INTERMISSION

I have to go away for a week or so, but I'll be back soon with fresh and (hopefully) interesting new ideas for future posts. In the meantime, as always, feel free to leave comments, suggestions, requests.
Take care.

GLAXO BABIES - Nine Months To the Disco

LP Heartbeat Records 1980
CD reissue Birdsong 2007 with bonus track
Japanese-only CD release



"The most impressive, but also the most overlooked of all the bands that lurched around the mutant extremes that trail through Gang of Four, the Mekons, and, ultimately, the Pop Group, the Glaxo Babies' debut album was actually cut following the collapse of the original band - both vocalist/songwriter Rob Chapman and drummer Geoff Alsopp had departed, with saxophonist Tony Wrafter explaining the reason for the rift: 'Rob was into songs and we weren't'. Too true!"
(Dave Thompson, All-Music Guide)

"After making its debut with four Wire-y / Pere Ubuesque jagged pop songs on the 12-inch This Is Your Life, Bristol's Glaxo Babies went through some personnel changes and veered off in a Residential direction. The resulting album uses all manner of noises to intrigue, confound, aggravate and entertain. Except for three song-like tracks that actually resemble rock music, Nine Minutes to the Disco consists mainly of formless sonic experiments, piling up seemingly unrelated sounds into an electronic jungle full of disjointed voices. Somehow, there's a pleasing quality to these random adventures into low-budget ambient insanity. "
(Ira Robbins, Trouser Press)

ENJOY


Shake (the Foundations)

Made in Portugal #19: CARLOS MARIA TRINDADE & NUNO CANAVARRO - Mr. Wollogallu

CD União Lisboa 1991



ENJOY


Plan

SCREAMING TREES - Buzz Factory

LP / CD SST Records 1988

"Where many of their Seattle-based contemporaries dealt in reconstructed Black Sabbath and Stooges riffs, Screaming Trees fused '60s psychedelia and garage rock with '70s hard rock and '80s punk. Over the course of their career, their more abrasive punk roots eventually gave way to a hard-edged, rootsy psychedelia that drew from rock and folk equally".
(Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All-Music Guide)

"A melodic mixture of psychedelia and '60s garage-rock has made the Screaming Trees, spawned in remote Ellensburg, Washington, one of the most influential, atypical and underrated bands to spring from the Northwest. Highlighted by Mark Lanegan's deep, mournful voice and Gary Lee Conner's snarling guitar work, the Trees conjure reverent but never derivative visions of the Seeds, Stooges, 13th Floor Elevators and even the Amboy Dukes".
(Jem Aswad, Trouser Press)

ENJOY


Yard Trip #7

J. J. BURNEL - Euroman Cometh

LP United Artists Records 1979
CD reissue Eastworld Recordings 1999 with (lots of) bonus tracks

"Burnel's solo career began in 1979, with the release of his Euroman Cometh LP. According to the bassist, the album was pieced together from 'after-hours' recordings made in London during the Stranglers' Black and White sessions. "I had nowhere to sleep at the time", he explains languidly. "I'd get stoned with my mates in the studio, then late at night, once they'd all gone, I'd be there with my sleeping bag and pillows - maybe I'd have a few girlfriends around - and start messing about with the drum machine". Before long, Burnel's moonlighting had accumulated enough material for an album, which United Artists duly agreed to issue. "I thought, 'This'll set the cat among the pigeons'", he recalls, "because firstly, nobody expected me to be capable of anything and secondly, it was quite a departure from what I'd been doing before". Indeed, in marked contrast to the punchy, melodic songs on Black and White, Euroman Cometh contained a collection of dark, atmospheric soundscapes, embroidered with Burnel's intense, monotone theorising about a united Europe - variously delivered in English, German and French".
(Record Collector interview, 1992)

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Freddie Laker (Concorde & Eurobus)

Request: THE WYGALS - Honyocks In the Withersoever

LP / CD Rough Trade 1989
UK edition with different tracklist from US version



"New York guitar-pop combo the Wygals formed from the remnants of the short-lived art-pop unit the Individuals, founded in 1980 by Ohio-born graphics student Janet Wygal (vocals/bass). With her brother Doug on drums in addition to singer/guitarist Glenn Morrow and guitarist Jon Klages, the Individuals debuted in 1981 with the EP Aquamarine; ex-dB Gene Holder produced the session, and returned to the helm a year later for the group's first and only full-length effort, Fields. After the Individuals dissolved in 1983, the Wygal siblings adopted the family's surname for their next project, with Janet switching to guitar; lead guitarist Eric Peterson also signed on, as did a seemingly endless procession of bassists including Rubber Rodeo's Doug Allen, Skunkadelic's Ilene Markwell, Let's Active's Faye Hunter, and even another Wygal, brother Jeff. Finally, Holder assumed full-time bass duties in advance of the Wygals' 1987 debut Passion. After releasing the 1989 full-length Honyocks in the Whithersoever, the Wygals called it quits; Janet then teamed with yet another sibling, sister Tricia, to form the short-lived Splendora, issuing the Holder-produced In the Grass in 1995".
(Jason Ankeny, All-Music Guide)

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Her Heart

AREA - Radio Caroline

LP Office Records 1987
CD C'est La Mort Records 1988 with bonus tracks
CD reissue Projekt Records 1998 with bonus tracks

"With a label name like C'est La Mort, and labelmates who used to play with This Mortal Coil, it's a good guess that Area is not a beer guzzlin' rockabilly band, but an outfit dedicated to funeral tempos and prettily wafting melodies that slowly and sexily intone over spacey synthesizers. There's no denying kinship here with the merry groups of 4AD. The music of Henry Frayne and Steve Jones splits into tunes where silence is an active partner to the sparse, delicately repetitive guitars, floating and ringing minimalistic keyboards, and basses that plunk like tolling bells: while at other times the songs parallel the slow, sad art/pop of the salad days of OMD. Pushing above the music like a blast of winter wind comes lyricist/melodist Lynn Canfield, whose rapturously chilly voice breathes tunes like a horny spirit obsessively recording a constantly shifting series of surrealistic and sharply detailed images and moods. She intensely describes the hills and valleys of her emotional landscape with clinical simplicity - until a wildly romantic odd-angled flash of memory adds a dash of symbolism to her gleefully neurotic lines".
(James Hopkins, The Bob)

"Area were a band musically that were right where they should have been for their time, circa ‘88. This is very 4AD sounding in the sense of Cocteau Twins and This Mortal Coil. You get female vocals over ghostly guitars and scare drum beats, this was definitely for the black clad set. Oddly enough, now we’d say this is very Projekt Records-ish. At the time this stuff came out, Projekt’s domination of the scene was just starting to build into the massive snowball it is now. This is loaded with the sort of melancholia that you get when you write rather deep and introspective songs. This stuff still holds up, which is partially due to the fact that the gloom and doom seems real rather than painted on".
(Under the Volcano, 1998 review)

ENJOY

Sweet Revenge

PETER CASE - Peter Case

LP / CD Geffen Records 1986



"This solo debut by former Plimsouls leader Peter Case shows the singer's rootsier side off quite well. Produced by T-Bone Burnett and Mitchell Froom, the primarily acoustic songs are adeptly arranged and filled with great melodies. Case has a reputation for being a bit too clever at times and on occasion the album's lyrics can be a bit obtuse, but overall songs like the Van Dyke Parks-arranged Small Town Spree and the harmonica-driven Old Blue Car rock with an immediacy that hits the listener where it should, in the gut rather than between the ears".
(Steve Kurutz, All-Music Guide)

ENJOY


Small Town Spree

BFG - Fathoms

LP / CD Attica Records 1988



"Containing Higher Than Heaven of which [Mick Mercer of] Melody Maker said “The greatest independent release of the year”, Fathoms swung from powerful guitar driven anthems to the sublime beauty of Mako and Firefly. Want to know the roots of Interpol? Listen to Fathoms".
(Attica Records press release)

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Malaria Summer

THIRTEEN MOONS - Going Against the Time

Original recordings 1985-1993
Compilation CD Soap / NMW 2006



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Undercurrent

Request: ADRIAN BORLAND - The Amsterdam Tapes

Original recordings made in 1992
CD Pop One Records 2006



"During the summer of 1992 Citizens member Victor Heeremans and Bart van Poppel recorded 14 songs with Adrian Borland on an 8-track recorder in Bart's home-studio in Amsterdam. They worked with programmed drums and bass because the recordings were intended as demos in the first place. After rejection of the record company, the tapes ended up in the closet where they stayed for about ten years. But when Bart transfered the analogue material to a digital format he discovered that these songs were just hidden treasures which only sounded a little back-dated because of the programmed stuff. He decided to replace the machines by a real rhythm-section and to add some guitars and other instruments like vibes, celeste and cello".
(brittleheaven.com)

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Fast Blue World

FIRE ENGINES - Fond

Original recordings 1980-1981
Compilation CD Rev-Ola 1992



"The Fire Engines formed, did absolutely everything in the most chaotic and unconventional manner possible, and broke up 18 months later. They started their first single with a mistake, never released a proper LP and basically flew in the face of every convention of rock'n'roll, yet they managed to leave a lasting impact on the Scottish music scene and post-punk in general. Considered one of the three main movers on the fertile Scottish post punk scene of the early 1980s with the much poppier Orange Juice and slightly more accessible Josef K, Fire Engines drew from similar influences but leaned towards darker and more abrasive sources: Velvet Underground, the Voidoids, Television, the artier end of UK punk and early post-punk like the Subway Sect, the Pop Group and the Fall, and perhaps most importantly, a copy of No New York, particularly the Contortions. The Fire Engines music was angular but funky, discordant but melodic, terse and energetic. They had strict rules, drummer Russell Burns was to set the tempo based on the intensity of his adrenaline-rush and wasn't to use cymbals or hi-hats. Guitarists Davy Henderson and Murray Slade weren't to play barre chords and well, Graham Main played bass".
(acuterecords.com)

LINK REMOVED BY REQUEST


Candyskin

THE FLAMING LIPS - Oh My Gawd!!!...

LP Restless Records 1987
CD reissue Restless Records 1990



The inventively self-produced Oh My Gawd!!! is a surprisingly mature and confident work, with more consistent material and performances. Odes to paranoia (Everything's Explodin'), unselfconsciously anachronistic Pink Floydisms (One Million Billionth of a Millisecond on a Sunday Morning) and moments of genuine sensitivity (Love Yer Brain), allow Oh My Gawd!!! to transcend the Lips' wacky-cult-band image, marking them as one of the American heartland's brightest - if least likely - new hopes.
(Scott Schinder / David Fricke, Trouser Press)

While the Lips here are still a rock band par excellence, evidence of the band's increasing ambition kicks in with the simultaneously mocking and celebratory Pink Floyd vibes of One Million Billionth of a Millisecond on a Sunday Morning. All ten minutes of it should really be on Ummagumma - Richard English's drums are pure Nick Mason from the get go - but darn if it doesn't sound equally great here, as Coyne idly wonders what to do with himself in the time allotted. Other songs throw in everything from Led Zeppelin drum stomps to Mountain / Deep Purple raspy rock bellowing and more besides - theoretically everything mid-'80s American indie rock wasn't, making the Lips that much more of a fun, unique trip.
(Ned Raggett, All-Music Guide)

ENJOY


One Million Billionth of a Millisecond On a Sunday Morning

ARTERY - Afterwards

Original recordings 1979-1982
Compilation CD Spinney Records 2006
Limited edition release



"Artery are one of the most unsung of all the Sheffield bands to emerge from the post-punk era. At that time the city was a hotbed of creative activity, with the punk movement having broken down the barriers, leaving room for new and original ideas. Artery were certainly original - unique even - the evidence of which is amply displayed on this compilation of some of the band's finest moments. John Peel was a fan of the band and invited them to record two sessions for his Radio 1 show. So impressed were the band by the results they achieved at Maida Vale that some of the tracks were included in the mini-album Oceans and are included here. Compiled by Simon Hinkler from the band (and later of The Mission), this album includes all the early singles Mother Moon, Unbalanced, Cars In Motion and The Clown, most of the Oceans mini-album and the excellent and never-previously released Input Studios Demos".
(Spinney press release)

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Into the Garden

THE LONG RYDERS - Native Sons

LP Frontier Records 1984
CD reissue Frontier Records 1992



"Native Sons was the first full-length album by the Long Ryders and the one that established their eclectic mixture of Byrds / Clash / Flying Burrito Brothers' influences. The band wore those influences on their sleeve, literally, going so far as to recreate the cover of an unreleased Buffalo Springfield album, Stampede, for Native Sons and using the producer of the first two Flying Burrito Brothers albums, Henry Lewy. Native Sons lovingly captures the band's musical obsessions, while turning in an original sound that became the banner for both the paisley underground and cow punk styles in the mid-'80s. (...) Ivory Tower, featuring the late ex-Byrd Gene Clark on vocals, remains the greatest song the Byrds never wrote and one of the most sincere tributes to that band's sound".
(Al Campbell, All-Music Guide)

ENJOY

Ivory Tower

MIRANDA DALI - Miranda Dali

LP / CD Les Disques du Crépuscule 1991
CD reissue LTM Publishing 2004 with bonus tracks



"Miranda Dali is the very definition of a lost classic. Though Carter Burwell is best known for his Hollywood film scores, the albums he created with Stanton Miranda as Thick Pigeon prove that he mastered experimental art rock before he moved onto mainstream success. And Miranda Dali is perhaps the easiest introduction to the duo's warped blend of minimalist keyboards, haunting themes and vocals, and agit-rock".
(All-Music Guide)

LISTEN
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Riding

THICK PIGEON - Too Crazy Cowboys

LP Factory Records 1984
CD reissue LTM Publishing 2003 with bonus tracks

"One of the more mysterious artists to record for the stylish Crépuscule / Factory axis, Thick Pigeon was essentially a vehicle for songwriter Stanton Miranda and arranger Carter Burwell. Based in New York, the duo recorded a brace of oblique, minimalist singles for Crepuscule in 1981-82 before moving sideways to Factory for their first album. Recorded in Manchester in late 1983, Too Crazy Cowboys saw the duo initially joined Steve Morris and Gillian Gilbert of New Order, as well as Gillian's sister Kim. In true Factory fashion the album was released a year late".
(LTM press release)

"The use of studio-generated effects, concussed vocals and techno rhythm are like ghostly suggestions of today's electronica scene, whispered down the decades from a more spartan age".
(reissue review, Uncut)

ENJOY

Jess + Bart

THE COLOURFIELD - Virgins and Philistines

LP Chrysalis 1985
CD reissue Toshiba EMI 1999 with (lots of) bonus tracks
Japanese only edition



"The Colourfield started slowly, with an eponymous single in 1984, but the trio's first album a year later was well worth the wait. Virgins and Philistines kicks off brilliantly with the mock-96 Tears organ intro to Can't Get Enough of You Baby, itself a fine imitation of Georgie Fame-era beat music. The music mixes its metaphors, from stripped-down Fun Boys rock to samba, folk and jazzy '60s R&B; Hall's sharp tongue and the band's intelligent creativity make each track different. Of special note: a shimmering acoustic version of the Roches' Hammond Song and Pushing Up Daisies, a vicious condemnation of celebrity. Drama, beauty, ideas and energy make Virgins and Philistines provocative, stylish and memorable".
(Jim Green / Ira Robbins, Trouser Press)

ENJOY


Castles in the Air

Made in Portugal #18: VARIOUS ARTISTS - Ama Romanta: Sempre!

Original recordings 1986-1998

2xCD Candy Factory 1998

LISTEN

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CROIX SAINTE - We Build Cities


LINHA GERAL - Ousadia

THE AU PAIRS - Playing with a Different Sex

LP Human Records 1981
CD reissue RPM Records 1992 with bonus tracks

"Blasting into the post-punk consciousness with a tremendous debut album, the Au Pairs, fronted by lesbian-feminist Lesley Woods, played brittle, dissonant, guitar-based rock that shared political and musical kinship with the Mekons and (especially) the Gang of Four. The music was danceable, imbued with an almost petulant irony, and for a while, very hip and well-liked by critics. Unlike many bands of the day, however, the Au Pairs (at least initially) backed it up with searing, confrontational songs celebrating sexuality from a woman's perspective. Also, they took swipes at the conservative political climate sweeping England after Margaret Thatcher's election as Prime Minister. (...) Opening with the tongue in cheek We're So Cool, the Au Pairs' debut record is a stunner, from Lesley Woods' scratchy guitar and declamatory vocals to lead guitarist Paul Foad's brittle soloing. This is an uncompromising, defiant record that asks no quarter; gender roles are turned upside down, hetero- and homosexual relationships put under a microscope, and theories about sex and sexuality turned inside out. Similarly, the tense political situation in Northern Ireland is harrowingly addressed in Armagh, which details Tory-sanctioned torture and sexual abuse of wrongly imprisoned Irish women. An unflinching look at the world, Playing with a Different Sex is one of the great, and perhaps forgotten, post-punk records". (John Dougan, All-Music Guide)

ENJOY

It's Obvious

THE NAMES - Swimming

LP Les Disques du Crépuscule 1982
CD reissue LTM Publishing 2000 with bonus tracks



"Between 1979 and 1983 Belgian new wavers The Names released a string of classic singles on WEA, Factory and Crepuscule, including Calcutta, The Astronaut, and - best of all - Nightshift. Their sole album, Swimming, appeared in 1982 on Crepuscule, and like the singles was produced by the late great Martin Hannett. (...) The music of The Names boasts a dark, romantic majesty and grace, sometimes redolent of Magazine, early Simple Minds and Joy Division".
(LTM press release)

ENJOY


Nightshift

OINGO BOINGO - Only a Lad

LP A&M Records 1981
CD reissue A&M Records 1987



"Only a Lad contains obvious new wave elements, but it doesn't stick to any one style long, undulating over a vast musical terrain. Ska, new wave, classical, heavy metal — they all make at least cameo appearances. The band's musicianship, even at this relatively early stage, far exceeds most of their peers, and [Danny] Elfman's deft songwriting ability offers a clear glimpse of what was to come.
(Kieran McCarthy, All-Music Guide)

ENJOY


Little Girls

RED TEMPLE SPIRITS - If Tomorrow I Were Leaving for Lhasa, I Wouldn't Stay a Minute More...

LP / CD Nate Starkman & Son 1989



“Los Angeles quartet Red Temple Spirits skillfully mixes tribal post-punk influences — mid-period Cure, Savage Republic, early (Death) Cult — with a loving dose of lysergic psychedelia (Syd Barrett and Roky Erickson are particular touchstones). (...) The follow-up [to Dancing To Restore an Eclipsed Moon 1988 album], If tomorrow I were leaving for Llhasa I wouldn't stay a minute more ... is far more direct, both in the melodic music and the lyrics, which turn towards external/environmental stimuli. As crystallized by the gorgeous Dive in Deep and an incandescent cover of Pink Floyd's Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun, the theme of hope for the magic and beauty of life in the face of despair remains”.
(Greg Fasolino, Trouser Press)

ENJOY


Dive In Deep

DIF JUZ - Extractions

LP 4AD Records 1985
CD 4AD Records 1985 with bonus tracks



"What proved in the end to be the only full proper Dif Juz album was a gentle marvel, showing the quartet building on the strengths of its initial releases to create a gripping, involving instrumental masterpiece. (...) Robin Guthrie's echo-laden production is perfectly suited for the work at play; it's no surprise that [Richard] Thomas contributed horns and percussion to later Cocteau Twins work, nor that Elizabeth Fraser added vocals for Love Insane".
(Ned Raggett, All-Music Guide)

ENJOY


Love Insane

MONOCHROME SET - Strange Boutique + Love Zombies

2xLPs Dindisc 1980
CD reissue Virgin Records 1993 released as Colour Transmission



"Monochrome Set's debut album for Virgin followed the indie success of their singles Alphaville, Eine Symphonie Des Grauens, and The Monochrome Set. (...) Amid the austerity of post-punk England, and before we became awash with irony and archness, we needed a band who could raise their eyebrows and smirk at it all without ever being condescending (or maybe only a little bit condescending)".
(Alex Ogg, All-Music Guide)

"Fans — BBC Radio DJ John Peel among them — had long since recognized the Monochrome Set's supreme compositional agility. This is amply demonstrated by Love Zombies, which switches from sweet pop to wry ballads to a kind of alt-rock rumba with disarming ease".
(Alex Ogg, All-Music Guide)

ENJOY


Adeste Fideles

Made in Portugal #17: JAFU'MEGA - Jafu'mega

LP Polygram 1982
CD reissue Polygram 1998



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Latin' América

VARIOUS ARTISTS - Gigantic! 2

CD Melody Maker / Rough Trade Distribution 1990



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Right as Rain