More Copeulation

Side 2 of a Julian Cope mixtape, assembled during the summer of 1990.

Depending on your opinion of Cope, having two consecutive selections is either a treat or a torment. Following swiftly on from yesterday's post - and the first of what would become many Julian Cope mixtapes - today's selection is the flipside of the Copeulation collection. 

Again, this favours the Skellington and Droolian albums, with a few select B-sides and a tribute to a Hollywood icon that's become one of Cope's best-loved songs.

Things kick off in raucous fashion with the limited edition 12" remix of Trampolene, housed in a unique sleeve that paid homage to John Cale's 1972 album, The Academy In Peril. In a commercially unwise move, both the regular 7" & 12" contained the same four songs but, as these examples demonstrate, they were pretty damn good.

Disaster had been around since 1984, when Julian included it in his session for Janice Long on Radio 1. Likewise, the origins of Droolian began in 1988 with the recording of Church Of England 1991...

 

Robert Mitchum is a wonderful, wonderful song, lifted even more by Cope's half-arsed attempts at French. Less of a tribute but equally brilliant, Bill Drummond Said is classic Cope and inspired the subject to pen his own 'response', Julian Cope Is Dead. 

 

My Nation Underground is served by one more song, the brilliant should-have-been-bigger single Charlotte Anne. I've also realised that by swapping the album version of Eve's Volcano on yesterday's selection and using only 12" mixes, I'm left with nothing from the Saint Julian album. For the record, I think it's a better album than My Nation Underground.

Don't Crash Here holds a special, relatively more recent meaning for me. I used to sing it to my daughter when she was a baby, as it was guaranteed to make her laugh, especially my attempts to replicate Cope's chest beating percussion. Come to think of it, she laughed at of my attempts to sing full stop, so maybe it wasn't the song after all...

1) Trampolene Warne Out! (Long Version By Warne Livesey) (1987)

2) Bill Drummond Said (Album Version) (1984)

3) Disaster (Single Version) (1987)

4) S.P.Q.R. (1988)

5) The Bloody Assizes (1984)

6) Church Of England 1991... (1988)

7) Robert Mitchum (Album Version) (1989)

8) An Elegant Chaos (Album Version) (1984)

9) Sqwubbsy (1990)

10) Charlotte Anne (1988)

11) Don't Crash Here (1989)

12) Mock Turtle (1987)

13) Kelly... (1990)

14) Everything Playing At Once (Album Version) (1989)

 

1984: World Shut Your Mouth: 8

1984: Fried: 2, 5

1987: Trampolene EP: 1, 3, 12

1988: 5 o'Clock World EP: 4

1988: My Nation Underground: 10

1989: Skellington: 7, 11, 14

1990: Droolian: 6, 9, 13

Side Two (45:45)