unpopular

Dungeons And Dragons

Astonishingly, there are those who do not rate Montt Mardié. People with otherwise impeccable taste, too. I just don’t understand it. What is not to love, after all?

In May this year I wrote two posts about Montt Mardié’s Skaizerkite album. In the first I suggested that it was “‘Like A Virgin’ glimpsed through Stockholm’s secret sugared Pop kaleidoscope.” I said it was “Tough Alliance slipping a tongue to Friends Again in a frantic lost embrace. Haircut 100 sliding a hand into Britney’s jeans pocket.” In the second, a week later, I said that “my head and heart go turning crazy summersaults in tune with those choruses that explode like roman candles across the cornflower skies of my dreams.” And it was true. It is still true.

Listening to Skaizerkite again in the freeze of December feels like being wrapped in a glittery electric blanket. It warms my heart and toasts my toes. Even a song like ‘Dungeons and Dragons’, which is essentially a sorrowful tale of the fear of public perception versus personal reality and of love thrown away because of that fear. It is a song fired through with brittle paranoia and apprehension that retains a core of warmth despite the cruelty of the self-inflicted pain. Yes, you want to shake the character (I hesitate to suggest it is really Monty, for he does sing so well of different - and recurring - characters in his songs) by the lapels and tell him to get a grip, to grow up and to get over it (Star Wars, Dungeons and Dragons, the girl, whatever...). Yet at the same time you also want to throw an arm around his shoulder, take him down the pub and have a good long chat about the horrors of The Phantom Menace.

May the Force be with you, indeed.

Montt Mardié - 'Dungeons And Dragons'

Liquid Mercury

To repeat: my favourite record label of the year released only three records. But what records!  This was from the third of the Occultation label releases and was the second single of the year by the legendary Wild Swans. Who would have guessed that 2009 would have seen the welcome return of the fire and skill of Paul Simpson and crew? Who would have guessed that the return would yield two sparkling gems of vinyl and a couple of live shows?

There is a compelling case to be put for the inclusion here of the first of those singles - the rampant ‘English Electric Lightning’. With it’s lines about Vulcan bombers, Cornish harbours and William Blake in Cash Convertors it was a startling piece of commentary on contemporary England that managed to strike a perfect balance between the rotten and the righteous; the grime and the glory. It’s flipside, the seven and a half minute ‘The Coldest Winter For A Hundred Years’ was every bit as memorable for different reasons. A tale of life in the Liverpool flat Simpson shared with then Bunnymen drummer Pete de Freitas, it was a track that perfectly captured the poignant, bittersweet blend of hope, love and doomed romantic despair inherent in the lives of young artists struggling to scrape a living. The specifics of the references meant it was impossible for the likes of me to detach it from the memories of the darkness of Thatchers’ England, but really it remains a timeless document - a beautifully observed piece that reverberates with spirit and soul. Which, when you think about it, is exactly what The Wild Swans have always been about.

Despite that, however, I am opting here instead for the second of those singles - the two and a half minute Pop rush of ‘Liquid Mercury’; a song that sounds exactly like its title suggests it ought. Guitars that shimmer in silvery fountains and atop it all, Paul Simpson. The voice of an angel. The soul of an England imagined in books and films and songs; that mythic England of Ray Davies, Evelyn Waugh and Nick Talbot. An England that is part fact, part fiction. An England that is a psychedelic daydream.

On the flip-side of the 7” (I suppose the very notion of ‘sides’ is anathema to the digital generation?) is another spoken word piece. In ‘The Wickedest Man In The World’ Simpson tells of how every year “gets just a little tougher to get through; the regime just a little tighter, and the stars a little more distant.”

I know the feeling.

The Wild Swans - 'Liquid Mercury'

Tomorrow morning, 3 a.m.

My favourite record label of 2009 released only three records. But what records! This particular track was one side of the second release on the small but perfectly formed Occultation label out of Exeter. Not that my locality has been in any way a factor in forming my opinion. I mean, just ask me how I feel about ninety nine percent of the local musical ‘talent’ and I guarantee you will be disabused of any suspicion of regionalism.

Part of that one percent who would escape my scorn however would be The Granite Shore. To suggest that The Granite Shore could in any way be allied to a ‘local’ music scene however would be ridiculous, for are hermetical artistes ever local to anything except their respective imaginations and perhaps the physical fabric of their Geek Lairs?

Now there is much to be said about the magic of the three minute Pop single. Indeed, most of it already has been. But size isn’t everything, and sometimes length really is more satisfying. At nearly six and half minutes ‘Tomorrow Morning, 3 a.m.’ might rightly be called epic. Certainly it is a song, and a record, that has the heart to dream of being something more than your average Pop song. Having said that, it does in fact concern itself with some of the essential themes of Pop: love, loss and longing. Yet it approaches those themes in a novel way, weaving connections between the sleeve and the song (the text on the back cover informs fuller understanding of the lyrics) so that in the end it feels like a wonderful amalgam of literature and Pop. Ged Quinn’s painting detail on the front cover is another magical element in the whole, setting the tone so exquisitely.

There were only 700 of these beautiful 10” records pressed, and on last glance at the online shop, there were still copies available. So once you’ve listened to this low bit-rate MP3, do yourself a favour and buy yourself a copy.

The Granite Shore - 'Tomorrow morning, 3 a.m.'

Start Slowly So We Sound Like a Loch

Earlier this year someone asked if I had given up entirely on live music. The belated answer is ‘yes’. And ‘no’. Or maybe more accurately ‘well, yes, kind of’. To be honest I have never been particularly bothered about live music. Even in my younger years the thrill of seeing a great performance would always be weighed against the immense tedium of hordes of acts going through the tired old (e)motions. The rate of return was not great. Besides which, I always did much prefer the isolation of listening to recorded music in my bedroom. Taking ownership of the music, moulding it into my own daydreams. Soundtracks to my own life, shared with no-one.

There are always exceptions, of course, and as I have grown older those exceptions have often become particularly sparkling memories. They have also usually centred on shows where I’ve had a nice comfy seat in a sensible theatre rather than standing on the sticky floor of a grimy pub, but that’s another story entirely.

This year there were two shows that stood out (neither, it must be said, with comfy seats): the utterly beautiful acoustic set by The Clientele at the Hangover Lounge in London that I made reference to a few days ago (the only downside of which was the frankly disappointing performance by The Cavalcade beforehand. If someone had told me it was going to be a Brighter tribute band I would have stayed downstairs with my beer, thanks very much. See, I can still be a miserable old grump...) and The Pastels / Tenniscoats on the Thekla in Bristol. A hearty thumbs up also goes to the mighty Wave Pictures show on the same boat back in the summer, though again, the appallingly twee and shambolic support effort deducts points.

But yes, Pastels / Tenniscoats. Stephen making quips about Jon Bon Jovi and smiling at my Frida Hyvonen t-shirt. A set so beguiling that I will admit it caught me off-guard, for at that point I had yet to hear the Two Sunsets record and had frankly never been blown away by what I had heard of Tenniscoats. Two Sunsets however was a peach of a record, blending artful experimentation and minimalist Japanese childlike aesthetic with a sharp ear for a seductive tune and the matured esoteric instrumentation of a group grown comfortable in their singular awkwardness. It was a soft triumph of a record; a record that took apart its various influences and cultural contexts and put them back together in ways that were at once splendidly new and gloriously familiar. From such a collection of delights though this album closing track was my favourite, not least for hearing Katrina sing ‘loch’, and for the way in which the group really do sound like one. No mean feat.

Pastels/Tenniscoats - 'Start Slowly So We Sound Like a Loch'

Never Lonely Alone

Up until yesterday morning, this entry was going to be a kind of blog ‘slight return’ of ‘Before I Lose My Style’. Some of you may recall the moment back in September when I was re-acquainted with the sublime magic of that particular Space Needle track and the Monsters, Robots and Bugmen compilation on which it first came to my attention. And indeed ‘Before I Lose My Style’ would be fine inclusion in this mix, especially coming after the mesmerising, grinding heartbreak of The Telescopes.

In the end though, in a last minute dash for the line it is this track that wins out instead. And, given that I only discovered it so belatedly after retrospectively investigating Space Needle further this year, it is probably much more fittingly included in this end of year reflection.

‘Never Lonely Again’ perhaps lacks something of the no-fi hissing reverb spaciousness of ‘... Style’, but it is a gorgeous, frosted winter morning of a moment nonetheless. Four minutes of the kind of off-kilter genius that Eef Barzeley and his Clem Snide buddies might have constructed - the tradition of warmly bleak Country music taken apart and put together with the glue of post-rock.

If I was being dreadfully harsh I might raise an eyebrow and quietly throw in a line about it being maybe just a wee bit like a too-knowingly saddened R.E.M. But then, during the phase when the vocals make me consider such a statement, there is a burbling noise in the background like a radio tuning and re-tuning to different tones of static, and I think again.

I think again and I think ‘exquisite’. I think again and I think of cornflower blue and tiny heart shaped earrings. I think again and I think how lucky we are to love and to be loved.

Space Needle -'Never Lonely Alone'

Please, Before You Go

Sometimes a song, like love, comes to you in the most unexpected way. I had never rated The Telescopes; had always had them down as a hideous caricature of The Jesus And Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine, Spacemen 3, Loop et al. And then this year I heard this track and realised that maybe, just maybe I had been wrong all along.

Or, if not wrong, at least right but from the wrong angle, for haven't some of the best Pop moments been all about caricature? After all what is the finest Bubblegum music if not fabulously knowing sonic and lyrical caricature? So The Telescopes as The Archies of gloomy ‘80s alternative rock? Perhaps. And why not? Certainly a song like ‘The Perfect Needle’ is almost cartoon like in its eager supplication to dreary rock’n’roll mythology.

‘Please, Before You Go’ is the show-stopper though. It carves its way through your psyche like a Driller Killer video nasty, placing casually tossed kisses delicately on your bleeding eyelids as it does so. Lyrically it is nonsensical: “I’m an elevator, I’m a seahorse for you now” sings Lawrie. Huh? But of course like much of the finest Pop it doesn't matter a jot, because the feeling it all evokes is just spectacular: the dramatic heartache of parting, the longing, the fall from grace, the evenings spent emptying bottles in the grate of the old fireplace. All cliche, for sure, but the most satisfying cliche nevertheless.

The Telescopes-  'Please, Before You Go'

Starcrossed

Something else from the past, but not, sadly, part of any reissue activity. Rather this was one of those songs that surfaced during a burst of random iTunes action. It was one of those songs that leaps straight back into your heart; that seduces the fibres of longing, that teases treasures of dreamy delirium from the depths of your memory.

There are those who say that Drugstrore were never finer than on their self-released debut ‘Alive’, and there is something in what they say. Certainly the cleaned up version that appeared on their eponymous debut set was not a patch on the bleak, mysterious depths of the 7”. There were other delights on that album, however, including other singles ‘Solitary Party Groover’ and ‘Nectarine’. “I still have the knife that I used to get rid of that guy” is a great line, isn’t it?

‘Starcrossed’ though is the one that still thrills me the most, from its 10” format with the beautiful murky painting on the sleeve (and the eye-catching blue of the earrings) through to the eerie charm of Isabel Monteiro’s voice and the push-pull of densely pulsating guitars.

That 10” also has another couple of fine Drugstore moments, including the crystal clear and icy clean ‘Accelerate’ (there’s a lovely demo version of the same song on the ‘Modern Pleasure’ 7” from the Rough Trade singles club release. Remember that series?) plus the Four-track demo of ‘Fader’ with those lines about ghosts by your side and making so many mistakes down in your youth. Sharp fragility. Soft yet strong, yet again.

Drugstore - 'Starcrossed'

Kilburn Towers

Cherry Red’s release of London Weekend was another piece of fine reissue action from 2009, and one for which I was privileged enough to write the sleeve-notes. It’s always a pleasure to reflect on the magic of Harvey Williams’ records, and who can resist the temptation to tie that in with an acknowledgment of the genius of The Bee Gees? I still vividly recall the shock with which I first heard the magic of ‘Kilburn Towers’ on that Caff 7”, for at the time I was very much ignorant of the thrill of the Gibb Brothers. They were despicable disco dolts, weren’t they? Apparently not.

So Harvey had me scurrying to the second hand stores to track down a copy of Idea, and what a thrill that was. Almost as much of a thrill as hearing 'Anorak City' or 'You Should All Be Murdered', in fact. And that’s saying something.

I reiterated in my sleeve-notes that Pop is all about personal moments and memories; Pop songs as vessels into which we place our most valuable emotions. The songs on the London Weekend set are all that and more for me. From scrabble games in Suffolk summers to scribbled letters from Sidmouth and beyond, these were some of the most poignant and loved songs of the times. They are songs that take me back; songs that make me long for chances to do things differently; songs that make me glad we didn’t.

Another Sunny Day - 'Kilburn Towers'

Ernestine

‘Ernestine’ was always one of the great lost Claim songs; The Claim one of the great unknowns of the 1980s and early ’90s. Thus, the eventual appearance of the Black Path retrospective courtesy of those fine people at RevOla was perhaps the most welcome piece of  reclamation activity of the year. Now I have always made a point of digging out at least a few Claim songs for a swift replay each and every year, and each time they have sounded fresh and exciting. So to have a whole CD’s worth was doubly so.

Of course it has been wonderful to hear old favourites in a newly digitised form; all clean and shiny new. Some records, it must be said, do not always benefit from this process, but it was a delight to hear these songs afresh, with a newly appreciated sense of space amongst the sonic elements. Best of all though was the unearthing of previously unreleased gems. With some salvage operations the ‘bonus’ tracks are throwaway: unreleased at the time because they were merely sketches or, frankly, rubbish. With a group like The Claim, whose recorded output was necessarily restricted, that is seldom the case. ‘Ernestine’ is a classic example: an established favourite of fans at the time, it would no doubt have cropped up on a follow-up to the legendary Boomy Tella set, if times and circumstances had been different. Certainly it is a particularly fine sparkler in a bag full of diamonds.

Now one of the things that struck me whilst listening again to Ernestine after all these years since my sole cassette copy gave up the ghost was how it appears to nod to several sources. Lyrically it seems to me that The Smiths are all over the song, with the lines about plagiarism and not owing anything... And whilst it is easy in hindsight to cast The Smiths as despoilers of post-punk possibilities with their insistence on trad-rock sound and style, it is also easy to forget just how influential and important they were from a cultural point of view; opening eyes to authors, films, literature and the like.

More vitally for me, however, are the sonic nods to Hurrah! and by association back towards Pentangle, to whom the gorgeous guitar in the closing phase of the song most notably suggest.

If you have yet to discover the pleasures of The Claim, may I humbly suggest that you pick up a copy of Black Path forthwith. And for all of you who are already dedicated followers of the cause; ‘Chapeau! Chapeau!’

The Claim - 'Ernestine'

Never Anyone But You

It seems somehow fitting that The Clientele are the only artist or group to feature in my advent list for both 2008 and 2009, for they are perhaps the most reliably great group of recent times. And whilst their Bonfires On The Heath set may not have contained quite the magic of previous releases for me, it nevertheless rose head and shoulders above the vast majority of the turgid drivel that seemed to plague the world of Popular Culture whenever I raised my tired eyes for a glance. It is surely one of the biggest cultural crimes of the decade that The Clientele have not been more fully embraced as one of our greatest national Pop treasures. A travesty, surely, that the media and the masses should have preferred the tedious antics and dubious artistry of a Pete Doherty, for example, over Alasdair Maclean’s dextrous fretwork and gorgeously observed vignettes of suburban life, love and longing.

Not that The Clientele are all about one person, for part of the unique charm of the group is that each brings their special ingredient, proof of which was evident in the beautifully restrained acoustic set I was fortunate enough to experience at the Hangover Lounge just a week and a half ago. All the parts in perfect place, slotting together just so.

It is inevitably a case of preaching to the converted in this particular forum, and I’m aware that the vast majority of the people reading this will be fully cognisant of the wonders of The Clientele. But should you have stumbled here by chance then I hope that this single sliver of delicious temptation will convinced you to dig deeper and to continue to spread the word.

The Clientele - 'Never Anyone But You'