Thursday 21 April 2011

The Associates - Party Fears Two

Album: Sulk (Beggars Banquet,1982) Chart pos:UK#9





Billy Mackenzie who was the subject of The Smiths song William, It Was Really Nothing, killed himself in 1997. Looking back on his career it’s easy to wonder how much how much the bloke had going for him. As well as having movie star looks and an amazing singing voice, he was also enormously charismatic the kind of guy who could rob you blind and could still charm you at the same time. Instead of capitalizing on his talent he turned his back on being successful and self-destructed after his mother’s death.

Listening to his band The Associates biggest (and only UK top ten) hit Party Fears Two it’s sometimes easy to understand how the big success the record company predicted never came. The bands idiosyncrasies like Billy Mackenzie's wacky lyrics that include odd couplets like 'Even a slight remark/Makes nonsense and turns to shark' and Alan Rankine's left-field musical experiments made their music much more of an acquired taste compared to much of the New Romantic detritus of the 80's.

Sunday 10 April 2011

The Dream Syndicate - Burn

Album: The Medicine Show (A&M, 1984) Chart pos:N/A



This is a band that I have gone crazy over for the post couple of years, hell my appraisal of the band’s debut album Days of Wine and Roses was published on the Mojo Magazine website. Now I’m wondering why it took so long to write a blog entry on this band, so today I’m going to look at one of their lesser known songs.

http://www.mojo4music.com/blog/2009/10/the_dream_syndicate.html


For those who aren’t in the know The Dream Syndicate were part of the Paisley Underground scene (the one that produced The Bangles FYI) which was a scene composed of ex-punks who sought solace in Neil Young, The Velvets and The Byrds. Disappointingly many of the bands were chewed up and spat out by big labels (execpt The Bangles of course) and the Dream Syndicate were no exception.

The Medicine Show was the Dream Syndicates second album and their major label debut. The third track on side 1 Burn is a standout track with its rousing chorus and widescreen Sonics. Unfortunately the band's college radio fan base scoffed at their new polished sound, pining for the rough sound of their debut. The band were dropped from their major label recording contract and R.E.M a band with similar influences sold millions of records as the Dream Syndicate floundered.



Here’s an interesting feature on the scene presented by Andy Kershaw before he lost the plot.



Friday 8 April 2011

Billy Bragg - Must I Paint You a Picture

Album: Workers Playtime (Go Discs, 1988) Chart pos:N/A



Even though these days he's more famous for ranting at far-right nationalists in Barking, Billy Bragg is still a great songwriter. His 1988 album Workers Playtime was the moment when he shifted from the rough one man with a guitar sound to something much more fleshed out. The highlight from the album Must I Paint You a Picture is possibly one of the finest breakup songs ever written, where Braggs simple guitar based tune backed by a piano accompaniment. Allthough he didn't experiment with a full band until the next album this song (and the album) did manage to push him into new musical terratories.

I went to university near Barking and it's possibly one of the most racially tense places in the UK, and possibly one of the few places a BNP candidate could win a seat. Not long after I left the area a white guy got beated to death by three pakistanis in a racist attack.

Wednesday 6 April 2011

MC5 - Teenage Lust

Album Back in the USA (Atlantic,1970) Chart Pos: #N/A



Yesterday, I went in to a record shop and bought a picture disc reissue of Back in the USA only to discover to my horror that the damn thing was warped. This put a bit of a damper on my day as the album was brilliant set of short sharp pop songs. Compared to their first (and slightly overrated IMO) album the production of Back in the USA is much more tame and the songs (for the most part) less politically inclined. This is not surprising as it was produced by future Bruce Springsteen producer Jon Landau. Teenage Lust the main standout track where the band opts to create songs about sexual frustration instead of race riots and Vietnam. Despite the tame production the songs lean composition surely must of been a huge influence on bands like The Ramones.

Monday 4 April 2011

Ike & Tina Turner - Bold Soul Sister

Album Hunter (Blue Thumb,1970)Chart Pos US#59 US R&B#22



Growing up the only things I remember about Tina Turner was the rather bland output she released in the 80's and Ike's wife beating, coke snorting antics. Even though the two of them had personal problems they still managed to release some impressive music together. Bold Soul Sister from 1970 took heavily from Sly & the Family Stone's 1968 hit Sing A Simple Song yeat still managed to top the song. Tina screams her way through through this raw funky cut, suprising when much of my earliest memories of hearing Tina Turner was hearing The Best being played on televised sporting events.

Here is the song that was the basis for this one, apparently Jimi Hendrix pilfered from it too.

Friday 1 April 2011

Super Furry Animals - Run-Away

Album: Hey Venus! (Rough Trade,2007) Chart pos:UK#120



Super Furry Animals are one of those bands who are musical magpies, one minute imitating the Beach Boys one minute and then imitating Burt Bacharach the next (in their own tongue-in-cheek way). Run-away is the Welsh eccentrics attempt at Spectorish wall of sound pop with singer Gruff Rhys singing about a breakup with quirky offbeat lines such as "We may have fought with teeth and nails/I still recall your banking details".



Funnily enough i saw the band play mime at T4 on the Beach in Weston Super-Mare (as seen on the link above as embedding is forbidden)and instead of miming like the rest of the band he put his microphone against the robot helmet he was wearing. A pity that more bands pull stuff like this at miming gigs.

Thursday 31 March 2011

The Morning Benders - Excuses

Album: Big Echo (Rough Trade,2010) Chart pos:N/A



Despite avoiding 'hip indie bands' for the last decade due to some totally dreadful overhyped bands, i decided to buy The Morning Benders second album Big Echo on a whim. On first listen the album seems to take a while to sink in, despite this there is some stand out tracks. Excuses is the opening track from the album is a sunny indie-pop number that is indebted to the Beach Boys (especially in its endless use of vocal harmonies). The song is the finest moment from an album that has had a bit of a muted reaction in the press.

Here is an amusing ukulele cover.

Wednesday 30 March 2011

The Troggs - Love is all Around

Album: Single (Fontana, 1966) Chart pos: UK#5 US#7

Ampshires finest.



Reg Presley the lead singer of The Troggs is an odd fellow. When Wet Wet Wet ruined covered Love is All Around he was in for a huge royalty cheque as the song spent most of 1994 in the charts. Most sane people would re-do the kitchen or buy a new house, but good old Reg had to be different by using his royalties to fund research into the results of drunken actions by Wiltshire drunkards aka Crop Circles (excuse my cynicism).

Unlike Wet Wet Wet's bombastic and overproduced version, the original version feels much more pared down with the basic guitars and comparatively slight strings. This brings credence to Reg's claim that he wrote this in 10 minutes, but yet again sometimes the simplest songs can be the most effective.

REM did an acoustic version of the song, interestingly enough the Troggs and REM collaborated on an album together in the early 90's.

Monday 28 March 2011

Zapp - Be Allright

Zapp (Warner Bros, 1980) Chart pos:N/A



Fans of 2pac will probably recognise the song as the basis for Keep Ya Head Up. Zapp took over the P-Funk mantle after the Parliament-Funkadelic machine floundered in the early eighties. The song Be Allright from their first (and possibly best) album moves away from the heavy vocoder-funk of the rest of the album and operates at a slower ballad like tempo. Interestingly Roger Troutman the lead singer went on to collaborate with 2pac and Dr Dre for 1995's California Love. Unfortunately the band met a grisly end in 1999 when Roger and brother (and fellow band mate) Larry were involved in a tragic murder-suicide.




Tuesday 22 March 2011

Jacques Brel - Jaures

Album: Les Marquises (Barclay,1977) Chart Pos: N/A



When Brel sang this ode to the murdered pre-WW1 pacifist Jean Jaurès he apparently only had one lung left as his body was being ravaged by lung cancer. Thus making this one of the most poignant records that he ever made.

Monday 21 March 2011

Jim Sullivan - Highways

Album UFO (Monnie, 1970) Chart Pos: N/A



If legends were to believed Jim Sullivan is probably in outer pace playing a wonderful blend of country and folk music to extraterrestrials, but alas on earth his music has been forgotten, until now.

Last year this masterpiece after years of being bootlegged on shitty sounding vinyl was instead mastered from um... better quality vinyl, at least this album is back in print though about 35 years after its creator mysteriously disappeared in New Mexico.

Highways the opening track from the second side (The Monnie Mix) with its galloping bass and ominous strings is a standout song from an album stuck in a milleau of endless highways, ghost towns, gas stations and of course UFO's

There's an amazing short YouTube documentary on the story of his music and his strange disappearance.

Friday 18 March 2011

Momus - Hairstyle of the Devil

Album: Don’t Stop The Night (Creation, 1989) Chart pos: N/A

He's got a devils haircut on his mind.



Momus (aka Nick Currie) was on Creation back in the days when they could barely sell an album, during his tuenure on the label he released 7 albums during his tenure on the label. Ironically being dropped because of the fact his affair with a teenage girl of bangladeshi caused some pissed off bangladeshi guys to threaten label boss Alan Mcgee.

Hairstyle of the Devil from the album sound an awful lot like a low rent Pet Shop Boys led by a lanky sex obsessed scottish guy. The songs sleasy razor-sharp wit no doubt owes a great debt to Serge Gainsborg as well.

Thursday 17 March 2011

Dexys Midnight Runners - My National Pride

Album: Don't Stand Me Down (Mercury,1985)



1985's Don't Stand Me Down was the Astral Weeks of the 1980's but thanks to shortsighted critics it became the bands death knell. As much as critics seem to say how wonderful the band is every time they re-release their music, Kevin Rowland was repeatedly lambasted by critics. My National Pride is the albums epic centerpiece a classic of yearning and nostalgia that sadly fell on deaf ears. Now the album is shamefully out of print and these days i generally get funny looks for allegedly 'liking a band who only had one hit', if only people knew they were a band capable of more.

Interestingly the Young Guns Go For It doc is on YouTube at last.







Friday 11 March 2011

The Brains - Money Changes Everything

Album: Single (Grey Matter, 1979) album: The Brains (Mercury, 1980) Chart Pos: N/A



The Brains are a band that I discovered via scouring the internet looking for rare music. Legend goes that this obscure band was plucked from obscurity when Cyndi Lauper covered this track, pity it was half a decade after the band split up after being chewed up and spat out by a major label with nary a hit. These days the band are almost forgotten due to the fact that none of their work has been released digitally, Which is a pity. even though they weren't quite as good as The Cars or Devo the two albums they released on Mercury were impressive. If you could imagine a nerdier (and slightly more pissed off version) of The Cars and you have a pretty good idea of this bands music.



Here's a link to the album and the rest of their back catalog.



Tom Grey the lead singer still plays the song with his new band Delta Moon



Funnily enough Arcade Fire have played the song live before.

Thursday 10 March 2011

Etta James - Out on the Street Again

Album: Come a Little Closer (Chess,1974) Chart pos: US(R&B)#84

Dem Heroin withdrawl blooze.



Any Etta James comp worth its weight in gold has at least 3/4 of At Last! (her best album IMO),huge chunks of her muscle shoals sessions and finally some of her later funkier material. This number with its extended funky intro (Etta doesn't sing a note for the first 90 seconds) is possibly her most underrated moment. Etta is on fine form despite being in the middle of Heroin withdrawal (she recorded this on day release from rehab).

Its a pity that some of Etta James' music is out of print, or in some cases not even available on CD. I think somebody should petition Universal who own the Chess back catalog to re-release her OOP albums. Once upon a time Temptations fans managed to successfully petitioned Universal to remaster Eddie Kendricks and David Ruffin's solo records.

Sometimes its easy to find a cheap copy of the album on Amazon

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B000002OCO/ref=s9_simh_gw_p15_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=0WGHE2E6DR9WPVQWPJ1C&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=470938631&pf_rd_i=507846

Sunday 6 March 2011

Roxy Music - Ladytron

Album: Roxy Music (Island,1972) Chart pos: N/A




Roxy Music is a band that i can't really dismiss these days due to the fact that nearly every sodding band I like owes a debt to them. And while I like some of their music, I've never had a burning desire to actually own anything they did. Ladytron from their début album sounds way ahead of its time especially Brian Eno's
electronic textures that beautifully augment the song. If Brian Eno never bumped into Andy Mackay on that certain underground station, popular music would have been whole lot poorer as a result.



Saturday 5 March 2011

Bob Seger Sysyem - 2+2=?

Album: Ramblin Gamblin Man (Capitol,1968) Chart pos: CAN: #79



After a busy six moths which included failing a Msc thesis twice I've decided to reactivated this blog as something to keep myself occupied.

Firstly off the tune for today is from an artist whose always been written off as a poor-man's Bruce Springsteen, while in all honesty I don't really have much interest in his later music, some of his early nuggets-esque garage rock is pretty impressive. 2+2=? is a protest song against the Vietnam War from the perspective of a young man who seen a High School acquaintance being sent way to die, ironically a few years previously Seger wrote a song mocking draft dodgers. Some people have noted similarities in this song with fellow Michigan natives The White Stripes 2003 hit Seven Nation Army.