The freshest forgotten albums of yesteryear. Not the usual fawned over suspects but albums that ‘net-trawlers and second hand record shop aficionados may come across and should snap up now.

Neil Gardner Recommends:
Chrome
Red Exposure
(Beggars Banquet) 1980

“I am anti-fade and I can’t go away” Chrome -’Eyes On Mars’

When independent label Beggars Banquet were looking to capitalise on the huge success of Gary Numan at the cusp of the Eighties, their attention switched to a strange duo from San Francisco with an obsession with the darker aspects of science fiction.

No doubt Beggars were hoping for an American version of Tubeway Army, a band who could take troubling subjects, give them an offbeat but commercial twist, and turn them into a major cash-generating machine.

What they got was something rather different.

Formed in 1976 by vocalist/drummer Damon Edge and Gary Spain, Chrome’s debut album, ‘The Visitation’, a relatively straightforward take on Latino-tinged electronic rock (‘Eno meets Santana”) gave little warning of the aural carnage to come and it wasn’t until the arrival of maverick guitarist Helios Creed, and Spain’s departure in 1977 that things started to change for the weird.

The notoriously eccentric Creed nearly blew his chances with the band, allegedly irking Edge by turning up to their first meeting dressed as a pirate, but his influence on Chrome was immediate. His abrasive guitar sound coupled with Edge’s demented tape manipulation and powerful drumming gave their next two albums – ‘Alien Soundtracks’ and ‘Half Machine Lip Moves’ – a deliriously wild, chaotic quality, pitched somewhere between Suicide and The Stooges.

Chrome purists invariably gravitate towards those records’ primitive dark psychedelics – Julian Cope memorably referred to ‘Lip Moves’ as ”Turkish robots playing Hawkwind“, but the general view appears to be that their difficult fourth album was where the duo compromised their sound, initiating an inevitable decline.

Yet, even a cursory listen would suggest that was nonsense, as ‘Red Exposure’ is, if anything, equally as wacked out and individual as its predecessors.

Taking a much more electronic approach, it isn’t so much produced (by the band themselves with the wonderfully named John L Cyborg who received a credit despite actually being the drum machine) as submerged. Its dense and cluttered sound, described by one critic as “so murky and bizarre that basically EVERYTHING sounds like it’s in the background”, provided the soundtrack to a gloomy Philip K Dickian future, where horror roamed at the corner of the eye and unspeakable things scuttled in the gutter.

As well as playing with a bewildering array of tape machines, oscillators and delays, the duo share vocal duties throughout – Creed opting for more traditional rock yelp, while Edge remains buried under waves of effects, veering from ominous whisper to malfunctioning robot.

The diseased synth introduction to opener ‘New Age’, an unlikely choice as a single, sets the tone by not so much fading in as seeping out of the speakers like poison gas, while Edge wails menacingly through waves of static over squelchy percussion and a clanking riff.

Even more upfront tunes like ‘Static Gravity’ teeter on the cusp of madness, with a crunching cyclical riff underpinned by a woozy orchestral sample, while ‘Eyes In the Center’ delivers a particularly nasty synth line over cavernous mine-shaft drums, portentous bells and shards of feedback, that explode like firecrackers.

Elsewhere, the menacing ‘Jonestown’ with it’s distorted vocals and piercing bowed guitar line is a close cousin to the harsh industrial tones of Cabaret Voltaire’s ‘Mix Up’, ‘Eyes on Mars’ is a delirious phasers-on-stun frug powered by some fierce tribal drumming, while the stentorian march of ‘Animal’ is enlivened by Creed’s deranged soloing.

Despite the album’s otherworldly qualities, flashes of beauty do occasionally rise out of the murk – the ghostly bleak ambience of instrumental ‘Room 101’ and the spooked piano of ‘Night of the Earth’ in particular.

There was even a cursory attempt at pop with the mutant Devo-esque ‘Electric Chair’, although inevitably it came out all wrong. Only Chrome would attempt to write a catchy song about an execution and although an increasingly hysterical Creed gleefully yelling “I know you want to fry!” over a gloopy guitar riff is oddly catchy, it was hardly Top of the Pops material either.

The deep, droning ‘Isolation’ was a suitably grim closer – with Edge’s repeated plaintive cry of ‘I’m so isolated’ proving to be sadly prescient.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, ‘Red Exposure’ didn’t exactly find favour with the UK music press – the NME dismissed it as “fine for those moods where you want to contemplate life in a toxic atmosphere, like a slave mine on Alpha Centauri, or after the bomb” – and that was one of the kinder reviews.

However, British youth ignored its pioneering use of backwards masking, cut-ups and electronics too, in favour of the more palatable dystopian visions of Numan and Ultravox.

Subsequently dropped by Beggars, Creed and Edge went on to record two more albums together, adding a rhythm section (the great Hilary and John Stench) for the punkish guitar-driven ‘Blood on the Moon’ and the gnarled metallic ‘3rd from the Sun’ before a somewhat acrimonious split in 1982.

Unfortunately, the Chrome story doesn’t have a happy ending. Edge attempted to keep the name alive, relocating to Europe and recording a series of albums that removed Creed’s more extravagant, experimental flourishes and appeared to appeal only to French teenage Cure fans with noticeably diminishing returns.

Depressed by lack of recognition and the break-up of his marriage, Edge eventually became an alcoholic recluse in Los Angeles, ballooning to over 300 pounds and dying of heart failure in 1995. His body lay undiscovered for over 30 days, a bitter reminder of how far Chrome had fallen from the public’s consciousness.

Meanwhile, Creed who had made several well received albums of fried psychedelia under his own steam, including the excellent ‘X-rated Fairy Tales’ in the Eighties, reclaimed the name and has recorded and toured as Chrome once again – most recently with 2008’s occasionally brilliant ‘Retro Transmission’.

Despite their lasting influence, heard in bands as varied as the Butthole Surfers, Skinny Puppy and Prong, Chrome have been rather ill-served by the nostalgia industry, with sporadic re-issues of their material, often in limited quantities. ‘Red Exposure’ itself was given a rather shoddy repackage (even printing the wrong title on the CD spine) by Cleopatra Records last year.

But at least it is now available and, 29 years after its difficult birth, it deserves a higher place in the Chrome canon – a mesmerisingly haunted creeped-out classic that remains determinedly out of its tiny mind and gloriously out of time.

The freshest forgotten albums of yesteryear. Not the usual fawned over suspects but albums that ‘net-trawlers and second hand record shop aficionados may come across and should snap up now.

This month Guy Oddy time-travels back a decade to the age of big beat…

It’s not so long ago that Kasabian were displaying the arrogance that is expected of new bands, by proclaiming that they had invented a new genre of music. This might broadly be described as marrying driving electronica with snarling punk rock attitude. To call this statement disingenuous to a number of English bands, stretching back to the late seventies, however, would be an understatement. Caberet Voltaire, Renegade Soundwave, Happy Mondays and the Lo Fidelity Allstars had all previously fused the menace of punk with hip-shaking dance music, in a manner that makes today’s “nu-rave” survivors seem a little bit polite for their own good.

Brighton’s Lo Fidelity Allstars, probably the least well-known of these combos, sprang out of the big beat scene of the mid-‘90s, displaying a menace that seemed somewhat out of keeping with Fatboy Slim’s attempt to revive ‘smiley culture’. This attitude, however, wasn’t the infantile bragging of American hip-hoppers like 50 Cent, but an altogether more British nastiness that had more in common with the Droogs of ‘A Clockwork Orange’. They also had the tunes to match it.

Making their presence known with the formidable singles ‘Disco Machine Gun’ and ‘Kool Roc Bass, the band bust onto the scene sporting names that seemed to suggest more than a slight a Wu Tang Clan influence: A One Man Crowd Called Gentile (bass), The Wrekked Train (vocals), The Albino Priest (decks and samples), Sheriff Jon Stone (keyboards), The Slammer (drums) and The Many Tentacles (engineering and keyboards). Bringing a much-needed snarl to a somewhat extended second (third or forth, even) summer of love, with outright stealing from hip-hop, techno, funk and punk, the Lo Fi’s looked set to be something special.

Unfortunately, their career was somewhat mercurial and they never truly lived up to their promise, as The Wrekked Train and Sheriff Jon Stone walked out of the band, mid-tour, after the release of their tour de force ‘How To Operate With A Blown Mind’. This ripped the guts out of the outfit, consigning all the survivors to the second division of electronica from then on.

‘How To Operate With A Blown Mind’ starts off with the ranting, poem-like, ‘Warming Up The Brain Farm’ that concludes with a snarling “Allstars taking over” and a sampled “Stick ‘em up, motherfucker” before the beat kicks in and all Hell is let loose. Sampling the likes of Paris and Sparky D, it sets the tone for the rest of the disc.

Taking in ‘Kool Roc Bass’ and ‘Disco Machine Gun’ (now renamed ‘Blisters On My Brain’ after a legal tussle with The Breeders, over an uncleared sample), hip-hop is successfully fused with a vocal style that often occupies similar territory to John Lydon/Rotten and Liam Gallaghe and an underlying acid house feel. This is party music with a bit of a disconcerting edge.

Where ‘How To Operate With A Blown Mind’ succeeds where so many electronica albums fail, however, is that it has true light and shade, and not just variations on a theme. So while the listener is treated to an almost straight-forward rocker, such as ‘Battle Flag’, things also calm down significantly with ‘Vision Incision’ and the spacey ‘Nightime Story’. The only unchanging aspect of the Lo Fi’s sound throughout is The Wrekked Train’s vocals, which mainly recall David Thewlis’ character in Mike Leigh’s 1993 film ‘Naked’.

For what is, at least nominally, a rock’n’roll album it’s refreshing that just about the only influence that ‘How To Operate With A Blown Mind’ seems to have borrowed from the mainstream rock world, is the structure of the album. Parallels with the Stones’ ‘Exile On Main Street’’s soundtrack to an alcohol and drug-fuelled night out are inescapable. ‘Warming Up The Brain Farm’ comes on like a statement of intent, before things really kick off then, towards the end, calm descends again although only in a passed-out-on-someone’s-sofa-with-a-half-smoked-fag-hanging-out-of-your-mouth kind of way.

‘How To Operate With A Blown Mind’ is a fantastic ride, but unfortunately it is one that the Lo Fidelity Allstars were doomed never to equal, never mind surpass. Once The Wrekked Train and Sheriff Jon Stone had left the fold, the rest of the band reverted to using their given names of Phil, Andy and the like. And after that it all just seemed a bit ordinary.

The freshest forgotten albums of yesteryear. Not the usual fawned over suspects but albums that ‘net-trawlers and second hand record shop aficionados may come across and should snap up now.

This issue Guy Oddy digs out a cacophonic art rock classic…

I first came across the Band of Susans in the late ‘80s supporting indie-dullards Throwing Muses. They were loud, with three guitars laying down a wall of feedback, distortion and hypnotic sounds over a pounding beat, and they were emphatically not singing fey, little songs whose only distinguishing factor was their weediness. Even though the band looked like high school geography teachers, I came away with one of their tee-shirts and a determination to seek out their latest album, ‘Love Agenda’. I soon found it and became an instant convert to the dense cacophony of guitar sounds that somehow managed to stay just the right side of aimless noise and form themselves into songs that recalled both the post no-wave sound of Sonic Youth and the droning melodies of the Jesus and Mary Chain.

The Band of Susans formed in 1986 in New York and were basically an art rock band that were just as much about rock as were about art. The original line up consisted of mainstays Robert Poss (guitar and vocals), Susan Stenger (bass and vocals) and Ron Spitzer (drums) with Susan Lyall (guitar), Susan Tallman (guitar) and Alva Rogers (vocals) completing the group – hence the band’s name. This version of the Band of Susans released an EP, ‘Blessing And Curse’, and an LP, ‘Hope Against Hope’, before Susan Lyall, Susan Tallman and Alva Rogers left to pursue other projects. Guitarists Karen Haglof and Page Hamilton were soon drafted in as replacements, however, and the recording sessions for ‘Love Agenda’ began in earnest.

‘Love Agenda’ is built on the heavily guitar-centric sounds of the band’s previous discs and was variously described, when it was released, as the “soundtrack for an epileptic fit” (in Melody Maker) and reflecting “everything that is currently happening in New York” (in Sounds). That said, it’s certainly an album that has aged well.

Things open up with a wave of squalling guitar-noise and feedback, as the band launch into Susan Stenger’s ‘The Pursuit of Happiness’ before hitting a droning groove that keeps expanding further into the sonic expanse, without losing any sense of melody. The likes of ‘It’s Locked Away’ and ‘Because of You’ are made up of layer upon layer of riffing guitars, backed with pounding drums and thumping bass, and vocals buried deep in the mix. There are no guitar solos, as such, though – the Band of Susans was certainly no Allman Brothers tribute band.

They were never tempted to go ‘unplugged’ either, and during the second half of the album, things get way more muscular as the band launch into ‘Hard Light’ (which was released as a promo and did receive some radio play, but was never released as a single), ‘Which Dream Came True’ and a thumping cover of the Rolling Stones’ ‘Child of the Moon’.

The Band of Susans recorded both songs and instrumentals for ‘Love Agenda’ and throughout their career, with their lyrics being, perhaps, the least noteworthy aspect of their performance. However, while the words rarely reveal any particular pertinent observations about the human condition, they do imply a cerebral, even reserved, rage. The vocals, however, are generally mixed so low in the mix as to be another instrument whose sound is more important than what is actually sung. One exception is the last song on ‘Love Agenda’, their anthem to New York’s public transport system, ‘Take The Express’, which is sure to raise a smile with anyone who has been stuck in an unreliable tube train.

After finishing ‘Love Agenda’, the Band of Susans toured Europe and the USA, recording a John Peel radio session along the way. Nevertheless, the line up was soon to change again, with Page Hamilton leaving to form the more commercially-successful Helmet and Karen Haglof leaving music altogether.

More replacements were found and over the next six years the Band of Susans recorded three more albums and continued to tour, before finally dissolving in 1995. Poss and Stenger did continue to work together sporadically and even collaborated with Wire’s Bruce Gilbert on the Gilbertpossstenger project in 2000. Long before the Band of Susans split, however, the likes of My Bloody Valentine had picked up the loud droney guitar batten, albeit with considerably less energy. Soon came the copyists, however, and the shoe-gazing scene was born. It is an unfortunate aspect of the Band of Susans’ legacy that they are frequently linked to this unloved movement. The Band of Susans were louder, more insistent and far more interesting than any of the Slowdives of this world.

When asked in 1993, what he thought about the Band of Susans’ lack of monetary success and widespread public acceptance, especially given the relative popularity of both their progeny, such as Helmet, and some of the shoe-gazers who took their lead from the band, Robert Poss replied: “People confer marketing success with musical success. That’s why everyone formed independents. Bands were successful but the music was full of crap. We feel successful because we’ve explored different areas, we’ve done records we’re proud of and we’ve toured with artists we respect”.

The Band of Susans: genuine sonic explorers or just underground realists? On the basis of ‘Love Agenda’, it was certainly the former.

The freshest forgotten albums of yesteryear. Not the usual fawned over suspects but albums that ‘net-trawlers and second hand record shop aficionados may come across and should snap up now.

This month Guy Oddy recommends the Rasta socialism of…

Max Romeo’s ‘Revelation Time’ is generally acknowledged to be the first concept album to come out of Jamaica. The album is made up of a set of reggae tunes from the roots era, played by members of the Soul Syndicate and Wailers bands, and a vision informed by both Rasta ideology and a socialist viewpoint. This is rebel music straight from the Kingston of the mid ‘70s.

Romeo’s recording career started in the late sixties, when he even scored a UK top ten hit with ‘Wet Dream’, pre-dating the ‘slack’ dancehall tunes of the ‘80s and ‘90s by some twenty years. However, despite a couple of other stabs at the big time with similarly risqué material, it was a style that Romeo soon abandoned in favour of one that was distinctly more ‘dread’.

As was usual in the reggae world of the ‘70s, Max found himself recording for a number of producers as the decade progressed, from Derrick Morgan to Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, Winston ‘Niney’ Holness and Prince Buster. All of them titans of the scene. Despite employing a plethora of producers, Romeo’s vision and lyrics remained rock-solid, proclaiming the righteousness of Rastafari and railing against the injustices suffered by the Jamaican majority. Tunes such as ‘Let The Power Fall For I’, ‘Public Enemy No 1’, ‘Babylon’s Burning’ and ‘Coming Of Jah’ left no doubt as to which side of the fence Max Romeo stood.

By 1974, Max Romeo and Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry had become firm friends, both inside and outside the legendary Black Ark Studio. Indeed, it was there that Romeo cut the hit singles (in Jamaica) ‘Revelation Time’ and ‘Three Blind Mice’ that were to form the pillars of the album that was originally to be called ‘Strictly Roots’, before the popularity of the ‘Revelation Time’ single caused a rethink.

The album was recorded under Clive Hunt’s direction at the Black Ark, where he also co-wrote a number of the tunes. Songs such as ‘Revelation Time’, ‘No Peace’ and ‘Warning Warning’ rivalled any of the protest songs recorded by the more commercially successful Wailers, but then Bob Marley never sang lyrics as direct as “Heads a go roll down Sandy Gully”! This was the imagery of violent revolution and not the more woolly viewpoint espoused by Bob Marley, especially after his parting with Peter Tosh and Bunny Livingston in 1974.

‘Tacko’ took on the more thorny subject of Haile Selassie’s overthrow by a Marxist coup the previous year, while ‘A Quarter Pound Of I’cense’ recommended the virtues of ganja as an escape from the stresses and madness of life in Babylon. It is, however, ‘Open The Iron Gate’, with its rhythm culled from ‘Iron Gate’ off Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry’s ‘Cloak and Dagger’ album, and its accompanying dub, which takes Babylon by the scruff of the neck and extols Jah to lead his people back to Africa. Not a point of view that you’ll hear in much reggae in 2007!

As with many reggae albums of the time, most of the tracks from ‘Revelation Time’ had previously been issued as singles in Jamaica, with their respective dub versions on the flip side. Some of these dubs appeared on the original Studio Tracks disc. As a complete album, however, these tunes were only briefly available in the UK and were reissued by United Artists in the USA for a similarly brief period. Nevertheless in 1999, reggae aficionados’ were again able to hear them all in their full glory, when Blood and Fire resurrected this forgotten gem, as part of the Max Romeo collection ‘Open The Iron Gate 1973-77’.

The ‘Revelation Time’ album provided the main body of this compilation with additional dub versions of the title track and ‘Warning Warning’, the rare-as-hens’-teeth single ‘Valley Of Jehosophat’ (which was also recorded at this time) and a number of other tracks which either pre-dated or followed the original album. It is a set which outshines the more commercially-successful follow-up, ‘War In A Babylon’, which was recorded with Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry at the controls, and one which emphasises a rare and magnificent vision that manages to successfully address both a Rasta viewpoint and revolutionary socialist ideals to a distinctly ‘dread’ bassline.

As Romeo, himself, said, “That album is really a revolutionary album. It came from 1972, when we had a revolutionary movement, with Mr Michael Manley trying to change society from capitalism to socialism. At that time I was socialist-minded – beca’ it’s the only form of poor people government, socialism.”

The freshest forgotten albums of yesteryear. Not the usual fawned over suspects but albums that ‘net-trawlers and second hand record shop aficionados may come across and should snap up now.

This month Guy Oddy harks back to an American classic…

Many grandiose claims have been made of X, since their glory days in the early 1980s. There have even been suggestions that in Exene Cervenka and John Doe (who were also married for the first half of the 1980s), X possessed the greatest punk rock song-writing duo after Joe Strummer and Mick Jones. This, however, is to miss the whole essence of the band. X was, and remains, a band that plays roots music, despite the frequent presence of loud electric guitars. The actual sound is as much country, as much folk, and as much rockabilly, as punk. The lyricism has more in common with Charles Bukowski than John Lydon, and their influences are as much Johnny Cash and Woody Guthrie as Iggy and the Stooges. In fact, X were making raucous Americana, long before the purists had imposed a blueprint on the genre, and many from the American alternative scene of the 1980s and 1990s, from the Butthole Surfers, Jane’s Addiction and Henry Rollins to folk singer Phranc, have acknowledged their influence. They even appeared in Bret Easton Ellis’ book ‘Less Than Zero’, such was their cultural cache.

X formed in Los Angeles in 1977, where they soon achieved a considerable local following, due to their live shows and debut single, ‘Adult Books’/‘We’re Desperate’. The original and best-loved, line-up of the band comprised Exene Cervenka (vocals), John Doe (bass and vocals), Billy Zoom (guitar) and DJ Bonebrake (drums). Their first album, ‘Los Angeles’, was produced by Ray Manzarek of the Doors, who also contributed keyboards to a number of tunes. The disc proved to be a minor commercial success but very much a critical hit, in both the underground press and the mainstream media. The follow-up, 1981’s ‘Wild Gift’, was again produced by Ray Manzarek and broadened X’s profile further when it was feted by such publications as Rolling Stone, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Times and Village Voice. In 1982, X made a slight stylistic departure on ‘Under the Big Black Sun’, by placing more emphasis on a country sound, while still retaining a fast and loud feel. This rootsy vibe was explored further in X’s fourth album, ‘More Fun In The New World’, which was also their last with Manzarek’s input.

‘More Fun In The New World’ proved to be the pinnacle of X’s recorded output. The song-writing, the singing, the playing and the whole atmosphere were at such a peak that this album should be viewed as the definitive X. The anthemic opener, ‘The New World’, set out the band’s stall from the off, with a view from the bottom of the heap, through the eyes of America’s dispossessed. X also achieved new rough’n’rocking heights with the vicious ‘Devil Doll’, ‘Painting The Town Blue’, ‘I See Red’ and the best cover of Jerry Lee Lewis’ ‘Breathless’ to make it to vinyl.

More mellow fare, like the spectacular ‘I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts’, covered similar territory, perfectly capturing the paranoid feeling prevalent in the consumerism, moral agenda and aggressive foreign policy of Ronald Reagan’s 1980s America. It has since come to be seen as one of the greatest songs in the X canon. Other numbers, however, such as ‘True Love’ and ‘Poor Girl’, dealt with decidedly un-punk rock subjects, such as unrequited love, broken hearts and disintegrating relationships.

Despite the country stylings, ‘More Fun In The New World’ is not a slow slide into unplugged territory. The final track, ‘True Love #2’ is a funky vamp, which takes in ‘Skip To My Lou’, ‘Black Betty’ and ‘One Nation Under A Groove’. While X definitely found a groove on ‘More Fun In The New World’, they didn’t just find a formula then stick to it. Instead the album is one of their most diverse, without diminishing the power of the music or the lyrics. It’s a statement by people knocked about by their difficult circumstances, but who refuse to just lie down and accept their fate.

Spurred on by the artistic success of ‘More Fun In The New World’, the band’s country side-project, The Knitters, released the ‘Poor Little Critter In The Road’ album in 1985. This was followed by X’s somewhat disappointing ‘Ain’t Love Grand’, which precipitated Zoom’s departure. He was initially replaced by Dave Alvin (of The Blasters and The Knitters) and then by Tony Gilkyson (previously of Lone Justice), to record the ‘See How We Are’ and ‘Live At The Whisky A Go-Go’ albums. After these, the band took a much-needed break from each other.

John Doe and Exene Cervenka recorded and toured as solo artists in the late 1980s and early 1990s, while Doe also branched out into acting, appearing in such films as ‘Salvador’, ‘Great Balls Of Fire’ and ‘Boogie Nights’. Exene also filled her time with spoken word performances and writing books, such as ‘Adulterers Anonymous’ (in collaboration with Lydia Lunch).

In 1993, X got back together to record ‘Hey Zeus!’. An underwhelming public response, however, saw the band’s momentum slow down considerably and solo activity return to the fore. In 1998, Billy Zoom returned to the X fold and the band resumed limited touring, which continues to this day. The reformed original line-up has yet to present any new recorded material to the world, however, a couple of 2004 Los Angeles’ gigs were released on the ‘Live In Los Angeles’ DVD, in 2005.

The freshest forgotten albums of yesteryear. Not the usual fawned over suspects but albums that ‘net-trawlers and second hand record shop aficionados may come across and should snap up now.

This month Blackbelt Jonez digs into the hip hop archives for…

The late 80’s and early 90’s wasn’t too bad a time to begin discovering the finer things in life, such as girls, alcohol and music. Distinctly unlike Fred Savage in ‘The Wonder Years’, I discovered thus: a bottle of Thunderbird Blue would get two or three of you nicely pissed. Woolworth’s and Boots store detectives didn’t seem overly concerned about their dwindling array of 90min TDK tapes (more about those later on) and female foreign exchange students were more accommodating than their English counterparts (especially when given some of the aforementioned Thunderbird).

With regards to music, it’s fair to say that many a teen’s musical education begins at home with the record collection of their parents and I was no different. Ashamed as I am to admit it, my formative years were spent listening to Dire Straits, Rod Stewart and Eric Clapton, as well as The Police (whom I’m not so ashamed of), but by the time I’d taken to filling the pockets of my baggy jeans (Mustard coloured, Pepe Jeans, 42” Waist – what was I thinking?) with stolen blank cassettes I’d made a re-discovery. The first record I ever bought was a Run DMC Christmas 7”, and I’d dabbled in break dancing (badly) on cardboard gathered from the skips of Texas Homecare, but since I was only 12 at the time I don’t think the concept of ‘genres’ was of any concern to me. However, once I’d hit the age where I’d actually ‘done a Frenchie (French kiss)’ with a ‘Frenchie (French girl)’, I was edging back towards the Hip Hop fold.

At the time it may have appeared that I was a bit of a kleptomaniac, addicted to stealing tapes wherever I went. Not quite, although they were an alternative currency to the pound if you didn’t have a job, but the truth is that my addiction was of course the music I was putting on them. It was fortunate for me (and equally unfortunate for my parents) that the other plus about the late ‘80s and early ‘90s is that the era is recognised by most as the golden age of Hip Hop.

By the time I got a Saturday job and could afford to start buying tapes and vinyl, the ‘Parental Advisory’ stickers that were splashed over practically every Hip Hop release (and curiously not on Cannibal Corpse albums…) were like a beacon. A guarantee of foul and abusive language and the promise of a slap round the head should any of it be heard by my younger sister. Much of the music I bought then is pretty much unlistenable now (2 Live Crew and Poison Clan spring to mind) but of course buying tawdry gangsta hip hop and smoking dirty hash was as close to rebellion as I could get to at 14 years old without getting a cheap looking tattoo of a ganja leaf on my arm or sellotaping myself to a politician. Fortunately, NWA clones made only a small percentage of the Hip Hop that was available at that time and, having gradually learned that the traditional Hip Hop misspellings (Nu Niggaz On Tha BloKKK – a shocking album) didn’t always guarantee a pleasurable listen, I ventured forth into uncharted territories where albums without warning stickers did lie: EPMD, Gangstarr, A Tribe Called Quest and Brand Nubian were all releasing classic material and label wise, Elektra and Def Jam were pretty much top of the tree, at least in financial terms. However with Wild Pitch Records there was always the guarantee of the good shit. Wild Pitch had more of an underground feel, possibly because it was strictly a Hip Hop label or possibly because they couldn’t afford to advertise or promote once studio costs and engineer fees had been covered, thus many albums seemed to come out of the blue. Affordable black sleeve with sticker/track listing covers eventually became synonymous with a single or album release on the label, perhaps because the logo was strong enough to encourage a purchase, though albums by Ultramagnetic MCs and OC would have sold by the shed-load had they been only available on the moon. However, many Wild Pitch releases did have picture covers – Main Source’s seminal ‘Breaking Atoms’, Lord Finesse’s ‘Funky Technician’ and UMC’s ‘Fruits Of Nature’ – again, all recognised as classics. One group fortunate enough to have a picture cover but not the marketing budget their talent deserved were Hardknocks, who dropped ‘School of Hardknocks’ in 1991.

Wild Pitch folded around 1995 and trawling the internet offers little in the way of information as to what happened to the group once the album was released. Their history is equally hard to trace. In 1990, Hardhead and Stoneface, MC and DJ respectively were known as 3 Da Hard Way and released ‘A Dirty Cop Named Harry’ on Noontime Records, the label’s only release. Sampling Bill Withers’ ‘Who Is He…’, the single was picked up by Wild Pitch who signed them up for an album deal and later reissued it, most likely as a last effort to generate money from the duo, fed up of their ties to a contract that couldn’t push them as far as their talent deserved.

The album was released following their first single for Wild Pitch, ‘Nigga For Hire’, and like the single, it targeted the typical subjects of Hip Hop in the early 90’s: The struggle of Africans in America (“First fired, last hired. Granny picked cotton till she died –what a way to retire”) and crooked cops (“He stashed a million in cash, two million of the white stuff. A hard days work without the use of his handcuffs”) as well as the obligatory braggadocios freestyle rhymes (“Lyrics made to engrave, amateurs whipped like slaves, take heed – as I ride the title like a wave!”).

Hardhead’s smooth, Rakim-like flow is complimented throughout by the funk and jazz-laden production courtesy of Stoneface. Apart from the Bill Withers loop and the obligatory ‘Funky Drummer’ beat, very few of the samples and drum breaks would be spotted except by the most anal of trainspotters. The only thing missing from this album is the standard posse cut that was also synonymous to the golden age. More often than not, a posse cut was the standout track on an album but the lack of one here as well as no outside production adds further to the ‘who the fuck were these guys?’ mystery. It’s like they didn’t know anyone and nor did they care to. All paths remain closed and I’m left feeling like Will Smith in rubbish old ‘Enemy Of The State’. For those that have heard it and know more than I do please educate me further and for those that haven’t, you should. It’s been bootlegged in Germany so chunky vinyl is available. I own 14 copies so my life is complete.
(Trainspotter Editorial Note – do not confuse with Lindy Layton and Steve Proctor’s big beat-goes-techno late ‘90s outfit Hardknox)

The freshest forgotten albums of yesteryear. Not the usual fawned over suspects but albums that ‘net-trawlers and second hand record shop aficionados may come across and should snap up now.

This month Guy Oddy goes wild for…

Guitarist Deniz Tek and singer Rob Younger formed Radio Birdman in Sydney in 1974 with the expressed intention of shaking things up. This they did, in spades. In a cultural landscape dominated, in the live arena, by insipid boogie bands in the image of Bad Company and, on the airwaves, by watered-down disco and soft rock, Radio Birdman pretty-much kicked-started the Sydney punk rock movement. Not bad for a band that weren’t really punks at all.

Radio Birdman took some time to find their feet but, from its birth, the band demonstrated peculiar traits that were not usual among Australian bands of the time. All members played raw, full-throttle, rock’n’roll, yet the unit as a whole was able to develop a sound with minimal structure that was allowed to go in any direction, at any time. This might also include elements of theatre, dance and poetry recitals. No two performances were ever the same.

The Sydney music establishment reacted in a predictable manner. Gigs were frequently cancelled after the first song, often with the threat of physical violence, as bouncers were turned loose on the group. Radio Birdman, refusing to compromise their vision, put on their own shows in community halls until they found a pub, the Oxford Tavern, which allowed them to perform without restrictions. Eventually, the band took over the management of the venue, renamed it the Oxford Funhouse, and opened the doors to fellow travellers who had similarly been denied access to an audience. The Sydney punk scene had found its first real home.

At this point, the line-up of Radio Birdman stabilised around Tek, Younger, bassman Warwick Gilbert, drummer Ron Keeley, keysman Pip Hoyle, and second guitarist Chris Masuak. In addition, the wilful experimentation and performance art were jettisoned in favour of a high-octane sound, reminiscent of the Ramones, filtered through the late-‘60s Detroit scene of the Stooges and the MC5. This was soon demonstrated on the EP ‘Burn My Eye’ and album ‘Radios Appear’. Both were low budget recordings, made piecemeal between paying clients, at Sydney’s Trafalgar studios.

‘Radios Appear’, especially, was a rollercoaster ride that included tunes such as ‘New Race’, ‘Anglo Girl Desire’, ‘Murder City Nights’, and a spirited cover of the Stooges’ ‘TV Eye’. Not everything was played at break-neck speed, however, as the album also featured ‘Love Kills’ and ‘Man With Golden Helmet’. Neither could be described as ballads, as such, but ‘Love Kills’ does feel akin to Lou Reed’s mellower moments, with more than a hint of menace.

‘Radios Appear’ was critically acclaimed by the Australian media at the time, but it was self-released and distributed, to reduce costs and price. Without the push of mainstream marketing and traditional distribution sales were therefore limited. However, when Seymour Stein was in Australia to sign Brisbane’s The Saints to Sire, he saw a Radio Birdman show at the Oxford Funhouse and was so impressed that he licensed ‘Radios Appear’ for international distribution and signed an international deal with the band.

Radio Birdman wanted to make changes to the original album and, with Sire’s blessing, they returned to Trafalgar, to re-record tracks such as ‘New Race’ and ‘Anglo Girl Desire’, and to replace others with newer material such as their homage to TV show Hawaii 5-0, ‘Aloha Stev and Danno’ (“Book him Danno, murder one. Awlright!”), ‘Non Stop Girls’ and a Thirteenth Floor Elevators-on-amphetamines version of ‘You’re Gonna Miss Me’.

The publicity that the Sydney punk scene was gaining at this point, was now also beginning to attract violence and fringe elements with unpalatable agendas. ‘Radio Birdman’ took this cue to go walkabout and, after a successful tour of Australia, they took off for Europe. Despite headlining gigs and dates with the Flamin’ Groovies, the group found itself back at square one in an England that was just seeing off the last of the punk movement. In addition, financial problems forced Sire to drop Radio Birdman and all but four of their acts when the band was mid-tour. They soldiered on but the album they were supposed to be supporting, the revised ‘Radios Appear’, didn’t. Thousands of copies were left abandoned in warehouses, later to be destroyed or to turn up in record shop bargain bins across the world.
Radio Birdman recorded a follow-up to ‘Radios Appear’ in 1978, called ‘Living Eyes’, mainly because Sire had neglected to cancel the sessions. The writing was on the wall, however, and after a final gig, at Oxford University, Radio Birdman finally gave up the ghost. ‘Living Eyes’ was released posthumously in 1981.

All the members of Radio Birdman went on to play with other bands. Most notably Rob Younger and Warwick Gilbert formed New Race with Dennis Thompson, of the MC5, and the Stooges’ Ron Ashton. They released one album, ‘The First And Last’.

During the ‘80s and ‘90s, just as with their spiritual forefathers, The Stooges and the MC5, the influence of Radio Birdman began to make itself felt to a much greater extent than when the band was functioning, especially within Australia. This influence was clearly part of bands such as the Birthday Party and the Died Pretty, but it could arguably even be recognised in far younger groups of today like Jet. Encouraged by this belated appreciation, Radio Birdman reformed in 1996 for occasional tours. However, in 2006 the group became a full-time project again with the release of a new album, ‘Zeno Beach’, and extensive touring throughout Australia, New Zealand, Europe and the USA.

When they were released both versions of ‘Radios Appear’ were essential listening. In fact, they only had five tracks in common. The first version was a reflection of the band during the time when they were very much an underground phenomenon, but their unconventional recording sessions meant that some tunes didn’t get the production that they deserved. The second, or ‘overseas’ version of the album was actually a hybrid of the best of the earlier recordings and the best of the newer live material. For years, this meant finding both versions. In 1995, however, the whole package was re-released and remastered with all fifteen tracks from the two sets and for those that like their rock’n’roll influenced by the likes of the Stooges, the Ramones and those that play with a certain raw power, ‘Radios Appear’ proved itself more than able to banish all memories of Antipodean sludge such as INXS.

The freshest forgotten albums of yesteryear. Not the usual fawned over suspects but albums that ‘net-trawlers and second hand record shop aficionados may come across and should snap up now.

“Ordinary person spends his life avoiding tense situations. Repo man spends his time getting into ‘em.”

‘Repo Man’ was the first commercially realised film to be directed by Alex Cox and is one of a slew of highly entertaining punk-rock flicks that were released in the mid-eighties. It is also one of those films that have reward numerous viewings to appreciate all the in-jokes and one-liners. However, when it was first let loose on an unsuspecting public, I was a suburban teenager with punk-rock leanings, so that was fine by me and it soon became required viewing, at some point, during most weekends.

The plot, while somewhat convoluted, concerns Otto (Emilio Estevez), an alienated young punk living in mid-80s Los Angeles. After getting fired from a shelf-stacking job in a supermarket, he discovers that his pot-head parents have donated his entire savings to a fundamentalist TV evangelist. Leaving home broke, he catches his girlfriend in the sack with one of his friends, and falls into a job with the Helping Hand Acceptance Corporation, a small automobile repossession agency. Here he is mentored by Bud (Harry Dean Stanton) a veteran repo man, who shows him the ropes of a dangerous trade (“Only an asshole gets killed for a car”).

Soon, Bud, Otto and numerous repo men all over town are searching for a 1964 Chevy Malibu from New Mexico, that is ludicrously overvalued at $20,000. It is overvalued for a reason and contains something strange and dangerous in its boot. Consequently, the FBI, represented by the distinctly odd Agent Rogers (Susan Barnes) and her team are also in hot pursuit. The film draws on the experiences of former Los Angeles repo man (and friend of Alex Cox), Mark Lewis. However, it soon wanders off into any number of surreal set-ups involving aliens, the CIA, incompetent punk-rocker smash’n’grab thieves, Otto’s new girlfriend, Leila (Olivia Barash), the ‘United Fruitcake Outlet’ and countless other improbable individuals and situations, punctuated by a number of running gags and unlikely coincidences.
Like many independently produced films, ‘Repo Man’ had a somewhat laboured birth and was almost lost without a trace, due to distribution company politics. Alex Cox’s response was to take out an advert in Variety, which reprinted a good review, as a challenge to Universal Pictures to get the film into cinemas. Universal’s response was to lean on the head of public relations at Pan Am (once a major international airline, now long-gone), Dick Barkle, to release a statement, which claimed “I hope they don’t show this film in Russia”.

The theatrical life of the film was, in fact, prolonged by a lone-voice at Universal, Kelly Neal, who went out of his way to support the film. Another major promotional success for the film was an LP of the soundtrack, very much a snapshot of the Los Angeles hardcore punk scene of the mid-eighties, taking in the usual suspects, such as Black Flag, the Circle Jerks, Suicidal Tendencies and Fear. That said, it’s not all screaming, yelling and relentless, high-speed tempos, as one of the Circle Jerks’ tunes is an acoustic version of ‘When The Shit Hits The Fan’, which is excellent.

There are some seriously rare jewels here as well as Henry Rollins and Keith Morris and their mobs. First among these is Iggy Pop’s theme tune ‘Repo Man’, which features a band that includes former Sex Pistol, Steve Jones, and couple of members of Blondie. It is the best song that he recorded in the whole of the ‘80s by several miles. In addition, there is the Burning Sensations’ cover of Jonathan Richmond’s classic number, ‘Pablo Picasso’ and three tunes from the fantastic Chicano punk band The Plugz, the best of which is their Spanish-language version of Johnny Rivers’ ‘Secret Agent Man’, renamed ‘Hombre Secreto’. Apparently The Plugz also released two extremely hard-to-find albums, ‘Electrify Me’ and ‘Better Luck’, during their short existence, which I’ve been seekin in vain for aeons.

Within a couple of years of the release of Repo Man, the American hardcore punk scene had largely retreated back to obscurity. It had been commercially eclipsed by the likes of the Pixies, with their watered-down version of the sound, and major figures like Henry Rollins and Jello Biafra had become as focused on other interests, such as spoken word, as they were on making music. This album, however, remains a storming representation of a musically aggressive, but largely humorous, scene and a cracking film.

The freshest forgotten albums of yesteryear. Not the usual fawned over suspects (usually due for re-release and consequent advertising revenue) but albums that ‘net-trawlers and second-hand shop aficionados may come across and should snap up NOW…

Guy Oddy recommends…

Do you remember the late ‘80s? Stock, Aitken and Waterman, Loadsamoney, Britain ruled the waves again after the Falklands War! Now think a bit harder. Remember an autocratic, right-wing government, unemployment, nuclear paranoia, privatisation mania and inner cities awash with heroin. Out of this amalgam came the On-U Sound System with its sound of resistance, keeping the flag flying between the politically-charged agit-pop of the early eighties indie and post-punk scenes and the anarchist, angry rave sounds from the likes of the Spiral Tribe in the early nineties.

It is difficult to adequately describe the profound influence of Adrian Sherwood and the On-U cast of thousands on contemporary music, from dub, techno and drum and bass, to any number of new waves of punk, electro and ambient. Obsessed by reggae, Sherwood’s early sound took the genre off on new tangents, twisting it into soundscapes that drew inspiration from Lee Perry’s trippy collages and King Tubby’s sonic depth charges, often polishing things with metallic sheets of noise and rounding them off with distorted thunder.

Adrian Sherwood

On-U Sound Records was formed in 1980 and was soon setting new standards of dub production. Sherwood produced a vast army of reggae, funk and rock artists, including: New Age Steppers, Mark Stewart and the Mafia, African Head Charge and the mighty Dub Syndicate. In addition, his live mixes for these bands and visiting reggae royalty, like Prince Far-I and Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, were nothing short of magnificent. All this and the first (and possibly only) decent football songs to be laid down on vinyl, courtesy of the Barmy Army!

During the mid ‘80s, Gary Clail (the self-styled “scaffolder from Bristol”!) became a regular warm-up for On-U Sound System parties with his “On-U Sound in the area!” crowd calls. Gary’s real impact, however, was to introduce and roadtest new On-U rhythms and tunes, and to recycle old favourites with his chants and toasting. He made his first vinyl appearance in October 1985, on the spectacular ‘Half Cut for Confidence’. The backing musicians were essentially Tackhead (who had previously been known as hip hop pioneers, the Sugarhill Gang), but were credited as The Occult Technology of Power. The following year, Gary released ‘Hard Left’ in his own right and ‘Reality’ as Tackhead’s featured vocalist. ‘End of the Century Party’, his first proper album, was released in 1990 and was a follow-up to ‘Tackhead Tape Time’, which was basically a greatest hits compilation, including versions of all of Gary’s contributions to their catalogue.

Gary Clail

‘Beef’, a duet with reggae legend Bim Sherman, opens ‘End of the Century Party’. Although pre-dating the BSE crisis in the UK, it nevertheless sounded a prescient warning on the dangers and morality of consuming the end products of the factory-farming industry. It also featured ex-PiL men Keith Levene and Jah Wobble, who played and shared a co-credit on the track. As well as this recorded collaboration, they also played live with On-U Sound that Autumn to rave reviews. It was the first and last time that they would play together since leaving John Lydon’s mob.

‘Two Thieves and a Liar’ is undoubtedly the pinnacle of the set, with a relentless bass line, incisive sample about the wickedness at work within the City of London (“…I’ve never seen such dishonesty and greed…”) and Bim Sherman’s crooning contrasting with Gary’s strident chanting. The style is pure fire and brimstone.

Continuing Gary’s long-running theme of delivering contemporary, socially-conscious lyrics, ‘Privatise the Air (parts 1 and 2)’ was particularly hard-hitting. The track lifted the rhythm from Barmy Army’s ‘Stadium Rock’ and saw Gary come as near as he got to a genuine JA early ‘80s toasting style. The ‘Rat Race’, ‘Rave On’, ‘House Building’ triptych had a totally different sound, sampling the contemporary rave sounds that were then terrorising middle England. While the final track, ‘A Man’s Place on Earth’, found Gary collaborating again with Keith Levene, and spitting out the refrain, “Poverty’s the crime, not what you have to do to get out of it”.

The U-ON Sound System ‘family’

Gary Clail’s presence on the On-U Sound scene brought a new feeling of energy to the live gigs and, although his vocal styling can be objectively described as limited and his lyrics sometimes trite, he certainly produced gold for these tunes and the earlier Tackhead singles. In fact, ‘End of the Century Party’ distilled all the best elements of the On-U sound and created the scene’s most perfect statement. Unfortunately, it didn’t get its deserved recognition and despite ‘Beef’ appearing on a number of radio play-lists, it soon disappeared out of the public gaze.

After ‘End of the Century Party’, Clail went on to release material through Paul Oakenfold’s Perfecto label. This union was to result in a Top of the Pops appearance, when the single ‘Human Nature’ reached number ten in the charts. However, while Gary’s time at Perfecto brought him his biggest commercial success, helped in no small part by the remixing talents of Paul Oakenfold and Steve Osborne, the partnership was to be short-lived. While 1991’s ‘Emotional Hooligan’ album sold well, a combination of Clail’s unrealistic belief that he was now a fully-fledged pop star, coupled with a lack of new musical direction and his record company’s increasing lack of interest in promoting him, saw an acrimonious parting in 1993. In particular, the almost complete lack of promotion of the ‘Dreamstealers’ album, left a bitter taste in the mouths of both Clail and Adrian Sherwood.

‘Dreamstealers’ album

A new deal was struck with French label, Yelen Musiques, for 1995’s ‘Keep the Faith’ album. It featured more of Clail’s lambasts against the injustices of the world, but largely passed unnoticed, before he slipped quietly out of the music scene in the late ‘90s, to run a guest-house in Penzance.

The freshest forgotten albums of yesteryear. Not the usual fawned over suspects (usually due for re-release and consequent advertising revenue) but albums that ‘net-trawlers and second-hand shop aficionados may come across and should snap up NOW…

Jim Paranoias Recommends

All great bands are born in pubs. But only truly great bands go the distance; sticking doggedly to that slurred manifesto, that ‘fucking come and have a go’ mentality, and the purity of inspiration that can only be attained in a moment of booze-fuelled clarity. So it must have been with Earl Brutus. Where else but at the yellowing fag-end of some hateful all-dayer would the melding acid house, glam, krautrock, electro and the Fall have seemed like a good idea? Where else but in a world wherein every night ends with the sound of breaking glass, police sirens and 303s galloping down the high street (as does virtually every track here) could such a cantankerous a racket as this album seem like a worthy addition to pop music?

Yes, this certainly isn’t the kind of Great Lost Album you can slip into as you would a pair of old comfy slippers. In fact, playing the album in the home is akin to that maddening, sickly feeling you get settling down for the night in some hitherto uncharted suburban boozer, only to discover the table next to you, and indeed the pub in its entirety, is populated by complete psychopaths and angry lunatic losers.

Staffed by two warlocks, an alcoholic zombie shouting at himself, a bucking sweating rodeo rider of a guitarist, a large man in an ill-fitting- tucked-in-jeans-and-cream-jacket combo and a slight oriental chap in a kagoul – exclusively employed to beat frothing tins of lager above his head on stage – Earl Brutus were far from your conventional glam/synth six piece. Their live ‘show’ was as visceral and threatening as it was hilarious and shambolic and no expense was spared when it came to production. Piss poor pyrotechnics would go off at random intervals throughout the set, rotating signage that you don’t see at Petrol Stations anymore reading ‘music/chips’ littered the stage and each member had their own name spelt out in a Kraftwerk style UV light box. Coupled with their resident lager chucker and head banger Shin-Yu the whole set acted as a visual representation of the band’s seemingly disparate reference points.

You wouldn’t think it would work, but it does and the album sounds as vital and dangerous today as it did on its release in 1996. In the main it’s all pounding Glitter band drums, barrelling acid lines and leery glam riffs yet it’s stuffed with little flourishes and flashes of side-splitting genius. There’s some woeful scratching in ‘Shrunken Head’, a vocodered “ENG-ER-LAND” chant at the end of ‘Blind Date’, some preposterous machine gun-like rack toms throughout ‘Life’s Too Long’ and a couple of inspired set pieces such as the faultless and unfathomably bleak Pet Shop Boys pastiche ‘On Me Not In Me’

Lyrically the album runs the gamut of booze related emotions. Those being: “I’m pissed and everything’s great” and “I’m pissed and everything is shit”. Most of the anger is directed squarely at mainstream consumer culture and the album is peppered with vile late ‘90s consumerist buzz words: “Is it Isotonic? Is it reversible? Is it a jacket? Back to your Barrett houses! Lonely in the Harvester, I’m new!, on a jetski…” etc. The overall effect is kind of like when you get the last train home pissed and end up looking around you thinking, “Is everyone in this country a complete fucking wanker?” But there’s enough humour, mischief and bile in there to keep the lyric sheet out of tramp at a bus stop territory.

So why is this a great lost album? Most bands don’t care if you want to hate them, they just want someone to like them. Earl Brutus didn’t seem to care whether anyone hated them or indeed liked them. Only a band with such antipathy towards the general public would happily play the Friday 11:30AM ‘Hangover Slot’ in the tent at Reading TWO years in a row. Only a band so nonplussed by credibility and recognition would, in the space where most bands cram their debuts with thank you credits for everyone from the vending machine man at the label to their pre-school maths teacher, Earl Brutus simply left, “Thanks not applicable”. The last time I saw Earl Brutus they weren’t even performing live. They just sat around a table getting stuck into two slabs of Skol shouting at their DJ – “next fucking record” – and generally ranting in between songs. It seemed like a fitting swansong.

Whilst ‘Your Majesty, We are here’ is no great leap forwards musically, it rules because of what it represents. A big fuck you to sobriety, normality and all that is crap and average. Gentlemen, step this way for those OBEs.