A Motion Picture You Will Never Forget

The first Barry Adamson solo single was a cover of The Man With The Golden Arm, composed by Elmer Bernstein for the 1955 film of the same name, starring Frank Sinatra.

As a statement of intent for Moss Side Story, the debut album also released in 1988, it was perfect. The quick time tempo of the original is slowed right down to a brooding, rumbling, menacing tune, so that when the dramatic stabs come in, it hits. 

The Man With The Golden Arm is placed at the end of Moss Side Story's flowing narrative of (mostly) imaginary soundtracks and theme tunes, but I recorded the song from my copy of the 12" single as the opening track of several mixtapes over the years. It works every way.

I've rarely if ever seen the video, and whilst it was no surprise to see the film noir story unfold with Barry in the titular role, the remaining cast and crew were. Barry's paramour is played by 18-year old Minnie Driver, in what must have been one of her first professional acting roles, whilst the striptease artist is none other than Marcia Schofield, better known (to me at least) as keyboard player with The Fall.

The video is directed by Angela Conway, a fellow Mute recording artist as A.C. Marias, and who went on to direct videos for The Smashing Pumpkins, Bryan Ferry, Nitzer Ebb, Maria McKee and Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, to name a few.

I think I saw The Man With The Golden Arm not long after. Maybe it was included in the Alex Cox-curated Moviedrome series on BBC2 but I also watched it on the big screen at the Watershed in Bristol and, in the early 1990s, bought the film as a budget-price VHS cassette.

Both the VHS tape and player are long gone and I haven't seen the film in years but, along with The Manchurian Candidate, ranks as one of Frank Sinatra's finest moments on celluloid. 

Here's the trailer, with a snippet of Elmer Bernstein's original score.

 

Nuns On The Run

Girl Missing by Albertine Sarges was an accidental but fun discovery. 

Released as a single on 7th January, it's a precursor - and title track - to her imminent second album. Girl Missing is out in full on 21st February, but a pre-order on Bandcamp will provide downloads of 5 of the 13 songs.

Albertine is Berlin based and her music has been appearing since 2020 via Moshi Moshi Records, a label which I frequently forget how much I enjoy. So, my loss that I've missed out on Albertine's music so far and I will be diving into the back catalogue pronto.

The video for Girl Missing is a lot of fun. Not, as the post title suggests, a homage to the rather underwhelming 1990 film starring Eric Idle and Robbie Coltrane, yet featuring nuns. On the run. Albertine's notes on the song and video's background makes for an entertaining and insightful read.

As these things do, Girl Missing inevitably got me thinking of A.C. Marias, the duo of artist Angela Conway and Wire guitarist Bruce Gilbert, specifically One Of Our Girls Has Gone Missing, also a single and album title, albeit from 35 years ago.

A quick search unearthed the video from 1989 featuring dancer Julie Hood, a founder member of Michael Clark & Co. The previous year, Julie was a key performer in I Am Curious, Orange, the now infamous collaboration between Michael Clark and Mark E. Smith. 

Everything is connected. 

Indie Top 20 Jukebox

Indie Top 20 was a visible presence on the record racks everywhere from your friendly neighbourhood record shop to HMV and Our Price, Woolies and WH Smith. 

A modest start in 1987 saw Volume 1 issued by Band Of Joy Music Ltd., stating that "This high definition Ferric Cassette contains 20 full length hits by the original artists selected from the National Indie Charts in the weeks immediately preceding this release." 

The cassette was repackaged and relaunched in conjunction with Melody Maker and Beechwood Music, the latter continuing with the series (and expanding to vinyl) until volume 23 in 1996. 

Volume 1, side 1, track 1 was Mickey Way (The Candy Bar) by A Certain Ratio. The final song on volume 23 was Andrex Puppy Love by Orange Deluxe.

Today's selection culls from volumes 1-10. Not an original idea, by any stretch of the mark: Beechwood themselves issued their own 'best of' in the 1990s and, before that, the self-explanatory CD88, the series' first shiny disc issue and an essential snapshot, in my opinion.

I wasn't an avid collector of the series, to be honest. I got a couple of the early issues but I pretty much bailed out after CD88 as by then I was more interested (and financially able) to pick up the individual singles and albums of the artists I liked. That said, I'd always pick up a copy of the latest issue for most of the 1980s, just to have a look at the track list.

So, why an 11-track selection? Indie Top 20 Volume 4 (1988) was issued in two separate volumes. Part 1, sub-titled State Of Independents, featured The Smiths, The Woodentops, Pop Will Eat Itself and The Wedding Present. Part 2, sub-titled House, was a nod to the inescapable wave of club music, so S'Express, Coco, Steel & Lovebomb and Smith & Mighty. 

The latter appear in my selection, though the remainder is more firmly rooted in the guitar-based alternative scene, whether jangly (Talulah Gosh, The Field Mice) or jarring (The Leather Nun, Thee Hypnotics). Some of these I will have first heard on the radio, courtesy of Janice Long, Andy Kershaw, Annie Nightingale or John Peel. Considering A Move To Memphis by The Colorblind James Experience was a Peel favourite and swiftly became one of mine too.

As the first volume noted, these songs were hits as far as the National Indie Charts were concerned, but none of the choices on this selection particularly troubled the UK singles charts. So, what better way to bring things to a close than with a bonafide smash hit from The Charlatans? The Only One I Know was their second single and on this day in 1990, was sitting at a high of #9, the second of three weeks in the Top 10. And it still sounds fantastic today.

1) Please Don't Sandblast My House: One Thousand Violins (1986)

2) Talulah Gosh (Single Version): Talulah Gosh (1987)

3) Lost And Found: The Leather Nun (1987)

4) You Make Me Feel (Album Version): The Woodentops (1988)

5) The Dark, Dark House (Special Re-Mix): Smith & Mighty ft. Jackie Jackson (1988)

6) I'm In Love With A Girl Who Doesn't Know I Exist (Single Version): Another Sunny Day (1988)

7) Considering A Move To Memphis (Album Version): The Colorblind James Experience (1987)

8) Preachin’ & Ramblin’: Thee Hypnotics (1989)

9) If You Need Someone: The Field Mice (1990)

10) One Of Our Girls Has Gone Missing (Album Version): A.C. Marias (1989)

11) The Only One I Know (Album Version): The Charlatans (1990)

Indie Top 20 Jukebox (44:10) (KF) (Mega)

A Heart Of Fool's Gold

Back with a selection of 1980s alternative/indie 12" versions to enliven your weekend.

Earlier this year, I included Peter Hook's original mix of Elephant Stone by The Stone Roses in the last of my Six Degrees Of Kevin Bacon posts. Here's the more familiar 12" mix by John Leckie. Can it really be 35 years old?! I never got into The Stone Roses in a big way at the time, though with the benefit of hindsight it's hard to deny that their debut album and singles like Elephant Stone were pretty amazing.

And this is where my timeline memory gets very confused. As The Stone Roses were paving the way to the future, All About Eve were just about to make it big, presaged by the single Our Summer. Hard to imagine now that the two bands were contemporaneous. This 12" version was produced by their mates from The Mission, Wayne Hussey and Simon Hinkler, who were also enjoying a bit of commercial success - and Smash Hits interviews - themselves. 

 

Cat-House by Danielle Dax was a staple of the alternative clubs I frequented in the late 80s/early 90s. I didn't own the 12" single but I did have CD88: The Vinyl, one of the quality and reasonably priced Indie Top 20 series that were great for penniless students like me at the time. The album included Our Summer and Cat-House, albeit in their single versions. Extended mixes of the latter popped up on a US-only 12" in 1989.

Earlier this week, SWC at the ever-excellent No Badger Required wrote about the race to be the first person to be 'into a band' when growing up. Big Audio Dynamite were 'my' band when I was at secondary school. A few kids had The Clash scrawled on their school bags or jackets but, let's be honest, we were all a bit late for that and had only heard of them by nicking borrowing our older sibling's records. Nobody had heard of Big Audio Dynamite, though, so buying those early 12" singles and the debut album was a moment. It helped that they were bloody brilliant, not least Medicine Show with it's Sergio Morricone samples and dub-inflected extended version.

A.C. Marias was essentially a duo of Angela Conway and Wire's Bruce Gilbert. I first heard a song (Give Me) on a Mute compilation and bought the single One Of Our Girls Has Gone Missing on 3" CD with a lengthy cover version of Vicious by Lou Reed as the B-side. There was no extended version of One Of Our Girls Has Gone Missing on either the 12" or CD single but the album version is about a minute and a half longer, so that's good enough for me.

Love And Rockets were born from the ashes of Bauhaus in 1985 and arguably found greater commercial success in the USA than the UK. I liked their earlier singles, including Yin And Yang (The Flowerpot Man) featured here, which has a rockabilly vibe yet can still be traced back to their earlier goth/post-punk roots. 

I resisted The Blue Nile for too long. The constant music press gushing in the late 1980s, telling me that I must like The Blue Nile because they ploughed a similar furrow of organic musical exploration and experimentation as one of my favourite bands, Talk Talk, actually made me less not more inclined to check them out. I learned the error of my ways years later and whilst they've never quite hit the spot that Mark Hollis and co. achieved, I shouldn't have let the journos put me off all those years ago!

 

The first time I heard the 12" version of Soul Mining by The The was when I bought the 12" double pack of Infected in 1986. Labelled as a "previously unreleased" version, it also popped up on the cassette format of the Infected single, the CD single re-release of Sweet Bird Of Truth (1987) and on the limited edition 2nd CD single of The Beat(en) Generation (1989). The B-side of the Uncertain Smile 12" single in 1983 contains Soul Mining (Definitive Version) which to these amateur ears sounds identical to the "unreleased" version. Either way, it's a great version, as all The The's 12" singles were throughout the 1980s. No surprise then that the song provides the title for this selection and an apt closure.

Happy weekend everyone, wherever you find yourself and whatever you may be doing.

More nonsense here tomorrow, more or less same time.

 

1) Elephant Stone (12" Version By John Leckie): The Stone Roses (1988)

2) Our Summer (Extended Mix By Simon Hinkler & Wayne Hussey): All About Eve (1987)

3) Cat-House (Overnight Mix By Danielle Dax & Renny Hill): Danielle Dax (1989)

4) Medicine Show (12-Inch Remix By Paul 'Groucho' Smykle): Big Audio Dynamite (1985)

5) One Of Our Girls Has Gone Missing (Album Version By Bruce Gilbert, Gareth Jones, John Fryer & Paul Kendall): A.C. Marias (1989)

6) Yin And Yang (The Flowerpot Man) (Remix By John A. Rivers): Love And Rockets (1986)

7) Tinseltown In The Rain (Album Version By Paul Buchanan & Robert Bell): The Blue Nile (1983)

8) Soul Mining (Definitive Version By Matt Johnson & Paul Hardiman): The The (1983) 

 

1983: A Walk Across The Rooftops: 7

1983: Uncertain Smile EP: 8

1985: Medicine Show EP: 4 

1986: Yin And Yang (The Flowerpot Man) EP: 6

1987: Our Summer EP: 2

1988: Elephant Stone EP: 1 

1989: Cat-House EP: 3

1989: One Of Our Girls (Has Gone Missing): 5

 

A Heart Of Fool's Gold (45:16) (KF) (Mega)