Friday Camp Out At The Shops

In other words, it's Bandcamp Friday and I am poised to purchase.

I already had a long list, including

‘Aphex Meets Some Simple Minds Uptown’: sLEdger

Disturbia: Phonolab (Gaudi & Eraldo Bernocchi)

Don't Leave Me This Way (Cover of Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes): Crooked Man

La Musica (2025 Version): Munk & Kapote

Vertigo: Michele Mininni

Wise Music In Dub: Dennis Bovell

...and here are five more new releases that have jumped the queue from Bicep, Bright Eyes (gone ska!), Cardiacs, Adrian Sherwood and Daphni aka Dan Snaith.

Tame Impala's new single isn't available on Bandcamp, but it's so good I had to include it. And, based on the shite weather in this neck of the woods in the past few days, calling the song The End Of Summer perhaps wasn't as premature as I first thought...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

535

The link today is that this is my 535th post and all of the four featured tracks have (according to Discogs at least) a running time of 535 seconds or 8:55 in proper currency.

The selection's opening song is possibly the most demanding. It's a different, longer take of the closing song from The Velvet Underground and Nico's debut album, taken from sessions recorded at Scepter Studios in New York on 25th April 1966. A couple of acetates surfaced in the late 2000s, one of which found it's way onto bootleg vinyl, CD and MP3s. The sound quality wasn't great and the acetate was full of pops, skips and crackles. In 2011 James Eldred, creator of the mighty Lost Turntable blog, had a go at cleaning up and posting the Scepter Studios Sessions and I think he did a pretty good job. European Son is a testing listen in it's commercially released form and this version pushes the listener's tolerance further still. However, I can visualise Lou, John, Sterling and Mo going for it in the studio and it takes me past the inescapable shortcomings of the audio.

In my mind, the only way to follow that is with even more out there weirdness and cacophony. Step up, Cardiacs. The opening verse sets out it's stall immediately:

We cut all his eyes we did
Squeezed the lids and down the grog into hole
He skip with cow eyed smile to the blissful
Into craggy dress and we will we praise him
We will praise him off his pins
Clear him of all sins
Oh my! we sang with strength to carry on
Encouraged him to sing along
We sang of all the world and praised him hooray!

 

By comparison, She's A Superstar by Verve (in 1992 missing the definite article) is lyrically in the realm of 6th form poetry:

She got my woe
Got my hand
Took the dreams right outta my head
She bought the world
I paid the bills
I took those pills
It was wind in her sails

 

Nevertheless, Richard Ashcroft's vocals are softer and more complementary to the music, a swirling sea of sound, with drums, guitars and vocals coming in and out to great effect. I much prefer early Verve to the worthy, anthemic incarnation that came later.  

Julian Cope is no stranger to a witty way with words, often veering from the sublime to the ridiculous in the same song. Mighty Carl Jung is described on Head Heritage as a "pre-Autogeddon workout". This version was completed in 1997, placing it in the 'wilderness years' following his last record label album, Interpreter, in 1996. It's a decent enough song but didn't fit with the self-released and largely instrumental albums that immediately followed, Rite² (1997) and Woden (1998). Mighty Carl Jung eventually found a home thirteen years later on odds 'n' sods compilation Floored Genius 3 (also self-released) in 2000. The song is worth it for the lyrical pairing of Carl Jung and Donkey Kong alone.

 

1) European Son (Scepter Studios Sessions, 4-25-66: Mo Tucker Acetate Digitally Restored By The Lost Turntable, 2011): The Velvet Underground (1966)

2) Dirty Boy: Cardiacs (1996)

3) She's A Superstar (Full Length Version): The Verve (1992)

4) Mighty Carl Jung: Julian Cope (1997)

1992: She's A Superstar EP: 3

1996: Sing To God: 2

2000: Floored Genius 3: Julian Cope's Oddicon Of Lost Rarities & Versions 1978-98: 4

2011: Scepter Studios Sessions, 4-25-66: 1

535 (34:52)

Though It's Never Quite At Home In The World Today

A random shuffle started with Cardiacs' Is This The Life, the re-recorded 'hit' version from 1988's A Little Man And A House And The Whole World Window. 

 

The song appeared in its full length form in my mix CD, You Never Really Saw..., last summer but here's the promo video, with cleaned up, synched and edited audio taken from the aforementioned album version. Cardiacs really were like nothing else, either on record or live on stage (I was lucky enough to see them once in 1996).

 

By way of compensation for the video edit hacking off the final two minutes, here's an incendiary live version from 1990 which more than compensates, the third and final encore of an 18-song set.

By all accounts, it was a horrendous gig for the band: Tim Smith's guitar fell apart, the keys fell off Sarah Smith's saxophone and it kept cutting out, the band couldn't hear each other; Tim Quy, a member since 1980, left  the band shortly after. From an audience/viewer's perspective, the performance is spectacular.

 

Is This The Life (Video Edit): Cardiacs (1988)

Is This The Life (Live @ Salisbury Arts Centre, 30th June 1990): Cardiacs

She's My Groovy Good Luck Friend

Celebrating Janice Long, 5th April 1955 to 25th December 2021.

 

This is a later-than-usual post, for obvious reasons. I had something else lined up for today but after reading the sad news last night of Janice's passing on Christmas Day, I wanted to pay tribute instead.

 

I probably listened to Janice Long more than John Peel on Radio 1 as a teen, mainly because her evening show slot usually coincided with doing homework or otherwise avoiding my family in my bedroom. The sessions on her show were every bit as essential to my discovering new bands and artists, who have stuck with me for a lifetime. I haven't got as many Janice Long sessions in my collection as I thought, so there are some glaring anomalies (Primal Scream's Velocity Girl, for one) and this is another of those selections that doesn't begin to do justice to the breadth of Janice's shows and her passion for music.

Instead, this is quite alternative/indie-heavy and mainly focuses on 1984 to 1988, the period when I was a regular listener to her Radio 1 show. I've acquired a quite few songs retrospectively over the years, including quite a few that I didn't hear when originally broadcast (e.g. the Gold Blade track from the 1990s). I didn't follow Janice's move from Radio 1 and I've rarely listened to the radio from 2000 onwards, but it's clear from the tributes that her joy and enthusiasm for music remained undimmed. A genuine trailblazing DJ and presenter. Thank you, Janice.

 

1) Feminine Gender: Ranking Ann (4th August 1985)

2) Turkish Song Of The Damned: The Pogues (22nd October 1986)

3) Groovy Good Luck Friend: BMX Bandits (8th June 1986)

4) Christmas Mourning: Julian Cope (12th December 1984)

5) Home Is Where The Heart Is: The Chameleons (13th March 1985)

6) Ballad Of The Band: Felt (12th February 1986)

7) Winter Coat: The Bible (5th November 1986)

8) The Whole World Is Turning: Toots & The Maytals (19th August 1987)

9) Gave You My Love: Aswad (13th September 1984)

10) Ruthless: Cabaret Voltaire (10th October 1984)

11) Piece Of You: Soho (8th November 1987)

12) America: The Communards (13th October 1985)

13) Independence Day (Cover of Comsat Angels): Voice Of The Beehive (7th March 1988)

14) What Do You Mean?: The Blue Aeroplanes (15th February 1987)

15) Frenz: The Fall (13th May 1987)

16) Traumas Traumas Traumas: Marc Almond (16th January 1985)

17) Is This The Life: Cardiacs (29th November 1987)

18) The Word Around Town: David Westlake & The Go-Betweens (14th January 1987)

19) Ostrich: Danielle Dax (1st December 1985)

20) Football Hooligan: Tippa Irie (26th June 1985)

21) 5 True Believers: Gold Blade (17th March 1997)

22) Take Me To The Girl: Associates (8th September 1985)

She's My Groovy Good Luck Friend (1:22:01) (KF) (Mega)

You Never Really Saw...

I unearthed this CD-R, which I compiled and burned on 1st June 2005, featuring "alternative 1980s twelve inch mixes". 

This got me reminiscing about going to alternative clubs in Bristol, such as Badlands and The Whip. The latter I've discovered has had it's own Facebook page for years...I'm always late to the party! 

In all honesty, I think the majority of these songs would never had made it near the turntable of most of the clubs I went to at the time. Attempting to play The Icicle Works or U2 would likely have resulted in a Snakebite shower, but Is This The Life, How Soon Is Now?, Uncertain Smile and She Sells Sanctuary were regularly played, along with Fetish by Vicious Pink and Nag Nag Nag by Cabaret Voltaire. 

I'm not sure if it was always there, but I remember Badlands being in a small room above a huge club called Busbys (maybe Ritzys by that time), so there was always the fun of 'mingling' with the mainstream crowd on the way in and out. The Whip was even more fun in that respect as it was in The Studio, in a small room off the main club area, and you had to run the gauntlet of pissed up lager louts dancing to Stock, Aitken & Waterman to get to and from the bogs. 

A limbering up session at The Bunch Of Goths on Denmark Street usually got you ready for the long night (& morning) ahead, followed by an 'all back to mine' at someone's place in Stokes Croft or a 'keep going til the dawn' refresher at the wonderful Jamaican Good Food in St. Pauls. Great times.

1) The Love Parade (12" Version): The Undertones (1983)

2) Is This The Life (12" Version): Cardiacs (1988)

3) Summertime (Extended Version): Fun Boy Three (1982)

4) Hollow Horse (Long Version: The Icicle Works (1984)

5) She Sells Sanctuary (Long Version): The Cult (1985)

6) Finest Worksong (Lengthy Club Mix): R.E.M. (1987)

7) Two Tribes (Carnage): Frankie Goes To Hollywood (1984)

8) How Soon Is Now? (12" Version): The Smiths (1984)

9) Driving Away From Home (I Mean After All It's Only 'Dead Man's Curve'): It's Immaterial (1986)

10) Two Hearts Beat As One (Club Version): U2 (1983)

11) Skin Deep (Extended Version): The Stranglers (1984)

12) Uncertain Smile (Extended Version): The The (1982)

 

You Never Really Saw... (1:18:33) (KF) (Mega)