Eyes down ....

Anyone following Car Boot Vinyl Diaries will be familiar with their list of perennial LPs to be found at car boot sales (also available as a handy bingo card here). Ultimately these are albums that sold in vast quantities in their day but which no longer hold the interest of the casual listener. For that's who would have sent their sales into overdrive - people who didn't regularly buy music but who found themselves at the record counter in Woolies, creating a snowball effect on sales. Put it this way: if you find someone with a record collection comprising mainly of those 12 LPs, you could comfortably say - or sing, if you wish - to them: "You don't really care for music, do you?" and they either won't know what you're talking about or, worse, will get all excited and say "I know that - it's that X-Factor song!".

That is not to say that these are all bad LPs. I was dragged up to the sounds of those Carpenters singles albums, and with its re-recording and segueing of tracks the 1969-1973 collection is far more appealing than the more recent cash-in trick of padding out a best-of with one or two, often poor, new recordings. And although Abba spent most of the 1980s being ridiculed their resurgence in the 1990s with the success of ‘Abba Gold’, topped-off by ‘Mamma Mia’, brought home the fact that although some of their lyrics might have been questionable (but could you do better in Swedish?) their melodies contained more hooks than any medicine show might muster up. 'No Parlez' on the other hand seems unlikely to ever regain the public's imagination; but if it does, I can point you in the direction of one Cambridge charity shop that has at least three copies in stock, along with assorted other selections from Mr Young's back catalogue.

The same phenomenon is being repeated with CDs (which incidentally are getting cheaper in charity shops). So who are the modern day equivalents of the Carpenters and Dr Hook? Apart from one extreme example (along with Lance Armstrong biographies, people have understandably been quick to offload their Lost Prophets collections, though by donating them to charity shops are they seriously expecting anyone to buy them?) they generally fall into the same pattern as their 70s & 80s predecessors – sell by the bucketload and then fall out of fashion.

Brit bubble popped
Blur may have won that battle but there's no denying who won the war, even if Damon & co are the ones getting the plaudits in 2015. As a result it was Oasis who truly crossed over and one CD in particular rears its ugly head rather too often. 'Definitely, Maybe' is too much of a fan's favourite, and even though '(What's The Story) Morning Glory?' was their biggest seller it remains popular and so it's 1997's 'Be Here Now', initially adored by the press, subsequently denounced as bloated and sometimes referred to as the album that killed Britpop, that people are discarding with relish. With estimated UK sales of 1.8 million (only 'Heathen Chemistry' is believed to have made it to 7 figures since), many of those are now available to you for as little as 50p.

Nods from this period also go to the Lightning Seeds best of 'Like You Do', Kula Shaker's 'K' (the K section of Reckless Records' now closed Islington branch consisted of little else) and The Verve's Urban Hymns.

Sisters are doing it for themselves
Eminem's 'Stan' famously featured an extract from Dido's 'Thank You'. This was arguably the best part of either song but the sales of ‘Life For Rent’ and it’s follow-up, ‘No Angel’ showed that several million people were keen to hear more. But not perpetually it would seem. Duffy’s ‘Rockferry’ is another staple, and I’ve noticed a recent rise in copies of Lily Allen’s ‘Alright, Still’. On the flip-side I don’t think I’ve ever seen any Adele (though if she doesn’t hurry up and release a new album the public may turn against her and send her CDs out into the wilderness), and rarely any Amy Winehouse.

Boys Keep Swinging

Or at least Robbie does according to ‘Swing When You’re Winning’, one of many CDs by the ex-Take Thatter you can pick up at your leisure. David Gray’s ‘White Ladder’ used to be prominent; I don’t think it’s recent lack of visibility is down to a new-found love for the album, more that everyone who wanted shot of it did so a while back. Jack Johnson and Army-man-turned-Twitter-comedian James Blunt are common finds.

And the rest ...
From the 90s you can expect to find Simply Red's 'Stars' and Robson & Jerome; the noughties offer up The Scissor Sisters self-titled debut and follow-up 'Ta-Dah' and Mika's 'Life In Cartoon Motion'. It's possibly too early to see any significant trends for whatever the current decade is supposed to be called, although the Only Men Aloud! CD is becoming a regular spot. I'd have predicted Florence & The Machine but their recent promotion to Glastonbury headliners has bought them at least another couple of years in people's collections. 1D look vulnerable, as do Mumford and Sons following the lukewarm reaction to their latest album. Time will tell ...

SOUNDS June 17 1978

I recently visited my local Freecycle group's page for the first time in a while and was immediately drawn to the following listing:

Melody Makers, 1978-1982. Over 20 copies, plus odd copies of Sounds, Record Mirror, Hot Press from that area.

Even better, they were only round the corner from me so I fired off a hopeful email. It turned out I was the only respondent and a few hours later I had them in my possession. Seems like a good idea to work through them, starting with ....

SOUNDS
June 17 1978
Cover: The Clash
Lead album review: 'Tonic For The Troops', Boomtown Rats
Lead live review: Ian Gillan Band
Alternative chart #1: 'Ain't Got No Clue', Lurkers
Single of the week: 'Under The Eye', Dennis Linde

1978. I should really have done some research on what was happening back then so I could pretend in the style of those ‘I Love The 70s’ shows that I have crystal-clear memories of things that I was obviously far too young to have shown even the slightest bit of interest in at the time, let alone recall.

It's a fair guess that I was either down the park playing football or out on my bike trying to clock up a few extra miles on my mileometer (okay, allow me a brief moment to reminisce – it was a hand-me-down Raleigh Strika, essentially a junior version of the Grifter but one-up on the Boxer, and with a pedal-back brake).

Hello (hello) hello (hello, hello)

What I definitely wasn’t interested in, or even aware of, was The Clash, yet here they are adorning the front page. Arguably punk's front-runners at this point given Johnny Rotten's recent departure from the Sex Pistols (page 2 references their search for a replacement singer along with details of Rotten's new, as-yet un-named band with Keith Levene & Jah Wobble), it's only right that I take this opportunity to slip on their debut LP, purchased nearly twenty-five years ago in a charity shop in, appropriately, Hammersmith.

Paul Simonon

It's a curious article, prefaced thus: "Pete Silverton gets them to talk. Chalkie Davies gets them to dress up in silly clothes and pose for pix". And it's true that Davies does just that, and recalling Mick Jones & Paul Simonon in their sailor outfits during their time with the Gorillaz makes me wonder whether this photo session gave them a taste for daft outfits.

Squeeze also command a large article as they tour the U.S. before they truly hit the UK charts, and their stride, the following year. At this stage they had the (largely) John Cale produced debut album under their belts; significantly, the two singles released from it were songs he didn't work on.

The issue's centre pages are taken up by a reasonably minimalist ad for Ijahman's debut LP, 'a joyous symphony that will enrich the spirit' apparently. Indeed it gets a 4* review a few pages on and the album's musicians get name-checked including the familiar-sounding rhythm section of Sly on drums and Robbie on bass.

Other LP reviews heap praise and 5* on the Boomtown Rats ("an outright masterpiece that gives rock and roll a good name") and the Real Kids ("one member of staff reckons it sounds like The Ramones meets Status Quo, which when you think of it is a pretty good gap to bridge"), while Dire Straits find themselves in just that with a mere 2.5* for their debut, with its "monotonous vocals" and a "lack of variety in momentum".

The fact that the live reviews kick off with ex-Deep Purple singer Ian Gillan, with Meat Loaf on the opposite page (they have Suicide in-between them), hammers home the fact that music magazines in 1978 didn't elect to limit themselves to specific genres. They were more all-encompassing (one issue I have to look forward to has Cliff Richard as its cover-star), with Sounds also carrying columns such as the 'Ranking Records' reviews of the latest roots & reggae releases.

Wot, no Judas?

The letters page proves that some activities now carried out online had their equivalents in 1978, hence Neil from Shepherds Bush criticising Sounds for allowing people to advertise Bob Dylan tickets at inflated prices. However the fact he didn't call anyone a Judas makes me think he wasn't really a true fan anyway.

Rachel, a "13 and a half year old XTC fan" from Caterham thanked Swindon's finest for putting on an under-16s concert at the Marquee, calling it "the best 60p I have ever spent" and adding that she hopes "Sounds do not ridicule my heroes again".

I couldn't find the single of the week (sorry, "this week's leading legend") on Spotify, but thankfully YouTube came to the rescue. "Hopefully this one won't be missed by the masses" they said. It was. But fear not. Dennis had the fact that he wrote 'Burning Love', a hit for a guy called Elvis who didn't work down the chip shop, to keep his spirits, and bank balance, up.

Indeed their are a few artists with singles out that I've never heard of. Listening to some of these today I'm thinking Mr Albarn may have heard Patrik Fitzgerald's 'Backstreet Boys' ("unique urchin makes good EP shock"); elsewhere there was Humphrey Ocean's Ian Dury-penned 'Whoops A Daisy' ("sounding not surprisingly Dury-esque"); and Johnny Rubbish with 'Living in NW3 4JR', who also doesn't make it to Spotify, maybe due to him apparently being "rubbish by name and nature".

Blur - Vinyl box set

Blur
21 (21 CD set)
Blur (7 LP set)

Announced overnight, an extensive re-issue package will see remastered editions of Blur's back catalogue be released on July 30th 2012. As well as the 21 CD set (consisting of 21 CDs funnily enough, including 65 unreleased tracks) there will also be a 13 LP box set, available to pre-order now.

'Leisure' will appear as a single LP, with the subsequent six albums each spread over two discs, all pressed on heavyweight 180 gram, audiophile vinyl. The first five albums have been remastered by Frank Arkwright, overseen by Stephen Street.

Original vinyl editions command high prices - with LPs selling in neglible quantities through the 1990s they're very hard to come by. As well as celebrating Blur's aural greaness this could well be a canny investment. And with the Amazon 'price guarantee' you can pre-order now and, should the price drop, you pay the lower price. Can't say fairer than that.