With the February edition landing (albeit not quite addressed to me; more on that another time) I thought I should re-visit what January had on offer.
When it arrived we took our lead from the final round of Pointless and, having flicked through the accompanying booklet, put the 5 singles in order of how much we thought we would like each one, leaving the possible best to last.
Flying Vinyl: The Class of January 2016
Thankfully, and quite brilliantly, we were proved wrong. January's stand-out single was one of the first we played: step forward Cameron AG. If we'd adopted the same approach on Spotify we may never have heard the stripped-down joy that is Lost Direction.
I don't think there's a single act in the January box that I wouldn't be interested in seeing live. So if Phobophobes, Storms, Otherkin, Junk Son or Cameron AG want to add a Cambridge date to their next tours, they can expect an audience of at least two.
Kids. They think they know it all. They think they're the first to do certain things, things us old folk would never have dreamed of doing. Well no. We've been there. Done that. And judging by this inner sleeve, a variation of snog, marry & avoid has been around since the 60s.
The verdict: Snog Mickey Dolenz, marry Peter Tork, avoid both Mike Nesmith & Davy Jones.
For those of a certain age, the mere mention of a mail-order music club will bring back memories of packages from Ilford landing on doormats nationwide as once again Britannia Music Club members neglected to cancel the latest 'album of the month'. That introductory offer, which seemed such a great deal in the Sunday supplement, felt less so with each unwanted arrival. But at least you were one more full-priced album closer to fulfilling their membership terms.
A more credible variation was that run by Rough Trade, who I was surprised to discover (just now) are not currently offering new subscriptions. This appears to be a recent, and possibly temporary, development.
I was the recipient on an appropriately-numbered birthday of a subscription to Flying Vinyl. And, having failed to notify them earlier that I didn't want it, thank you very much, I found myself spending Christmas trying to convince myself of the merits of my recently delivered CD of Take That's III.
Now I'm sure I don't need to point out that some of the above may not be true, as I did of course actually receive a nice little box housing five well-packaged 7" singles, some tasting notes and a reminder that The Revolution Will Not Be Digital. My apologies for not broadcasting this on long wave.
Flying Vinyl: The Class of December 2015
Having only limited existing knowledge of two of the five artists, and having briefly heard just one of them, the scene was set and each single was played in its entirety. Both sides. No impatient skipping during intros. No leaving the room and no checking Twitter or Facebook. This was indeed a time for analogue to come to the fore.
Ten sides of vinyl later it was felt that Sweden's Magic Potion just edged it ahead of Glasgow's Temperance Movement. A slightly younger me strongly lobbied for the latter but I think I haven't quite got over the fact that someone once recommended them to me, only for me to find that they had played less than a mile away from my home the day before. But ultimately there were no losers - all five singles will be played again and chewed over. Further recordings and gigs will be sought. And an eager eye will keep watch on the letterbox around January 18th.
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Well, not quite. More a case of six 7" singles picked up over the years from charity shops which were either unexpected (prototype NY punk in E17?) or unknown to me. But perhaps between them they are the answer to the ultimate question.
Seems only right to start with this, a fresh acquisition that rather stood out amongst the Smokie and Racey singles in my local Cats Protection shop. The stamped labels with their minimal information screamed DIY but I had no idea what the grooves might contain. I took a look online before parting with my 50p and was able to quickly gauge that it was one of only two singles released by Industrial Accident Records, and with a run of 500 copies. On playing it The Institution revealed themselves as a band that tapped into a new wave / reggae sound, not quite ska but also not The Police either. Mrs DGW commented, quite fairly, that it sounded a little like The Libertines. The Discogs listing for Jane And Jon didn't provide much additional information but on clicking through to the label's only other release, Don't Go Away by Sonic Tonix, I found that both bands featured members that went on to form cult indie legends The Jazz Butcher. Nice to find an early slice of that band's history.
I had no difficulty identifying this single. The very song that famously saw the New York Dolls derided as 'mock rock' by smug looking, sorry, Whispering Bob Harris, it was a surprise find in a Walthamstow charity shop, sometime back in the early 1990s. Note the songwriting credit with unnecessary apostrophe. When your record company does that you know they're not wholly supporting your band.
Another purchase from the 90s. Given its release year (1978) and the image of the band, No Dice, on the back of the sleeve I figured this would probably be an underwhelming single from the footnotes of the post-punk era. Instead Why Sugar is the best record the Faces never made.
As discussed in the BBCs 'The Joy Of The Single' documentary, sometimes the b-side of a single is where it's at. Here, the Casinos put out a pretty inoffensive ballad, Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye as the a-side but flip it over and I Still Love You, although not ground-breaking, has one hell of a hook in its verse.
The contribution of The Birds to 60s pop history rests on two things. Firstly, not being The Byrds and secondly, having Ronnie Wood in their ranks. I was aware of their existence and the rarity value of their few releases so I wouldn't have expected to find this in a pile of otherwise junk sleeveless singles. But there it was, far from mint and its over-sized hole suggesting it had spent some time waiting patiently in a jukebox. It's crackly but no worse for it.
I can't claim to have known who I Giganti were. But they looked like they were worth a punt. And again it's the b-side, La Bomba Atomica, that stands out. Curiously I was in a local independent Italian pizzeria recently that was playing 60s Italian guitar pop and I joked that maybe some I Giganti would come on; mid-meal the a-side, Tema, duly made an appearance. When occasionally DJing at a friend's club in the 1990s, La Bomba Atomica was the only song that was allowed to breach its 'nothing pre-1970' rule. Not even the first Stooges album, or the likes of Beggars Banquet or Let It Bleed, got a look in.
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 ...
MELODY MAKER November 4 1978 Cover: Keith Richards Lead album review: 'Dub Housing', Pere Ubu Lead live review: The Clash Single of the week: 'Nothing New', Bethnal The chances are that any TV show setting itself at the tail-end of 1978 would be using punk/new-wave music and imagery to help set its scenes, with maybe some disco elements thrown in for good measure. One look at the front of this issue of Melody Maker paints a very different picture, featuring as it does Keith Richards, Rod Stewart and Mike Oldfield. The Clash & Third World get a look in next to a piece referred to as 'Kraftwerk The Movie'. No such film exists as far as I know but instead ties to an article written in the style of a film script. The lead piece on Keef relates to him taking to the stage in New York after his trial following his legendary drugs bust in Canada, which ultimately triggered him finally kicking heroin. I used to have a poster of photos of Keef from 1962 through to around 1990 and it always seemed to be that his appearance changed significantly around this time; it was almost as if the heroin had been slowing down his ageing process. There's a gallery here where you can judge for yourself. Richards has also claimed that he never had a cold during his heroin years, and that governments knew full well it was the cure for the common cold but didn't want to admit it. It can be assumed then that Eddie & The Hot Rods weren't users as p3 reveals they were cancelling a short run of Scottish dates as various members of the band had flu. I was pleased to see an ad for Our Price inside the front cover, having worked there over a couple of stints a decade or so later. I was there when they were a fully-fledged national chain and opened their 300th store; in November 1978 they had 10, all with 01 telephone numbers. Alongside a Top 60 rundown ('Grease' at #1), the ad prominently features the Fabulous Poodles. From flicking through this pile of issues they, along with several other bands I'm not familiar with, crop up quite a lot although my route to them was via seeing their singer (Tony de Meur when he was a Poodle; Ronnie Golden when I saw him; his website reveals more on his various personas) provide the musical backing for 'Arthur Smith Sings Leonard Cohen' (downloadable here). Johnny Rotten may have worn a customised 'I Hate Pink Floyd' t-shirt but Melody Maker were happy to give keyboardist Rick Wright a platform to discuss his recent solo album while also dropping hints about a new project Floyd were about to start work on: "I can't say what it is .... it's Roger's baby, his thing ....it is a very strong idea .... a very involved thing and we're doing a film as well. It's a film based on the idea of the music that Roger has written for the album". The elongated recording process of the resulting album, The Wall, would see Wright leave the band albeit remaining as a session musician for the record and as a hired hand on the subsequent tour.
Paul Weller reviews the singles, name-dropping that he's a "personal friend of the band" before saying that Blondie's 'Hanging On the Telephone' just "doesn't do a lot for me". That's certainly not the only new release he dismisses, but the fact that he says on three occasions that he prefers the b-side shows he was pretty thorough. His appearance in the office doesn't prevent All Mod Cons from getting almost as good a kicking as the man who was down in the tube station at midnight; "If Paul Weller were to be a little less enthusiastic, a little less concerned with churning out singles like a bottle factory, and a little more selective in his approach, The Jam would not be in danger of becoming tiresome".
All the way through to its merger into the NME, Melody Maker was the go-to magazine for musicians wanted ads. Assorted tales exist of careers that owe their existence to those pages. Given he was born a few weeks after the ad to the right was placed, it's a fair guess that Mike Skinner didn't take almost a quarter of a century to go from a manager-less hopeful 'ready to roll' to the man behind Original Pirate Material. Whether Iver's Sledgehammer found themselves a vocalist, or Fanni from the Stillettos took any worthwhile calls from drummers may never be known. At a different level, a Mr Luigi was seeking a synth player to accompany a drummer on Friday & Saturday evenings, from nine until one pm in an Italian restaurant. Given that reads to me as a 16 hour shift I'm hoping the money was extremely good.
But my favourite ad has to be this one. I'm not entirely convinced this would be acceptable under current-day equal opportunities legislation. Is the 'warning' paragraph a description of their predecessor? Though it should be noted that to be (r)ejected you'd have to be all of those things and it's a pretty niche list. So if you're still determined you know what to do.
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".
