THE SMITHS: How Soon Is Now? (7″, WEA YZ 0002, 1993)

I really like this song, but I am in no way a Smiths aficionado. I only own a couple of their records, and I think I’m slightly younger than those music fans that had a deep and meaningful relationship with their band as they traversed their awkward teenage years. (A combination of hip-hop and indie pop helped me through that time personally, but that’s another story…) As such, I don’t have an extreme and possessive sense of ownership about the Smiths, as seems to be the case with many people of a certain age. But, as I said, I really like this song. This one and ‘This Charming Man’ are my favourite Smiths songs, if that counts for anything: although probably not, as I haven’t heard all of their songs and therefore can’t really state much of a watertight opinion on them as a whole.

This is some kind of reissue single; I presume that the original came out on Rough Trade at some point before 1993? The reason for the reissue seems to be as a promotional device for the Best… compilation that’s none-too-subtly advertised on the rear sleeve. It must be nice for major labels to press up thousands of copies of a record purely to promote another record. It compares strangely to my own experiences of pressing up one thousand records at maximum and finding it to be an incredibly difficult, time-consuming and somewhat stressful job. (But ultimately very fulfilling – even if hundreds of records still reside in my attic waiting for the very slow sales to continue rolling in…)

I’m sure there is an essay or two to be written about the Smiths’ artwork, with its many stills from films of the ’50s and ’60s. A psychology student could no doubt read all kinds of meanings into the significance of the stills as regards their connections with the music. For me, they just look nice, and make me want to see some cool old movies. This one is from Blow Up, is it not? That’s an odd movie. Before explaining the significance of the film in terms of the Smiths’ music, can somebody first explain the meaning of the mime-tennis scene at the end of the film, please?

GAG/ABLE MESH: Condo 63/Mountaineer/Holiday Faces (7″ flexi, Audacious AUDACIOUS 2, 1993)

A brief meditation on the inherent problems in trying to order records, that feature more than one artist, on the shelf – such as in this example, which I’ve just spent ten minutes trying to find. What’s the best way to go, assuming an alphabetical ordering of records is the baseline requirement?

1. Arrange in order of the first-named artist quoted on the sleeve?
2. Arrange in order of the first-named artist to appear on the A side of the record?
3. Arrange in order of the label name for the record?
4. Arrange in order of the title of the record?

I use method number four as a rule, but the obvious problem with that is that not all multi-artist records have titles. So in those instances I use method number one as a backup. In the case of this particular record, however, I had decided at some point in the past that the title was ‘Audacious Two’ – seemingly because that was the largest text on the cover. So I’ve exposed a weakness in my system; a flaw: I was fully expecting this to be shelved under G for Gag and it took some time for me to realise otherwise. What to do, to counteract this kind of thing happening in the future?

1. Give up on any kind of ordering system, and just make my shelves a free-for-all?
2. Use another system, such as sleeve colour, date purchased, or something else?
3. Throw all of my records away?

On reflection and after careful consideration, I can tell you with a calm sense of urgency that none of these three suggestions…

1. Will ever happen.

So I’m stuck with my system and all of its wonderful foibles.

Anyway. I’ll never tire of records and fanzines with this kind of look – the single-colour printing and layouts made up of typewritten text and pasted-in imagery drawn from all kinds of sources (clip art, old comics and magazines, photographs, drawings). I remember that when I bought this flexi through the mail from the chap in Bedford who released it, I was immediately impressed with the idea of packaging a fanzine around a record. Not that it was a particularly original or devastatingly new idea, but it allows in this case, where the fanzine is in 7″-sleeve-sized format, for ease of shelving amongst other records. Despite the aforementioned problems that this may create.

The flexi is great, a clear sliver of plastic containing music from Gag, who were brilliant in a Captain Beefheart-gone-indie-pop kind of way. The fanzine is a decent read, too – stuff on Henry Rollins, bits about Gag and Able Mesh, some personal ’slice of life’ bits of writing and a few reviews. I always like reading reviews in old fanzines as they remind me of all of the links and networks that used to exist. In this case, the reviews include opinions on a marvellous old fanzine called The Melody Haunts My Reverie and the first release on Imperial Recordings, whose releases I’m sure I’ll randomly come to on here at some point. There is much to say about that label and its releases, when I get to it.

TRANSPARENT THING: Car (7″, Wurlitzer Jukebox WJ 35, ?)

I don’t know when this record was released – the sleeve or insert doesn’t offer any hard information. Why can’t these people include the correct information for efficient record-keeping, eh, eh?

In fact, it’s very likely that the year of release could in fact be printed on the rear of the foldover sleeve, but the type on there is so eye-wateringly, brain-splittingly tiny that it’s hard to tell. Well; in all honesty, I’m being slightly facetious. It’s not like the type is unreadable (and I’d never want to come across as one of those dimwits who looks over a piece of design and whose only comment is ‘urrr can’t the text be bigger?’ – that comes just behind ‘I’m not really sure about the colourrrrDUH’ in the whydon’tyouhavearealopinionandwhycan’tyouseebeyondtheendofyournose annoyance stakes). The combination of small type size and swash-heavy script typeface, however, does result in much of the text being just on the right side of challenging to decipher. Maybe that’s the point of this sleeve, though? From the photography on the front and the back, which seems deliberately hazy, washed out and overexposed, to the small type size, and the printing of everything onto a lessen-the-contrast-even-further shade of yellow paper, it seems that perhaps a general feeling of woozy vagueness is being created on purpose. According to some of the microscope-friendly rear sleeve text, the design is by Christopher Douglas @ Flypaper. A cursory glance through Google results suggests one of the following things:

1. Christopher Douglas and/or Flypaper have no presence on the internet.
2. Christopher Douglas and/or Flypaper now operate in spheres outside of design – perhaps a businessman, an author, or even as simply the title of a movie.

Who knows? Wurlitzer Jukebox was always like this, in their presentation as much as the music contained within their releases: vague, enigmatic and a momentary glimpse of something that proved difficult to capture.

MANTRONIX: Music Madness (LP, 10 DIX 50, 1986)

In 1986 when this record came out, I was around thirteen years old and the existence of hip-hop and breakdancing was evident enough for me and a few pals at school to feel confident and knowledgable enough to form our own little breakdancing crew. After all, we’d all seen movies like Beat Street and Breakdance and listened to a lot of badly-recorded tapes of whatever repetitive beats we collectively managed to track down through random radio dial whirling and home taping. Admittedly, our middle-class Midlands-based upbringing may not have been the same experience as if we’d grown up in the rough corners of late ’70s New York, but regardless, the Electro Breakers (as we cringingly named ourselves) were formed, and enjoyed many a playground-based dance off during a few months’ worth of breaktimes. We must have been doing something right, at least in the eyes of our obviously hip teachers, as the highlight of our brief career was to host a physical education class for an hour, teaching classmates how to pop, lock and spin whilst remaining effortlessly cool, clad in matching Nike tracksuit tops.

Some of the artists I remember from those scratchy old cassettes include Roxanne Shanté, LL Cool J and Mantronix, amongst others whom I’d surely recognise but never knew of a name to attach to the sounds. I wasn’t much of a record buyer back then, so unfortunately I don’t have an outstanding collection of original early hip-hop and electro vinyl, but nowadays I’m very slowly picking up records here and there to, effectively, recreate those old cassettes that are now long gone. So, this Mantronix album was acquired at a charity shop somewhere – I can’t remember where – a few months ago. As is so often the case with these things, however, it was something of a small disappointment to play it after a twenty year gap. It’s good, but it’s not as revolutionary or inspiring as it seemed to be back then. I guess that’s what comes of knowing more about music, putting things in perspective and forming your own timelines and histories of sound? The genuine thrills become few and far between. That sounds sad, but it’s not supposed to – I wouldn’t have it any other way. I’m not about to reform the Electro Breakers, though.

HULA HOOP/HOOD/BLAIRMAILER: 3 Band Flexi With… (7″ flexi, Tangled TANGLED 006, 1993)

Flexis are cool. People don’t make them that much any more, as far as I know. Maybe it’s difficult to make them these days. Maybe I should investigate, and if I can, just make a flexi for the hell of it. And hey, if I did, it might be like this one, as it’s a good one. Not only does it involve Hood, everybody’s favourite band that nobody has heard of but who are really very good indeed, but also Hula Hoop, who I remember did an excellent split album with Boyracer, and Blairmailer, who I  remember were something of a big (indie) deal in Australia in the early nineties.

This flexi came free with a fanzine called Open Your Eyes, amongst other things – back in the crazy early nineties there were all kinds of hook-ups and cross-promotional activities going on, with flexis being given out free with several fanzines, fanzines given out free with flexis, and so on. That fanzine was very, very well written and I distinctly remember it as being the first place I ever read the phrase ‘post-rock’. This may not mean much now, as the phrase is attached in one way or another to pretty much every independent band that doesn’t sound like Coldplay of the past ten years. But it was a strange and mysterious new phrase back then – which I think was attached to not what you might expect (the often-referred to as ’slowcore’ of Slint, Codeine etc) but instead to the gliding modern swoops of Trans Am and the noisy tension of Rodan. Actually, Rodan were kind of post-rock-meets-slowcore, but there I’ll end my categorisations before I tie myself in pointless pigeonholing knots.

I’ve actually got several copies of both Open Your Eyes and the associated Hula Hoop/Hood/Blairmailer flexi – for reasons I can’t exactly remember; but very possibly due to my vague plans once to act as an independent distributor and hence buy in several copies of a thing in order to sell it on (for no profit, by the way) after that. Anyway. If anybody reading this wants a copy and can stump up a couple of quid to cover postage, let me know, and I’ll ‘hit you up’ as they say.

OL’ DIRTY BASTARD: Got Your Money (12″, Elektra E7077T, 2000)

Occasionally I’ll hear some piece of music from the mainstream that totally sticks in my head and obsesses me to the point where I ultimately end up in HMV buying it whilst trying to maintain an air of independent coolness that will convince the person behind the till that although I’m buying something that’s been bought by thousands and millions of kids who just don’t know music, I’m still somehow better and more knowledgeable and more hip than any old casual purchaser. Hah! Deal with that long sentence.

This record is such a case – okay, so it might not be from the complete MOR pop mainstream, but it got what I believe is known as ‘heavy rotation’ on major radio stations upon its release. Those major radio stations were the ones that polluted my ears during my working days at the time, and this song was a huge relief amongst the relentless crap every time it came on. Ol’ Dirty Bastard’s voice is so ugly, so rough, I love it – and I love the fact that such a dirty and sleazy song as this was all over Radio One for a time (even if they did have to refer to the artist as just ODB in order to fend off the inevitable flood of complaints)…

By the way – Ol’ Dirty Bastard; RIP. He seemed to live life to the full (to put it mildly).

My Wu-Tang Clan anecdote: I saw Raekwon and pals performing at an All Tomorrow’s Parties festival a couple of years ago, and a few memories stay with me:

• The total rip-off they got away with by playing snippets of Wu-Tang faves for a minute or so before playing out a huge gunshot sound, shouting at the crowd for a bit and then moving on to the next track. Then ultimately descending into nothing more than a sales drive for Wu-Tang t-shirts from the stage.
• How inappropriate the sleazy, dirty hip-hop of Wu-Tang seemed to be when played out to a room full of pasty-faced indie kids (in which group I consider myself firmly a member). The intense embarrassment of seeing flower-skirted indie girls attempting to shake their booty when invited up on stage.
• A brief, drunken conversation with a couple of Wu-Tang entourage who were stalking through the crowd during the performance, selling mix CDs. I purchased a couple, and attempted a manly slap on the back whilst informing the guys that they were ‘great sallesshmen’. What did I expect to be the outcome of this lame performance? That I would get invited to hang out with the group? That I’d become an honorary Wu-Tang? Alcohol makes you do funny things.

SWELL MAPS: A Trip To Marineville (LP, Rough Trade/Rather ROUGH 2, 1979)

This album is an insight into a strange set of minds. I bought it in around ‘92 or so after hearing Swell Maps’ name dropped in the context of a variety of indie-pop and fanzine mentions of – very vaguely and very possibly wrongly – music that prefigured the Pastels and was ’shambolic’ before the whole post-C86 world of shambolicism became a going concern. Just looking at the sleeve and artwork raises some immediate questions:

• What/where is Marineville?
• What’s the significance of the burning home on the front cover?
• What are these songs all about – ‘Vertical Slum’, ‘Midget Submarines’, ‘Harmony In Your Bathroom’, etc… are they literal or some kind of bizarre set of metaphors?

I can’t answer any of these, but I like the fact that before even playing, this album has successfully generated a strange world of intrigue that seems both ramshackle (in the cut-and-paste styling of the inner sleeve collage, or the wide variety of recording sessions noted under each song’s liner notes) and oddly ‘complete’ (in the confidence to include a free 7″ containing four more songs, when the album itself already contains around seventeen). The band members have their performance names – Epic Soundtracks, Golden Cockrill, Phones B. Sportsman and so on – and the whole package suggests as much time sitting around devising plans and schemes as was spent creating the music. And that, of course, is how it should be – non-careerist music created by weirdo artists with a hidden, defined set of personal guidelines for doing so.

I wasn’t old enough to be interested at the time, but I wonder if other records were released in the late-1970s rush of invention that followed punk and led to so-called post-punk which share such a sense of invention, adventure and playfulness as this one? In a very small but somewhat significant way, I believe that this record and others like it paved the way for the entirety of the ‘indie’ scene that grew up in the ’80s and which is now, essentially, the mainstream. Naturally, this album’s on Rough Trade, who had a finger in pretty much every musical pie of note from the late ’70s through the mid ’80s. Respect.

VARIOUS: Rubble Six: The Clouds Have Groovy Faces (LP, Past & Present PAPRLP006, ?)

I will never tire of buying compilations of rare and/or hard-to-find 1960s psychedelia/garage/weirdo/folk music gems. And that’s lucky, as there are what seem like thousands of them out there – some crossing over in their track lists, but on the whole a seemingly endless treasure trove of goodies to be uncovered and enjoyed. I’ve mentioned the Rubble series on here before; this release is one of the Past & Present reissues though, rather than a Bam-Caruso original. (Even when I’ve got all of these records, there will still be the different labels’ issues to keep me occupied in my record hunting. And once I’ve got all of the 1960s compilation vinyl that exists, there are then the CDs to move on to…)

The Rubble series, despite being pretty consistently high quality throughout, make me slightly uncomfortable with their somewhat hackneyed ‘far-out-man’ taglines on each volume – ‘The Clouds Have Groovy Faces’, for example. Why, that’s just paisley-patterned student nonsense. I would prefer more worrying, more disturbing taglines that delve into the darker side of the 1960s – ‘I Took STP And Sawed My Arm Off’, or something. But that’s probably just me. I love the cover of this one, the big bold type works nicely and the imagery is proper The Trip/Psych-Outesque swirling mania.

Looking at the track listing for this volume, it makes me think how some aspects of music never change. We’ve got acts including:

• The Fairytale
• The Kinsmen*
• The Poets
• The End
• The Attack
• The Accent
• The Elastic Band

…and you thought that it was just a recent trait to lazily bands ‘the something‘? Oh, no.

*I did type that correctly – it’s The Kinsmen, not The Kingsmen (of ‘Louis Louis’ fame). The cheek of it!

HAPSHASH AND THE COLOURED COAT: Featuring The Human Host And The Heavy Metal Kids (LP, Minit MLL 40001, 1967)

Wow, look at that cover design. Hapshash And The Coloured Coat were a fashion/graphic design house right in the centre of the late 1960s maelstrom of London psychedelia who, true to the spirit of ‘try anything’ released several albums, of which this is their first. The record within that glorious sleeve is on red vinyl, and is the earliest example of coloured vinyl that I’ve ever seen. I’d be very interested to hear of earlier instances. For now I’m happy to consider it the first, and therefore I imagine a stoned hippy or two having their mind further blown by a record being coloured. Woah.

I bought this on eBay four or five years ago after searching for a copy for a long time. With old records, and especially ones like this that were pretty ‘far out’ at the time, I’d really love to know the paths of ownership by which they have travelled from initial release through to my eventual ownership – in this case, over forty years later. Maybe this record once sat in Syd Barrett’s flat? Maybe it was under the arm of some hipster during their attendance at the 24 Hour Technicolor Dream or some such event? Maybe it was bought and hated by a square? Whatever, I’m pleased that it’s ended up with me. Out of all of the 1960s records I own, this is perhaps one of the finest examples of the super-underground freaked-out British music scene that I love and envy so much. Not so much because of the music – which is fine, chant-heavy meandering psych, somewhat lacking in direction – but because of what the record represents. People doing their own thing, being independent minded and creative, trying things out and proving that the idea of alternatives to a mainstream have always existed.

THE OLIVIA TREMOR CONTROL: Black Foliage (2LP, Flydaddy BRRC1005781, 1999)

Some time ago, in the midst of my letter-writing exploits of the past, I regularly corresponded with a guy called Simon who was at university in, as I recall, Bristol. I’d first been in touch as he’d put out some weird and wonderful fanzines, and he in turn ordered some of mine, and we struck up a postal friendship that often included trading cassettes of stuff that we were into at the time. He provided me with a lot of really good stuff – anything from Aphex Twin’s I Care Because You Do to my first exposure to Can and, indeed, the recorded output of Leonard Nimoy. Yes, this was home-taping at its most illegal, but rather than killing music it sprung me into action to find out (and purchase) records by these people. Simon also provided me with the first CDR of music I’d ever been given, which was very exciting and futuristic back in the swirling mists of the early ’00s when the CD player in my hi-fi was generally unused, save for the odd Christmas gift of a Jon Spencer CD here and a Pebbles box set there.

On that CDR, which I retain to this day (and still listen to) was a wide mix of out-there music, which included a track by The Olivia Tremor Control that stood out as a particularly weird, freaked-out take on 1960s psychedelia of the Fifty Foot Hose/Silver Apples ilk. A couple of years later I chanced upon Black Foliage in a second-hand store somewhere and thought, after being exposed to just that one track of this band’s music before, that here would be an album that finally took centre stage as the ultimate psychedelic music. Well, it’s not quite that – it’s great, if somewhat sprawling and less whacked-out than I had expected, but it still leaves me looking for the ultimate head-trip album to jettison me into the stratosphere. Any hints?