good and very uplifting set that despite the late hour charged my batteries enough that the walk back to my hotel did not bother me.

Day 2: Friday June, 1
God! Were we tired, by now after too much beer, too much walking and not enough sleep conjugated with my advancing years, talk about recipe for disaster. Luckily enough there was a surprise band that had just what was needed to get me literally on my feet. How Dare You are a three piece, two girls and a boy from Barcelona. Heavily influenced by post punk and with their influences, Slits, raincoats, P.I.L. worn firmly on their sleeve, what they lacked in originality they more than made up for with youthful enthusiasm. They managed to do the trick and I stayed for the lions part of their set as they won me over and even got me tapping my feet. Currently unsigned, the only place to listen to anything by them would be on their my space. definitely one to watch out for.
One of the particularities of Primavera is that it is held on a urban site, bordering the Mediterranean, that includes an inside conference centre. This is used during the festival as an inside stage for quieter more intimate artists. Much to his surprise Billy Bragg was considered as such by the organisers, I got the impression that in his mind festivals meant a field and the big blue sky. Not to worry Billy adapted well to the situation. He is an artist that I feel a close affinity to, having my own roots in the same part of the world as him, I was born in Forest Gate and later spent mt adolescence in Barkingside. Seeing that his fan base is rather weak in France it is a good twenty years since I've seen him live, so my expectations were high, I guess you could almost say that I had stage fright! Billy was solo with his trusty guitar and cups of tea. He certainly has come on a long way as today he provides a very varied and interesting show, part music part talk, sure he is not the worlds best best guitarist and barking at times could describe his voice, but during his hour long set he made us cry, laugh, smile, frown and even sing along with him, if only all politicians could be this entertaining. His set included rants or storytelling that took in nuns, penguins, football, book writing and SxSW where this rare acoustic guitar backed version of 'New England' comes from. I'm not quite sure the percentage of native English speakers in the audience but despite the language barrier he went down a storm. We were treated to reworked versions of many songs, highlights including a radially reworked 'Great Leap Forward', there were strange cover versions; the Carpenters 'Superstar', hidden guitar riffs; 'Smoke On The Water', whistling solos and the Clash fueled name checking song inspired in part by his Johnny Clash persona. It was a real pleasure to see him again and I got the impression he enjoyed himself as much as we did. Politics and love have never gone down so well together, I just hope I don't have to wait 20 years to see him again.
This undeniable personal highlight was unsurprisingly difficult to follow and so fine as they were Blonde Red Head but failed to inspire and I got the feeling I was not the only one. Despite my age and my geographical origins I've never had the pleasure of seeing the Fall live and as such was looking forward to it. I got the impression that Mark E Smith has stopped smoking as he was not to be seen with a cigarette through the whole set, and seemed to be mashing chewing gum the whole time, so was it for this reason that he spent half of his set staring so aggressively at his audience? It was loud to say the least and exaggerated by the presence of two bass players and Mark E's fiddling with the volume controls on the amps. I'm glad I've seen them but won't be too disappointed if this is the only time. Another band that I was looking forward to seeing was Beirut, but was somewhat disappointed, not I might add the bands fault. The problem is that their music is so delicate and of an acoustic nature that it did not come over too well performed on an outdoor stage what with other, noisier bands playing on neighboring stages and the wind playing havoc with their fragile sound.
After all of this I was in need of a little pick me up that came in the form of Canadian duo, Chromeo, another discovery. Nothing too original with these boys as they take you back to the eighties NYC club scene, as my other half said "it's disco isn't it?". Good fun was had my me and it even got my butt moving! There are a couple of down loadable songs on their site, and they are currently touring Europe. As I have already stated we were rather tired and so we found ourselves a place on the grass hill looking down on the main stage and finished our evening off with the efficient set from Maximo Park, I must say that the new songs 'Girls That Play Guitars' and 'Russian Literature' make for strong addition to their repertoire. Still hardly the most original band in the world but they do what the do well.

Day 3: Saturday June, 2
Must have slept well or maybe it was the copious breakfast at the hotel as we started the day with an amazing amount of energy. 18h30 was maybe a little bit early in the day and the Mediterranean sun bearing down on backs was not the only thing hot as before us was that most English of American combos, Ted Leo and the Pharmacists rocking away like a good old V8 engine. They certainly are not the most visual of bands, the bassist is pure eighties hair metal but they have serious attitude and that counts. I couldn't help thinking of the Clash while they were playing, such was their intensity. Taking this line of thought even further, Billy Bragg is great solo, but his backing band the Blokes are from their name through to their musical backing of him, pedestrian, and personally I'd say that's rather kind. So I started imagining Ted Leo and the Pharmacists backing Bragg, not as silly as it sounds both of them share a split personality, Political / love songs as well as both of them sharing a liking for the best of late 70's punk. I couldn't get enough of them and their set was too short full of inspired anthem like tunes such as 'Where Have All The Rudeboys Gone', that reminds me of Thin Lizzy itself not such a bad thing, and 'Never Give Up' these two recordings come courtesy of NPR from Washington DC's 9:30 club earlier this year. They couldn't resist it and dedicated a blinding version of 'Costa Brava' as an appreciated set closer.
The Long Blondes were next on our shopping list. True they are visually pleasing but singer, Kate Jackson, is so loud mouthed that after a while her in between song banter becomes a pain in the arse. Musically I found them rather superficial and they got me all nostalgic for the band that is such an obvious inspiration for them, Blondie. We hopped over to one of the smaller stages to catch a band from Montpellier, Koacha. This was the first time that I had seen them and they did not disappoint, delivering their well crafted angular pop songs with precision and humour. Nice to see a young band so at ease on stage and playfully teasing the audience with the vocalists beer borrowing antics and crowd walkabout. Another one to watch out for.
Last year Saturday night featured Lou Reed and this year the old school NYC connection was also present with Patti Smith, who after a shaky start, we were almost stage front and the volume was rather lacking for the first two numbers, soon got into her stride and the high priestess of rock 'n' roll rebellion held spiritual communion with her followers. A real crowd pleasing set that included three numbers from her latest album the highlight being the dirge like cover of 'Smells Like Teen Spirit', personally I was not to hot on the acoustic guitar led numbers, Lenny Kaye after all was was born with a Fender Stratocaster in is hand, wasn't he? A set rich in jewels from Patti's past including 'Free Money', 'Pissing In A River' and 'Because The Night' before rounding of with the orgasm inciting pair of 'Gloria' and 'Rock 'n' Roll Nigger. Talk about making an old man happy!
The Good The Bad And The Queen were next, and to be honest I was apprehensive as press reports have not always been good and I've always found that seeing living legends is not always rewarding. My first impression was how Damon Albarn, the man that challenged Oasis, has really turned into the anti thesis of a star, with his timid almost apologetic stage personality which is totally opposed to that of gun slinger Paul Simonon who comes over as a right cocky bastard with some great stage moves. Again the sound was rather pale and appeared to be lost a little bit in the open air, they are playing with a four piece string section. Gradually we made our way to the front arriving there for the last three number and both the sound and atmosphere was indeed a lot hotter.
The last band that were were to catch before returning wearily to our hotel was Sonic Youth, who were treating us to their first ever recital of 'Daydream Nation'. Now I will be the first to claim the album as a classic, though whether it is best heard in the comfort of your own home, personal stereo or performed as an opera in it's entirety on stage is very much open to debate. The album concept does loose a lot with between song chat and the ever present extended pauses be it for technical or personal reasons. Also the pacing for an album does not necessarily correspond to that of a gig and so the chronological reading of an album leads a lot to be desired. Even Thurston Moore said that they had never before played the whole of the album even when they were teenagers, the whole concept smells a bit too much like treating rock as high art, sorry but for me it doesn't work! Still it was nice to see them on stage again though they did give me the impression to have mellowed a little, shame!

There was of course a whole load of bands that we missed due to scheduling problems, toilet queues, tiredness or just down and out laziness these include; Portastatic, Black Mountain, Spititualised, DJ Yoda, Shannon Wright, The Apples in Stereo, Wilco, The Klaxons, Slint.........
So was it worth it? After all what with tickets, hotel, restaurants, drink and travel it must have cost me about a months salary. Well the answer is yes, it's a great festival set on an original site in one of the worlds best towns and with a really good atmosphere, if next years line up is anywhere near as tempting I'll be back.

P.S. I have a little confession to make, I had decided to provide Sound Of The Suburbs with original photos from Primavera 2007 and so had taken my trusty camera along with me. And believe me I had taken some more than decent snaps, the problem was that Saturday morning I was fiddling arround with the camera deleting images that wer obviouly no good when by error or pure stupidity I reformated the disc which is the same a deleting everything. Immediatley I realised what I had done, so gutted was I left my camera in the hotel room Saturday night. This means that the photos here come from different sources you can look at the rest of their galleries here and here. I would have asked for permision, honest, but my Spanish is terrible, anyway thanks for the immages guys!

Peel Sessions 56

2007-06-05T17:22:00.000+02:00

When you're my age after the party is the pay back, as far as I am concerned a little bit of sleep should put things to rights, though unfortunately where I work they appear to think I am some kind of superman as no one did much of my work while was away and so I have a whole week to catch up with, thanks guys! I shall report back with my thoughts concerning Primavera sound 2007 in a few days.
I guess many of you have often wondered what today's rich and famous were up to before they slipped into super tax bracket, well in the days before Pop Idol when reality TV meant the news or documentaries, those that wanted to climb the ladder of musical fame served a sort of apprenticeship that is otherwise known as paying ones dues. What in effect this meant was years of trailing the length and breadth of the land in the back of a battered transit van, playing what is affectionately known as the toilet circuit and if you were really lucky maybe playing support slots where you lost money and all of this was done while surviving on next to nothing and eating whatever was offered to you. This is what people mean when they talk about the good old days! As is our custom the first out of the hatch each week is from a Peel Session and this time from a band that was to feature a carrot topped vocalist that would go onto world domination - Mick Hucknal - yes before he started bombarding our ears with his syrupy soul make overs he used to front a post punk band. The Frantic Elevators were one of many bands that were to be launched upon the world in the wake of the punk earthquake that was to shake the almost Victorian Manchester of the late '70's firmly into the 20th century. They played a rough edged interpretation of rhythm and blues that was quirky enough to win them friends on the developing post punk scene. Between 1979 and 1982 they released 4 singles on as many different labels, that have long been in the realms of collectors shops. The band were invited down to London twice in 1981, February and September, 'Hunchback Of Notre Dame' is taken from the first session. Should you be interested in listening to more from the band there was a six track compilation that has been released several different times, different name, different sleeve, same track list, that is currently easily available from Amazon Market Place for less than £2.00. By 1983 Mick Hucknal had decided that enough dues had been paid and so quit the band and played under the banner of different Red names before hitting gold with Simply Red, yes it was just like in the fairy story, fame and fortune were just around the corner and in 1985 they scored that all important first US hit with their rather good cover of the Valentine Brothers 'Money's Too Tight To Mention'. Peelie was not to invite Mick Hucknal's new project to record a session!

Primavera 2007

2007-05-31T07:10:00.001+02:00

Sea, sex, sun and rock 'n' roll.
Barcelona here I come!
The Pogues - 'Fiesta'
La Mano Negra - 'Indos De Barcelona'

Peel Sessions 55

2007-05-28T15:24:00.000+02:00

Gallon Drunk, great name, great band. I had what I would consider to have had the good luck to have seen them live, they were only the support band but after their full frontal audio and visual assault on the unsuspecting audience the headliner PJ Harvey had her work cut out to follow them! They hailed from London and started gigging at the beginning of the 90's and displayed a spiritual fondness of North London pubs as their chosen venues being particularly fond of Camden Town. Musically speaking their sound was a tense, nervous, violent soundtrack to an imaginary film noir set in 1950's London. Retro maybe in influence but still very much up to date in spirit. It came as no surprise that band leader James Johnston was requisitioned by Nick Cave as live guitarist in 1994, finally becoming a fully fledged Bad Seed in 2003. The band have been out and about playing selected gigs for the last few years, and their first three albums, the early singles compilation 'Tonite.... The Singles Bar', 'You The Night And The Music' and their 1993 masterpiece 'From The Heart Of The Town' have recently been given the CD re-looking treatment along with the obligatory bonus tracks by Satorical Records. During the broadcast of Their only Peel session in July 1981 the DJ felt moved enough to say "Why? Because they don't sound like anyone else". here are the four tracks to let latecomers judge for themselves.
1. 'Ruby'
2. 'Some Fools Mess'
3. 'Drag 91'
4. 'Two Wings Mambo'

The Family Cat

2007-05-23T13:58:00.000+02:00

Not the most handsome looking of bands were they? Though they were capable of making some fine guitar led pop rock that did the indie ghetto proud in the early 90's though for some inexplicable reason failed to trouble the main stream. My introduction to them came rather belatedly as I managed to miss out on the initial interest that was caused by their name checking debut single, 'Tom Verlaine' from 1989, I had definitely read about it but maybe because I had only recently left the UK I was a little bit out of touch. Some three years later and I was getting cutting edge records sent to me every week from the UK for my radio show, I can remember receiving a white label 12" single one week with the word steamroller felt tipped onto the label and nothing else not even a press release. Steamroller, was it the name of the band or the song? I must say this was a good way to get you to listen to the record and I wasted no time in dropping the stylus onto the run in groove. For the seven minutes of the song I was captivated by the song's thumping beat, scratchy guitar lines and lazy killer melody. The song stared getting some serious airtime from me and a favorable response from my audience. It wasn't before the following week that the name of the band was revealed to me and I could confirm that 'Steamroller' was the title. The Family Cat came from Yeovil and had also caught the ear of local girl made good PJ Harvey who was to provide backing vocals on their follow up 45t 'River Of Diamonds' both songs feature on the 'Furthest From The Sun' LP. Despite good press and being admired by their peers they failed to sell enough to dent the charts. The same fate was waiting for the 1995 follow up 'Magic Happens' and disillusioned the band called it a day. More information on the band can be found here.

Peel Sessions 53

2007-05-21T14:10:00.001+02:00

Does one need a reason to post PJ Harvey? No I would tend to say as not only does the lady produce some fine music but by way of a bonus she is also pleasant on the eyes, I don't know about you but I'd much rather see an image of PJ than for example ZZ Top, no offence boys! Having said that I need no reason, there was obviously some thing that got me thinking her about her which was that for some unknown reason I've found myself listening to a lot of music that has its roots in England's west country. So it looks as if the week will be theme based, if you like a bit like Sound Of The Suburbs goes west.
To both fans of good music and avid followers of Peel alike Ms Harvey needs no introduction and it should come as no surprise that the two of them got on well together, and as such she was another of Peel's favorite artists. Late last year there was a 12 track compilation of tracks from her sessions, with the selection apparently having been made by Polly Jean herself, the release came in for a lot of criticism as the current tendency is to let the complete sessions come out of the vaults and such an important artist should be served by only by a snapshot. What I do agree with is the inclusion of the four songs, 'Oh My Lover', 'Victory', 'Sheela Na Gig' and 'Water' that made up the first revelationary session from October 1991. I have left out 'Sheela Na Gig' for two good reasons 1) I posted the song way back at the beginning of the blog and 2) Not everything's for free so if you like it, it's available, fork out and but it!

Doll By Doll

2007-05-19T09:23:00.000+02:00

I couldn't believe my eyes when I flicked my way through the pages of the May issues of the music press upon seeing Doll By Doll albums being reviewed. Was this some kind of sick joke? A quick visit to everyone's best friend, Amazon, revealed that indeed these lost masterpieces had indeed finally found their way onto the CD format some 20 plus years after Dire Straits democratised the the medium with their 'Brothers In Arms' album. Unbelievable is probably the best word as the bands four albums 'Remember' (1977), 'Gypsy Blood' (1979), 'Doll By Doll' (1981) and 'Grand Passion' (1982) had fallen victim to legal problems over rights as the label that unleashed the original vinyl, Magnet, had long since disappeared, this situation is particularly difficult to understand when considering the career band leader Jackie Leven went on to carve for himself. Anyway as they say happiness is only a click away and I wasted no time in ordering the first two which I have been rediscovering over the last two weeks. The strangest thing is that I never actually owned either of these albums, though I've been looking out for them for many years. 'Remember' was released in 1977 at the height of punk and could not have been more out of step with the year zero approach that was being preached by both bands and the music press, despite this they managed to gather some friendly press for their heartfelt songs maybe abetted by the some what sloppy production of the album that gives it an almost organic feel. In 1977 I had a part time job in a record shop while I was pursuing my studies, the shop was part of a local chain and John, the manager, and myself had a free reign over the music we played as long as we were sensible and did not frighten off the paying customers. As such I got to discover a lot of music that I would not have done otherwise as UK radio was in a poor state at the time and my finances were very limited. One of the bands that became a shop favorite in '77/'78 was Doll By Doll with 'Remember' that found a place in John's hippy summer of love sensibilities as it did with those of the young gun who was fervently following the new crop punk and post punk bands. I don't think we ever got to sell a single copy of the album though we loved it to death wearing out it's grooves with it's numerous visits to the shop's turntable. I think listening back to day that what pleased us so much was the obvious soul and feeling in Leven's versatile and characteristic voice. I would suggest that Doll By Doll are the missing link between Van Morison and Dexys Midnight Runners, just listen to 'Changes' from this album with it's almost doo wop opening before embracing a kind of Caledonian soul complete with falsetto vocals as it works itself up to a strong emotive peak reminiscent of Al Green. The follow up 'Gypsy Blood' took up from where it's predecessor had left off and refined the ideas into shorter songs that are easier to consume, the production is a lot cleared and the sound is big as can be heard on the epic and atmospheric 'Highland Rains'. I have genuinely had a problem in choosing a track a piece from these albums, such is the quality and variety on display. If you like your pop with balls, your rock with feeling and your soul inspired do your self a big favour and check out these two albums before they disappear again. Those of you that are unfamiliar with Jackie Leven's hefty volume of solo work should be ashamed of yourselves.

Foxy Ladies

2007-05-18T13:46:00.000+02:00

My absence these last few days has been due to an exceptionally heavy workload this last week so I thought something of a frivolous nature to get the week end off to a good start is in order. This charming pair of young ladies with a rather brazen dress sense is none other than Shampoo, which was in effect Jacqui Blake and Carrie Askew who became friends while at school in the London suburb of Plumstead. Fascinated with music the pair started their own fanzine Last Exit dedicated to the Manic Street Preachers before deciding to give performing a go themselves. Their first single saw the light of day on pink vinyl thanks to Icerink Records before they were snapped up by Food which was of course the home to Blur, Jesus Jones, Diesel Park West amongst others. This move led to a softening of their sound to a more classic pop, they took up in many senses from where Voice of The Beehive had left off and were also to show the way for the world domination of Girl Power as seen by the Spice Girls a few years later. The pair had become darlings of the UK music press and were firm favorites of many an indie fan in the early eighties. This cult popularity was for once to be converted into mainstream success with 'Trouble' that gatecrashed the charts in 1994 and opened the doors to Top Of The Pops, Smash Hits and mega fame in Japan for Shampoo. They were not the most original of bands often lacking a little bit in the vocal department, a little bit one dimensional never the less they were great up beat fun and an important part of the decade. I was rather chuffed the other day to see a new factory sealed copy of their 'We Are Shampoo' album for sale for 2 euros, it's arrival in my post box was to fetch memories of my airwave days rushing back. Two tracks from the album 'Delicious' and 'Saddo' which between them should provide you with enough sugar for one day, should your tooth be very sweet you could always seek out the freshly re released album on Rev-Ola. Anyone know where they are or what they are up to today?

Peel Sessions 53

2007-05-14T14:41:00.000+02:00

As our weekly Peel session rendez-vous enthusiastically enters it's second year of existence the thought came to my mind that the band that defined the post punk spirit of the sessions has been until now absent. So now is a good a time as any to remedy this situation, it also comes about because I'm actively trawling through my Fall collection as in a few weeks I shall find myself confronted by the maverick wordsmith genius, Mark E Smith fronting the latest line up of his garage monsters the Fall in Barcelona. Hard as it may seem to believe this will be the first time we meet face to face. I must confess that I am no great fan of the band, though I can remember being taken with the freshness, difference and above all attitude of the early days, that first LP still has a place in my top 1000. I often thought that at times quantity was preferred above quality as to say the least the band has been prolific. Their spells with a major independent, Beggars Banquet and a major, Fontana gave them the taste of chart success and also their most polished recordings. Both before and after this there were spells with different independent labels, the result of this contractual nightmare is that for a band with such an importance to modern music there was no career spanning compilation until 2005 when Castle picked up the rights and released a 6CD box set compiling the bands 24 Peel sessions as recorded over 27 years. The end result probably does the band a better service than a more classic compilation of studio cuts would as the the urgence of the session format appears to suit Mark E Smiths way of working. It goes of course without saying that the Fall became firm Peel favorites and he heaped such praise on the band that he eventually stated the he had "run out of superlatives" to describe them.
I have chose their first session that was recorded 30th May 1978, a mere 23 days after Peel's long time producer John Walters had first seen them playing a gig, and was first aired 15th June the same year. The immediate result was them being heard by Mark Perry who rapidly signed them to the Miles Copeland financed Step Forward. These four songs were to later be featured on their debut album 'Live At The Witch Trials'.

1. 'Futures And Pasts'
2. 'Mother Sister!'
3. 'Rebelious Jukebox'
4 'Industrial Estate'

Listening back to these songs almost 30 years later they still sound fresh and vital to these ears, and strangely enough I would suggest that they, and above all 'Industrial Estate' that despite it's grim subject matter contains a very catchy chorus, would not sound out of place in today's top 40 whereas when they were originally released this would have been impossible. This I guess we could consider as a step in the right direction.

Friday Nite Fever

2007-05-11T15:06:00.000+02:00

Those of you that have been through the archives will have no doubt about my admiration for the work of Mark Vidler or as he is better known Go Home Productions. It's been a little while now since we have had any new work from him but his latest EP, 'Six Pack' makes up for those lost weeks as it inspires that weekend party feeling right from it's title inwards through to the very last strains of it's music. The 6 tracks are only available as a free zip file download, so don't go asking your record dealer for a copy, he'll only scratch his head and tell you to come back next week. On top form for these 6 tracks his favorite artists, the Beatles, Radiohead ....., are well represented with tasteful and imaginative mixing and mashing of the source material to come up with true foot tapping, bum wiggling, head shaking originals. My personal favorite is the preposterous coupling of 'Creep' with 'Lucky In The Sky With Diamonds' to revisit an Italian folk story on 'Pinocchiohead On Acid'. The week end starts here!

Drookit Dogs

2007-05-09T14:03:00.000+02:00

A band that I found by surfing the web, not I might add my space, a concept that disagrees with me, but good old fashion follow the links and see where you end up, and I must say very pleased I am with discovering the Drookit Dogs. The name sent images of A Clockwork Orange rushing through my head and I guess the band are a little bit like the book and it's film in so far as you'll either love them or hate them. A Brighton based three piece that claim to play Polk? Don't bother looking as I've done it for you and the word is well and truly absent from the trusty Oxford dictionary. I can only guess that the term comes from mixing punk with folk, in any case they have very little in common with polka! What initially held my attention was the successful mixing of singer Matt Oldfield's booming voice that comes hurtling straight at you like a demented English folk singer backed by his trusty old punk guitar that has spent years at the bottom of a swamp. They managed to hold my attention as they also have a knack of writing some snappy tunes such as the wonderfully tongue in cheek 'Female Singer Songwriter' that does hit the nail on the head, 'Worthy' has got me thinking about another Brighton native Wreckless Eric with it's English trash sound, 'I'd Rather Be On A Comedown' is almost an epic with it's throbbing bass line and dare I say it Dylan meets Joni Mitchel like qualities add to this the simple but effective melody and you're onto a sure winner. For those of you that like these songs as much as I do there others currently available for free download on the bands web site. If there is any justice in the world the band will not be spending that much longer playing in small intimate venues, If you're in London or near Brighton do check them out as by all reports they are even more powerful in the flesh.

For Why You Kicka My Donkey

2007-05-08T08:38:00.000+02:00

A little trip down memory lane today. I finished my education by a three year stint at Redbridge Technical College, Sociology, Psychology and Communications where I studiously avoided my official studies as I held court in the pup on the other side of the green opposite the said hall of learning. It was here that I met many like minded people, our inebriated conversation would often turn around revolution and how to change and maybe even save the world. This heady subject matter would often be served with a side dish of music, whatever was new in NME or maybe something that had stuck in our head from Peel, or maybe arranging to go to a gig. Strangely enough we did not seem to know many people who actually played in bands, Dean Grant and my self rehearsed together for about three weeks under the tentative name of Mammary And The Glands, a good friend of mine, Tim Scott, a train driver by day, was the bassist with the Alsatians, one of the coolest pop bands to come from Canning Town who released the one single 'Teen Romance', and that was about as close as we got to rock 'n' roll in suburban Essex in the late 70's. Then by good luck I was to meet a shy retiring girl called Sema at college who grabbed my attention, little my little we became friends, she as well was a big fan of music, and she wasted no time in telling me about her older brother Joe who was the guitarist / song writer in a band. The name of the band was the Brakes, not to be confused with the Brighton based band these boys were from the East End of London with a base in Walthamstow. I guess the year was 1977 or maybe 1978, I wasted no time and caught the band live, I think the first time I saw them was at the Red Cow in Hammersmith. I was more than pleasantly surprised at how good they were, a classic four piece line up that delivered a powerfull live set of US influenced power pop, with the accent firmly on power though in pop terms their songs did not lack anything excepting the necessary luck to turn them into hits. Over the course of the next 18 months I would try to get along to see them whenever possible, often I would drag some of my friends along with me who tended to agree with me that we were in the presence of a great band.

The Brakes had already been signed by Magnet Records and were preparing to record their first album 'For Why You Kicka My Donkey' that hit the shops in 1979, there were two singles lifted from the album, 'Blame It On The Brakes' and 'The Way I See It', both of which failed to trouble the charts. The general consensus of opinion at the time was that the album failed to live up to the bands live promise lacking the punch of their gigs. I for one was the proud owner of a number of cassettes of their demo recording, which I have long since mislaid, and knew only too well that they they could deliver a much more spunky sound in the studio. The band never got round recording a second album, and I have no idea what became of Keith Wilson - vocals and guitar, Joe Fadil - guitar and vocals, Bob Renny - bass and vocals, John Brown - drums excepting that by the turn of the decade they were no more, there was a rumour that Steve Marriot wanted them as his backing band but nothing ever materialised. A shame really as they had genuine penitential, with their song writing partnership that was more than capable of delivering songs that Tom Petty would be proud of. Still they have left me with great memories and until recently that was all I had as my copy of their long deleted album had been left behind in Italy in the mid eighties and so it was 20 years since I had heard it, though I still knew all the songs by heart. I was pleasantly surprised to discover a German record dealer selling a new factory sealed copy for 10 euros, and so I am now the proud owner once again of 'For Why You kicka My Donkey'. I was more over the moon to say the least to hear these songs again and maybe I'm a little biased but I honestly think the 10 originals and the Bob Dylan cover stand up well today. It is not something I do very often as so much music has been re released in recent years, and yes I do believe in copyright and artists being paid, though I think the chances of this becoming available on CD or even digitally are negligible, so here are the 11 tracks that were 'For Why You Kicka My Donkey'. Enjoy.

Side One
1. 'What Am I Gonna Do?'
2. 'I Don't Know Nothing About Hollywood'
3. 'Doing Life'
4. 'Who's That Man?'
5. 'Like A Rolling Stone'
6. 'Blame It On The Bakes'

Side Two
1. 'The Way I See It'
2. 'Last Man At The Station'
3. 'Strange Man In The City'
4. 'Yesterday's Arrival'
5. 'It's A Shame'

Peel Sessions 52.

2007-05-07T15:29:00.000+02:00

And the winner is, well actually no one bothered to enter, I'm not sure, why lack of interest? anyway I must confess that even I Could only come up with one other band of repute from Aberdeen, and that Is The Shamen, who lest we forget before they went all top 40 and easy rave in that horrible home counties way, they did come up with some good music, 'In Gorbachev We Trust' remains to this day a good listen. So In conclusion I guess we could say that herrings and rock 'n' roll don't mix!

I did threaten you with APB's second Peel session, from December 1982, and so here are the four songs:

1. 'Got It In One'
2. 'Play It'
3. 'Wonderdrug'
4. 'Back Inside Your Heart'

As I mentioned in Peel sessions 50, by the time of their second visit to Maida Vale the band's sound was a lot more polished I guess you could compare them to Spandau Ballet but without the silly clothes to detract from the music. They were not the only band making similar music that were to be ignored by the masses, another example is the excellent Way Of The West, both of these bands are the proof that in the eighties white boys were playing credible funk in their own pale way.

Election Blues

2007-05-06T09:09:00.000+02:00

Today sees the second round of the French presidential elections, after a record turn out two weeks ago there was no real winner, the right wing obtained the highest score at just over 30%. The projected results of today ballot give a narrow victory to the right but who knows maybe the opinion polls are wrong, it wouldn't be the first, time would it?
'Fuck The Mother Fucking President' by Witchypoo, no I don't know who they are but it's a great song, is dedicated to the winner be it Nicolas Sarkozi or Seglene Royal. 'Chirac En Prison' by the Wampas is a song that sums up a lot of peoples feelings about outgoing President Jacques Chirac, who has used his position to avoid investigation for criminal fraud charges.

Bankrobber

2007-05-05T10:10:00.000+02:00

This last week has turned out to have had a theme running through it, a political rock axis around the Clash and Billy Bragg. So to round off the week I've decided on a pair of Clash Covers, and there are certainly no shortage of candidates! 'Bankrobber' was a single only release that got their CBS paymasters worried that the band really had too much control. Musically speaking it was a collaboration with Jamaican DJ / producer / artist , Mickey Dread, that obviously pursued the bands love of reggae, and was topped off with Strummer's amazing plaintive vocal delivery. The lyrics were not really political as it tackled that urban legend of the gentleman working class bankrobber, sort of a modern day Robin Hood that justified his career choice by the fact that some are born rich and some are born poor and above all he never hurt anybody! Sounds to me like a man that takes pride in his work. For very good reason this song has long been one of my favorites, though truth be told with the Clash I probably have far too many favorite song for this to be the correct adjective.
Audioweb delivered this version, that is a little bit too bombastic for my liking as it does little to fetch out the songs more subtle side, still it makes for a nice little toe tapper. On the other hand Chumbawamba have really done the song proud by totally reinterpreting it as a folk song where the story angle is pushed to the front, it's almost enough to enable us to forgive them for 'Tubthumping'!

Jail Guitar Doors

2007-05-03T14:02:00.000+02:00

As any aging punk rocker will be able to tell you 'Jail Guitar Doors' was the the b side the the Clash's 4th single 'Clash City Rockers', those were the days when singles really meant something, yes we would be waiting there as the record shop opened to buy our copy, and their flip sides were every bit essential as the tune the other side was. The song title has also given it's name to the initiative set up by Billy Bragg, yes him again, with the purpose of providing musical instruments for inmates of UK jails. This sounds like a great idea to me, ask any touring musician or his roadie and they will explain the possibilities of hiding your stash in your instruments! But seriously any action that serves the purpose of reinsertion as opposed to the current school of thought where by we punish you and throw the key away, is fine by me. In November this year Bragg will be headlining a date at London's Acton Town Hall, the venue that hosted the very last appearance of Strummer and Jones together on stage just before his death, with proceeds going to Jail Guitar Doors. I've heard and I must say that I'm hardly surprised that the date is already sold out!
The song itself opens with the lines 'Let me tell you 'bout Wayne and his deals of cocaine'. The Wayne in question is none other than MC5 guitarist Wayne Kramer who actually did spent some time inside for drug offences after having lost his way a little in the 80's. When released he teamed up with briefly with Johnny Thunders in Gang War, maybe not the best of plans for someone being tagged by the drug squad. By 1995 he had embarked on a solo career with his albums being released by Epitaph. Two live tracks recorded somewhere in France some time in the 90's, both of which have a drug related theme, 'Dope For Democracy' proving that he is still a revolutionary at heart and 'Junkie Romance' that sounds not too far removed from Lou Reed.

Attila The Stockbroker

2007-05-02T14:17:00.000+02:00

Back in Blighty's dark days of Mad Maggies mayhem there was a trinity of radical rockers that could often be found sharing the bill of a benefit or protest gig. Regular readers will already know who they were, The (Newtown) Neurotics, The Redskins and Billy Bragg, I guess we were lucky as these bands also played some damn fine music. As often as not somewhere on the bill would be a roundish balding male with an acoustic guitar strapped round his neck, he would either be spitting out his poetry or playing one of his songs full of anger and rage. The man was none other that Attila The Stockbroker, who started out as a bass player in a punk band influenced by none other than the Clash. He cashed in his chips and reinvented himself as Attila in 1998, the inspiration behind the name comes from when he had a temporary job on the London stock exchange. This change of name also led to the change of style and in many ways luck as for one man and a guitar it was a lot easier to get a support spot as opposed to a full band. As such he was quickly noticed by both Peelie, two sessions were to follow, and major indie Cherry Red, who would release two albums 'Ranting At The Nation', 1983 and 'Sawdust And Empire', 1984 from which we find 'Boadicea Uber Alles' a good example of his work from this period where he uses the Dead Kennedy's song as a starting block for his own ideas. Since parting company with Cherry Red he has kept himself busy writing, recording, performing and drinking beer. 2007 will see the 12th edition of the Sussex based festival Glastonwick where he manages to mix those things closest to his heart, poetry, music and beer! Apart from performing as a solo artist, listen to 'New World Order Rap!' to get an idea, since 1994 he has a side project in Barnstormer where he gets to mix his two favorite forms of music, medieval and punk! Listen to 'Haider' from their 2000 'Just One Life' album to hear what they sound like, and yes that is a recorder!

As I have already mentioned Attila was greatly influenced by the Clash and above all Joe Strummer, who wasn't? In the 80's it was not unusual for a Neurotics gig to end with a rousing version of 'Garageland' with Attila taken over the vocal duties, he has also recorded a rather straightforward cover of 'Washington Bullets' obviously chosen by him for it's political content, many of his own songs tackle US foreign policy. It should come as no surprise then that following Strummers untimely death Attilla was moved to put pen to paper and came up with the touchingly honest 'Commadante Joe'.

I guess in quite a lot of ways I grew up just like you
A bolshy kid who didn't think the way they told him to
You kicked over the statues, a roots rock rebel star
Who knew that punk was more than just the sound of a guitar
And I'll always remember that night at the Rainbow
When you wrote a soundtrack for my life, Commandante Joe.

So many bands back then were like too many bands today
A bunch of blokes who made a noise with bugger all to say
The Clash were always out in front, you put the rest to shame
Your words were calls to action, your music was a flame
You were our common Dante, and you raised an inferno
And you wrote a soundtrack for my life, Commandante Joe.

Reggae in the Palais
Midnight till six!
Rockin' Reds in Brockwell Park!
Sten guns in Knightsbridge!
Up and down the Westway
In and out the lights!
Clash City Rockers!
Know Your Rights!

I guess in quite a lot of ways I grew up just like you
A bolshy kid who didn't think the way they told him to
Like you I always knew that words and music held the key
As you did for so many, you showed the way to me
Although I never met you I'm so sad to see you go
'Cos you wrote a soundtrack for my life, Commandante Joe.

Not the most complicated of prose I will admit, but definitely from the heart and I must say it speaks volumes to me while putting a smile on my face and taking back to those innocent days of youthful optimism. If only all poetry could be as simple and direct as this.
If any of you have been taken by his music/poems there is a bucketful of mp3s to be downloaded here, and if you really feel like it well why not buy his records and his books, after all poets need to eat as well!

May, 1

2007-05-01T08:42:00.000+02:00

I hope there is no need for me explain today's choice of music, which come from long time personal favorite, Billy Bragg. Little side track here as I'm actually quite excited, and I'm not sure that this is good at my age, as in a few weeks I'll be off to Barcelona where I'll be catching Billy live at the Primavera Festival, the last time I saw Bragg live was during the days of the GLC and the first reign of Ken Livingston over London. The Music is taken from Billy's 1990 mini album of traditional political and workers songs that took it's title from his rewritten version of 'The Internationale' and also included a stirring version of the British Labour party's traditional song 'The Red Flag' played to it's more upbeat original tune. I was rather surprised when re listening to the title track to the similarity, in musical terms, between this and Monty Python's 'Every Sperm Is Sacred'! Over at Billy's blog he is up to part 7 of his ongoing podcast detailing his history and as chance would have it this latest posting is where he discusses the making of 'Internationale' and the period of change, well worth a listen, even I have learnt little tit bits of information such as Billy having been banned from East Germany just 6 months before the Berlin Wall came down due to his outspoken support for the imminent changes.
I don't know about you but I've always been a sucker for Russian art work, and all that it inspired such as the rich collection of posters from the Spanish civil war, well if you feel the same way as me there's a nice site here that includes as well a the usual revolution art a series of Russian anti alcohol propaganda.

Peel Sessions 51

2007-04-30T15:10:00.000+02:00

I know it's been out for just over a month now, blame it on snail mail, but it must not be forgotten that David Gedge and his glum band otherwise known as the Wedding Present were along with the Fall the archetypal post 1976 Peel band, a point borne out by the elevated number of Sessions recorded by both them and his following project Cinerama. The Complete Peel sessions is a 6 CD box set that dare I suggest might have been a more essential purchase if the 3 live discs had not been included as apart from the Peelie 50Th birthday bash the live sets are far from the bands best, recorded long after the bands high point of 'Bizarro' and 'Seamonsters' . There are two things that have grabbed my attention the first is that wonderfully grim up north style sleeve, that in many ways goes to sum up Gedges down to earthiness normal man vibe, though this of course could not be further from the truth as the ex schoolteacher is indeed a very bright and well informed man, I somewhat doubt that he has ever crossed the door of a bookies for example. His difference can further be seen by the songs that are amongst the most pleasing on this set, those of the three sessions of Ukrainian folk songs. Having already laid down 'Hopak', a song that they often played at sound checks, in November 1986, Pete Solowka suggested that they did something really radical and record a whole session of Ukrainian music. Radical it was as these were the days before the new folk revival, probably the only band doing something similar was the Pogues but they sung in English. And so it was with the help of fiddler Len Liggins that they recorded these 5 songs in October 1985:

1. 'Katrusya'
2. 'Svitt Misyats'
3. 'Tiutinyk'
4. 'Yikav Zozak Za Dunai'
5. 'Hude Dnipro Hude'

I guess you can't really get much further removed from cloth caps, whippets and mushy peas can you? The record buying public were obviously behind this project as when the first two sessions were compiled as 'Ukrainski Vistuosi v Johana Peela', the bands first release after signing to RCA, it's 40,000 sales were enough to put the it at 22 in the national album charts, the real one not the indie charts! Now this was good news as it frighted the shit out of daytime jocks who were genuinely worried that they might have to learn a foreign language. By 1991 Solowka had left the band and along with Liggins had turned the Ukrainians into a full time affair, I saw them in 1993 and they certainly provided you with a good night out. This departure led to the Wedding Present regrettably shutting the door on Eastern European folk music a shame really a bit colour up north goes down just fine.

Who Invented Love?

2007-04-29T09:17:00.000+02:00

The Young Playthings are a UK band based in Oxford and London that have recently been making friends for themselves on the live circuit after opening for The Pippettes the length and breadth of the land. After having released three singles since 2005, the time for them to release their inevitable debut album has arrived, an event scheduled for May, 15 by the UK indie label/co operative Smalltown America. A quick glance at 'Who Invented Love's?' art work should set the tone, a cartoon style design that owes more to Hanna Barbera, the creator of The Flintstones and Scooby Doo amongst others, than it does to indie pop, still we all have our roots and influences don't we? The opening four songs do not disappoint as the accent is firmly on fun with that good old vibe of feel good running through the tunes. I guess it wouldn't be too inaccurate to describe them here as falling somewhere between Green Day and The Frank & Walters with a pleasing nerdy edge thrown. I was particularly taken with 'So Good, So Bad, So Good' that manages to stir up memories of Buddy Holly, Doo Wop, Del Shannon and NYC girl groups, in other words a song with bags of attitude and feeling. After these four songs the album looses the plot a little and fails to work as a whole as there is too much variety involved before the band has managed to stamp their trade mark, imagine that The Clash had delivered London Calling as their first album I doubt that it would have been as well received as it was. Though taken as individual songs their are plenty of gems to be discovered a fine example would be 'Last Night In Los Angeles', subtle shuffling drums, fluid guitar lines, refined harmonies (one of the bands definite strong points) and an all important youthful enthusiasm that at times leads to the impression that the song is being played just a little to fast!
In conclusion a solid debut, but no classic leaving that all important space for improvement, don't forget it's easier to climb than to fall! With it's enthusiasm, soaring harmonies and well crafted tunes It should find friends with lovers of intelligent indie pop that want a good time, and I rather doubt that they'll have much problem in shifting the 800 copies.
Bonus track 'Yr So Fit (For Me)' a non album track and single release from 2006 illustrating a more punkish side to these three boys.
Anyone know who invented love? They have a hell of a lot to answer for!

The Best Kept Secret In The World?

2007-04-28T13:35:00.000+02:00

I don't know about you but I can always remember reading in the music press about classic albums or artists, such as Big Star, that back in their day never sold enough copies to pay the bus ticket back home, now I will be the first to say that sales do not necessarily equate to quality, though it did often get me scratching my head and wondering why these classics failed to grab the attention of the masses. I guess part of the reason is that these artists are often what we might call critics bands or maybe even musician's musicians. Today's chosen gang are quite possibly the best band in the whole world, proof of their esteem amongst their colleagues is that when the worlds greatest Rock 'n' Roll Band needed a bassist to replace Bill Wyman they looked no further than Doug Wimbish. The nucleus of Wimbish along with drummer Keith LeBlanc and guitarist Skip McDonald began playing together in NYC at the beginning of the 70's and a decade latter they had become the house band at Rap pioneering label Sugarhill Records. As such they were the musicians that performed on such influential songs as 'White Lines' and 'The Message'. This was followed by a brief spell at Tommy Boy Records before a chance meeting with Adrian Sherwood led to them relocating to the UK. Here they once again assumed the role of house band this time for Sherwood's highly influential On U Sound label where dub and studio wizardry was pushed to the limits to good effect. it was while here that our trio formed Tackhead with the addition of vocalist Bernard Fowler. Their 1989 debut album 'Friendly As A Hand Grenade' has stood the test of time with it's proficient playing doing nothing to detract from the feeling of these funk/dance/rock crossover tunes as can be heard on 'Airborn Ranger'. They continued working with On U Sound artists and formed a special relationship with ex Pop Group vocalist Gary Clail. The slightly less rewarding 'Strange Things' was released in 1990. The early 1990's saw guitarist McDonald recruit the talents of his fellow journey men for his new project Little Axe. It would appear that his manifesto here was to put a new take on that original black American form of music, the blues. Mission accomplished, with the aid of Sherwood behind the mixing desk they mixed the fore mentioned blues with gospel, rock, reggae and funk to come up with the critically acclaimed 'The House That Wolf Built', 1994 and 'Slow Fuse', 1996. As a band the project was put on hold until 2002 when they hit back hard with 'Hard Grind' on blues revival label Fat Possom, maybe this rebirth was due to renewed interest in the blues thanks to the likes of The White Stripes, still their return was more than welcome. The band have now found a home on Peter Gabriel's Real World, it's nice to see those Genesis royalties going to good use, and delivered the goods again last year with 'Stone Cold Ohio', their fifth album to date. It has been genuinely difficult to choose a track from this album as the bar has really been set that high in terms of quality, I've gone for 'Same People' which is a fine spirited cover of an Alen Toussaint song where they manage with so much class and feeling to put the voodoo back into New Orleans swamp music.

Hillbilly Alert

2007-04-27T17:03:00.000+02:00

I must say that in much the same way that Iggy Pop can be relied upon to get his wrinkled willy out on stage so can Hayseed Dixie be relied upon to deliver the goods when it comes to deep bluegrass cover versions of rock classics. This time round they have delved into one of Punk's classic albums for the opening track for their fresh on the shelves album 'Weapons Of Grass Destruction', don't you just love these sensitives boys way with words! The song in question is none other than 'Holidays In The Sun', band member Barley explains his thoughts behind this song by saying "I miss the Cold War. I think we all do, really. At least back then everybody had a clear and distinct picture of who was trying to whoop who. The Berlin wall was the concrete (literally) symbol of this certainty, and this song sums up the longing for those times of old quite perfectly. You know . . . it’s a nostalgia piece really." In musical terms it's much of the same stuff as can be found on their other albums, this version is about so far removed from the original that it almost sounds romantic! I guess it's pretty much a case of you'll love it or hate it, as for me it put a smile on my face, and with the state of my the back these last couple of days that can't be such a bad thing, though I will say that I still prefer the panzer like XXX full strength version that made sure we weren't sleeping while listening to 'Never Mind The Bollocks'.
The band will be taking their energetic live shows just about everywhere this summer including the home of heavy metal festivals, Donnington and excluding France. I can't think of a better way to spend a summer evening than watching these bastard sons of the Dukes of Hazard bashing away with their mandolins and banjos while nursing a glass of warm cider!

Bristol Dance Three Pack

2007-04-25T14:53:00.000+02:00

Ever since the arrival of punk, Bristol has been a fertile source of new music, not always the most commercial of sounds though in general of artistic merit. Part of the logical fallout of the bastard rhythms of post punk was a new generation that openly embraced dance music. Massive Attack are probably are very good example of how a band can be inventive in musical terms and still be popular. For me their 1994 album, 'Protection' was a big eye opener into a whole new realm of music with their grooves managing to be both sophisticated and street level at the same time. one of their definite strengths lie in their ready acceptance to collaborate with other artists, a fine of example of this is Tracey Thorns vocals on the song 'Protection', Tracey was of as everyone knows the singing half of Everything But The Girl who has just released, 'Out Of The Woods', her first solo album in twenty years. Another collaborator on this album was Tricky who was also to taste fame under his own name particularly with his 1995 debut album 'Maxiquaye'. A larger than life personality who was verging on the edge of sanity, sadly a nervous breakdown left him a normal human being and his music a lot less interesting. 'Black Steel' was an inspired cover version of the Public Enemy song that can be found on his debut album, personally I prefer the 'Been Caught Stealing Mix' complete with it's loud guitars. Neneh Cherry first came to our attention as the energetic singer and dancer from the post Pop Group, Rip Rig And Panic, she went on to have a very successful solo career with music not the far removed from that of Massive Attack, she bravely took the decision to quit music while still a popular figure to raise her children. She has since resettled in Sweden, a country that one boasted her father Don Cherry as a citizen, her latest music venture, CirKus, is still groove based and their debut album 'Laylow' is well worth your time. I was lucky enough to catch them live last year and a very good gig it was with Neneh's vocal chords being as powerful as ever. One of the stand out moments was the lilting reggae/rap of 'Your Such An' that was introduced with an amusing dedication / put down of George Bush.

Unashamed Publicity

2007-04-24T15:20:00.000+02:00

And in my opinion deservedly so! The album in question dates from 1979 and originally saw the light of day on the Jake Riviera set up and Warner Brothers financed Radar Records, which was of course the home to Elvis Costello. The album has long been unavailable excepting a very expensive Japanese import, and now 28 years after its original release it has been put back on the shelves by Rhino and for a very modest sum for such an important work. The album was the first from the Bristol based noise warriors the Pop Group who had a strong radical left agenda to preach. As AMG so rightly state the name of the band is to say the least ironic, the band's love of word and sound play was also evident in the title of this album, 'Y'. Their sound definitely had it's roots in intellectually radical free jazz, and as such song structures would often be sacrificed for random ideas the sort of thing that might look great on paper or after a joint, their saving grace as far as our ears were to be concerned was their use of both funk and reggae that made their abrasive sounds exciting and if my memory serves me well, danceable to inebriated students. The reggae edge was well exploited on this album as it was produced by UK reggae producer Denis Bovell in his down time between producing chart artist such as Janet Kay, it goes without saying that the Pop Group were never to disturb the charts, one of their early singles was called 'We Are All Prostitutes', Marxist dogma was not a staple of Radio One in the late seventies. Listening to the album 28 years down the line it sounds every bit as fresh and rewarding if one takes the effort to listen to it as it did, it back then. It has also sent the memories rushing back of my youth and above all crazy anything can go gigs at London students union bars and halls!
By 1983 the adventure was over and the bands foghorn soapbox vocalist Mark Stewart had formed Mafia and released his excellent debut alum 'Learning To Cope With Cowardice', Stewart's political rantings and dub heavy musical soundscapes were to become one of the many outstanding features of Adrian Sherwood's On U Sound label. His fellow band mates were also to play with numerous bands of note including Rip Rig And Panic, Public Image Ltd, The Slits, Guided By Voices, Pig Bag and the Gl*xo Babies.
Of all of the songs on the album probably the most accessible was 'She Is Beyond Good And Evil' that unsurprisingly enough was also the lead single despite it lacking a sing along chorus and so it was destined to linger in the then ghetto of the Indie charts. Do yourself a favour and but the cd now before it disappears for another decade or so.

Peel Sessions 50

2007-04-23T15:12:00.000+02:00

Funk, in general when we think of this kind of music it is the black US artists such as Clinton (George of course) and his different bands or maybe Sly, a style of music that often had so much going on that the sound was maybe at times a little confused but what the hell it got our arses moving which after all it was intended to. My first real meeting with funk was the metal pop hybrid of Wild Cherry's 'Play That Funky Music', a little bit obvious but still a great song, and a direction that would be followed years later by bands such as Extreme. It must be said that during the seventies the nearest we got to funk in the UK was the sterile likes of Level 42 and the UK Jazz Funk, hey slap my bass, movement. One of the fall outs of punk was the currently much in vogue post punk years and their melting pot attitude to music making, certain artists such as The Slits and Public Image Limited, incorporated heavy dub influences into their musical offerings, while other bands such as The Gang Of Four were to delve into funk for their foot tapping influences. Now it goes without saying that a white boy from the industrial north of England did not have the same sense of rhythm as an Afro black from the Bronx the result was that wonderful hybrid often labeled indie funk that was a very clean mechanical cold, yes almost industrial sound.

One of the undisputed leading lights behind this was a band that hailed from Aberdeen, a cold forbidding austere town in the North of Scotland that at this period was best known as being a large fishing port, this was before North Sea oil brought undreamed of wealth to the town, APB was the bands name. I've seen the band described as being the missing link between between The Gang Of Four and early Red Hot Chili Peppers, the only thing that I would add is that they were obviously a big influence on their fellow Scots Franz Ferdinand. Interestingly enough the band were at the end of the day to go down much better in the far off city of New York than they were in their home town. They were invited down to the big smoke by Peelie for two sessions, the first in December 1981:

1. 'My Love'
2. 'Higher The Climb'
3. 'Crooner's Lullaby'
4. 'From You And Back To'

This music here was much more brutal and sparse sounding than that from the follow up session from December the following year where the sound was larger and richer. As with many bands from this period the dream was not to last and despite their US popularity that had led to them to opening for James Brown and playing NYC's famed Ritz club and so by the end of the decade they were no longer a viable concern. Interest in them and this musical period had led to their 'Something To Believe In' album being given the double cd treatment and an excellent disc of their BBC Radio sessions (Peel, Powell & Jensen) being compiled by Young American Recordings. 2006 saw the band getting back together to profit from this renewed interest and have even gone as far as recording their third album 'Three'.

COMPETITION
Due to a careless mistake, I double clicked when ordering the Radio sessions, I am now the proud owner of two copies. The reader that can name the most bands from Aberdeen (Scotland) will become the proud owner a factory sealed copy of the cd. Entry's are to be e-mailed to soundofthesuburbs@aliceadsl.fr before Friday May, 4, please put APB competition as the title. I do of course expect serious names and not silly made up band monikers, my decision will be final and announced May, 7 along with the posting of the second APB Peel session. Good luck!

Good Taste Bad Taste

2007-04-22T09:43:00.000+02:00

Last week end my partner and myself were invited to a diner party, older readers probably know the sort of affair, four or five couples that have known each other for many years though today we probably only meet up two or three times a year at the most. As is usual with these affairs conversation revolved around a) our children, b) our work, c) whatever happened to so and so and d) music which was after all one of the things that bonded us together all those years ago. As has been the case with our lives in general, the way they have taken different paths so is the case with our musical tastes, personally I am rather proud that at my age I am still listening to such a wide variety of music and that I still find myself excited by a new band or sound much the same way as I was when I was a teenager. Sadly this is not the case with my friends, with the notably exception of Jeff and GG, as far as the others are concerned music stopped in 1990, with the exception of certain mass appeal artists. And so my ears were treated to what my host considered to be cutting edge music, the latest Scissor Sisters, Mika and an album of Stones classics Bossa Nova style. I was bored and my ears were feeling offended. These bands might be OK for the odd song but to be forced to listen to their albums from start to finish borders on torture, above all when considering that the CD age has put quantity over quality, rare is the album today that clocks in at under the 60 minute mark, with vinyl it was more often or not two times 20 minutes. Listening to these two artists I was struck by the resemblance to eighties synth/dance music and one name stuck in my head that of Jimmy Somerville. The next day I dug out some old record by Bronski Beat and The Communards, and yes I was right there was a similarity between the two generation though I much preferred the falsetto warble of Jimmy Somerville over that of media friendly nice clean boy Mika. The Bronski Beat songs have the advantage over the Cummunards materiel in so far as they are not just good songs but politically motivated. 'Smalltown Boy' was their debut single that set the scene for what was to follow with it's synth based mix of pop and house, 'Ain't Necessarily So' displays a certain maturity, today listening to it it reminds me of Steely Dan, and had a subversive sensual feel to it.
I wonder if 25 years down the line people will look back with the same affection at Mika and the Scissor Sisters work?

Spring Clear Out

2007-04-21T09:16:00.000+02:00

Sometime back I created a Sound of the Suburbs e mail address that I placed on the side bar enabling those of you that don't wish to leave public comments to contact me as well as labels and bands to send me their latest wares. Of course this letter box receives a lot more junk mail than interesting mail. Concerning the bands, the labels and the promotion companies that have sent me musical links I do eventually listen to all of them at least once, and as is to be expected the majority are not to my liking and don't spend much time on my hard drive. There have been a few that have been the exception, almost a revelation and have been posted almost immediately. And there are others that have gone into a dossier named Blog Possibles, due to lack of time this has got bigger and bigger, so the other day I decided it was time for action and gave each of the artists a second listen, this meant that some of them were to be destined for the scrap heap, and as for the others, well they make up the back bone of today's post. For the majority of the artists I know nothing or little but we don't need to know the singer or the band to enjoy the music do we?

1. Ist are a real mystery to me, I think they are American, but this is all I know about them, who sent me the mail I don't remember, a Google search has come up with nothing and so I'm starting to wonder do they exist? Their song that grabbed my attention was the compact 60 seconds of 'I Am Jesus And You're Not' rockabilly trash with breakneck speed vocals.

2. Sir Salvatore hail from San Francisco and are are a relatively new band though as is often the case these boys are no newcomers to the world of music making. The band will be releasing a six track cd entitled 'Those Men Are Not Astronauts' at the beginning of May, 'Hooray The Projector' is a fine guitar led indie pop song and 'Publickley' is a much more atmospheric affair both songs can be found on the cd and show a certain promise, a band to watch.

3. The Dealership are also from America and have been together since 1995 when they got together while studying at UC Berkeley. They have released three albums. 'California' from 2001's 'TV Highway to the Stars' displays a healthy baggy influence without the more dance element, there are definite shades of The Stone Roses and The Charlatans here. If you like this there are a whole load of other tracks to download from the band's site.

4. Winterpills have been labeled as Americana and have just released their second album 'The Light Divides'. From the evidence of the two available tracks, the female led 'Hankerchiefs' and the more upbeat 'Broken Arm' I would say an album well worth checking out.

5. Von Südenfed is the name given to a project between Andi Toma and Jan St. Werner from Mouse on Mars and Mr Mystery himself Mark E Smith better known as the Fall's ringmaster. Their album 'Tromatic Reflexxions' has been picked up by Domino and is due for June release. 'The Rhinohead' could almost be signed the Fall and displays a welcome pop edge whereas 'Flooded' is another beast altogether with Smith rapping over some heavy mechanical funk.

6. The Basement probably need little introduction for many of you though for me me they were a recent discovery, I would describe them as being somewhere between an Irish Showband, Bob Dylan and the Waterboys! 'Close The Door' is a pleasant enough piano led romp with it's vocals and harmonies owing more than a little to the Beatles, 'Bringing Out The Dead' an instrumental, is wacky enough and loose enough that it charms you through it's 2 minutes 21 and you don't even miss the vocals.

As they say that's all folks!

Peel Sessions 49

2007-04-16T17:09:00.000+02:00

I'm not quite sure when it was announced,the end of February? All I know is that I must have had my head firmly wedged in a bucket of sand of maybe even cement to have let news as important as the reformation of the original line up of the Only Ones be missed by myself. I guess this is going to be very much of case of don't hold your breath and don't blink as no one not even London's finest bookmaker's are willing to offer odds on the given length of this return of the four original members of one of the finest bands to have come to light in those turbulent years of '76/'77. Peter Perrett, vocalist and songwriter, by his own admission is in a bad way physically after spending the best part of the last thirty years as a junkie, his good friend Johnny Thunders is reputed to have once advised him to clean his act up! Having said this reports from the rehearsal studios are so good that apparently he no longer needs a fix of oxygen between numbers, and there is even talk of them entering the studios to lay down some new material.
It would appear that this move was sparked off by an offer to play All Tomorrows Parties (April, 27), this has now been followed by a short UK tour, 6 dates starting June, 1 and a festival appearance at the beginning of September, as I have already said it remains to be seen if they manage to fulfill these obligations and I am under no illusion regarding the possibility of seeing them here in the south of France - Nil. Still I wish them luck and must admit to being just a little envious of those of you that are going to catch them.
To celebrate I'm putting up the four tracks that made up their very first session for Peel originally aired in September 1977. I know that some of these songs have already been posted here but those links have long been lost in cyber space.

1. 'Lovers Of Today' which was their first single, released on their own label and the song that started a label bidding war for the band. Perrett has since regretted their choice claiming they should have signed to another, nameless label, because he had done drugs with the label boss!
2. 'Oh No' not their most memorable song and somewhat out of character for the band it being an out and out rocker and lacking the bands trade mark atmosphere and dynamics, though it does feature a nice bit of very free guitar playing by John Perry at the end and it really sounds like he was enjoying himself. As Far as I know this song was not featured on any of their official CBS releases, maybe under a different name? Though a version does exist on the outtakes compilation 'Remains'.
3. 'Telescopic Love' a lovely slice of English psychedelic pop that was later to figure as the b side of the 'Another Girl Another Planet' 7" single with the title changed to 'Special View'.
4. 'Inbetweens' that would later feature on the bands second album 'Even Serpents Shine'.

This session along with the three others that the band recorded for Peel have been compiled with two BBC In Concert recordings under the title of 'Darkness And Light' for a double CD release by Hux. Their three official CBS albums are available on another 2 cd set which includes their debut single and b sides for a very reasonable £11.

God And Other Stories

2007-04-14T11:15:00.000+02:00

This was the title of Peter Astor's last solo album that dates from 1993 and it was in March of that year that I promoted his gig in Montpellier. I must say that at the time Astor's previous bands, The Loft and The Weather Prophets were just names I'd come across in the press but don't worry I have since done my home work and caught up with those early Creation bands that he fronted, and well worth my time it was as well. I can remember that gig posters were rather loud, being an image from the album sleeve of a flamenco dancer in different shades of red, not very rock 'n' roll, though here in the south of France maybe the image was not too out of place. The gig, was great, though not that well attended around a 100 people in an 900 person venue, despite this I was won over. I can remember us having a healthy presence of local musicians for the concert, all of whom seemed to consider Astor to be some God like figure in the scheme of musical evolution. The result of which was that I checked out his earlier albums, 'Submarine', 'Zoo' and 'Paradise' and there wasn't a dud one between them! These four albums, two a piece for Virgin and Danceteria, have long been relegated to the realms of second hand shops. Interestingly enough Peter Astor would still appear to be in favour with Alan McGee as a compilation of songs from these four albums called 'Injury Time' with the track listing having been selected by the songs author is a new feature of the Revola catalogue. The two numbers posted today, taken from 'God And Other Stories', do not feature on this compilation though I would suggest that they would not have been out of place on it. 'No Food Is Blue' has a title that reminds me of my days as a psychology student and was picked up by myself and other jocks on Radio Alligator as the lead track from the album, no surprise really as it is a nice little pop gem with a catchy hook. 'Big Dumb Song Again' the albums closer is a mixture of pop number and ballad that is so infectious that I get the impression that I have already heard the melody somewhere else, this of course may well be the case but I can't for the life of me put my finger on who or what it was!
Since 1993 Peter Astor has stayed active with different projects such as Wisdom Of Harry and Elis Island Sound, two very different projects both distant in terms of musical style from his earlier work, but more from them another day.

Jealous Again!

2007-04-12T14:26:00.000+02:00

It's true that a times I miss living in a large, big happening town such as my birth place, London, this feeling is often accentuated when I see the bands that are passing through these large centres of population. This was very much the case when I saw the advert for tomorrow's gig in Paris, is this the right word for a DJ set? Regular readers will have already witnessed the praise that I have been heaping on Go Home Productions and so missing the chance to see him perform along side his contemporaries, top French bootleggers DJ Zebra and Loo And Placido has rather put the dampers on my day. I do find it rather strange that the 'gig' should start and finish so early after all this is night time party music, this might be because the event is taking place in one of the capital's prestige concert halls! Anyway if I were to go I'd probably find myself to be the oldest person in attendance! To cheer myself up a little I've given GHP's recent comic relief mix that was commissioned for radio 6 another spin and well worthy it is with its as ever inspired choice of tunes mixed in this time with selected comic snippets, the whole 60 minutes is dowloadable as two files; pt1 and pt2. Those that don't know DJ Zebra can check out their download page where there are always a good number of files up for grabs.
I am a recent convert to the UK music mag The Word that has just celebrated it's 50th issue, above all I appreciate it's more in depth thought provoking articles that do not not limit themselves to just the music and do much more than scratching the surface as the more established press seems to do these days, I often get the impression that I know much more than the so called journalists recount in their articles. I read with interest their review section, more a case a quality above quantity, and as such was pleased to stumble across their review of GHP's 'Mashed' album that has recently seen the day of light on EMI, a well thought out article signed by David Hepwoth that I tend to agree with especially his closing thoughts that he feels a certain nostalgia already for the days when GHP's work was only available as hush hush naughty free downloads in other words when bootlegging earned it's name and reputation as an underground peoples movement.

Brown Horses or Wild Sugar

2007-04-11T14:51:00.000+02:00

A pair of Stones cover versions today that have been rolling around my head for the last few days, interestingly enough both are from artists that I wouldn't normally listen to twice. 'Wild Horses' is signed by the Sundays, who are just a little bit too twee for by taste and I have never really appreciated Harriet Wheeler's voice. Having said that this cover grabbed my attention when I discovered it hidden away as a B side for one of their Parlophone singles in the early 90's, I find that her dream like vocals suit this wistful but straight forward romp through the song. The song apparently featured in a US TV commercial in 1994, anyone know what it was for, Marlboro, Cherokee Jeeps? Probably because of this the song has been tagged onto the end of their US version of 1992 album 'Blind'.
'Brown Sugar' is another altogether more demanding and possibly rewarding cover that features the combined talents of Ryan Adams and Beth Orton. Now where it not for the presence of Ms Orton I would probably not have given the song a second listen as in all honesty I always though the young Adams to be over rated, recent reports of him following in the footsteps of the Grateful Dead would appear to back me up. Though on the other hand I've had a soft spot for Beth Orton's work ever since having been hooked on her gentle folk dance numbers from her debut 'Trailer Park'. The combing of the two on this song has proved to be inspired, instead of the rocker as in the original the song is now presented as a mournful piano led ballad full of the necessary sadness that does an excellent job of summing up the real despair behind the songs title. Keef should be impressed!

Made In France

2007-04-10T14:52:00.000+02:00

Ever since I can remember I've been using public libraries, as a child I was always down there borrowing books to feed my thirst, as I got older and interested in music I started using the record lending service, which was a great way to learn about jazz and classical music as at this period popular music was a dirty word for librarians. Some thirty odd years down the line I'm still visiting my local library on a regular a basis and am pleased to say that contemporary music has now found itself a place there, or at least it has in France. I find this a great way for checking out new or unknown artists with the minimum of financial risk, of late I've also started borrowing at least one disc by a French artist each visit, the choice is often rather arbitrary and may be made by the bands name, album name, sleeve design or as was the case with today's band a song title.

And so it was to be that Maximum Kouette exploded out of nowhere into my life and for no other reason than their latest album, 'Et Elors', rounded itself off with a ditty entitled 'Fuck Me Tender'. I was intrigued was this some dumb punk thrash take on the old Elvis standard on something different altogether? Well the song is in fact inspired by the other song but has a life and soul all of its own and is well worth a listen, the introduction is a nice sleazy jazz sax over some good old vinyl surface noise, followed by a laid back French temptress in full chanson mode and the naughty chorus complete with Elvis style 'Uh hu hu'. The rest of the album is a nice mix of guitar led punk pop with enough new technology for it not to be too retro. I particularly like their use of sax and trumpet to such good effect without being invasive and the strong in your face female vocals that are at times menacing and at others seductive. Over all the album is a good time fun record and I'm sure that live the band are more than capable of warming up the coldest of audiences. 'Va T'Faire' is a good example of this with it's grunge meets industrial guitars being the backbone to this infectious pop number that boasts electronics straight out of the eighties and as for the lyrics let's just say they are none to polite, maybe just as well the majority of you will not understand them!! Now that's got you wondering and running for your French/English dictionaries hasn't it?
As for the band, a healthy seven piece, they date from the mid 90's Paris bar/club scene where they spent the last years of the century paying their dues and refining their repertoire. It wasn't until 2000 that they released their first album, 'Et Alors' from 2006 is their fourth to date. If you like what you've heard there are some MP3 files illustrating their earlier albums for download on the bands web site and who knows maybe one of you will even buy one of their records.

Peel Sessions 48

2007-04-09T15:21:00.000+02:00

Well I've been away for the week end, my boys were lucky enough to get in some end of season skiing, and as such have just got back to Nimes after a five hour drive, so this weeks Session will probably be brief and to the point.
No excuses at all for revisiting artists when their is merit and even if there was no merit it is my blog and as such I'll post what I want. back in August last year we had a look at Marc Bolan'sacoustic work with T.Rex, well there were to be two more pre-fame sessions that had a more electric edge to them and are fine examples of an artist in mid transformation. From November 1969 is the Eddie Cochran standard, that was a live staple of many UK groups at this period maybe thanks to the Who's explosive live version on 'Live At Leeds', 'Summertime Blues' with its nice touch of bongos and primitive guitar solo. This primitive side is also present on 'Hot Love' from the same session a much more direct recording than the later official studio version. By the following year and Bolans last Peel Session the band were fully electric as can be heard on 'Ride A White Swan' and the missing part of the puzzle, producer Tony Visconti, and fame and fortune were just around the corner.

Easter

2007-04-05T20:47:00.000+02:00

While thinking of something to post for the Easter weekend, I quickly dismissed the more obvious such as Echo & The Bunnymen or Patti Smith before stumbling upon the New Christs, who a bit like JC himself have a habit of coming back from the dead, as recent as last year they were back with a new line up and playing selected dates in the old continent. Seeing as ever since first hearing the Saints classic debut 45t '(I'm) Stranded' back in '77 I've had a soft spot for Australian rock, something that goes a lot further than Nick Cave, Inxs and Midnight Oil, I thought sharing some Antipodean rock with you was well over due. The New Christs were formed from the ashes of Australian band Radio Birdman, who's main claim to fame apart from being an excellent band was their cover version of the Hawaii 5 O theme, they have an excellent compilation available on Sub Pop. Rumour has it that ex Birdman vocalist Rob Younger formed the band when he was offered the opening spot on Iggy Pop's 1974 down under tour. Having won over the audience with their high octane garage rock the band decided to try and make a go of it and rapidly released two singles on Sydney indie Citadel Records, despite these 7"s gathering good reviews Younger was to find himself the sole band member when the others quit to return to their day time bands, Celibate Rifles and Hoodoo Gurus. This was to herald the first of many line up changes. I caught the band on stage in Toulouse at the tail end of the 80's and was seriously impressed. Today's music comes from a 1987 12" single 'Detrius' that compiled the 4 tracks from their first two classic singles.

1. 'Born Out Of Time'
2. 'No Next Time'
3. 'Like A Curse'
4. 'Sun God'

DON'T EAT TOO MUCH CHOCOLATE!

Why Wasn't This On The Album?

2007-04-04T16:53:00.000+02:00

The post could be also called the missing title track, the track in question is 'Sreamadelica' by Primal Scream. Anyone know why it was absent from the album of the same name? The album was of course one of those that helped to define the musical landscape of the 90's, and it must be said it is an album that has well stood the test of time with its inspired mixture of 60's and 70's classic rock, think Motown, think Rolling Stones and the then trendy acid inspired house. This track I have as the B side of the 12" promo of 'Movin' On Up' and ever since the first time I heard it's wonderful dreamlike ten minutes of Herb Albert meets House Diva groove machine I've been in love with it. If you don't know the song then go ahead and treat your ears.

Rant

2007-04-03T14:30:00.000+02:00

Last Sunday I had a run in with French passport control police and British airways at Marseille airport. Let me try to explain, my eldest son who is 13 was due to depart for the UK and spend his Easter holiday's with my parents. When we presented ourselves at the check in desk we were asked for a document authorising him to leave the country, now this is not the first time that he was to travel on his own, but the said document that is delivered by your local town hall had not entered our thoughts and British Airways, deemed it not necessary to remind us when we booked, a change in their policy as on previous occasions it was them that drew our attention to this. To cut a long story short despite both his parents being present and having the same documents with us that we would need to provide at the town hall, our request was refused by an arsehole policeman, who hid behind rules are rules. While I can understand the reason behind this document, that is apparently unique to France, I can only state it's inadequate nature as it is only required if the minor is travelling on his identity card which is delivered free, a child that has his own passport that delivered for a rather heavy fee, is free to come and go as he pleases. As I said son was refused permission to leave the cuntry, and unsurprisingly was very disappointed, BA claim it is not their fault and are refusing to refund our ticket, hiding behind conditions of booking.......................There are presidential elections here in a few weeks, though nothing will change.
My immediate reaction was one 'Fuck The Police', which was originally by Cromptons bad boys NWA and a live cover version by Rage Against The Machine, both of these are dedicated to my son who likes rap and RATM. On reflection I would say it was more a case of 'I Fought The Law' and the law won, live by the Clash in Holland October 1981 or if you prefer live by Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros in LA November 1999. Which reminds me wasn't there talk of there being a live Strummer album in the pipeline around the time of his death, I guess it will be released one day and until then are plenty of bootlegs in circulation.

Peel Sessions 47

2007-04-02T15:36:00.000+02:00

The beginnings of That Petrol Emotion were in the ex Undertones home town of Derry in 1984 where some demos were laid down, Alan McGee heard these and invited the boys over to London to record a single. The band gelled together and started gigging under the name of Novacaine Combo with the vocal duties being handled by Sean O'Neill and Reamann O'Gorman. They were not happy with the results of the vocals on the recorded single and so started searching for a singer, and in walked the recently arrived from Seattle Steve Mack who passed the audition with flying colours. The band's name was changed to TPE and the vocals re-recorded for the single, 'Keen' that was released in September 1985. Strangely enough record companies were not queuing up at the doors to sign the band and so a second single, 'V2' was released on their own label. The following year saw their debut album 'Manic Pop Thrill' released under a one off deal with Demon, it was probably the good press that they were now generating that got them signed to Polydor, where they stayed for one album before jumping ship to Virgin where they were almost to find real fame and fortune but that's another story.

Both last weeks session and this week's from November 1985 were recorded long before the band were to release their debut album, testimony of Peel's faith in the band.

1. 'Tight Lipped'
2. 'Circusville'
3. 'Cheapskate'
4. 'Mouth Crazy'

Teenage

2007-03-29T15:34:00.000+02:00

Two cover versions today with in common the word teenage. Following on from yesterday's TPE post a version that maybe you don't know of the Undertones main claim for fame 'Teenage Kicks', which is one of they great songs that I find you never get tired of, even at the tender age of 46 those opening chords still send a shiver down my backbone as Johhny Kidd would have said. The song is interpeted by French artist Dominiqe A with a little bit of help from Francoiz Berut, and in a dreamy way it's not bad with an introspective forlorn touch.

How can you cover a Sonic Youth song with out seeming foolish? Well I found the answer in my mail box this week signed by Ruby Isle, who take on 'Teenage Riot', that can can found on their recently released 'Into The Black EP'. Kindercore founder and member of I Am The World Trade Center, Dan Geller has teamed up with old school friend Mark Mallman, author and performer of rock's longest song performed in 2004 and lasting over 52 hours! They describe themselves as being the rock band predicted by Nostradamus, their press agent describes them as being the merge of alcohol and sweat drenched Mallman glam with a dance pop production, I'm not quite sure what they mean but regardless on the evidence of the three songs thay should be destined for great things, or at least an NME front page. Their piano led cover has been running arround my head for the last few days and for good reason as they have managed to keep the menace of the original while adding a child like feeling of optimism, in a fair world this would be a hit, as they used to say. The other two tracks are equally good and can be heard a their my space.

Peel Sessions 46

2007-03-28T15:46:00.000+02:00

I know I missed the Monday rendez-vous, but believe me I am having big problems with my work load at the moment and since the beginning of the week I've been on 10 hour plus working days. So as they say better late than never, and with next to no text as time is really not on my side, but I'll catch up with the writing side next week and by way of bonus another Session from the same band.
That Petrol Emotion were of course the band that raised itself from the ashes of the Undertones, while Fergal Sharkey was off chasing fame and fortune, That Petrol Emotion, formed by the O'Neill brothers with American Steve Mack handling the vocal duties, were doing what real bands do. It should come as no surprise that they quickly earned the patronage of Peel and as such got round to laying down three sessions, the first of which from June 1985 is up for grabs today.

1. 'V2'
2. 'Lettuce'
3. 'Blind Spot'
4. 'Can't Stop'

Abbey Field

2007-03-24T09:00:00.000+01:00

I stumbled across this photo in a French music mag the other day, it was being used to advertise Eurostar, I must admit I had to look at it twice to realise that it was a fresh new take on the tired old image of the Beatles Abbey Road cover. So why not some Beatles covers for the week-end? Booker T & The MGs with 'I Want you (She's So Heavy)', I've always been a sucker for the organ heavy hands of Booker and the slashing chords from Steve Crooper's Telecaster, a match made in musical heaven. With their take on this song from their 1970 album 'McLeone Avenue' they do the song proud taking it to new majestic heights. Having been their in '77 I have always had a soft spot for Siouxsie, especially those first four albums, I can remember waiting outside the door of my local record shop to get my hand on 'Scream' on the day it was released, the sort of thing no one does now as Amazon gets it to the letter box. It is on the Banshees first album that we find their version of 'Helter Skelter' a song they took and made their own in much the same way that Hendrix did with 'All Along The Watchtower' many years earlier. Siouxsie will be celebrating her 50th birthday this year, now that hurts! Puerto Muerto are a husband and wife duo hailing from the lone star state that make music about as far removed from the state's image as it is possible to get. They could be loosely described as punk folk using German cabaret and Spanish folk as their main pillars of support. Their 'With A Little Help From My Friends' was for me one of the stand out tracks on the recent Mojo Sgt Pepper cover versions album.

Head At The Controls

2007-03-22T14:53:00.000+01:00

I was rather bemused the other day when I saw the adverts in the music press for the latest Trojan compilation 'Jonny Greenwood Is The Controller', is this the same person that strums away behind Thom Yorke making the most weird and beautiful noises? The answer was yes, so I pondered was this revenge for the Easy All Stars album 'Radiodread' from last year that covered the OK Computer album in reggae style. Apparently the studio wizard is a newcomer to reggae only really starting to explore it 3 or 4 years ago, one does wonder what took him so long! The album is the first of a series to be released to celebrate the labels 40th anniversary, where stars are being asked to compile a compilation from the labels massive and impressive vaults. Well worth checking out as are the numerous limited edition Trojan box sets that contain 50 tracks over their 3 discs and retailing at under the 20 euro mark are not just a good listen but a good deal as well, personal favorites 'Dub Rarities' and 'Rockers'.
Seeing as I am very much a product of the place and time that I spent my formative years reggae has never been to far from my ears. The golden age is of course long over and the best albums were probably all recorded in the seventies, this does not stop rasta legends from recording and touring to this day though it must be said that the ears of the nations youth would much rather listen to other forms of music such as ragga. A collection of four songs from the musics golden period :

1. Prince Far I - 'Message For The King'
2. Augusto Pablo - 'Fat Girl Jean'
3. Tapper Zukie - 'Rockers'
4. Tapper Zukie & The Musical Intimidators - 'New Star'

It is not necessary to be black, nor to smoke weed, nor to wear a silly hat, nor to be sexist to enjoy this music, just close your eyes and let yourself be taken into it's hypnotic groove, I was and I've never regretted it, though I must say I probably look a right idiot when skanking away to the deep bass lines that seem to infest your body and oblige you to move, but what the hell !

The Good & The Bad

2007-03-21T15:41:00.000+01:00

Bad News : fileXoom don't like me any more or else I've been rattling someones' cage and been banned, as my account with them has totally disappeared and they don't recognise my e mail address either, can't complain really seeing as the account was free. What this does mean is that all files hosted there and posted before today are now dead, sorry! Amusingly enough I was able to sign up for a new account using the same e mail, let's see what happens. Some of you will have noticed that files hosted at My Data Bus are not always available, the reason is quite simple, I am restricted to 1 giga of band width per day and as demand is high I am easily passing this at the moment, don't worry I'll be spreading the files around other services so try again another day.
Last year I discovered a great festival, Primarvera that is held in one of my favorite towns, Barcelona, well the 2007 line up has just been announced and it's a scorcher : The Apples In Stereo, Barry Adamson, Billy Bragg, Black Mountain, Blonde Redhead, Buzzcocks, Dirty Three, DJ Yoda, The Durutti Column, Fennesz & Mike Patton, Girls Against Boys, Jonathan Richman, Klaxons, Long Blondes, Low, Patti Smith, Rakes, Slint, Smashing Pumpkins, Sonic Youth, Spiritualized, Ted Leo & The Pharmacists, Good The Bad And The Queen and Wilco, of course this list is not exhaustive and as with such events is liable to modifications. I've already bought my tickets that it must be said are a bit on the expensive side at 110 euros, and reserved my hotel, can't wait!

One of the big attractions is going to be Damon Albarn's new project, The Good The Bad and The Queen, who played a gig in Washington DC last week that was broadcast by NPR who amazingly enough considering the importance of the band have put the 60 minute concert up as a hefty one piece 55 mo download. The set was a straight run through of their album with an unreleased song 'Doghouse' and a single b side 'Mr Whippy' played as the encore. Mr whippy includes a Syrian called Eslam Jawaad, God knows how he managed to obtain an entry visa to land Uncle Sam. The song itself is a pleasing take on cod reggae that reminds me very much of Mark Perry and ATV doing 'Love Lies Limp', and that can't be a bad thing.

House Of Pain

2007-03-20T15:31:00.000+01:00

This should have been posted last Saturday but something went wrong, so rather wait 12 months for St Patrick's day to come around again I thought, why not, after all it's only four days late. The House of Pain were a white pop rap band that were more than keen to display their Irish heritage and took this to comic book levels of stupidity with their loutish behaviour, foul language and excessive consummation of beer, this of course worked fine at first in grabbing the medias attention, but was to latter backfire. Band leader, Everlast had been a member of Ice-Ts Rhyme Syndicate before forming the band with High School friends, Their first single provided them with a huge chart hit, that they were to find impossible to fellow up, the song was of course 'Jump Around' presented here in it's Pete Rock Mix. The song is a fine party number that comes over as a cross between early Beastie Boys and Cypress Hill. Their second single, 'Shamrocks and Shenanigans' also got the remix treatment I've chosen the Butch Vig Mix, rounding up the music with their theme tune 'House Of Pain Anthem Master Mix' They released three albums in total each of which sold less than the previous did and by 1998 Everlast was recording under his own name releasing a pleasing album in 'Whitey Ford sings The Blues', that was well received by the critics.

Peel Sessions 45

2007-03-19T14:47:00.000+01:00

Kevin Coyne was a die hard rock 'n' roll maverick who as Robert Chalmers correctly pointed out sung about subjects that failed to inspire the majority of the record buying public. Though fans he did a have, including John Lyndon, Sting and Jon Langford. There is another pair of Johns that we could add to that list, Peel and Walters. Peel was so taken with the demo tape that he received that he wasted no time in signing him to his Dandelion label, after the label folded Coyne started a fruitful relationship with the then hippy tinged label Virgin, It was in this same year that he recorded the first of his 10 Peel sessions, the last of which was laid down in 1990.

I have always had a soft spot for his work, loving his commanding voice over a folk rock 'n' roll with shades of left wing avant garde, the subject matter of his songs could be both challenging, pleasing and disturbing as he often used his experiences as a social worker for the basis for a song. The eighties would prove to be difficult as it would seem that struck by depression and alcoholism and a failing marriage he was living out his earlier lyrics. Thankfully he was to come through this with the help of a new relationship and a wise move to Germany. He continued recording and gigging despite being diagnosed with lung fibrosis that finally took his life in December 2004.

Regular readers will have already read about some of the concerts that I promoted between 1992 and 1999, when starting out we were looking for a name, something that would catch the eye, we came up with Luna Tick. A few days later I was listening to a Kevin Coyne album and stumbled across his song 'Lunatic', and ever since then I have not regretted the choice of name. The song comes from his 7th session recorded in February 1978 as does another of his songs that maybe sums up our experience 'That's Rock 'n' Roll'. Both of these tracks can be found on the long deleted but worth while tracking down 'Peel Sessions' album from 1990 on Strange Fruit where we can also find one of his touching love songs 'Marlene', that has always struck a chord with me.

What follows is a more or less complete list of gigs that Luna-Tick promoted during it's 7 years of existence, unless otherwise stated they took place at Le Rockstore, Montpellier. There might be some mistakes and some omissions as there definitely some black holes in my memory, feel free to correct me! The team that worked with me and myself had a great time and have some wonderful memories and tales to tell and regretted nothing except maybe the adventure ending. That's enough of blowing my own horn for one day!

25/11/92 – New Fast Automatic Daffodils
16/12/92 – Inspiral Carpets / Otis Wood
23/02/93 – Hinnies / Beckets
11/03/93 – High Llamas
??/04/93 – Peter Astor
??/04/93 – Mamas Boys
12/05/93 – Third World
17/05/93 – Wilko Johnson / Captain Sensible
31/05/93 – The Auteurs / David Gray
17/06/93 – Radiohead
20/10/93 – Ukranians
24/10/93 – TV Smith / Mike Rimbaud
29/10/93 – Welcome To Julian
01/11/93 – Boo Radleys
??/11/93 – Christine Lakeland
30/11/93 – Moose / Sidi Boo Said / Divine Comedy
28/01/94 – Les Satellites
16/02/94 – Faith Healers
15/04/94 – Boo Radleys / Sharkboy
16/04/94 – Boo Radleys (Espace Julien, Marselle)
21/04/94 – Voodoo Queens
20/04/94 – Dominique A
23/04/94 – Steve Wynn
15/05/94 – Divine Comedy / Epic Soundtracks
16/05/94 – Divine Comedy / Epic Soundtracks (Balzac, Nice)
17/05/94 – Divine Comedy / Epic Soundtracks (Espace Julien, Marsellie
26/05/94 – Pulp / Lighthouse
27/05/94 – Pulp / Lighthouse (Espace Julien, Marseille)
06/06/94 – Terry Lee Hale
05/12/94 – New Fads / Molly Half Head
20/01/95 – Edwyn Collins / Catchers
07/05/95 – Boo Radleys /Sleeper
02/06/95 – TV Smith
04/11/95 – Kepone / Sloy
20/11/95 – Radiohead / Drugstore
24/11/95 – Pulp / Menswear (replaced by Otis Wood
27/11/95 – Terry Lee Hale
01/12/95 – Welcome To Julian / Notre Dame
20/03/96 – Sylvain Vanot
23/04/96 – Bluetones
??/04/96 – Autour De Lucie
13/05/96 – Katerne
14/05/96 – Assassin
06/11/96 – Mathieu Bogard
09/11/96 – Sebadoh
23/11/96 – Sloy
08/12/96 – The Cardigans
19/01/97 – Boo Radleys / Linoleum
01/04/97 – Lemonheads / You Am I
28/04/97 – Palace Brothers
09/05/97 – Swell / Tarnation
28/05/97 – Placebo / Dream City Film Cluc
20/09/97 – Smog / Ego
14/10/97 – Stereolab / Pram
20/11/97 – Delta 72/ Twenty Miles
24/11/97 – Lucky Peterson
08/12/97 – Yo La Tengo / Run On
25/02/98 – June Of ‘44 (?)
25/03/98 – Les Thugs / Tantrum
17/04/98 – Tortoise
03/06/98 – Royal Trux
23/09/98 – Swell
10/11/98 – Louis Bertignac
14/11/98 – Eliot Smith
16/10/98 – Divine Comedy / Pelvis
19/11/98 – Sloy
23/11/98 – Gomez
28/11/98 – Les Sheriff
05/12/98 – Cat Power
24/01/99 – Unbelievable Truth
07/02/99 – June Of ‘44 (?)
27/04/99 – Chokebore / Zen Guerila
13/05/99 – Lucky Peterson
19/05/99 – Sebahoh
21/05/99 – Add ‘n To X
14/10/99 – Stereolab / Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci
24/10/99 – Ben & Jason
05/11/99 – Atari Teenage Riot
18/11/99 – Les Thugs
25/11/99 – Mass Hysteria / Wasin' Machine

Made In France

2007-03-14T16:05:00.000+01:00

As I Have Already mentioned, when I arrived in France in November 1987 I wasted no time in checking out the local music scene. Now French rock is a strange beast as some of it is more French than other, there are for example certain groups that sing in English, there are others that are fervent followers of Manchester, New York, London, Seattle or wherever and as such produce heavily derivative music. On the other hand there is a strand of musicians that with the help of protectionist legislation have breathed new life into that old beast la chanson. The late 80's and the early 90's were a boom period for what was labeled as "alternative" music in France with the most obvious examples being La Mano Negra and Les Negresses Vertes, one of the most annoying things about this scene was that it attracted a high percentage of dog on a string give us a pound/ a dollar/ a franc type of person. Another of the leading lights of this scene were Les VRP who mined la chanson and the spirit of inter war year cabaret as the influence for their humorous acoustic based numbers. They had a relatively short life span, 1988 - 1993, splitting live on stage in the 6000 capacity Zenth in Montpellier after headlining a festival there. Just in case the audience were not quite sure whether it was true or not the band trashed all their instruments before offering what was left to the stunned public. One of their songs that I spent many a stoned evening listening to and trying to decipher the lyrics was 'Le Roi De La Route' from their 1989 debut album 'Remords Et Tristes Pets' ( loosely translated as, remorse and sad farts). The song is in fact an early example of road rage with a motorist obsessed with overtaking another vehicle. From the same album comes 'Mardi Gras' more of a lounge number that pays it's respects to the great Serge. So enjoy the music and get your French dictionaries out!

Count Me Out

2007-03-13T14:43:00.000+01:00

As a youngster I was not as keen on my studies as I could have been and by the time I was 16 or 17 I was spending far too much of my free time on nocturnal outings to catch bands live. At this period, the mid to late seventies the East End of London was not the trendy inner suburb that it has become in recent years but more of a cultural desert as far as music venues were to go and so I became very familiar with the workings of the London tube as I would often be off to the town centre or even as far as West London, which at the time boasted a good selection of live venues, one of my favorites was The Nashville Rooms in West Kensington. This was a very large Victorian pub that had a room that must have contained somewhere in the region of 400 people and was equipped with a decent stage where they put on live music 7 nights a week. It was a bit of a hangover from the pub rock days though the venue was quick enough to grab the spirit of change that was in the air, one legendary gig, which I missed, was the Sex Pistols supporting the 101er's. I saw many a band and sunk many a good pint of Fullers inside it's smokey confines, most of the bands I saw were not to go on to mega stardom, but there was one that I saw there on at least three occasions ('77/'78) before turning up one cold winter night in 1978 to see them again only to find a great big line of faces waiting to pay their entrance fee, the night before the band had been on the Old Grey Whistle Test tv programme, I did not wait around as there was another gig just down the road at Hammersmith's more intimate Red Cow. The name of the band was the Police, I can remember at this period they made for a good night out with their mixture of fast punk inspired numbers and what was to become their trade mark, white reggae.
It was with much surprise and even amusement that I learnt the news of them reforming for a world tour, it was not that long ago that Sting was giving a big loud NO when journalists would pose the question of a possible get together, so what happened has Sting been stung by that vulgar disease called poverty? Is the up keep of his Tuscany life style proving too much? Who knows, who cares, the only thing that I am sure of is that I will not be sending off for tickets, in fact I somewhat doubt that if you were to offer me a place that I could be arsed to go. I can remember when the Sex Pistols got back together, the first time, I was tempted but finally decided that it was not a good idea. I saw the the reformed Buzzcocks who were older and fatter than the first time I saw them some twenty years previously and last year I caught the reformed Wedding Present and despite it being an enjoyable evening it was not a patch on the gig I saw them perform a decade before. This might sound a little mean but I almost consider that Joe Strummer did me a favour by passing away when he did a it has saved me the dilemma of deciding whether or not to see a reformed version of the Clash were it to have ever come about. On the subject of the Clash, Carbon Silicon, Mick Jones latest venture, have just posted four new tracks that can be found here.
I guess at the end of the day the hesitation on my part boils down to two factors, first the bands motivation, I loudly condemned the Pixies as it was more than evident it was just for the money as was also to be the case with the Pistols, the cynic in me also says the Police are looking forward to a good pension plan from the dates they'll be playing. Secondly I think I've got a nagging thought at the back of my head that I might just be disappointed, imagine seeing Strummer, Jones, Simonon and Headon once again on stage and them failing to deliver the goods, that would almost kill me!
Anyway enough of this rhetoric, after all this is a music blog. In their day I can vouch that the Police were one hell of a fine band on stage as you can hear from these two tracks taken from their box set 'Message In A Box' a fine (s)punky 'Next To You' recorded live in NYC and their live favorite 'Message In A Bottle'. If you are planning to go and see them don't let the musing of an aging punk rocker spoil your enjoyment.

Peel Sessions 44

2007-03-12T15:07:00.000+01:00

The Jesus & Mary Chain, one of the greatest names for a group ever, and they knew it but this was not enough in the media obsessed eighties and so the band went out of their way to create the kind of headlines that Oasis would be proud of. The band came to surface at the tail end of 1984, I was to read of their exploits weeks after they took place thanks to the good old NME, as at the time I was living in Italy. It was with both a degree of surprise and pleasure that I consumed the stories of their twenty minute sets, their arrogant confrontation with their audience and the ensuing riots, now this sounded more like rock 'n' roll to me than some of synthetic music that the decade was to serve us. Unfortunately by the time the time I had moved back to London the rioting was over and the band were playing things by the rule book. It should come as no surprise that John Peel and John Walters wasted no time in inviting the Reid brothers in to lay down some session tracks, in total they graced those studios 6 times for the Peel show between 1984 and 1989. 'Just Like Honey' is taken from the February 1985 visit and included Bobby Gillespie bashing his drums in stand up fashion as if he was playing a session for the Crystals with Phil Spector in control, but the overall effect was much more menacing than a teen pop opera, the treble heavy guitar at times being the limit of acceptability and the vocals so far down in the mix that they are at times inaudible, but we loved it. By October the same year Gillespie had left to concentrate on Primal Scream, and the mood was, acoustic, but somehow they managed to retain a pleasing feel of menace as can be heard on 'Some Candy Talking' and what do you know we were all surprised to hear Jim's voice and above all how good it was. 'Sidewalking' comes from their penultimate session in May 1988 as does their rewarding cover of the Temptations 'My Girl'.
I finally caught up with the band in 1992 when they were touring 'Honey's Dead' at Le Rockstore, Montpellier. While I would not dispute that they were maybe past their prime in no way was their sell by date up. They were not the most visual of bands but this they more than made up for with both an impressive wall of sound and an equally amazing wall of lights. The menace was ever present and as for the volume it was probably the loudest gig I've ever attended, and I've seen Motorhead and next to the JAMC, Lemmy and the boys sound like a bunch of pussies, my ears were ringing for days afterwards! Thinking about it now I would say that the title of their 1988 B side and out takes compilation 'Barbed Wire Kisses' does a very good job of summing up the band, a bit like the sweet and sour of rock 'n' roll.

Good News And Bad News

2007-03-11T09:35:00.000+01:00

First up lets' get rid of the bad news which is that I am still having big problems with my Internet connection and neither Tiscali nor Telecom are competent enough to do anything else but cash my cheques. This has meant for the last week I have suffered the cyber indignity of being connected at speeds as low as 12kbit/s, is this a record? This is somewhat like pissing against the wind, necessary but not at all rewarding. Yesterday being Saturday, I was happy to pass the day with only one or two minor problems so who knows maybe I'm back to my normal speed of 44kbits/s ! On the subject of the Internet, my regular readers will know that I'm still battling away with a 56k dial up and as such am waiting with eager anticipation for the possibility of a high speed connection, I live in a town with a population in excess of 100 000, well I learnt this last week that this is very unlikely in the near future as Telecom are reluctant to invest for the benefit of other operators. Maybe I should move?
Good news, I noticed yesterday that fileXoom were at last back on line, this of course means that all of the files should now be available again, I guess they had problems as their three day estimation turned out to be more a case of eight days. Due to this problem I have been looking around and come up with a new service that we shall be trying out this week, myDataBus.
Another good point to my forced week of down time is that I have been able to spend more time listening to music for my own pleasure, this has led to the discovery and rediscovery of some new gems that I will be sharing with you over the weeks to come. The first of which is a live recording of the man they called the Godfather of Ska, Laurel Atken. Having been born in in Cuba, 1927 he was to move to Jamaica at the age of 15 and started performing in Calypso groups. 1957 saw his first record release and the following year he started recording for Chris Blackwell's newly formed Island Records, their first single together 'Little Sheila' was to be a massive hit in Jamaica and was also the first Jamaican record to be released in the UK. His records found a home in the UK, with it's large West Indian community a result of which was that Atken moved to England in 1960 and settled in Brixton. He signed to the legendary Blue Beat label for whom he was to record over 15 singles before returning to Jamaica three years later. From here on his output was often to feature the Skatalites as backing band and included his classic 'Skinhead Train'. The rise of reggae was to make Ska sound childlike and out of date and therefore redundant so along with other Ska artists the period until the Two Tone ska revival lead by the Specials was to be spent out of the limelight. This revival was to refire the boilers in the old beast and 1981 gave him his first UK chart hit 'Rudy Got Married'. Like many artists from his generation he was at home on a stage performing and as such was regularly to be seen playing live until his death in 2005 at the age of 87. Today's songs are taken from a concert somewhere in the South of France in the late 90's, just think when listening to these songs that the man was in his late seventies, early eighties when they were recorded! Bonus track from the same gig his cover of Prince Buster's 'Al Capone'.

Peel Sessions 43

2007-03-05T14:49:00.000+01:00

I've still got problems with FileXoom, my file hosting service, this is the 5th day they are down, they estimated 3 days! To add to this, since Saturday I'm having great problems in staying connected for more than five minutes and my connection speed has dropped to a ridiculous 14kbits/s, is this a record Tiscalli or am I being given special treatment? So to say I'm pissed of would be the polite way to express my feelings.
So no wonderful text today as I no longer have the energy to battle with my computer, Just a handful of songs from the early XTC Peel Sessions, I loved them when they were churning out quirky angular leftfield pop songs, and liked them a lot less when they started to tread the Syd road of whimsical English psychedelic pop, sorry I know a lot of people like the later period, just my personal opinion.

1. 'I'm Bugged' (21/09/77)
2. 'Crosswires' (20/06/77)
3. 'Meccanic Dancing' (13/11/78)
4. 'The Rhythm' (13/11/78)

I will not be back until I've got my internet connection sorted out or have found another less painful way to post, today it has taken me over two hours and I don't think my patience is going to last for much longer. HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Forced Downtime

2007-03-01T16:10:00.000+01:00

Sorry about this but I've just discovered that fileXoom have started to change their servers or something else that is promised to give us better service, am I the only one that can remember how Ezarchive went rapidly down hill after changing everything for what should have been better. They say it's going to take about three days, looks like they are moving the files one by one. This means that the music I had prepared for today and tomorrow has been put on hold until they are up and working again. At the worst I shall be back next Monday using my emergency uploading service for our regular Peel Sessions rendez-vous.

Yesterdays Forgotten Heros pt.1

2007-02-28T15:58:00.000+01:00

How long have you been at it? I'm talking about a right click on the mouse and saving as, probably better known as mp3 downloading. I've been happily clicking away for eight years, I started in the 1999. I can remember that at this period I was not listening to too much music as after my years of working in radio and promoting, lets just say that I had had to much of a good thing and my ears and brain were seriously suffering from musical overdose. Part of my job as at the radio was listening to the new releases as sent in by the record companies, and for the concert hall we received a very large number of demo tapes, and I did listen to each and every one of them even if for many of them it was a quick listen. Add to this my 15 hours of weekly airtime and not forgetting that I sometimes liked to take something out of it's sleeve just for the pleasure of listening to it, I really was at saturation point and could take no more! So after a year or two of let's say radio silence, I started to get pleasure from from my records again and as luck would have it this corresponded roughly with the beginning of the mp3 revolution. I can remember my first PC, bought the same year boasted a mighty 4 giga of hard drive, though this was enough to start off, remember that at this period 128kbps was optimum quality! Despite the pioneer nature of my activities I was never to follow that murky path of p2p file sharing as I do firmly believe that an artist deserves to be rewarded for his work, though the odd track here or there was ok after all it was publicity, wasn't it. Back then things were not as organised as they are today, if you had said music blog to someone the reply would undoubtedly have been "what!"

So too the real purpose of today's post, a little bit like that time old favorite question of the music magazines, what was the first record you bought, well I'm asking what was the first track that you downloaded? Me I can remember the first three records that bought, though I'm not too sure about the order, as being 'Razzamataz' by Nazareth, 'Band On the Run' by Wings and '24 Carat Purple' by Deep Purple, I guess this says a lot about me. Well in much the same way I can remember the excitement of those first downloads, sitting there watching the percentage slowly rise and the file to be complete before finally listening to the song, as often as not the music was not that good but what the hell, this was a great way of discovering new music and I would say that it opened many new musical avenues for me, particularly concerning small artists from exotic far away places such as America! In much the same way that those first first records still mean a lot to me, so do those very first mp3 downloads that I have still have floating around somewhere on one of my hard drives and stocked on various back up CDs. I will not pretend that it was earth shattering music and no none of these bands went on to conquer the world but it was fun. I think the very first song that I downloaded came from the newly created People Sound Com, and was probably on their front page a lively piece of groove pop as only the Brits can do called 'Knock Yourself Out' by Ink. Another early delight included Big Boss Sausage, great name, with 'Heaters', this band were well enough known in their native America to merit an entry in the AMG guide. At this period I used to download and ask questions latter, maybe not the best of practices as I was to latter discover, finding myself with too many files that were not tagged or not well tagged, this means when you get round to listen to them, you find the song great but have no idea at all who it was by. This is the case with today's last track a great country/rap take on the Lynyrd Skynyrd classic that I have called 'Sweet Home California', anyone know the bands name?
The quality of these files may not be the best, but who complains when listening to their grandfathers old 78s! How times change.

201/365

2007-02-27T15:32:00.000+01:00

Looks like Sound Of The Suburbs has made it to that all important first birthday. 201 posts and over 31,000 hits later I've still got the energy and enthusiasm to continue sharing my thoughts and various musical bits and pieces with those of you that care to stop by. It must be said that probably my biggest enemy is lack of time and of course the boring fact that where I live the only possibility I have is of a 56k dial up Internet connection and believe me up loading those files often takes one hell of a long time!
So who shares their birthday with Sound of The Suburbs? Elizabeth Taylor, I must say I've always fancied the thought of a pint with Richard Burton. Joanne Woodward who of course if not famous herself would be by association with her marriage to Paul Newman. Laurence Durrell, they forced me to read 'My Family And Other Animals' at school, and must admit it's not such a bad read. John Steinbeck, author of one of American literature's classics 'Of Mice And Men'. Nancy Spungen, RIP, punk groupie that helped fetch the Pistols down. Steve Harley, ex journalist and Bob Dylan fan that made some people smile with his Dylan impersonations and even managed to make a career out of it.
Every birthday needs music to help along the celebrations, and so I've chosen three topical songs. From 1980 and Altered Images (anyone remember the film of the same name?), the 12" remix version of 'Happy Birthday', for those of you too young to have been around at the time the 12" single was the latest marketing gimmick and for better or as the case often was worse everyone had their remixes. 'Birthday Blues' sums up how we feel depending on our age, I can remember hitting thirty was for me a big bummer that I took a long time coming to terms with, forty was OK though I must admit dreading the thought of fifty probably the symbolism. The song is taken from Wreckless Eric's great 1991 album 'The Donovan Of Trash', good news for fans of Wreckless and good music his classic third album from 1979 'Big Smash' is at long last about to be released on CD, complete with it's original bonus compilation and three live tracks recorded in Australia, get it here. Last track is from The Sugarcubes and is the demo version of 'Birthday' sung in their Native tongue. I must say that this song and the album from which it was taken took me by surprise in 1988 with it's charming and powerfully naive sounding pop gems , I was lucky enough to catch the band the following year in Toulouse, which was a great gig, and cemented my lasting admiration for pop's number one pixie Bjork. I read good reports about their recent concert in their home town, I just hope they have the good sense to leave it as a one off.
Year two starts tomorrow, maybe Sound Of The Suburbs will start walking!

Peel Sessions 42

2007-02-26T15:24:00.000+01:00

Well First up I must say it's nice to be back to blogging even if this does have it's down side such as being woken up at 6 a.m. this morning and back to the wonderful world of work! And so without beating about the bush let's get straight down to business, today's chosen session tracks come from the Australian band that are all the proof you will ever need that class A drugs, old blues 78's, your brother's Captain Beefheart records, winklepickers, black suits and a good old Aussie upbringing makes for a marriage in musical heaven. There can be no hiding the identity of the band as it is indeed Nick Cave's musical beast the Birthday Party, rumour has it they were actually named after the Harold Pinter play of the same name. Saint Nick as we call him here in down town Nimes has long been a household favorite, there's nothing like watching my other half going around her household chores while both of us are singing along with 'The Weeping Song', he was also a big favorite with our record spinning hero maybe due to the Beefheart influence? The Birthday Party recorded four sessions during their all to short life time, 'Release The Bats', which some have unfairly stated was responsible for kick starting Goth (not true), and '(Sometimes) Pleasure Heads Must Burn' are both taken from April 1981's second set and 'Bully Bones' from December the same year. Since their split in 1983, Nick backed by his ever faithful Bad Seeds have got about as near as possible to world domination while staying faithful to themselves, he is the artist that merits the tag of rock crooner. It is a regrettable fact that I have never actually seen the man live though I was close to doing so on several occasions, one of which was one of his passages in Marseille during the 90's. At the time I was still active as a promoter and was invited the gig by a fellow promoter who was later to tell me about the bands rider. I cannot vouch for this being true but it is a nice story anyway. The days of bands exaggerating in terms of the back stage desires were long over by this period and as such their riders tended to be reasonable, negotiable or forgettable. The promoter was surprised to see that a large amount of champagne was required, even here in in France this is an expensive drink, eventually the promoter bowed down to the bands request. After what was apparently a great gig the band invited the fans that had not disappeared backstage, and only then was the sound of champagne corks to be heard popping. This was if the road manager was to be believed the purpose behind the request. Great chap!
Now rapidly approaching 50 it is interesting to note that Nick Caves new side project Grinderman is a return to his garage roots after the years of refining his sound, their first single 'No Pussy Blues' was released last week though with such a title I doubt that it's getting much daytime airplay, the album is due next month.
Cave fans that do not already know Nick Cave Online should visit the site as their are numerous live MP3s of reasonable quality available for download that is if you are brave enough to sign up.

Holiday Time Again !

2007-02-15T15:34:00.000+01:00

It is true that I am rather privileged in terms of vacations, proof of which tomorrow straight from work I'll be loading the car up and we'll be off looking for snow at Supper Besse in the Massif Central. This does of course mean that there will be radio silence on the blog front until February 25 when I hope to be back with my batteries fully charged and my fingers aching to go. Until then I'll leave you with three cover versions of a long time favorite song of mine, 'The Boys are Back In Town' by Thin Lizzy. I would like to add that the links on your left come highly recommended so if you have the time do give them a try.
Version number 1 comes from the Cardigans who took the world by storm in the 90's with their sublime single 'Love Fool'. I have always had a soft spot for them and love their lounge music takes on old Black Sabbath songs, 'Iron Man' is to be both heard and seen to be believed. Their version of this Phil Lynot song is in much the same vein and can be found on the 1988 B side and rarities compilation 'The Other Side Of The Moon'. Cover number two is also a laid back take on the track from American cult band the Mountain Goats and was recorded for Dutch radio station VPRO. Number three dates from 1999 when it was released a single for the Happy Mondays come back Tour only for them to disappear again before getting back together yet another time last year, there is a new album recorded and ready waiting for the right label.
See you soon!

Made In France

2007-02-14T16:03:00.000+01:00

I arrived in France at the tail end of the decade that started so well with punk's productive fall out only to finish with that awful sound of syndrums and other technology that should be banned by the UN. Of course I'm talking about the eighties. My chosen town for the next two years was Toulouse, it was there that I made my first tentative steps in the language of Moliere, it was also there that I started to accustom myself to that strange beast, French rock. I soon stumbled upon an independent local rock station, Radio FMR, that celebrated it's first 25 years last November. The station was and indeed still is a loose collective with the kind of programming that would put your local indie store to shame. At this period the station was based in an old factory and put the space to good use with a bar on the ground floor where I spent some pleasant evenings, but it was the first floor that was of real interest as they had turned it into a small concert hall where I was lucky enough to catch Mega City Four and the New Christs amongst others. It was also there that I was to discover one of the periods best French bands, Les Thugs.

Some what interestingly there is no date on the ticket but I think the event took place in 1989, It was a mini festival featuring four bands from one of France's leading independent labels, Gougnaf, I think the four bands were new to me at the time, but a great time was had by both me and my girlfriend a the gathered masses. Les Rats were a rather straight forward punk band as were Les Sherrifs, as for Parabellum they were more in the NY Dolls / Johnny Thunders mould. The band that literally blew me away was the least visual of the four but did they make some beautiful punk inspired pop / rock. I would break their career into two periods, the eighties when their efforts were on the home and European markets, and the Nineties when world domination was their target thanks to their association with Sub Pop and Alternative Tentacles.
I've chosen four songs from that early period to illustrate why they were so good, I will follow this up sooner or later with another post concerning the nineties. 'Bulgarian Blues' where the vocals were pushed more up front over an incendiary guitar riff, just in case you didn't realise that these boys from Anger were angry and had strong political thoughts that were not to be ignored. is taken from their 1987 mini album 'Electric Troubles' and was the first time they recorded outside France. The song is a fine example of their pounding rhythm, tightly controlled mesmerising guitars, laid back vocals by this I mean down in the mix and their trade mark of church like backing vocals provided by drummer Christophe, who wasted no time with words as his 'aahs' were more than sufficient to fill out the sound. The following year saw the release of the single 'Dirty White Race''I Need You' pays tribute in both subject matter and musical style to the Buzzcocks who were a big influence on the band. 1989's 'Still Hungry / Still Angry' was recorded in London with Ian Burgess producing, and was described in Sounds as being "genuinely unique". It has been difficult for me to chose a track from this album, so I employed the pull one out of the sack method and came up with 'Your Kind Of Freedom', the albums opening cut.
'Electric Troubles', 'Dirty White Race' and 'Sill Hungry / Still Angry' have been compiled together on CD going under the name of 'Still Hangry', a little bit of French word play in the title, and for once I'm pleased to be able to say that such an essential record is still readily available.

Another Third Of The Crucial Three

2007-02-13T15:08:00.000+01:00

Following on nicely from yesterday's post with long time favorite of mine Julian Cope who latest recording venture is a three piece going under the name of Brain Donor. A wonderful name for a band that makes me think of the classic Mel Brook's film Young Frankenstein, if you don't know why, well shame on you! The band have been around since the beginning of the century playing some fine garage rock. The end of last year saw the release of their fourth album 'Drain'd Boner', it's five tracks clocking in around the forty minute mark has brought the memories of vinyl albums rushing back. In the band's own words the album is "munting sub-humanoid No Wave from the bowels of the Goddess Hell", and no, I don't quite understand what Cope means, he has after all long had the reputation of being a little bit eccentric, but the music is fine by my ears. The song that won't leave my head at the moment is 'Where Do We Take U' which is a very catchy song reminiscent of early Public Image with it's mocking vocal tones. It really wouldn't be fair to put up two songs as this would be almost half of the record, and it is new, and don't forget the point is a little taster and if you like it enough well two or three clicks here and a week or so later you'll find it waiting for you in your letter box.
Bonus track comes from Julian's aptly named 1987 album 'Saint Julian' which was a welcome return to amphetamine fueled garage pop all played at a break neck pace and with great hooks thrown in for good measure. 'Spacehopper' despite the throw away nature of the song was always great to listen to and real live stormer, now the memories of Toulouse 11th November 1988 are flooding back. It was only recently that I discovered that the track actually dates from the days of the Crucial Three and if rumour is to be believed Ian McCulloch co-penned the song, as he did with 'Robert Mitchum' that was to feature on Cope's 1990 release 'Skellington'.

Peel Sessions 41

2007-02-12T15:44:00.000+01:00

Pete Wylie has what is both a good and honest title for his web page : part time rock star, full time legend!

The legendary part dates from the late '70's when along with Julian Cope and Ian McCullough they were collectively known as the Crucial Three, another true garage band that never quite made it passed rehearsal stage. Pop star, yes back in the '80's under one of his many Wha pseudonyms he was a regular in the single charts scoring his biggest hit in 1982 with "Story Of The Blues" that peaked at a respectable number 3.
Their seemed to be a complicity between Peel and Wylie, that was probably based on their mutual love of music and Liverpool F.C., both were natives of the city, and not their personalities that were radically different Peel being more quiet and retiring while Wylie reputation as a motormouth probably did his career more harm than good in the long run. Wylie's site contains the following tribute to Peel that I found quite touching:

"john peel changed my life.
the music he played thrilled and inspired me/us
then his faith gave us the confidence to do what we did.
he supported 'the story of the blues' for 2 months when everyone else had given up on it,and that's what made it a hit.
and his friendship matters more than all that.
he named us the mighty wah!
i was the first person to co-host his show.
he said he never called an LP an album after i said it was wrong.
last time i saw him,he dj'ed in liverpool summer 2004,wearing a mighty wah! tshirt.he went on at seven minutes to midnight...
anyone else you'd think 'coincidence'.but not with peelie.
one of the motivating forces behind my next lp's,'pete sounds'and it's evil twin 'slime',was to make something peel would be proud of.
it's a shame he's not around to find out.
and the 1982 wah! peel session has just been voted among the 125 best sessions ever!
i loved him,i love him,i owe him.
and i don't think i ever let him know..."

The punctuation or lack of it is his, not mine. He got to record 6 sessions between 1980 and 2000, today's four songs were first broadcast 17th September 1984.

1. 'Basement Blues : The Story Of the Blues'
2. 'Better Scream'
3. 'Weekends'
4. 'Yuh Learn'

Still sounds fresh to me after all of those years and still gets my feet tapping away, those looking for a handy introduction could do worse than checking out 2000's career spanning compilation 'The Handy Wha! Whole', to be pronounced quickly to get the full effect of the word play!

This Bug / Rock On

2007-02-10T09:36:00.000+01:00

Silverfish were a Scottish band from the late '80s and early '90s that eventually found themselves signed to one of the hippest labels at the time, Creation that also had it's roots in the highlands. The bands focal point was singer Lesley Rankine who with her aggressive vocals and radical feminist views made the perfect partner for the bands metal influenced proto industrial noise. They managed four albums and numerous singles before their rising star was to fall to the ground with their split, Rankine went on to form the trip hop influenced Ruby but as they say that's another story.
The 'This Bug' single is fine example of what they did best, slightly chaotic noisy pop with raunchy female vocals. The single's B side might come as a surprise as it is a very good cover of one of David Essex's better songs 'Rock On' where the title's tribal feeling is pushed to the limit with some great overloaded guitar counter balanced by Bridge Over The River Kwai style whistling.

Peel Sessions 40

2007-02-05T15:18:00.000+01:00

When many of you here the words Peel Session, I'm sure what springs into your head is images of that exceptionally fertile period that was the fall out of punk. There are maybe even some of you that think that Peel played his first platter in the wake of the revolution in '76! This is of course false as he had already achieved much more by this stage than many lesser jocks do in a whole life time. By far the great majority of Peel Sessions commercially available date from 1977 onwards and by far the biggest slice of discussion on the subject also concerns this period. It was therefore a pleasant surprise to come across a previously unknown to me Strange Fruit compilation while searching the second hand sites from 1991 with the revealing title 'Before The Fall', no surprise to discover that the 20 tracks, recorded between 1967 and 1977 are from Dinosaurs that were to reach the heights of stardom and offbeat 70' freaks that were obviously never going to hit the big time. Today I've chosen songs from 3 artists who were to go on to taste wealth and fame, another post will be dedicated to those artists of a more leftfield bent.
The early seventies were the boom period for the sensitive singer song writer both in sunny California and in drizzly Britain. A UK artist that was to go on to become a spokesman for opticians and glasses manufacturers around the world, Elton John, was in 1970 just warming up for greater things. In August that year he laid down tracks for what should have been a Peel Session, though purists might disagree as Peelie was absent at the time and replaced by whispering Bob Harris. 'Ballad Of A Well Known Gun' is taken from that second session the first having been aired two years previous and his last was from 1973.
It is hard to believe now but back then a young band such as Queen could easily be programmed in between the likes of Captain Beefheart and T. Rex. And such they also were invited into the studios on three occasions, February and December 1973 and October 1977. 'Doin' Alright' is from their second performance. I must admit that it seems strange to think that Peelie would being playing Queen along side the Pistols, X Ray Sex and choice reggae cuts in '77, this is just the proof that things were not as clear cut as maybe many of you think they were.
Nine sessions is not the record, though I think it must definitely define them as a Peel band, and no surprise really when listening to Phil Lynott's laddish romantic rockers such as 'Dancing In The Moonlight' from 1977 a fine example of the many hits that he was to churn out with such ease with his group Thin Lizzy, a band were one of the first in the UK to deliver street poetry.

Moonflowers.

2007-02-03T11:17:00.000+01:00

They look a happy enough bunch don't they? The Moonflowers were a collective with their roots in England's west country that were active between 1987 and 1997. I guess that they could be loosely termed as being part of the crusty movement, as they certainly displayed hippy influenced ideals, and would appear to have led a somewhat nomadic existence.
They came to my attention in 1992 when I received their 12" single 'Tighten Up On The House Work Brothers And Sisters" that was described on the cover as being a funky south west sound. The three tracks were played almost to death by me over this period and for very good reason, I like the organic, free, loose feel to their music. What also stood out was that here was one of the rare UK bands that were capable of locking into a funk groove, that would not be out of place on a US stage. Their musical influences are very much worn on their sleeves and would include Sly And The Family Stone and the extended George Clinton family. The three tracks were 'Tighten Up' a cover of an Archie Bell & The Drells song, 'Housework' that was used for a TV programe about guess what? The last track was the anthemic 'Brothers And Sisters', that reminds me in places in of the Neville Brothers, a live version can be found on their web site along with other free songs to download and If you like what you hear, all of their material is also available there at reasonable prices.

Daytrotter

2007-01-31T16:16:00.000+01:00

Those of you that don't already know of Daytrotter have either been hiding or shouldn't be reading this blog! Their site has become since it's conception in March 2006 an incomparable weekly rendez-vous for those music lovers that would have constituted the late John Peels audience. They feature two sessions a week, Monday and Thursday, from touring bands that are just passing through. They own or have access to Futureappletree Studio One in Rock Island, Illinois. The results are remarkably addictive as the four songs laid down live in their few allotted hours contain a lot of warmth, this is maybe due to the fact that they have been laid down on good old fashioned 1/4 inch analog tape before being transferred to a digital medium, this has almost got me feeling nostalgic for tape hiss! In their own words their manifesto is to "give you exclusive, re-worked, alternate versions of old songs and unreleased tracks by some of your favorite bands and by a lot of your next favorite bands." In my opinion they have more than succeeded in their 49 sessions to date, true you wont find Oasis or Neil Young here, not yet anyway. The bigger names that have laid down some stunning sessions include Bonny Prince Billy, Shearwater and Two Gallants. I have discovered numerous artists thanks to them these include Thao Nguyen who will go down a storm with fans of Cat Power, Erin McKeown that contains webmaster Marks favorite track, a cover of Fats Waller's 'Honey Suckle Rose' and last Monday's session by The Elected that exposed me to their well crafted songs that are a little bit on the laid back side but we all have to relax sometime, don't we? I guess relax is the key Daytrotter word as what is consistent through these sessions is an easy going vibe that can only be found when musicians are winding down and doing what they do best : making music with people that understand and appreciate them.
What actually puts the Daytrotters way ahead of the competition apart from the obvious, their good taste and original material, is the almost total lack of photographs on the site. Each of the sessions is illustrated with original drawings from one of their team of eight illustrators / artists.
Another recent discovery of mine thanks to them was current favorite of the music press David Vandervelde, he comes over a bit like a contemporary Mid West Marc Bolan, checkout 'Nothin' No' from his just released debut album 'The Moonstation House Band' brought to you by that terribly cool label Secretly Canadian. I must admit what brought may attention to him was the cover version of 'Cocksucker Blues' that he had laid down. Like many of you I was aware of the legend of this notorious contract breaking song by Mick and the boys, though never having actually heard it I was, I must say at times dubious of it's existence, well you can now own this fine version with the lyrics well up in your face over a suitably sleazy rock 'n' blues backdrop. Daytrotter have stated that the song will be taken down when they reach 1500 downloads, they have currently clocked up 948, you have been warned, get clicking!
I guess I'd sum up Daytrotter as being an essential excursion through the backwaters of a vibrant American alternative music scene, to be missed at your peril.

Africa

2007-01-30T15:47:00.000+01:00

No It's not a homage to the Toto song , but a handful of random songs that have been keeping my grey cells busy for the last few days, with nothing more in common than they are connected to that enormous continent that was the cradle of humanity.

1. Robert Plant's favorite band of African Nomads Tinariwen provide us with 'Cler Achel', I have no idea at all of what they are on about but it sounds fine to me. The track is taken from their latest album 'Aman Iman : Water Is Life' that is currently gathering the plaudits and stars that it deserves in the music press, may be Damon Albarn has something to do with this?

2. Rachid Taha has long been a star in, France, his country of adoption, and for certain politicians here he has the same quality as a thorn in the side, not such a bad thing? A few years back he recorded a cover version of 'Rock The Casbah' by the Clash that he renamed 'Rock El Casbah' which was really just like taking the song back home. Rachid also has a new album 'Divan 2' where he joins forces with his old sparing partner Steve Hillage to revisit songs of his youth in Algeria.

3. I love female singers in oriental music and a such Natasha Atlas has been a long term favorite of mine here is her voodoo meets Casablanca take on the old standard 'I Put A Spell On You'.

4. Last up is vinyl rip from a song from the Sisters Of Mercy, now I'm no big fan of Goth, though this version of 'Temple Of Love' is for me a big success in the way that it manages to mix the stiff goth original with the sensual charms of Ms Haza to such great effect.

Those of you that have enjoyed today's music and find yourself with too much money could do worse than visiting the Red Cross site and if you agree with the essential work that they carry out, make a donation!

Peel Sessions 39

2007-01-29T15:21:00.000+01:00

Therapy have proven to be a difficult band to pin down, their infuences include the classic metal bands such as Black Sabbath as well as more hip names such as Husker Du, this dual personality was mirrored in the early 90's press as they were well received by both the more fashionable side as well as the traditional hard rock inkies. The band also displayed a good sense of melody and were capable of turning their hands to composing catchy pop gems that left many a band jealous. Their self released debut single was picked up by John Peel who wasted little time in inviting them down to Maida Vale for the first of two sessions in August 1991, a three song set that contained 'Innocent Abstraction', 'Prison Breaker' and 'Perv ersonality', their second and final Peel session would be recorded in November the following year. Therapy's following two releases the EPs 'Baby Teeth' and 'Pleasure Death' were on the indie label Wijja, the second of which was to include the 'Potato Junkie' with it's classic chorus concerning James Joyce and someone's sister, for many of us this is a classic Irish sing a long song! Such was the buzz around the band that the majors wasted little time and their following releases were on the A&M imprint, and included the hit 'Screamager'. The band are still around and would appear to have deservedly kept a firm fan base, a recently released live album is available through their web site.

I had the good luck to catch up with Therapy in Montpellier back in their 90's hey day and can assure you that they were a damn good live band giving real meaning to the term power trio! They returned to Montpellier April 15, 2005 and unfortunately I missed out on this though those that were present are always telling me that I missed out on one of the gigs of the year. I have three songs for you from that gig 'Potato Junkie', U2 fans are not to take the song's introduction too seriously, a wonderful cover of 'Isolation/She's Lost Control', from the cover stars of the February edition of Mojo and a hot 'n' sweaty 'Screamager'. The photo comes from a Dutch gig on the same tour so I guess energy levels were high on all dates! The band seemed to have a good time as drummer Neil Cooper has the following to say on their web site about the gig "Montpellier seemed like a really nice place. Gig was really cool - thanks to the fella for getting in the tequila shots. The venue - Le Rockstore - was great. We danced the night away at the rock club after the show and got ever so slightly inebriated." Hard life isn't it?

Who Are The Beautiful?

2007-01-26T14:47:00.000+01:00

Shoegazing is a form of music that I will readily confess to being fond of, the scene corresponded with a period where I was heavily involved in music and a such could consider my self to have been a player. Now I'm not going to pretend that I listen to this style of music everyday, regular readers will be aware that my musical tastes mirror my advancing years, though from time to time it gives me a lot of pleasure to dig out an old Boo Radley's track or give Catherine Wheel another spin. And so it was that a couple of weeks back that I dug out an old Chapterhouse 12", and was rapidly dragged in by it's charms. Now I would not consider myself as a big fan of the band, though I can remember at the time 'We Are The Beautiful' received some healthy airplay during my radio shows and for good reason just listen to it's big John Bonham style drum sound, It's addictive chorus with a touch of the orient in it's backing vocals, I'd say it deserved to have been a big hit! Now if this wasn't enough my 12" version contains two remixes 'Spooky's Ugly As Sin Mix' which to my ears is just that as it a rather tedious techno take on the song but 'We Are The Beautiful (Spooky's Extravaganja Dub Mix' is as we used to say in my youth, the business! For me this version rates along with the mighty Lazarus, a song so majestic that many others just fade in comparison, as one those songs to be listened to loud, a remix almost made to test your speakers. It's big warm dub base line and shimmering vocals really do sound like as if heaven is calling you in. A track to be consumed only by consenting adults, and be careful with your woofers!

SORRY

2007-01-25T21:06:00.000+01:00

Time to be a bit humble and apologise for yesterday's cock up with the music files, my thanks to anonymous, it's always him or her isn't it ? Anyway as they so poetically stated 'links all fucked up'. Well I've spent the best part of the afternoon trying to sort this one out, only to discover it was a problem of forbidden characters, apparently '&' buggers up the system. So I've replaced the '&' with 'and' before re uploading the files and what do you know the links are up and working. Sorry again and I'll be back tomorrow with some new music.

Bow Bell Blues

2007-01-24T17:33:00.000+01:00

We all from time to time re evaluate the prejudices, big or small, that we carry around with us as cumbersome baggage, an example of a smaller prejudice that I had being carrying around for years was Chas & Dave, who at the end of the day I gave a second hearing to and what do you know, they're actually quite good, after all they did go down a storm at Glastonbury in 2005.

Part of the reason why I disliked them so much was that as a teenager I had the good luck of getting the Saturday job at my local record shop that was in Barkingside High Street, at the time it went under the name of Roylance and was owned by a charmingly eccentric old man called Reggie Roylance, as he was well passed official retirement age he finally sold up. His shop was picked up by a mini-chain going by the name of the Record Center. The new owner Ron Self, seemed to model himself on George Cole's Minder character though in reality he often made me think more of old man Steptoe! Ron, in general left us alone to run the shop as we saw fit, and did we have a ball! He liked to turn up Saturday afternoon to watch the money rolling in. If it was a good Saturday around closing time he would invite us to join him for a whisky coke, this would as often as not be soundtracked by one of his favorite records, I guess it goes without saying that on of these was Chas & Dave, God how much we suffered for our whisky coke back in the seventies! I guess the other reasons for my disliking of them is that a) they were so stereotyped East End, and that it was to close to home for comfort and b) lets be honest back when I was a lad they were about as cool as the sun and us Punk / Indie kids thought we were the dogs diner.

My re - appraisal of the band has started with listening to 'Rockney', 1977, and 'Don't Give A Monkeys', 1979. While both albums have their merits the second does get a little bit carried away with it's knees up attitude though it does contain the hits 'Gertcha' and 'Rabbit' that was used in a beer commercial. It is 'Rockney' that has held my attention and given me the most pleasure as it contains songwriting, that dare I say It, is in the same caliber as the Kinks and Squeeze to name just two. Their matter of fact was of story telling about life, their life, in London, which when you think about it is a lot more honest that singing about route 66 or Kansas City! 'Strummin' is a tale about how they started playing music that is reminiscent of 'Razzle In My Pocket' by Ian Dury another Cockney poet. Personal favorite is 'Edmonton Green', close your eyes while listening to it and see if you agree that it comes over as Blueberry Hill by way of Primrose Hill after a detour down New Orleans all served up with a healthy portion of jellied eels.

Do yourself a favour and give them a try, you might actually like them! In case you are worried about credibility, bare in mind that the duo are seasoned session musicians, and as such played guitar and bass on 'I Got The' by Labi Siffre which was in turn sampled by Eminem on 'My Name Is'.

Sid Presley Experience

2007-01-23T10:50:00.000+01:00

No it's not a joke though the cocktail of the first name, that of a sad punk rock icon with that of the surname of the king of rock 'n' roll who also met with a sad demise could well be conceived as character that would be worthy of the pen of Ben Elton, or some other 'alternative' comedy writer from the eighties. They were a short lived London guitar based four piece that had been formed by Peter and Chris Coyne in 1984. A quick look at their press photos reveals an image of UK gangster chic long before the likes of Guy Richie was to be serving up the same in his films. The look was very much that of the East End around the period of the Kray twins, this underworld association was to be kept up as the brothers next band, that was to be more successful was the Godfathers.

During their short life span the Sid Presley Experience gathered enthusiastic articles from the press where they were promised a great future. They managed to release two singles in 1984 the first of which 'Public enemy Number 1' (gangster references again!) was produced by Dave Goodman, ex Sex Pistol soundman, and producer of the legendary bootleg 'Spunk Rock'. Their second single boasted a cover version of 'Cold Turkey', a John Lennon song, which considering the the bands punk roots seemed a strange choice. Investigation reveals that this was recorded in protest about heroin dealing and addiction on London housing estates, during the early eighties more and more dealers were taking advantage of the forgotten population that was being left behind on these backwaters of society. the second song was 'F For Fake' that shouted out loud and clear their admiration for the Sex Pistols and this was very much to good effect. Final track 'Firewater' is a hi-octane surf/rock 'n' roll instrumental that would burn a hole in any stage. They never got round to releasing an album and by the following year, 1985 they were no more and the Coyne brothers were already planning greater things with the Godfathers.
In conclusion great name, great image and the music wasn't bad either, needless to say their releases have been second hand shop affairs for a long time, this really is the sort of music that should be licensed for digital commerce.

Peel Sessions 38

2007-01-22T09:49:00.000+01:00

I probably first heard his voice and word play on Peel, that all important first EP on Rabid records, without doubt I had already read about him in the NME, I was lucky enough to have seen him perform on numerous occasions, the first of which being an opening slot at London's famed Marquee Club. I am talking about noneother than the Salford word slayer, John Cooper Clarke for whom I have been a big fan since '77. It was therefore very much to my surprise and pleasure to see an interview with the man known as the punk poet in the February issue of Mojo. The article was apparently instigated at the request of Artic Monkeys singer, Alex Turner, who we are to learn, studied JCC's works at school, is this proof of how education has changed since my day or was the young Turner just lucky? True the interview is not the most soul searching piece that I have read though I must admit that regardless it is nice to see JCC having some of the attention that he merits. There is very little that we don't already know that is revealed, though I did learn that Phil Harris was a big influence, he was the man who provided the voice of Baloo in the Jungle Book (the first film I saw at a cinema). Also of interest is that he was not to fond of the musical backing for his three CBS albums as produced by new wave legend, Martin Hannett, claiming that they were not punky enough. The good news is that a new album is planned next year (2007/2008?), that will be the follow up to 1982's 'Zip Style Method' that is itself being re-released in expanded version today! There is also an autobiography 'Slim Volume' that has recently been completed and awaits publishing.

As already mentioned JCC's first vinyl outing was picked up my Peel and this resulted in two sessions one in November 1978 from which the following two songs/poems are taken and a second session in May 1983 which I believe provides the bonus tracks on the CD reissue of 'Zip Style Method', another good reason to buy it.

Readers' Wives
make a date with the brassy brides of britain
the altogether ruder readers' wives
who put down their needles and their knitting
at the doorway to our dismal daily lives

the fablon top scenarios of passion
nipples peep through holes in leatherette
they seem to be saying in their fashion'
I'm freezing charlie - haven't ya finished yet?'

cold flesh the colour of potatoe
sin an instamatic living room of sin
all the required apparatus
too bad they couldn't fit her head in

in latex pyjamas with bananas going ape
their identities are cunningly disguised
by a six-inch strip of insulation tape
strategically stuck across their eyes

wives from inverness to inner london
prettiness and pimples co-exist
pictorially wife-swapping with someone
who's happily married to his wrist

HEALTH FANATIC
AROUND THE BLOCK - AGAINST THE CLOCK
TICK TOCK, TICK TOCK, TICK TOCK
RUNNING OUT OF BREATH - RUNNING OUT OF SOCKS
RUBBER ON THE ROAD... FLIPPETY FLOP
NON-SKID AGILITY... CHOP CHOP
NO TIME TO HANG ABOUT
WORK OUT HEALTH FANATIC... WORK OUT!

THE CRACK OF DAWN HE'S LIFTING WEIGHTS
HIS TELL-TALE HEART REVERBERATES
HE'S HIGH IN POLYUNSATURATES...
LOW IN POLYSATURATES...
THE DUKE OF EDINBURGH'S AWARD AWAITS
IT'S A MAN'S LIFE
HE'S A HEALTH FANATIC... SO WAS HIS WIFE

A ONE-MAN WAR AGAINST DECAY
ENJOYS HIMSELF THE HARD WAY
ALLOWS HIMSELF A MARS A DAY
HOW OLD AM I - WHAT DO I WEIGH
PUNCH ME THERE... DOES IT HURT... NO WAY
RUNNING ON THE SPOT DON'T GET TOO HOT
HE'S A HEALTH FANATIC, THAT'S WHY NOT

RUNNING THROUGH THE TRAFFIC JAM - TAKING IN THE LEAD
HYPERACTIVITY KEEPS HIM OUT OF BED
DEEP DOWN HE'D LIKE TO KICK IT IN THE HEAD
THEY'LL REGRET IT WHEN THEY'RE DEAD
THERE'S MORE TO LIFE THAN FUN
HE'S A HEALTH FANATIC - HE'S GOT TO RUN

BEANS GREENS AND TANGERINES
AND LOW CHOLESTROL MARGARINES
HIS LIMBS ARE LOOSE, HIS TEETH ARE CLEAN
HE'S A HIGH-OCTANE FRESH-AIR FIEND
YOU'VE GOT TO ADMIT HE'S KEEN
WHAT CAN YOU DO BUT BE IMPRESSED
HE'S A HEALTH FANATIC... GIVE IT A REST

SHADOW BOXING - PUNCH THE WALL
ONE-A-SIDE FOOTBALL... WHAT'S THE SCORE... ONE-ALL
COULD HAVE BEEN A COPPER... TOO SMALL
COULD HAVE BEEN A JOCKEY... TOO TALL
KNEES UP, KNEES UP... HEAD THE BALL
NERVOUS ENERGY MAKES HIM TICK
HE'S A HEALTH FANATIC... HE MAKES YOU SICK

I'm not quite sure whether he ever played live with a band or not as every time that I saw him his was on his own, just like a real poet and in many ways that was how I preferred him, in his own word crowd pleasing. 'You Never See A Nipple In The Daily Express' is taken from the 'Ou Est La Maison de Fromage' album and is all the proof you need concerning his stage presence.

I'll leave the last words to poet himself who said about his works, "it's reality but it's cranked up a couple of gears. Real reality's quite dull. It's not really that interesting, is it?"

The Bottle

2007-01-18T15:12:00.000+01:00

No! In case you are wondering I have not hit the bottle, though if things keep on going this way maybe it won't be long. It's turned into another one of those weeks, that despite my good intentions I find myself having trouble finding the time to do everything that I either have to or planned to. I am still waiting for the Beatles wish of an eighth day a week to become reality!

And so to 'The Bottle' which is indeed a song and not the one that has probably already sprung to mind by Gil Scott Heron, but another song altogether signed by The Tyrrel Corporation. A band from the early eighties for whom I remain blissfully ignorant excepting the fact that this single of their's did a good job of getting my feet moving back then. A song that will go down well with fans of the Hi-Energy brand of pop house that was served up by Bronski Beat, with just a little nod in the direction of rock. A vinyl rip, so the background noise is normal!

Peel Sessions 37

2007-01-15T15:23:00.000+01:00

First up well done to Sonofajoiner who was the only person to answer, and correctly. The common point between the four images was indeed the comic artist Jamie Hewlett, the first image was Tank Girl a co creation between Jamie and Alan Martin from the 1980's, great comics, lousy film! Number two was the Senseless Things, a band for whom Jamie was to design album covers and other artwork. Number three is of course Pulp, Jamie was commissioned by their record company to draw a promotional strip based on the bands 'Common People' single. The comic can be downloaded, but be warned I scanned the images in high quality so the files are large, maybe only for hardcore fans! Cover, Page 1, Page 2, Page 3, Page 4, Page 5 and Page 6. And the last image was indeed Gorillaz the band that Jamie formed with his flatmate Damon Albarn.
Pulp were no way near being the band that recorded the most sessions for Peel, four studio sessions and four live recordings spanning the period 1981 to 2001, interestingly enough seven of these were from 1993 onwards. Their record company has done a very good job of compiling the four studio sessions along with highlights from the live recordings that is still available at an attractive price with the added bonus of some great sleeve notes from Jarvis's pen.
I consider myself to have been rather fortunate so far in my life for many different reasons one of which was the years I spent promoting concerts, I was lucky enough to organise three gigs by Pulp. The first of which took place just before the summer kicked in, May 26, 1994 at the Rockstore, Montpellier. This was when they were touring the 'His 'n' Hers' album, my memories of the band were of a group that couldn't believe their luck, off stage they were shy and retiring though once the houselights went down Jarvis went to great lengths to persuade us that this was where he belonged. The following year they were back in the south of France and I organised a date in both Montpellier and Marseille 24th and 25th November. By now the band were real stars, and the transformation was almost fairy story like, the tour bus was bigger, no longer the 2 star hotels of the previous year but now 4 stars were required. An image that has lodged itself in my head is of seeing Jarvis sitting in the salon of the hotel sipping tea as if it was the most normal thing in the world with all the bustle going on around him. The difference on stage was also to be seen to be believed, everything was 100 times more professional, I can remember the moment that I realised the difference was when Jarvis started strumming the introduction to 'Sorted for E's And Wizz', he was so full of confidence and the audience were totally behind him. Two great gigs! Those of you that never had the chance to see them at their height could do worse than buying 'Ultimate Live' a DVD containing two London concerts one indoors and the other outdoors, you won't be disappointed.
And so for today's music 'Common People' recorded September 1994, the vocals are a lot less upfront and I find this version has much more of a reggae feel. 'Sorted For E's & Wizz' was recorded at London's Kings College as part of the celebration of Peels 40 years in broadcasting.

Question

2007-01-13T09:05:00.000+01:00

What is it common point between the following

The answer will be provided Monday!

The second image in case you are wondering is of the Senseless Things, a UK powerpop/punk band who had their five minutes of fame and the odd NME cover and even recorded two Peel sessions during the early 90's. Their albums have all been long since deleted by Sony/Epic who would seem to prefer spending their resources on other things such as game consoles, sorry but this is not my generation! So in case you missed out on them try the Buzzcocks influenced pop of 'Everybody's Gone' from their 1991 LP 'The First Of Two Many' that situated them as contemporaries of Mega City Four often sharing the same bill. 'Homophobic Arsehole' from 1993's 'Empire Of The Senseless' took a heavier direction while keeping their pop sensibilities in tact, maybe because of the more serious nature of the subject matter radio airplay was to be rare and the song failed to chart.

Odds & Ends

2007-01-12T15:51:00.000+01:00

There is a lot of talk about global warming at the moment and if this leads to a radical change of attitude, hi there G.W. Bush, then this can't be such a bad thing but I must say I do have my doubts. I think I have already mentioned there was not much snow in the mountains at Christmas, and my sister who lives in Nova Scotia who usually spends a good few months a year snow bound, has yet to see the white stuff this winter. I've just had a look around the garden, and really considering the temperature it's no big surprise that certain flowers already have buds months ahead of schedule. I think it is maybe for this reason that I've had 'Baby's Got Sauce' by G. Love & The Special Sauce running around my head for the last couple of days as it is a nice laid back funky blues number, maybe sharing it with you will remove it from my memory cells for the moment. The band have been around for a good few years now and this song is taken from their self titled debut album released in 1994, this was right in the middle of my spell as radio jock in Montpellier and I seem to remember their French label, Epic, giving them the big push and trying to sell them as a rap/blues crossover. Still not a bad a album. Those of you that like this could do worse than visit their Archive Org page where there is a good choice of live shows spanning recent years for you to download.

Backtracking to yesterdays post I get the feeling that I have short changed Tym on Dogg, and I'm sure that many of you are not quite sure who he is. Probably most famous due to his friendship with Joe Strummer that dates from the the early 70's in squatting and busking London, rumour has it that it was Tymon that was resonsible for Captain Joe's stabbing style of guitar playing which led to his adoption of the name Strummer. By the time the two met Tymon had already had several brushes with the industry, he had almost been signed by the Beatles Apple label though this never quite came about, in part due to the fab four splitting and putting their label on ice. This experience was followed by him being picked up by the Moody Blues newly formed label, though the promised album was never to materialise, maybe older readers can remember seeing him support the Moody Blues? His first album 'Outlaw Number One' dates from 1976 and owes its existence to a heavy handed arrest while busking in the London underground, the resulting £300 compensation paid for the recording and pressing of the only 500 copies of the album to exist, so if you own this it's a real rarity. A second album 'Battle Of Wills' was released through Rough Trade in 1982. This period was when he first came to my attention with his contribution to the Clash triple album 'Sandinista', the violin led country influenced 'Loose This Skin' was the song that made you wake up before the album went really silly with children singing 'Career Opportunities'! It was to be four years before another album bore his name 1986's 'New Age Songs' had been recorded with his wife Helen Cherry. His fourth and latest album, 'Relentless', saw day as recently as 1989, a compact 14 song set in under 35 minutes, this is probably the album where his folk instincts are pushed to the front along with his enthusiastic style of violin playing and very distinctive voice as can be witnessed on 'Sides'. He has also played on 'Combat Rock' by the Clash and 'Short Back And Sides' by Ian Hunter amongst others.
His recent years were spent as one of the main Mescaleros who along side Joe Strummer co wrote a good number of the bands songs. His most recent activity has been with his new project the Quikening and can be seen playing the occasional gig (London/Hastings), there is an EP, 'Guantanamo', due for release in of 2007 that can be pre-ordered here.
I think it goes without saying that his four albums are all hard to find, it is therefore to their credit that the webmasters behind his site are providing a real public service and have the four albums available here as high quality 320kbps downloads along with two live performances of 'Loose This Skin' recorded with the Mescaleros in 2002. Definitely to be consumed without moderation!

Whatever Happened To ............?

2007-01-11T14:27:00.000+01:00

Possibly the first in an occasional series or may be just a one off, just have to wait and see. The idea came about after the Basement 5 post when I discovered what Richard Dudanski is up to these days. Shame on those of you that are mouthing Richard who? It may be true that the drummer, yes the one sitting at the back with what looks like chopsticks in their hands, is often not the best known member of the band. How many drummers can you name? I'm sure a lot less than you can vocalists or guitarists.

Dudanski learnt his trade alongside legendary Clash leader Joe Strummer in the mid seventies. By summer, 1979 he was behind the drums for PIL, and was present for part of the recording of the classic 'Metal Box'. This was the second punk figurehead that he was to play behind. As was to be with the majority of John Lyndon's drummers, he was not to last long and by mid 1980 his talents were being put to good use with basement 5. Since then he has been a member of The Raincoats recording 'Moving' with them and has recorded extensively with an outsider that deserves to be an insider, Tymon Dogg, again that Joe Strummer/101er's connection. For those of you either too young or too geographically removed to remember, the London of the late 70's early 80's was probably a lot more hip place than the swinging town of the 60's partly due to increased mobility, I can remember that it was not unusual to encounter and make friends with people from foreign lands, and so it was that Richard had met and married his wife a Spanish national. One thing led to another and in 1988 he moved to Granada in Spain claiming to prefer the life style, not that different from me really excepting that I'm no drummer! He has lived there ever since and has played with Por Si Las Moscas whose album was mixed by Strummer, with whom he kept up his friendship as Joe also had a soft spot for the Iberic Peninsula and would often spend part of his Summer there. A chance meeting with American exile and veteran of the Madrid music scene Tom Lardner led to the duo forming El Doghouse in 2004. And that just about brings us up to date the band gig as often as they can taking great pleasure in playing live and have released an album entitled 'In Heat' that can be purchased for the modest sum of 10 euros from their web site. Musically speaking it has more in common with his early days, if pushed I would describe them as being a heavy country blues with a heathy funky element present, check out 'Little Bit Of Jesus' or 'Ridiculous' to see what I mean. Of the 12 songs 11 are originals with a cover of the Stooges classic 'I Wanna Be Your Dog', the band said why not, I would say that a man with Dudanski's pedigree deserves to cover this song much more than many others that have done so.

Maybe you were fortunate enough to have been present when the 101er's reformed to play two tributes to Joe Strummer, after his untimely death in 2002, one in his native London and the other in Spain, guests included Mick Jones, Wilko and Jem Finer from the Pogues, well the man that organised these was none other than Richard Dudanski.

Made In France

2007-01-09T13:43:00.000+01:00

Following on from yesterday's post with another all girl band this time from another decade and another country. Strictly speaking this not made in France as despite their French nationality today's heroes met and formed in the Teutonic capital of all things arty, Berlin. This meeting between Francoise and Coco took place in the early eighties and was followed by their first attempts at forming a band with the points of reference ranging from Sylvie Vartan To Jacques Dutronc. With the addition of the Italian, Tutti Frutti the first line up was complete and so a name was needed, this they found after seeing Kubricks adaptation of a Nabolov novel, and so Les Loitas were born. They began gigging in their adopted homeland and despite singing in French, they started to build a reputation. The end of that year saw the German release of their self titled debut album that despite being self produced on a thin budget gathered buckets full of praise from the press. It was the following year that French Label New Rose, named after the Damned song of the same name, picked up the band despite have never played a gig in the country. This event coincided with them becoming a four piece with the addition of Olga. A second album 'Series Americaines' followed before the French label took the band firmly under their wings. They were to spend summer of '88 in Memphis with Alex Chilton producing their third long player 'Fusee D'Amour' at Ardent Studio, they even had the legendary Jim Dickinson guest on two songs. 'Cactus' is an energetic cover version of a sixties hit from one of their influences, Dutronc and 'Le Mec D'Hier Soir' is almost a cowpunk before it's time as it does a good job of mixing country and punk and in French! The band were strangely reluctant to play France 1988/9 saw them give less than 10 performances against the 300 in Germany and so it was that their star rose faster and higher the other side of the Rhine. New Rose, convinced that the band had real potential, hitched them up with another of their artists, Guitar legend Chris Spedding who produced what was to be their final album 'Rouge Baiser'. Described by Spedding as being a fresh take on rock sung in French and not a bad copy of American music, he took them to NYC to record where they laid down this cover version of the Otis Redding song 'I've Been Loving You Too Long'.

And so it was that after a mere five years of existence that Les Lolitas having recorded four albums, having become well known in Germany, a cult in France and unknown to the rest of the world before going their separate ways at the beginning of the new decade. Their albums were all available at some stage on CD though the only CD that I have come across recently is copies of the compilation of their last two albums entitles 'New York Memphis'.

Peel Sessions 36

2007-01-08T15:11:00.000+01:00

One of the great things about the Peel Sessions was that they featured everything from the big bands to those that were, and are still today in many cases, obscure. All it needed was for either John Peel or John Walters, his long term producer, to be suitably impressed with a single or a gig and the band could easily find themselves invited down to Maida Vale and subsequently broadcast along the nations airwaves a week or two later. If we take for example the letter P you will see that for every Pixies, P.J. Harvey or Pulp there was also a Psylons, Premi or Po lurking in the shadows waiting for the masses to listen and who knows maybe even buy their records. This list will also reveal bands that were maybe not destined for greater things for different reasons, one such band is Period Pains, I honestly cannot imagine hearing a daytime jock announcing the latest release from them sandwiched between his usual banalities unless of course the show were to be sponsored by Tampa...........................! And yes in case you are wondering the band did actually exist in the late 90's. I know very little about them excepting that they were a female four piece from the town of Reading that formed at school. According to their record label Damaged Goods they played short sharp songs reminiscent of X Ray Spex and Pink Kross, I would like to add that their attitude was similar to that of the Slits. A single was released in 1997 that slagged off the Spice Girls 'Spice Girls (Who Do You Think You Are)' the single came to the attention of Steve Lamaq and John Peel both of whom put it on heavy rotation on their evening shows. The result was the single peaked at number 87 in the national charts, such is the power of night time radio! The band had struck the right note with JP and recorded their first and only session in August of the same year. 1997 really was their year as the single made it to number four in Peel's annual end of year listeners chart the Festive Fifty. Quite why I don't know but the band did not build on this cult success, indeed their only other release was the five track BBC sessions that belatedly hit the shops in Spring 1999. It would be reasonable enough I guess to call the band one hit wonders, anyone know where they are now? So, two songs the aforementioned single 'Spice Girls (....' and the terribly middle class girly issue number 'Daddy I Want A Pony' or were they just being sarcastic I'll let you decide.

Basement 5

2007-01-04T15:41:00.000+01:00

I've just read a rather nice article in the January edition of Mojo as part of their on going series Buried Treasure. The article has been penned by Kris Needs who was editor of the much missed UK monthly Zig Zag during the 70's and unknown by me was also manager of the long defunct Basement 5 who much to my surprise have a rather good MySpace page, not too many friends but they do seem to have more of those that count than a lot of other bands. The article had the necessary effect on me and I dully dragged my CD copy from it's hiding place to give it another listen too, and yes I must say that I agree with Needsy, to use the old reggae idiom a crucial release.

The band, as with so many others at the time, were motivated to start their short adventure by the punk movement. Formed by genuine punk legend Don Letts in 1978 the band wasted no time in scoring the prestigious opening spot for Public Images coming out gig at London's Rainbow Theatre on Christmas day of the same year. I am rather ashamed to say that despite being present at the aforementioned gig I have no recollection at all concerning the opening act. Letts did not last and was replaced by Island Records art department employee Dennis Morris, who dully gave up his day job only to have his band signed to Island. This new version of the band entered the studios with Martin Hannett at the controls and laid down the tracks that were to become their sole album '1965-1985', which interestingly enough was preceded by the critically acclaimed dub version of the album called rather disappointingly 'Basement 5 In Dub'. The band had problems keeping a drummer and if rumour is to be believed the skin basher on the album was Charlie Charles on loan from the Blockheads who laid down his contribution in one day! At another period the drum stool had been occupied by Richard Dudanski whose other notable bands were the 101ers and of course Public Image. The album did not sell as well as expected and as with so many other bands before and after them they fell in pieces and were never to deliver a follow up. Denis Morris, who returned to photography after a nervous breakdown, in a rather bitter but droll manner blames their lack of success firmly at the feet of Island who according to him were spending all of their energy on breaking U2. He goes further by saying that after playing together Bono and the boys borrowed various elements from the Basement 5 that helped to contribute to their success! It is somewhat criminal in my mind that there is nothing freely available from the band, despite '1965-1980' being coupled with 'In Dub' for a CD reissue this has long been out of print, so it's happy hunting on E Bay or wherever.
Musically the band were very much at home with the post punk spirit of mix and match experimentalism. They painted a rather bleak landscape both musically and lyrically that could come from no other period than the dismal years of Thatcher's reign. Mixing rock elements with reggae and dub they were one of the bands that broke down the barriers and paved the way for black kids to play rock music. The album's opening track 'Riot' comes over as cross between The Fall, 'My Sharona', 'Riot in Cell Block No.9' and the song that many think inspired it, 'White Riot'. 'No Ball Games' takes it title from the notice that would often be found on public housing estates at the time and does a good job of conjouring up the urban misery of the masses that were doomed to live out lenthy periods of unemployment at such savory places. They also came close to scoring a hit with the punky 'Last White Christmas' I'm never quite sure whether this was tongue in cheek coming from a band that was three quarters back!

The Godfather

2007-01-03T17:29:00.000+01:00

Another quick one today as time is not on my side, I've just spent over an hour emptying my mail box, I must have received almost a million junk mails, spam or whatever you want to call it while I was away for the last 10 days, they are still shit and one of the drawbacks about the wonderful web.
One of the things that I like about being on holiday with the family is that we often do a very good job of cutting ourselves off from the rest of the world, no TV, no radio and no newspapers are the general rules, and believe me for a week or two this isn't such a bad thing. What this does mean is that when I get back there is often some catching up to do concerning the big wide world, I can remember a few years back it wasn't until mid January that I learnt of Joe Strummer passing away. And so it was that while driving into work this morning that I was saddened to hear about James Brown, who left for the great gig in the sky over the festive season at the age of 73. Now I'm not going to beat about the bush and pretend what a wonderful human being he was, as this was not the case he was as weak as the majority of us are and had his own personal devils to cope with, wife beating and excessive drug use were amongst his. Personally I think he had big problems coping with the fame that was thrust upon him, I can remember reading an interview with him, probably in the NME, during the eighties, where he came over as being madder than the mad hatter, and that is no mean feat! The was to remember is by listening to his ground breaking music 'Papa's Got A Brand New Bag' is probably my favorite studio track that he laid down as for me this was where the bridge was built between a more traditional R 'n' B and the funk that was to move so many peoples feet from the sixties onwards. 'Cold Sweat' is taken from the classic album 'Live at the Apollo pt 1' that was recorded at his home away from home, Harlem NYC. NPR have hefty file of a live recording from the Godfather of soul up for grabs here, as recorded just under a year before his death at The 9:30 club Washington DC December 2005, don't forget while listening to this that he was already well into his 70's when this was recorded.

May his music live on and give pleasure for many years to come.

Peel Sessions 35

2007-01-02T15:42:00.000+01:00

First up I would like to wish each and everyone of you a happy new year, I guess what is really important is your good health and your mutual respect for your fellow beings.
I think the next couple of days are going to be hard going for me, as everyone else is still on holiday in my household, I do hate being the only one that gets up for work! I didn't ski as there was a noticeable lack of the white stuff, only about a third of the slopes were open, though this did not deter the boys who spent their time speeding down to the station on their boards. Never mind for me there should be enough snow during the February break for me to show off my style.
Don't worry I have not forgotten that this is a music blog, and despite today not being Monday, it is the first post of the year and so I thought why not something a little bit special today. I know that I am far from being the only one to appreciate Bill Bragg's voice and guitar, and one of his fans was also John Peel. It was therefore only natural that Billy was present at the gig held to celebrate 40 years of broadcasting by Peel, this event took place at Kings College Students Union in the centre of London on November 24, 2001, and was dully aired a few days later on the radio. Five songs representative of his career played as Billy does best accompanied only by his distinctive voice and unique style of guitar playing, and an introduction from John Peel for your listening pleasure.

1. Introduction
2. 'A Lover Sings'
3. 'Milkman Of Human Kindness'
4. 'St Monday'
5. 'She Came Along'
6. 'Everywhere'

Sorry about the editing as this was how I discovered this on the web some years back, still the music is well worth it.

Ho Ho Ho

2006-12-21T07:43:00.000+01:00

It's that time of the year again, and tomorrow as soon I get back from work I'll be loading the car and then off on a five or six hour journey to a rather small ski resort called Supper Besse in the Massif Central where the family and me will be holed up over the holiday period. Bad luck means that I must be back in Nimes Thursday and Friday, before returning to my family and the snow drenched peaks for another long week-end, what this does mean is that me having no internet access on the ski slopes there will be radio silence, as they used to say, here at Sound Of The Suburbs for the next few days. Do try to enjoy yourselves, I do even if don't always succeed! I've chosen some Christmas themed music for you from lets just say some of the more classy acts.

1. John Cale - 'A Childs Christmas In Wales'
2. Randy Newman - 'Christmas In Capetown'
3. Willard Grant Conspiracy - 'Christmas In Nevada'
4. Jacobites - 'Teenage Christmas'
5. The Waitresses - 'Christmas (W)Rapping'
6. Go Home Productions - 'Carpenters Christmas'
7. Go Home Productions - 'Christmas In Boston'

I think that's enough, don't you?
The image comes from the cartoon book 'Father Christmas' by one of the true masters of the medium Raymond Briggs. It was he that was responsible for the immortal 'Fungus The Bogeyman' that kept us amused for hours upon an end as students in the post punk fall out of London's suburbs at the end of the 70's. He also wrote the classic anti nuclear tome 'When The Wind Blows' that again touched a vein with my generation back then. I would strongly recommend his works if you don't already know them.
So that's it hope to be back mid week, with all my bones in tact!

Made In France

2006-12-20T15:30:00.000+01:00

Top French music and cultural magazine les Inrockuptibles has been running a demo tape competition for the last three years that goes under the name of CQFD (an expression meaning what you should discover) for the last five years. The principle is very simple, send them a song and the journalists will listen to it, and choose 21 best tracks that are then pressed up for a cover mounted CD, and from then on it's the readers that decide by voting. This year the journalists got to tease their ears with 7 000 tapes! And the prize? A live concert broadcast on national station Le Mouv, studio time and who knows maybe fame? I'm going to share three songs from the CD with you, I am not going to pretend that they are the best as there were eight songs that grabbed my attention and these three just happen to be my favorites today and of course this may well not be the case tomorrow.

MONTGOMERY
They have a very English sounding name but despite this they sing in their native tongue.This five piece from Rennes, Northern France, offer 'Melody' a dreamy child like slice of low-fi indie pop that drags you in under it's spell from it's first bars. They claim to have Gainsbourg and Sinatra as grandparents, Nirvana and Radiohead as parents, Beck as their older brother and Surfjan Stevens as their sister! Sounds like quite some family! Check out their MySpace here.

CAPTAIN BRACKMARD
They claim to originate from a mix of the Brackmard Corporation, a gang a car thieves situated in Mexico and the greatest of superheros Captain America. They are non-political but do have the goal of replacing blue M&Ms with pink ones as this discrimination based on sex is unacceptable! In their own words their own brand of hip hop is out of date, decadent and happily mixes Eminem with the Beastie Boys. Their chosen track displays a finely tuned sense of humour for this contemporary concept over some lively and dancable beats, I'm sure they're the kind of band that warms up a cold hall. Their MySpace is here.

LA CANAILLE
This last offering is my personal favorite at the moment. Their name comes from canis, meaning dog, this was how the bourgeois described the poor in the 19th century it is also the title of a revolutionary song sung by workers. As we can assume from such cerebral thoughts this band has a message, this can be heard loud and clear on 'Ni Dieu, Ni Maitre' (Neither God Nor Master), a cry against the way religion is being used to hinder advancement. Musically it subtle mix of beats and ethnic instruments such as a bouzouki that makes this as original as their ideas are interesting. Their musical roots range from funk, rap, chanson, rock, reggae, african, arabic, blues to down and out dirty hard rock, if they keep on producing tracks like this with no musical compromise they deserve to go a long way. MySpace here.

What you have probably realised is that today's trio of songs are all in French two of which being rap, hip hop call it what you want, what I do find is that the French language is much better suited to this style of music that traditional rock. Anyway I wish the bands involved good luck and may the best band win!

Nikki Sudden

2006-12-19T15:51:00.000+01:00

From being a teenager onwards the highlight at the end of the year was not the presents neither was it getting pissed as we tended to that the rest of the year, but it was that strange object the NME double issue for the Christmas break! I really don't know if it still exists but back in it's hey day it provided us with much entertainment with it's 100 plus pages over the festive season. Apart from special articles, Mark E Smith was always in tune with the spirit of things, commissioned stories and poetry, wonderfully stupid photo spreads, agonising quizzes there were those end of year lists that you could pore over for hour and hours agreeing and disagreeing while you digested your Christmas meal and tried not to upset your extended family. I recently received a mail inviting me to partake in an end of the year top ten album list for another blog, it was while looking back on what I have purchased or obtained over the last 12 months that I stopped and listened again to 'The Truth Doesn't Matter' the final album from the talented hands of Nikki Sudden. I guess a fair number of you won't even know who he was, the past tense is used as his light went out after a gig in NYC on March 26 this year. Nikki was someone who was important to the greater picture largely thanks to his first band Swell Maps that he had formed with his brother Epic Soundtracks who also made his way to the great gig in the sky in November 1997. In their three year existence they released 2 albums and a number of single, cited as being influential by the likes of Sonic Youth and Pavement, their records often obtained ecstatic reviews from the press, what made them important above the music was the DIY/independent nature of their releases that really did show that anyone could do it themselves even a bunch of schoolboys from Croydon. Nikki and his brother were further supported by Geoff Travis who employed them behind the counter of his Rough Trade record shop in London before they were fired after having insulted one rasta too many.
Upon the disappearance of the Swell Maps, Nikki set upon a long solo career sometimes under the guise of the Jacobites, the many albums that he released were of varying quality and often plagued by bad luck. He was not the most fashionable of artists as he was not ashamed of sounding like his heroes: Bob Dylan, The Rolling Stones and T.Rex. Towards the end of his life it looked as though maybe things were changing he was at long last signed to a sympathetic record label, Secretly Canadian, that actually cared about about him and that had some clout in so far as the label was hip. The album recorded in his adopted home town of Berlin and mixed in London had been completed but not released by the time of his death. It is a very fitting epitaph that this record is probably his most complete album managing to be polished while retaining that loose Stones/Faces feel that he so loved. As was often his case his roots were more than evident and the album cover owes more than a little debt to Bolan's 'Slider'. Two tracks up for grabs today from the album 'The Ballad Of Johnny And Marianne' that is the sound of young New York City in the mid 60's with it's big Spector drum sound and native Italian gang style music . 'Green Shield Stamps' is in altogether another league, imagine that Dylan had been born in Croydon at the end of the 50's beginning of the 60's and maybe he would have come up with something like this, a touching homage to that long gone period and everything that was, well so British, pure nostalgia in fact not that different from what Like Haines has been doing for years.
So there you go just in case anyone does care my vote this year goes to Nikki Sudden and 'The Truth Doesn't Matter not the hippest of choices I know but a damn fine record and one hell of a way to go.

Peel Sessions 34

2006-12-18T16:09:00.000+01:00

Last week-end I was alone at home, sitting in front of a blazing open fire, listening to some music while casually flicking through the pages of the latest batch of music mags to arrive here. My relationship with the music press is a strange one, I guess it's akin to an addiction, even when I think it's 100% rubbish I will still buy the next months editions, often I will only read a part of the articles as I think there is a limit to the amount of Beatles, Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Oasis ......... articles one can consume in a lifetime, and then there is something interesting that grabs me, and so it was that I was happy to stumble across the Jarvis interview in December's Mojo. His comments on the great Britpop movement "There was no real kinship between bands. It was sad. There was no unity to it..........When success came people just got into it for themselves. There was no revolution; everybody just got into personal ego problems or drink problems or drug problems. Then everyone got a hangover and made bad tempered, downer albums", this got me thinking. Despite all of the obvious ego problems, and yes the remark about downer albums, I thought was spot on, this period in the UK did give us some very good music, even the first Oasis album sounded fresh, snotty and urgent at the time. Britpop, I do hate that term, had it's own royal couple in Damon Album and Justine Frischmann who held court in indie HQ Camden Town. Damon was of course the tonsils behind Blur and as for Justine she was founder of one the periods better bands Elastica. Inbetween parties and ligging obligations the band managed to record their excellent self titled album in 1995 after a string of successful singles, the album entered the UK charts at no.1. The band were not ashamed of their new wave roots and did not hide their influences, an advert for band members asked for Wire fans! They were accused in the press of lifting a melody here or a keyboard riff there from their late 70's heroes, this led to an eventual out of court settlement with the Stranglers for the loan of a part of 'No More Heroes'. Plagiarism aside the band remained extremely popular but creative inertia put an end to this as we waited six years for the follow up 'Menace', that as with the Stones Roses before them was deemed to be unworthy of all the fuss. Shame they could really have been something.
They graced the BBC studios on four different occasions for John Peel, the first of which was in September 1993, just one year after their forming from which 'Line Up' is taken, I think it still sounds very fresh today, true it does sound just a little bit like Wire's 'I Am The Fly', but I wouldn't have it any other way. Their last session was recorded in September 1999, just months after fellow original guitarist Donna Mathews quit the band. Their version of Trio's novelty hit 'Da Da Da' managed to put a smile on my face and the memories rushing back. These two songs can be found on the album 'BBC Sessions' that is currently only available in the US on Koch as the UK, Strange Fruit release is no longer on catalog. Seeing as Christmas is just around the corner I'm going to treat you to a song that was recorded for, well yes Christmas, 'I Wanna Be a King Of Orient Aah', their spelling not mine!
As for what has happened to Justine, well she split up with Damon in 1999, they're still good friends!!! She has co written with M.I.A. and produced demos for White Rose Movement. She has presented Television in the UK and gone back to school. If anyone cares there is an interesting interview with her from four years ago here.

Made In France

2006-12-16T15:22:00.000+01:00

The job of rounding up this week of vinyl rips goes to a French band that I certainly hope that you are at least aware of their name if not their music, as along with Les Negresses Vertes, Mano Negra were the biggest selling French rock export of the 90's (the Gypsy Kings don't count as rock). The Band with their enigmatic leader Mano Chaos set fire to concert halls just about wherever they played with their explosive sets and on stage fun antics. After having independently released their debut album, 'Patchanka', they were snapped up by Virgin France who proceeded to turn this unruly bunch of radical music makers into international stars. Their fame was well deserved as they dished up a successful mix of musical styles, Ska, Punk, country, rap, oriental ......, that somehow or the other worked as they forged their own sound. 1990 was their year, as their groundbreaking second album 'Putas Fever' had hit the shops the previous year and was winning friends with every day that went by. To celebrate this success the band decided on a short tour of their home territory, Paris, and staying very true to the spirit of the album chose six venues, Erotika ; La Cigale ; New Moon ; Elysée Montmartre ; Narcisse ; Folies Pigalle, all situated in the Pigalle district that is of course known for it's lively nightlife, infact several of these venues were better known as strip clubs! The same year they released another single from the album, in it's 12" form it was accompanied by six live titles recorded during that tour, here are three of them for your pleasure.
1. 'Sidi B Bibi'
2. 'Darling Darling'
3. 'Magic Dice'