As Ruts DC prepare for the 40th Anniversary re-issue of their seminal album ‘The Crack’ we took time to chat to ‘new boy’ Leigh Heggarty, to ask which albums inspired him to take up guitar, to tell us about the albums that have made a difference to his life… the albums he returns to. We didn’t realise it would take quite so long, but Leigh really delved into himself to come up with this list, a list which to be honest he was till trying to alter even after submission!

To be honest we have also invited both Segs and Ruffy to provide their individual Top 10’s, that conversation took place at the North West Calling festival back in June 2018… come on gents, were waiting!!

My Top 10 Albums: Leigh Heggarty – Ruts DC

First things first – I like music. I really like music. No, I mean I REALLY like music.

There have been times in my little life that I haven’t thought about much else, and I’ll say now that it’s very likely that there will be more times like that in the future. In fact that’s pretty much what I’m doing now… consequently choosing my 10 favourite albums is not an easy task. I’m happy – ok, fairly happy – with the following choices, but I reserve the right to remake / remodel any part of what follows at any time in not-too-distant future. I might even do it as I’m going along.

Firstly a few ground rules:

There’s nothing here from the 21st Century. That’s not because I don’t like any more recent music, more that the term ‘favourite’ implies, for want of a better word, longevity – if you know what I mean.

They are all, broadly speaking, ‘rock’ music. I like other styles, but this is the (ahem!) genre that I’m most at home in.

They are all records – I still call them records, don’t you? – that (a) mean something to me emotionally and (b) influenced me as a musician. There are people playing on these records that I’ve never met and indeed will never meet, but that have been my friends at times when I didn’t have any friends. They still are sometimes. Intense? You betcha.

There is only one album from each featured artist – otherwise they would mostly have been by The Beatles, and The Who.

There’s only one compilation album, and one live album – ‘the inherent danger is that with an excess of freedom in all directions we will eventually destroy ourselves’ (Patrick McGoohan, 1977)

The list is correct at the time of going to press. Probably!

So with all of this in mind what follows is, in no particular order, my 10 favourite albums.

We’ll start, appropriately enough, at the beginning – with the first album that I ever bought. I’d had records as presents before, but here’s the one that I chose to throw my milk round money at. It’s a compilation album of previously released material so maybe it shouldn’t be here at all, but that doesn’t alter the fact that it was ground zero for your humble narrator. And in many ways, it still is…

The Who ‘Meaty, Beaty, Big And Bouncy’ (Track/Polydor Records: Rel October 1971)

I bought this a wee while after it was first released – it’s hard to say when exactly, but I reckon I was about 12, so maybe 1973. I’d heard Marc Bolan play ‘My Generation’ on a radio show (I think it was called ‘My Top Twelve’ where famous people played their favourite records – incidentally the first record I ever bought was ‘Metal Guru’. A good choice) which I dimly remembered from my childhood when the grown-ups hated it as they thought that it made fun of people who stuttered. When Marc played it I thought it was the greatest sound that I had ever heard. After a fair amount of time attempting to find out how one went about buying an LP as opposed to a single (things were tough for a quiet lad like me) and after much debating as to whether I could afford it I eventually found ‘MMB&B’ in the racks at Barnard And Warrens in Uxbridge. I will never forget the excitement of buying it, looking at the cover on the way home and eventually putting the record onto the turntable for the first time… seconds into ‘I Can’t Explain’ I was hooked. When ‘I’m A Boy’ finished I turned the record over and played it again. And again. And again. I drove the family mad. I drove my friends mad. I played it so much that I knew how long the gaps between the tracks were. I’ve still got it and it still plays. Just. Everything about it from the sleeve to the label was the stuff of wonderment. The performances were astonishing – Keith Moon’s patented exploding drumming, John Entwistle’s still-astounding bass playing, Pete Townshend’s slash ‘n’ burn power chords and Roger Daltrey’s he-man vocals are as great now as they were then, and there wasn’t – isn’t! – a bad track on it. Most bands aren’t performing their first single 5 years after it was released – The Who are still starting shows with theirs over 50 years later. The Greatest Rock ‘n’ Roll Band In The World with some of the best music ever created – I’ve got so excited writing this that I’m going to have to play it again now. See you in 43 minutes.

The Beatles ‘Revolver’ (Parlophone Records: Rel August 1966)

Choosing my favourite Beatles album isn’t hard – it’s all but impossible. In the last few days I’ve changed it gawd knows how many times. For example I have a huge sentimental attachment to ‘The White Album’ as I remember my two older cousins Steve and Gary playing it when we used to visit them up in Birkenhead during the school holidays. I was just starting to like (or as they would say, ‘getting into’ – this was the 1970s after all) music in a big way, and it’s endlessly fascinating collection of songs still amazes me today. But I’ve gone for ‘Revolver’ for a number of reasons, in addition to it being an indisputably brilliant record.

The band had released their first single ‘Love Me Do’ less that four years earlier – how they got from that to ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ is an endlessly baffling question. Actually how they got to ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ at all is pretty difficult to answer… with everybody involved at the top of their game Revolver combined great performances on ground-breaking songs with unsurpassed studio expertise to a record that may have been equalled (probably only by The Beatles themselves) but that has rarely if ever been surpassed. It’s incredibly varied – no track follows a song that is even remotely like it and yet they all somehow fit together, making the sum infinitely greater than the parts. From the string octet stylings of ‘Eleanor Rigby’ to the backward guitar brainstorm of ‘I’m Only Sleeping’ and from the kid’s singalong of Yellow Submarine’ to the psychedelic maelstrom of ‘She Said She Said’ it’s non-stop action all the way – and we haven’t even got to side two yet, where ‘For No One patiently awaits the ‘saddest song ever’ award. You want a soul horn section? ‘Got To Get You Into My Life’. You want blazing electric guitars? ‘And Your Bird Can Sing’. And don’t forget the standalone single recorded during the sessions – ‘Paperback Writer’ is a power pop classic while ‘Rain’ predicts heavy metal while introducing the unsuspecting world to backward vocals and tape vari-speeding. And I’ve even not mentioned George’s songs yet. A absolute masterpiece.
Then again, I’ve just played ‘Rubber Soul’ – surely that’s their best album? Maybe I should have gone for ‘The White Album’ after all? And then there’s ‘Abbey Road’. And I’d somehow forgotten ‘Sgt. Pepper’… (continued on page 94)

Sex Pistols ‘Never Mind The Bollocks – Here’s The Sex Pistols’ (Virgin Records: Rel October 1977)

For a while – a very short while as it happens – I tried not to include this one. It’s a bit, err, cliched to see it on ‘best of’ lists such as this isn’t it? After everybody who ever had an opinion about anything seems to have something to say about it; there must have been hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of words written about what is after all ‘only’ a ‘pop record’. Ah well – I’ll add my thoughts then…
I bought the album when it came out in October 1977 – I was 16 years old and still at school. At the time it seemed to be something that was – and this might well sound daft 40-odd years later, but hopefully you’ll get what I mean – a genuinely dangerous item to own. Well I told you that it might sound daft… but at the age I was punk rock had created the ultimate ‘them and us, if you’re not part of the solution you’re part of the problem’ situation. See what I mean by cliched?

But enough of my teenage traumas – for the moment at least – let’s get to the music. There was much taunting along the lines of ‘they can’t play’ from the non-believers and naysayers, and I guess in the case of old dear old Sid they might well have been correct, but that opened the door for Steve Jones and Paul Cook to combine forces to create producer Chris Thomas’s much-vaunted ‘Panzer Division’ of rock and roll power. Over this monstrous bedrock Johnny Rotten’s branding iron vocals somehow articulated every godawful thing that was wrong with the World that people like me were being forced to live in. Well that’s certainly how it felt to me at the time, and listened to today it’s lost none of it’s explosive force. Would it have been even better with Glen Matlock on bass? Maybe. It certainly would have been different, as one listen to any of the recordings that he plays on shows. And here I have to mention the (Berlin) wall of guitars – I’m not entirely sure that there are as many as some people say that there are, but it’s a helluva row isn’t it?
In the end NMTB remains the perfect storm of right place / right time, more-by-luck-than-judgement newsworthiness combined with a dozen slabs of utterly unprecedented powerhouse rock ‘n’ roll. From the opening bass drum of ‘Holidays In The Sun’ to the final moments of ‘E.M.I.’ (‘AAAAAY AANND EMMM…’) it has an unstoppable power and force. The only way it could possibly have been any better is if it had included all the B-Sides. And it ends with the blowing of a raspberry. Of course it does.

The Clash ‘London Calling’ (CBS/Epic Records: Rel December 1979)

Hmm. Another cliched choice.

Maybe. But it’s still bloody great isn’t it?

By 1979 The Clash were in an unusual position in that they had shown that it was more than possible to progress musically whilst still remaining a ‘punk’ band. From their adrenaline (or was it amphetamine?) powered debut album through a batch of classic singles and a second more rock-orientated long player they had managed to keep an ever-growing following despite many falling by the wayside. I loved ’em and lost many-a mate as a result in the teenage equivalent of collateral damage. ‘The Cost Of Living’ EP polarised opinion even further, as did ‘London Calling’. The music press alternately loved it or hated it, but that was nothing compared to what was happening on the streets (maaan!) where the wrong badge on your jacket could be a matter of life and death. For many the band had moved too far from their roots, the musical equivalent of ‘jack of all trades and master of none’. It also coincided with a drastic image change – which many hated whereas I just thought that they went from being the coolest looking people on Earth to being the coolest looking people in the known Universe.

The album itself is a fine example of (ooh, here comes another cliche!) the sum being greater than the parts, with the stylistic scattergun serving to make the overall collection stronger even though the individual songs do dip in quality here and there. The band sound as great as they look, with the time spent rehearsing in Vanilla Studios giving the band what Joe Strummer referred to at the time as a ‘rock ‘n’ roll power’ that few if any bands would ever match. Topper Headon’s much-vaunted mastery behind the drum kit meant that the band could go in pretty much any direction that they wanted to, from rock to reggae, from ska to jazz, from rockabilly to punk (oh yes!) and beyond – and while Guy Stevens’s production methods were infamously controversial he coaxed some amazing performances from the band. And if there’s a better ‘side 1 track 1’ than ‘London Calling’ itself then I’ve yet to hear it – an instant classic when released as a single, it’s brilliant promotional film somehow captures the mood of the album and indeed the prevailing times better than I ever will by writing about it here. It’s a shame that the B-side ‘Armagideon Time’ didn’t make it onto the album as it’s better than some songs that did – but as no lesser historical figure than John Cooper Clarke once said, ‘you can’t have everything. After all, where would you put it?’

Dr. Feelgood ‘Stupidity‘ (United Artists Records: Rel September 1976)

Seeing Dr. Feelgood playing live on the kid’s TV show The Geordie Scene’ was, to use yet another cliché, a watershed moment for your humble narrator. Their devastating performance cost me more than a few school friends
and in a funny sort of way helped to make me (ahem!) the man I am today. Yes – if it wasn’t for Lee, Wilko, Sparko and The Big Figure I’d have a job, a house, a car, a wife, a family… probably. I bought their monophonic, monochrome, monolithic masterpiece ‘Down By The Jetty’ and it’s equally excellent follow up ‘Malpractice’ before ‘Stupidity’, the live album that everybody had been waiting for, made number one in the charts and catapulted them to superstardom. Except of course, it didn’t. Mere months after it’s release Wilko was out of the band (replaced by the late and undeniably great Gypie Mayo) and for many things were never quite the same again. But ‘Stupidity’ remains a testament to their explosive power – recorded in Sheffield and Southend it houses stage-only cover versions of songs by the likes of Chuck Berry and Sonny Boy Williamson alongside Johnson originals that are so strong that they sit alongside the old classics with ease.

Everything that made The Feelgood’s so great is here, as Sparko and Figure’s powerhouse bass and drums, Lee’s guttural growl and Wilko’s broken-glass-guitar coalesce in a manner unlike anybody before or since. Highlights are many and varied, but the guitar solo in ‘I’m A Hog For You Baby’ still sounds as bonkers as it did when I first heard it, ‘Going Back Home’ (co-written with Pirates guitar hero Mick Green) is an amazing band performance and ‘Roxette’ is as near to musical perpetual motion as anything I’ve ever encountered. Footage of the Southend show exists, and if you’ve not seen it then check it out – these boys sounded and indeed looked like that when all too many bands were wearing capes and singing about goblins. Sadly I didn’t get to see this line-up of the band play live – I saw the band with Gypie – but I’ve attended many Wilko gigs and he remains a source of infinite inspiration. His well-documented diagnosis and subsequent recovery from cancer alongside his ascension to National Treasure status can’t alter the fact that he’s best known for being a brilliant and original musician – and his old band weren’t too bad either.

The Rolling Stones ‘Sticky Fingers’ (Rolling Stones Records: Rel April 1971)

There has to be a Stones album here, if only to acknowledge the enormous contribution Keith Richards has made to the much maligned and indeed misunderstood art of rhythm guitar – but as with The Beatles choosing one is no easy task, although for a very different reason. Whereas the Merseymen made so many great albums that it’s difficult to decide which one to go for, the Stones albums are often a few great tracks held together by all-too-many indifferent ones. ‘Exile On Main Street’ is an undoubted classic, but for me it falls apart a bit on side 3; ‘Beggars Banquet’ would be a contender if it had included the standalone single ‘Jumpin’ Jack Flash, and I’d choose ‘Rolled Gold’ if I hadn’t already chosen a compilation album elsewhere in this listing – so it has to be ‘Sticky Fingers’.

It’s the first full album to feature the great Mick Taylor as Keef’s six-string sparring partner, and whilst it’s a bit too laid back for many it features some undeniably great songs, from the narcotic swirl of ‘Sway’ to the Otis-charged ‘I Got The Blues’. ‘Wild Horses’ is as good a ballad as they’ve ever written, ‘Sister Morphine’ is as harrowing as it’s title suggests and ‘Dead Flowers’ keeps the C&W flag flying, albeit in a somewhat tongue-in-cheek way. ‘Can’t You Hear Me Knocking’ is unique in their catalogue, with the Richards rhythm guitar showing once again that the gaps are as important as the chords, Mick Taylor out-Santanaing Santana and Bobby Keyes blowing up a saxophone storm. And the only thing wrong with ‘Brown Sugar’ is that you’ve heard it too many times, often in the sweaty hands of dodgy pub covers bands. (Guilty your honour!) But give it a listen now – it’s bloomin’ great, with Bill and Charlie excelling at being, well, Bill and Charlie, the brothers-that-never-were Keef ‘n’ Keyes giving it everything, and Jagger at his ‘did he really just sing that?’ best. Talking of which – weren’t they taking a lot of drugs around this time? Cocaine eyes, speed freak jive, needles and spoons – no one sounds quite as out of it as The Stones because I suspect no one was quite as out of it as The Stones. Whatever, it’s the band at their best, casting their evil spells in a World that we would all kinda like to join them in but that we never ever will. Maybe that’s just as well.

And somehow, against all the odds, they’re still doing it today. Maybe that’s just as well too.

Bruce Springsteen And The E-Street Band ‘Darkness On The Edge Of Town’ (Columbia Records: Rel June 1978)

This is an album utterly unlike any other that I have ever heard.

Why? Well…

Firstly there’s the sound.

Dry.

Claustrophobic.

Suffocating.

Sounds good, doesn’t it?

Of course it does.

And then of course, there’s the songs. Let’s look at just one of them.

Side 1, track 4.

‘Candy’s Room’.

The song concerns the relationship between two people. Characters. An ‘ordinary’ man. An ‘ordinary’ woman. Except she happens to be a prostitute.
(Probably. Bruce isn’t telling. And why should he?)
It features one of the greatest vocal performances ever recorded. It starts as little more than a mumble, goes through more emotions than many singers manage in their entire career and by the end sounds beyond desperate. Well, you would be, wouldn’t you? It also has one of the most extraordinary guitar solos I’ve ever heard. It sounds as though both the player and his instrument are about to turn themselves inside out in an attempt to convey what’s going on in the man’s head. If someone told me that Springsteen had played it using a razor blade as a plectrum I wouldn’t be surprised. And the E-Street Band are with him at every twist and turn – and there are a lot of those. The word ‘intense’ doesn’t even begin to cover it. Amazing.

Candy’s Room is two minutes and forty six seconds long.

And that’s just one song out of ten.

As the man himself put it –

“More than rich, more than famous, more than happy – I wanted to be great.”

David Bowie ‘Aladdin Sane’ (RCA Records: Rel April 1973)

Much in the same way as there ‘has’ to be a Stones album here I feel as though David Bowie should make an appearance, although for rather different reasons. The outpouring of grief that followed The Thin White Duke’s passing in 2016 showed just how great an influence he had been on pop culture, be it through music, fashion or simply by showing that it’s alright to be different from the norm. He made so many fabulous albums – ‘Hunky Dory’ has some of his best songs, ‘Ziggy Stardust’ was game changing in pretty much every way and ‘Scary Monsters’ is an often-overlooked masterpiece – but after much musing I’ve gone for ‘Aladdin Sane’.

For starters there’s Mick Ronson’s guitar work – from the more-punk-than-punk opening chords of ‘Watch That Man’ to the acoustic beauty of ‘Lady Grinning Soul’ via the psychotic solo in ‘Time’ he runs riot over the record, sounding, as Mark Radcliffe brilliantly put it, ‘like a van load of police dogs’. Magnificent. The rhythm section of Trevor Bolder and Woody Woodmansey are rock-solid throughout, tackling some very varied styles of music with ease and aplomb – and then there’s the extraordinary piano playing of Mike Garson. Much has been made of his solo in the title track – and rightly so, as over 40 years later it still sounds like nothing on Earth – but his virtuoso work throughout the album takes the whole thing up to another hitherto uncharted level. Bowie himself was now by all accounts (including his own) totally in the grip of his alien alter ego, and in doing so came up with a remarkable set of songs – glam-tastic romps, Germanic cabaret, swooping ballads, Bo Diddley beats and a skewwhiff cover of ‘Let’s Spend The Night Together somehow all make sense next to each other. And if you didn’t hear ‘The Jean Jenie’ screaming out of a cheap transistor radio (preferably on a milk float, which is where I first heard it) then you’ll never know just how crazy it sounded next to the pop hits of the day. And talking of crazy, don’t forget the cover – I first saw it as an easily-amazed pre-teen but it doesn’t look any more, for want of a better word, ‘normal’ now does it? Mind you, after hearing this record, who in their right mind would want to be normal?

Johnny Thunders And The Heartbreakers ‘L.A.M.F.’ (Track Records: Rel October 1977)

Let’s All Make Friends? Something like that anyway…

The Velvet Underground. The MC5. The Stooges. The New York Dolls. All are legends these days and rightly so, but it wasn’t always like that. These were names – and what names they were! – that we’d all heard, but by the time they were being dropped by the punky people their records had long since disappeared from the racks, save for the odd appearance on compilation albums. When Johnny Thunders And The Heartbreakers swaggered (staggered?) into view they boasted not one but two Dolls; they also had a set of clothes that your humble narrator would still give virtually anything to be cool enough to be seen in the same room as, let alone to actually wear. Their incendiary live shows quickly became the stuff of legend, although often for their chaotic nature as much as for their musical accuracy. If, as Spinal Tap will tell you, there is a thin line between clever and stupid these boys seemed to somehow have both feet both sides of the line – but when ‘Chinese Rocks’ came out none of this mattered. An instant classic if ever there was one, it bode well for the soon-to-come, soon-to-be classic album that would surely follow.

What happened next is the stuff of folklore. What went wrong? The playing? the recording? The mastering? Drink? Drugs? Women? All of the above? Probably all of this and more, but listened to now it’s an album that embodies the essence of rock ‘n’ roll and that shows just how great that much-maligned medium can be. There are no ‘perfect’ performances here – but if you want perfection you can find that in a lot of other places, all of them boring. Jerry Nolan on drums and Billy Rath on bass walk the green mile to oblivion every time but somehow just avoid getting there before the end of the song while Walter Lure is the perfect ‘a-bit-more-in-time-and-in-tune’ foil to Johnny T. And what of Mr. Genzale himself? To some he’s a grotesque junkie parody, to others a god-like icon – somehow he’s simultaneously the best and worst guitarist of all time, often in the same song or indeed solo… he wouldn’t have cared what you, me or anybody thought of him – but if you can listen to this record and tell me that you don’t get it then, well, you don’t get me either. He’s the real deal, so are the band and for that matter so is this album. L.A.M.F. – and then some.

The Tom Robinson Band ‘Power In The Darkness’ (EMI Music: Rel 1978)

Time for another trip back to 1977. And why not?

So there I was, a hapless mid-teenager attempting to be, well, a non-hapless mid-teenager. Looking back from the lofty position of hindsight, I was not a happy chappy. I won’t go into details here – maybe another time – but I was, to use a technical term, in a right old state. ‘Sullen, unhealthy and mean’, as someone once sang… needless to say music was one of the (very) few positive things in my godforsaken life. I’d started to go to local gigs whenever I could, and the few friends that I did have were similarly music-obsessed. One day one of them turned up on my doorstep with a smile, a 7” single and the words ‘you’ve got to hear this’. It was ‘Motorway’ by The Tom Robinson Band and he was right, I had to hear it. I’d just started to try to teach myself the guitar (having discovered to my horror that you didn’t just pick it up and play it!) and so was always on the lookout for anything exciting in the 6-string section of the orchestra, and this was certainly that.

Soon they appeared on the telly and there he was, the mighty Danny Kustow knocking hell out of a Gibson Les Paul through a Marshall amplifier. Fabulous. The ‘Rising Free’ EP followed – ‘Glad To Be Gay’ caused all four parental eyebrows to rise but ‘Don’t Take No For An Answer’ was the song for me. Then in 1978 ‘Power In The Darkness’ exploded into view and things were never quite the same again. The guitar roared and scored in all it’s ragged glory but there was much more here – these were songs like no others, overtly political, unafraid to take sides even if it meant causing division (and it certainly did where I was!) but all melodic and brilliantly played. Listened to now the lyrics inevitably sound a bit dated here and there, but I guess that’s all but inevitable. TR has since regretted not putting the singles on the album – the U.S. import version rectified that and if you buy it on CD you get them all, so all’s well that ends well – but the 10 tracks sound perfect together. The band were brilliant, the guitar sounded like a bomb going off (mostly in my head!) and the songs became anthems, showing that you can play music with a message and maybe – just maybe – inspire others to do the same. It certainly did that for me, and it still does today.

So there you have it, my 10 favourite albums of all time. Possibly. Probably. Almost definitely. But of course there’s also…

The Sub’s Bench

There are lots more where these came from – here are 20 that nearly made it, should have made it, still might make it if I don’t send this article off soon…

In no particular order –

The Beatles ‘The Beatles’
As I say above, The White Album is an endlessly fascinating collection of songs.

The Beatles ‘Rubber Soul’
Perfect pop music from the perfect pop band. They were ever so good you know.

The Who ‘Quadrophenia’
My story. Your story. Everyone’s story?

The Who ‘Who’s Next’
‘Baba O’Riley’, ‘Bargain’, Behind Blue Eyes’, ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again’ and more. Thanks Pete.

The Who ‘Live At Leeds’
Crikey! That’s the way to do it!

Bob Dylan ‘Blood On The Tracks’
The Big Zim at his best. And that is very good indeed.

The Damned ‘Damned Damned Damned’
32 minutes that changed the World. Is she really going out with him?

The Rolling Stones ‘Exile On Main Street’
No, side 3 isn’t that great – but the rest of it certainly is.

Iggy & The Stooges ‘Raw Power’
James Williamson on guitar. Enough said.

The Mega City Four ‘Tranzophobia’
You had to be there. Thankfully I was.

The Gas ‘Emotional Warfare’
– The best album you’ve never heard by the best group you’ve never heard.

TV Smith’s Cheap ‘R.I.P. – everything must go!’
The best album you’ve never heard by the best group you’ve never heard (slight return).

The Godfathers ‘Hit By Hit’
Their early singles collected. Mighty.

Elvis Costello And The Attractions ‘This Year’s Model’
– If I ever meet EC my teenage self will thank him for wearing glasses…

Television ‘marquee Moon’
As good an album as everyone says that it is.

Rory Gallagher ‘Irish Tour ’74’
The best guitarist that I’ve ever seen. It’s as simple as that.

The Jimi Hendrix Experience ‘Electric Ladyland‘
Talking of guitarists – the man that the instrument was invented for takes it to the outer limits.

Eddie And The Hot Rods ‘Life On The Line’
The first vaguely punky band I saw play live. Great stuff.

New York Dolls ‘New York Dolls’
Rock ‘n’ roll? That’s all folks!

And last, but by no means least –

The Ruts ‘The Crack’
You were wondering where this one had got to weren’t you? To be honest it would / should have been in the top 10, but, well, that would just be weird wouldn’t it? Well, wouldn’t it?!?

‘The Crack’ is re-issued on the 8th February 2019 having been Re-mastered by Tim Turan at Turan Audio, and then cut to vinyl at Abbey Road Studios, the release comes complete with a digital download.

Special guests for the entire ‘Crack’ tour will be The Professionals; advance tickets are on sale now.

Photo of Leigh Heggarty courtesy of Chris Cohen.

The post My Top 10 Albums: Leigh Heggarty – Ruts DC appeared first on Louder Than War.

Various Artists: I’m A Freak 2 Baby

Grapefruit

3CD/DL

Released 25th January 2019

Subtitled “A Further Journey Through The British Heavy Psych And Hard Rock Underground Scene 1968-73”, this is the follow-up to 2016’s well received collection, I’m A Freak Baby, featuring contributions this time round from better known acts like Love Sculpture, the Move and Jeff Beck rubbing shoulders with genuine obscurities from Sardonicus, Lightyears Away and Iron Claw. LTW’s Ian Canty keeps the freak flag flying.

With the positive reception given to the original I’m A Freak Baby boxset a couple of years back (reviewed here), it was inevitable that there would be a second collection, and here it is. Zeroing in on the years bookended by the psychedelia boom and the dawning of glam, to my ears this follow up veers slightly more towards out-and-out proto-metal than the first. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing and the people at Grapefruit have managed to winkle out many previously-forgotten gems of hirsute mayhem from the vaults. For those who may have missed the first box, we’re in the area where psych and hard rock co-existed, sometimes as part of the same song. Progressive was the key word, perhaps not quite as in a prog rock sense though, more developing away from psych roots into something else a little rougher.

Led Zep and Black Sabbath were prime inspirations for a lot of groups on here, but rather than being straight copies of Plant/Page or Ozzy’s gang (leaving aside Thor’s standard but ok take of Paranoid on disc 3) most put their own particular and often peculiar stamp on things. The “Underground” thrived in this era too and the various free festivals, benefit gigs and alternative publications offered a support network for these acts. Many of the participants had been playing in bands since the beat days and the long sets that were required for mod all-nighters sharpened their chops and instilled a soul/R&B itch that would prove hard for them to fully shake off, even when at their very heaviest. As a result, there’s a surprising amount of tracks here that get the feet wanting to move, which may not have been the original intention, but adds to the fun immeasurably.

Setting the general template for what follows on disc 1 are Cardiff’s own power trio, Budgie, who start this compilation in fine style with their track Guts. Anyone still labouring under the impression that they were some sort of middling boogie band will be knocked for six by the brutal, beautiful thuggery of their mighty riffage here. They, among many others here, may have provided the building blocks for heavy metal, but at this stage the genre was not fully formed and still playful, including elements not generally seen in head-banging music a few years later on. Jeff Beck, with Rod Stewart providing vocals, pre-empts Zeppelin with a tough treatment of the Yardbirds’ oldie Shape Of Things, demonstrating the general changeover that was occurring in 60s rock in the later part of the decade towards something much heavier.

Wicked Lady add garage fuzz to Run The Night and Slowload provide a crunching proto-metal background for what is actually a bewitching pop song in Rosie. It works a like a dream. Iron Claw might sound like an archetypal heavy metal name, but actually their Clawstrophobia is more like teak-tough psychedelia and I rather like the punning title into the bargain too. The Move weigh in with a stellar horns-embellished shouter in Turkish Tram Conductor Blues, showing they were a long way ahead of being mere a psych-pop cash-in.

Dave Edmunds’ Love Sculpture got all the way to number 5 on the UK Charts with their manic version of the Sabre Dance, they full-on attack the old standard with a real proto-punk zeal. Stack Waddy provide more premonitions of the punk to come by giving the Pretty Things’ Rosalyn an ultra-basic doing over and Andromeda benefit immensely from the genius of the late John Du Cann. His inspirational guitar runs through I’m A Freak 2 Baby like Blackpool through a stick of rock, cropping up on disc 2 with Atomic Rooster (Death Walks Behind You) and Bullet on disc 3 (the tough rocker Sinister Minister), but here he packs a lovely late freakbeat-style guitar solo into the heavy psych wonder Let’s All Watch The Sky Fall Down. Monument’s crazed Dog Man is a macabre treat for hard rockers and the ever reliable Patto provide some of Ollie Halsall trademark bendy guitar heroics on Loud Green Song.

Moving onto to disc 2, Tear Gas kick things off with their funk-enhanced number, Woman For Sale, the band featuring future SAHB member Zal Cleminson. Another guitarist with just a little way to go before making it big was Mick Ronson, here providing his six-string majesty to the Rats’ Early In Spring. Personally I find the Edgar Broughton Band easier to take in small doses and their hit Apache Dropout is real snotty, proto-punk fun. Shrewsbury combo Dogfleet may have met with hostility from music weekly Melody Maker (“the usual set of manure” gives you a feel of the uncharitable tone), but their song Armageddon is a masterful piece of phased weirdness.

The Deviants keep the freak flag flying with the laidback menace of Somewhere To Go and if Tonge would later provide members of ’77 punk band the Depressions, you wouldn’t know from the strutting drums, constantly soloing guitar and rock & roll demeanour of Old Father Time. Even so it’s good stuff and is immediately followed up by the doomy crunch of Mouse’s Ashen Besher, mad riffing and a cool rhythm section working nicely in tandem. You can hear the clubland roots of Sunday on Fussing And Fighting, a R&B/soul backing to lyrics that recall Bad News on Warriors Of Genghis Khan! The Human Beast sound a formidable outfit on Brush With The Midnight Butterfly, fast paced bass and drums at first, but then utilising stops and starts to change mood with light and sensitive playing in the slower sections.

Reaching the final disc, a lot of the material featured on this platter only had a limited release (if that), by bands that mostly disappeared afterwards. An exception is the stripped-down version of Arthur Brown’s big hit Fire, which works well without the horns and, if anything, is that bit more effective. Of the more obscure acts, the stinging fuzz guitar and treated vocal of Lightyears’ Away’s Yesterday is excellent and 60s band Wild Silk’s follow-on act, Little Big Horn update mod pop for the early 70s on their punchy Name Of The Game. Ember signees, 9.30 Fly season their version of Willie Dixon’s blues standard Hoochie Coochie Man with a little glam thwack and it’s always a joy to hear Maggie Bell in full flight, her full-bodied vocals enhancing Stone The Crows on Big Jim Salter.

Beginning at near Ramones-speed, Early Morning Sun by Tarsus slows into a very pleasant boogie rock groove, garnished with trippy elements and a very high vocal styling. Natural Gas sprang from Opportunity Knocks winners Strawberry Jam and their bass-led Is There Any Doubt has a touch of 10CC-style pop about it, definitely a good thing I would say. Clark-Hutchinson were later to establish themselves as underground mainstays, but caught in early 1969 on Someone’s Been At My Woman they were a much more bluesy proposition. Good singing on this one as well. Prog/soul nutters, Writing On The Wall end things with Lucifer Corpus which hints at the theatrical and spectacular nature of their stage show.

Though I’m A Freak 2 Baby does have a somewhat heavier feel to its predecessor, there is enough diversity and moments of genuine inspiration to make it a more than worthy follow up. As you would suspect with a set put together by Grapefruit, there is the usual pleasing attention to detail, as the stories of the often almost forgotten bands are related in the sleeve notes and illustrated by some great period photographs. It’s a box load of fun indeed.

The years covered have sometimes been viewed as a period of “downtime” in UK rock – this, along with its predecessor, proves that under the surface, plenty was happening, much of it fascinating and certainly meriting reinvestigation. I’m A Freak 2 Baby offers us another fine insight into the pre-punk years and damn good listening too.

~

All words by Ian Canty – see his author profile here

The post Various Artists: I’m A Freak 2 Baby – album review appeared first on Louder Than War.

Beastie Boys Book

Michael Diamond & Adam Horovitz

Faber & Faber

Out now

A new self-told retrospective from the punk hip-hop trio, telling the story of their musical lives, collaborations and adventures. 

According to Adam Horovitz (a.k.a. Ad-Rock), one third of the Beastie Boys, 1998’s Hello Nasty was their best album. His reasoning is a bit of a stretch. He points to the large number of tracks it holds: an undoubtedly impressive 22. Apart from mixing together music that doesn’t even sound like its made by the same group, he argues, its bumper track number means Hello Nasty is particularly good value for money. Horovitz describes the album as a kind of lovingly crafted mixtape of ideas.

The new Beastie Boys Book is a little like that too. A mixtape of diverse tales. The book has many of the features of a Beastie Boys album. Its numerous short chapters are written mostly by Horovitz and Michael Diamond, complemented by some guest contributions. The chapters mix commentary with biography, insight with reflection. Like Hello Nasty, this is a chunky tome. Yet, despite its heft, by its conclusion, the triple trouble membership remain largely enigmatic. Unusual in content and varied in style, the chapters shift in different directions. The stories are largely chronological but there are hardly any mentions of years or dates, making it hard to tell exactly when things are happening; the only real clues are the mentions of albums or songs.

There is though one key difference between this book and the Beastie Boys’ music. Unlike their albums which, with the exception of some of the more puerile early recordings, tended to be forward-looking, the book casts its gaze backwards. This change of direction takes them out of their comfort zone. In a recent interview they admitted to be uncomfortable dealing with the past, preferring the present and future. In this case, part of the difficulty of looking back is the sense of loss. Sadly Adam Yauch is not here to tell his own stories, and the book often touches on the grief of his absence, as well as his particular presence in the band.

In the book the trivial sits alongside the substantial and the serious. These leaps sometimes feel a bit disjointed, but they are totally in character, given the eclectic nature of the music they produced. On the more trivial end is an entertaining description of a photo of which Horovitz admits he has no memory of the place or circumstances – with a comically dressed Yauch barely visible in the background. Or the story of when Yauch purchased the phone number of a defunct company mentioned on their album Paul’s Boutique — he hooked it up to an answer machine to see what happened. The messages, as it turns out, got quite strange and voluminous.

The book is awash with these types of stories. The variation in content goes further: there are even several pages of recipes and a short graphic story. These little creative avenues rest alongside more heavy-duty descriptions of how particular songs were created, tours unfolded, label interactions played out and video production techniques. The accounts of how particular songs were made provide those really revealing moments that you’d want from a book like this. Yet it is the mix of these completely different features that makes the book so readable.

One of the stranger inclusions is a lukewarm review of Ill Communication. Whilst damning the album with disinterest, the author of the review reflects on some soup they are making for a social gathering that evening. I can’t work out if it is a genuine review that they found funny, or a kind of spoof review. But that is the way with the BBs, you never quite know when they are messing with you. The numerous short pieces that make up this book don’t so much resolve the mystery and tensions as highlight the sometimes baffling features of their collaborations. The fantastic pictures, which make up around half the 550 or so pages, tell us a bit more. These pictures give different glimpses and perspectives on the musical life of the trio. The photos bring a vibrancy to the text, telling stories beyond those captured in the writing.

Overall, this is a very human story. It captures the mistakes, of which there were a few, and the losses. It pinpoints the good fortune along with the deft touches. The little vignette chapters reveal enough to show the haphazard development of the band as well as their music and their thinking.

Mixtapes can be a little disjointed, after all they are compiled rather than composed. This book has a bit of a stop-start feel with lots of fragmented bits. But the Beastie Boys were never about smoothness; they assembled, gathered and combined. They joined the dots and blended the fragments and detritus of their surroundings. In its images and fractured mini-chapters, this book continues with the style of those early collaborations, unfortunaely minus the influence of Yauch.

~

Beastie Boys’ website is here and they are on Twitter and Facebook.

Words by Dave Beer. More information about his writing can be found on his website and he is also on Twitter.

The post Beastie Boys Book – book review appeared first on Louder Than War.

Eric Haydock, the original bass player with Manchester finest sixties pop group, The Hollies, has died at the age of 75.

Considered one of the finest bass players of his generation he left the band in 1965 just as their best-known sixties hit Bus Stop was released but not before creating his reputation and also pioneering the use of the six string bass.

The Hollies we a hit machine in the sixties with many huge singles and were also a huge influence on the Stone Roses with their classic crystalline guitar pop and those perfect harmonies that Roses drummer Reni enthused about to LTW.

The post Eric Haydock (The Hollies) RIP appeared first on Louder Than War.

We have been writing about Shorparis for some time on LTW. (Live review here)

Their mesmerising live shows – which see a mix of industrial power, death disco grooves and a shimmering post punk cultural politic have rooms across Russia and Europe melting to their fluid beats.

Topped off with magical flasetto vocal, this band is something else – it’s like pop music from an alternative universe and truly wonderful.

They are the best new band in a current Russian scene that is the most cutting edge in Europe with many great bands and a really fascinating and sprawling underground scene.

Their new video is like a collage of all the news stories from the last year – a dark mix of ISIS, terror, refugees and strange scared times forming an eventual backdrop to an astonishing dance routine.

The post WATCH THIS! controversial new video from Shortparis – the post punk death disco Russian band who are breaking big appeared first on Louder Than War.

Steven Brown: Music For Solo Piano

Les Disques du Crepuscule

CD

Released 11th January 2019

Reissue of Steven Brown’s debut solo album from 1984 with added input from Tuxedomoon colleague Blaine L. Reninger, plus nine bonus tracks in a similar format, with three coming from the modern ballet, Belly Of The Whale. Ian Canty ponders the crossover between classical music and post-punk on a grey January afternoon.

Well, one could be forgiven for saying this LP does what it says on the tin, but there is a bit more to Music For Solo Piano than just that. Steven Brown had been a member of Tuxedomoon since the band took shape in San Francisco back in 1977. Music For Solo Piano was his debut solo album, but began as a collaboration with his Tuxedomoon colleague, Blaine L. Reninger in 1982. With the latter’s exit from the band a year later, Brown was left to finish off the project on his own and it duly emerged in 1984.

Anyone expecting the kind of edgy electronics that Tuxedomoon specialised in circa the Half-Mute LP is in for a bit of a straightener. On Music For Solo Piano, we’re firmly in the quasi-classical field that appealed to a lot of the post-punk crowd as time went on and Brown was possibly one of the first to make the leap. Even the austere original sleeve design, restored to the version, bears an influence of the kind of graphics that adorned composers release. I’m not a great fountain of knowledge when it comes to classical music (much to the chagrin of my lovely music teacher at school), but from what I have heard and can remember, this kind of reminds me a little of the serene, timeless feel of Erik Satie. But I could well be wrong about that.

Taking it for what it actually sounds like, rather than playing spot the genre, this album is a melancholic pleasure and the restraint of the musicianship (which included viola and clarinet by Reninger as well as Brown on the old joanna) is just right. Brown’s piano lines are lyrical and emotional, filling in the gaps where words would have been and, in a sense, saying just as much. For example on Hold Me When I’m Naked, bass plucks and crashing chords give a curious scuttling effect and perhaps represents the natural impulse to take flight when forced to confront difficult feelings. This track veers close to musique concrete, but kept this listener rapt.

Egypt and The Fall were previously recorded by Tuxedomoon and Reninger’s viola makes its presence felt on both, being very much the lead instrument on the latter, with Brown’s piano not much more than a ghostly tinkle. Fantasie (sic) For Clarinet & Violin, a longer piece, has jazz swoops and evokes a strange atmosphere – you can imagine this sound-tracking a dance performance. R.W.F. is far more strident, almost a march and the lengthy set closer Rotterdam Lullabye (sic again) produces a very haunting atmosphere, with clarinet mournfully sounding over the viola. A memorable way to end the album.

Moving onto the bonus tracks, two takes of The Ghost Sonata are included, recorded for Belgian radio in 1983. They both are frosty and spine-tingling, tense, but lovely. Then we have Music No. 2, a stately gallop led by the viola. Three pieces including Basso Pomade have a full orchestral setting which tends to dominate proceedings. This gives them a slightly different edge to the pared-down sound of the album, but they are still worth hearing. The best of the three for me is the neat, off-beat feel to the viola/clarinet duet Licorice (sic yet again – this is how this is spelt on the LP sleeve, honest!) Stick Ostinato.

The last three tracks are the newest, being recorded in October 2018 for the ballet, Belly Of The Whale. These selections do hark back to the 1984 sound, but are a bit more playful. My favourite is the rapid changes in tempo of Melancolia (sic again!); with this you are obviously missing the crucial visual element, but it is easy to imagine how this piece knitted together with the dancers’ movement.

Music For Solo Piano is a pretty satisfying and unique creation, enjoyable and playful, at some times sad and others uplifting. Obviously a long way away from post-punk and even pop music, this is basically classical music in bite-sized pieces, with a left-field approach. But it is accessible enough to hold the attention of anyone prepared to try something a little different. You would have to be in the correct mood to get much out of this, but the melodies will embed themselves given half a chance and informative sleeve-notes plus stylish design make for an attractive package. Steven Brown took a chance with his first solo record like few others would and that is worth applause on its own – he also managed to fashion a pleasing collection into the bargain.

~

All words by Ian Canty – see his author profile here

The post Steven Brown: Music For Solo Piano – album review appeared first on Louder Than War.

Keith Goldhanger ends his second year of monthly articles highlighting some of the new bands he’s witnessed during nights out in London whilst not forgetting one or two of his favourites he’s been visiting since they were turning up to perform free shows before they’d released anything themselves. Here we have his own personal overview of the year gone by including many of his favourite tunes that were unavailable twelve months ago.

Fifty two weeks, gigs every evening, anything you want to hear available at the click of a button and the opportunity to watch some of that gig you’ve just been to thanks to the person with the strong arm who managed to film it whilst everyone else tutted, thought bad things or muttered out loud something about living for the moment.

One of January 2018’s finest moments belonged to those of us that visited rooms across East London hosting free shows and great new bands. SPORTS TEAM were met by using the old fashioned form of communication – the mouth. I didn’t even know the name of the band until I asked them and then seven months later they managed to get me into the second best Reading Festival of the year (the one in the field).

PINK KINK looked at me with a blank expression once i tried to explain how awful I thought they might be and then realised how ace they were. The best form of response really. Pink Kink didn’t last much longer once we’d managed to catch a couple of very impressive shows which was a shame, however for every band that crumbled during the year there were plenty that kept us waiting until the second winter before providing us with yet another old fashioned form of activity – releasing music for us all to hear.

Those of us (well most of us) who saw CREWEL INTENTIONS would turn up again and be very impressed . Ditto CHEST PAINS, MUSH, TREEBOY & ARC , HOTEL LUX and even SUPERORGANISM who’d arrived in 2017 and were now being played on the radio, in between bands at gigs and even in high street shops for the first couple of months during 2018.

A band from Leeds called TEAM PICTURE caused some chin stroking when they turned up in East London and then threw us an album that made at least one of want to see them again once the tunes had been heard half a dozen more times. NADINE SHAH headlined The Camden Roundhouse and was a huge highlight on this years Mercury Prize coverage. She’s three excellent albums old and has performed on nearly every one of London’s venues now. Some of us have been fortunate to have been in attendance at most of them.

BLACKWATERS impressed during these early months as did GRACE LIGHTMAN who’s ‘Faultless’ video featured individuals we would end up bumping into for the rest of the year. INSECURE MEN went to the top of the bands we wanted to see live list as soon as we heard the album and even more shouty stuff turned up from Northern upstarts LUMER, LUXURY APARTMENTS and best of the lot BAD BREEDING whose Abandonment tune had the fists (both) punching the air.

By the time March arrived so did MONO CLUB who calmed us all down with the debut album by the band formerly known as Goldheart assembly.

PLEASURE COMPLEX kept our interests up around spring time with another fabulous video, FRANCOBOLLO played again (and again and again) and provided The T-shirt of the year as did HOO HA’s and all their friends who all without fail so far have failed to produce anything other than brilliant music that the rest of the country should get to hear one day. We could draw up one of those family tree wall charts like the NME used to print every now and again indicating who used to be in who’s previous band and allow some even stranger named bands to get a mention but we can’t be arsed. Everyone knows their place. They don’t need it on a chart anyway.

One person who occasionally watches his football in West London during 2018 got into the habit of a last beer before bedtime in East London’s Old Blue Last where a band called HEAVY LUNGS who appeared one night after a one all draw away to Fulham (last minute equaliser). This band were decent enough to grab a moment with, learn that the man who had just owned the room was called Danny and then by the time we were sitting on the beach with a hanky around our heads was even better known once his surname was revealed as Nedelko.

BENIN CITY released one of the tunes of the year (and my favourite album of the year) featuring the night bus that some of us have been guilty of falling asleep on and the best Reading Festival of the year (Are you listening?) introduced early arrivals to CHINA BEARS who also gave us a tune that’s still difficult to put down.

We also saw the end of an era when our Radio X friend John Kennedy stopped putting on his nights in Tooting. Known for years as ‘The Remedy’ some of these nights were unforgettable experiences that are too numerous to mention here. Ending with MESADORM on the penultimate night and then Benin City (or was it the other war around?) a month later we met the end of an era not with regret or sadness but thankful for some of the Friday nights we’d had.

MESADORM performing this in Tooting was another of the years highlights.

Summer begins in May for some of us. Too early for our tents maybe but Liverpool Sound City was as great as we’d remembered from previous years when we could skip around an area of the city, refuelling our hunger with packets of crisps from sweet shops, dodging cars and watching dozens of unknown acts that had already impressed with their limited releases and modest on line presence. Some bands are still insisting on not bothering with an on line presence. This is not only very daft but counter productive when people such as ourselves are trying to work out if something we’d just witnessed was the best thing ever of the worst thing ever.

One of us met a man named Jacob in Liverpool who released one of the most beautiful tunes of the year under the name of PINING FOR SUNSHINE. He brought his Grandmother along to the show and his music sounds not unlike what you’d expect music to sound like when performed by a man who once played a gig at a funeral.  SLOW READERS CLUB played one of the most euphoric shows we saw this year. Over the same weekend, IDLES shows and new tunes were still coming thick and fast and so were SUPERORGANISM  gigs. A tune from one of Liverpool’s local bands THE CHEAP THRILLS  in the tiny Baltic Social Bar was simply an experience when one felt like a drunk Frank from Shameless staggering into his local at midnight for one final bevvy. Codependance was that tune. A fabulous five minutes before trying to remember where the hotel was on a busy Saturday night in Liverpool that involved witnessing a fabulous car chase and a man on his knees trying to cross the road causing the traffic to be at a standstill.

Festivals in local parks began in June. East London’s All Points East series were full of fabulous acts that never seemed to clash and amongst others a first look at ST VINCENT. Here’s an act we want to see again one day late at night under flashing lights. It’s been difficult to listen to Slow Disco without getting the acoustic version out afterwards. NICK CAVE was great, BJORK‘s show wasn’t as interesting as the thunderstorm everyone seemed to be watching in the opposite direction.

England won the World Cup and celebrations went on for over fifty years before many of us lost interest in top tier football and tutted into our warm beer as the country kept singing about football coming home. Many of us who spend our Saturday afternoons sitting on cold plastic seats or crumbling terraces watched from the back as blokes fell through bus stop shelters, sang a terrible version of an Atomic Kitten song and watch an England team bow out as soon as they met a half decent team. We were unlucky said anyone that doesn’t watch football on a Saturday afternoon. We were lucky to get where we did said anyone that loves the sound of a turnstile clicking.

Egypt v Russia was followed by another moment of the year, this time inside The Brixton Windmill when a young lady by the name of JESSICA WINTER sang a song that should be here by now but isn’t because it’s coming out in the new year. More about that in 2019.

On the same evening we met WOOZE, a British / Korean Duo who are already on the first drafts of every new band festival for next year. Not satisfied with simply appearing in an episode of Made in Chelsea (It’s a TV Program)  they’re off to play in Korea in the new year and have been popping up making appearances in many of our favourite bands (that would be on that that map I mentioned earlier but cant be arsed to draw )

East London’s Visions festival produced the goods again this summer. Some of us got to see RIVAL CONSOLES in the middle of the afternoon and then spend a few months laying on the floor listening to his Persona album. BLUE HAWAII  we’d never heard previous to this days event have also provided the world with ace music to dance around the bedroom to before going out on a Saturday night and HMLTD provided (for those who had decided that seeing Idles yet again was unnecessary one) one of the performances of the year along with the first song some of us have heard that brings back memories of The Village People.

Standon Calling Festival was hit and miss this year. The disappointing headliners were certainly made up for by the acts lower down the bill. SHAME were seen again on a huge stage, DREAM WIFE suddenly started looking like title contenders and previously unknown acts such as PARK HOTEL and MAVEN GRACE were just what the doctor ordered alongside ARTIFICIAL PLEASURE and the mighty CONFIDENCE MAN who all contributed in yet another lovely weekend in the Hertfordshire countryside.

And then we heard this . . .

One bloke (two actually) and a song that was played by one man on a daily basis for weeks on end, dancing in front of the mirror, learning the words and never wanting it to end. Then AVERAGE JOE visited London and a few of us eventually got to see the duo’s complete repertoire. A story you’ll hear more of. Song of the year.

This overshadowed slightly the wonderful introduction to THE BIG AND THE FAT and their debut. This is the band that began life as Eighteen Nightmares at the Lux, kept all the personnel and replaced all the tunes with a selection of new catchy foot tappers we need to see in a field next summer.

August arrived and SPORTS TEAM  were headlining Reading (BBC Introducing), IDLES were on Telly, everyone was in love with their second album except for at least one half of SLEAFORD MODS  who were busy clocking in on their second night at the huge Camden Roundhouse.

Once we’d accepted summer was over we had our first wonderful experience of FUR who gave us a hint of what’s to come in 2019 however October was the month dictated by Cardiff’s annual Swn Festival , always a highlight of the year. That meant WILD CAT STRIKE (second best album of the year) , GRETA ISAAC, SUUNS, THE BLINDERS, FARM HAND, DREAM WIFE (again), ADWAITH and VIVE LA VOID all became new favourite bands.

PLASTIC MERMAIDS gave us a new stonker of a tune (and video), CREWEL INTENTIONS gave us a stonker of a debut, Measadorm came back and played in a church and for those of us that got there early enough to delve into some breakfast cake a Saturday morning performance by KADIALY KOUYATE & AL MACSWEEN  turned out to be a memorable experience.

KILLING JOKE continued to appear at many major world city venues yet again. Then we bumped into FONTAINES DC from Ireland who are set to be the band to get any Idles fans through the doors early next year before taking over the same venues themselves in a year or two its expected.

Whist many bands during December were keen to boast on social media the number of Spotify stats achieved during the year one band in particular caught the eye as the year ended. SLIME CITY only employ band members called Michael (Hopefully Mike, Mick or Mickey whilst attending rehearsals) and boasted of a lonely 4 hits during the year therefore the last great band of 2018 award goes to them. We’ll be paying them a visit once 2019 gets on its way.

Books of the year were all written by people I’ve know or met during the past few decades. Gail Thibert‘s ‘Soap the Stamps Jump the tube‘ gave us an insight into living in London during the 80’s whilst struggling to fit life in between gigs and being in a band.
Lois Pryce got on her motorbike and went to Iran on a ‘Revolutionary Ride’ and most impressive of all was the fabulous ‘Woman of Substance’ by Jenny Valentish.

Woman of Subatance is not only part biographical but digs deep into the causes and results of continuous alcohol and drug use amongst women. Jenny doesn’t only tell her own story in this book but interviews leading researches in the subject and explores the causes and consequences of the path she walked along that makes this book a humorous and engaging read.

Film of the year was Bohemian Rhapsody and what an awful film that is.
Bad acting, bad script and most of the characters speaking in a silly voice. For me, the problem with Queen is that since about the time that Freddy left us they have been represented to us (the public) like four very posh blokes that spend their spare time reading caravan brochures and having tea with the local vicar before standing around a rehearsal room coming up with stupid ideas that no one in the room has the personality to say “Hey ! …that’s a really shit idea mate!”
When the film recreates them standing in a room discussing what would be the first mention of We Will Rock You (also the title of a West End play that on seeing the posters may also have misrepresented the band) where were the laughs ? Where was the irony, the smiles and the look of apprehension that this may actually be a stupid idea ?

Anyone who has ever been in a band will tell you that when someone comes up with a great, simple yet ridiculous idea it is usually responsible for some irreplaceable bonding that would hold the unit together. Its difficult to believe that the four blokes in this band actually believed at the time that they were seriously onto something with this. They would have been glowing with self doubt at this stage surely ? Saying things like ‘Fuck off’ or ‘Don’t be so bloody ridiculous’ and then arguing about the other new songs they’ve been rehearsing for the previous three months. Maybe I’m wrong, maybe they were a bunch of chaps that took everything too seriously. Maybe the members of Queen were the opposite of the people we know in the bands that we love so dearly today? Were (or are?) Queen the most un-rock and roll band ever ? Probably, and that’s why they suck.

Queen were arguably as cool as Idles are now for a few months in 1976 but are now represented as a band that people like David Brent from The Office (It’s a TV show) would consider their bit of rough. A band to undo your top button to. What a shame the rest of the band don’t do anything to distract us from this image. Were some of us duped ? – Its too late to care now.

This was the only film I’ve seen this year by the way until that that Bros documentary that has provided us with more quotes than Python’s Parrot Sketch came along and then The Festival with that bloke from The Inbetweeners that was as dull as dishwater and had a better effect on those of us walking in on it being filmed a year ago than sitting down and watching it on a comfy chair.

2018 – RIP: Mark E Smith, Pete Shelly, Charles Aznavour, Conway Savage, Aretha Franklin, Scott Hutchinson, Delores O’riordan, and Barry Chuckle.

Here’s the whole playlist of my own personal favourite tunes of 2018 from top to bottom. Things we didn’t know about until 2018.
More to come in 2019.
Stay tuned.

Thank you for the music x

~

All words by Keith Goldhanger. More writing by Keith on Louder Than War can be found at his author’s archive. You can also find Keith on Facebook and Twitter (@HIDEOUSWHEELINV). You may subscribe to the Goldhanger Shorts Facebook page or browse some of his photos too if you so wish.

The post Things we didn’t know a year ago: 2018 review appeared first on Louder Than War.

All over the UK a legion of Kate Bush fans are sighing with relief after the iconic singer released a statement stating that she is not a Tory. (we still loved here whatever – John Robb review of her album here)

The whole situation started a couple of years ago when she said…

“We have a female prime minister here in the UK. I actually really like her and think she’s wonderful. I think it’s the best thing that’s happened to us in a long time,” Bush told Maclean’s in 2016. “She’s a very intelligent woman but I don’t see much to fear. I will say it is great to have a woman in charge of the country. She’s very sensible and I think that’s a good thing at this point in time.”

It was probably more that she was trying to say she liked having a woman prime minister but in the internet age any comment is there to take a totally black and white stance ion leading to digital whispers that she was a Tory which she has countered with the statement today.

The post Kate Bush releases statement to state that she ‘is not a Tory’ appeared first on Louder Than War.

Flares

Birmingham Hare and Hounds

Jan 3rd 2019

Live review

More info from here

From the moment Flares fire up the intense moshing starts.

Kids are fiercely hurling themselves at each other as the beaming band’s sonic maelstrom takes hold. I wanna join in but I’m twice the size and over three times the average age of the churning mass of bodies.

This is a freezing cold January night at the Hare and Hounds in Birmingham and Flares single launch is sold out. With an average age of (just) sixteen Flares have already played some major festivals and gained a fervent young following.
cThey don’t know it but they’ve somehow channelled the Pixies skewed pop, (bassist Edie like a young Kim Deal), welded it to Nirvana’s intensity, (Guitarist Leo channelling Cobain, hurling himself around like it’s life or death) and then added an infectious Pop charm all of their own.

The last time I saw a band grin at each other this much was Undertones playing Teenage Kicks on Top Of The Pops light years ago. The band pause and launch into a gleeful re-working of M.I.A’s Paper Plane and suddenly it sounds like a Power-Pop classic. The sweaty audience run at each other again and the intensity continues. Castle of Cards closes the set with its glorious ascending chorus. One clattering, instrument-swapping (and just as good) encore later and it’s over. For now. The crowd head out to steam in the frosty air. A perfect start to 2019

The post Flares : Birmingham Hare and Hounds : Live Review appeared first on Louder Than War.

RANAGRI

PLAYING FOR LUCK

CD / DL

Stockfisch Records

Released 11 January 2019

Fourth album from the folk quartet who mix their traditional influences with some contemporary musical and lyrical bite.

An album  too that introduces what Marjorie Dawes from Little Britain’s Fat Fighters would call a ‘neeeewwww member’ in harpist Ellie Turner making her Ranagri recording debut and one that also sees a greater percussive emphasis at the hands of Joe Danks.  Their ‘new direction’ doesn’t quite hit the heights  of the bizarre qualities of  Spinal Tap’s Jazz Odyssey but for sure sees them aiming to live up to what they’ve termed as  “progressive, poetic and vibrant.”

While we at Louder Than War might have referred to their last release, Voices, as an album where you’re  “unlikely to hear anything more folky this year”, from the off,  Playing For Luck suggests quite the opposite. The ominous sounding The Strangler opens proceedings, displaying a darker and more chilling side via an ambience of a Parisienne dusk and a blend of Guy Garvey and  Hawley style crooning,  before Eliza Marshall’s flute work significantly enters  the fray halfway through Devil’s Need to confirm that there’s a lightness at the end of a short tunnel.

The coating added by  Ellie Turner’s glittering harp belies the “back to the days of black and white” and (shock, horror “two fat ladies off their tits” – well, really…) and tongue in cheek realism  on The Medication Show  – we premiered the video last August (view here) yet  their folk roots aren’t abandoned. The Thief’s medieval vibe combines with  Falling Down which could easily pass as  pure bucolic Tull cross bred and fused with some Celtic embroidery while the gentle acoustic trundle that flows and permeates  through  a dreamy Sometimes Home offers a mellow and pastoral alternative.  The thought that we might have been anticipating  jigging and chair dancing along to some new Ranagri has to be parked in lieu of arrangements and writing that seems much more mature and meticulous.

Coming full circle, Out There makes its own  case for the album highlight as it pleads and ponders with a simple yet understated but strident piano figure and finds itself typifying the Ranagri  healthy dose of realism that awaits most notably in  Waiting For The Rain and the “wild, wild world” described in Trees. The album’s  gambling motif that suggests Ranagri are taking a few chances seems to be one that pays off. With a few aces up your sleeve, there’s no point in hedging your bets as they sign off with a song of freedom and barely disguised jibes with  mention of  “building big fences in far away places.” Not a ‘B’ word  or a ‘T’ word in sight but more than enough of  the promised progression, poetry and vibrance.

Watch the band playing  The Strangler live  here:

The Ranagri  website is at : http://www.ranagri.com/

They are  also on Facebook  and tweet as  @ranagri

~

All words by Mike Ainscoe. You can find more of Mike’s writing on Louder Than War at his author’s archive. He can be found on Facebook and is currently revamping his website…

The post Ranagri: Playing For Luck – album review appeared first on Louder Than War.

2019 sees the continued fast forward of music – pop culture continues to fracture as we hurtle away from the Elvis big bang and into a new future. Embrace the changes! The past was holy but we don’t need to hide in its undergrowth forever. In this list there will be future festival headliners and game changers, there will be cult artists and burnouts but as this moment in time we love them all and celebrate their diversity. There are bands growing up in the digital age that make a music that is fluid , morphing the genre to suit their needs and moving away from the decades old formulas.

Hardy traditionalists give yourself a slap in the face and embrace the new! 

Henge

Their debut album is just out and these outer-spaced rockers are breaking out big with their space rock trip and ecstatic freak live show.

Witch Fever

Ostensibly rooted in riot grrrl, Witch Fever are really a vibrant, life-affirming rush of rock noise and the best raucous rock band in the UK right now.

Fontaines D.C. 

Already out there and already written about on LTW in 2015 (we were going to release their debut single in 2015 as well!) the band will be Arctic-Monkeys-huge by the end of the year. (The first write-up on the Fontaines DC from 2015 was on Louder Than War here)

GLOVE

Two women from the north of England who are so good that LTW will be releasing their debut single. Think Patti Smith meets The Slits and then be prepared to be taken beyond this with their mesmerising live performances and poetically brilliant, highly original music.

Shortparis 

This Moscow based band delivers an industrial tinged dirty disco with falsetto vocals that turns every venue into a mosh fenzy. They also deliver an unsettling narrative on these times and are at the forefront of a Russian band scene that is one of the best in the world and that LTW has been at the forefront of breaking.

The Murder Capital

Bruising and brilliant Dublin crew dealing a raw honesty and big mates of Fontaines DC.

Kaelan Mikla

Icelandic synth-punk ‘a dark fairytale with haunting synths and melodies with a post punk bass driven darkness…’

Girls In Synthesis

Art-Punk? Anarcho-Punk?  Whatever GiS are, they are a ferocious, intense proposition and not for the faint-hearted.

Flares

16 year old band who have somehow channeled the Pixies skewed pop, and welded it to Nirvana’s intensity.

Pleasures

Manchester-based band with classic Fall-esque wonk and lyrical snarks that sees them endearingly described as “sons of Cabbage”.

The Common Cold

Groovy Lancashire doggerel and post-Fall dislocation from Preston.

Descartes A Kant

Wild and theatrical Mexican band whose day of the dead industrial mash up of post punk and metal is intriguingly brilliant. Expect big things.

Evestus

Estonian industrial band breathing new life and fire into the form.

Amyl & The Sniffers

Signed to Rough Trade, the Austrian band with the name that captures the drug of the moment and rush of races garage rock ‘n’ roll to match.

Hector Gannet

For lovers of the classic Smiths high IQ melodic guitar rush.

Art School Girlfriend

Wrexham is becoming a brilliantly unlikely musical epicentre. Partly driven by the annual Focus Wales event and a proactive arts scene taking advantage of the space in the town, Art School Girlfriend is a producer from the town ‘making introspective music for bleak times’

Meanwhile the metal world continues to delight, surprise, and disturb, in equal measure. A reflection of its collision of diverse musical styles and approaches, and lyrical themes, and edgy live performances.

A band that epitomises this is Conjurer, who somehow manage to surf the wave of all the key extreme metal genres, sliding smoothly between tech death, black metal, doom and prog metal, sometimes within a single song. They are simply breathtaking in their ambition. After storming sets at the 2018 Bloodstock and HRH Doom vs HRH Stoner Festivals, they seem destined for bigger things.

In the world of doom metal, the success of festivals like HRH Doom vs HRH Stoner, is testament to a continually evolving and increasingly inventive metal genre.Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard from Wrexham, Wales, mix spacy electronic keyboards with a sledgehammer like riffing, and pastoral-like vocals. They have a new album coming out shortly, which is sure to intrigue, as they reveal their next musical steps.

Instrumental bands in metal have become a bit of a phenomenon, with large followings and impressive attendance at gigs, an increasing component. All The Best Tapes with their recent album ‘Apex Emotion’, describe their music as ‘Thrash Jazz’, and cover the full range, from pummeling death metal like riffs, to full on elegant and melodic guitar soloing, and quirky electronics.

A shout out also for the four-piece instrumental Plini from Sydney, Australia, recently on tour with the fabulous TesseracT, who effortlessly combine full throttle metal riffs with jazzy guitar soloing and funk like rhythms.

We can’t of course forget death metal, as we look to 2019. Whitechapel hailing from Tennessee, have explored some of the most disturbing sides of humanity, accompanied by demonic like growled vocals and dynamic metal rhythms and guitar breakdowns. More recently they have incorporated prog like elements into their music, but if preview tracks from the upcoming new album ‘The Valley’, are anything to go by, their threatening death metal sounds are going to be well in evidence.

An exciting development in 2018 was black metal band Winterfylleth’s ‘Hallowing of Heirdom’, an acoustic album full of beautiful melodies, harmonies and strings, and with a focus on folklore themes. They successfully toured the album, and it spoke to the musical risk taking that metal is quite wonderfully capable of, and may encourage other bands to open up their musical palette.

Shht

An amazingly odd relatively new band from Belgium “are space rock for the now generation. Five wired men from the sonic spaceship. A modern digital..”

The Claremonts

Manchester twisters

The Pacers

London-based garage psych band (guitarist Harry Stam is My Drug Hell’s bassist), delivering 60s sounds with a 90s edge in new album Forget Everything You Know. We reviewed their latest single here.

Glintshake

Russian shoe gazers whose debut album is a masterpiece of dynamics and atmosphere.

Slagheap

Supporting Beak before Xmas. Energetic post punk nonsense from four women in their pants. Melodic, naive and raucous songs about our experience of the world.

Los Blancos

The next band on libertino records to really take off.

Xqui

The experimental producer is really set for an exciting year and has already garnered praise from Electronic Sound mag and Neil Arthur of Blancmange fame with his unsettling and spell binding electronic soundscapes.

Crewel Intentions

Fresh from supporting Johnny Marr – lush and melodic indie with yearning melodies and classic swooping anthems with a hint of Suede.

DRY CLEANING

Quirky wonk with an energetic edge and brilliant eccentric lyrics.

Stony Sugarskull

From Berlin and sometimes based in L.A. dealing shoe gaze post punk.

Cold Water Swimmers

The sound is of full of melody, bright and intoxicating. A far cry from some of the denser grooves like Swerve that former band Dub Sex dealt.

The Pagans S.O.H

Mancunian-style rap (from West Bromwich) meets indie crossover with an addictive urgency. A total fusion of Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Rage Against The Machine, Dust Junkies, fuck me, they are great! Keep your ears open folks because they are special.

Au/Ra

A dark-pop queen for even darker times.

Moonchild Sanelly

With her stunning tough beats and brilliantly in your face lyrics Moonchild Sanelly’s self styled future ghetto funk is so stunningly 2019 it’s perfect.

Rival Bones

Explosive raucous loud/quiet rock from the northern duo

Baby Strange

Fine mix of harsh punk mixed and quieter tracks.

Avalanche Party

They have been on the scene a couple of years but this will be the year of the band with the wild dishevelled live show and full of dislocated riffology music like an early Birthday Party. Their debut album of angular post punk saw them noticed by those that know and they are doing the full Sleaford Mods tour. The Manchester-based three piece will be making a big impression this year.

Ist Ist

Poetically personal and considered approach. We still get the careering bass freak-outs, drum solos and screams to punctuate the performance

Rascalton

It is a short, sharp shock of a band. Spare, tight and perfect – another example of how the modern, punk influenced scene in Scotland’s largest city is 21st splenetic punk at its best.

The Scuttlers

From Middleton – Kaiden Nolans put together a filthy rock ‘n’ roll quartet – They play ramshackle Libertine-esque rock n roll, reminding us of early Beatles, with their good looks and swagger.

False Advertising

Manchester-based three piece delivering a noise-pop and grunge agenda full of song angst, fuzz crank and deep intelligence.

(also available digitally on Bandcamp).

Scarlxrd

British rapper with a machine gun dense word delivery breaking boundaries and mixing heavy metal and hip hop together in an extraordinary way

 Trianglecuts

Awesome brooding electro-goth from Manchester – great spooked atmospherics – see also another new band – Working Men’s Club (from over near Todmorden)

Trancendental Equation

Local psych madness taking the existing psych energy in the room and exploring it further through free-flowing instrumental jams of guitar, bass and drums which washed around like a weird bliss

Weimar 

Crafting shimmering art rock underpinned by artful guitar – all the time the sound swirling with experimental edges, every little trill and flair adding felt bursts of intensity.

Trupa Trupa

Carving out unique, individual spaces in a zone where mould-breaking innovation has all too often ossified into idea-free conformity. Essential listening.

The Homesick 

Now signed to SubPop and played by Iggy on the radio, etc with a perfect soupcon of styles that hint at the compressed psychedelia of early Wire – that deceptively stripped-down and yet complex brilliance of the post-punk.

Mart Avi

Glorious, modern soul-pop record that dives deep into a weird, blue lagoon of the senses and never seems to surface

Elizabete Balčus

The vibe is so transcendent in places you feel you are in motion listening to it, transported in a stupor through some faerie glade

The post Louder Than War 50 new bands for 2019 list appeared first on Louder Than War.

Friends Of Mine Punk in Manchester 1976-1978

Martin Ryan

Empire Publications

Martin Ryan has produced the definitive account of Manchester’s seminal punk scene – kicked into gear when a pre-Buzzcocks Pete Shelley invited The Sex Pistols to play in the city. Nigel Carr reviews the book for Louder Than War.

With many new punk bands popping up around the country, year zero was 1976. Event zero was The Sex Pistols playing at The Lesser Free Trade Hall in Manchester in June of that year. Many claimed to have been there, few actually attended. Ryan’s book takes a timeline from that seminal gig to the end of October 1978 when a young Chris Sievey and The Freshies would play the Electric Circus before the venue closed and after a short reprieve, it all was over. The Circus was flattened and an era had ended. Manchester had become the northern steam house for an exploding subculture that would affect no other city in the same way.

The book is sub-titled, A Necessary Corrective and for good reason. There has been so much bullshit written about the rise of punk in Manchester, few people actually know the truth. The truth is that in 1976 and early ‘77 punk was not the all-pervading scene it has become today. In those early days, there were so few punk singles available, DJ’s had to intersperse records like New Rose and Anarchy in The UK with tracks by Bowie, Roxy Music and Dr Feelgood to make up the numbers. Most punk audiences would turn up in flared jeans as the fashions simply hadn’t kicked in. You were more likely to see The Enid or AC/DC at The Electric Circus than any touring punk band, many of whom found it difficult to get gigs.

Ryan and cohort Mick Middles (who later went on to write for Sounds and many other publications as well as writing a variety of high-quality books) set up the fanzine Ghast Up in early 1977. They scored interviews with Buzzcocks and other up and coming punk bands and covered gigs in the city, giving their own unique spin on the scene. The magazine was produced on an old-fashioned Roneo Stencil machine and distributed to record stores like Virgin on Lever Street and Paul Morley’s shop in Stockport. Augmented with photos by the likes of Kevin Cummins the publication would run for only 3 editions before running out of steam in July ’77 due to the sheer labour involved producing it.

Ryan takes us on a journey through every gig he attended throughout this whole period. There are detailed diary-style reports of each performance, not just at the Circus but at venues right across Manchester including The Phoenix, The Ranch and The Free Trade Hall – there is also the odd jaunt to London, including the legendary Hope and Anchor!

The book is packed with detail, a full glossary and gigography as well as all three Ghast Ups with interviews with the aforementioned Buzzcocks’ Pete Shelley and The Vibrators.

“Manchester was the second city of punk but quickly moved to create its own narrative – driven by the late and great Pete Shelley who modestly shared his new found fame with a whole host of characters from the local scene – it pretty well invented post-punk with Joy Division. This book captures the energy and the madness as a post-industrial city built the foundations with music for the future city we have today.” – John Robb

This book is an essential part of any music fan’s collection. It fills gaps that few knew were there and far from being just a corrective, is a fascinating glimpse into a nascent subculture. One that would change Manchester forever and set the scene for an explosion of sub-genres which are still popping up to this day!

~

You can buy the Friends Of Mine from Empire here for just £10 inc P&P and £14 outside the UK

Martin Ryan is on Facebook  

Words by Nigel Carr. More writing by Nigel on Louder Than War can be found in his Author’s archive. You can find Nigel on Twitter and Facebook and his own Website. Top pic © Kevin Cummins.

The post Friends Of Mine – Martin Ryan, book review appeared first on Louder Than War.

The Stairs

Mexican R ‘n’ B

Cherry Red

Release Date: 25/01/2019

Mexican R’n’B lays claim to being one of, if not, the most sought after, great lost album of the early 90’s recorded by 60’s influenced garage, west coast, fuzz guitar Liverpool juggernaut trio The Stairs. Having received a lukewarm response when originally released the album has gone on to receive cult status because of its ultra-rare availability on all formats coupled with the album being a total knockout 10/10 effort. All of this is set to change on January 25^th 2019 when Cherry Red Records are to re-release it as a 3 CD deluxe digipak edition which will have the bands fans scrambling around the record stores trying to grab a copy aka Mike Reid’s Runaround. G..g..g…g….GO!! Matt Mead oversees the release and catches up with guitarist Ged Lynn in this exclusive interview for Louder Than War.

I clearly remember the birth of The Stairs came at the time of early grunge/shoegaze scene, meaning the band stood out as being one of a kind with their musical influences including 1960’s garage, fuzz guitar and Captain Beefheart coupled with the backing of a major record company in Go Discs, they were given big exposure in the national weekly music papers, seeing them release a bunch of EP’s, sent out on national tours all within a short space of time, meaning the band were seemingly onto a sure fire winner. Not so. The indie kids of the time didn’t quite get the bands musical leanings and sadly with not so favourable articles in the press, apart from decent reviews of Mexican R ‘n’ B, plus with the rise of Nirvana, The Stairs sadly faded into obscurity, as did their outstanding debut album Mexican R ‘n’ B.

Since then everyone from Elvis Costello, Noel Gallagher to Paul Weller have confessed to the genius that is Edgar Jones and The Stairs, so it would appear appropriate that Mexican R ‘n’ B is now given the sort of fanfare it should have received when it was originally released. Cherry Red Records have been given the task of grappling with the re-release and what a job they have done. From getting my hands on the digi-box the immediate impact is the packaging and artwork. With a superb booklet insert featuring previously unseen archive pictures of the band, archive press clippings and fanzines plus a big write up by famed Mojo magazine writer Lois Wilson, it’s a relief to see the original artwork and colouring have been kept with this new set. With its iconic 1960’s type logo and layout, staying true to original layout captures the magic of the album, a piece of artwork outside to accompany the sounds captured within the package.

On disc one the original album is backed up with the B-sides from the Weed Bus, Mary Joanna, Woman Gone and Said Goodbye EP’s, we get the familiar Rolling Stones-type Mary Joanna kicking off proceedings, with fan favourites Sweet Thing, Wrap Around Your Finger and the instant classic Weed Bus included you can hear the Jaggeresque tones of Jones wrapping his famed lips around the lyrics and shrugging his loafers to the cosmic beat of drummer Paul Maguire and guitarist Ged Lynn. Disc 2 has the hard to find Last Time Around EP in all its glory, further delights on disc 2 and 3 have previously released material that was featured on the albums Right In The Back Of Your Mind and The Great Lemonade Machine In The Sky albums released on Viper Records, which give added insight into the productivity of Edgar Jones. He wasn’t just a one album wonder, there are 3 to 4 albums worth of outstanding material within this package, a true treat for anyone wanting to rediscover the The Stairs or for those that are looking for the best re-issue of 2019, this is the release you’ll be playing all year. Do Tarzan undies scare ya?

Interview with Ged Lynn

LTW: What are your first memories as a child?

Ged: Sitting on the couch in the morning watching me 2 older brothers going to school, must have been 3 or 4 years old.

What is the first musical memory you can remember?

The radio being on a lot and watching Top of the Pops on the TV. Blockbuster by The Sweet had a big impact on me at the time.

Who were your first musical influences?

I was into the Buzzcocks, The Sex Pistols, XTC, etc. from 1978 onward, but it was hearing Crocodiles by Echo and the Bunnymen that made me want to learn guitar.

Were any of your family musical?

My cousin John was a guitarist and played in a band called Come In Tokyo and my cousin Paul was a drummer, which is where my interest in the drums came from. He played in Rhombus of Doom years later in 2000.

When did you first pick up an instrument?

Finally started learning guitar at 14yrs old (4 years after Crocodiles was released). I was a drummer with no kit since I was 5 years old and finally got a kit at 14yrs old.

Were you in bands before The Stairs?

First band I was in was called The Skinnies (drums and guitar). I was also in a group called The Poppy Field on the drums.

How did The Stairs form?

Me old mate Pete Baker had moved to a new flat in town so I knocked for him and his flat was full of these people I didn’t know. Edgar was one of them though I knew who he was from going out, etc. but had never met him, then I heard his demo tape of Weed Bus. The song that blew me away was I Remember a Day. Anyway the idea was me on drums, Pete Baker on bass and Edgar on guitar but not much happened with that idea and Edgar met Paul Maguire so I became the guitarist. It was 1988 when I first met Edgar, I met Paul a couple of months later.

Did you play gigs before you recorded songs in the studio?

We played loads of gigs before recording the Weed Bus EP. First ever gig was New Year’s Eve 1989 we played about 3am so the nineties begun with a 4 song gig. We did a 6 week residency at the Cosmos Club on Seel Street and eventually a residency at the Ritz in Manchester so we were building a decent following before we were signed by Go Discs.

Was the bands output always raw blues/60’s garage lead songs?

Initially it was all about garage fuzz. Practice was sparse to begin with so we had a cover of Sweet Young Thing by Chocolate Watchband, Mary Joanna and Laughter In Their Eyes but soon enough Edgar was writing all sorts of great stuff and we became more Kinks, Easybeats. 1966 was a bit of an obsession for us the Yardbirds, Pretty things, etc.

Where did some of the ideas come from the songs such as Weed Buss, Woman Gone and Mr Window Pane?

Weed Bus was about skinning up on the top deck of the bus after getting paid, it’s a well-known story nowadays. Mr Window Pane is influenced musically from What In The World by The Dukes of Stratosphere, Edgar can explain the lyrics better than I can but it’s not about LSD which I initially thought it was (there were strong gelatine LSD tabs called Windowpanes doing the rounds at the time, so it was a great psychedelic song title). Woman Gone is just good old fashioned RnB with brilliant twists and turns, a truly brilliant tune which highlighted for me how Ed and Paul had become so tight. A pleasure to play something that Brilliant for me.

Did Edgar have the main ideas for the songs and then the band would thrash out the song to make it into the song that appeared on the album/single? Can you explain this process?

Edgar was always writing so there was always stuff to learn and change, etc. Sometimes the whole tune was finished in his but others would get thrashed out in practice and 4 track home recording to sort the more trickier tunes but Edgar was always open to Paul and I to have ideas about stuff. It was always a case of if something is written and sorted don’t mess with it but other tunes needed a total band effort It depends on the nature of the tune

What are your memories of recording the album? How long did it take to record?

The album took 3 weeks to record and was a bit erratic at times for me. There was just some tunes I couldn’t play as well as Edgar did on guitar which did my overall confidence no good, but it got finished and released and it’s stood the test of time, which is always important.

Chas Smash of Madness fame was a big fan of yours at Go Discs wasn’t he? How did he first get in contact with the band?

Chas was in Crash Studios looking for bands to sign and we was rehearsing there. He loved the stuff we we’re doing and signed us up. Also, around the time of getting signed by Chas, I lived in a house with Pete Baker, Neil Reeves (Stairs van driver) and Jason. We called it Transparent Mansions as me, Pete and Neil we’re in a group called the Transparent Band. I was the drummer, but was eventually replaced by Andy Parle who was our drum roadie at the time. The Transparent Band would go on to support us on tour.

Was there a plan to always release an album?

Anyone in a band wants to make an LP so it always an aim The Mexican R’n’ B concept had been around for ages, it was Edgar’s idea, enthusiastically supported by the rest of the band. I was a kind of spaced out character of the group so I asked if I could wear a space suit instead of the Mexican garb.

Did you tour extensively to promote the album? Are there any interesting stories you can tell of your time on the road at this period?

There was a 3 week Britain tour for the album. As for stories we kind of kept to ourselves round that time. We we’re in our own stoned all the time universe really so no rock n roll tales, but lots of fun was had.

Did you get any good press? I remember NME slated you in a number of interviews?

Mixed reviews really. Bad reviews for the first 2 singles but good ones for the album which is odd as the singles clearly sold better than the LP

You were and are very popular in Japan?

Everyone is popular in Japan aren’t they? Are we still popular there? I haven’t a clue!

Looking back now, what do you think the legacy is of the album is?

The legacy of the LP is that although it sold poorly it stood for something that never quite fitted in anywhere and those kind of LP’s tend to influence slowly as the years go by. A lot of stuff we loved from the 60’s suffered a similar fate, plus that what could have been thing is helpful to legendary status.

Are there any stand out songs from the original album and the reissue with the additional tracks that you are pleased with?

Laughter in their Eyes, Mundane Mundae, Sweet Thing are stand out songs for me and made up that more people can hear the Last Time Around EP and Toerag stuff.

Are there any songs that haven’t made the re-issue that you hoped would have made the cut?

A tune called Don’t Water The Froth which was my reply to Froth, a band with Barry Sutton, Lee Webster and drummer Alex (can’t remember surname). They had written an instrumental tune entitled The Stairs. It was a kind of mix of the Elevators/The Stairs and Froth, and was brilliant. So my reply was an instrumental with a mix of The Stairs style garage, improvised parts and even a Sex Pistols style section. A pretty crazy tune that was always destined to be overlooked.

What are the plans for the band in the future?

A tour will happen a few months after the reissue for sure. We would like to release new stuff eventually but how and when is all up in the air at the moment.

Finally, what’s on your turntable at present?

Nothing permanent on my turntable these days. I have music in my head all the time anyway so I don’t need to play recorded music as much, but I never tire of The White Album, XTC and The Dukes of course but I listen more to stuff I’ll never be able to play myself. Miles Davis, Steve Malmus and the Jicks, The Fall and Marc Riley’s BBC 6 music radio show have featured heavily over the years.

~

You can pre-order Mexican R’n’B via the Cherry Red website. You can also follow The Stairs via the Facebook, Twitter and Instagram pages.

All words by Matt Mead. Further articles by Matt can be found via the Louder Than War author archive pages.

The post The Stairs: Mexican R’n’B reissue – news and interview appeared first on Louder Than War.

Elizabeth Joan Kelly – Music For The DMV

DL

Out Now

American classical and ambient/industrial electronic artist releases her new album. Louder Than War’s Paul Scott-Bates reviews.

Originally released in August 2018, Music For The DMV is slowly but surely receiving more and more recognition as time goes by. Utilising Found Sound and MIDI, Elizabeth Joan Kelly has created something of a milestone in underground electronic music with the Brian Eno inspired title – Music For The DMV (America’s Department of Motor Vehicles).

Taking its title influence from Music For Airports, fifteen tracks see Kelly delve into the extraordinary masses of online found sounds which she treats, manipulates and regurgitates. A simple task on the face of things but what she does here is nothing short of extraordinary and inspiring.

With Bachelors and Master’s degrees in music composition from both New Orleans’ Loyola University and the Cleveland Institute of Music, the Louisiana born artist certainly has a high pedigree when it comes to writing and recording. With past music performed by the Cleveland Chamber Symphony, Vox Novus and So Percussion, Kelly now finds herself experimenting with instrumental electronic music exploring the links between technology, industrialisation and consumerism.

Album opener, Industrial Ambient Prelude welcomes the listener to a sombre dystopian atmosphere before the following track, Club Clanger combines chaos with dance and experimentation with more than a hint of the intro to Depeche Mode’s Shout as it skilfully knits everything together.

Twilight Moving Meditation is a gorgeous ambient piece with a gentle percussive loop and Bouncyland brings immense fun to the party proving that Kelly isn’t just a one-trick pony and Ghost In The Machine succeeds with the shrillest of movietronic screams added for good measure.

With final track, Call My Number comes one of the most beautiful tracks you could hope to hear. Sometimes disturbing, sometimes enlightening, it features Elizabeth on haunting angelic vocals akin to Julee Cruise with the most restrained of instrumental backing.

With the promise of a new album for 2019, Elizabeth Joan Kelly could well be a name to look out for. Simple but expertly assembled music with more than a few surprises along the way.

More from Elizabeth Joan Kelly on Bandcamp here. Her website is here: elizabethjoankelly.com and she can be followed on Twitter as @elizabethjelly

All words via Paul Scott-Bates. More of Paul’s writing on Louder Than War can be found at his author’s archive. Paul’s website is hiapop Blog and you can follow him on Twitter here, and on Facebook here.

The post Elizabeth Joan Kelly: Music For The DMV – album review appeared first on Louder Than War.

Serfs Up! is Fat White Family’s third album and their first for new label Domino. Released on Friday 19^thApril 2019 it marks the most gratifying and unexpected creative volte face in recent musical history.

The band have today shared the first track to be taken from the album, Feet, a triumphant return which perfectly heralds the overwhelming musical scope and ambition of the album.  Listen to Feet HERE.

Having released their second album, Songs For Our Mothers in January 2016, core-members Lias and Nathan Saoudi relocated to Sheffield and set about writing the album. Joined by co-conspirator Saul Adamczewski and recorded at their own Champzone studios in the Attercliffe area of the city, Serfs Up!was finished in late autumn 2018 with the help of long-time collaborator, Liam D. May and features a guest appearance from Baxter Dury on Tastes Good With The Money.

The track listing of the 10-track album is as follows:

1.   Feet
2.   I Believe In Something Better
3.   Vagina Dentata
4.   Kim’s Sunsets
5.   Fringe Runner
6.   Oh Sebastian
7.   Tastes Good With The Money
8.   Rock Fishes
9.   When I Leave
10. Bobby’s Boyfriend

Serfs Up! is a lush and masterful work, lascivious and personal. Tropical, sympathetic and monumental. It invites the listener in rather than repel them through wilful abrasion. Fat White Family have broken previous default patterns of behaviour, and as suchtheir third album heralds a new day dawning.

Gregorian chants, jackboot glam beats, string flourishes, sophisticated and lush cocktail exotica, electro funk and the twin spirits of Alan Vega and Afrika Bambaataa punctuate the record at various junctures, while the dramatic production of Feet is as immaculately-rendered as ‘Hounds of Love’-era Kate Bush. The dirt is still there of course, but scrape it away and you’ll find a purring engine, gleaming chrome.

Echoing within the arrangements throughout are traces of blissed-out 60s Tropicalia, Velvets/Bowie sleaze-making and star-gazing, 80s digital dancehall, David Axelrod-style easy listening, joyous Pet Shop Boys synth crescendos, acid house, post-PIL dub, metropolitan murder ballads, doom-disco and mouth-gurning, slow-mo psychedelia so by the time it comes to a close only a fool would deny that Serfs Up! is something very special. No longer is unadulterated music malevolence Fat White Family’s stock in trade; this is cultivated music for the head, the heart. For tomorrow’s unborn children.

Where once they soundtracked a grubby Britain of vape shops, Fray Bentos dinners and blackened tin-foil, a crepuscular comedown realm stalked by Shipman, Goebbels and Mark E. Smith, Fat White Family now inhabit another cosmos entirely. Serfs Up !is the product of a band of outlaws reborn. Few but themselves could have forecast it: Fat White Family survived. Fat White Family got wise. Fat White Family got sophisticated.

Serfs Up! will be available on CD (WIGCD401), standard vinyl (WIGLP401), Dom Mart exclusive vinyl (12” heavyweight transparent red vinyl with fold out poster – WIGLP401XM) and via digital download (WIG401D).  You can pre-order Serfs Up! HERE.

The post Fat White Family announce new album! Listen to new track here appeared first on Louder Than War.

• Liam Frost / Frank Sims

Manchester Night And Day Cafe

Jan 2018

Live Review

Liam Frost brought his Latchkey Kids album and full band to the Night and Day on the Saturday before Christmas for a not-so-festive Christmas party. Support came from promising singer-songwriter Frank Sims.

It’s a tough slot opening for a local hero as loved as Liam Frost but Frank Sims is made of strong stuff. Unperturbed by the chattering at the bar and with the promise of no festive songs he disarms the crowd down the front with some deliberately crafted songs about love, loss and how friends and gin get you through bad times. Tracks like Corners Of You and Astoria have a well-observed thoughtfulness to them whilst Angie genuinely captures emotions of a relationship. His voice isn’t the most aggressive or emphatic but it’s his softly-spoken approach and willingness to talk about his songs that generates an empathy with those willing to listen and not compare Christmas jumpers or size of turkey they’ve bought at the back.

“These are some of the most depressing songs ever, fuck your Christmas” Liam tells us a couple of songs into his set to huge cheers from the assembled crowd. No one goes to watch Liam to sing along to meaningless glib platitudes, his songs are to envelop yourself in, relate your own experiences to his own revelations and to together feel that it might just be alright if we stick together.

He’s assembled a rock band tonight to deliver the harder edged tones of The Latchkey Kids in comparison to his previous two loved albums Show Me How The Spectres Dance and We Ain’t Got No Money Honey But We Got Rain. Whilst tracks from those records get the biggest cheers of recognition, the new songs get similar levels of acclaim at the end.

He opens with a series of new songs, as if to make his intentions clear to those at the back. Going Steady’s country-infused rock blends beautifully with his accented vocal while Hall Of Mirrors Rope Of Sand sees the band let loose battling against some on-stage sound issues to add a hard edge to proceedings. Didn’t It Rain and in particular Mercy Me have tinges of country to them, but the sort that looks you square in the eye whilst Who’s Gonna Love You feels like it’s on steroids with the band compared to the slower quieter solo versions he’s played for a few years.

The solo section really tests the audience’s listening capabilities and splits the crowd between those tied up in their own thing and those whom Liam has eating out of the palm of his hand. Rightly, given he’s brought a band together, this section focuses heavily on Spectres and even gives us a nod to the festive season with a dash of Last Christmas. The likes of Try Try Try, Is This Love, If Tonight We Could Only Sleep and The City Is At Standstill are engraved on the hearts of those who consider, like us, Liam to be up there with the city’s most feted lyricists of drinking and doom and as most of the front rows mouth back every word, you can’t help but wonder why he’s still playing these tiny venues and not the academies and bigger halls.

The band return for the set’s finale, again heavily focused on The Latchkey Kids with lead singles Smoke and The Slow Knife as well as the album’s most fan-acclaimed track Pomona. The band add depth and power to the songs that make this record not shirk in comparison to its more beloved older friends. There’s a wistful beauty to Follow You Around, a world-weariness that comes through in Liam’s voice too. There’s a couple of tracks from the longer-standing fans too. The Mourners Of St Paul’s is sung back to Liam with a drunken gusto that’s reserved for ubiquitous singles of more successful bands without losing the emotion of the song’s subject whilst Skylark Avenue ups its game to compete with the new kids on the block around it.

As it’s Christmas and Liam’s fuck you was very much with tongue firmly planted in cheek, he leaves us with a singalong of Santa Claus Is Coming To Town and even our ice cold heart is melted enough to forgive this celebration of something so very un rock and roll.

The Latchkey Kids songs have been played in different ways now, but each time they unravel new things about themselves. They can take the bruising and battering of a rock and roll set like tonight as nonchantly as they wrap themselves round you when stripped back. That’s the ultimate testament to great songwriting and fifteen years on Liam Frost is still crafting songs of timeless quality that connect to the rawest of human emotions in the same way his more celebrated peers are lauded for. He is still this city’s best kept secret after all this time.

Liam Frost’s website can be found here and he is on Facebook and Twitter.

Frank Sims can be found on Facebook and Twitter.

The post Liam Frost / Frank Sims: Manchester Night And Day Cafe – Live Review appeared first on Louder Than War.

The sales of tapes have seen big increases in recent years with another increase of 125% in 2018, but is this really a return of the cassette?

In the words of LL Cool J, don’t call it a comeback. Yet quite a bit has been made of the increase in tape sales in 2018. The jump in sales is quite big, standing at 125%. On the surface it sounds like an acceleration in sales that replicates the recent resurgence of vinyl. But is tape really seeing a revival? If we look more closely, it seems more likely that something else is happening.

If we are honest, tapes were never a great way to listen to music. They gave us access to music, but they are unlikely to be anyone’s preferred way of listening. We might have nostalgia for the time that we used tapes or for the music we listened to on the format, but people are unlikely to be that nostalgic about the format itself. They lacked the warmth and feel of vinyl, they lacked the quality and ease of skipping of a CD. The tape trapped you into linear listening, having to follow the tape from start to finish and back again. With tape it was hard to skip between tracks or to go straight to a particular song (this admittedly had some benefits, you got to know the music better and I suppose it made you listen to tracks that you might otherwise jump over). They were easily damaged and the quality wasn’t always great.

Despite the drawbacks, tapes still had their value. They were more mobile than other formats of the time, they could be listened to on the move and stored more easily, and they were often cheaper than CD and Vinyl. The best thing about tape was how easy they were to record onto. Purchased albums could easily be copied and mixtapes were a great way to share music.

Tapes also have a couple of advantages over streaming and download, which might explain the modest sales numbers of recent years — and why some bands and artists are choosing to release their music on cassette. Tapes have an actual material presence. They can be held, looked at, felt, displayed. The move from more material formats to streaming and downloads does lack this, it lacks the tactile material relationship that formats like tape provide – which might also be why people are turning back to vinyl.

For some, tapes carry a kind of connection with past experiences. They are an example of what Sherry Turkle calls ‘evocative objects’, they are objects that capture bits of our biographies. Some of the tape sales will be a product of people recalling the magic of buying music on tape and the excitement that went with it — especially when they were part of early musical experiences. I remember with fondness getting Never Mind the Bollocks on tape, I still have it (although I listen to the vinyl version now)

If we look more closely at the official sales figures, they show that of the 50,000 tapes that were sold 7,523 were of The 1975’s album A Brief Inquiry into Online Relationships and 6,262 were of Kylie Minogue’s album Golden, both were limited edition (the Prodigy were third highest with 2,148 tape copies of their album No Tourists). So these two artists made up about a third of all the tapes sold in the year. This suggests not that people are going back to tape, but that certain limited or collector-type issues of tapes will do well and will boos the overall numbers. It seems that the tape is making a comeback not so much as a way of listening to music, although people undoubtedly are doing this, but more often as a collectable.

A few years ago tape looked like a dead format. Tape players weren’t manufactured on the same scale and few artists and labels released material on the format. The increase in tapes is part of a return to a more material connection with culture that goes with increases in book and Vinyl sales (although CD sales are still dropping). Sometimes people like to hold their music in their hands and put it, and their identity, on display in their homes. We can’t think of tape sales increases as being a big change in itself. Under 50,000 sales is modest, especially compared to 91 billion streams in the year. The limitations of tape are likely to prevent people returning to it in large numbers, but it seems that cassettes still have a place in the complex mix of music listening practices we have today. What this small increase does suggest is that sometimes people like to have something tangible that represents their tastes, something that they can hold onto.

Words by Dave Beer. More information about his writing can be found on his website and he is also on Twitter.

The post Are cassette tapes really making a comeback? appeared first on Louder Than War.

Following on from the success of turning Alphabet Brewery into Manchester’s newest pop up venue by staging the Punks 4 West Papua gig with The Blinders, Membranes, Witch Fever and Modern Family Unit, Georgina Robinson (Factory Records) and Jo Lowes (Puffer Fish Press, Fab Radio) are teaming up again under the guise of new venture “Birds on a Wire” to bring more unique gigs and events to the Alphabet Brewery Tap.

This first funked up offering will be Saturday February 23rd in aid of Musicians Against Homelessness featuring The Winachi Tribe, Manc street poet Argh Kid, SWJ Group and The Pagans: Shepherds of Humanity. After the live music is wrapped up the Winachi Tribe will be hitting the decks. The brewery will be offering it’s usual blend of Alphabet drinks and street food in their extended outdoor space.

Each band on the bill offer their own unique style, so what better way than to give you the lowdown on each act says Wayne Carey.

Photo Credit: Anthony Conway Photography.

The Pagans S.O.H.

Straight Outta West Brom these guys are one of my tips this year. I saw them first at The Castle last year supporting another promising band Cold Water Swimmers (review here: https://louderthanwar.com/cold-water-swimmers-manchester-castle-hotel-live-review/) and they had me from the start. Think Chilies, R.A.T.M, hip hop / grime and a bonkers frontman. Just check the excellent debut single out and decide for yourself.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thepagansband/

SWJ Group.

SWJ Group are a Mancunian band who make music to nod your head to. Our own Emily Oldfield had the radar out from day one (review here: https://louderthanwar.com/swj-group-scribbles-single-review/). Funky, groovy tunes with a hint of Manchester grit, they hit a groove and stay on it, making every gig an event filled with happy vibes. Wah, beats, keys and above all else top tunes combine to make a huge sound, some call it slacker funk, some call it Mancadelic – It’s best you see them and make up your own mind. In the words of the band themselves “All you got to do is live and love”.

Website: http://www.swjgroup.co.uk/

Photo Credit: Paul Grogan Photography.

Argh Kid.

Another recommendation from a LTW fellow writer prompted me to check him out live when he dropped in on Northwich late last year (review here: https://louderthanwar.com/argh-kid-northwich-plaza-live-review-friday-7th-december/). Definitely one to watch as his debut album hits the streets from March and will be up there in the album of the year polls if what I’ve heard already is anything to go by.

This Manchester raised poet is winning hearts and minds with his verbal energy, gaining celebrity fans such as Liam Gallagher, Christopher Eccleston and Chris Evans. The “Acapella Eminem” is now the Official Poet for the NSPCC, UEFA and Manchester United and his work has been broadcast to homes across the globe. There are few artists in his genre able to provide on-point commentary and storytelling with the same spirit, skill and compassion. David is also a poet on a mission to make the art form accessible to the masses. Using his own experiences as a template he facilitates workshops across the country, creating a sense of what is possible to young people when you pick up a pen. He is often found across UK media and is a regular on ITV, BBC, BT Sport and beyond. His work has been reproduced in different languages and publications around the world from Denmark’s Politiken to The New York Times.

Website: https://www.arghkid.com/

Photo credit: WAM Warrington Music.

Winachi Tribe.

Since the formation of the band in 2015 opening for Ringo Star’s Son ‘Zak Starkey’ in London’s West End, ‘The Winachi Tribe’ have not stopped for a second.

Releasing a number of critically acclaimed singles, also two promotional videos starring acting greats Keith Allen and Hollywood star Tommy Flanagan (Sons Of Anarchy / Gladiator / Braveheart). The second was filmed with Tommy Flanagan at his Ranch in Malibu, California. He actually starred in the bands video for single ‘A Room With A Zoo’ (not a bad black book eh?). Collaborating with legendary producer’s ‘Howie.B’ ‘Danny Saber’ & ‘John X (recording sessions with Danny Saber took place in the Laurel Canyon at his notorious Batcave studio & John X at the legendary Venice Beach Creation Centre). John is currently co-producing the bands debut album. They have gained global press / airplay in both the U.K, U.S and China, including rotation on national BBC 6 Music, BBC Introducing, KCRW, KEX, plus features in major publications such as L.A Times, L.A Record, Buzz Bands L.A, NME, Billboard China, Manchester Evening News & The Big Issue (all this achieved with no corporate backing, just raw talent and relentless hard work!). Tearing up stages at some of the UK’s biggest music festivals including Victorious Festival, Tramlines, Shiiine On Weekender, Moovin Festival, Bearded Theory & Sunflowerfest Belfast. Being booked as official tour support for Happy Mondays, Soul 2 Soul, Sugar Hill Gang, The Furious Five and The Charlatans, plus also headlining three of their own national U.K tours. The Winachi Tribe show no sign of slowing down!

2018 has seen the band head to America in March for their debut headline tour of the U.S (California) and a second tour of L.A in September which saw the band open for U.K Indie legends The Charlatans at the Teragram Ballroom L.A. It’s also fair to say L.A has become the second home for this Northern U.K band of Funked up misfits…with their management H.R.B management also being based in West Hollywood. Summer 2018 also saw the release of critically acclaimed single ’Transition’ (picking up an official ‘Grammy’ entry along the way for best Dance track!!!). This release was backed by a 20 date headline U.K tour which was met by rave reviews throughout the U.K music press. The Winachi Tribe’s rise in a relatively short space of time has been astonishing. From humble beginnings as the U.K.’s North West Electro Funk underdogs, to collaborating with a large impressive cast of legendary names from the world of music and acting, gaining major press / airplay all over the world and touring both the U.K & L.A to rave reviews. The world seems to literally be in their hands of Winachi, if they choose to take it. It’s an exciting prospect to see what the future holds for this unique band, dare I say it, Tribe.

Tickets are £10 and on sale through Skiddle.

Words by Wayne Carey who writes for Louder Than War. His author profile is here and you can catch his  website here 

The post Alphabet Brewery Live Event News and Feature appeared first on Louder Than War.

Greg Gilbert (Delays): Love Makes a Mess of Dying – Poetry book and Art Exhibition previewed.

Greg Gilbert is singer/guitarist/frontman with Delays,  a band named after Southamptons most common traffic report – who remain arguably the coolest band to have ever emerged from the city. Since the news of his stage 4 cancer diagnosis broke just over two years ago, Greg has explored other art forms as part of his convalescence from ongoing cancer treatment.

An exhibition of his art – drawings and painting – will be on show at Southampton City Art Gallery from 1st Feb 2019.

And a selection of his poetry is being published after being selected by Carol Ann Duffy for the 2019 Laureate’s Choice Collection.   (Currently #1 on Amazon’s Hot New Releases in Poetry chart !)

Well deserved and a testament to his huge talent, which ironically seems to have branched off in other directions and bloomed due to his ill health.

…………..

The shittiest things happen to the nicest people.

Greg Gilbert to be frank was rubbish at being an old-fashioned excess-all-areas rock-star.  He never took drugs, barely drank, always had his head in a book.  And he sang like a girl. (“I take that as a compliment Ged”)

He was already a much-loved figure in Southampton and within the Noughties Indie scene because, basically, he and his band were thoroughly nice blokes.  His quiet determination to live with cancer, whilst the NHS help him beat the disease, lead to a huge response to the appeal for funds for potentially life-saving treatment the beleaguered NHS cannot provide.

The book (or pamphlet) of poetry I haven’t seen yet, but is described thus;

Examining the collision between tragedy and hope, Love Makes a Mess of Dying follows the struggle to make sense of the prognosis and treatment of a life-threatening disease whilst surrounded by the love and support of friends and family.

The search for the truth of an experience which seems to belie words gives Gilbert’s poetry urgency, eerie clear-sightedness, and a lush Keatsian lyricism.    – Sasha Dugdale

I know that the poems are going to be stunning, beautiful and painfully sad. It is, “Raw, honest and scared”, he told the Daily Echo.   There are two pieces of prose that Greg wrote which appear on his wife Stacey Heales blog ‘Beneath the Weather’:  Blue Draped Cube and There Are No Secrets Here – which show what a great, lyrical writer he is.

His art, some of which he has put on Facebook over the years range “from miniature, photorealistic biro studies drawn from photographs to equally intricate but surreal imaginings” on canvas.  I’m no art critic but they are vivid, livid and to me, scary. (The chemo-therapy dreamscapes perhaps only cancer-survivors find frightening  -others think they are just remarkable.)

This exhibition will feature a body of work, Convalescence, which was created in a great outpouring both in hospital and at home. Although all of the images arrived very naturally, they put the artist back in touch with primary influences of interwar artist such as Stanley Spencer, Paul Nash and David Jones, who processed their traumatic experiences through surreal narratives.

To accompany this presentation of his own works Gilbert will be selecting several drawings from Southampton’s permanent collection, featuring artists who have informed and resonate with his own practice.

Also on display will be a selection of the artists’ poetry, a selection of which has been chosen by Carol Ann Duffy to be one of her Laureates’ Choice publications. These poems further explore his illness but in a less abstract way creating a full, sensory diary of his experience.

There is an extremely good interview with Greg in Southampton local paper, the Daily Echo, by Sally Churchward who has covered his progress over the past two years, where he talks about his poetry and art, which I would urge you to read.  (Greg has even succeeded in bringing some proper journalism to a very dull newspaper – mentioning when-ever he can the Fight to Save the NHS.)

Fans of Delays music will have to be patient as far as music is concerned, but hopefully they can get something out of these other artistic outlets.

Whatever he turns his hand to, he is a simply a great artist: a gentle, immensely talented man.

Why do the shittiest things happen to the nicest people?  I don’t know, but sometimes, something of lasting value comes out of it…

Pre-Order/ Buy ‘Love Makes A Mess of Dying’ from here 

Details of Art Exhibition 1 Feb – 6 May 2019 at Southampton City Art Gallery

Daily Echo Interview piece by Sally Churchward

All words, except where stated, Ged Babey for Louder Than War

The post Greg Gilbert (Delays): Love Makes a Mess of Dying – Poetry book & Art Exhibition appeared first on Louder Than War.

Glenn Campling (Tones On Tail) and Mark
Garner, collectively; LONESTATION return
with their second album MACHINE. The
magnificent new album follows last years’
debut DARK MATTER*
LONESTATION remain an enigma, defying
categorization at every turn and once again
boast a mighty fine collection of deep grooves.
A myriad of different styles, sounds and
colours adorn MACHINE, for example, check
out the once dormant deep rooted dub
influences of King Tubby and Lee “Scratch” Perry, now coming up for air, very much
evident on tracks like ShadowMan sitting neatly alongside the chugging rock of
Silver & Gold, Bleeding Blue or Enemy Eye. The ambience that garnishes One will
perhaps remind listeners of at least one half of Lonestation’s humble beginnings…
while the floaty Burn Underground features celebrated world music artist and
some time Transglobal Underground contributor Natacha Atlas

CDs available from Lonestation

The post Glenn Campling (Tones On Tail) announces new album from his Lonestation project appeared first on Louder Than War.