SD50 cover 01/09/2015 18:07 Page 1

JOHN RENBOURN |AUDIENCE |DIANE COFFEE

NICHOLAS GODIN
Bach to the beginning with the man from Air
ISSUE 50 • £4.95
DAN PENN & SPOONER OLDHAM|ARTHUR BROWN
p002_Shindig_50 26/08/2015 11:24 Page 1

1
SD50 Contents 27/08/2015 10:58 Page 3

ISSUE 50, SEPTEMBER 2015

Howdy Shindiggers!

It does seem like a long time ago that I saved

pounds and pounds to buy a PC to enable me to
write about garage-punk in pipe dream fanzine
Gravedigger, published in 1994. Two issues
down the line this tentative photocopied affair
became the professionally printed Shindig! –
yes Shindig!, the base version of the very
publication you’re holding. The first few issues
put together with PJ Crittenden also seem like a
lifetime ago, but with We The People on the
cover and writers like Lenny Helsing coming on
FEATURES
board, the template for what you're holding
was set; in a somewhat primitive and rough
around the edges format. In the year 2000 Andy
The Optic Nerve 30
Morten appeared in time for issue #5, our Move Lost recordings surface by much-loved ’80s New York folk-rock act
cover, and since then we have basically run
with it, and are still here after many ups and Graveyard 32
our recent down. This isn’t about arena-filling retro-rock any more
Shindig! may be 20 years and 57 issues old (if
you want to be pedantic), but it's from Vol 2 Shindig! At 50 36
Issue #1 – the magazine that emerged onto the Our 50 favourite releases since our rebirth in 2007
High Street in late 2007 – that we’re celebrating
our 50th issue with. Of course, back in 1994 I
had no great aims for the title, yet it
John Renbourn 40
consistently continued to grow enough to take The late, lamented guitar maestro in his own words
it far beyond its humble roots. Even today, the
magazine is about music and things that we Dan Penn & Spooner Oldham 48
cherish and believe in. People have come and Keeping the torch of southern soul burning for 50 years
gone, our remit has expanded, as have our
horizons, though Shindig!’s core values remain Audience 54
the same: spreading the word about great The early ’70s art-rock ensemble that should’ve been huge
bands, records and films and curating a unique
melting pot of genres, styles and people into a
solid whole.
The Faces 60
It would be lovely to see you at our 50th The first steps of one of the ’70s’ biggest and best British bands
birthday bash at Rough Trade East, London
([Link]/XwqryB) and to raise a glass to our
continued success. Emails, Facebook messages REGULARS
and Tweets pour in on a daily basis, so thank
you for the incredible support.
This issue features Kenney Jones discussing Shindiggin’ What’s hot on the Shindig! turntable 4
the formation and fun of The Faces, their one
time US support band, the wonderful Audience,
recollections from UK folk furtherer John
Thoughts & Words Your letters and emails 6
Renbourn, the southern white country soul
brothers Dan Penn and Spooner Oldham, a It’s A Happening Thing News from the Shindigverse 8
brilliant 20 questions with The God Of Hellfire
Arthur Brown, latter day New York folk-rockers
The Optic Nerve, Swedish long hairs Graveyard
Happening Right Now The hottest new bands 22
and an interview with Air’s Nicolas Godin
about his incredible debut album. 20 Questions The God Of Hellfire himself, Arthur Brown 24
Raise a toast to us as we turn 50 with our
printed equivalent of totally unacceptable Family Album Roberta Flack’s deathless 1969 debut, First Take 34
shoes and rock ’n’ roll sunglasses. We look
forward to doing it all over again when we turn
60.
Reviews The best in reissues, new releases, books and live shows 71
Lay back, pour a drink and enjoy. Vinyl Art Miles Davis’ jazz-rock milestone, Filles De Kilimanjaro 96
See you in six weeks, Prize Crossword Win an America box set! 97
Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills
Editor-In-Chief

33
SD50 Shindiggin 24/08/2015 17:17 Page 4

The brand new releases, compilation standouts, old album tracks and dusty 45s
rockin’ our world this month
THE FACES MOTHER HEN
Flying Mother Hen
Even at this point in their short but fruitful Jane Getz – jazz pianist and session
career the ex-Small Faces (who there was musician (Bee Gees, Lennon, Harry Nilsson,
now nothing “small” about) and Jeff Beck no less) – looked like Crystal Tipps and
cast-offs Ron Wood and Rod Stewart hit sang like The ISB’s Licorice McKechnie
upon the formula they’d become legendary fronting an eccentrically ramshackle
for. First single ‘Flying’ has a classic Stewart country-rock band a la Earth Opera.
vocal, the SF Hammond, bass and drums Sparklingly recorded and lyrically intelligent,
combo, and some splendid Woody slide. her 1971 debut on RCA under the name
Who needed lil’ Stevie anyway? Mother Hen seems to have missed the
Available on: You Can Make Me Dance, clutches of dealers and is an utter delight.
Sing Or Anything (Rhino box set) Available on: RCA 1971 LP

SUSAN JAMES THE KITCHEN CINQ

Sea Glass Determination
Susan James has quietly released five Released as a single and included on
albums of country-tinged singer-songwriter Everything But..., the group’s sole long-
fare to date but little in her canon prepared player issued in mid-67 on Lee Hazlewood’s
us for this arresting cocktail of California LHI label. Originally from Texas they based
sunshine, baroque arrangements (courtesy themselves in LA, yet ‘Determination’ has
of High Llama Sean O’Hagan) and ornate everything required of a top drawer melodic
instrumentation. It’s the first record we’ve Texas teen punker: a driving rhythm, vocal
heard that truly evokes the wanderlust and energy, mean fuzz guitar and a great pop
questing spirit of benchmarks like Linda sound that screams with urgency and
Perhacs’ Parallelograms, while remaining intensity.
firmly in the pop firmament. Available on: When The Rainbow
Available on: SJM CD Disappears (Light In The Attic CD)

NACASH BROTHERS BETTY EVERETT

After Winter  God Only Knows
Tucked away on the B-side to a now Everett was 20 years into her recording
forgotten French 1976 single, this track is career when she cut this sumptuous version
as odd as they come. Over a spaced-out of The Beach Boys’ 1966 crowning glory.
waltz peppered with deep bass and Produced and arranged by Gene Page, it
analogue keyboard effects, our male employs the slick, string-laden sound of
protagonist gets all cosmic in an attempt to much mid-70s soul without ever submerging
persuade his lover to stay with him, in the Everett’s vocal. And it manages to get the
process coming over like Barry White on chords right! Parent album, Happy Endings,
acid. Equal parts creepy and brilliant. is worth investigating too.
Available on: B-side of ‘Zendali’ Available on: Here Today! The Songs Of
(BASF/Disco Più 7”) Brian Wilson (Ace CD)

AGUATURBIA GOSPELBEACH
Ah Ah Ah Ay Southern Girl
The current crop of Santiago psychers The mellowest moment from Brent
– Föllakzoid, The Holydrug Couple et al Rademaker and friends’ impressive debut,
– seem to owe as much to the ubiquitous which both continues and furthers the
Tame Impala as they do to Jimi Hendrix. West Coast sound he established so well
But back in 1969 Chile was all about with Beachwood Sparks. The incredible
heavy-blues riffs and a sweet, stoned Frisco Neal Casal adds some fiery guitar breaks
vibe. Their first album of mostly covers into this easy-going ’70s ode, which
catches husband-and-wife-led Aguaturbia comes off like a very stoned Steely Dan
(“dirty water”) at their wah-wah toting doing The Beach Boys circa Holland.
rawest. Gorgeous.
Available on: Aguaturbia (Essex LP) Available on: Pacific Surf Line (Alive CD/LP)

GEORGIE FAME ALICE COOPER

Sweet Thing Under My Wheels
The title track-ish of Fame’s ’66 LP Sweet Penned by group members Bruce and
Things takes the already sublime Spinners Dunaway with producer Bob Ezrin, this basic
original and angles the mirrors in such a rock ’n’ roll number mixes brassy sax parts
way that the whole thing is just ablaze with with driving bass and wheel screeching
sunlight. Here’s a song to turn a day guitar to compliment Cooper’s
around, to make flowers burst from cracks characteristically rough vocals. From the
in the pavement, to coax potential suicides threateningly growled first line you know
back in from window ledges. they mean business, on what was the first
Available on: The Whole World’s Shaking: single release from Alice Cooper’s fourth
Complete Recordings 1963-66 (Universal album, 1971’s Killer.
box set) Available on: Killer (Rhino CD)

44
p005_Shindig_50 26/08/2015 11:25 Page 3

new
from
ace

THE LONDON AMERICAN LABEL ALL ABOARD! 25 TRAIN TRACKS LINK WRAY DION
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CDCHD 1444 STATIONS CDCH2 1451 (2CD) HIQLP 033 (LP)
1966 as documented by the releases of the CDCHD 1450 A 2CD set featuring three albums Link Wray The much sought-after Phil Spector- Annie Philippe
UK’s most famous source for US rock’n’roll, We reflect the incredible variety of train songs recorded on his brother’s farm in the early produced Dion album available on vinyl for
pop and R&B. on this new compilation created by the team 70s. Radically different to what Link had the first time since its original release. A 180
behind 2008’s “Feline Groovy”. “All Aboard!” previously recorded – raw and basic, but gram release, with inserts that include a new
with vocals and acoustic instruments - these interview with Dion.
albums are the rarest of Link’s catalogue.

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An overview of the 1967-69 southern soul Black American soul dancers and grooves The first ever CD release for this 1975 A welcome re-release for this 2CD set
sessions undertaken at FAME studios by with that 70s sound beloved of the Modern instrumental set from Isaac Hayes’ renowned featuring a show recorded in California
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SD50 Letters 26/08/2015 16:45 Page 4

THOUGHTS & WORDS

jon@[Link]
[Link]/[Link]
@shindigmagazine

STAR LETTER A MYSTERY TO ME I passed your message onto Lady J and she was most
touched. She still covers new folk, but found that, as a
Jon, Dear Jon, genre, many acts had moved on.
Over the last few issues (leaving aside the K*********** The overlooked era of Fleetwood Mac remains so in my eyes.
issue, which I didn’t read) you’ve reviewed several live To leave Mystery To Me and Heroes Are Hard To Find as a AGENTE 077
albums that are effectively bootlegs as far as I can tell. In footnote to your otherwise excellent article was a tad
the issue 49 you review The Mahavishnu Orchestra’s Whisky disappointing. The two albums mentioned are my favourite Dear Jon,
A Go-Go 1972. A quick look round the murkier corners of Mac albums and I thought they deserved better coverage. I’m a huge Lydia MacDonald fan and was delighted to see
the internet can find it offered for downloading, along, I’m Bob Welch, as you mentioned was a great artist, but I’m still that your magazine has run an article on this much neglected
sure, with a pile of viruses and malware. The record company waiting to read that one great story in a magazine to justify singer. I have been researching Lydia’s life and work for a few
doesn’t appear to have a website, but the press release his talent. years now and have managed, with the assistance of her
claims it to be “re-mastered”. The CD has hiss and a muffled Chris Triggs nephew David Chillier (who kindly pointed out your article), to
sound that suggest it was mastered with the sound off. It amass a fair bit of material which helps fill out the paucity of
seems unlikely that Mr McLaughlin and band are seeing any I agree – great albums one and all. I wanted this piece to Lydia MacDonald information (photographs, discography
royalties from this release. The Renaissance and Byrds end with Kirwan leaving as I still believe the band took on a etc). 
albums reviewed in your pages are other examples.  new sound after his dismissal. There’s so much to cover I was interested to hear your podcast featuring Piero
Does Shindig! have a policy on supporting artists being though. Welch deserves a feature of his own don’t you think? Piccioni’s ‘Abigaille’. This track did not feature on Fumo Di
paid for their work? I would suggest that this sort of release Londre. The track was the main theme for the movie I Giovani
benefits neither artist nor audience, one gets no payment, NO REGRETS Tigri. The vocalist on the ‘Abigaille‘ (main theme titles) track
the other gets substandard material.  which you played could be Lydia MacDonald though. She must
This issue of poor mastering isn’t confined to live radio Hi Jon, have made many uncredited appearances as a working singer
broadcasts warmed over as official releases. I bought the Really excited to find out Tom Rush is playing Ogunquit, (I have uncovered a fair few myself) as well as doing the “big
recent Aviator albums put out by Gonzo Multimedia and, Maine when we’re vacationing there on October 23rd, purely film theme” numbers. She worked a lot for Piccioni and many
comparing them to my old vinyl copies, find two songs cut by chance. I missed him last time. Has Shinners (as I others (Travaioli, Bacalov, Ferro, Umiliani, Morricone et al) as
off before their end and what can only be clicks from a affectionately call your wonderful mag) ever done a feature? I you will be aware, and her body of work is scattered across
scratched record on another. The sound quality varies from can’t recall, but it would be of great interest if you haven’t. many soundtrack albums (I even found an Italian Library
one song to the next as well. As a fan I’m happy to get the While there we’ll be visiting The Record Exchange in Music album with a vocal of hers on it!). Do you have any
extra songs, but I am hugely disappointed in the quality as I Salem, Mass where, the great Barrence Whitfield works – nice sources which confirm Lydia as the vocalist on the ‘Abigaille’
doubt there will be the demand for another go at reissuing review of his new album by the way. I have known Barrence track? Please understand I am not being a pain in the
them. My emails to Gonzo have gone unanswered. Where for many years through visiting the shop, one of the best on backside about this... I am trying to pull together as
many of the reissue labels do a brilliant job in working over the East Coast, and one of the nicest guys around. comprehensive a discography as possible for this wonderful,
old material the slapdash methods of others leaves a lot to Also recently been playing Jesse Colin Young albums, Light warm and too little-known singer and any references/ sources
be desired. Shine and Love On The Wing, another singer songwriter that for tracks I have missed would be most welcome.
I know it is traditional to end a letter with a plea for an would be of interest to readers with his Youngbloods anthem All the best,
artist to be covered by Shindig! so here’s mine, Bill Nelson. ‘Get Together’ and ‘Darkness Darkness’. Lanark McVie
He’s producing the best work of his life at present but has Really enjoyed latest edition #49 with Fleetwood Mac –
health issues that seem to have cut off his live work and checked out Mystery To Me again – and Dragons interview. Glad you enjoyed the piece, we like to vary the type of
may reduce his studio work as well. Talk to him and get the Cheers, singers we cover and Lydia was certainly worth reappraisal.
world (who lost track after Be Bop Deluxe) to look at some Glenn Evans ‘Abigaille’ was included on a ’94 edition of Fumo... Good luck
of his great recent albums. with your investigations.
Oh, and I am the Shindig! reader who likes Sky? Tom Rush is a great idea, as is Jesse Colin Young. We
Tim Martin covered The Youngbloods some years back. Enjoy your break BROTHER CHRIS
Clevedon Somerset and please listen to the Mac’s Future Games – my own pick.
Hi Jon,
We feel your pain Tim. We do not MORE FOLKUS Loved the feature on The Chris Robinson Brotherhood, which
intend to go out of our way to help pointed me in the direction of Chris Robinson & The New
nor condone the legions of Hi Jon, Earth Mud’s The Magnificent Distance. As always, Shindig!
bootleggers that function so readily Well what a good surprise, I found Shindig! again. Great – sends me off on another musical journey of exploration.
in the world of our beloved music. stay like that, please don’t move. I am an avid reader since Currently enjoying your magazine sitting in a cottage
We do, however, support and the beginning. I do miss the folk column by Jeanette overlooking Polzeath beach in Cornwall.
champion the known and trusted though. Bring back this page again if you can. With it I Mike Smith
reissue labels at all times, as should our readers. If the discovered good acid-folk bands.
label name is not known, proceed with caution. Have a Like you said Jon, lay back and enjoy... but you forgot to Yes when discovering the Brotherhood I knew this was a
copy of the new Faces box set for your troubles – all legit add with a good beer! band that had to be brought to the attention of our readers.
and above board, of course. Andre So glad you like them too.

Editor-in-Chief: Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills jon@[Link] Publisher: Tom Saunders, Silverback Publishing tom@[Link]
64 North View Rd, London N8 7LL 14 Victoria Road, Sutton, Surrey SM1 4RT. Tel: 020 3752 2263
Managing Editor: Andy Morten andy@[Link] Director: Andy Crispin
Editorial Assistants: Phil Suggitt phil@[Link], Advertising Manager: Alan Thomas alan@[Link]
Paul Osborne paul@[Link] Tel: 07830 168076
Contributors: Richard Allen, Joe Banks, Grahame Bent, Ashley Brooks, Subscriptions: Louisa Bell subs@[Link]. Tel: 020 3198 6972
Christopher Budd, Louis Comfort-Wiggett, Nigel Cross, Hugh Dellar, Stuart Draper, Design: Andy Morten, Martin Cook
Photo by Adrian Sherratt

Mike Fornatale, Ian Fraser, Ian Gilchrist, Brian Greene, Greg Healey, Lenny Helsing, Printed by: Warners Group
Jason Hobart, Kate Hodges, Mick Houghton, Neil Hussey, Henry Hutton, Rhys Jones,
Jeanette Leech, Austin Matthews, Andy Morten, Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills, Kris Needs, If you have trouble finding Shindig! magazine in the UK please contact Warners Group Publications Plc
on 01778 391171, email: nikkim@[Link]
Paul Osborne, Tom Patterson, Jeff Penczak, Mark Raison, Paul Ritchie, Marco Rossi, While every effort is made in compiling Shindig! Magazine the publishers cannot be held responsible for
David Savage, Vic Templar, Carl Tweed, Chris Twomey, Gary von Tersch, Glynis Ward errors or omissions. Readers are advised to pay by credit card when ordering goods off the page as they
are regulated under Consumer Act 1974, unlike debit or charge cards, which are not. All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or
mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any storage or retrieval system, without the consent of
the publisher. Registered at Stationers Hall Copyright. Direct Input by Silverback Publishing Ltd.

64
p007_Shindig_50 26/08/2015 11:26 Page 3

The Wonderful World of Cherry Red

www. [Link]
Available at all good record stores Find us on

ESOTERIC

HOT MILK
ESOTERIC

ESOTERIC

Tony Banks Procol Harum Procol Harum Various Artists

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SD50 IAHT 26/08/2015 17:06 Page 1

Photo by Thomas Humery

Bach to the future. Nicolas

Godin photographed in 2015

18
SD50 IAHT 26/08/2015 17:07 Page 2

Second Hand Classical Culture

Since 1995, NICOLAS GODIN, as one half of Air, has released umpteen albums and singles of
impeccable electronic retro-futurism. Now, two decades after Air first emerged onto a vibrant
Parisian scene comes Godin’s solo debut, Contrepoint, an album that takes the classical music
of Johann Sebastian Bach and shapes it into intriguing new forms.
THOMAS PATTERSON gets switched on

“A
s a musician I don’t see anyone else as good as Bach,” Godin
tells me from his home in Paris about the intriguing genesis
of Contrepoint. “For me, he’s the God of music. I wanted to
understand more about how his pieces work and how
they’re built and as a composer and musician I wanted to get better and
improve by learning from him. And I’m getting older, I was feeling that I
was limited musically and that I couldn’t go further so I needed to go
deeper into the source of music to learn new things.”

Indeed, it was this desire to improve musically, rather than any burning
desire to break away from Air that led to Godin finally recording his solo
debut.

“I never sat one morning and said ‘I’m going to make a solo record’,” he
explains. “It was just about me saying to myself I want to play the words
and keyboards of Bach, my own personal challenge. It was not supposed
to make a record. But because I was not able to play it well, I had to
make a record to express my ideas, because what I had in mind, I was not On stage with Air
good enough technically to play it on a piano.”
“If we do what we used to be good at before
e results are astonishing, an endlessly rewarding album that bends
genres and defies easy categorisation, both somewhat confirming yet
Elvis Presley and The Beatles showed up I’m
also minimising Godin’s self-effacing statement “e only original thing I sure we cannot miss”
do is mix things together that are not supposed to be mixed together.”
Indeed, the title Contrepoint both refers to Bach’s habit of using different
but interdependent harmonies and Godin’s habit of mixing different sure we cannot miss. at’s what French people should do, we should
forms and tones to inventive effect. focus on our heritage and our culture – all these great soundtrack
composers in France and Italy, they were good, and I’m sure I can take it
e spirits of greats like Dave Brubeck and Glenn Gould light up the further and bring another brick to the wall.”
album, infusing every twist Godin spins on Bach’s originals – though the
clearest influences on display alongside the German composer are Godin will be taking Contrepoint out on the road in the near future,
legendary soundtrack artists like Lalo Schifrin and Ennio Morricone. firstly with a small band but with plans to eventually expand to a full
orchestra. Air will also return at some point, either playing old songs live
“e biggest influence in my career are soundtrack composers,” Godin or recording something new – if and when the right inspiration hits.
confirms, “because as I grew up I was watching TV all day long and I
learned from movies and TV shows and what I know is that those “With Air, we just need to come up with a great idea – I need a good
classical composers like Ennio Morricone, John Barry, Nino Rota, reason to make a recording. We did some great albums and if we’re going
Georges Delerue, Lalo Schifrin and John Williams, they all have a to make another one it has to be strong enough that we have to do it. I
classical background, so everything I know about classical music, I know don’t want to make a less good album than I did already”.
from those guys, so it’s like a second hand classical culture.
In the meantime, Godin will continue learning his craft and flexing his
“I think I used Bach to do an homage to do all these great soundtrack musical muscles. He has recently finished the soundtrack to a
composers,” he continues. “It’s funny how you use someone to pay forthcoming film called Taj Mahal and he plans on using music to
respect to other guys. It’s very strange, it’s just my earliest memories of further explore the work of people he admires.
music, they’re just so strong in me, I just can’t help let them appear when
I’m recording.” “In future, I will use music to know more about a subject,” he says. “is
time it was Bach but next time I want it to be something else. I will use
And, of course, the sensual French mood that courses through Air’s work my gift to learn about something and I will make it sound like a record
is present, expanded to a pan-European vibe with the inclusion of songs but it will be more my relationship with something that I really like.”
in German and Italian – indeed, it takes skill to turn Bach’s cantata
‘Widerstehe Doch Der Sünde’ into a song of erotic seduction but that’s Although he already has a few possible candidates lined up, he refuses to
exactly what Godin has managed with the assistance of vocalists Gordon name any of them. One thing is for certain – if they inspire him as much
Tracks (aka omas Mars) and Dorothée De Koon. It’s a tactile, carnal as Bach, the results will be extraordinary.
form of music that’s a world away from traditional Anglo-accented pop.
Contrepoint is out now on Because Music
“It’s what we call continental music compared to English music, like pop
music,” Godin says. “I think that’s what we’re good at, and if we try to
sound like rock ’n’ roll and pop, we sound ridiculous but if we do what
we used to be good at before Elvis Presley and e Beatles showed up I’m

29
SD50 IAHT 26/08/2015 17:07 Page 3

Rhythm ’n’ Booze

Self-proclaimed Hermits On Holiday CATE LE BON and White Fence’s TIM PRESLEY take a break
from their regular musical activities to pursue their new “solo project”, DRINKS.
We ask them to tell us about the records that helped cement their musical union, with typically
beguiling results

First up, Cate… Various Artists Lou Miami

Punk 45: There is No Such Thing As Society Rituals (Throbbing Lobster LP, 1985)
(Soul Jazz 2-LP, 2014) I played this to Cate on another mammoth tour
Faust is compilation worked a treat on me. It drive and she loved it so much I bought it for
Faust V (Virgin LP, 1975) reignited my love for scrappy guitar music. I her for Christmas. She still calls him Louie
is album is the pinnacle of everything an am a self-proclaimed punk now, whatever that Miami though, which is not his name. I think
album should be. It is equal parts playful, means. is is very much Tim’s domain and we’re both attracted to the repetitious guitar
exciting, beautiful, abrasive and bizarre. I had when I told him that I was listening to it he lines that underpin his songs. In particular
never been able to definitively answer the spouted off a million bands I should listen to ‘Dancing With Death’ is the same riff
question, “If you had to pick a favourite album, next. We had a very teenage time listening to throughout. Any small flourishes added on top
what would it be?” until I happened upon this. I punk together. Better late than never. He tells are amplified by the monotony. 
am as captivated by it now as I was when I first me he’ll take me to a punk show but I have a
heard it. When Tim told me that it too was his bad back.  Tom Petty & The
most perfect album I knew we were going to be Heartbreakers
just fine.  The Greatest Hits (MCA LP, 1993)
Now it’s Tim’s turn… No listening session was ever complete without
“When Tim told me that it too a visit from TP. He ignites something in us both
was his most perfect album I Datblygu that cannot be quashed. Sometimes you have to
let your songs go where they want and
knew we were going to be just Amheuon Corfforol sometimes they want to go to the Petty zoo.
fine” (Casetiau Neon cassette, 1982)
A truly incredible Welsh band. Cate showed me Hermits On Holiday is out
this and I immediately started researching now on Heavenly.
everything about them. She tells me they hold Drinks is on tour in the UK
Fille Qui Mousse the record for most Peel Sessions. Datblygu was now and the US in October.
Se Taire Pour Une Femme Trop Belle crucial for us with our writing process for the
(Mellow CD, 1994 – recorded 1971) Drinks record. One of us would mess around
I picked this album up at Permanent Records in with a Casio, while the other played bass or
Eagle Rock purely on their recommendation for guitar. It’s groups like this that are very
lovers of Faust V. It is musical assemblage. inspiring to me, seemly simple, poetic, melodic
ere is no map. It’s the sound of the most and unrestricted.
wonderful scribble on the back of a foreign
newspaper. I was excited like a teen to play this Mayo Thompson
to Tim. I invited him over the house specifically Corky’s Debt To His Father
to do so and we drank milkshakes and talked (Texas Revolution LP, 1970)
about boys.  is is one of my all time favourite albums, and
I played it for Cate on a whim. I figured with
Tronics the way the Drinks record was going, this
What’s The Hubub Bub (M’Lady CD, 2001) would be a good record to take in. It’s loose yet
On an East Coast White Fence tour last fall we calculated, which suited our frame of mind. I
had a marathon drive from a College Town in always come back to this record. It’s an endless
upstate New York back to the city. I took the pool of vision and mystery. 
wheel under the proviso that Tim was co-pilot
and DJ. He played this album for me and I was The Nixe
immediately transfixed and almost furious that The Nixe (Rock Against Records EP, 1981)
I hadn’t heard it before. I don’t remember the Whilst this isn’t an album, it carried the weight
drive, just the songs. It’s directness is potent of one when it came to inspiration for our
and a lesson in cutting out all the superfluous record. Another one I thought Cate would love,
nonsense. It’s an important reference point for seeing as she is a punk now. ere are
that in the studio.  moments vocally that made me think if Cate
had a punk band it may sound a bit like this.
Young Marble Giants e nonchalant lyrics and delivery were
Colossal Youth (Rough Trade LP, 1980) fetching to us both.
This is another magnificently sparse album
and a reminder that punk isn’t formulaic. Its “There are moments vocally
presence can be in what’s omitted. that made me think if Cate
Abruptness is king. Tim hadn’t heard this
album before and I hadn’t visited it for a
had a punk band it may sound
while so it was nice to do it together and be a bit like this”
Alcopop music. Tim
equally as inspired by it. Presley and Cate Le Bon
AKA Drinks

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Photo by Cara Robbins

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SD50 IAHT 26/08/2015 17:07 Page 5

Asterisk The Gaul

As SIMON LOVE unleashes his solo debut, It Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time, PAUL
OSBORNE is treated to a hilarious insight into the mind of a unique songwriter

Loves’ then bassist/funny lady Danielle Ward at

S
imon Love rose to prominence in the would’ve attempted to make things radio-
2000s as front man of Welsh indie friendly (which has served me so well in the ace ’60s night, e 13th Floor. I talked to him
darlings, e Loves – a band that built past), this time I left all my weirdness in. And about Bob Dylan in e Albany’s decaying
up a loyal and devoted following with its the swearing. ‘Don’t Get e Gurl No More’ toilets for about an hour and ever since then
unique take on the sounds of e Kinks, Velvets starts with part of the original instrumental whenever I’ve seen him out and about he asked
and classic ’60s pop. Following their demise demo I made for it in 2005, so that one has me what I was up to. When I came up with the
he’s now ready to step back into the limelight been gestating for 10 years. e rest of the idea for ‘e Meaning Of Love’ and knew I
and showcase his debut solo, It Seemed Like A songs were a mixture of things I wrote for needed a narrator I first asked Bruce Campbell
Good Idea At e Time. A wonderful collection Knickers and unfinished bits and bobs. It was via his website but Bruce said, “Unfortunately
of witty, sometimes stinging vignettes tackling only when I assembled them that they seemed this is not something I’m looking for at the
the absurdities of love and relationships, it’s to make some sense. It’s strange looking back moment. anks, BC.” en I asked Stewart
uniquely British in its delivery (with some of on the LP with today’s hindsight. When I was and he said, “I would be delighted to do that.” I
the most creative uses of obscenities this writer writing and making it, I was in what I thought thought I had a coup getting him on record but
has heard in a long time) but all set to a was a happy relationship, but now I see I was he’d already appeared on an LP by Evans e
musical backing which references Harry miserable and it was all coming out in the Death. He was only crying on that one though.
Nilsson, McCartney’s best solo work and the songs. You don’t write a song like ‘**** (Is A For the recording he came in and did 12
cream of late ’60s and ’70s rock and pop. We Dirty Word)’ when you’re content. ‘Elton John’ different versions including one as his
caught up with Love to get his take on the was written after I read a biography of him. Baconface alter ego.
making of the record, collaborating with ere was a chapter about his wife Renate and
Stewart Lee and the use of profanity in song. what he (allegedly) did on the eve of his SD!: Ten out of 10 for the profanity count. Has
wedding night but now I see it as a metaphor your mum heard the album?
Shindig!: Was the progression from e Loves for being fucked about by someone you trusted.
to putting together your own record a natural SL: She has. My entire family has. ey all came
one? Did your experiences with the band mean SD!: Musically, this definitely seems to be a to a show I did in Cardiff last Easter. Afterwards
it was an easier process having full control and major step forward from your previous work. my Auntie Sheila said she was in tears at ‘Elton
did you have a very clear idea of what you Who were the artists or albums that had an John’. is led to the legend on the back of the
wanted to do before you started writing? impact on the album? LP for my grandparents, who died during the
making of the record (though not as a result of
Simon Love: It was natural in the sense that “You don’t write a song like it being made, I hasten to add): “is LP is
e Loves was never “a band”. I ruled the group dedicated to Beryl Stone, who wouldn’t have
with an iron fist, a wooden leg and a piece of
‘**** (Is A Dirty Word)’ when cared for the language, and Eloy Rodrigues, who
string. In truth I probably shouldn’t have you’re content” wouldn’t have been able to hear it.”
broken e Loves up. I started another group
straight afterwards called Knickers with an eye SD!: Any idea of where you want to go next
to making $$$. I put an advert on Gumtree for a SL: I would say the main influences stylistically musically? Do you have plans to follow up this
French girl singer and I got one and she was were Biff Rose’s e orn In Mrs Rose’s Side, album quickly?
amazing. We got an EP released on the Spanish Nilsson Schmilsson and Ram by Paul and Linda
label Elefant but my girlfriend at the time was a McCartney. Another aspect of the sound of SL: I’m looking forward to playing loads more
psycho-hose beast and didn’t like it so it overall togetherness of this LP is owed to Sean shows this year. I love playing live and attempt
crumbled soon after. After that lucrative dream from Fortuna Pop who made me drop two to make each show different which mainly
ended, I came across a badge I found on the songs and actually did some record company involves me giving in-between song
floor of the nightclub Metro’s in Cardiff that business in re-ordering the songs. e only monologues that last longer than the songs
read, “From Now On, We Fuck ings Up My problem is now he’s done that and been proved themselves. I’m going to record a few songs this
Way” and that became my mantra. For a while right, he thinks he’s right about everything. month with A Little Orchestra, who did all the
that was going to be the LP title. e band was strings on the LP, which should see the light of
also going to be called Simon Love’s Cock And SD!: Great Macca cover. Why did you choose day next spring in some sort of release.
Balls as a homage (of sorts) to Noel Gallagher’s that particular tune? In terms of a second LP (currently titled F-U-
High Flyin’ Birds. S-S), I’ve got about six songs written and there’ll
SL: I was a big McCartney-was-shit-after-e- be two cover versions on it: one Bob Dylan and
SD!: It’s a fantastic album. It pulls off the same Beatles person for ages until one night I came one Alex Hale, both songwriters I hold in high
trick as the Father John Misty record in that across ‘Too Many People’ from Ram and sat esteem. My main influences for these songs are
you’ve managed to write an album about love bolt upright and breathless. en I downloaded e Smiths (who I’ve previously hated but, after
that maintains a sense of humour about the the LP. en I bought a copy. en I bought reading Morrissey’s autobiography, I heard
absurdity of it, without resorting to the same another copy. And then another. At the Strangeways Here We Come and realised I was
tired old clichés; something that most moment I have about seven. I’m still looking to wrong... sort of), Silver Jews, Ronnie Lane and
songwriters seem unable to do. Was that get the box set of it. I’m also now a massive Wings. If you can imagine such a thing. I want
something you were conscious of when writing Wings fan. I chose ‘Dear Boy’ because it’s one of to get everything recorded at once early next
and were there any songs that proved more the few on there that didn’t sound finished to year, I could have another record out by
difficult than others to get right? me. Paul’s song seemed to sum up everything I Christmas 2016, weather permitting.
wanted to say a lot more succinctly.
SL: I was really flattered by that comparison. I It Seemed Like A Good Idea
only heard his LP about two months ago and SD!: How did the Stewart Lee collaboration At e Time is out now on
have been espousing its amazingness to come about? Fortuna Pop
everyone since. Writing this LP, I didn’t edit
anything that came out. Whereas before, I SL: I met him about 10 years ago through e

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William Tell, It Was Really

Nothing. Simon Love: sort of
wrong about Macca and The
Smiths

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SD50 IAHT 26/08/2015 17:07 Page 7

The Big And The Bold

PAUL OSBORNE meets DIANE COFFEE, the ambitious wunderkind behind one of this year’s
great albums… and a lot more besides

S
haun Fleming has enjoyed a colourful record that draws on the best popular music of three-month deadline for writing. The
and interesting career to date and, as the last 60 years to create a richly layered mix recording and mixing, however, took around 10
well as his role as drummer for Shindig! of rock, soul, sunshine-pop, psychedelia and months due to tours with Foxygen.”
favourites Foxygen, he’s also enjoyed a lush orchestration. It’s a huge leap forward in
successful career as a voice actor for kids’ sound for him, and with good reason. “With Listening to the album you’ll hear familiar
cartoons. But it’s on the solo records that he’s Everybody’s A Good Dog I was finally able to get touchstones (opener ‘Spring Breathes’ is
released as alter ego Diane Coffee that he’s into a proper studio and spend a considerable undeniably touched by the hand of Brian
found his true calling. If his debut, My Friend amount of time writing at home,” explains Wilson), but there’s a sense that Fleming’s
Fish, set a standard for inventive and Fleming. “I wanted everything for this album: influences are wide reaching and serve as step
imaginative pop music, then its follow-up, strings, horns, lush harmonies, heavy guitars. I off points from which he can create something
Everybody’s A Good Dog, raises the bar even wanted to create something that was fully that’s unique to his vision. “I thought a lot
higher. It’s an ambitious, beautifully realised realised and well thought out. I gave myself a about Joe Cocker on this album. He was always

“I think you can write and

sing any way you like. I’ve just
always been a fan of the big
and bold”

such a dynamic powerhouse. Joe and Sam

Cooke mostly. Also, the Hedwig soundtrack. I’d
say if there was anyone that’s really stayed with
me, though, it would be Donovan. He was the
first musician I was ever fascinated by.”

Shindig! asks if there’s a tendency in some

musicians to shy away from pop music in
favour of being cool. “I think you can write and
sing any way you like,” says Fleming. “It’s still a
valid form of art. I’ve just always been a fan of
the big and bold. Whether it be pop music or
any other.”

Does he see any similarities to his approach to

his own music and that of Foxygen? “I’d say it’s
pretty separate. I’ve never actually seen how
Sam and Rado make music so I can’t really
speak to that. I think I still approach writing in
the same way I always have. That much hasn’t
really changed.”

The next step for Fleming is to get back to live

performance. Will he be using a big band to
replicate the grand sounds contained on the
album? “The set up right now is pretty
standard: guitars, keyboard, drums. We end up
comping a lot of the string and horn lines for
our live set. We have it down pretty well, I’d
love a chance to tour with a brass band or a
string ensemble though.” After the tour there’ll
hopefully be some new music to digest. “At
some point I’d like to record with a full
orchestra and choir. Something very ‘Georgia
On My Mind’ or ‘A Change Is Gonna Come’. I’ve
also been toying around with a very synthy
Moon Pop album. More on that soon.”

Whatever’s next, we can’t wait.

Everybody’s A Good Dog is

out now on Western Vinyl

Shaun Fleming AKA Diane Coffee

seeing the world through rose-
coloured glasses

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SD50 IAHT 26/08/2015 17:07 Page 8

Trash And Treasure

JOHN WATERS’ trash oeuvre is being given the veneer of respectability with a season at The
BFI. JEANETTE LEECH is already queueing

In the pink. John Waters cult films and a centerpiece of the season, also
wrestles with his flamingo; features a heavily ironic score. Who can forget
Divine on a lobby card for
1974 fan’s favourite, Female Patti Page sweetly intoning ‘How Much Is at
Trouble (inset)
Doggie In e Window’ while Divine redefines
the phrase, shit-eating grin?

Fan favourite Female Trouble is another delight,

the anarchic tale of teenage Dawn Davenport
(Divine, of course) who rebels against her
parents when she’s not given a pair of ‘cha-cha
heels’ to embark on myriad wanton
misadventures. Hairspray, Waters’ most
commercial film, will also be screened. Far

“He brought the underground

New York cinema aesthetic to
the mad-eyed end of
Hollywood”

Y
es, it’s true. We’ll get Divine severing What’s especially vital about the BFI season is from a diluted sell-out, it repositions Waters’
an umbilical chord with her teeth, that it will screen, for the first time in the UK, unique take on American society into one of
Divine getting raped by a giant lobster, Waters’ early late ’60s short films – Hag In A the most irresistible films of the ’80s.
David Lochary performing a bird foot Black Leather Jacket, Roman Candles and Eat
transplant on Mary Vivien Pearce, and an anus Your Make-up. Waters has always guarded Placing the John Waters filmography in an
miming ‘Surfin’ Bird’. Bravo! these juvenilia, although he’s given fans establishment space such as e BFI rather
tantalizing insights into what the films might than a midnight movie theatre or on grainy
John Waters has celebrated the marginal and the actually be like. Roman Candles, he claims, was VHS will be an interesting experiment. Will
extreme in American culture like no-one before not edited because of his filmmaking naïveté: chin-stroking about Waters’ suburban satire
or since. Almost uniquely, he brought the Waters thought what was filmed was the movie crush the black comedy of Polyester? Will the
underground New York cinema aesthetic to the itself. And Eat Your Makeup contains an words “polymorphous perversity” take the fun
mad-eyed end of Hollywood (think Sunset entirely taste-free re-enactment of the JFK out of Desperate Living? What might Divine say
Boulevard and Joan Crawford), while also being assassination, featuring Divine as Jackie about being in the heartland of film academia?
influenced by the schlock directors William Kennedy. “Kill everyone now! Condone first degree
Castle, Russ Meyer, and Herschell Gordon Lewis. murder! Advocate cannibalism! Eat shit! Filth is
“ese assorted sluts, fags, dykes and pimps ese all pre-date Waters’ first feature, ’69’s my politics! Filth is my life!”
know no bounds,” says the carnival barker for fantastic Mondo Trasho, which will also have a
the ‘Cavalcade Of Perversion’ in 1970’s Multiple rare big-screen outing. What has traditionally It Isn’t Very Pretty: e Complete Films Of John
Maniacs. “ey have committed acts against God hampered its distribution is the soundtrack – Waters (Every Goddamn One Of em…) runs at
and nature, acts that by their mere existence completely unlicensed use of teen pop, surf, BFI Southbank from 1st September to 6th
would make any decent person recoil in disgust.” and rock ’n’ roll. Pink Flamingos, that cultest of October

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SD50 IAHT 26/08/2015 17:07 Page 9

Les Couleurs Originelles

Better in black. Whyte Horses
with Dom Thomas, top right

Photo by John Shard

In the spirit of the crate-digging culture that birthed them, the enigmatic WHYTE HORSES
have just pre-released their debut album as an extremely limited edition vinyl-only private
pressing. ANDY MORTEN hears what head Horse DOM THOMAS has to say

“W
hyte Horses was an “I think Whyte Horses will just guitars but it’s got a lot more going on too. It’s
imaginary band conceived in about a specific type of feeling, a desperation to
my head during a depressing try and exist on our own try and print those hazy childhood sensations
Manchester day sat in a car plane. We genuinely don’t musically and honestly. Every song has to give
park with grey skies looming above,” begins you a feeling. We believe there has to be care
Dom Thomas on the provenance of his current
want to be affiliated with when borrowing from the past, it should be
musical project. “About three years ago I was anyone or anything” done with taste and a forward-looking
having this recurring idea of a desert pop band purpose.”
playing in a church in Mexico. So, initially,
Whyte Horses was going to be this group of girls in 2015. “The advent of the internet has But still, there are clearly some sonic
playing this new genre of music, but I nurtured the ethos of sharing music, which in touchstones. “The main influence on the record
reconnected with my old friend, Julie Margat, turn has backfired and made everything was imagery and a loose story. There’s a
and we started to write material and dig into disposable and, to a point, worthless. It’s Salvador Dali documentary that we had on
our old songs and it just took off from there.” turned too many people into music critics. We repeat, the one Orson Welles narrates. Finding
have websites marking people with decimal that was a pivotal moment; in a way it brought
The first fruit of this collaboration was last points in their reviews. It’s like the joy has been our ideas into focus. Os Mutantes are a great
year’s ‘The Snowfalls’ 45, a charming slice of sucked out of music. I think [Whyte Horses] band who shaped their records the way they
retro-futurist pop no less informed and will just try and exist on our own plane. We wanted regardless of a ‘sound’; they let every
insightful than you’d expect from one of the genuinely don’t want to be affiliated with song speak for itself without having to sound
founding fathers of hipper-than-thou anyone or anything, at this moment in time.” like ‘Os Mutantes’.”
Manchester record label Finders Keepers
Records and its attendant B-Music club night. If you’re looking for the true definition of There’s no denying the rare artistic integrity at
“The songs take a long time to get right, we get independent, then you can probably stop work in the way Whyte Horses see themselves
quite obsessive,” he continues. “I really think looking right there. In the meantime, let’s talk and their place in today’s pantheon of DIY
we’re trying to make something that we can about the sights and sounds that have gone music makers. “It’s purely about making
believe in, because I was becoming increasingly into the crafting of Whyte Horses. Surely a man albums for me,” Dom concludes, “that’s the
despondent with what was out there; bored of who spends most days listening to often very test. Not just one great song. It’s about crafting
thinking ‘I could do better than that.’ I think it’s obscure music for a living should be drawing a set of songs that can last forever. I want
a dour time for music, like a musical recession. on an enormous spectrum and knowledge. people to be able to put the record on from
The problem is everything has been done. I “The White Horses theme [by Jackie Lee], in my start to finish and listen to it as an album,
hear people attributing tags like ‘modern’ to opinion, is one of the greatest, most succinct that’s how it’s designed.”
songs, but to me they sound older than music pieces of pop ever written. It probably affected
Joe Meek was making in the early ’60s. It’s all our name in some way but I wasn’t thinking Pop Or Not is out now
been done before.” about it at the time. People might think our exclusively from
record sounds like certain records but we’re [Link]
Clearly warming to his theme, Dom is eloquent not a ’60s band; our music hasn’t been done
and confident in his diagnosis of music-making before. We’re more of a stray cat. It’s got

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SD50 IAHT 02/09/2015 09:30 Page 10

Journey’s End
RHYS JONES uncovers a once-lost early ’70s album by Moog
pioneer and ‘Popcorn’ writer, GERSHON KINGSLEY

“Connecting you now, sir!”

Gershon Kingsley and tools of
the trade; the recently
discovered Journey acetate;
poster for Kingsley-scored dirty
movie, Sugar Cookies

A
mongst the numerous experimental female vocal
Moog pioneers, stylings (the refrain of ‘Come On
Gershon Kingsley is A Journey’ is reminiscent of
perhaps the most Linda Perhacs’ Parallelograms or
versatile. Since parting ways Annette Peacock’s I’m The One).
with Jean-Jacques Perrey after Kingsley also revisits other
their collaborations on the tracks from the Moog Quartet
Vanguard label, Kingsley’s solo catalogue, namely the Ronee
output along with his Blakely-fronted ‘Miracles’
collaborative works with The (sampled by artists such as Luke
First Moog Quartet explored Vibert, Black Milk and
the endless possibility of the Quakers). Cover versions are
Moog. This culminated in also given drastic reworkings in
hitting musical pay dirt when true Kingsley fashion as he
Hot Butter released a version takes the Bergman/Legrand
of the ubiquitous Moog theme, staple, ‘Windmills Of Your
‘Popcorn’ (a staple of numerous budget Moog “Kingsley takes ‘Windmills Of Mind’, and re-arranges it as an electronic eerie-
novelty records that had appeared on The First folk masterclass; both pastoral and industrial
Moog Quartet’s eponymous debut) in 1972. Your Mind’ and re-arranges it at the same time. Show tunes are also re-
After ‘Popcorn’ composition becoming an as an electronic eerie-folk worked to within an inch of their lives, with
unexpected hit internationally, major label masterclass; both pastoral Gentlemen Prefer Blondes’ ‘Diamonds Are A
offers should have flooded in. However this Girl’s Best Friend’ resembling vulgar proto-
wasn’t the case. What follows is an overview of and industrial” punk vaudeville.
Gershon Kingsley’s private press output as well
as those that have yet to materialise. A drastic departure to the all-Moog
Kingsley created two pieces of music: the first a compositions found on the Popcorn album,
At an early age Kingsley had converted to Moog-heavy soundtrack to Sugar Cookies, a Journey went no further than the acetate stage.
Judaism, and incorporated cutting edge softcore film for Lloyd Kauffman’s Troma Audio Fidelity (Kingsley’s label at time)
electronic music and funk with secular Jewish stable (co-produced by none other than Oliver probably wanting an easily accessible all-Moog
rituals to create a body of interesting (if not Stone) and the second an acetate recently outing similar to his last hit more than an
overlooked) albums. His privately pressed LPs, discovered by yours truly, called Journey. audio maelstrom of genre-bending concepts.
Shabbat 68 (’68), Shabbat Of Today (’69) and the The record languished in dust-covered
Theodore Bikel narrated 5th Cup: A Spirit The music on this LP is nothing short of obscurity until it was rediscovered a few
Explosion (circa ’71) expanded on the breath-taking, encompassing all major facets of months ago.
incorporation of the rock idiom and Jewish left field music making in the early ’70s. The
Music explored by David Axelrod on The slinky funk of previous Moog Quartet Any further information regarding this great lost
Electric Prunes’ Release Of An Oath. In ’73 recordings is present, as are the ethereal and album would be most welcome.

17
10
SD50 IAHT 26/08/2015 17:07 Page 11

Under The Counter

THE DRIFT RECORD SHOP is the jewel in the crown of Devon’s
beautiful new-age mecca, Totnes. Shindig! favourite Jacco Gardner curates
Cabinet Of Curiosities, a segment of the Le
Manager Rupert Morrison draws Shindig! in Guess Who? festival in Utrecht, Netherlands on
Sunday 22nd November, with live appearances
from the legendary Os Mutantes, Swedish psych-
rockers Dungen, Michael Rault (recently covered
in these pages) and transplanted Brit baroque
folkie Nick Garrie among others. [Link]

It’s mod madness all the way with box sets from
both The Small Faces and Georgie Fame
imminent. The Decca Years promises five CDs of
rarities and BBC sessions alongside the Faces’
complete 1965/66 recordings; the four-LP or
expanded five-CD The Whole World’s Shaking:
Complete Recordings 1963-66 is similarly self-
explanatory.

The Liverpool International Festival Of

Psychedelia 2015 takes place on September
25th and 26th and boasts an impressive line-up
that includes Spiritualised, Anton Newcombe, The
Heads, Hookworms, Jacco Gardner and the usual
array of multi-media events including Finders
Keepers DJs and Cardinal Fuzz Records
showcase. [Link]

Donovan celebrates 50 years of making records

with his first UK tour in 10 years, kicking off on
October 3rd at The Glasgow Pavilion and winding
up at London’s Cadogan Hall on the 31st. He
promises all the hits as well as rarities, cult
songs and his “legendary story-telling”.
[Link]
Specific drift. Inside the shop;
owner Rupert Morrison (inset) One of the most surprising reunions of 2015 is
that of Trader Horne, the short-lived acid-folk
The Shop advantage of, we take duo comprising Jackie McAuley (ex-Them) and
“Drift has been in our curation pretty Judy Dyble (ex-Fairport Convention), who will
bigger new home for seriously. We’ve had celebrate Earth Records’ reissue of their sole
three and a bit years (we really big success this album, 1970’s Morning Way, by performing it in
its entirety at London’s Bush Hall on November
opened on April Fools year with Sufjan 29th. [Link]
Day), but we were based Stevens, Father John
at our more compact Misty, Unknown ERRATUM:
former home since 1995, Mortal Orchestra, Last issue’s review of The Pretty Things’ new
give or take. We used to Jamie XX, Bjork, album should, of course, have carried four stars,
rent VHS tapes of world Courtney Barnett... not three. The minion concerned has been flayed.
cinema and stock a then slightly more left
bunch of Latin jazz, but I got involved when I field with releases by Holly Herndon, Kamasi
was about 16 and gradually started pushing for Washington, Lightning Bolt, The Cairo
more and more music. I think The Strokes’ Is
This It was the first time I convinced people we
Gang, Viet Cong and Tobias Jesso Jr That list is
pretty diverse. Reissue wise we’re still totally in
NEXT ISSUE
could actually sell a lot of records.” love with Light In The Attic and Numero –
those guys are such amazing record
SLADE
The Philosophy archaeologists. The Led Zeppelin and Joy ’N Between the ’60s and stardom
“Listening to everything, pick the good stuff as Division LP reissues keep selling strong... life in TASTE
neutrally as possible and display everything in a the old dogs yet.”
way that makes it impossible not to want to Rory Gallagher’s blues-rockers
invest. It struck on me years ago that nobody The Deluxe music paper THE FLIRTATIONS
was really merchandising record shops like “I thought it was funny if I’m honest. We’ve Brit pop-soul... US style!
other shops, you wouldn’t hit a jeans shop and been involved in loads of projects out at SXSW,
find them all shoved into boxes. Records and so one year, as my work load was lighter, I AIR
music in general is such an easy sell if you can decided the most decadent thing I could do was French electronica and beyond
get people through the door, get them create a newspaper dedicated to record shops...
completely overwhelmed by the artwork and turns out people liked reading about them as GEORGIE FAME
majesty of seeing something that they might much is I liked writing about them. So we just On 50+ years of rhythm ’n’ soul
have considered antiquated.”  continue reaching out to artists and it’s not Plus... Geranium Pond, Mercury Rev,
hard to get them interested... ‘Do you like
The most popular stock Record shops? Why?’ ” 
Powder, Water Into Wine Band,
“We’re lucky, people seem to follow us news, reviews and hullabaloos!
wherever we go... which we don’t take [Link] Published 22nd October

18
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p019_Shindig_50 26/08/2015 11:27 Page 3
SD50 IAHT 26/08/2015 17:08 Page 13

Shindig!’s 50th Birthday Party

To celebrate both Shindig! magazine and The Pretty Things having turned
50, Rough Trade East is hosting a special party with DJs and a live set and
record signing from The Pretty Things, in celebration of their brilliant new
album, The Sweet Pretty Things (Are In Bed Now, Of Course…). The event
will be the first opportunity to buy the album on vinyl.
Why not come along on Thursday 8th October between 7 and 9 pm. A
wristband will be given to the first 50 people who pre-order Shindig! from
Rough Trade East. This will entitle them to free entrance to the event, and
also a free, limited edition Shindig! tote bag. The Pretty Things will be ready
and willing to sign vinyl editions of the new album.
It’s a big day for us, so please try and come along, share a drink with the
team and witness The Pretty Things as they continue to put so many of the
young guns to shame with their enviable stagecraft.
Rough Trade East, Old Truman Brewery, 91 Brick Lane, London, E1 6QL
[Link]/events/2015/10/1582

20
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p021_Shindig_50 26/08/2015 11:27 Page 3
pp20-21–Shindig_50-ANDY 26/08/2015 18:35 Page 22

HAPPENING RIGHT NOW

Praise be for GospelbeacH. Brent Rademaker, second right

Of course, fans of Beachwood Sparks will

GospelbeacH adore GospelbeacH, but there are differences, as

Rademaker points out: “GospelbeacH is a rock
’n’ roll band with more humour and fun. ere's
more lead guitar too, which I love!!” is writer
also hears a wider canvass: ‘Southern Girl’
JON ‘MOJO’ MILLS’ album of the moment from the easy-going new act led bridges Steely Dan and e Beach Boys, ‘Out Of
by American journeyman BRENT RADEMAKER My Mind’ channels mid-70s Canterbury scamp
Kevin Ayers drunk on Californian wine (and

“I
really just wanna grow my and e Grateful Dead survivors in Furthur has coke and weed). Touching on not only country-
moustache and play some rock ’n’ also made a number of solo albums, had a long rock, there are regular forays into sunshine-pop,
roll,” says the flaxen-haired Brent stint with Ryan Adams & e Cardinals, and is soft-rock and beyond. When questioned about
Rademaker, the man behind currently making music with e Chris was being llistened to over the gestation period
Beachwood Sparks, Further and e Tyde. Robinson Brotherhood) alongside the of the album Rademaker eagerly rolls of a fitting
Having left music all but behind and relocated induction of bassist Kip Boardman and list: “Sandinista (e Clash), Future Games
from California to his native Florida, the steady guitarist Jason Soda, who had previously played (Fleetwood Mac), McGuinn, Clark & Hillman,
formation of new band GospelbeacH happened together in e Watson Twins. All schooled to Souther, Hillman & Furay. Lotsa sailboat rock:
quite by accident. And with no master plan. Little River Band, Bread. Many records from the
In 2014 Rademaker started jamming in his AM radio days of my youth in the ’70s. Same
Crabshack Studio with the Sparks’ old
“That was what was missing stuff as always. Classic rock, the Dead, Free,
drummer Tom Sanford. “ere was no band, no in the Sparks: the support of Foreigner, Boston, Jackson Browne, ELO, e
name, no record deal. en we started writing each other for all the good Beach Boys, e Zombies, Wings.”
songs together – and the songs we were coming Hopefully the rest of the world will get to
up with were telling stories, about people I vibes in the songs” experience this warm-hearted band soon. “Who
knew and places where I grew up. We began knows what's next?” chuckles Rademaker.
exploring the kind of collaboration that we “We've been approached to tour overseas, but
hadn't really done since the early days of PhD level in American Cosmic Music the band we want to wait until the record is out so
Beachwood Sparks, and the joy returned. And gelled, culminating in regular live shows in everybody knows the songs. We are just playing
my little gang of two with Tom became the California and the forthcoming debut album in California right now, getting our shit
foundation for what would become the band.” Pacific Surf Line. “When Neal, Kip and Jason together. It's really fun playing live... this wasn't
After returning to LA a group of musicians came on board we just inspired each other. supposed to happen, but I'm stoked that it has!”
soon metamorphosed around the multi- at was what was missing in the Sparks: the
talented and very busy guitarist Neal Casal support of each other for all the good vibes in Pacific Surf Line is out on Alive Naturalsound
(who as well as having played with the Sparks the songs.” Records in October

22
pp20-21–Shindig_50-ANDY 26/08/2015 18:36 Page 23

years and was playing with me at the time,” says

Nathaniel Rateliff Nathaniel. “She suggested sending the songs to

Richard. So I did and he got back to me and said
he was digging the tunes and wanted to work
together. I headed out to Oregon and we hit it off
PAUL OSBORNE talks to NATHANIEL RATELIFF about his new direction and right away.”
becoming part of the Stax Records legacy As if to cement the album’s credentials it’s
being released on the rejuvenated Stax label,
“I'm sure some people will be surprised and some hell out of the track. We recorded a song a day which is something that clearly pleases him, “I'm
may not like the new direction of the record. But and it took a couple of weeks.” overwhelmed to be apart of the amazing list of
we are really happy with it and it's something I've Contributing to the sound and feel of the people that have put out records on Stax and,
always wanted to do.” So says Nathaniel Rateliff album was production maestro and Shindig! yes, very proud.”
when Shindig! asks him about how those familiar favourite, Richard Swift. “I was playing the
with his previous releases might react when demos that I’d recorded at home for Jenna Nathaniel Rateliff & e Night Sweats is out now
hearing his fantastic new album, Nathaniel Conrad, who had played with Damien Jurado for on Stax
Rateliff & The Night Sweats.
Although Rateliff has already established
himself as a master of thoughtful folk and
country confessionals, for this record he’s shown
another side as a master of southern soul,
employing a seven piece band (the
aforementioned Night Sweats) and amping
things up to deliver a raucous mix of country and
soul music which brings to mind Otis Redding,
Sam & Dave and e Band’s finer moments.
e sheer joy apparent in some of the songs
(such as the albums gospel infused centrepiece,
‘S.O.B.’) makes it sound like the band was having
a blast recording them. “All the tracks are live
takes,” explains Rateliff, “not full band takes –
just good takes without moving and editing the

“All the tracks are live takes –

Photo by Malia James

good takes without moving and
editing the hell out of them”

languorous vocals float above a finely

The Radiation Flowers constructed wall of slow-burning guitar and

subtle keys, while simple but effective hooks
snag your attention.
Christopher Laramee (guitar), Elsa
JOE BANKS investigates the gothic psychedelia of Canadian quintet THE Gebremichael (keys), Jay Allen (bass) and
RADIATION FLOWERS Amber Ross (drums) complete the line-up. e
band was originally all female, but the idea that
“We make more music because we live in the ere’s certainly a strong element of this has any significance in the 21st century
middle of nowhere,” says Shelby Gaudet, singer splendid isolation in their sound, which gets short shrift from Gaudet. Nevertheless,
and guitarist with e Radiation Flowers, moody combines e Paisley Underground vibe of e there’s a quality to e Radiation Flowers’
psych-gazers based out of Saskatoon, central Rain Parade, the chiming post-punk of Echo & music that suggests a different take on what’s
Saskatchewan. “ere's nothing much to do here e Bunnymen and the blissed-out grooves of traditionally been a male-dominated genre.
in the winters and they’re so long.” e Black Angels. But it’s the quality of their Up until the end of last year, the band went
songwriting that sees them rise above by a different name – Powder Blue – but were
their forced to change it upon receiving a cease and
influences. desist order from another Canadian band
Pieces such as trading under that name. I wonder if their new
‘Feel It’ and name has anything to do with the mutant flora
‘Run’ from now growing around Chernobyl, but Gaudet
their says, “Chris came up with it. It sounded like a
eponymous forgotten ’60s band and we all liked it.”
debut album ose Saskatoon winters might drag, but on
are very big the strength of their debut, it won’t be long
tunes indeed, until e Radiation Flowers come in from the
darkly melodic cold.
earworms that
demand repeat e Radiation Flowers is out now on Sundowning
plays. Gaudet’s Sound Recordings

“There's nothing much to do here in the

winter and they’re so long”

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SD50 20 Questions 26/08/2015 17:34 Page 1

Brown, Black & Blues

It’s 50 years since two recordings by The Diamonds were released on a Reading
University RAG Week flexi-disc. Three years later, their singer, ARTHUR BROWN, had
become The God Of Hellfire and was sitting atop the UK singles chart with the
psychedelic shock-rocker, ‘Fire’, the song that has, for better or worse, defined him
ever since. Since then Brown has drifted in and out of the music scene, fronting a
succession of bands and collaborating with the likes of Hawkwind, The Who, The
Alan Parsons Project and The Pretty Things.
In the wake of the sixth Crazy World album, 2013’s ZimZamZim, Arthur spills the
beans about Hendrix, Viv Stanshall and being mobbed in Russia
24
SD50 20 Questions 26/08/2015 17:34 Page 2

Shindig!: Do you remember when you were

first seduced by music and what it was that you
heard that made you want to pursue it
yourself?
Arthur Brown: Some say that language and
philosophy develop from people’s relation to
their environment. Whitby [in the English
country of North Yorkshire] had a fishing fleet.
e sailors echoed the rhythms that came in
the wild rising and falling of wind and sea, in
their shanties. ose sounds together with the
cry of birds and other country sounds still
echo through my bones. I also had a year in
London when my father was a special
constable and the explosions and tense
silences fed into my DNA and later my
music. My family was traumatised by their
losses in the war and I’d sing away my pain.
Music is a language that can celebrate life
and point to a place of absolute liberation.

SD!: What were the origins of the stage image

and that “flaming head-dress”?
AB: In Montmartre in 1965 I was playing at a
club which became the epicentre of the Paris
music scene for that year. We were playing
R&B, soul and early funk. But I began to wear
costumes, to dance wildly, and to incorporate
theatrical ideas. e audience was composed of
beatniks, jazz greats like Roland Kirk, Salvador
Dali, mafia dons, police chiefs, fashion models
and budding Buddhists. One night I found in
my rather sleazy hotel a crown with candles in
it, left by someone from a wild party down the
corridor. I wore it at the gig that night and
people loved it.
By the time I returned to the UK via some
money earned by doing the soundtrack of a
Roger Vadim movie, the UFO club was about to
begin. Having formed e Crazy World, I
decided to embrace a more pagan image and
reactivate the flaming head, but the crown had
disintegrated. We tried a vegetable colander
with candles on it, but when I pulled it off some
of my hair would go with it as the wax from the
candles had solidified. So we tried a pie dish
with a screw through it in the centre, going also
into a strap which went under my chin. Of
course it was difficult to sing with it on,
because the strap choked my throat. But the
petrol would burst into huge flame, often
setting fire to my hair and clothes and the
audience loved it. In came horns and wings
over the ears to stop the helmet wobbling. In
the end we had something that looked like a
descendent of the Viking battle helmet. Again,
we used petrol in the bowl of the helmet. is
moved to lighter fluid, and cow gum mixed
with other ingredients was applied to wick
wound round the horns. is kept the flame
going longer.

SD!: You don’t do that on stage any more. Is

that down to venue health and safety
stipulations or concern for your wellbeing?
AB: Well in the end the flames got to about
three to four feet wide and four to five feet high.
Dangerous. However, the accidents that have
caused me most damage – broken bones and
stitches – were not in fact caused by the fire
helmet but other onstage pranks and mis-haps. Arthur Brown sporting the Pyschosonic
Helmet in 2013 (opposite). He says, it
In fact I am currently developing a new helmet allows him to play instruments with just his
with Mike and Paul Harrison, technicians and thoughts. This page, from top: Arthur and
artists in residence with the current Crazy extra arms in ’68; the ’65 Diamonds flexi-
disc; those classic ’68 Crazy World
World. It will be a little more contained, with a releases; an early line-up of The Crazy World
somewhat smaller flame. in ’67. L-R: Vincent Crane, Brown, Drachen
Theaker and Nick Greenwood (front)

25
SD50 20 Questions 26/08/2015 17:34 Page 3

The Hapshash-designed Crazy World

poster; US booking agency ad for The
Who and The Crazy World; Brown with
The Jimi Hendrix Experience; ‘Fire’ on
Top Of The Pops: the most talked
about thing on TV that summer.
Opposite: Arthur in Kingdom Come,
early ’70s; still hot stuff in the ’80s

SD!: How did e Crazy World come about? and rebellion, being intelligent enough dancing. e topics were not ones people were
AB: e name was devised by myself and a guy negotiators to force Polydor into allowing them used to find in pop music of the time. We also
named Greg who played sax with me in Paris in to do things which in terms of business at that did comic skits and little dramas about police
the early soul/R&B days. I announced I would time should not have been done. Kit and Chris planting hippies with drugs. I would improvise
form a new outrageous band. I would call it e worked together well by ducking and diving, poetry in the middle of what was a psychedelic
World Of Arthur Brown. Greg thought it wasn’t boxing without obeying the rules. ey were a soul song. Vincent took that clue and soon we
crazy enough! So I said, OK, e Crazy World Of great promotion team though, really fearless would be in a totally different musical genre.
Arthur Brown and it stuck. However, the band’s and imaginative in their tactics. is of course was not what came out on the
name became a real comment on society. As managers they set about from the very Crazy World album, but it was somewhat
Mainstream people saw us as being crazy. We beginning splitting up the band. ey wanted represented on the Strangelands album.
saw the way they lived as being crazy. “e me as a solo performer, not noticing that I
market rules” doesn’t work, and materialism worked better in a team that I know. ey SD!: e Crazy World act got you into a lot of
has run out of steam. became erratic and unable to help us at several trouble, getting kicked off a Hendrix tour. Crazy
times of crisis and both ended up in need of days and great fun to be sure, but do you ever
SD!: How did you become signed to Track management themselves. ey had succumbed look back at that and think, “Wow, what a
records, home to e Who and Jimi Hendrix?  to drug habits that the unbelievable flow of missed opportunity”?
AB: John Fenton, who’d worked with Brian AB: Actually, the reference to being “thrown off
Epstein, took us under his wing after seeing us “One night I found in my the tour” was a little misleading. It is true that
at a London gig. He had us play at e at that time I was referred to in the music press
Speakeasy and Joe Boyd was there spotting rather sleazy hotel a crown as e Wild Man Of English Rock, but what
talent for the UFO club. All the major record with candles in it, left by happened was that Chris Stamp told Jimi
companies came down to see the acts, and to Hendrix that they were proposing a tour and
wine and dine them. I went to dinner with at someone from a wild party that we should open for him. ey had worked
least 10 of the top people in the music down the corridor. I wore it at out how to use that to promote both of us. He
recording industry over a period of three the gig that night and people showed Jimi the photos of me in my mask and
weeks. Pete Townsend went to see us and flaming helmet, and Jimi said, “I am not going
recommended us to Kit Lambert and Chris loved it” to follow that.” Subsequently he began to set
Stamp at Track, who had just missed out on his guitar on fire, and we did many a gig with
e Bonzo Dog Band. Vincent Crane (keys), him. On this occasion, though, my part in the
Drachen eaker (drums) and I all discussed it, cash coming in had made possible for them. I tour was nixed.
and felt that Track were at least in a frame of saw Kit once near to the time of his death and
mind that might understand what we were he looked a haunted man, rather paranoid. He SD!: Why did it take 20 years for Strangelands
aiming at. Pete recorded some demos of our was a man who inspired love in people. I would (recorded in ’69) to see light of day?
numbers and before you could say “Take a say that my feelings for him now are still loving, AB: It was a totally improvised album. A fine
drive in my flash fully automatic American car though he travelled down many roads I could example of people’s creativity being drawn out
with electronically operated windows” (which not understand. I found him a tragic figure. of them. ey had to listen to each other and to
Pete did) we signed a recording contract. Chris I ended up losing my respect for. the lyrics and respond. ey were from very
different backgrounds for example, it was the
SD!: What are your memories of Kit Lambert SD!: In the sleeve notes to the first Crazy World first time the synth/keyboard player had ever
and Chris Stamp? album (written by Charles Fox of e New played in a rock band. My only instructions
AB: Kit was outrageous, neurotic, quite caring, Statesman) it said you may have been the first were to say before we began, “We will move out
and brilliant. Chris was Mister Cool – a good genuine artist to come out of the underground. of the city into the country.” Giorgio Gomelsky,
looking guy who made a great impression on Do you think the music you made when he heard it, booked us a tour in France
young ladies. Kit took care of older ladies, and was revolutionary? organised by e Communist Party. He offered
young men. Kit was openly gay though he once AB: What did make the band revolutionary was to put it out on Marmalade Records. I felt it
did confess to me that he found gay sex too its whole concept, and the performance itself. It was good, but wasn’t quite the full expression
clinical, and hoped one day to get was multimedia, with cutting-edge costumes, of what I wanted to do at the time. Now it
married. ey ran their record label with flair masks, make-up, voodoo and shamanic seems foolish to have withheld it.

26 3
SD50 20 Questions 26/08/2015 17:34 Page 4

SD!: Your post-Crazy World outfit, Kingdom occasional percussionist with e Scottish Also in the late ’70s I fell in love with a beautiful
Come, was one of the most interesting, Symphony Orchestra and the tabla player of lady from Texas. We decided to have a child,
experimental rock bands of the early ’70s. What choice for visiting Indian musicians. At that and then got married. Musically, money was at
do you regard as their crowning achievement? time, of course, we did not have a guitarist but a low ebb in the UK so I thought the US would
AB: e greatest achievement was to be able to in Kingdom Come we had Andy Dalby, a hold brighter prospects. I could have had a
remain together through total changes in style, brilliant musician, while Victor Peraino was good crack at a recording career in LA or New
and produce two what are now considered unequalled in his ability to create sonic York but decided on Austin, Texas as a better
classic albums in totally different fields. On the landscapes with the synthesiser. place to bring up a family. Pretty soon, I was a
Galactic Zoo tour, the band all wore different trainee carpenter. I also decided to do a
costumes, and the lights moved rhythmically to SD!: You’ve collaborated with some interesting blues/R&B album in the old style. I got Jimmy
create light worlds and shadow worlds. It was a characters – Robert Calvert (Captain Lockheed) Carl Black involved and he brought in some of
climactic act quite demanding musically. Alice and Viv Stanshall (Captain Lockheed and the other ex-Mothers and a whole load of great
Cooper called it a “psychodrama”. By the time Kingdom Come), troubled geniuses both. How blues players from the area. e album,
we had performed it for a year, it was quite challenging and rewarding was it to work with featuring many old classics, was called Brown,
amazing. However for the Journey tour, the them? Black And Blue and received many positive
whole show had changed. We were projecting AB: I had encounters regularly with both of reviews.
mandala, classical master paintings, we were them. In the case of Viv, the Bonzos and e During this time I was invited to be on a
the first band to use a gauze screen that Crazy World did quite a few gigs together, and panel judging the bands at a concert called e
allowed us, if we wanted to appear in the Viv and I enjoyed sharing perspectives on life in White Nights festival in St Petersburg, Russia.
middle of a projected forest. general. We started to work together on two When I got there I was recognised so often that
We also were the first band to do away with items: The Brain Opera and another piece about it was decided I should sing instead, which I
the drummer and base the band sound round a giant iridescent green slug that landed on ended up doing to 20,000 people and it was
the percussive properties of a drum machine. earth after a journey across universes. Our beamed live into nine million homes on the
is was in ’73. If you listen to ‘Spirit Of Joy’, the imaginations were hard to rein in. In fact we only TV channel. is was the time of glasnost
single from Journey, you’ll be surprised how nudged each other further out. He was as and I was treated as a kind of cultural hero.
modern it sounds. I sang in a giant transparent powerful in his individuality as Frank Zappa.
syringe that filled with white powder as I ey both had the same intensity but Viv had SD!: How did you become involved in the SF
performed. It took the mainstream of rock a capacity for riling people up, as did Bob Sorrow shows following your return to the UK?
about seven years to catch on to this sound. Calvert. ey could both nail a person’s AB: It was something that Mark St John, e
en Gary Numan came along. He took it his weakness the moment they met them, and Pretty ings’ manager particularly wanted me
own way – I thought he was fantastic. would take occasionally a fiendish delight in to do. It demanded a different approach and
prodding them where it hurt. Bob was made me focus very carefully on all the flow of
SD!: Crazy World and Kingdom Come were a charming and effervescent when he wasn’t words and the intention of the writer. In much
fertile breeding ground for some notable being overbearing. Working with Bob was for the same way as an actor will approach a role.
musicians, notably Carl Palmer and the late me a pleasure and I still see Captain Lockheed e fact that it was the first live internet
Vincent Crane. Looking back do you see being way ahead of the field at the time it was broadcast of that nature was also challenging.
yourself as a mentor/band leader in the mould made. Viv made me laugh and surprised me. He We did many shows together – both where I
of a Beefheart, Clinton or Zappa? would look at me quizzically waiting to see if I supported them and where I sang with them.
AB: I was interested in being a catalyst, both in had got the dumbfounding thing he had just Dave Gilmour, a fan of the Pretties, played lead
performance and in recording. Rather than said to me. His partner told me he considered guitar on the SF shows. He was really easy to
being a leader in the normal sense I tried to be we were both alike in our deepest natures. Bob work with and Phil May was happy that the
with the other musicians in such a way as their also made me laugh as he poked fun at yet music would at last get seen in the context of
creativity was drawn out of them, rather than another sacred cow, or rubbed on my corns. the story he originally had in mind when he
that they were just a framework for my wrote the lyrics for the tunes.
creativity. Vincent Crane was a monster SD!: What prompted your move to America at
keyboard musician, Carl Palmer a drum giant the turn of the ’80s and what are your most SD!: You also joined Hawkwind for a stint in
of his time. Drachen eaker, the original vivid memory of this time? the early noughties. How did that come about
drummer with e Crazy World, became AB: e style of music over here had changed. and how did it work out?

4 27
SD50 20 Questions 26/08/2015 17:34 Page 5

Photo by Dave Easthope

AB: When e Crazy World played with
Hawkwind at Drachfest, it determined Dave
and Kris Brock to return Hawkwind to being a
band with a theatrical show and they suggested
I join them for a while. We included some
Kingdom Come material in the set and Dave
Brock was good at keeping me musically
comfortable and challenged. Of course we did a
lot of Hawkwind’s original material from when
Bob Calvert was with them. I thought it worked
quite well although I had to sing on the side of
the stage, as the bass was so loud. 

SD!: You reunited surviving members of

Kingdom Come for a one off show in London in
2005 which won you the Showman Of e Year
award from Classic Rock. Assuming you have a
mantelpiece, do you keep this one on display?
AB: It is still awaiting the unpacking of a
couple of boxes of stuff in my yurt. I’m happy to
have it, as it came as a surprise to me to have
actually won an award. It was one of the last
big shows at e Astoria. e gig itself was
chaos, in fact it was all so very nearly cancelled
when the original agent walked out but
thankfully others took over the reins. In the end
it was a successfully orchestrated evening. e
cast was hugely eclectic, all introduced by
Howard Marks and I sang with three different
line-ups including of course the “classic”
Kingdom Come. We brought in some of the old
props and incorporated eight “policemen”
wielding truncheons for ‘Night Of e Pigs’.
In fact we are just about to release the DVD

I was invited to be on a panel

judging the bands at a concert
called The White Nights
festival in Russia. When I got
there I was recognised so
often that it was decided I
should sing instead, which I
ended up doing to 20,000
“You mean me?”Still a force
people” to be reckoned with. Even
his goggles are wild

of the show. commercial festivals go, among the best. While do you owe your age-defying vigour and vitality?
it is good to play to a large crowd to me they AB: I keep my body supple, my mind open and
SD!: You played at Glastonbury Fayre in ’71 and are now too huge although there is still a small flexible, and listen to my heart. I spend time
your performance is captured at length in Nick core of people who operate the Green Fields with people of all ages and backgrounds and I
Roeg’s film of the same name. Was there any area, and it is here that children and adults eat what my body knows is good for it. I don’t
sense at the time that you were involved in alike can get a taste of the original ethos. listen to most health professionals although I
what is now regarded as such an iconic event? will in times of crisis consult someone I feel can
You were back there again in 2010. How SD!: Do you feel that you have received proper help me.
strange was it to return to the scene of past recognition for your undoubted influence on
glories and was it a better or worse experience the likes of Alice Cooper, Kiss and Marilyn SD!: What’s currently cooking and what’s next
this time around? Manson? for Arthur Brown?
AB: e Glastonbury festival of 1971 was a free AB: Well you could add to that list King AB: We have, with the current line-up, over a
festival inspired by stoned-out visions of a new Diamond and others who have admitted period of four years built up from playing small
society based on spiritual principles, and built influence, such as Peter Gabriel, George gigs to playing the main stage at festivals. is
in accordance with ancient sacred sciences. As Clinton, Bruce Dickinson, Ian Gillan, Pete year, for instance we play the main stage on
such, it perhaps reflected a movement that Shelley (Buzzcocks). But beyond the statement Saturday night at Bestival. We are all eagerly
became more widespread, before being by artists is the network that governs awards, looking forward to pushing our musical and
smothered by atcherism and materialistic press etc. usually manipulated and informed by performance boundaries so that we will
greed. management and record companies. at said, constantly travel with our audiences into new
ere was a sense of trust and openness. is I have had rather a lot of recognition, and territory and serve you tasty treats.
is why my avant-garde band Kingdom Come consider myself to have had a successful career
was well received. e Glastonbury festivals of based not on financial wealth, but a life that ZimZamZim is available now
the later period came after the commercial was meaningful to me. from [Link]
success of many of the original underground
bands, and the music produced in the wake of SD!: Shindig! saw you play live a couple of years
atcher. ey were no longer spiritual events. back and was astounding by your seemingly
ey drew enormous crowds but they were, as boundless energy and on-stage moves. To what

28 5
p029_Shindig_50 26/08/2015 11:28 Page 3

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SD50 Optic Nerve 26/08/2015 17:21 Page 26

Optical Sounds
By rights, THE OPTIC NERVE should have achieved the same kind of accolades and
sales as The Long Ryders, Rain Parade or even REM. As it is, their recorded legacy
remains small but perfectly formed.
Born of a revival they had little connection with, the New York quartet made
thrillingly authentic, chiming mid-60s influenced folk-rock in the ’80s, crowning
them as the kings of their own castle but leaving them very few places to go.
GLYNIS WARD hears what happened from the single-minded Bobby Belfiore

N
ew York in the ’80s was the epicentre of During their brief existence, The Optic Nerve something of The Optic Nerve alive. In ’93,
the garage scene in the US. There was a mainly played shows in the New York area, Screaming Apple released the “unreleased
good number of bands, and each filled a Michael Stark, editor of Trashbeat, an ’80s New album” Forever And A Day, and later, Get Hip
special niche. There were, of course, The York fanzine that chronicled the local scene re-released their two EPs on an album with
Fuzztones, with their own brand of high energy recalls that people loved The Optic Nerve, seven more unreleased cuts. Encouraged by the
rock infused garage fuzz, then there was the partly because they had pedigree. But beyond interest, Bobby and Tony continued to write,
living ’60s jukebox of The Headless Horsemen, having a mix of respected area scene musicians, and in 2004 approached Cryptovision’s Dave
the wild psychedelia of The Mad Violets and they had songs. It was always the songwriting Amels with a handful of new songs, which Dave
Blacklight Chameleons, The Vipers who mixed that set The Optic Nerve apart. A casual air says were strong, strong enough for another
the English and American sounds, the more pervades each lyric, a loosely woven poetry album.
’60s pop Cheepskates, The Fleshtones who were which always seems somewhat biographically
mastering the blend of frat and indie-rock, observant, sometimes even poignant. The songs That album was recorded in 2005 with Dave
Mersey beat was represented by The range from the Dylanesque style of half-spoken and Dennis Diken producing, and Mike Caiati
Mosquitos, pure ’60s teen-punk in The Outta phrasing to Byrdsian California harmony laden engineering the basic tracks at Brooklyn’s
Place, and the mod Secret Service. folk-rockers, and where as many of the ’80s Coyote Studios with Bobby, Tony and Tom
groups so heavily influenced by the ’60s could Ward, who played bass for most of the band’s
And then there were The Optic Nerve. Bobby seem “affected” at times, The Optic Nerve existence. Mike Linn and Dennis Diken played
Belfiore formed the band with Orin (from The always struck with a genuine honesty, lacking drums while Dave played organ and a small
Outta Place) and Elan Portnoy (The Headless the cocky attitude and the overdone clothes orchestra was added to a few songs. Dave then
Horsemen, The Fuzztones) and Ira Elliot (The that went with the garage bands of the ’80s. took Bobby and Tony to The Bomb Factory in
Fuzztones) in 1985 to play the one style of ’60s LA, where they could spend time putting the
garage revival that the New York scene had After two EPs full of promise on Dave Amels finishing touches on it. Everything was finished
overlooked – folk-rock. Bobby had just moved and Mike Linn’s Cryptovision label, the band up in early 2006, but Cryptovision had a few
to New York from DC, where he had played “officially” called it quits in ’88. The difficulties irons in the fire with Dennis Diken’s first solo
with The Purple Onion. Eventually guitarist and of keeping a line-up together – and what felt release, and then Dave had some family
singer Tony Matura joined what became an like a lack of interest outside of the New York concerns to deal with.
ever revolving line-up, as Ira and Elan were scene, and Bobby’s growing disillusionment
busy with The Fuzztones. “The problem with with New York in general – had put a Finally, by 2009, when releasing the album
keeping a steady line up was that full-time dampener on their spirits. It seemed like a became an option, record sales were waning so
drummers and bass players in New York were struggle without reward, but for Bobby there much that any return in financial investment
scarce as hens’ teeth” Bobby explains. “Most of seemed to be an intrinsic need to keep seemed stark. So it sat. And the rumours of the
them tended to play in several bands at the great “lost” album circulated. For those eager
same time, and if you wanted to hire one you’d The Optic Nerve always struck to hear this new album, time kept passing, and
usually have to pay their expenses… and a with a genuine honesty, it seemed like it was never going to see the light
simple thing like locking in a gig or practice of day… until a press release from State
session could involve a dozen phone calls. No lacking the cocky attitude and Records emerged informing two tracks slated
guarantee anyone would remember anything the overdone clothes that for the ill-fated album were to be released on a
from one rehearsal to the next as a result, single. Mole from the label had been in contact
shows were often hit and miss… unfortunately went with the garage bands of with a mutual friend of his and Bobby’s –
something of a trademark for us.” the ’80s. Matteo Bocci – who convinced Dave to let Mole
have his pick of the tracks to release.

30 26
SD50 Optic Nerve 26/08/2015 17:21 Page 1

‘Penelope Sunshine’ is the undisputed A-side,

and a crowning jewel for The Optic Nerve –
the epitome of California sunshine-pop mixed
with folk-rock. “What’s funny is that I wrote it
in LA when I was house sitting a bungalow in
Hollywood over the 4th of July in the late ’90s
and knocked out the song in about 20
minutes. It was about a girl from the East
Village, a ‘scene maker’,” Bobby explains. It
is perhaps the best 20 minutes that Bobby
Belfiore ever spent. “I don’t consider myself
much of a songwriter though,” he laughs.
“I only seem to be able to write Optic
Nerve stuff, a simple kind of folk-rock
because I guess that’s what comes most
naturally to me (and Tony, too).”

When asked how he feels about the

State single release, Bobby says, “I feel
kind of like a kid at Christmas. I
probably should have fought harder
and been more proactive in pushing to
get [the album] out, but by that point
I’d become fed up with the whole
subject.” The great “lost Optic Nerve
album” as a whole still remains
tantalisingly hidden away, for now
at least – 13 more gems waiting to
be heard.

Someday.

‘Penelope Tuesday’ / ‘Here To Stay’

is out now on State

The Optic Nerve during

sessions for the “lost”
2005 album. Coyote
Studios, Brooklyn NY,
January 2005; in their
’80s prime (opposite)

31
SD50 Graveyard 26/08/2015 17:22 Page 96

W
hat began as a group of teenagers

Too Much Is exploring the rock music of the late

’60s and early ’70s has grown to
become one of the most authentic and exciting
bands around today. Channeling the sounds
and the spirit of groups like Cream, Black
Sabbath, Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin, to

Not Enough
name but a handful of their influences, they
have managed to capture the creative
dynamism of one of music’s most revolutionary
eras whilst making it new and relevant to
today’s audiences.

The story began back in 1995, in Gothenburg

Sweden, when Joakim Nilsson along with
From cult status to Grammys and addiction, friends Rikard Edlund, Magnus Pelander and
Kristoffer Sjödahl formed a rock band,
GRAVEYARD are back… with a new lease of life. originally called Winterorb. The name was
quickly changed to Norrsken and, immersed in
music, they set out to explore what they called
On the eve of their fourth album, “straightforward rock”. In a template that still
holds true today they quickly drew in many
guitarist/vocalist Joakim Nilsson tells GREG influences, often with the help of kindred
spirits. “We’ve been doing the same thing for 25
HEALEY how the Swedish quartet is so much years. Back then we’d started to get into
original rock, like Sabbath. We had a lot of
more than a “retro rock band” record collectors and dealers sending us mix
tapes of really cool bands like Bang and we had
an openness to all music, but particularly
music from the late ’60s and ’70s. I suppose
eventually it became a mix between everything
we’d ever heard,” is how explains Nilsson this
Risen! Graveyard in 2015. L-R: Truls long and fruitful journey.
Mörck (bass), Axel Sjöberg (drums),
Jonatan LaRocca-Ramm (guitar),
Joakim Nilsson (guitar, vocals) In the year 2000, after releasing two demos and

32
SD50 Graveyard 26/08/2015 17:22 Page 97

a 7” single, Norrsken broke up, with Pelander done in three parts. Don didn’t take much to write new songs. We worked on the fourth
going on to form Witchcraft and Nilsson and money for the first album but on the second he album for over a year, even though the
Edlund joining the dirty blues outfit Albatross. needed to get paid.” recording process was really fast,” says Nilsson
Described by Nilsson as “a jamming band” this of this time.
outfit was more about musicians having fun In what was to be their largest gig to date, as
than any desire to perform. “It wasn’t about well as a triumphant homecoming, Graveyard’s In a band whose ethos is a collective one,
having a real career. The kind of band we were rise continued when they supported Iron particularly when it comes to song writing,
we wouldn’t have that big a crowd playing the Maiden at Ullevi Stadium, Gothenberg in July of such tensions can prove to be counter
kind the of thing we were doing,” says Nilsson. 2011. Speaking to Shindig! Nilsson explains how productive. “We all contribute to the song
After six years of this enjoyable, but rather self- the years of small gigs prepared him for the writing process. Someone comes up with an
indulgent music making, Nilsson and Edlund, very different experience of being a front man idea and jam it, trying different ideas. Edlund’s
along with their drummer, Sjöberg, and the of a stadium rock band: “It’s easier being a problems had an impact of course.” After time
guitarist, Truls Mörck, decided time was front guy at a small gig than an arena, but away from the group Edlund’s absence would
running out for them to do what they really doing those small gigs teaches you to just play become permanent in early 2015.
wanted to do. “We felt this was the last chance and be yourself. Not do anything special. I’ve
we had to pursue a music career and we never been that guy jumping around. I try but I Their fourth and latest album Innocence And
couldn’t really do that with Albatross. I’d will never get used to that. But we are doing Decadence will finally be released in late
always considered myself a vocalist rather than alright and getting better at that.” September. Recorded with their old friend and
a guitarist and the guy who I formed Graveyard founding member of Graveyard, Truls Mörck,
with, Rick Edlund, he was a bass player. It was With a committed label behind it their second on bass, it marks a new phase in the group’s
about getting to do the things we wanted to do album sold well and, in what was a surprise for development. Mörck originally left the group
and making the music we around the time of the first
wanted to make,” recalls album, replaced by Jonathan
Nilsson. “Graveyard came out of Ramm on guitar. With the
the love for ’70s music that had group’s problems behind them
always been there from the and with a new producer, the
beginning. We said to ourselves jazz musician Johan Lindström,
that we were going to be a on board they have pursued a
straightforward rock band more nuanced and confident
again.” approach. Nilsson explains: “It
was time for us to see what we
The band’s story took on could do with songwriting
parallel with Lilly Allen’s when, ourselves. Everything is new,
after playing only a handful of with a new bass player and
shows and recording a two- producer and recorded in a
track demo and uploading it to different studio. We wanted to
Myspace, they were quickly experiment a little bit with
offered record deals by things. Johan isn’t just a
Transsubstans for Sweden and producer, he’s an amazing
TeePee Records for the USA. musician and his understanding
Beginning what would be a for music is unreal. There’s a
three album collaboration with better feeling in the band right
the producer Don Ahlsterberg, a now. We’ve got a new found
man who Nilsson describes as energy.”
being like a fifth member of the
band, they hit the studio to Graveyard’s strength is that
record their self-titled debut their music is not made as an
album. “Don brought a lot of professionalism “There’s a better feeling in homage, nor is it guilty of pastiche. Bridling
into the band. We had never done a record in a the band right now. We’ve got against the term “retro rock”, that has been
studio and we’d never had a sound like he applied by some in the music press, the group’s
could make. He had a lot of good ideas as a a new found energy” singer Joakim Nilsson explains that such terms
song writer too and taught us a lot,” says “make their music small, like a throw back
Nilsson. band.” He continues, “we want to be more than
the band, was awarded a Swedish Grammy in that and make new music that people from
Released in 2008 this well received album sold 2012. “Someone told us we weren’t going to win, today can listen to. Not just those who are into
only in modest numbers but cemented the so we were just drinking. When they announced the music of the ’70s, but all people.”
bands reputation enough to secure an invite to it we were already really drunk. A lot weird
play that year’s SXSW. Their first time in the things happened that night,” says Nilsson. Drawing on influences that range from early
States, the experience was to prove more than a blues through to ’70s rock and beyond, they
little terrifying. “I was shaking. I’d never been After a period of relentless touring Graveyard combine these sources with an outlook that is
exposed to something like that. The size of the took time off in 2012 to write and record their resolutely 21st Century. Although in no way
festival, SXSW, it’s a huge thing with people third album, Lights Out and deal with bass preachy, much of their music, which is rooted in
everywhere. And we couldn’t even bring our player Rick Edlund’s emerging problems with the band’s upbringing in the Scandanavian ethos
instruments because we didn’t have visas.” addiction. “There were a lot of tensions in the of social responsibility, offers observations on
recalls Nilsson. band around some people. It wasn’t that fun at contemporary issues. Rock music has alway
that time. We call that album our hate album.” been an agent for change and, through the
The band continued the hard work of building authentic analogue and valve powered sound of
a career and in January of 2011 their reward These difficulties would play a significant part Graveyard, with its roots in the expressive power
came when they signed with Nuclear Blast in the story of the band over the next couple of of dirty blues, it may yet again.
Records. Their second album, Hisingen Blues, years as they promoted Lights Out until, in early
had been slowly taking shape over the previous 2014, the decision was made to take a break. Innocence & Decadence is
two years, amidst the conflicting “We deliberately took a step back. We were just released by Nuclear Blast on
responsibilities of song writing, touring and thinking about things and working a lot with September 25th.
working at their day jobs. As Nilsson explains, Rick, trying to help him get better. Also, not Graveyard will then be on
the process was difficult. “We had to tour a lot touring as much was deliberate, so we weren’t tour throughout October and
to make money to record the album, so it was wearing ourselves out and we could take time November.

97 33
SD50 Family Album 02/09/2015 09:27 Page 96

FAMILY ALBUM

The first time ever we saw her face.

Roberta Flack photographed in 1971

Take It To Heart
The story behind ROBERTA FLACK’s remarkable debut, catapulted to the top of the charts
by a fluke movie appearance. ANDY MORTEN gets starstruck

W
hen Roberta Flack’s ‘The First Time come to national attention,” Roberta tells successful career, which shows little sign of
Ever I Saw Your Face’ hit the US #1 Shindig!, “was Clint Eastwood insisting that slowing down 40-odd years later.
spot in April 1972, few of the millions ‘The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face’ be kept at
who bought it could’ve cared less that it, and its the slow pace that I’d performed it at. Atlantic Raised in Arlington, Virginia, Flack was turned
parent album, First Take, which simultaneously [Records] wanted the song sped up a bit to be on to music by her parents at any early age. She
topped the album charts, were in fact three more ‘radio friendly’.” Indeed, it takes Flack excelled at piano, being awarded a scholarship
years old. Flack had released her third album, almost five minutes to negotiate the three by Howard University in Washington, DC
Quiet Fire, in November ’71 and it had barely verses of Ewan MacColl’s ’57 love letter to his before switching her major from piano to voice
dented the Top 20. The same month, Clint future wife Peggy Seeger, so languid and after having fallen under the spell of gospel
Eastwood’s directorial debut, Play Misty For Me, sensual is her approach. “That movie and its singers Mahalia Jackson and Sam Cooke in the
opened and featured ‘The First Time…’ in a success got my song the attention and me right Baptist church. The sudden death of her father
prominent love scene. along with it. It hit the charts as a result and off when she was 19 necessitated a move into
I went.” ‘The First Time’ won the Record Of The teaching music, which she did in Junior High
“The pivotal issue that made that first album Year Grammy for ’72, kick-starting a hugely schools and from her home in Washington. But

34 96
SD50 Family Album 02/09/2015 09:27 Page 97

“I sang songs about the

times. I sang show tunes,
songs by Bob Dylan, Leonard
Cohen. Anything that spoke to
my heart”

the performance bug stayed with her and she songs over and over at Mr Henry’s,” she different place to contemporary outings by
began accompanying opera singers at The recalls. “They came pouring out of me and my Nina Simone, Aretha Franklin, Odetta, Judy
Tivoli Club in the evenings, eventually playing heart. What you hear is as close to a live Collins or any of the other artists routinely
sets of blues, folk and pop standards alone performance as I would have done at that time.” named as being Flack’s peers.
during the intervals. “I sang songs about the
times,” she explains, “what was going on. I sang Gene McDaniels’ radically-charged ‘Compared First Take was released on June 20th, ’69,
show tunes, songs by Bob Dylan, Leonard To What’ proves an uncharacteristically funky housed in a sleeve depicting Flack in a
Cohen. Ones that told stories that moved me; opener, Flack’s version being the first to be nightclub gazing intently at her piano, while
anything that spoke to my heart.” recorded, before McCann’s rendition was her bass player and drummer look on from the
captured live in Montreux that June for his smoky stage. It received mixed reviews – a
Word soon spread and Flack took her first Swiss Movement album. Andrés Blanco Guzman belated October ’70 notice in Rolling Stone was
professional gig at Mr Henry’s, a Capitol Hill and Manuel Álvarez Maciste’s ‘Angelitos favourable – and sales were modest, resulting
restaurant, in ’68, where she was “discovered” Negros’ had been released by Toña la Negra way in its follow-up, the similarly intoxicating
by jazz pianist and vocalist, Les McCann. “Her back in 1942; the traditional spiritual, ‘I Told Chapter Two, taking over a year to appear. But
voice touched, tapped, trapped, and kicked Jesus’, was probably learnt from Nina Simone’s Flack’s talent could not be denied – her place in
every emotion I’ve ever known,” McCann later ’62 live recording; Fran Landesman and Thomas popular music was assured.
wrote in the sleeve notes for First Take. “I Wolf’s ‘Ballad Of The Young Men’ originated
laughed, cried, and screamed for more... she from the ’59 stage musical, The Nervous Set; With the benefit of hindsight, most of us would
alone had the voice.” Flack’s good friend and future musical partner find it hard to believe that ‘The First Time Ever
Donny Hathaway contributed two co-writes in I Saw Your Face’, and the album on which it
Roberta is keen to clarify. “[Les] didn’t discover ‘Our Ages Or Our Hearts’ and ‘Tryin’ Times’, a appeared, wouldn’t have become massive hits
me so much as open a door that resulted in my biting slice of social commentary. eventually – with or without Clint Eastwood’s
first major record deal with Atlantic. Many help. So was it strange to experience one’s first
talent agents and producers saw me before he But it’s the devastatingly fragile and emotional major chart success with three-year old
did. People make lots of promises, but he readings of the aforementioned ‘The First Time recordings on the back of a mainstream
followed through.” Ever I Saw Your Face’ and Leonard Cohen’s movie? “It blew my mind,” she says. “I’m not
‘Hey, That’s No Way To Say Goodbye’ that keep sure that the song would have charted if it had
McCann took Flack to Atlantic Records many listeners coming back to Roberta’s debut. had a different arrangement or was sped
producer Joel Dorn, for whom she reportedly Flack imbues both songs with a humanity and up. Sometimes the meaning of a song is lost in
played 42 songs in three hours before he humility that might be inaccessible to many in the arrangement and the production.”
snapped her up. In November ’68, 39 songs were their original incarnations. In her hands, these
demoed, leaving the team with something of a poetic odes to all-consuming love take on And as long as Flack continued to base her
dilemma about what to present to the world on universal depth and intensity. choice of material on meaning, she’d be sure of
her first album. So who chose the eventual creating the kind of timeless, inspiring artistry
contents of First Take? “I did!” states Roberta The “less is more” approach employed in the that years of over-exposure on movie
triumphantly. She plumped for a wildly eclectic sparse, often feather-light instrumentation soundtracks and TV ads, and a hundred pale
selection; songs of many styles and from (Flack’s vocal and piano supported by John cover versions, could do nothing to erode.
disparate sources, all connected by their Pizzarelli’s guitar, Ron Carter’s bass and Ray
emotional heft and spiritual heart. The whole Lucas’ drums) and spacious arrangements Roberta Flack performs on the Legends Live tour
thing was cut in 10 hours over two days in late (courtesy of Atlantic’s William Fischer) helped with Dionne Warwick, Mary Wilson and The
February ’69. “I had performed many of those ensure that First Take inhabited a radically Drifters, nationwide from 2nd October.

97 35
SD50 50 26/08/2015 17:42 Page 26

5
Shindig! is 50.
Well, technically, it’s 57 but we
reset the counter to one when we re-
launched and hit the High Street in late
2007.
To celebrate this monumental coming of age,
we asked our trusted team of contributors to
submit their favourite albums released during
those (almost) eight years, whether new work
or fresh compilations of old gear.
What emerged is the musical soundtrack
to our lifetime so far, and as fine a
haul as you’re likely to find in
one place

The Dragons Horisont Camera Obscura

1 BFI 4 Tva Sidor Av Horisonten 7 My Maudlin Career
Ninja Tune, 2007 Crusher, 2009 4AD, 2009
Out of the blue, this 1970 Monstrous Swedish Every CO album has
curio appears and blows heavy-rock that bettered the last, but it
everyone’s minds with its painstakingly recalls the was this, their fourth,
30 years ahead of its time mid-70s greats, while that made us realise we
electronic art-pop moves.  including hearty dollops were dealing with a
of melody.  genius songwriter.

Various Artists Various Artists

2 Thank You Friends: The White Hills 8 Brazilian Guitar Fuzz Bananas
Ardent Records Story 5 Heads On Fire Tropicalia In Furs, 2010
Big Beat, 2008 Thrill Jockey, 2009 Super-freaky collection of
As well as telling the Big Hawkwind crash land in rare and undiscovered
Star story, this is proof Detroit’s Grande fuzz-funk nuggets from
that Ardent was home to Ballroom in 1971. Warp tropical South America.
the best out of time beat factor 10, Mr Sulu!
and powerpop sounds of
the ’70s.

Stone Breath
The Soundcarriers George Jackson 9 The Shepherdess And The
3 Harmonium 6 In Memphis Bone White Bird
Melodic, 2009 Kent, 2009 Dark Holler, 2010
Evokes timeless summers A prolific songwriter with When Timothy Renner’s
spent cruising around a hitherto unknown back pitch-black Stone Breath
with the top down. Light catalogue of unreleased unexpectedly returned
yet intricate jazz/pop songs for Goldwax, Fame they were as bloody and
excursions to drown the and Sounds Of Memphis. uncompromising as ever.
frown and gladden the
heart.

36 26
SD50 50 26/08/2015 17:42 Page 1

Airbus The Stepkids Rodriguez

10 Test Flight 15 The Stepkids 20 Searching For Sugar Man
Tenth Planet, 2010 Stones Throw, 2011 Light In The Attic, 2012
Who knew that a pile of Wonderful kaleidoscopic Rodriguez’s comeback
DIY demos by a couple of soul with lush harmonies was nothing short of
jobbing songwriters and and psych-funk grooves miraculous and the
’60s pop journeymen to die for. soundtrack proves he
could yield this kind of should never have
treasure? disappeared into
obscurity in the first place.

Mandy More Trembling Bells White Fence

11 But That Is Me 16 Abandoned Love 21 Family Perfume Volumes 1&2
Sunbeam, 2010 Honest Jon’s, 2011 Woodsist, 2012
Ultra-rare major label The second Bells outing, Tim Presley’s marvellous
release doubled in size. on which they find both lo-fi home recording
Swirling rock, their feet and their voice. project brings to bear the
heartbreaking torch Ignore the freak-folk tag; full spectrum of analogue
songs and the best cover these are timeless epics. overload and pure,
ever of ‘God Only Knows’. muddy brilliance. 

Various Artists Various Artists Melody’s Echo Chamber

12 Book A Trip Volumes 1 & 2 17 Motown’s Mowest Story 22 Melody’s Echo Chamber
Now Sounds, 2010 / 2013 1971-1973 Weird World, 2012
Kiss those bootlegs Light In The Attic, 2011 If you’ve never fallen
goodbye. Major label US Fantastic document of asleep in the bath to the
sunshine pop and psych- Motown’s short-lived spacey electronic dream-
lite obscurities never West Coast offshoot pop of ‘Bisou Magique’
sounded or looked so featuring sun-kissed soul then your life is as yet
good. and funk from the likes of incomplete.
Sisters Love, Odyssey and
Frankie Valli.
Sandy Denny Lee Hazlewood
13 Sandy Denny Edgar ‘Jones’ Jones 23 There’s A Dream I’ve Been
Universal, 2011 18 Soothing Music For Stray Cats Saving: LHI 1966-71
Nineteen CDs, 21 hours of Viper, 2012 Light In The Attic, 2012
music, 100 previously Scouse bass legend comes Three Lee albums and
unreleased recordings, a up with a set of authentic two CDs of his amazing
72-page hardback book, soul, jazz and vintage psych-pop, garage and
oodles of memorabilia: the R&B to blow your mind. country-rock
last word in definitive productions, plus a DVD
collections. of Cowboy In Sweden and
a huge book. Wow!
Vibravoid
14 Minddrugs Beachwood Sparks Tame Impala
Sulatron, 2011 19 The Tarnished Gold 24 Lonerism
Essential listening for Sub Pop, 2012 Modular, 2012
anyone who either needs Reformed legends’ Third album from Kevin
reminding of what they triumphant return with a Parker opened many
got up to at UFO in 1967 brilliant update of The readers of this tome to
or has spent half their life Byrds’ sun-kissed new music, and also
wishing they’d been there. Notorious-era sound. showed how psychedelia
can move with the times.

Don’t accuse Beachwood Sparks

of aping their heroes

37
SD50 50 26/08/2015 17:42 Page 2

Soundtrack Of Our Lives The Steppes Serge Gainsbourg

25 Throw It To The Universe 28 Green Velvet Electric 31 Intoxicated Man 1958-62
Parlophone, 2012 Cherry Red, 2013 él, 2013
Ebbot and the boys bow Finally the best His remarkably inventive
out with a final album psychedelic rock band of first four albums,
that homages heroes and the ’80s get the exposure originally released under
influences, stays true to they deserve. Irish- the radar, now hugely
form and impresses with American acid-rock of influential and always
its integrity. la Belle Époque. entertaining.

Various Artists Wolf People Various Artists

26 Country Funk 1969-1975 29 Fain 32 Love, Poetry & Revolution
Light In The Attic, 2012 Jagjaguwar, 2013 Grapefruit, 2013
The start of a series that’s Charged like a It’s rare that comps of
had many foraging thunderstorm on a British psych, freakbeat
through country music summer’s day, Fain is the and flower-pop offer
bargain bins in search of Magna Carta of re- anything new these days.
soulful, swampy sounds; nationalised retro-rock. This one is stuffed with
the Nuggets of its world. exceptions.

Various Artists The Hidden Masters Medusa

27 Bonehead Crushers, Bonehead 30 Of This And Other Worlds 33 First Step Beyond
Crunchers, Ultimate Bonehead! Rise Above, 2013 Numero Group, 2013
Belter, 2012-2015 This blend of psych, jazz, Unreleased four-track
The ultimate soundtrack pop and rock had us recording from 1975
to a sleazy head-banging mesmerised. One single, yielded Sabbath-like
grease brawl or merely one incredible album, doom-rock and lengthy
glam-friendly, sexist piffle and that’s all we got. Amon Düül II-esque jams.
for mullet-skulled thugs? Thanks for the memories. See also Darkscorch
Canticles comp. 

Nilsson
Harry Nilsson, one of a kind 34 The RCA Albums Collection
Sony, 2013
From the genius of the
first few albums to the
post-Nilsson Schmilsson
madness, a not entirely
serious body of work
from a one of a kind.

Broadcast
35 Berberian Sound Studio OST
Warp, 2013
Continuing the incidental
feel of Witch Cults Of The
Radio Age, yet with a
softer musical hue,
Berberian Sound Studio
thrilled fans with its
multi-faceted scope.

Jacco Gardner
36 Cabinet Of Curiosities
Trouble In Mind, 2013
The Dutch psych-pop
Prince’s debut proved
that good music doesn’t
need to re-invent the
past; it could re-interpret.
Baroque-pop perfection.

Jonathan Wilson
37 Fanfare
Bella Union, 2013
Epics are a rare thing
these days but studio
boffin, singer, songwriter
and guitarist Wilson
achieved just that with
this sprawling West Coast
outing.

38
SD50 50 26/08/2015 17:42 Page 3

Temples, our cover

Small Faces
38
stars in issue 37
Here Come The Nice
Immediate / Charly, 2014
Lovingly compiled and re-
mastered collection of
some of the finest pop
music ever to come out of
the UK.

Emma Tricca
39 Relic
Bird, 2014
Glacial, detached yet
stirring observations on
the vicissitudes of
contemporary urban life
from London’s giallo
queen.

Wilko Johnson & Roger Daltrey

40 Going Back Home
Chess, 2014
Wilko bonds with Who
frontman Daltrey over a
love of Johnny Kidd &
The Pirates and bashes
out this belter of a disc,
then doesn’t die!

The Action & The Creation Various Artists The Zakary Thaks
41 The Singles Box Sets 45 Truckers, Kickers, Cowboy 48 It’s The End: The Definitive
Demon, 2014 Angels Volumes 1 & 2 Collection
The very bedrocks upon Bear Family, 2014 Big Beat, 2015
which so many of us built No rednecks here, just a While there have been a
our record collections consummate overview of fair few compilations of
and love of ’60s flower- country-rock’s birth in LA this most excellent Texas
pop, back on seven-inch and its baby steps group’s work over the
where it belongs. courtesy of Parsons, years, none hits the mark
Clark, Dylan, Dillard et al. quite like this one.

Graham Day & The Forefathers

42 Good Things Damian Jurado The Kitchen Cinq
Own Up, 2014 46 Brothers And Sisters Of The 49 When The Rainbow
Thirty years has done Eternal Son Disappears: An Anthology
little to dim the power Secretly Canadian, 2014 Light In The Attic, 2015
and integrity of these Master songwriter adds a Teen rock ’n’ roll,
bastions of British rock layer of cosmic magic powerpop, garage, wistful
’n’ roll as they power (courtesy of producer folk-rock or jangling
through their killer back Richard Swift) to come up psychedelia, mostly made
catalogue. with a modern classic. for Lee Hazlewood’s LHI
label.
Rog & Pip
43 Our Revolution
Rise Above, 2014 Foxygen The Pretty Things
Late ’60s to pre-punk ’70s 47 And Star Power 50 Bouquets From A Cloudy
glam and hard-rock Jagjaguwar, 2014 Sky
crunchers from former We Are The 21st Century Madfish / Snapper, 2015
Sorrows, Pip Witcher and Ambassadors was their This colossal box set
Roger Lomas. A bona fide “pop” classic and this celebrating the Pretties’
classic is born. raucous, often insane and first half-century in
dangerous follow-up is its business is literally mind-
yang. blowing in its depth,
Temples quality and presentation.
44 Sun Structures
Heavenly, 2014
Tame Impala ushered in Tame Impala
psych for indie kids and Contributors: Richard Allen, Christopher Budd,
Temples ran with it. An ushered in psych for Mike Fornatale, Ian Fraser, Gregory Healey, Lenny
assured debut that Helsing, Jason Hobart, Henry Hutton, Jeanette
trumps the competition indie kids and Leech, Austin Matthews, Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills, Andy
with both melodies and Morten, Kris Needs, Paul Osbourne, Jeff Penczak,
panache. Temples ran with it Tom Patterson, Paul Ritchie, Chris Twomey

3 39
SD50 John Renbourn 26/08/2015 17:47 Page 1

A study of history.
John Renbourn
photographed in 1965
Sd50 John Renbourn 26/08/2015 17:47 Page 2

The eTeRnal
One of the world’s most brilliant fingerstyle
guitarists, JOHN RENBOURN first announced
himself in 1964, working solo and then with
Bert Jansch, before the pair formed Pentangle –
a truly innovative group reflecting Renbourn’s
rich musical palette that encompassed folk,
blues and jazz, early music and classical pieces.

MuSical
Renbourn never stopped exploring this diverse
musical landscape during his long career.
MICK HOUGHTON draws from a series of
conversations with Renbourn and Jacqui
McShee, who sang with John across five
decades, to paint a picture of folk’s dramatic
coming of age in the ’60s
One of the world’s most brilliant fingerstyle

advenTuReR
guitarists, JOHN RENBOURN first announced
himself in 1964, working solo and then with
Bert Jansch, before the pair formed Pentangle –
a truly innovative group reflecting Renbourn’s
rich musical palette that encompassed folk,
blues and jazz, early music and classical pieces.
Renbourn never stopped exploring this diverse
musical landscape during his long career.
One of the world’s most brilliant
MICK fingerstyle
HOUGHTON draws from a series JOHN
guitarists, of RENBOURN first announced
himself in 1964, working solo andconversations with Renbourn and Jacqui
then with Bert Jansch, before the pair formed Pentangle
McShee, who sang with John across five
– a truly innovative group reflecting
decades, to paintRenbourn’s
a picture of folk’s rich musical palette that encompassed
dramatic
coming
folk, blues and jazz, early music of ageclassical
and in the ’60s pieces. Renbourn never stopped exploring
this diverse musical landscape during his long career.
MICK HOUGHTON draws from a series of conversations with Renbourn and Jacqui
McShee, who sang with John across five decades, to paint a picture of folk’s dramatic
coming of age in the ’60s

ometime in 2008 I

S engineered a visit to
Bert Jansch’s Kilburn
flat on a day when I
knew he and John
Renbourn were working together in
the small studio at the rear of the
garden. Bert’s wife Loren ushered
me down there, armed with
revitalising mugs of tea. e two of
them sat hunched purposefully
over their guitars in a pose etched
in the memory of classic images
from 40 years back; all that was
missing from the picture was a
cigarette in the corner of John’s
mouth, with an inch of ash ready to
drop off. “is is a real Lennon and
McCartney moment for me,” I
blurted out as I stumbled through
the door, spilling tea everywhere.
ey looked up at me with
considerable kindness at the
foolishness of a star truck fan. In
my eyes, though, Bert and John
meant just as much as John and
Paul. If I’d said Sonny Terry and
Brownie McGhee, they would have
been more impressed.

41
SD50 John Renbourn 26/08/2015 17:47 Page 3

I feel very fortunate to have known John in the famous former students, Eric Clapton, joined Take two girls…
last 10 years or so of his life. He had a e Yardbirds, the core of the group had
delightfully dry sense of humour and was a joy formed there as e Metropolitan Blues John Renbourn accompanied a number of girl
to work with. He was always enormously Quartet. singers after leaving Kingston, including Julie
helpful, particularly when I was researching my Felix and even Marianne Faithfull on a package
book on Sandy Denny and he generously “I went to the art school because I couldn’t do tour that began in February ’65, headlined by
tolerated me picking his brains about other anything else and it was a bit of a catch all for Roy Orbison. Beverley Martyn (née Kutner)
friends and contemporaries such as Jackson C drop outs. Sandy Denny also enrolled at sings a couple of blues songs with Renbourn on
Frank, Alex Campbell, Davy Graham and Bert, Kingston (a couple of years after him in ’65). the forthcoming retrospective, e Attic Tapes.
of course. She went there for the same reasons as me, not At the time she was a member of a jug band,
to study art but to be in the swing of things. e Levee Breakers, and also Bert Jansch’s
Wherever I have played, the Plenty of music was being made there at the girlfriend. She’s pictured on the cover of Bert’s
blues are all the same… time. I mostly remember her sitting in the It Don’t Bother Me, taken in the flat he shared
canteen beaming out pleasantries. She was with Renbourn at 30 Somali Road in
“I was obsessed with Josh White, my mother taken under the wing of Gina Glaser, who was Cricklewood.
took me to see him when I was about 11 or 12; one of the models. Gina had arrived in London
I was too young to go by myself. I had e Josh in ’58. She was really beautiful, a pure singer, Renbourn was associated with two singers in
White Guitar Method book that came out in ’56. and she played guitar, banjo and dulcimer and particular in the ’60s; the first was Dorris
He played in England a few times in the ’50s knew people like banjo player Derroll Adams Henderson. She was a vivacious black singer
and you’d even hear him on the radio. at’s and Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, and her father was a who arrived in London late in ’64. She found
where my interest in blues recordings began folk organiser. (Dave Van Ronk talks about her her way first to e Troubadour before taking a
and I still love his blues playing. In the ’60s in his book, e Mayor Of MacDougal Street.) regular spot at e Roundhouse off Wardour
there were some who thought he wasn’t Street, where she invited John Renbourn to
authentic enough and too smooth but those “Sandy had a naturally good voice but Gina accompany her. ey recorded two albums
old numbers he played are still great. For influenced her phrasing and repertoire and the together in ’66 and ’67, ere You Go and Watch
others the eye opener was when Chris Barber difference was very noticeable. Gina was a key e Stars. She also appears on Renbourn’s Faro
brought Big Bill Broonzy over to play here. He figure for me too because she played banjo and Annie in ’71.
directly influenced a lot more home grown American style finger picking so it was a real
players, including Bert who saw him in thrill to watch her play close up. I learnt a lot.” “I went to e Roundhouse (Wardour Street),
Edinburgh. In his autobiography, Eric Clapton says much one of the old skiffle places where Alexis Korner
the same about Glaser. “She was the first and Cyril Davies used to play. I played there
“Muddy Waters came over in ’58 and that came American musician I had been anywhere near, with Gerry Lochran, who was another great
as a shock to people who had only heard and I was star struck. She had a beautiful clear blues player. One time I went to see Champion
acoustic blues. Skiffle was more or less over by voice and played an immaculate clawhammer Jack Dupree and that’s where I met Dorris.
then so plenty of people had acoustic guitars style.”
and knew the basic chords, but it was Muddy “She was a hip, very modern woman who had
Waters’ visit that led to electric bands forming. “By the time I went to Kingston, I wound up heard it all before. She thought what we were
I tried to play R&B for a while. with an acoustic guitar because I had no money all doing was so old-fashioned; she was more
and that’s all I could afford. I’ve never stopped like Nina Simone in her attitude and her style
“When I was knocking around in Guildford, playing blues; it’s just resonated down the years was more like Roberta Flack. She used to play
before I got a place at Kingston Art School, I and still sounds fresh in its original form and the autoharp which was as eye-catching as
was in a band called Hogsnort Rupert & His no matter how many times it gets repeated by Dorris herself; nobody had seen one before.
Famous Porkestra. at riff from ‘e Wildest one generation after another.” Dorris was a real force of nature on stage. We
Pig In Captivity’ (dedicated to Hogsnort on were all obsessed with the blues but she’d left
Renbourn’s debut album) was lifted from a John Renbourn’s first recordings were made that behind. She had sung in Greenwich Village
James Brown song called ‘ink’.” using an English dance band guitar – a Scarth – folk clubs and in West Coast jazz clubs with
which set him back a fiver. Much repaired over Lord Buckley; we listened to him a lot in Somali
Hogsnort Rupert were on the fringes of the the years, using layers of ice lolly sticks pushed Road, usually smashed.”
Guildford R&B scene, alongside groups like e under the overhanging high fret board, he
Primevals, Andy Latimer’s Phantom Four and continued to use it up until his second album, Jacqui McShee: “In ’65 John played at the folk
e Stormsville Shakers, a parallel scene to the Another Monday, in ’66. e trusty Scarth can club I helped run, e Red Lion in Sutton, and
one along the ames “blues delta” that took in be heard on the self-titled John Renbourn we began singing together there and
Twickenham, Richmond and Kingston, where (where it’s pictured on the cover), two albums occasionally at Cousins. Quite by surprise he
Renbourn soon enrolled at art college. Even with Dorris Henderson and his first tracks with asked me if I’d sing on Another Monday. at
before one of Kingston Art School’s most Bert Jansch. was the start of it for me. John wasn’t confident

“I wound up
with an
acoustic
guitar
because I had
no money and
that’s all I
could afford”
42 3
SD50 John Renbourn 26/08/2015 17:47 Page 4

The young Turk.

On stage (this pic) and
on the street (opposite)
in the mid-60s

43
SD50 John Renbourn 26/08/2015 17:47 Page 5

Coffee house scene. John

flies solo (this pic) and
collaborates with (clockwise
from below) Wizz Jones,
Davey Graham and Dorris
Henderson; that first flush of
albums

Courtesy of Roger M Kinsey

44
SD50 John Renbourn 26/08/2015 17:47 Page 6

in his own singing; his wasn’t a strong voice but

it was always really effective. I think he’d get
fed up with performing on his own and he liked
“Bert once “Jackson came across as quite different from
the rest of the layabout crowd because he had
some money (from the insurance claim after
playing with other people who had something
different to offer. When I started singing with
played at one the fire where he was disfigured and many of
his school friends died); he was well dressed
him it was because he wanted to discover more
traditional songs.” of Ewan’s considering that the style in those days was to
be as badly dressed as possible. He was quiet,
had a nice sense of humour, laconic, laidback,
Hound dogs, Bach addicts
and Davy Graham… clubs, The easy but never pushy. He played a Martin guitar
in a very clean finger picking style that

“There was a funny ideology in the

establishment crowd whereby a folk song a)
Singers Club, obviously drew, with respect, on traditional
sources, but was his own patent so it wasn’t
just a copy. What he played sounded really
shouldn’t be accompanied, b) couldn’t be
accompanied and c) if the guitar was
where he rootsy because he’d listened to a lot of good old
time picking and he’d got it down. He’d played
anywhere near, that was absolute heresy. They
were very anti-guitar because it was
considered to be American. There was all that
played ‘Anji’ a lot of blues in the past and traditional
material like ‘Kimble’ and he wrote some
terrific songs like ‘Blues Run e Game’ and
nonsense going on. Peggy Seeger could play
just about the best guitar and banjo you could
and was ‘Carnival’ – all in all he was the complete
package. In the very early days of singer-
hear. She was great; more influential than I
can tell you. People would do anything to hear
her playing if they could avoid hearing Ewan
asked to songwriters, he was the best.

“I was never that taken with singer-songwriters

MacColl singing.
leave. but a few things Jackson Frank would sing,
certainly hit the mark. Bert admired him and
“(Unlike MacColl) Shirley Collins wasn’t at all
rigid in her outlook but she was highly
regarded as a traditional singer. She and Davy
He never don’t forget, Bert, on the whole, was head and
shoulders above everybody else on the scene.
Bert was his own man and when he played and
were opposites as people so it was pretty
remarkable that they ever recorded together. It
went back” sang there was nobody you could compare him
to. So the fact that he played some of Jackson’s
didn’t last but that record, Folk Roots, New songs was a measure of how good he was.”
Routes, changed everything. I first heard it with
Dorris. We couldn’t afford it and we went into a Catch a boat to England… Bert And John…
record booth to listen to it.
Jackson C Frank arrived in London just as Les In a revealing interview in Terrascope, Bert
“Before that I used to follow Davy around Cousins re-opened and was at the forefront of recalled the first time he saw John Renbourn
anyway, we all did. Along with Bert and Martin the first wave of singer-songwriters play and being impressed by his “‘clawhammer’
Carthy they were the ones everybody looked to. establishing themselves on the folk circuit style guitar at about 100 miles an hour…” Like
Folk Roots, New Routes had a huge impact on us alongside Bert Jansch and fellow American Paul much of their shared history there’s plenty of
all. It showed that nothing was sacrosanct. It Simon. conjecture but Renbourn first witnessed Jansch
took people like Martin Carthy, Bert and Davy play – sometime in late ’64 – at e Scots
to make it acceptable to accompany traditional Hoose (some accounts say it was Bunjies). After
folk song with the guitar. Bert learnt a lot the first set, Renbourn went outside where
through working with Anne Briggs and for a Jansch was supposedly throwing up in the

EXTRA JOHN #1
while his guitar playing mirrored her singing. gutter. e two wound up later that night at
at’s how Jack Orion came about; they worked somebody’s flat smoking dope. ey ended up
on those songs together.” sharing three flats together between ’65 and the

The Cousins… John in house band on end of ’67. Jack Orion and Bert And John,
simultaneously released in August ’66, sealed
BBC2 pop show! their partnership.
Les Cousins Club Continental had opened in
autumn ’64 with a broad musical policy that After John hooked up with African-American “We never played a lot of those tunes [from Bert
never found an audience until it re-opened the singer Dorris Henderson in 1965, she caught And John] again because they were completely
following year and soon became the hub of the the attention of the makers of BBC2’s new improvised in the flat and we couldn’t
more alternative folk scene alongside other Monday night “pop” show, Gadzooks (It’s All remember them. And Bill [Leader, arguably the
Soho venues like e Scots Hoose, e Happening), and John was requested to most important sound recordist in UK folk
Roundhouse and Bunjies off Charing Cross accompany her. It was there that he met future music] would ask, ‘What’s that one called?’, so
Road. Most likely Cousins re-opened in March Pentangle colleagues Danny Thompson and we usually made up titles on the spot. If people
although the date usually given is 16th April Terry Cox, who were members of the show’s requested anything from Bert And John we
’65, which coincided with the release of Bert house band, fronted and directed by blues man could never play it. Even ‘Goodbye Pork Pie
Jansch’s self-titled debut. Alexis Korner. John found himself appearing Hat’ bore little resemblance to the Mingus
frequently on the show during its short original. I’m still trying to learn how to play
“e purist clubs were just sheer hell for lifespan (all 17 episodes broadcast between that.”
someone like me or Bert, we didn’t do things February and July ’65 are believed to be lost).
their way. Bert once played at one of Ewan’s Jacqui: “I don’t think John was overshadowed
clubs, e Singers Club, where he played ‘Anji’ by Bert. ey were so different but when
and was asked to leave. He never went back. Pentangle played you always had the first three
rows, usually boys, just watching Bert and
“To begin with, the Cousins was a shady, John’s fingers and trying to figure out what they
derelict scene, full of dossers and not the were doing. Bert got more recognition because
springboard to fame and fortune as it’s he wrote songs. John was never interested in
presented later. It was never that, however being a songwriter.
much people romanticise about it now. It was
just a word of mouth joint with no stage at first “Bert could never jam which John could and
but everybody who was anybody and plenty John was more technical and organised than
who weren’t all played there over the years.” Bert who probably learnt more from John than

6 45
SD50 John Renbourn 26/08/2015 17:47 Page 7

The might Pentangle in

action with John (playing
sitar), Danny Thompson,
Jacqui McShee, Terry Cox and
Bert Jansch

John did from him because Bert was more ere were no instructions that came with it gradually became an entity.
instinctive. John could play anything. Blues was and Pentangle grew out of that way or thinking
his first love but his interest in early music was but not because we sat down and talked about Jacqui: “We used to rehearse at the flat John
always there from when he was growing up. He it, we just played and improvised and that was shared with Bert by the zoo (St Edmunds
liked all kinds of music including rock ’n’ roll the result.” Terrace, St John’s Wood where the Bert And
and R&B, and jazz of course. His taste was John cover photo was taken) and one day John
really eclectic.” Pentangling… just announced, ‘We’re starting a band and
you’re the singer.’ Nat Joseph (Transatlantic
Renbourn’s Sir John A Lot Of Merrie England In January ’67 Jansch and Renbourn started Records boss) wasn’t happy about the band
(’68) and e Lady And e Unicorn (’70) their own weekly club at e Horseshoe on forming at all. He thought Bert and John should
effectively defined his interest in early music, Tottenham Court Road where Jacqui McShee remain solo. e contract was drawn up so that
even if he might combine or offset a medieval would sing with them and friends such as Bert and John would employ three other
piece with an obscure Booker T song like ‘Sweet Martin Carthy, Sandy Denny and Carl Palmer musicians. ey got paid a regular wage of
Potato’ or Charles Lloyd’s ‘Transfusion’. turned up if they weren’t working. It ran £22.50 from the gigs and the three of us would
throughout that year but it was only after split the rest of the money between us.
“I don’t think in terms of this is blues or jazz or Danny ompson and Terry Cox – then the Sometimes we earned more than they did.”
medieval music and should be done this way or resident rhythm section at Ronnie Scott’s –
that way; I never drew lines between music. began to sit in each week that Pentangle e catalyst to Pentangle becoming a serious

46 7
SD50 John Renbourn 26/08/2015 17:48 Page 8

“We never worried whether it

was ideologically sound to
mix jazz and folk or blues
and medieval music. None of
us were contorted with
intellectual problems about
the meaning of folk music”
“I don’t think anybody called Pentangle a America where they played just about every
supergroup. Outside of our respective circles folk, jazz and rock festival and every major
most people didn’t even know who we were. We concert hall and rock venue, still finding time
were just a new band starting out. In the same to make six albums.
way people now describe the Bert And John
album as ‘folk-baroque’ (he laughed when I Jacqui: “John was devastated when Bert said
suggested it’s now ‘seminal acid-folk’), most of the band was finished. He said, ‘Who says the
it we made up on the spot. We never worried band is finished?’ And I said, ‘I’m sure it’s over’.
whether it was ideologically sound to mix jazz He said, ‘I don’t think so’ but we had a break
and folk or blues and medieval music. None of from touring at the end of ’72. None of us were
us were contorted with intellectual problems good at communicating so we never talked
about the meaning of folk music.” about it and that’s how it came to end… with a
bit of a whimper.”
Pentangle were swept along for five years,
relentlessly touring in Europe and North Over the next 40 years John Renbourn
explored the breadth of his musical passions
on solo albums, with The John Renbourn
Group and Ship Of Fools, collaborating on

EXTRA JOHN #2
record or touring with lifelong friends Stefan
Grossman, Robin Williamson, Jacqui McShee
and Wizz Jones, among others. He studied,
John plays on David taught and wrote about music, and even
reunited with Pentangle for dates in 2008 and
Bowie’s first album! 2011. The resulting live album should surface
next year.
It’s not that well documented that in the
months preceding Pentangle’s 1967 Jacqui: “You asked what my memory of John is
formation, John Renbourn had contributed and I started to smile. I just think of all the daft
acoustic guitar to ‘Come And Buy My Toys’ things that happened and all the scrapes we
on David Bowie’s Deram debut. Bowie got into, the adventures we had. John would
clearly felt he needed some authentic finger- always talk about having adventures. John was
picking accompaniment for this rare so eccentric. You only had to visit him in the
venture into acoustic folk, which was clearly last place he lived in the Scottish borders. It
influenced by Simon & Garfunkel’s recently- was a converted chapel in Borthwick Bay,
released ‘Scarborough Fair / Canticle’, Harwick, a beautiful place but really isolated
which also lends the song its “cambric shirt” and he loved being there alone. He would drive
lyric. Bowie’s ability on the guitar at this down for a gig and drive six hours straight
early juncture has freely been called into home again; he even bought a van so he could
question, not least by the man himself, and sleep at a service station if it was too far to get
venture was when they acquired manager Jo many of his late ’60s sides employed session back. John was such a big character, larger
Lustig, a brash American who had successfully men. Indeed, Pentangle drummer Terry Cox than life in every sense. He really didn’t look
launched Julie Felix’s career. He took the band would go on to appear on ‘Space Oddity’ in after himself and he was never going to
on in February ’68, and immediately shut down early ’69. change. e long drives – as we now realise –
e Horseshoe and withdrew them all from must have taken their toll.”
playing folk clubs to create a demand for a
hyped-up Pentangle in the wake of their Shel John Renbourn’s official website includes a full
Talmy-produced debut album. chronology and annotated discography,
entertainingly and modestly written by the man
“Jo Lustig was a PR man of the old school. himself.
Barnum and Bailey probably used him. But he e Attic Tapes is released by Riverboat Records
was tone deaf. That’s not a joke, he really was. in October and features the earliest recordings of
His forte was drumming up publicity and no many of John’s favourite blues and
shot was too cheap. I think he even instrumentals.
announced that Prince Charles wanted to be Bert Jansch’s It Don’t Bother Me, Bert And John
in the band. I will say this for him though, he and Jack Orion, featuring significant
knew better than to try and impose on the contributions from John Renbourn, are re-issued
music. on vinyl by Sanctuary Records.

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h o f th e m e n th at ke e p th e d e e p
te a rs a s h e s ets o ff in s e a rc
HUGH DELLA R chokes back the
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One of the world’s most brilliant fingerstyle

guitarists, JOHN RENBOURN first announced
himself in 1964, working solo and then with
Bert Jansch, before the pair formed Pentangle –
a truly innovative group reflecting Renbourn’s
rich musical palette that encompassed folk,
blues and jazz, early music and classical pieces.
Renbourn never stopped exploring this diverse
musical landscape during his long career.
MICK HOUGHTON draws from a series of
conversations with Renbourn and Jacqui
McShee, who sang with John across five
decades, to paint a picture of folk’s dramatic
coming of age in the ’60s
One of the world’s most brilliant fingerstyle
guitarists, JOHN RENBOURN first announced
himself in 1964, working solo and then with
Bert Jansch, before the pair formed Pentangle –
a truly innovative group reflecting Renbourn’s
rich musical palette that encompassed folk,
blues and jazz, early music and classical pieces.
Renbourn never stopped exploring this diverse
musical landscape during his long career.
MICK HOUGHTON draws from a series of
conversations with Renbourn and Jacqui
McShee, who sang with John across five
decades, to paint a picture of folk’s dramatic
coming of age in the ’60s

: DA N P E N N & S P O O N E R O L D H A M
d A m e ri ca n s o u l m u s ic p u m p in g
southern heart of blue-eye
Alabama bound. Dan
Penn and Spooner
Oldham. Still rollin’ after
50 years together
SD50 Penn & Oldham 26/08/2015 17:55 Page 3

Penn and Oldham at work in the mid-60s;

Jimmy Johnson (guitar), Wilson Pickett,
Spooner Oldham, (keyboards), Roger
Hawkins (drums), David Hood (bass) at
FAME Studios in ’66; Aretha and the crew
(Oldham to her right) in ’67; assorted
classic ’60s Penn/Oldham creations

he single bullet fired from the Remington Model 760 that entered the right cheek of Doctor
Martin Luther King Jr as he stood on the balcony outside his room in The Lorraine Motel in
Memphis, Tennessee shattered far more than the great man’s jawbone and vertebrae. In many
ways, the assassination of Dr King on Thursday April the 4th 1968 also smashed the fragile peace
between blacks and whites that had developed in the south in the wake of advances forced by
The Civil Rights Movement. In the decade or so since Rosa Parks had sparked the Montgomery bus boycott,
segregation in schools, work and public places had been outlawed and all black Americans had won the right to
vote. Yet racism remained ever-present and optimism was a rare commodity best kept close to the heart and
kindled time and again.

A short trawl across town from The Lorraine in black rhythm ’n’ blues. “I spent a lot of time minutes, it hinted at heavier heart-wrenches to
Motel, which today houses The National Civil glued right up close to my green transistor come. The demos also resulted in his first hit,
Rights Museum, brings you to 827 Thomas radio, listening to deejay John R on WLAC out as Conway Twitty picked up on an unused cut,
Street, home then to American Sound Studio, a of Nashville. He was playing spirituals, R&B… ‘Is A Bluebird Blue’, and took it to #35 in the
recording space started the previous year by and my heroes back then were Jimmy Reed and national charts. Beneath the syrupy overlay of
writer and producer Lincoln Wayne ‘Chips’ Ray Charles and James Brown. My ears knew strings – and despite its novelty title – the song
Moman and Don Crews. In its brief five-year that good was good. And I just kept on leaning swaggered with a gritty carnality.
existence the studio spawned over 100 hits, that way.”
bringing out the best in everyone from Bobby This early success, though, was not without its
Womack and Joe Tex to Dusty Springfield and By the end of the ’50s, all the influences and pitfalls. “I’d been doing some drinking and I
Elvis. Busy beavering away behind the scenes at input were bearing fruit and Dan was starting guess my momma was having trouble with me.
American Sound was one Wallace Daniel to pour forth songs, the earliest of which he ran My aunt Margaret said to send me to her in
Pennington, better known as Dan Penn, by fellow Alabama musician Billy Sherrill (who Dallas, where she’d watch over me and get me a
producer and songwriter extraordinaire. went on to work at Sun and later became a job. So that’s what I did… till one night I was
legendary Nashville producer). Impressed by out on a date with a lil’ local girl, and we pulled
As fury erupted at the killing by James Earl Ray, what he heard, Sherrill recommended Penn pay into a Dairy Queen. There were these guys
a fugitive petty criminal with known white a visit to Tom Stafford, who’d recently outside with an amp and a microphone all
supremacist leanings, and as conspiracy established SPAR studios above The City Drug coming through the one speaker, trying to play
theories about the hidden hands behind the Store in Florence. It was to be a trip that would some songs and stuff, and it just came to me,
gunman swirled across the city, the first riots open the doors to the rest of Dan Penn’s life. “I ‘Man, I sure would like to play a song’. I’d been
began – and invisible battle lines were drawn went up these stairs, it’s the middle of the day, in Dallas three months. I asked them and they
across the terrain. One impact of this harsh around noon, and I knocked on this door. The said sure, you go ahead, so I played some songs,
new polarised age was a drying up of the once door opens, and there’s three or four big beds got back in the car, and said to this girl, ‘That’s
steady stream of black performers keen to work in there, all full of guys sleeping, you know, and it. Tomorrow I’m going to go to Alabama, and
with both Penn and American Sound. Not that I just thought to myself, ‘Now THIS is my kind I’m going to play music.’ From there on in, I
anyone was ready to face it just yet, but the of place.’ “ just did what I could.”
party was drawing to a close and leaner times
lay ahead. Penn laid down a few demos that day which led Back home, the landscape had slightly shifted
to his first real recording. ‘Crazy Over You’ / and the new kid on the block was the FAME
And what a party it had been! Born in Molloy, ‘You Don’t Treat Me Right’ came out as quite (short for Florence Alabama Music Enterprise)
Alabama in ’41, Penn came from a musical possibly the sole release on the local Earth Studio, initially situated in an old tobacco
background, with his mother playing piano, his Records in June ’59, and the flipside in warehouse on Wilson Dam Road and the
father the guitar and both being heavily particular showed a burgeoning and most brainchild of Sherrill and a former SPAR
involved in the church. His family moved to the distinctive talent: spare and stripped down, producer, farmer’s son Rick Hall. The studio
Florence / Muscle Shoals area in the ’50s and doused in reverb, melancholic in mood with its very quickly started living up to its optimistic
during his teenage years he immersed himself many minor chords and over in less than two moniker and in ’61 local hotel worker Arthur

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“I spent a lot of time glued right up

close to my green transistor radio.
My heroes back then were Jimmy Reed
and Ray Charles and James Brown”
Alexander cut ‘You Better Move On’, Dan Penn in evening as the day’s sessions were
storming up to #24 on the nationwide performer mode winding up, and putting in all-night
charts. Watching the hit-maker in shifts. Buoyed up with the occasional
action provided Penn with guidance at assistance of truckers’ little helpers, the
a crucial time. “I learned a lot from two would chip away at ideas, working
Arthur – just from being around him. intuitively and utterly in tandem – Penn
The most important thing he showed us on guitar, Oldham on keys – towards
– and it’s a tough, tough thing to teach sketched-out songs, which they’d then
folks when they’re young – is how to demo and play back on the studio
keep things simple.” speakers. Soon the floodgates were
starting to crack: the Black Diamond, Mr
Also crucially influential on Penn’s Joe Simon, had first stab at the taut
approach to his craft were the song- ballad ‘Let’s Do it Over’; The Ovations
pitching trips to Nashville he was fronted by Louis Williams gave ‘I’m
making with Rick Hall. He was quick to Living Good’ the full Sam Cooke
notice that the local moguls they touted treatment; and Oldham himself (as
tracks to often ventured no further into Spooner & The Spoons) turned out a
a tune than its opening few bars, perfect dancefloor-friendly piece, ‘Wish
leading him to start fronting the titles as early Percy Sledge to PJ Proby (though Bill Brandon’s You Didn’t Have To Go’.
on in his own pieces as he could manage. deep Tower 45 rendition remains definitive, to
these ears at least). However, it was Penn also continued to release his own
While still playing with what would soon settle collaboration with another of the backroom recordings during this time. Under the
into being the first FAME house band, The boys at FAME that was to provide Penn with, if pseudonym Lonnie Ray (inflicted upon him as
Mark V (who underwent a name change and not his greatest moments, then at least his one of Rick Hall’s many ruses), he lay down a
became Dan Penn & The Pallbearers following most enduring partnership. sublime broke-up ballad ‘Take Me As I Am’, and
the acquisition of a black hearse for ‘I’m Your Puppet’, released on MGM late ‘65,
transportation purposes), it was right around A native of Center Star, Alabama, Lindon replete with a slightly unnecessary slathering of
now that Penn started writing in earnest. Dewey Oldham, known to all as Spooner, was Nashville sugar and strings, was soon picked up
Working sporadically with Donnie Fritts (who a almost two years Penn’s junior, stick thin, and on by James & Bobby Purify and turned into yet
decade or so later went on to record the had managed to become increasingly in- another smash. Dan had also been silently
criminally under-rated Prone To Lean album demand as a piano and keyboard session man. soaking up as much as he could about the
and to be Kris Kristofferson’s keyboard player Having cut his teeth on the local live circuit workings of the studio, learning the ropes
for the best part of 40 years), Penn soon started with Hollis Brown & The Key Notes, and whilst fetching burgers and cigarettes. Feeling
coming up with more gold. ‘Sorry I’m Late, coming from a background steeped more in closed down on this front at FAME, it was his
Lisa’, a cracked soul ballad lilting right on the country music, Oldham’s playing was laconic, desire to immerse himself more in the
cusp of country, was the B-side of a ‘63 Tommy soulful and possessed of true grit – much like production side of things that led to a big move
Roe hit, ‘Everybody’, while ‘Rainbow Road’ was the man himself. The duo quickly established a northwards in the summer of ‘66. Memphis, the
covered by everyone from Arthur Alexander to working pattern, hitting the FAME studios early home of Stax and Hi, was beckoning.

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Waiting for the fall.

Spooner Oldham at the
time of his ’72 Pot Luck
album; Penn’s ’73 outing,
Nobody’s Fool; Penn in the
late ’70s

“I was in American Studios working on

a Box Tops record. Chips called me up
and said, ‘Dan, you’ve get outta there,
they’ve shot Martin Luther King’ ”
Having already befriended Chips Moman on his Young, who added the kind of electric sitar riffs many of the local music scenesters – both white
frequent visits down to Muscle Shoals, Penn that did not normally keep company with and black – were living embodiments of
was thus able to walk on through into perhaps gospel singers or brass and string sections. integration in action. As Dan reflects on the pre-
the most golden phase of his career. With assassination era, “Sure we knew there were
Oldham’s loyalties keeping him in Muscle Other tracks of note from this purple patch problems, but I wasn’t close to them. I’d see it
Shoals until a replacement musician could be include Dee Dee Sharp’s tender, late night on the news, but I’d go to the studio and we
found, Moman and Penn started writing – and pleading ‘Help Me Find My Groove’, which rises would be all okay, and we were all okay out on
within weeks had come up with perhaps the and falls as Spooner stabs away at the the street as well. It sure wasn’t everywhere.”
two greatest cuts in the whole southern soul Hammond; the fragile throb of ‘Dreamer’,
canon: ‘Do Right Woman, Do Right Man’, a which when cut by Patti LaBelle & The As the decade drew to a close, the ever
massive hit for Lady Aretha, and the taut and Bluebells for Atlantic, hovered just above the forthright Penn and Moman were reaching the
tragic tale of forbidden love, ‘Dark End Of The ground like some spectral 4AM visitation; and ‘I end of their collective tether. As Dan remembers
Street’, initially cut with such devastating Worship The Ground You Walk On’, delivered it, the pair were “just two people who couldn’t
intensity and drama by James Carr. to Cadet by Etta James as a guttural, testifying, live in the same pea pod. He was a real talented
energised entreaty. cat, but very jealous too. Take ‘The Letter’. Even
He also proved his production chops when though that made him rich, the day we cut that
placed behind the desk for the debut single by It was just as life seemed that it could truly get was a sad day for Chips. He’d been making
local likely lads The Box Tops, fronted by the no better that news of the shooting down of Dr mini-hits and I slipped on in and cut the biggest
precociously talented, gravel-throated 16-year- King broke. “I was in American Studios working one of the period. The writing was already on
old Alex Chilton. Following a blazing row with on a Box Tops record,” recalls Dan, “and Chips the board from there. And of course, I was still
Moman, sparked by Penn’s insistence on called me up and said, ‘Dan, you’ve get outta young back then, and if there’s one thing young
retaining the dubbed-on sounds of an airplane there, they’ve shot Martin Luther King’. By the folk like to do, it’s move.” Gathering together his
taking off, the resulting ‘The Letter’ was put out time I was in the car and around the corner, the earnings from the hits, and taking advantage of
by Bell subsidiary Mala and became a global air had already started to take on a meanness. a banking climate still real keen on lending,
sensation, ending up as the second biggest- And the real sadness is that up until that point, Penn ploughed a whole heap of cash into his
selling single of ’67 Stateside – and topping there’d been no real tensions between races or own establishment known, quite rightly, as
charts everywhere from Norway to Israel to Chile. whatever in Memphis. It was all lovey-dovey Beautiful Sounds. Despite being in possession of
but then, just like a guillotine, it separated.” the first 16-track in the city, though, the work
By the time the song had started its meteoric The result was, as Spooner chipped in, that never arrived in the volumes he was expecting.
ascent, Spooner too had upped sticks to “nothing changed – but everything changed.”
Memphis. The pair returned to writing, and Large swathes of the city’s black community
Lord how they wrote. One upshot of this Now of course, at this juncture it’s only right to were busy retreating from engagement and an
recouping was The Box Tops’ second huge hit, point out that a white man’s perception of race unofficial, politically driven self-segregation
‘Cry Like A Baby’: its title derived from a relations is always open to accusations of being was in operation. This, coupled with Penn’s
comment uttered by a forlorn and exhausted rose-tinted and that many everyday indignities reputation for being, shall we say, ornery on
Oldham, despairing of ever coming up with a and injustices may easily have been unknown to occasion – and unpredictable due to personal
decent follow-up, the song was propelled into the pair. That notwithstanding, it remains the predilections – hit hard. While partying more
the extraordinary by session man Reggie case that in a Jim Crow age, Penn, Oldham and on the back of his successes, he found the muse

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The Ovations,
standing

started visiting far less frequently. As he puts it its understated late-night vocal sitting snugly THE OVATIONS
himself, “I got a little strung out – and it on top of the warm strains of the Nashville I’m Living Good
sounded like it. I never got into heavy drugs, Horns and Strings right through to the closing This sublime slice of feel good soul first
thank God, but what it became was … heavy spoken-word epic ‘Skin’ – a hushed appeared as a single on Goldwax in 1965. A
use of the most common drugs. I was stoned rumination on the state of the nation over better version appeared in ’69, with added
and drunk and I didn’t take care of business. backwards ’40s film music and Christmas strings and horns, ditching the original passé
Suddenly I was having more bills than income sounds, which comes on like a backwoods spoken word intro. Arthur Conley revived the
from the studio.” As for so many others around white boy What’s Going On? in dungarees – song for Capricorn in ’71 but failed to turn this
the world, the dawning of the ’70s came both the album is a lost gem, currently screaming timeless, uplifting hymn into a hit.
cold and cruel. There was a Changin’ Tymes 45 out for someone to do it justice with a
and the Ilmo Smokehouse LP, but the once legitimate reissue. The 45 that was taken from ETTA JAMES
bottomless well was starting to run dry. the album – ‘Prayer For Peace’ and ‘If Love I Worship The Ground You Walk On
Was Money’ – somehow failed to become the Even in the hands of mere mortals, the qualities
Spooner, meanwhile, had married and left runaway smash it deserved to be, perhaps in of this track are undisputed, but James takes
Memphis for LA, the final straw being rushing part due to the fact the wrong track got the the song by the scruff of the neck and throttles
home from a session in New York to find his nod for the A-side. it into submission with her inimitable
house burned down and the ruins looted in his powerfully unhinged delivery. Cut at FAME, the
absence. The City of Angels proved kind and he Musical partnerships, tendencies and track featured on the flip of her cover of Sonny
was soon cutting sessions with everyone from preferences aside, what united the two & Cher’s ‘I Got You Babe’ on Cadet.
The Flying Burrito Brothers and Gene Clark to recordings was the fact that both then fell off
Jim Croce and even Liberace! Remarkably, out into the void, receiving next to no radio play, THE ENTERTAINERS
of all this upheaval and change, the pair wound publicity or acclaim. Though, of course, as is I Need Someone
up cutting their debut solo albums, released often the way, one decade’s bargain bin Stately ballad released by The Wallace Brothers
within a few months of each other. staples have gone on to become a new on Jewel and by Dan Penn on MGM. This must-
century’s collectables. By ’74, Beautiful Sound hear, stripped down demo first appeared on
Oldham’s recently reissued Pot Luck came out was on its last legs, Moman had closed up Ace’s Hall Of Fame CD in 2012. A solitary piano,
in ’72 on Family Productions, and was shop and left town, and even the once-mighty exquisite male group harmonies and a yearning
produced by Ed Cobb. The idiosyncratic Stax Records was failing. With a heavy heart, lead vocal reveal the song’s true genius.
chicken leg image wound up on the front after Penn shut up shop and moved to Nashville,
Spooner found himself taken aback by the where he’s been mostly ever since, continuing BJ THOMAS
label’s first suggestion – a piece of psychedelic to write and produce beneath the radar, while I’ve Been Down This Road Before
erotica featuring naked ladies grooving in the Oldham went from one super-session to the This one was a co-write with Mark James who
smoke from his cigarette! A classic the album is next way out west. famously penned ‘Suspicious Minds’. A spiritual
probably not, and the lengthy second side segue feeling runs through many Penn/Oldham songs
of previous hits is barely better than bizarre The story could, of course, have ended here that reflect their deep love and understanding
lounge bar bad, but the opener – written with had it not been for Penn’s severely belated of R&B but their country roots are often
Penn on one of his trips out west – ‘The Lord second solo LP, Do Right Man, sneaking out in recognisable too. This poignant, reflective
Loves A Rolling Stone’ is deep southern gospel ’94, and the duo returning to the stage ballad with aching strings was one of the finest
goodness, the vocal just this side of cracked together for the first time in a quarter of a productions of its kind.
and wavering, and all the better for it; ‘Julie century. And the rest, as I’m sure y’all know,
Brown’s Forest’ is as powerful as anything Leon is now history. DAN PENN
Russell was producing at the time and ‘Life’s Come Into My Heart
Little Package Of Puzzles’ is pure country Pot Luck is out now on vinyl and CD on Light Dan Penn was no slouch when it came to
home-cooking. In The Attic. singing. His early demos captured on the Ace
compilation, The Fame Recordings, showed how
Penn used the plentiful downtime afforded him A big thanks to Spooner Oldham and Dan Penn he could easily emulate his idols with gusto.
by a studio not exactly running at full capacity for their time and southern hospitality, to Joss This one diverts from the southern soul/R&B
to put together, over six or seven months, his Hutton for his help and sharing of sources, and genre, soaking up inspiration from pop
own solo outing, Nobody’s Fool, which came out to Will Lawrence at In House Press and Neil contemporaries such as Phil Spector and The
on Bell in ’73. From the opening title track, with Scaplehorn at Ace Records for photos. Supremes.

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SD50 Audience 26/08/2015 17:58 Page 1

House music? Audience in 1971.

Clockwise from top left: Howard
Werth, Keith Gemmell, Trevor
Williams, Tony Connor; the lone
Lloyd Alexander Real Estate 45
(opposite)
SD50 Audience 26/08/2015 17:58 Page 2

Over four hectic years, HOWARD WERTH and his band

AUDIENCE undertook an extraordinary journey from East
London pub gigs to the verge of replacing The Doors as Elektra
Records’ house band in the USA. Along the way they produced
four unique albums, whose style, wit and approach set them
apart from their peers, but ultimately may have hastened their
demise at the hands of a fickle music industry.
Werth tells GREG HEALEY about experimentation, graphic
design and Little England

H
oward Werth was a keen fan Werth’s day job, as a graphic artist working for bassist] got to see Captain Beefheart down at
of rock ’n’ roll and jazz, and IPC Magazines in the heart of London, helped The Electric Garden as it was called at the
played guitar from the age of keep him in touch with what was going on in time.”
10. It was an art school the capital and he was a regular at many of the
education that played an hotspots. “You had the UFO Club. I remember Werth’s early musical interests led to the
important role in the going down when The Soft Machine and Pink formation of an R&B group called The Lloyd
development of his creative talents. “I was Floyd played regularly, and it being emptied Alexander Real Estate that played the semi-pro
taught by Peter Blake and a lot of the pop-art out by the police. Trevor [Williams, Audience circuit of the East End. By late 1968, in
artists,” he begins. “It was all at the beginning response to all that was happening around
of The Beatles and it was all happening. It was them, this formed the basis of Audience, with
a very exciting period. It was a great time to be his friends Williams (bass), Keith Gemmel (sax)
in London, with all those influences, both and John Richardson (drums).
musical and from the art and the fashion world
all conglomerating. It created a very creative Right from the very beginning, the style of the
period. It gave you an idea that you weren’t new group’s music was to be determined by a
restricted by a specific formula and that you desire to do things in their own way. Even their
could draw on lots of different things and bring choice of instrumentation was different to that
them together. I think that was partly what of their peers. Werth’s unique voice, his nylon-
Audience did. As for musical styles, we weren’t strung acoustic, along with Gemmell’s effects-
restricted at all. We’d never think, oh no, you laden flute, sax and clarinet work, would all
can’t do that. That would inspire us in the play a part. “I was playing a nylon-strung
opposite direction and make us think, yeah, acoustic guitar at home a lot, because I didn’t
you can do that. A bit of Russian with some want to annoy the neighbours with loud
medieval and some American R&B, mixing it music,” explains Werth. “I really got into it and
up was what we were doing.” really enjoyed the feel of it. I used to think that

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Building upon their solid live shows, Audience

continued to develop a loyal following as they
toured and soon they receive an opportunity
that would place them back at the heart of
Werth’s own place of birth in the East End of
London.

The band’s rapid rise had created the need,

early on, for a manager and it was Tony Hodges
of Juliana’s Discotheques management agency
that became their steward. Perhaps seeking to
capitalise on the group’s East London
connections, or the narrative quality of
Audience’s material, with music, lyrics and
instrumentation shifting between styles and
modes to tell stories, Hodges secured an
agreement from film maker Barney Platts-Mills
to have Audience provide the soundtrack for
his new film, Bronco Bullfrog.

Feature-length and shot in black and white

with untrained actors, the film would be feted
as a masterpiece. For a band who, despite their
inexperience and youth, had already produced
an album, the task seems to have been greeted
with characteristic ease. Beginning the writing
process whilst in Switzerland, the quartet
produced a soundtrack that gels perfectly with
it would be great if I could get an electric nylon- material was very old and things came together the action and imagery of the film. Despite
strung guitar that I could play through an amp, in the studio very quickly,” explains Werth. “We their confidence, working to the exacting and
but no such thing existed. Until one day I worked together really well. I’d come up with unmovable demands of edited and time synced
walked past a music shop in London and there an idea and Trevor would go off and come back celluloid would prove to be a challenge, as
it was in the window: an electric nylon-strung with some lyrics. It went from there.” Werth explains. “It was an experience in itself,
guitar. That was it, I’d found it. Eventually I was writing certain length bits of music, writing a
used as their advertising as I think I was the What would become a defining characteristic couple of main tunes and then doing little
first person to actually play one of those. Then I of Audience’s material, its narrative content, pieces that had to fit specific scenes. We
heard someone in one of the shops in the West expressed both lyrically and musically, but with sometimes worked from the rushes. They’d
End with a flute through an echo machine and I humour, was also present. “Humour and dry need a little bit here and they’d show us a
thought, wow. And that triggered us off and we wit along with narrative was always an section and they’d say we need a little bit here
started putting instruments through all sorts of important element for us.” where they are walking towards a station or
effects like wah-wah. It was a case of trying whatever, 17 seconds or whatever. We did a lot
things out and seeing what works. Anything to Despite reportedly early starts (Brough’s strict of that and it was quite hard work actually. All
bend the sound a bit.” routine had the band in the studio from 8:30 in this was at the same studio we did our first
the morning), they were allowed to self- album, at Morgan Studios.”
The quartet first took to the stage in early ’69. produce their first album. This freedom did not
Within six weeks they were snapped up by extend, however, to complete creative control. With the band at loggerheads with Polydor, the
Polydor Records and heading to Morgan “They let us get on with it, but only up to a potential for a long period in the creative
Studios to record their eponymous first album. point. They wanted new things at that time. But doldrums was high, but with their live shows
The result of a contact through the band’s soon there were things they wanted to change that drawing attention it was only a matter of time
to be ex-drummer, their deal came about as we weren’t happy about.” A combination of before a new prospect arose. In October that
Richardson pursued a career in television. creative and personality differences, perhaps opportunity came as Audience played support
“John, who was later in The Rubettes, had other over Brough’s strict regime, coupled with a to Led Zeppelin at The Lyceum in London. “The
things up his sleeve and left the band. He’d got perceived lack of commitment from Polydor, night we supported Led Zeppelin was a good
to do some kids’ TV work with Ayshea, the wife meant that the lightning relationship with the night. We went down very well and got some
of Chris Brough from Polydor. Chris came label was over almost before it began. “When great music press the next week. We had a
down to see us and that was it.” they finally brought the album out we decided strong live following.”
not to work with it, so we went on tour to Italy
The first album was to arrive almost fully and Switzerland. By that point we didn’t click. As Audience played through their set of songs
formed, with the band achieving their signature It was obvious they weren’t going to put the about lazy, love-struck medieval poets and
sound from the very beginning. “None of the time or effort into it so we decided not to.” stage-coaches to Waverley, there was an

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SD50 Audience 26/08/2015 17:59 Page 4

Williams, Connor, Gemmell and

Werth let rip at Reading Festival; the Friend’s Friend’s Friends lyrics.” Formless
Werth and his treasured electric and messy, the execution could not be further
nylon-strung guitar (far left); early away from the work of a graphic artist whose
Audience performance at Ronnie
Scott’s jazz club, ’69 (left) output helped define the look of the late ’60s
with his work for The Beatles’ Apple Corp.
Werth would learn from this experience and, in
future, would seek to engage more closely with
the designers of Audience’s album covers.

Unfortunately, despite the resumption of a

heavy touring schedule across the UK, the
album failed to make the hoped for impact and
sales were poor. Given that they’d self-
produced their first two albums it’s
understandable that, both in terms of concept
and quality, they are a little rough around the
edges. Youthful bravado and arrogance are,
after all, no substitute for the steady guiding
hand of a skilled and objective producer. Their
next album would need more cohesion and
polish and Audience knew just the person to
admirer watching from the wings. Tony producer to forget it. “We actually went in the bring that. “We wanted to work with Gus
Stratton-Smith, the head of the newly studio with him and he virtually said, ‘I don’t Dudgeon after hearing ‘Space Oddity’ and really
established Charisma Records, had come down like any of this material. Let’s do some other liking the sound of it and the whole idea of it.
with his team from the label to see the band. stuff.’ And we thought, ‘That’s handy, of course He liked what we were doing and it really
Legend has it that the band was signed almost we’ve rehearsed some other stuff’ and we said, worked out.”
overnight, though details of how things were ‘Bye,’ and produced it ourselves. We’d done it
resolved with Polydor are sketchy and once so we thought we were experts [laughs]. Under the guidance of Dudgeon, Audience were
contradictory. In some histories the contract We were a strong unit and we knew what we to produce their best album yet. Assured and
with Polydor had lapsed, in others it was wanted to try.” professional, the band and their producer
merely dormant. Werth’s understanding of the “clicked” and formed a bond based on a shared
situation is that “Charisma had to buy us out of Eclectic and disparate throughout, Friend’s vision. Werth describes their time in the studio
the Polydor contract.” Friend’s Friend is an album whose songs touch as being “relaxed but productive”. Having a
on a bewildering variety of subject matters, producer of Dudgeon’s reputation also meant
Signing to Charisma was to have a including the occult and the mystical. This that the pressures normally associated with
transformative effect on the studio recording where, as Werth
fortunes of Audience. Werth puts it, “time is definitely
describes the label as money”, were felt less.
engendering a “spirit of “Dudgeon was so successful at
camaraderie between the the time. We could get
various bands” with the
charismatic figure of
“We went in the studio with away with murder,
stuff we couldn’t have
Stratton-Smith at its Shel Talmy and he virtually done by ourselves.

said, I don’t like any of this

centre. “I remember when Loads of spending money
Charisma were changing offices and stuff.” Aside from the
and he’d be walking along with all
these young followers from his material. Let’s do some other practical considerations,
Dudgeon also knew how to
office. He looked like a
mother hen with all his stuff. We said, bye, and coax the best from his
artists. “He was good at
chicks around him. He
made us feel secure and he
produced it ourselves” bringing the best out of
us in the studio. If he felt
had a great sense of humour it could be better, he’d
and he was supportive – up to a make suggestions and we’d go
point.” again. He was good at
coaching the best performance
Olympic Studios were booked for the recording variety is further reinforced by the out of you.”
of the band’s next album and, perhaps, to smorgasbord of musical styles, which ranges
compliment the story-telling subject matter of from jaunty pop, to country, to epic and back The band remained committed to the
their material, Shel Talmy, who was known for again. In the can and released in mid-70, the experimental and eclectic formula found on
his associations with The Kinks, was drafted in album yielded one single, Shel Talmy’s their first two albums by and their faith in this
to produce. “Shel was brought in by Charisma favourite, ‘Belladonna Moonshine’, for which an approach paid dividends. The fuzz bass solo
because of Gail Colson, who was really the appearance on Top Of The Pops was required. found on the superb ‘Jackdaw’, and the use of
power behind Strat at Charisma; she used to be Despite this feint towards the hit parade the Leslie cabinets to spin new sounds out of
Shel Talmy’s assistant. So I think it was she that music press regarded the band as being more Gemmell’s sax and Werth’s vocals on ‘You’re
brought him into the picture.” towards the serious side of things and duly Not Smiling’, are just two examples of where
applied the epithets art and progressive rock. processes, deployed with skill and assurance,
Despite his longstanding association with helped elevate the band’s material.
Colson, the American hitmaker did not feel any As you would expect from someone with a
need to treat Charisma’s latest signing with kid graphic art background, Werth wanted Bigger budgets meant that there was also a
gloves. Turning up at the studios to hear the involvement in the sleeve design for the album. greater scope for indulgence. Audience had
exhaustively rehearsed new material that the Offering a concept that was intended as a previously found space for instrumentals,
band intended to record, Talmy flatly homage to the work of Alan Aldridge, the usually with a classical angle, and The House On
announced he did not like any of it apart one resultant design was a disappointment to The Hill was to be no exception. Keith Gemmell
song, ‘Belladonna Moonshine’. In a display of Werth. In an interview with Sid Smith for the had taken the floor with his Mozart-inspired
the confidence that had seen them walk out on album’s 2015 reissue liner notes he expressed ‘Ebony Variations’ on Friend and now it was
one record deal Audience told the respected his exasperation. “It was really just illustrating Werth’s turn to show off his guitar technique.

4 57
SD50 Audience 26/08/2015 17:59 Page 5

Friend’s Friend’s Friends. L-R:

Gemmell, Connor, Werth, tenor
saxophonist Bobby Keys, pianist
Nick Judd, brass player Jim Price

Called ‘Raviole’, the piece – its title is a pun on toll. “It was a strange time. We headed for the trombone player, was invited to contribute and
the Spanish word Ole and Ravi Shankar’s name States and did a week at The Whisky A Go Go Nick Judd also came in on piano. The album
– was given the full treatment with string and then a tour in early July with Rod Stewart was, once again, produced by Gus Dudgeon.
accompaniment by none other than The and The Faces around America and Canada. It
London Symphony Orchestra. worked well. We played these huge places and Despite their status as a progressive or art-rock
went down really well with the crowds. It was band, Werth maintains that Audience were
Aware of how they were developing as a an amazing time. There was some flying never part of that scene. Citing his
musical unit and the way their material had between gigs but most of it was on the road in a longstanding influences, such as Ray Charles,
evolved since they began, Audience revisited a car driven by our manager. It was at that point he maintains that it was American music
song from their first album. Although an we fell out with Keith. He became difficult to be rather than anything British or European that
unusual step, Werth’s explanation for the with but things got out of hand. It was all the drove the Audience sound. “We lean more to
decision makes sense, particularly when the pressures of touring and driving long distances. the American, I definitely think that. While we
two versions are compared side by side. “We We were young, immature.” were around at that time, and some of our
revisited the track ‘House On The songs would fit into that prog
Hill’ for the album because the area – particularly on Friends
first time we recorded it we’d only – I never really saw us as
been together a few weeks, and of being part of that. For the
course by the time we got to American thing, there
the third album we’d been
on the road a lot.
“We’d had this euphoric was always that R&B
and blues
Obviously we’d really
embedded that song in a new
experience in America and underpinning much of
what we did, rather than
way and it had actually developed came back to this little circuit that Euro prog sound. If we’d
into what it became on the album,
The House On The Hill.’ that we’d had before. The had a Hammond we’d have been
more towards Jimmy Smith

Once again, Werth sought to whole American thing wasn’t than ELP or that lot.”

exercise creative control

over the album’s sleeve,
taken advantage of” Lunch, released in
February ’72, bears out
developing a ’40s crime theme his point about the
that was completed by the team American influences, with a
at Hipgnosis. Due to what was a smooth country vibe infusing
strong relationship with the people many of the tracks alongside
at Powell and Thorgerson’s design agency, With the tour finished Audience returned to folksy and transatlantic rock overtones. That’s
Werth was able to fine tune and influence the the UK, where Gemmell immediately left the not to say that the masters of pastiche had
work as it progressed. “I really knew what I band. forgotten how to mix things up, as most of the
wanted with The House On The Hill and got that album moves effortlessly between styles and
from Hipgnosis. I also designed the lettering on The impact of Gemmell leaving was not influences, often within a single song. ‘Party
it. They did one shoot and I got them to do it immediately apparent as there was much to do, Games’ is a good example, mixing what Werth
again because what they’d done with the set up including finishing the fourth album. Many of describes as a “funny Russian tune” into the
with the girl was wrong. So they did it again. I Gemmell’s parts had been recorded before the song, and accordion and pan pipes all adding
knew them socially so that all helped.” trip and these were retained as the process of to the atmosphere. The American tour also
completing what would become Lunch got influenced the music, with tracks such as the
The House On The Hill was released in the underway at Trident Studios. New members fast pickin’ ‘Trombone Gulch’, a story of dirty,
spring of ’71 and sold well in Europe, were brought in to replace Gemmell and dusty, road trip craziness, written following a
generating new followers for the band. With enhance the sound. The first musician to join flight over The Grand Canyon. Along with the
new horizons beckoning, Audience turned their the ranks was the American Bobby Keys, on classic stadium anthem, ‘Stand By The Door’,
attention to the States, where the album had tenor sax, who was working with The Rolling with its gospel choir mood, this exemplifies the
enjoyed some success. Unfortunately, the Stones on Exile On Main Street at the time. At direction of travel for Audience. A million miles
pressures of touring were soon to take their Keys’ suggestion, Jim Price, the trumpet and from the bucolic humour of ‘The Poet’, from

58
SD50 Audience 26/08/2015 17:59 Page 6

their first album, these tracks The band embarked on a By the time the news of Holzman’s interest
point to a rosy, if somewhat tour of the same old came through it was already too late for
mainstream, future on the places it had played Audience, but Ray Manzarek of The Doors got
American circuit. before. After a final gig in Switzerland they the idea that Werth might be able to fill
turned, in a somewhat beleaguered fashion, Morrison’s shoes. “I’d already started on the
With the sights and sounds of America still homewards. It was a Bank Holiday and their solo thing and The Doors tried to contact me.
fresh in their minds Werth, Williams and journey back was to be by ferry from Ostend. Eventually I found out through Gus that they
Connor found it difficult to adjust to life back Tired and with big queues to contend with they were interested in me. That all came about
in Blighty. They had strode like gods upon the suddenly found themselves attracting the through Jac Holzman of our US label, Elektra.
stages of America’s biggest venues and, by attention of the police who marched them off He’d originally seen Audience as taking over
comparison, the clubs of England no longer to be searched. Unfortunately, they were from The Doors but unfortunately we split up
held much glamour. Their success in the States detained so long that they missed the last ferry. as well. And so his thinking was to merge the
would have been a gift to any management This final inconvenience appears to have been remaining Doors members with me up front.
firm, but unfortunately for Audience the good the last straw. “We’d had enough,” sighs Werth. That was what he had in mind.”
people of Juliana’s Discotheque were not well “It wasn’t fun anymore.”
placed to capitalise on it. “Juliana’s The possibility of recruiting Werth as the new
Discotheques used to put discos into all the They played a few more gigs on their return to front man of The Doors was explored by Ray
posh debs balls so we did a lot of debs parties. the UK and then called it a day. Werth, aware of Manzarek and, although auditions were held
They didn’t know what they were doing either, the impending demise of Audience, negotiated for Werth, it progressed no further. Eventually
to be honest. They managed us right through himself a new solo deal with Charisma. Tony Werth, who moved to LA, would go on to work
our time with Charisma but were out of their Stratton-Smith also offered to become his with Manzarek on various other projects.
depth. They didn’t know how to make the most manager, though this decision was, ultimately,
of our American successes,” despairs Werth. to have negative consequences for Werth and The rise of Audience was both spectacular and
“Having come back from America, the scene in his career. “When Audience split Tony put me rapid, but in the end the speed of their ascent
this country had changed. We’d had this off getting another manager but he didn’t do was to be their undoing. Each stage of their
euphoric experience in America and came back the job properly himself so, eventually, it all development appears to have been rushed, with
to this little circuit that we’d had before. The went downhill.” little time or effort given to consolidation and
whole American thing wasn’t taken advantage development. Despite this they managed to
of by our management.” Even with his good friend Gus Dudgeon produce distinctive music that was often
producing, his first solo effort seems to have superbly innovative and, occasionally, very odd.
Alongside the rather rueful feeling that they been difficult to complete, with Werth no From the outset it contained properties that
had just experienced The Promised Land, only longer a priority for either his label or his linked it to both the quirky, narrative
to see it escape their grasp, the impact of manager. “King Brilliant took a long time. Gus songwriting of English people like Ray Davies
Gemmell’s departure was also starting to make was working with Elton John and I was shoved and the more epic visions of their
itself felt. The dynamic of four friends working in between various other projects.” The album, contemporaries in progressive rock. In addition
closely together had been broken. With another credited to Howard Werth & The Moonbeams to this, through its use of structure and
European tour planned the remaining would eventually be released by Charisma in juxtaposition of styles and modes to reflect
members needed to both re-capture the live ’75. lyrical content and humour it also prefigures,
energy that had, thus far, propelled them along in some respects, the music Frank Zappa made
and create a sound on stage that reflected the In a strange twist, just as Audience were in the period between ’73 and ’75, and the arch
work done on Lunch. To this end they sought to experiencing the dismay they felt at finding art-rock moves of those first Roxy Music
expand the group’s line-up. Unfortunately, themselves back in England, Jac Holzman, head albums.
recruiting session musicians only caused of Elektra Records, the group’s US label, had
problems. “Although Bobby Keys was willing to noticed them and was formulating plans. Who knows? Had things happened with less
come with us I don’t think we could afford him. Following the death of Jim Morrison and the haste and more care, we’d be talking about
He was working with the Stones at the time. So assumed end of The Doors, Elektra needed a Audience in the same breath as those deities
we got in Nick Judd who’d been working on replacement. With good fan and media interest they may inadvertently have influenced.
Lunch to tour with us, and a sax player called and promising sales during and following their
Pat Charles. It wasn’t quite the same. It was no US tour, Audience appeared to be perfectly All four Audience albums are reissued as
longer working as it used to.” placed to fill the role. expanded editions by Esoteric

6 59
SD50 Faces 26/08/2015 18:05 Page 1

The dog’s bollocks.

The Faces in 1969. L-R:
Ronnie Wood, Rod Stewart,
Ian McLagan, Ronnie Lane
and Kenney Jones
SD50 Faces 26/08/2015 18:05 Page 2

One of the world’s most brilliant fingerstyle

guitarists, JOHN RENBOURN first announced
himself in 1964, working solo and then with
Bert Jansch, before the pair formed Pentangle –
a truly innovative group reflecting Renbourn’s
rich musical palette that encompassed folk,
blues and jazz, early music and classical pieces.
Renbourn never stopped exploring this diverse
musical landscape during his long career.
MICK HOUGHTON draws from a series of
conversations with Renbourn and Jacqui
McShee, who sang with John across five
decades, to paint a picture of folk’s dramatic
coming of age in the ’60s
One of the world’s most brilliant fingerstyle
guitarists, JOHN RENBOURN first announced
himself in 1964, working solo and then with
Bert Jansch, before the pair formed Pentangle –
a truly innovative group reflecting Renbourn’s
rich musical palette that encompassed folk,
blues and jazz, early music and classical pieces.
Renbourn never stopped exploring this diverse
musical landscape during his long career.
MICK HOUGHTON draws from a series of
conversations with Renbourn and Jacqui
McShee, who sang with John across five
decades, to paint a picture of folk’s dramatic
coming of age in the ’60s

61
SD50 Faces 26/08/2015 18:05 Page 3

he Faces were really boozy, yeah, shit! Brandy and cokes, brandy and ginger, brandy
and anything. It had to be Rémy Martin though. We were the Rémy band.
Simultaneously we all came up with the idea to put a bar on stage. We’d dress up our
roadie in a black suit, white shirt, and he’d be our barman. So when we wanted a drink
he’d put it on a tray, towel over his arm, and bring it over. If anyone wanted a sit down
during a gig they could go over to the bar and sit there. God knows how we got
through a show. We went on slightly merry and came off absolutely fucking rat-arsed.”

Today Kenney Jones, owner of the finest ‘Lazy Sunday’. member of the family. So we just got together
drumstool CV in Britain, is sober but looking once a week in e Rolling Stones’ rehearsal
forward to a quiet pint later. “I like being “We were desperate to lose our teenybopper space in Bermondsey Street, just to have a jam
straight, I like the idea of being straight, but image – desperate,” remembers Kenney. “We and so we could be together. Not knowing what
when e Faces came along, forget it. It got to a only did ‘Lazy Sunday’ for a laugh; the last thing we were going to do, where we were going to
point where I enjoyed a day off drinking. I was we wanted was for Andrew Oldham and go, but we enjoyed doing it.”
like wow, I’m straight, what a buzz this is.” Immediate to release that as a single. It was
Immaculately dressed in a blue three-piece suit really commercial, not at all us. So there it was; On hearing of the spilt, Ronnie Wood, then on
with velvet collar and Italian shoes, his old another nail in our coffin. It drove Steve bass duty in e Jeff Beck Group, phoned Lane
modness is still in evidence, as Shindig! Marriott nuts – it drove all of us nuts – but he to express his shock about Marriott’s actions.
suggests. “It never leaves you,” he says. As just couldn’t take it anymore and he was off.” e Small Faces, he said, were his and fellow
Kenney finishes signing posters for a new CD Beck employee Rod Stewart’s favourite group.
box set of Small Faces Decca material he is, With tensions increasingly fraught with Wood was invited to jam and was quickly
with his easy-going Cockney charm, quietly Marriott on one side and Ronnie Lane, Ian integrated into the loose Bermondsey set-up.
excited about getting together with his Faces McLagan and Kenney Jones on the other,
pals Rod Stewart and Ronnie Lane for a charity Marriott, desperate to play with Herd eir paths had only briefly crossed previously
fundraiser. With a Faces box set, You Can Make guitarist/singer Peter Frampton in whatever but Wood first made an impression on Jones
Me Dance, Sing Or Anything hitting the shops band possible, chucked down his guitar during and Lane after the pair had left school and were
this month, Shindig! is here to quiz him about a New Year’s Eve show at Alexandra Palace and working in Selmer’s music shop in Holborn
the transition from the swinging Small Faces to announced he was leaving. e Small Faces testing amplifiers. “One day e Birds, with
the swaying Faces. soldiered on, fulfilling contractual obligations Ronnie, came up there; we were exactly the
to the gigs they had lined up, until they bowed same age. I remember looking at him like that
By mid-1968 e Small Faces had long broken out in inglorious circumstances at the [mimes big hair and wide-eyed disbelief]. We
from the strict stuffiness of Decca and were Springfield eatre in Jersey on March 8th ’69. didn’t say boo to a goose to each other.”
settled into the more liberating environment of ‘Tin Soldier’ ended the set before Marriott
Immediate Records and provided the label with jumped straight back into the fire by signing e Birds, out to the west of London, were a
their masterpiece, Ogdens’ Nut Gone Flake. his Humble Pie, officially unveiled weeks later, popular live attraction with their soulful yet
Released in May, the album spent six weeks at straight to the label from which he’d seen little ballsy R&B attack and strong mod image. eir
#1, although not, as the band had hoped, as a previous money. For the remaining Small debut single, ‘You’re On My Mind’, written by
result of shedding their young audience and Faces, the future was uncertain. Wood, came out in November ’64 and, with a
finding a more fulfilling acceptance of their television appearance already under their belt,
musical advancement but due, in part, to the “After Marriott walked out we – me, Mac and were seen by the fledgling Small Faces as
success of their knockabout knees-up novelty, Ronnie – were, like, lost. It was like losing a kindred spirits. Mention of e Birds has

62 3
SD50 Faces 26/08/2015 18:05 Page 4

What came before.

The Jeff Beck Group in
’68. L-R: Beck, Wood,
Micky Waller, Stewart;
The Small Faces the
same year. L-R: Steve
Marriott, Lane, McLagan,
Jones (photo by Gered
Mankowitz); Marriott
immediately after his
departure, ’69; the short-
lived Quiet Melon. L-R:
Jones, Art Wood, Kim
Gardner, Stewart,
McLagan, Ronnie Wood;
early gig poster
announcing one of the
many confusing
transitional Faces bills

Kenney follow up with memories of another when inviting his buddy along but the pair great personality, he was a right piss-taker and
band cut from the same Prince Of Wales cloth. played it cool with Rod watching Lane, he taught us all how to be even more piss-
McLagan and Wood’s half-hearted attempts at taking.”
“One of the bands I really loved from that time singing.
were e Action. I thought they were fucking With the new band starting to take shape, a
excellent. ey should have been the biggest “One thing that was apparent was Steve’s couple of extra ingredients found themselves
thing since sliced bread. I kick myself every day powerful voice was not there. We were playing being added to the mix. Woody’s brother Art,
and question why they weren’t. Because they good enough music but the vocals were very previously of e Artwoods, and Kim Gardner,
were so good, their music was good enough, polite. I kept thinking, there’s a fucking great formerly of pop-art legends e Creation,
they were better than most people and they had singer sat over there, so I took the bull by the began a short-lived association which saw
a great name.” horns. We’d have a break in the evening and go them join forces to stagger out of the Stones’
over to the pub, drank loads and loads of basement and onto the stage.
By ’69, e Action were in a similar situation to brandy and cokes, shit like that, quite pissed. I
e Small Faces. Singer Reggie King had left took Rod to one side and said, ‘Do you fancy “We were in there for weeks and Art said, ‘Look
and the remaining members forged on without joining the band?’ He said, ‘Yeah, do you think we’ve got to get some gigs’. He got us these gigs
him. With Reggie then without a band or everyone would let me?’ He really did jump at but we never had a name because we never for
recording deal it’s interesting to speculate how it.” once considered we’d call ourselves e Small
he might have filled the slot vacated by Faces, or e Faces, or anything like that. To us
Marriott. Shindig! idly suggests Kenney could’ve Rod didn’t put himself forward? “No, Rod’s very it was a completely new entity and that’s what
asked King to join. “Humph, yeah, that’s right, careful in the way he approaches things. Rod we wanted it to be, so a name would come
we could have done,” he replies without and Woody’s wages in e Jeff Beck Group were much later. So Art went out and booked us
conviction, humouring our flight of fancy. £60 each, which was a lot of money in those under the name Quiet Melon. A stupid name,
days, but this was an opportunity to get away but we were stupid anyway. He got the name
But of course Rod Stewart proved to be the from them. at evening, Alvin Lee of Ten Years out of the air. I think he looked at a melon and
perfect choice. “After a couple of weeks Ronnie After was having drinks round at his mews said, ‘at melon’s quiet’. Typical.”
Wood bought down his mate, which was Rod house, so I said to everybody there, ‘Look, I’ve
Stewart. Rod sat there on the amps watching just asked Rod to join the band’ and all I got A couple of tracks from this period were finally
for a few weeks. He loved it.” Like Wood, Rod was, ‘Oh no, we don’t want another prima released in ’94. Kenney doesn’t recall the songs.
had paid his dues around the live circuit, and donna, someone that’s gonna walk out on us’. “I don’t even remember doing it!” ey offer a
had the mod pedigree after stints with But they were totally different personalities. snapshot to those rehearsals and sound like
Steampacket, Shotgun Express, e Jeff Beck Steve was like a little big mouth, e Artful what they are, the formative Faces – easily
Group and even deputising on occasion for an Dodger who turned us all into little Artful identifiable – but with Art Wood taking lead
absent King in e Action. Woody knew this Dodgers, but Rod was Rod e Mod – he had a vocals with Rod providing backup.

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Unfortunately for Art, as it was through him money, which was to be a 30 grand advance. So lease of life, a breath of fresh air and we
that the tracks got recorded, it’s his harsh vocal between us we came to a decision that we’d realised it wasn’t all over and we had a future.
which distracts from any potential contained in sign the first album as e Small Faces – so We didn’t really think about any expectations.
‘Diamond Joe’ and ‘Engine 4444’. With no we’d get the bloody money – and thereafter We knew we had to make an album but we
takers for the material and after a few low-key we’d be known as e Faces, as there was didn’t know what direction we were going in.
gigs, Art and Gardner’s involvement ended, nothing small about us anymore. It couldn’t We were finding ourselves because it was that
which left the others looking to get started in have been better in a sense. It saved us the early. We just were what we were and that’s
earnest. bother of trying to find a name anyway and I what people loved about us. Slightly dishevelled
was so pleased to get away from being called but each one of us were fucking great,
“When it came to doing something more Quiet Melon.” competent musicians.”
formal, one day we were down e Speakeasy
and I bumped into Billy Gaff, who was working Preceded by the single, ‘Flying’ (“A fucking First Step, which spent only one week on the UK
for Robert Stigwood at the time. We all still great track,” says Kenney), and recorded in De chart (#45 with a mullet), included two
thought we were signed to Immediate Records. Lane Lea Studios in Queensway between instrumentals in a Booker T & e MG’s vein,
So I told Billy and he said, ‘I can get you out of August ’69 and January ’70, First Step was which ramped up the soul quota, such a strong
that, no problem’ and sure enough he did. released in March, its title downplaying influence running through all e Faces. “at’s
at’s how Billy became our manager; we expectations. ey needn’t have worried as the right, and there was in e Small Faces but we
thought the sun shone out of his arse for that. 10 tracks laid the blueprint which only required could never play it on stage because everyone
But what we didn’t know was we were already fine tuning for the rest of their days: rocking wanted our hits. But when we played together
out of it.” and rolling, bluesy boogieing, folksy reflections in the studio we were jamming all that stuff.
and soulful instrumental grooves. e LP Loved it but then we had to go and do the
What Billy Gaff failed to mention was e Small closed with a number inspired by e Soul dinky-dinky-dink. ‘Looking Out e Window’
Faces’ contract with Immediate had expired in Brothers Six’s minor ’67 hit for Atlantic, ‘Some was really just an instrumental jam but
June ’68, but with nothing more than a Kind Of Wonderful’, and crystallized e Faces’ ‘Pineapple And e Monkey’ was more based
gentlemen’s handshake he set about securing a signature sound as that of a rumbustious on a Booker T kind of influence with a bit of
record deal. “Ian Ralfini was taking over as rhythm and booze house party. ‘Cissy Strut’ by e Meters in there. I loved e
head of Warners UK. He wanted to sign us so Meters.” Kenney proceeds to play Shindig! some
we said, great. It was only when it came to “ere’s some nice songs on there,” thinks mean funky air-drums and human beat box
signing the contracts we went, ‘Hold on a Kenney. “It’s a very honest album. What you which this writer sadly cannot adequately do
minute, it says Small Faces – we’re not e hear on the album is what we had at the time. justice with the written word.
Small Faces’. ey said if we didn’t have a name ‘Devotion’, that’s lovely; ‘Around e Plnyth”
like Small Faces nobody knew us, so they’re was one we used to play a lot on stage; ‘Stone’ It was the rich blend of soul and blues and e
signing e Small Faces. We went, ‘Nah, no was typical Ronnie Lane – ‘‘Once I was a Faces approximation of it – with Rod’s
way.’ So we had a big hoo-ha. Eventually they stone…’ but it’s a fucking great song. With the sandpaper rasp, the locked-in rhythm section,
said they’d sign us but we wouldn’t get the release of the album it felt like we had a new the warm organ, and Woody’s country picking

64
SD50 Faces 26/08/2015 18:05 Page 6

No longer small, the boys

goof around for early press
photos, ’69; the first Faces
single, ‘Flying’, still bore their
forebears’ name in some
territories

S
tewart and his musical brother-in-arms, Surrounded by musician friends, including
Ron Wood, were riding high in The Jeff Wood, drummer Micky Waller (who he’d
Beck Group. Their album Truth (credited played with in Steampacket and The Jeff Beck
to Jeff Beck), released in August 1968, had Group) and new mate Ian McLagan, the
showcased the emerging song-writing talents of template for his early solo career was
Stewart, as well as his instantly recognisable immediately established.
careering blues rasp and, in more restrained
moments, a tender yearning to rival his hero The piano-led cover of Mike D’Abo’s ‘Handbags
Sam Cooke. Jeff Beck’s increasingly irascible And Gladrags’ is the classic everyone knows.
behaviour, however, Wood’s Stonesy
was the downside. bottleneck guitar on
the Stewart original
So when Stewart was ‘Blind Power’
approached by Mercury impresses. Also
Records’ A&R man Lou interesting are the
Reizner about signing nods to Stewart’s
to the label, it was a youthful flirtation
and bottleneck slide – which marked them no-brainer. His with folk music and
out from the straight blues, heavy-rock, or commitments to The left-wing politics on
more progressive bands of the era. ey Jeff Beck Group, Ewan McColl’s ‘Dirty
swung. Or, as Kenney puts it, they had feel. including four Old Town’ and the
gruelling tours of the American traditional
“e Small Faces had real telepathy. No one States to build on the song ‘Man Of Constant
told me what to play and I didn’t tell them encouraging record Sorrow’.
what to play. We just knew. It was almost a sales for the debut
similar thing in e Faces but in a more album, would however By the time An Old
ragged way. Why it worked with e Faces delay for several Raincoat Won’t Ever Let
was because of the feel. Just feel. You played months any thoughts of getting You Down was released
with your emotions. at’s what a musician into the recording studio. “The template for in late ’69, the booze-fuelled
is, that’s why we’re all sensitive people, you camaraderie of The Faces had
know. You can really upset us easily. You When The Jeff Beck Group’s his early solo already proved impossible to
play you; you play what you feel. It’s no good
if you feel lousy. People say to me it must be
album Beck-Ola was released in
June ’69, Wood took this as his
career was resist. It would mean that we’d
get to hear a lot of Rod in the
great being a drummer, you can take out all
your aggression on your drums. Now, if I’m
cue to leave. Stewart quickly
followed suit and headed
immediately early ’70s. Also, sadly, the seeds of
The Faces’ eventual destruction
angry I don’t go anywhere near my drum kit. straight for the studio. established” had already been sown.
I play my drum kit and I respect my drum
kit, I don’t take it out on my drum kit.”

As for the band name, the album was

credited to Small Faces in America and,
more accurately, Faces in the UK. Not that
the identity crisis – which saw them billed
throughout ’70 as variously Small Faces,
Faces, Small Faces With Rod Stewart, Faces
Featuring Rod Stewart and, in a forecast of
what was to come, Rod Stewart And Small
Faces – caused much confusion with few
expecting to hear Rod sing ‘Tin Soldier’ or
‘Rollin’ Over’. “e Small Faces didn’t hit it
off in America so e Small Faces to them
were this [e Faces]. I can’t remember there
being any confusion about it over here.
People knew straight away it was a new
band.”

e album cover, shot by Martin Cook at

designer and Ronnie Lane’s fellow Meher
Baba devotee Michael McInnerney’s flat in
Richmond, graphically displayed the
changing times. e days of high-end
Carnaby Street fashions, of dressing to adorn
posters for teen mags, were behind them as
they embraced the prevalent mood and
strove to be judged only on the music and Rod The Mod in ’68; the first
not an image. From today’s vantage point solo album from the
following year

6 65
SD50 Faces 26/08/2015 18:05 Page 7

“Hurry up mate, we want

to get back in the pub!”;
debut album, First Step,
credited to Small Faces
in the US

Rod’s An Old Raincoat Won’t Ever Let You Down

– complete with grubby tramp in a dirty mac
chasing small children across a field as the
choice of cover photograph – beat First Step to
the shops in the UK and the US (where it was
retitled e Rod Stewart Album and had its
dubious artwork replaced) and was followed
later in ’70 by Gasoline Alley, both featuring
contributions from his band mates, as Rod
sought to ride two interlocking careers in
tandem. In time this proved unmanageable as
his solo success went stratospheric, but initially
it worked fine.
e Faces, in that photograph, look shoes in this picture. And Ronnie Wood, being
magnificent in an understated way. Sat on the the arty person, had the book. We didn’t know “Joe Moss at Warners and the head of Mercury
sofa, drunk on homemade punch, their what the album was going to be called. It was Records were close friends, that’s how we
fabulous exaggerated mod hair and couldn’t- only after Ronnie picked up this First Step, worked out a deal to maintain it,” explains
care-less attitude is still used as a template by how-to-play-guitar book, that we called it Kenney. “Rod should’ve been with e Faces
bands today albeit with a calculated that.” but found he had to deliver an album, so he did.
knowingness rather than a genuine off-the-cuff So they worked out – Mercury were sly
stance. e honesty of e Faces’ music Whether the state of Rod’s dilapidated bastards – that they released Rod’s records at
matched here by their garb. footwear was symptomatic of the band still the same time so we were promoting his album
waiting to cash their 30 grand advance or of his as much as ours. ey were pushing him big
“I remember the picture being taken because notorious stinginess, Kenney doesn’t say. In time. In the end I thought it was quite a good
none of us knew what to wear because we fact, Rod was doing okay for himself as he’d thing, the way it worked. We both benefitted.”
didn’t have an image. e Small Faces became already signed a solo deal with Mercury
very much about the image. In e Faces Records (see sidebar) prior to penning e e band’s schedule now increased as they
image didn’t come into it, it was take it or Faces’ contract. “We didn’t know Rod had gigged to promote their record, and Rod’s,
leave it. We just wore what we wanted. We signed to Mercury for a solo album,” claims especially in America. “It was amazing to tour
didn’t even care about it that much. So we Kenney, “he didn’t tell us. He only signed it America because we never went there with e
tried to look respectable and Rod was sort of because they gave him an advance and there Small Faces. We did all these clubs. e first
Rod, because in those days he had holes in his was enough to buy a Marcos sports car. But one we played was in Detroit with e MC5.
shoes, stuff like that. He had cardboard in his then he had to do albums.” Everyone loved us and by the time we got to

66 7
SD50 Faces 26/08/2015 18:05 Page 8

R
ock ’n’ Horsepower takes place at how far it goes but it’s difficult when other
Hurtwood Park Polo Club and is people get involved, managers and that.
Prostate Cancer
UK’s flagship music event, Prior to that we’d been
put on by Kenney Jones seriously trying to do
and his wife Jayne to raise something. It became all
funds and awareness for the more poignant due to
the disease. Kenney the loss of Mac. Echoing
explains how The Faces around all our minds
reunited to support the were we’d better do
event this September. something quick before
one of us pops off. So I
“Woody and I flew over said to Rod why don’t we
for Rod’s 70th birthday do the next Prostate
party in LA. He had a very Cancer UK gig, because
private party – marquee I’d had prostate cancer
in his garden, very posh, and was keen to raise
and there was a stage set awareness. Get yourself
up. We’re all in dinner tested. If you have your
suits and Rod, Ronnie prostate removed you can
and I ended up doing a couple of songs – kiss goodbye to a hard-on
‘Stay With Me’ and ‘Sweet Little Rock ’n’ forever but if you catch it early enough, and
Roller’ or something. And Rod said ‘You’ve with brachytherapy, everything’s normal. You
just witnessed the reformation of The Faces’. fire blanks, that’s about it. I’ve already got six
It’s nice we’re getting back together. We’ll see kids, I don’t want any more!”

Boston, or the next place, the word of mouth

had gotten out, that’s how it travelled then.
In those days, we’d do a gig, right from day
dot, and invite the audience back to the hotel
to have a party. And they came. at stayed
with us all the time. at’s why we became
this fun loving party band. e audience got
pissed with us and we got pissed with them.
And then we played music with each other,
like one big family.”

at accessibility endeared them all the

more to their fans. ey were a proper
people’s band, all sharing the same good
times. As their success escalated, so e
Faces partying increased as boozing,
groupies and rearranging hotels became
outlets to relieve on tour boredom, proudly
earning a ban from every Holiday Inn in
America. “We had more fun really in e
Faces than we did in e Small Faces. We
could be more rebellious.” e more
innocent japes would begin on the Atlantic
crossing. “You wouldn’t want to fall asleep
with e Faces on board. You could smoke
on the plane in those days, so anyone who
fell asleep would have cigarettes on them,
butter, custard, anything. Butter was a great
one. You’d put it on their head and it would
slowly melt and go down their face and then Survivors. Kenney, Woody
you’d put ash in their hair.” and Rod embarked on
the latter’s first official
Faces reunion this
Even during performances nobody was safe. month; Kenney sticks up
for the Prostrate cause

8 67
SD50 Faces 26/08/2015 18:05 Page 9

The much-missed Mac

and his Hammond hands

office and, until they spilt in ’75 enjoyed all the

trappings that brought. “For a while we were
more successful than the Stones, believe it or
not,” says Kenney.

Shindig! asks Kenney if he wishes to sum up his

days with e Faces but it’s clear he has no
intention of ringing last orders just yet. “No,
not really. I’m still having a good time.”

Chin, chin!

You Can Make Me Dance, Sing Or Anything is

out now on CD and LP on Rhino
“You never knew what was going to happen Forget it.”
with e Faces on stage. I think it was at Many thanks to Kenney Jones, Jayne Jones, Rob
Kilburn, behind the stage door was a pub, right After the package tours, screaming fans and 20 Caiger, Pete Flatt, Andy Neill (whose Faces book
on the corner. So, I started the drum solo off to minute sets e Small Faces endured only a few will be published in an
‘(I Know) I’m Losing You’ and I soon realised years earlier, playing to audiences who wanted updated edition in early
something was different, I couldn’t see them to listen, and being in a band able to extend 2016) and Jon ‘Mojo’
watching me anymore. All of a sudden there themselves came as blessed relief to e Faces. Mills for additional
was no one there. I played away a bit longer. questions and
Where the fuck are they? After about 20 “e Small Faces always wanted to be known company
minutes they came back in. ey’d been in the for our musicianship as we were getting better
pub. I don’t even like drum solos.” and we wanted to lose the teenybopper image,
so with e Faces it was very different, I felt like
e Faces spent their days and nights in a near I was finally being appreciated as a drummer. I
permanent sloshed state in a way that differed think everyone felt a little like that in the band.
from e Small Faces. “I didn’t really drink We were playing more meaningful stuff. We
back then and e Small Faces were more into could play lovely blues, stuff like that, and not
the drugs, except me, which was why I couldn’t ‘Lazy Sunday’. at’s what we wanted to be and
live with them in Westmoreland Terrace in why Marriott and Humble Pie got the head
Pimlico. All on speed, and LSD – you fucking start on us, got to America before us, but we
name it. I could never do that. e most I’d overtook them and it happened really quickly.”
have would be some uppers maybe, some blues.
Moonie got me into those a bit. He’d just pick It certainly did. 1971 was an incredible year for
up handfuls, and I’d go, ‘I’ll just take one.’ I was e Faces, far outstripping any expectations.
like a bag of nerves. I could never do cocaine, e band released two more albums, Long
although I tried it. I’d be playing away like this Player and A Nod’s As Good As A Wink… To A
[mimes huge rush of energy] and then all of a Blind Horse, plus Rod’s Every Picture Tells A
sudden you’d go whoop [deflating noise], it Story went to #1 simultaneously on both sides
would just leave you, that buzz would just go. of the Atlantic, with the single ‘Maggie May’
And then it’d come back again out of nowhere. inescapable. ey were now major league box

68 9
p069_Shindig_50 26/08/2015 11:28 Page 3

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pp72-95_Shindig_50_ANDY 28/08/2015 12:37 Page 72

THEN REISSUES, ANTHOLOGIES AND COMPILATIONS

Collecting The Debris
KRIS NEEDS wonders if this new anthology offers any fresh glimpses into the great early ’70s
English rock band
THE FACES ballad 'Devotion' showed much raw soul sauce while sounding like they had which was released a single, is one of
You Can Make Me Dance, promise. just been thrown out of the pub as the extras, which mainly comprise BBC
Sing Or Anything Then came the glory stretch of Woody's teetering, scything guitar and sessions and pissed-up rehearsals.
★★★★ landmark gigs and February ’71's Long the late, great Mac's barrelhouse piano Those extras include the phenomenal
Rhino 5-CD/LP box set Player. I was lucky enough to catch The and swirling Hammond spilled and version of Robert Johnson's 'Love In
It now seems almost unbelievable that Faces on several occasions during their soared in perfect synchronisation over Vain' that they were playing at shows, as
The Faces can carry such a huge and most magical year, including the the loose, dynamic tension of Lane's then-recently recorded by the Stones.
beloved legend from a peak creative breakthrough London gig at The bass and Jones' drums. Throw in the That was a bit cheeky, maybe suggesting
period which spanned just a couple of Roundhouse (a quid to get in!), Watford finest white soul cheeky chappie doing that here was a band to whip their
short years. Their four studio albums, Town Hall (where I watched them the rounds before he went sailing to crown, which didn’t seem that far-
finally corralled together after years of ejaculate their unique brand of magic success and you had the kind of once- fetched at one point.
catalogue-milking compilations, can from a prime spot behind Woody's in-a-lifetime band that hit the heights The Faces continued the momentum
best be summed up as a solid warm-up bottle-stacked amps) and almost but unfortunately couldn’t last long. with November's A Nod Is As Good As A
followed by two peaks then a patchy blowing The Who offstage at The Oval. Of Long Player's respective side Wink… To A Blind Horse; obviously
swansong. But, on their night, The Faces course these were the riotous, scarf- openers – 'Had Me A Real Good Time' thrown down in sporadic bursts between
could be the best band in Britain and, waving celebrations of legend, coming at and 'Bad 'n' Ruin' – stand as the hectic gig schedules but boasting their
as the highlights of this consummate just the right time in a musical ultimate declarations of The Faces' quintessential knockabout anthem 'Stay
package show, one of the best this landscape dulled by indulgence and sizzling sozzled intent. 'Tell Everyone' and With Me'. By the following year The
country's ever produced, which makes simpering singer-songwriters, with only 'Sweet Lady Mary' showed their often Faces were huge but Rod was huger,
their demise due to Rod Stewart's Mott The Hoople supplying any form of overlooked delicate way with a ballad, inter-band discontent precipitating the
exploding solo career all the more street level rampancy. But The Faces while 'Maybe I'm Amazed' was a departure of Ronnie Lane after ’73's
frustrating and Woody's departure to the also boasted a rare kind of internal cracking live version of one of the last comparatively flimsy Ooh La La. The
Stones more understandable. combustion which could cook up a songs Paul McCartney had written while Faces' days were numbered but they still
After the band was formed in 1969 scorching groove and fry it in Memphis in The Beatles. Its studio incarnation, went out with a great single in 'You Can
by these two refugees from Jeff Beck's Make Me Dance, Sing Or Anything',
group and Small Faces, Ronnie Lane, “The Faces also boasted a rare kind of which boasted one of their most
Ian McLagan and Kenney Jones (who sublime ballads on its flip in 'As Long As
Steve Marriott had abandoned in favour
internal combustion which could cook up a You Tell Him'.
of the lumpen Humble Pie), their aptly- scorching groove and fry it in Memphis soul Then they were gone. Although these
titled First Step debut was a tad sauce while sounding like they had just been albums are readily available, and some
premature, although the rollicking 'Three of the extras have appeared before too,
Button Hand Me Down', raucous 'Shake thrown out of the pub” it's good to have them all in one place;
Shiver Shudder' and sublime blues warts, flatulence and all.

72
pp72-95_Shindig_50_ANDY 28/08/2015 12:37 Page 73

JOHN BAKER
The Vendetta Tapes
BRUCE AND VLADY
The Reality
some long forgotten slice of cinematic
exotica.
THEN
★★★★ ★★★★ Grahame Bent
Buried Treasure CD/LP Vampisoul CD aside any facile attempts at tidy
Following recent Sporting the calibre ALICE COLTRANE categorisation, at its simplest the five
vinyl reissues of all of sleeve artwork Universal Consciousness compositions that together make up the
the major usually encountered ★★★★ album are nothing more, nothing less
Radiophonic in charity shop Superior Viaduct LP than musical representations of
releases, it at one digging raids, The Regarded by many mankind’s continued quest for
point seemed like Reality’s album as the purest enlightenment.
the well might have at last run dry. cover belies the true intensity of the distillation of the Grahame Bent
However since then, with the revitalised sounds lurking inside. For the record, sound and musical
Workshop on tour and the promise of Bruce was Bruce Powell an American ideals of the great BONNIE DOBSON
a new album still looming, things have Hammond B-3 player and Vlady was Alice Coltrane, Dear Companion
been looking up for lovers of Mills, Wladyslaw Jagiello, a Polish jazz Universal Consciousness (1971) finds ★★★★★
Kingsland, Howell et al’s brand of drummer who crossed first paths in a the pianist/harpist accompanied by an Big Beat CD
quirky, jazzy electronic musique Stockholm rock club and decided to extraordinary congregation of musicians Bonnie Dobson is
concrète. pool their talents there and then. You which includes bassist Jimmy Garrison, probably best
The archive cupboard has turned can do a lot with a Hammond B-3 and the triple drummer battery of Jack De known to Shindig!
out to be far from bare too. This a drum kit and The Reality bears Johnette, Rashid Ali and Clifford Jones, readers as the
collection of tracks produced by Baker spectacular witness to this as Bruce tamboura player Tulsi and a string author of the much-
for the now mostly-lost late ‘60s BBC and Vlady head off on a series of trippy section that adds a shimmering celestial covered ‘Morning
TV thriller, Vendetta, is a fascinating groove explorations illuminated en dimension to the sound. Dew’, but this timely reissue of her
fusion of his percussive, choppy sound route by Bruce’s wigged-out hipster While the resulting audio tapestry second album, from 1960, once again
palette, superb melodic jazz vocal observations on the nature of fuses aspects of free and spiritual jazz proves that there is much more to her
sensibilities, and the prevailing “reality”. with Indian musical forms, forging them talents than one great song.
swaggering post-Bond soundtrack feel Originally released in 1970 on the into a dazzling hybrid which, on Made up almost entirely of
of the era (John Barry produced Svensk American label (which folded occasion, veers towards what might be traditional material, there’s an unusually
Vendetta’s iconic theme music). The shortly after), vibe-wise this remarkable considered the orchestral avant-garde cosmopolitan outlook to her choice of
combination works brilliantly. “lost” Swedish jazz album oscillates this is nevertheless still jazz but jazz as songs, pulling in tunes from France and
Completists take note: the CD between a full-on psychedelic freakout few have ever had the requisite mind set Eastern Europe as well as English-
version has 10 more tracks than the and the very happening score from and the chops to perform it. Setting speaking countries. She made a point of
LP. A shame for vinyl lovers – this would
have made a nice double album.
Christopher Budd

BLOOMFIELD KOOPER
STILLS
Too Soft To Rock
Supersession 5.1
★★★★ teenage version of Crosby, Stills & Nash rather good, 1971’s fine self-titled
BLOOD, SWEAT & then slowly morphed into a schmaltzy debut awash with a hazy hashish ’60s
TEARS MOR juggernaut – so the prospect of hangover and follow-up, Homecoming,
Child Is Father To The Man wading through eight CDs of their music a folk-rock disc in thrall to Déjà Vu but
★★★★ filled me some trepidation. with enough of its own homespun
Both Audio Fidelity 5.1 SACDs Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad. This charm. Album number three, Hat Trick,
For a brief is after still the band who struck gold is just awful, however, a soft-rock
moment, multi- with the Neil Young-wannabe ‘A Horse monstrosity lacking both spine and
channel sound With No Name’, the winning ‘Ventura groove. The next few albums saw the
appeared to be Highway’ (which sounds particularly band hooking up with George Martin,
the future of good whilst driving a convertible down and the fifth Beatle ensured that not
audio, but due to the 101), and the George Harrison- every album would be a complete
a confusion of formats it never caught aping ‘Sister Golden Hair’ (the best washout – thanks in large part to his
on. In 2004, just as Al Kooper AMERICA song Big Star never wrote and one of sonic skills, they all have at least one or
completed 5.1 mixes of two classic The Warner Bros Years the great pop songs of the era). I mean, two decent tracks, (‘Sister Golden Hair’
albums, the majors ditched the 1971-1977 for every saccharine ‘Muskrat Love’ and an obvious standout), but ultimately the
surround concept. Over 10 years later ★★★ horrible cod-reggae ‘Woman Tonight’ band’s output is a triumph of
those mixes have finally been released Warner Brothers 8-CD box set there’d be a far out ‘Sandman’, right? production and virtuosity over
with fascinating liner notes by Kooper. America were a trio of ex-pat Americans Well no, not really. songwriting.
These are the first psychedelic in London who formed their own Albums one and two are actually Tom Patterson
albums of the ’60s to receive the
surround sound treatment and it Dan Peek, Gerry Beckley and
Dewey Bunnell. All-American
surpasses all expectations. Kooper has
done an amazing job taking the
sound, expanding it and sending the
psychedelic effects right around the
room in a way that could only have
been dreamt of in 1968.
It’s hard to choose the best
moment but the phased ‘You Don’t
Love Me’ on Supersession is now in
mind-blowing 3D, the Moog and guitar
solos on ‘His Holy Modal Majesty’ are
physically alive and Child Is Father...
now resembles an album you’ve never
heard before. Who needs drugs?
Incredible.
Richard Allen

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pp72-95_Shindig_50_ANDY 28/08/2015 12:38 Page 74

THEN learning these songs directly from oral

sources and manuscripts, which gives
until it was lost in a flood. Ironically, the
album earned the musicians parole,
them a strong sense of immediacy and which split the band, making this unique
verisimilitude. The arrangements are one-off blast from the darker side of US
sparse, and her voice shifts seamlessly African-American history a truly priceless
between pure, glacial beauty and warm document.
sensuality. On the a capella ‘Ben’s Kris Needs
Lullaby’, her singing is almost painfully
beautiful; rich, resonant, and touchingly THE ELECTRIC FLAG
sweet. ‘The Cruel Mother’, learned from Old Glory: The Best Of
Shirley Collins, is a chilling tale of ★★★★
infanticide, sensitively rendered. A Retro World CD
mesmerising and gorgeous record. Usually the deal
Neil Hussey with any Best Of
collection is that it
DR JOHN pulls together the
The Atco/Atlantic Singles strongest material
1968-74 from across an
★★★★ artist’s discography. In the case of Old
Omnivore CD Glory, the vast majority of the tracks are
The artist known as drawn from The Electric Flag’s all-
Dr John has done defining debut album from 1967, A
plenty of memorable Long Time Coming (including alternative
work both before versions of tracks from the same) with
and after the time the balance of material coming in the
Carole King in the comfort of the studio period contained on form of four titles from the band’s
this collection, but the vast majority of second outing, The Electric Flag: An
his top career highlights as a solo artist American Band, previously unreleased

Queen Of are captured here. The A and B-sides

presented in the compilation work
together to create a supernatural
embarrassment of musical riches.
demos and live recordings from their
appearance at Monterey Pop, which just
happened to be the band’s first ever gig.
Considering that Mike Bloomfield, the

The Canyon Mystical, funky, soulful, dangerous,

streetwise and swampwise, they reveal
Dr John to be a kind of voodoo
initial driving force behind The Electric
Flag, quit after the release of the debut
album, in terms of presenting the
ringleader with a seemingly limitless strongest possible collection of material
THE
SD ALBUMS
CITY ARTISTS didn’t
dionums stopandionse
her inadvertently
dio odip lighting
elis array of groove-laden talents. He can be on one disc, this atypical approach to
GOES
Now IN Everything’s
That THIS SPACEBeen the touch
augait nit paper
lutatiounderdolobor theinsinger-
euis et, spooky on a gem like ‘I Walk On Gilded selecting material actually makes some
Said
SD Albums title goes in this songwriter explosionquis
sustrud deliquisit, thateros
followed,
aci of Splinters’, then turn around and come sort of sense.
★★★★★
space here and in here course,
tisismo butdolore thatdiatetu
was still a couple
eriustie of
dolore off as good-timey on the irresistible Grahame Bent
★★★★
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the ‘Gris Gris Gumbo Ya Ya’ then turn dance GEORGIE FAME
behest
faccumsan of fellow
ullut émigrés
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band
esequat members, guitarist dipsum
acil irillamcore Danny Wrong Time’. Throughout the varied Strings / The CBS As & Bs
Kortchmar
dolore commodip and bassist Charlesam,
esequissit Larkey tracks, the one constant (besides the ★★★★
(King’s
corem inimthen-squeeze
nibh following her consistent high quality) is the BGO 2-CD
split
Duis from
eum Goffin).
et augiam Egged on by vel
incilisisim shamanistic character of the Few artists threw
producer
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King as azzriure
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enit, vel ut Powell did during his
to perform,
laore moditeven velit in frontfaccum
laore of her incilisci THE EDGE OF DAYBREAK late ’60s / early
collaborators,
essenit iriure venisiwas slowly eroded and
te modiatue Eyes Of Love ’70s solo tenure
she beganctetue
molesse sharing her latest
deliquam vulla feu feu ★★★★★ with CBS. While his mastery of tough,
creations,
faccum zzriustenlisting new writing
ionsenis augiam in Numero Group CD/LP Booker T / Jimmy Smith-indebted soul
partners
ullan uteinminis Davidexerit
Palmer [Link],
Pit more
luptat, Numero's knack for and R&B continued to find an
Some
SD Albumstime
labelback
goes Light
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commodo luptatio Toni [Link] veratie tis unearthing pure soul occasional home on B-sides (see
head honcho
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et augiam placed
incilisisim velThe dolorTheam dozen songs
veliquis that make
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City’s lone 1968
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time between at velthe sources hits new became increasingly commercial, often
his “dream
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acknowledging
iliquisim zzriurethat tatiesuchfeui aenit,
dreamvel may
ut Aadigniam,
Giant Step’ ver and
susto ‘Pleasant
consecte Valley
min sparkling set Ballad Of Bonnie And Clyde’),
be
laorean modit
impossible one due
velit laore to incilisci
faccum Sunday’ and theblaebullient,
henim zzriusci aliquat vel FM-friendly
iure recorded by inmates at Richmond, occasionally giving way to effortless,
contractual
essenit iriureissues.
venisiStill, why be “a
te modiatue tones of first Writer,
commodigniam and then utem
dolob’eliquatin Virginia's State Farm penitentiary in sublime creations like ‘Peaceful’ and
man
molessewithout
ctetue a dream”?
deliquamNow, wefeu
vulla canfeu Tapestry. ‘Wasn’t Born To Follow’ had
augait, vulputat. 1979. Recorded over five strict hours four-to-the-floor funk-rockers like
luxuriate in the ionsenis
faccum zzriust reflected augiam
glory of inLITA’s already
SD Albums beenwriter
covered by The Byrds; under the cold gaze of armed guards, ‘Somebody Stole My Thunder’.
triumph
ullan utewithminis their longprat.
exerit awaited edition
Pit luptat, ‘Snow
Xxxxxx Queen’, ‘Now That Everything’s the eight tracks present an enthralling, This run of 45s – from ’67’s
of said album.
commodo luptatio con veratie tis Been Said’, ‘Paradise Alley’ and ‘That often moving update on the field ‘Because I Love You’ to a piano-led take
dolorButam why would adigna
veliquis what is feuip
effectively a Old Sweet Roll (Hi-De-Ho)’ would also recording concept, which had to be on James Taylor’s ‘Fire And Rain’ three
half-forgotten
eummy nulputCarole King anomaly
atue doluptat at vel find their mark in the hands of other pulled off in first takes. years later – is collected on this set’s
have
ing erfloated to theduissenibh
sequiscilit top of such eaa taste artists. But, sadly for us, this fleeting The musicians, who were serving extremely satisfying second disc, while
maker’s
adigniam, bucket list inconsecte
ver susto the first place?
min experiment in “Carole King as non- between six to 60 years, rose to the the first finds Fame in full-on MOR /
henimWhen CaroleblaKing
zzriusci left New
aliquat York for
vel iure starring band member” was occasion, unfurling sweet soul harmony easy mode on a selection of pop and
LA’s Laurel Canyon
commodigniam in 1967, she was
dolob’ unsustainable, otherwise we might be ballads, up-tempo funk workouts and jazz standards with no sign of his
in aOmmy
dark place.
nostrud Herdolendrerat.
marriage to Iquat listening to the singer’s own take on EWF-style optimism with remarkable trademark Hammond attack in
childhood
ip estie velsweetheart
ut irit nisi and songwriting
bla facilla ‘The Porpoise Song’ today. And what ability, telepathy and polish. The project evidence. The ’67 Knock On Wood EP
partner
conulputGerrylore Goffin was onero
facin henibh theodorocks
od could be better than that? was financed by a local record store bridges the two worlds and provides
and she was
doleniam dit alaoreet
motherlaoffacipittwo. That
ute vel Andy Morten owner, who booked the mobile studio some much much-needed respite.
then sold the album's 1,000 pressing Andy Morten

74
GOLDBERG
Misty Flats
through the wonder of 5.1 surround
sound. Taking up four of the 5.1
the stellar outpourings of steel-string
pioneer John Fahey, who also started
THEN
★★★★ channels the original quad mix can his career with a lovingly self-pressed
Future Days CD/LP now easily be heard and fairly album. with the Appalachian romp-along ‘Log
This mystifying inexpensively if that’s your bag. When The spellbinding instrumentals Cabin Home In The Sky’ and the
album was recorded the majors had any interest they which Hulburt crammed into his sole country-tinged hymnal, ‘Greatest
to two-track in 1974 concentrated on the usual mainstream 1972 album ripple and glower with Friend’.
for Michael Yonkers’ stuff so it’s gratifying to see speciality dazzling dexterity and, on tracks such ISB would limp on until ’74, by
label with only 500 labels now filling demand. as ‘Sunset’, ‘All Night Waitress’ and which time their stock would be greatly
copies issued. This comp of one of the great ‘Clark St.’, shimmer with the kind of diminished but for now they were still
Stripped back and bare, it fits the folk Canadian ’60s bands is a delight. other-worldly arcane luminescence on top of their game. Being a double
bill, but the songs also pay tribute to ‘Laughing’, ‘American Woman’ and which graced Fahey's seminal works, album there are moments where you
Goldberg’s earlier life in powerpop band ‘Share The Land’ now sound huge and along with that indefinable but crucial feel compelled to go out and put the
The Batch, format and structure rather truly three dimensional, filling the room sense of wonder and mischief. kettle on. As a single disc it could have
than sound, and a punkishness inspired with a completely new perspective. Hulburt ended up living in Paris been a classic of its rather singular
by Lennon’s Plastic Ono Band. When you switch back to stereo it’s until his death in 2012. We should be genre.
Like other similarly now respected like dropping to mono. glad to know about him. A proper Ian Fraser
albums it’s crude, innocent and Although quad isn’t as exciting as mind-blowing revelation for Fahey-ites.
retrospective; not surprising when a true dedicated 5.1, the idea of Kris Needs IRON BUTTERFLY
considering Goldberg was 23 at the obtaining Beaver & Krause’s Ball / Metamorphosis
time. Alex Chilton and Neil Young are the Gandharva and Jefferson Airplane’s THE INCREDIBLE ★★
easiest reference points for his wavering Volunteers in quad 5.1 is truly ear- STRING BAND BGO 2-CD
voice and plaintive lyrics, but this is a watering. More please. Wee Tam And The Big Huge Formed in San
cohesive “loner folk” album all of its own Richard Allen ★★★★ Diego in the mid-
making that sits easily alongside the BGO 2-CD 60s Iron Butterfly
mentioned artists, and sounds at times JOHN HULBURT After the high attained huge
like a basement version of John Phillips’ Opus III watermark commercial success
Wolf King Of LA pointing the way for the ★★★★★ established by their and lasting fame
purposefully mournful and low key Tompkins Square CD two previous with 1968’s ‘In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida’.
artists of today. An understated gem. Tompkins Square releases this, The These subsequent and often overlooked
Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills have long been ISB’s most releases receive their long-awaited
outdoing ambitious project to date (1968), dusting off as part of BGO’s twofer
THE GUESS WHO themselves in found core duo Robin Williamson and series of retrospectives.
The Best Of The Guess Who resuscitating Mike Heron in increasingly spiritual 1969’s Ball veers between heavier
★★★ obscure, long-lost mood. proto-prog workouts (‘In The Time Of
Audio Fidelity 5.1 SACD Quad recordings from a bygone age but this The more expansive and esoteric Our Lives’) and soulful lounge-bar
With a wealth of latest missive, co-curated by the numbers (‘Job’s Tears’, ‘Ducks On A schmooze blues (‘Lonely Bar’) while ‘It
quadrophonic label's Ryley Walker, is up there with Pond’, ‘The Son Of Noah’s Brother’) Must Be Love’ makes you wonder how
mixes made in the label's greatest achievements. John come courtesy of Williamson, although early Jethro Tull might have sounded
the ’70s it makes Hulburt came up in Chicago garage Heron – vocally the stronger of the pair had they been American. It’s definitely a
perfect sense to band The Knaves but took on a deeper but usually more lightweight in terms patchwork quilt, both quality-wise and
release them mission after he became enthralled by of composition – hardly disappoints in terms of categorisation. The following

Solid Soul Sensations

THE FANTASTIC FOUR the way of success. Led by portly lead the capacity to astound. You can add floater. Similarly, The Swans’ ‘Nitty Gritty
The Lost Motown Album singer “Sweet” James Epps, their obscure names like Bobby Whitlock, City’ and The Superbs’ ‘Goddess Of
★★★ cancelled Motown album, How Sweet Ilana, Colette Kelly and Roz Ryan to a Love’ would keep a northern party in full
VARIOUS ARTISTS He Is, remained unreleased, until now. heady mix of funky, creamy and spine- swing. Intriguingly, slightly leftfield twists
Ian Levine's Solid Stax The Lost Motown Album rights that tingling sanctified soul. Oh yes. can be heard in The Fidels’ pounding
Sensations wrong with 13 bonus tracks, many On an even scarcer note, Doré LA ‘I’m Givin’ You Notice Baby’, The
★★★★★ previously unissued. Epps ragged and Soul Sides 2 contains varying styles Superbs’ funky, flute assisted ‘Wind In
VARIOUS ARTISTS passionate lead vocal is the main from across the years. The Vows’ My Sails’ and the quirky ‘Funky With My
Doré LA Soul Sides 2 vehicle for these deep, sometimes heavenly doo-wop inspired ‘I Wanna Stuff’ by The Natural Resources. More
★★★★ heartbreaking, sometimes heartening Chance’ is the earliest track from 1962; eclectic still is the ‘Louie Louie’ stomp
All Kent CDs recitals. The grown-up lyrics and Gail Anderson’s ‘Just A Little Ugly’ from of Smoky & The Bears and the
gorgeous sweeping arrangements were ’81 is iffy ’80s sister soul. Better is The discofied Shaft-like workout by Willie &
probably deemed too deep for a pop Entertainers IV’s ‘Getting Back Into The Euphonics.
savvy, hook hungry audience to fully Circulation’, an exquisite northern soul Paul Ritchie
appreciate back in the day, but there’s
Motown magic to be found in these Margie Joseph’s
last chance
perfectly crafted grooves.
Next up is a revealing look at what
lurks in the cupboard of an ardent Stax
collector. Ian Levine's Solid Stax
Sensations is one of the best Stax
releases I’ve heard in a long time.
There’s hardly a duff track on here and
most of it is relatively rare or under-
appreciated. Take Margie Joseph’s
Berry Gordy acquired The Fantastic Four intoxicating ‘One More Chance’, one of
from the Ric-Tic label, but their tenure the better known tracks here, but
at Motown yielded surprisingly little in representative of a sound that still has

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pp72-95_Shindig_50_ANDY 28/08/2015 12:39 Page 76

THEN year’s Metamorphosis is more

consistent and polished yet less
Marks’ home, the album comes with a
52-page book which details Marks’
intriguing. ‘Butterfly Bleu’ provides the career complete with full recording
over-stretched 14-minute highlight but credits, label scans, lyric sheets and
although the rest of the album may be previously unseen photos.
hard to fault it’s just as hard to love as Grahame Bent
all but a glimmer of experimentation is
buried under slabs of blues-rock. MOTHER NATURE
Not disposable by any means but Orange Days And Purple
hardly indispensable either. Nights
Ian Fraser ★★★
Tenth Planet CD
LONNIE LISTON SMITH & Buckinghamshire
THE COSMIC ECHOES quartet Sleepy Rojo
Visions Of A New World (later Mother
★★★★ Nature) not only
BGP CD managed to upset
Prior to fronting The Mickey Most and
Cosmic Echoes, make two wonderful progressive folk-
Lonnie Liston Smith pop singles but also recorded a bunch
was already a much of similarly digestible demos and
in-demand unreleased recordings between 1968
keyboardist, having and ’72.
previously been a key component in By far the best moment is ‘Orange
Deadbeats. Garcia and co in ’66 the bands of Roland Kirk, Pharoah Days And Purple Nights’ – prime
Sanders, Leon Thomas and Gato Fading Yellow-grade orchestrated bliss.
Barbieri, not to mention a brief sojourn The lush orchestral arrangement –

The Trip That with Miles Davis during the early ’70s.
Released as his fourth album on
Bob Thiele’s Flying Dutchman label in
1975, Visions Of A New World’s
reportedly by Paul Buckmaster – in
combination with the delicate West
Cost influenced harmonies and folksy
electric guitar work results in a sound

Never Ends uplifting vibes of peace and positivity

are the sound of Lonnie Liston Smith at
his commercial peak, refining the
musically not dissimilar from
Marmalade’s ‘Reflections Of My Life’
but with more kudos. Equally
spacey blends of jazz and soul enchanting follow-up, ‘Once There Was
available in two formats: for the previously unveiled to great effect on A Time’, maintains the quality but, as
completist, there’s an 80-disc (!) set, Astral Travelling (’73), Cosmic Funk is often the way with this kind of
featuring 30 unreleased live shows. (’74) and Expansions (’75) and archival project, the material starts to
That’s one from each year from 1965- marrying them to a funk undercarriage. spread thin when filling an entire CD.
95, complete with a 7” single, a 288- With his brother Donald featured on Nevertheless, it remains worthwhile.
page book and, erm, a scroll. Then for vocals, such is the stylistic and Richard Allen
the mere mortals, there’s this four-disc thematic unity evident throughout the
overview, which is more than album that everything flows with all the TOM RUSH
adequate. fluidity of a near-perfect song and Tom Rush / Take A Little
As you’d expect, the set is loaded instrumental cycle. Walk With Me
with sweet jams from all eras. Personal Grahame Bent ★★★
favourites including a lovely, shape- BGO CD
shifting ‘Uncle John’s Band’ from ’74, RICHARD MARKS Rush’s first Elektra
GRATEFUL DEAD and a deep, soulful ‘Estimated Never Satisfied album (his fourth
30 Trips Around The Sun: Prophet’ from ’78 – but the early stuff ★★★★ overall) is mostly
The Definitive Live Story is particularly fascinating, revealing the Now-Again CD traditional tunes
1965-1995 Dead as a white-hot, paint-stripping This anthology of that continue to
★★★★★ R&B band; prime dance floor groovers seriously rare show Dylan and
Rhino 4-CD peddling a deliciously lysergic stew of recordings Leadbelly influences with lots of
How times change. When I first began amp-shredding blues and soul sounds. documents the harmonica (courtesy John Sebastian)
listening to the Dead some 35 years The totemic ‘Dark Star’ from ’68 is as entire recorded and (acoustic) slide accompaniment.
ago, they were musical pariahs on the allusive (and elusive) as you’d imagine, output of Richard It’s a relaxing mix of folk (including two
late ’70s/early ’80s music scene, spreading its cosmic mysteries into Marks, an all but forgotten southern Woody Guthrie covers) and blues (‘If
universally mocked and derided by areas which still remain largely soul man from the heyday of the Your Man Gets Busted’, ‘Milk Cow
sputum-drenched punks and mascara- unexplored, even by the most Atlanta soul scene of the late ’60s and Blues’, ‘Black Mountain Blues’) that’s
ed Bowie wannabees. Now, in the adventurous bands, a hinterland where the early to mid-70s. All 21 tracks not much different from his first three
wake of their 50th birthday farewell rock, jazz and psychedelia meet in a showcased here were originally albums. Highlights include an eerie
shows, and a slew of cover features in singularly creative cosmic union . released between 1968 and ’76 on a solo take on ‘Poor Man’ and the good-
the glossy music monthlies – including There’s a consensus amongst string of 45s issued on a series of timey ‘Solid Gone’.
this esteemed organ – the Dead are in certain Deadheads that the band lost small local labels including Tuska, The ’66 follow-up marked his
serious danger of becoming hip. something after their ’75 hiatus: a Shout, Note, RSC and Free Spirit, and venture into folk-rock, with Dylan’s
Throughout their long strange trip, damping of their collective fire are only now being reissued for the electric sidemen (Al Kooper, Harvey
they’ve remained resolutely in tune perhaps, a less exploratory approach first time. Brooks et al) featured on the electric
with their founding musical principles, to live performance, and while there’s A much sought-after artist among Side One, comprised of fun-but-
drawing deep from the well of Great some truth in that, they were still hard core soul and funk collectors, inconsequential rave-ups of Berry,
American Music (in all its forms), and formidable on a good night. Marks never released an album during Holly, Diddley and Dixon. The acoustic
suffusing it with the spirit of freedom, Love them or hate them, the Dead his lifetime, making this lovingly Side Two is more memorable, featuring
experimentation and deep, deep joy. were a one-off; true, old-school mould- assembled CD the sole anthology of two of his best-loved recordings in
If further proof were needed, check breakers, and this is a fine celebration his material currently in print. Besides ‘Joshua Gone Barbados’ and a rare
out this monster – a comprehensive of their legacy. the anthology, which includes two original composition, the gospel-
overview of the band’s live career, Neil Hussey previously unreleased tracks inflected ‘Galveston Flood’.
discovered on the original tape reels in Jeff Penczak

76
pp72-95_Shindig_50_ANDY 28/08/2015 12:39 Page 77

SABATTIS LABI SIFFRE

Warning In The Sky Labi Siffre
★★★ Crying Laughing Loving Lying
Out-sider LP The Singer And The Song
The band name For The Children
and album title All ★★★★
might hint at some All Edsel CDs
sort of proto-doom Perhaps more
act, but Rochester, famous, in the UK
New York’s Sabattis at least, for
were very much in the vein of Grand Madness covering
Funk Railroad or Iron Butterfly. his 1971 hit, ‘It
Originally recorded in 1970, these Must Be Love’, and
recordings were first released on CD in various samples being pinched by
2011 and this is their debut everyone from Eminem to Fat Boy
appearance on vinyl. Slim, the singer and songwriter of
Powered by swirling Hammond and Barbadian and Belgian descent
tough lead guitar parts, the material proffered a number of hits, issuing six
works best on ballsy rockers like ‘The albums between ’70 and ’75. The first
Devil’s In You’ and lead-off track, four of these have now received
‘Everyday Is Cool’, which sports a expanded editions. And quite why
memorable riff and solo. The long Siffre isn’t more spoken about needs
ballad, ‘Conversation With Billy’, also to be rectified.
succeeds with its unnerving An openly gay, black man growing
Smoke gets in his eyes.
atmosphere and lyrics. up in middle class London was bound Bert in mid-60s action
Elsewhere, tracks like ‘Crystal to be the object of prejudice and
Mirror’ never really leave first gear and throughout these albums the
drift by pleasurably, though
unmemorably.
The album is generally well-
mannered when you wish it were
singer/songwriter reacts victoriously
with humour and intelligence.
Musically, there’s a dose of Macca,
Gilbert O’Sullivan and Nilsson
Kissing Cousins
wilder, but this is still a decent slab of (including a cover of Harry’s ‘Maybe’
early heavy-rock and of interest to on the debut), a folksiness akin to Cat recorded vocals on a typically stoned
genre fans. Stevens and the cool funk, soul and ‘A Man I’d Rather Be’). Renbourn’s
The accompanying liner notes and jazz vibes that Rodriguez touched upon lead acoustic playing on ‘My Lover’
images are illuminative of the band’s with equal success. It’s the moody folk and the collaborative ‘Lucky Thirteen’,
short history. of the debut album and the more which he wrote,
dunt laore dolummod unveilstate
an magna feu
Austin Matthews produced leanings of For The Children association
faccumsan ullut that lore would continue for
magnibh
that are the outright winners, but many
esequat years,
acil and severaldipsum
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BUFFY SAINTE-MARIE they’re all great. short
doloreinstrumentals
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stances (‘Los Pescadores’, ‘Welcome one of the quintessential anthems of faccum zzriust
receiving ionsenis
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SD Albums 14writer
years later – having
Welcome Emigrante’) mirror Joan the emerging folk-rock movement in ullan ute
former (hisminis exerit prat.
sophomore Pit luptat,
effort) recorded so many songs together on
Xxxxxx
Baez’s contemporary passion to 1966, the Tom Wilson-fortified The commodo luptatio
celebrates its 50thcon veratie tis
anniversary, each other’s albums, it seems fitting
champion underdogs and outcasts. Sounds Of Silence, but their final dolor am aveliquis
released mere eightadigna feuip after
months they “make it official”. It’s a loose
‘Groundhog’ and ‘Come All Ye Fair studio project in ’69 featured a title eummy
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early albums, ‘Piney Wood Hills’ is proved an instant classic. henim zzriusci
anything on parblawith aliquat vel iure
‘Strolling Down where the other was taking the mostly
much more effective in its original, Their close, distinctively balanced commodigniam
The Highway’ or dolob’‘Needle of Death’. improvised, predominantly original
folkier traveling vagabond rendition, harmonies, reminiscent of The Everly LikeOmmy
Dylan,nostrud
his smoky, dolendrerat.
sleepy vocals,Iquat tunes. Perhaps no other album
and Patrick Sky’s title track continues Brothers, provide an inviting melodic ip estie
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which, while commendable, are, sadly, compositions. Two self-produced titles, augait end
songs nit lutatio dolobor
and surely in euis et,
influencing masterpiece of acoustic blues, folk,
quite forgettable, although the a ’66’s often overlooked Parsley, Sage, sustrud deliquisit,
everyone from Donovan quis eros andaciNick and jazz by two flatmates whose stars
capella ‘Lazarus’ sends shivers up the Rosemary And Thyme and ’68's tisismotodolore
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Roy dolore
Harper were still in ascendance.
spine. Bookends, deserve special mention – modion
(who henisitone
supplies accummy nit lor sed
of his earliest Jeff Penczak
Jeff Penczak the former generated five singles

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pp72-95_Shindig_50_ANDY 28/08/2015 12:40 Page 78

THEN

State Of Mind
SHAG family as one of the most prolific and
1969 respected US ’60s garage and
★★★ psychedelic reissue enterprises
THE BITTER SEEDS/ around.
ROCK SHOP Shag are known to Pebbles fans
State Of Your Mind for their fuzz punker, ‘Stop And Listen’,
★★★★ but less well-known is the band’s
THE RAINBOW PRESS album, issued on Gear Fab CD and
There’s A War On now for the first time disseminated on
★★★ vinyl. Frequenters of San Francisco
THE MONOCLES/THE bills and neighbours of The Grateful
HIGHER ELEVATION Dead, Shag deliver languid acid-blues
The Spider, The Fly And The typical of the era on ‘Lovely Lady’,
Boogie Man whereas the flute-infused ‘Gypsies In
★★★★ The Forest’ is a dead-ringer for early
All Out-sider LPs Tull.
The Bitter Seeds were also
denizens of the San Francisco scene, The Bitter Seeds: Pip music
kicking up an R&B storm out of
Monterey whilst appearing on bills
with SF giants such as the Dead and first legit vinyl edition of the New York content with one classic they gave us
the Airplane. A name change to The State band’s debut, reveals the ’68 three with the Pebbles monster, ‘The
Rock Shop accompanied the recording to be melodic, pop-psych Spider And The Fly’ by the former, and
incredible ‘State of Your Mind’ / ‘Halo’ with one fuzz pedal in the garage. It the latter producing the demented
45, a frantic blast of dance hall acid has a slightly baroque-pop feel, “must be heard to be believed” psych
mayhem from 1967 featured here particularly in the vocal department, monologue ‘The Diamond Mine’ (with
together with unreleased recordings underpinned by tasteful keyboards Dave Diamond) and the spacey
that in their entirety make up a no- and buzzing guitar leads, all illustrated ‘Odyssey’ – evoking Bull Of The Woods-
brainer purchase for any US psych by the moody title track. In many ways era Elevators. The remainder is
connoisseur. a neglected gem. pleasant folk-rock and teen beat and
Four legitimate, fully-annotated and The Rainbow Press’ debut album The Monocles, who evolved into a most satisfying selection by this
illustrated releases cement the has had a few bogus, crackly The Higher Elevation between ’65 and Colorado band.
reputation of the Guerssen Records incarnations over the years but this ’68, had a high kill rate. Not just Richard Allen

Sly in reflective mood

(including 'Homeward Bound' and 'The song communication with the
59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin' audience and the sheer unstoppable
Groovy)'), while the latter, a pensive power of the The Family Stone you get
song cycle of sorts, is probably their a tangible sense of occasion as soon
most satisfying work. as you hit the play button on this
Gary von Tersch booty bag of electrifying live
performances.
SLY & THE FAMILY STONE Grahame Bent
Live At The Fillmore East
October 4th & 5th 1968 PERCY SLEDGE /
★★★★ BEN E KING
Epic Legacy 4-CD box set The Bitter Seeds The Very Best Of Percy Sledge
Welcome to the & Ben E King
sound of soul ★★★★
dynamite. Rhino CD
What we have April was a grim
here is a complete month for soul
recording of Sly & music after the
The Family Stone’s four shows at New world lost two of its
York’s Fillmore East staged over two greatest singers in
nights in October 1968. Recorded by Percy Sledge, then
Epic for release as live album that was Ben E King. As this handy twin set
ultimately shelved with the tapes being shows, their catalogues went a lot
dispatched to the vaults, The Fillmore deeper than the two songs of theirs
East recordings show just how powerful which were used in Levi Jeans
a live act Sly and the gang already commercials.
were the best part of a year before Percy's first hit was 1966's
their barnstorming performance at gorgeously desolate 'When A Man Loves
Woodstock. A Woman', its sepulchral southern soul
Chief among the highlights here followed by further gems including
are versions of ‘Colour Me True’, ‘Love 'Warm And Tender Love' and 'It Tears Me
City’ and, most powerful of all, Sly’s Up' while, as this set shows, he could
consciousness-raising call to arms ‘Are also caress deep soul monuments such
You Ready’. Thanks to Sly’s lively inter- as 'Dark End Of The Street'.

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From Alabama to Harlem and Ben of Percy Mayfield’s ’Danger Zone’, Ode
E King, who left The Drifters and
scored with New York City classic,
'Spanish Harlem', before 'Stand By
To John Law from the same year is
entirely composed of STC originals and
continues the band’s exploration of the
’83 In ’15
Me' became his anthem. These are territory so potently mapped out on its
joined by further classics including predecessor. sessions. It’s comprehensive, but
'Supernatural Thing' and 'What Is Both titles come with the added there are omissions; one of the
Soul?' bonus of live tracks including ‘Freedom label’s oddest and best singles, Les
Here is some of the most sublime Road’ and the Crows’ famously Zarjaz’s ‘One Charming Night’, isn’t
music ever recorded. extended take of Dylan’s ‘Hollis here.
Kris Needs Brown’. It begins with The Legend! – AKA
Grahame Bent journalist Everett True – and his
DUSTY SPRINGFIELD awkward ranty ‘73 In 83’. It’s a great
Come For A Dream: The UK CHIP TAYLOR single, but not an accurate barometer
Sessions 1970-71 Gasoline of what’s to come. The main mood is
★★★★ ★★★ psychedelic shambolic – a type of
Real Gone CD Retro World CD Velvet Underground-indebted, pre-
After 1970’s Chip Taylor wrote C86, indie-pop. It’s here, in varying
Gamble & Huff- era-defining songs quality, in absolute spades.
helmed A Brand (‘Wild Thing’, ‘Angel Sometimes the style is done
New Me (AKA From Of The Morning’, brilliantly: The Pastels’ ‘Baby Honey’,
Dusty With Love), ‘Picture Me Gone’, The Loft’s ‘Up The Hill And Down The
Ms Springfield’s ‘I Can’t Let Go’, Slope’, The Bodines’ ‘God Bless’ and
albums became piecemeal affairs ‘Anyway That You Want Me’), loved to The Jasmine Minks’ ‘All Fall Down’.
comprised of ad-hoc tracks recorded live, did some gambling along that VARIOUS ARTISTS There are also a few terrible-but-
for Atlantic in the US and Philips in the road, played a bunch of country music Artifact: The Dawn Of distinctive numbers, like the toytown
UK. Indeed, it would be two and a half and to this day is a regular on the Creation Records 1983-85 psych of ‘Flowers In The Sky’ by The
years before that album’s follow-up, Americana circuit. This budget reissue ★★★ Revolving Paint Dream.
See All Her Faces – drawn largely from of Chip’s ’71 solo debut (originally on Cherry Red 5-CD box set The downside of this box is a
these sessions cut in London in mid- Buddha) is a no-frills introduction to Creation Records, one of the big indie general sameness; most of these
70 and late ’71 – appeared, and then an album of solid, country-flecked hitters of the ’80s and ’90s, found bands were similarly influenced with
in the UK alone. singer-songwriter fare. the zeitgeist time and time again. It analogous band structures (including
Constituting another “lost” early Beautifully crafted at Bell Studios gave platforms to Loveless, Going a notable lack of women), lacking a
’70s Dusty album (see also Real Gasoline is warm and lush, and turns Blank Again and Screamadelica, My Bloody Valentine-esque heft, and
Gone’s recent Faithful set), these 17 in some cracking songs; introspective, eventually hitting mainstream pay dirt hearing the lot in one go rams that
tracks – most of which appear on the desperate, humorous, but all beauties. with Oasis. Alongside household home. The best disc for the non-
still-essential ’99 set, Dusty In London ‘Swear To God Your Honour’ is a SD
names ALBUMS ARTISTS
and cult favourites, the label fanatic
commodo is the third, con
luptatio the veratie
only onetisto
– find Dusty tackling soulful rock, Kristofferson-style send-up of “country GOES
hosted odderIN THIS SPACE
experiments like Felt’s involve
dolor am a measure of curation.
veliquis adigna feuip These
emotional torch songs, lachrymose ways” and ‘Oh My Marie’ could have SD Albums
Let The Snakestitle Crinkle goes
Theirin thisTo
Heads selected
eummy nulput oddments
atue and albumat tracks
doluptat vel
ballads and Brazilian dazzlers. She fallen off Hayward and Lodge’s space
Death and here andThe
Momus’ in here
Poison are well-chosen
ing er sequiscilit(including
duissenibha ea
may have been struggling to find a Blue Jays. ★★★★
Boyfriend. fascinating
adigniam, ver early
susto takeconsecte
of JAMC’s min‘Just
voice for the new decade but the Unfortunately, Chip’s stab at that This new
SD Albums label box
goes insethere
predates all that. Like
henim Honey’),
zzriusciandbla feature
aliquat some raw
vel iure
quality of both performance and Merrilee Rush chart-topper, ‘Angel Of The
Duisonly
eumreal stars included
et augiam herevelare
incilisisim live performances.
commodigniam dolob’
arrangement (Keith Mansfield, Peter The Morning’, doesn’t quite stack up, Primal Scream
exer sustrud enimandam Jesus
quat,And Mary
quat. Ut The
Ommy inherent
nostrud tension with a Iquat
dolendrerat.
Knight and Wally Stott, among others) there are just too many irreproachable Chain
veratet(with
nonum thedo former in a gentle,
dio dolobor eetuerc complete
ip estie vellabelut iritbox nisisetblais facilla
that you get
would not be equalled again. ‘Wasn’t versions out there. jangly
iliquisimguise virtually
zzriure tatie unrecognisable
feui enit, vel ut the indifferent
conulput and the
lore facin henibhdownright
ero odo od
Born To Follow’, ‘How Can I Be Sure’, Louis Comfort-Wiggett from
laore their
moditfamevelityears).
laore faccum incilisci awful
doleniamalongside the sparklers.
dit laoreet la facipit uteIt vel
‘Mixed Up Girl’ and the title track The iriure
essenit first two CDstecollate
venisi modiatue the usually
dionumsmakes it suitable
andionse dio odip forelis
the
alone should have fans and novices VARIOUS ARTISTS label’s
molessesingles
ctetueindeliquam
release order; the feu
vulla feu hardcore
augait nit and fewdolobor
lutatio [Link],
et,
alike queuing up for this one. Happy Lovin’ Time: Sunshine third
faccum is “rarities and album
zzriust ionsenis tracks”;
augiam in in the final
sustrud analysis,
deliquisit, quisis no
erosdifferent.
aci
Andy Morten Pop From The Garpax Vaults the
ullanfourth demos;
ute minis theprat.
exerit fifth Pit
BBCluptat, Jeanette
tisismo doloreLeechdiatetu eriustie dolore
★★★★
STONE THE CROWS Big Beat CD Jesus And Mary Chain with Bobby Gillespie, front
Stone The Crows / Alec Palao’s
Ode To John Law delightful showcase
★★★★ of dreamy, fresh-as-
Angel Air CD a-daisy psychedelic
Fronted by Maggie pop is primarily the
Bell’s husky Joplin- work of three ultra-
esque vocals and talented souls: Gary S Paxton, a one-
also boasting the man singing, playing, writing,
talents of arranging, producing and engineering
bassist/vocalist whirlwind; studio hand and songwriter
Jimmy Dewar and ill-fated guitarist Les Kenny Johnson; and in-house backing
Harvey (younger brother of Alex), Stone vocalist Curt Boettcher, no less.
The Crows with their potent brew of Between 1966 and ’69 Paxton,
soul and blues sadly remain a from the airless hothouse of a
somewhat undervalued act in the converted bus, coaxed a variety of acts
annals of early ’70s British rock. to concoct an exquisite blend of
Originally released on Polydor in Pepper-era Beatles and Zombies pop
1970, their self-titled debut has much filtered through hazy Hollywood
to commend it, including the psychedelia and sunshine harmonies.
ferociously cranked ‘Raining In My Johnson recollects that, “We made way
Heart’, powerful re-workings of Josh better records than we needed to for
White’s ‘Blind Man’ and ‘Fool On The the budget. Gary wanted to make
Hill and the 17-minute epic ‘I Saw everything great.” It shows.
America’. With the exception of a cover Check The Four Freshmen’s

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THEN such as Stax and Hi but, after the

industry changed with musical trends,
VARIOUS ARTISTS
Motor City: The Motown Vocal
interesting than gripping but such
microscopic documents are essential in
the city's studios had to adapt. As this Group Sound this transient age, if only so lesser-
fabulous harmonies on ‘Nowhere To collection of obscure gems from the ★★★ known outings such as The Cap-Tans'
Go’, The Whatt Four’s languid Sounds Of Memphis operation shows, Fantastic Voyage 3-CD 'Tight Skirts And Crazy Sweaters' or The
‘Dandelion Wine’, the creepy psych- some labels managed to weather the It's always Ecuadors' 'You're My Desire' (featuring
folk of The Chocolate Tunnel’s ‘Ostrich changes with style and invention. fascinating to hear Etta James) don’t vanish into specialist
People’ and great cuts from Dave The label's initial success had the music Berry collectors' oblivion forever. And we love
Antrell, Mary Saxton, Willie & The been with names such as The Ovations Gordy released the scratches on Mickey McCuller's
Walkers, The Black Box and many but Sounds Of Memphis embraced the before the advent of obviously priceless 'I'll Cry A Million
more. post-disco boogie sound and The Supremes and Tears'.
Vic Templar unleashed some humdingers which Motown's rise to world domination. This Kris Needs
still kept the Memphis soul elements 89-track set is one of the most
VARIOUS ARTISTS bubbling. voluminous selections to date as VARIOUS ARTISTS
Groove With A Feeling: Many tracks here never saw release compiler Laurence Cane-Honeysett Psychemagik Presents
Sounds Of Memphis Boogie, so the world can be happy to receive a reaches into the vaults of Tamla, Magik Sunset Part Two
Soul and Funk 1975-1985 new treasure trove of Memphis action Motown, Miracle, Gordy and Mel-O-Dy, ★★★★
★★★★ from names including The Jacksonians along with Anna, Tri-Phi and Harvey. Leng CD/LP
BGP/Ace (with their lovely take on The Spinners' The selection is divided between Compilation number
Most Memphis soul 'I'll Be Around'), Everyday People, vocal groups such as The Temptations, two in a four set
sets focus on the Freedom Express, Vision, Lee Moore, Satintones, Miracles, Valadiers, Spinners series from crate
time when The Big Fran Farley and Erma Shaw, plus and The Five Quails from Cleveland, and diggers
Easy was firing out 'Unknown Artist' covering Isaac Hayes' singers including Barrett Strong, Marc extraordinaire Danny
hits on 'Do Your Thing'. Johnson, Ty Hunter and Eddie Holland. McLewin and Tom
independent labels Kris Needs Some tracks are more arcanely Coveney, AKA Psychemagik, and it

Surf City Confidential

VARIOUS ARTISTS
Here Today: The Songs Of
Brian Wilson
★★★★
Ace CD
His place in history may be assured,
but it’s curious how poorly Brian
Wilson’s legacy has been reflected by
other artists covering his songs.
There are a couple of explanations
for this. Firstly, such compilations are
usually overloaded with early “cars and
girls” material, this being by far the
most productive period of his career.
Then, when we get to the “post-
breakdown” years, explorations of
Brian’s work tend to dwell on largely
ignored corners of his back catalogue Brian Wilson practices his bowling
or bootlegs. Throwaway surf-pop
doesn’t sit terribly well alongside re-
imaginings of songs that were odd block of material written during his Betty Everett, best known for her mega- than howlers. Wondermint and latter-
enough in their original form. Fuck most fertile period, including the hit, ‘The Shoop Shoop Song (It’s In His day Brian mentor Darian Sahanaja
‘Honking Down The Highway’ – this is faithfully-reproduced title track, a 1966 Kiss)’. does a fine job of transforming ‘Do You
the man who wrote the sublime ‘Our single for the then-fading teen idol, Inevitably, a surfeit of dated period Have Any Regrets?’ from clompy Sweet
Sweet Love’ (on Sunflower) for Bobby Vee. That it sank without a trace pieces such as ‘Farmer’s Daughter’, ‘My Insanity demo to majestic ballad,
Chrissakes. Someone please cover that doesn’t reflect badly on Vee, or any of Buddy Seat’ and ‘Move Out, Little whilst orchestra leader Hugo
instead! the other five artists who delivered Mustang’ – recorded by the less-than- Montenegro, famed for his renditions of
Here Today holds up better than strong interpretations of songs from Pet legendary Basil Swift & The Seegrams, spaghetti western theme tunes, delivers
many previous similar celebrations of Sounds. These include Kirsty MacColl’s The Hondells and Rally-Packs – prevent a killer version of ‘Good Vibrations’. If
Brian’s work (including Ace’s own 2003 pretty take of ‘You Still Believe In Me’ this 25-track collection from being an only he’d credited the vocalists on the
release, Pet Projects: The Brian Wilson from ’81 and a soulful ’75 version of essential showcase of Brian’s genius. title track of his ’69 album…
Productions) because it features a ‘God Only Knows’ by gospel singer That said, there are still more surprises Chris Twomey

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pp72-95_Shindig_50_ANDY 28/08/2015 12:41 Page 81

continues the duo’s attempts to mould heard on distributors Light In The

the most obscure disco, electro, soft-
rock and yacht-pop numbers into a
dreamy lysergic soundscape. Unless
you’ve spent years pawing through racks
Attic’s essential Country Funk
(although the rough diamond and
semi rockin’ ‘Good Times’ by Andy
Johnson could easily sit on that
Off Their Rockers
at record shops from here to the back of series), these songs predominantly VARIOUS ARTISTS rauncherama of Five By Five’s
beyond, you won't have heard most of stick close to the forlorn country music Ultimate Bonehead wonderful ’15 Going On 20’ then add
the groups contained within (The Electric beloved of short-haired, yodelling Volumes 3 & 4 in copious cuts of fuzz stomp, swirling
Connection, anyone? Trepidant’s? Americans in awe of Hank Williams. Both ★★★★ organ and basement bass and you’ve
Plaisirs Erotique, or Glenn?). Ron McFarlin’s ‘Death Of Bobby Both Belter LPs got a knuckle sandwich of noise that
Obscurity means nothing however if Darin’ is an enjoyable oddity, the just won’t quit.
the quality is lacking – and for the most spoken ‘Second Rate’ by Lefty Volume 4 leans more towards the
part, Psychemagik’s mining has Bachelor is funny and Kenny Brent & heavy-psych end of the Richter scale.
delivered gold, 13 tracks of blissed-out Donna Harris’ ‘Shadows Of You’ is Acknowledgement must be handed to
Balearic grooves bathed in orange excellent, but the rest of this set Purple Sun for working the name of
sunshine. Occasional dud notes prove borders on the forgettable and their band into the lyrics of album
that not everything needs to be schmaltzy… and occasionally opener, ‘Doomsday’, and for the
resurrected from limbo (Instrumental excruciating. keyboard from the afterlife and other-
Group Cabas sound like a particularly Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills dimensional vocals of Rogues’
shonky cruise ship band), but for the ‘Coming Home’. There are echoes of
most part, this is a fine addition to an VARIOUS ARTISTS ‘Zig Zag Wanderer’-era Magic Band on
expanding series of comps. Troxy Music Screen 2 former ’50s rocker Larry Lynn’s
Tom Patterson ★★★ ‘Diamond Lady’ and some tempo-
Croydon Municipal CD juggling madness in the form of ‘Are
VARIOUS ARTISTS Martin Green is Hot on the heels of the first two We Alone’ (question mark not
Rough Trade Shops: your usher for releases in this series of arcane included) by Shepherd.
Heavenly 25 another delve into obscurities, Volume 3 leans to the The second side of this release
★★★ primarily British harder, rockier elements of the thud takes off into B-side B-movie horror
Rough Trade 2-CD ’50s and ’60s film and blunder that those armies of territory with the Sabbathy growling
The music business themes for Bob boogie bedevilled wannabes, who had guitar that punctuates ‘The Devil’s
may have changed Stanley’s marvellous Croydon Municipal escaped their teen garage roots for Come’ by The What and the proggy
beyond recognition imprint. No getting away from this being the crimson velour décor of the local heaviness underpinning Darkseid’s
since Heavenly first another age altogether, where the booze parlour or the wonky-tonk ‘Land Of The Darker Sun’. Not
introduced us to soundtrack humbly accompanied the hardwood floors and exotically smoky accepting their place scrubbing the
the disparate credits or simply provided a vocal haze of now forgotten venues, bottom stair of the pantheon of rock,
delights of Manic Street Preachers and divertissement for the lead actor(s). decided to commit to posterity. Stone Foxx show an utterly confident
Saint Etienne 25 years ago, but it’s Into the latter category sat the From the chunky Jesse Hector-like swagger on ‘Gypsy Lady’, whilst ‘Yours
heartening to discover there’s still novelty duet, in this case Juliet Mills vocals of Pelican Peace Band’s ‘Take Truly, Jack The Ripper’ sticks
great affection for a label whose only and Michael Redgrave’s rather It Off’ through the dodgy lyrics and Whitechapel and Detroit in the phonic
“brand identity” is its willingness to enjoyable calypso, ‘No My Darling speed backing of Hot Ash’s ‘Jail Bait’ blender and emerges with novelty
take a punt on “alternative” creative Daughter’. Deeply nostalgic for those of taking in the zipwire guitar and goth horror par excellence.
Britain. As this two-disc celebration of a certain age will be Henry Mancini’s floundering production of ‘Bring It On Lovingly cleaned up and packed
Heavenly’s 25th anniversary reveals, ‘Baby Elephant Walk’ and nursery sing- Home’ by Pendulum, this is a with Satanic soundbites and stream
their roster appears to be as wildly along, ‘The Big Ship Sails on the Alley- collection of unpretentious, punching, of unconsciousness lyrics, these
inconsistent, yet exciting, as ever. Alley-O’. We have frantic big band pounding proto-metal and percussive saved sounds from the landfill of the
CD one opens on a bit of a “So orchestrations (Shorty Rogers’ ‘The Wild rock. Caps must be doffed in the loud scream for your attention!
what?” moment with ‘Hermits On Ones’) and jaunty jazz ensemble pieces direction of the harmony-packed Henry Hutton
Holiday’ by the over-lauded Drinks (Ken Jones’ ‘Paper Chase’ and Johnny
before featuring stand-out moments by Scott’s ‘Scott Free’), whilst ‘Never Let
current signings such as Hooton Tennis Go’ is unmistakable early John Barry happening British jazz musicians of the evolved the sound into heavy frat-
Club, The Wytches, TOY, Gwenno and with trademark Vic Flick twang and era – are highly evocative of the rock, good enough to attract the
the brilliant Temples. The second CD is pizzicato strings. liberated atmosphere of the late ’60s attention of Sire Records. Their sole
a collation of Heavenly’s recent Record Sure, it’s frightfully dated, but the and early ’70s with original pressings album, 1967’s Microminiature Love –
Store Day single releases, previously best here possess a popcorn bucket of each having long since taken on the recorded in one hour – was subject to
only available on vinyl. load of charm. mantle of highly prized collector’s contract hoo-ha and not released
As you’d expect, there’s no stylistic Vic Templar items. until 2002.
consistency, but that’s Heavenly – the This hugely welcome anthology Following the decades-delayed
Quality Street of indie labels – for you. VARIOUS ARTISTS marks the first time any of the three release, Yonkers returned to recording,
Whoever thought it was a good idea to Turtle Records: Pioneering titles has been reissued on any format. but this time on a smaller scale. Every
sell Coconut Éclairs alongside British Jazz 1970-1971 Additionally, the box set includes a 56- year, between 2003 and 2007 he
Strawberry Delight? ★★★★ page booklet penned by Colin Harper, would record his practice sessions
Chris Twomey RPM 3-CD box set author of superb biographies of John with one guitar, one microphone and
This three CD box McLaughlin and Bert Jansch. one effects box, distributing the results
VARIOUS ARTISTS set documents Grahame Bent to friends on CDR. Neverending… now
Small Town Country Volume 1 three distinct voices brings the best of these sessions to a
★★ from the uniquely MICHAEL YONKERS wider audience.
Orion Read CD/LP fruitful, if ultimately, Neverending Light Beam From The songs are great: scratchy and
Like a country short-lived golden Planet 00s / Deep Within uncompromising, but by no means
music Garage Punk age of British progressive jazz. Founded Home Planet / Plan A untuneful or unstructured. In fact, the
Unknowns or by producer Peter Eden as an outlet for ★★★★ mainly hard-rock sound recalls the
Purple Heart home-grown talents unafraid of creative Mystra LP later, weighty work of cult bands like
Surgery, these 14 risk taking and sailing close to the Michael Yonkers is Jan Dukes De Grey.
Texan sides cut as edge, the label’s three album releases not well-known, but A limited edition, it comes in a
acetates in the ’60s and ’70s capture – Mike Osborne’s Outbreak, Howard he has a long handmade cover by Mystra label
country music in its purest, most Riley’s Flight and John Taylor’s Pause history. Originally in owner and lo-fi free-folk artist, Joshua
natural and unadulterated form. Mainly And Think Again, which between them a surf act, Yonkers Burkett.
avoiding the hippie country-rock styles feature a virtual check list of the most and his bandmates Jeanette Leech

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NOW A MULTITUDE OF NEW MUSIC

BEAUTIFY JUNKYARDS JACKSON BOONE for the comedown. Tommy and the Magical Mystery Tour
The Beast Shouted Love Natural Changes Joe Banks amongst the key albums whose ghosts
★★★★ ★★★★ can be heard, Rendon, along with
Mega Dodo CD/LP Self-released CD THE BUTTERSCOTCH collaborators Chris Ayers and Jim
Lisbon’s Beautify On his second CATHEDRAL Waters, brings enough originality to
Junkyards took an album, Jackson The Butterscotch Cathedral make this new and bold.
unusual step in Boone creates a ★★★★★ Greg Healey
having their 2013 sound world that’s Trouble In Mind LP
debut album be a forever on the cusp Matt Rendon NICOLAS GODIN
collection of of the ’60s and (Resonars, Lenguas Contrepoint
covers, but they’re wisely following it ’70s, artfully poised between blissed Largas) ably ★★★★★
up – two years later – with a set of out and rockin’ out. If you dig the lush, achieves his stated Because Music CD/LP
self-penned tunes. That first full-length laid-back Pink Floyd of Meddle, then goal of an homage As one half of Air,
release was comprised of their you’ll love Natural Changes. to the concept Nicolas Godin has
versions of mostly autumnal folk Opening track ‘Lala’ sets the albums of the ’60s and ’70s, on this made some rather
material, with occasional diversions template for much of what’s to come, wonderfully authentic and immersive impressive music
into takes on tracks originally done by its lazy acoustic guitar, wandering bass album. With influences drawn from the over the past 20
Kraftwerk and Os Mutantes. and sun-kissed strings evoking the meisterwerks of The Who, The Beach years. Now solo,
The Beast Who Shouted Love is beautiful melancholy of a summer’s Boys and many others, The he’s gone even further, making music
very much in keeping with the sounds day that can’t last. ‘Dolphin Turned Into Butterscotch Cathedral creates a that binds together the primary
and feels of the covers album. If you A Cat’ is more playful, Boone’s vocals feeling of loose yet powerful narrative, influence of Bach via pianist Glenn
hadn’t heard the debut and listened to alternating between heavy-lidded and as pretty melodies morph into and out Gould into future-retroism and, indeed,
this collection, you would probably helium-high, but there’s a darker of momentary segments of the music of tomorrow. Taking the
guess that they like Heron, Vashti undertow too. This sense of something atmospheric sound and psychedelic, theme of each piece from Bach, Godin
Bunyan and Donovan, whose tunes sinister in Paradise continues with choral splendour. then spins silken, cinematic tapestries
they interpreted on that eponymous ‘Moonbeam’, its cosmic reverie This approach, that sees three long that touch upon all manner of record
record. A lot of their own songs have interrupted by a harsh mechanical tracks artfully and subtly divided into boxes encompassing jazz, Euro’60s
the same gentle, serene, lightly beat. Similarly, ‘Open’ and ‘Strawberry discrete songs, successfully transports and ’70s art house scores, taut Giallo
psychedelic feel as the work of those Vibes’ are acid-in-the-water trippy, the listener on a pleasant journey that thrills, smooth ’70s pop and proggy
artists who have inspired them, with Boone’s stoned falsetto gradually is potently nostalgic whilst remaining late ’70s and early ’80s synth
slight departures into Tropicalia- turning into a howl of anguish. strangely pertinent to now. Although soundscapes creating ambrosia for the
influenced exoticism. Natural Changes is easy listening listeners may find themselves playing senses, performed with immense skill
Brian Greene as in “hard to dislike” – just watch out spot the reference, with Pet Sounds, and produced to perfection.

Jackson: a positive Boone

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A Macedonian choir, French and GospelbeacH have got classic tunes in

Brazilian singers Gordon Tracks and spades. ‘Sunshine Skyline’ could have
Marcelo Camelo, New Zealand psych been plucked from Roger McGuinn at
maverick Connan Mockasin and Italian the height of his powers, whilst Tom
author Alessandro Barrico all add Petty would be happy to call ‘Out Of
inimitable touches to this rich, My Mind’ his own. Unreservedly
rewarding and often surprising musical recommended for all you cosmic
tapestry. Everything fits. ‘Bach Off’, country heads out there.
undoubtedly the album’s calling card, Tom Patterson
betters every ’70s film score maestro.
Perfection. FAY HALLAM
Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills Corona
★★★
GOLDEN VOID Blow Up CD/LP
Berkana Taking inspiration
★★★★ from the bossa-
Thrill Jockey CD/LP nova of Astrud
Heralded as the Gilberto, the
next big thing in breathy ‘Se Mi Ami’
San Francisco Bay and the sultry
Area psychedelic ‘Stars’ bookend the welcome return of
rock, Golden Void’s Fay Hallam. Like drawing back the
second album, curtains to see the sunshine sweeping
Berkana, from its very outset, is a work into the room, the sunny samba of
of craftsmanship than demonstrates ‘Arco’ ushers in a new dawn for our
the technicality and experience of its keyboard caper.
protagonists with sufficient subtlety so It’s a shame this album doesn’t go
as not to over shadow the fact that the whole distance and transport us
this is quite simply a damn fine groovy back to an exotic world of Tropicalia
rock album. sounds. Instead, The Italian Job and
Frontman Isisah Mitchell’s vocals Get Carter sound-tracks spring to mind
exude the tortured soulfulness of in the hazy soulful ambiance of ‘Sunny’
Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell, with the and ‘Let Me Into Your Soul’ or the
album’s slower tracks – ‘Silent Season’ playful muzak of ‘Lido’. A slow-burning
and ‘Astral Plane’ immediately jump to soulful cover of ‘Maybe I’m Amazed’
mind – showcasing his talents fits perfectly with the reflective mood
perfectly. Camilla Saufley-Mitchell’s that prevails, particularly on the
complementary Hammond-esque Carpenters meets Saint Etienne-
interludes and flute melodies influenced ‘Summers Love’.
introduce a few folkier touches to what A departure from the Hammond-
is otherwise simply a great solid piece heavy sound we’ve become
of West Coast rock ’n’ roll. accustomed to but a worthy follow up
Closing with its finest moment in to the recent Lost In Sound
the shape of the trippy and tribal, collaboration with The Bongolian none-
“Honey, the babysitter’s here.
guitar-bending ballad, ‘Storm And theless. And it’s Susan James!”
Feather’, Berkana is 42 minutes of Paul Ritchie
pure joy. It’s been too long coming, but
well worth the wait. LINDA HOYLE feels very much like an honest, which bears favourable comparisons to
David Savage The Fetch complete statement of where Linda is the country-folk, baroque-pop of Judee
★★★★ now. Sill.
GOSPELBEACH Angel Air CD Christopher Budd Vocally, Susan James may not
Pacific Surf Line Making Vashti possess the “fruitiness” of the late Sill,
★★★★ Bunyan look SUSAN JAMES but she has a fine multi-octave voice
Alive CD/LP prolific, Linda Hoyle Sea Glass nonetheless and her compositional
Led by the mighty has been absent ★★★★ talents evoke a similar sense of
Brent Rademaker, some 44 years SJM CD timelessness and depth.
LA music scene since her debut Forgive the cliché, Chris Twomey
fixture and one solo record. Nothing on her new LP is but Susan James
time member of quite as energetic as Pieces Of Me, yet really could be a MCFADDEN'S PARACHUTE
Further, The Tyde The Fetch, which could sound like a contender for the Sugar 3
and Beachwood Sparks, GospelbeacH lost artefact itself if the modern Best Artist No One ★★★★
is a Californian super group of sorts, production didn’t just about give it (well, few) Has Ever Peter Fonda CD
culling members from all the away, still has a beguiling depth. Heard Of award. The Californian singer- The latest in a long
aforementioned bands plus personnel Demanding your full attention, songwriter has been active for two line of recordings
from The Chris Robinson Brotherhood, Hoyle’s voice is the star of the show, decades, during which she’s toured by one-man
Ryan Adams & The Cardinals and having lost none of its unique mix of with – and converted – all sorts, garage-psych
Everest. Their music is as joyous and power and delicacy. It’s your guide including Bob Weir and Lindsey dreamer Darren
buoyant as the technicolour cartoon through 12 tracks of jazzy folk, with Buckingham. Brennessel AKA the
that adorns the album cover, and the melancholy, nostalgic lyrics and High Llamas front man Sean wonderfully-monikered McFadden's
band gives out a loosey-goosey notable influences from The Great O’Hagan has been another admirer for Parachute. On Sugar 3, as with
country-rock vibe that recalls The New American Songbook (‘It’s The World’). years, and the pair finally collaborated previous outings, the listener is taken
Riders Of The Purple Sage, The First The production and instrumentation, on Sea Glass, Susan’s sixth and best on a wild time trip loaded with paisley-
National Band and The Flying Burrito Mo Foster’s bass particularly, is album to date. O’Hagan adds his hued fun and games. The three and
Brothers, all played at a Malibu restrained and tasteful, and while the trademark lush instrumental four chord turnarounds, fuzz-tone
beachside jam at dusk. smoothness and lack of grit might not arrangements to several tracks on this leads, keyboard spatterings and
Vibes are nothing without good be to everyone’s taste (although ‘Earth wonderful record, opening with the nothing fancy drumming conjured up
songwriting, however, and And Stars’ gets good and weird) this richly-textured ‘Poseidon’s Daughter’, are always worthy of attention, and can

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NOW Midnight as they return to the grand

melodic songwriting of Deserters
of artists like Tim Presley, this album
draws influences from the early
vast and exciting soundscapes.
‘La La La Love Me’ and ‘Strange
Songs and All Is Dream. songsmithery of Todd Rund-gren, circa Love’ have an intriguing Zombies/Eric
strike gold on occasion. It’s a wonderfully sequenced ’71’s Runt. Alongside this there are Burdon-ish Summer Of Love R&B flair,
McFadden's Parachute’s particular, record, implying a journey from despair undoubted echoes of Elton John’s but with an added depth of modern
sometimes peculiar way with chords to redemption. The first half is a superb Tumbleweed Connection. mystery. Album closer, ‘Everyone's
and words and poetic vocalising, is masterclass in lush, hazy dream-pop; Despite its serious intent and Got...’ is a primarily instrumental
quite mesmerising at times, and if ‘Central Park East’ and the driving sometimes gloomy timbre, Timeline moody funk jam with choir backing
you’re a fan of Sky Saxon, Faine Jade, ‘Emotional Free Fall’ being particular has an engaging edge and many vocals and a throbbing bass line. It's
even early Neil Young, and have a highlights. As the album progresses unusual, catchy tunes. The paired back not the same ole’ throwback record; it
passion for the primitively pulsating though it throws up some wonderfully sound, with its mixture of early ’70s goes to unexpected places. Think less
rhythms of garage-style psychedelia, unexpected moments of pure pop joy, transatlantic singer-songwriter pop and blue-eyed soul revival and more lost
you will find much to be enamoured starting with the sunrise of ‘Coming Up vague ’60s psych undertones, make Capsoul Label tunes.
with here. 'I Can't Seem To Get It Right' For Air’ and ending with euphoric this excellent debut album well worth Ashley Brooks
is a bona fide "hit" in waiting, while closer ‘Rainy Day Music’, a joyful checking out.
'Robin Gibb Is Dying' is obviously sad, celebration of the healing power of Greg Healey MARTIN NEWELL
but funny too – an exercise in quirky music. An album to stand proudly Teatime Assortment
mod-pop excellence. Get on this flight amongst their finest work. MONOPHONICS ★★★★
now! Paul Osborne Sound Of Sinning Captured Tracks CD/2-LP
Lenny Helsing ★★★★ It’s nice to see that
MILD HIGH CLUB Monophonics CD/LP “the wild man of
MERCURY REV Timeline Sound Of Sinning, Wivenhoe” has
The Light In You ★★★★ the latest record been keeping busy
★★★★★ Circle Star DL from San of late. Last year
Bella Union CD/LP Alexander Brettin, Francisco's self- saw the release of
This is the first the LA-based, jazz described his superb Return To Bohemia album,
Mercury Rev record schooled muso "psychedelic soul" he continues to chronicle the lives of
to be self-produced behind Mild High group Monophonics, dips in and out of the eccentric inhabitants of his
by core members Club comes across sonic fuzz. Guitars and organ whirl imaginary home town via Mule TV and
Jonathan Donahue as somewhat around one another while holding onto he’ll be bringing The Golden Afternoon,
and Grasshopper earnest when describing his music. a recognizably nostalgic funk groove. his occasional soiree of poetry and
(scheduling commitments meant that Themes such as the alienation of the Singer/organist Kelly Finnigan's vocals song, to The Big Smoke in September
it’s the first without Dave Fridmann at individual in the social media world are more faraway and echoic on this this year.
the controls) and their personal and are paramount, alongside reflections album, allowing his voice to act as a In his latest, 24-track album,
physical upheavals alluded to in the on the nature of creative processes, in contributing instrument rather than the recorded between 2010 and 2014,
album’s accompanying press release songs such as ‘Note To Self’ and ‘You focal point. On Sound Of Sinning, Newell continues his pop-sike
seem to have given the band renewed And Me’. Monophonics move deeper into exploration of the small town English
focus. Gone are the electronic Recorded in the ad-hoc, lo-fi home eccentric soul territory, using their ’60- psyche. It’s a joyous and occasionally
flourishes of 2008’s Snowflake recording tradition that’s the hallmark inspired roots as a jump-off point into wistful collection of lush, Brian Wilson-
esque melodies that is nevertheless as
evocative of a vanishing English idyll
as half-baked summers, warm beer,
cycling bobbies and village greens.
It’s doubtful that this quiet release
will increase his following beyond its
cult status, but then Newell, thankfully,
remains resolutely immune to the
allure of showbiz and fame.
Jason Hobart

PROMISED LAND SOUND

For Use And Delight
★★★★
Paradise Of Bachelors CD/LP
The second album
from Nashville-
based alt-country
rockers Promised
Land Sound picks
up where their
debut self-titled album left off, taking
the cosmic Americana of The Byrds,
Burritos and Band and adding light
touches of psych and dreamy
melodies to create a sound which
burns brightly.
The gorgeous first single, ‘She Takes
Me There’, is a fine example of what
they do best, with Harrison-esque slide
guitar and a vocal melody which
recalls The Jayhawks’ finer moments.
‘Through The Seasons’ is a gentle
rolling groove with fluid country licks,
whilst ‘Golden Child’ kicks in as a
heavy chugging rocker before breaking
There’s no Newell like an old Newell down to an almost krautrock middle
section, which then explodes to life

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NOW whole album both a fine evocation and

updating of those alternative ’80s and
VARIOUS ARTISTS
Daptone Gold II
’90s sounds. ★★★★
Tom Patterson Daptone CD/LP
The communal
THE SINE WAVES spirit of the
Into The Syntax Era With Daptone family
★★★★ echoes the in-
Sine Lab CD house studio
Inhabiting that ensembles of yore,
small cross-section where a dependable group of
in the middle of musicians would lay down the grooves
the Venn diagram for rookie artists to add their soul.
of science and surf Updating that model for the 21st
music, Hastings century funkateer, this lovingly-crafted
quartet The Sine Waves are influenced second volume cherry picks Daptone
as much by local hero Alan Turing as highlights from the last six years onto
they are Joe Meek and Dick Dale. In one tidy package, LP or CD, depending
many ways, this is a straight-up, on your predilection.
impeccable surf album; there’s a cover On the menu are five beatific
of The Surfari’s ‘Storm Surf’, and a Sharon Jones tracks including the
cover of The Mummies’ ‘The Fly’, but slick 'Better Things To Do' and her
it’s truly brought alive by the little faithful cover of Shuggie Otis'
samples and scientific archive 'Inspiration Information'. Stepping
soundbites that bridge tracks. Infusing from the shadows, her backing
cheery, up-beat surf with the spirit of singers, Saun & Starr make sweet soul
Sirs Clive Sinclair and Christopher sounds of their own and Charles
Cockerell makes remarkable sense – Bradley brings the house down with
the two, seemingly disparate fields two slabs of tortured soul. There are a
share a certain optimism in the future. couple of heady Hammond workouts
There’s many a knowing wink to by The Sugarman 3, infectious
pop culture: ‘They Peel Them With Their rhythmic Afrobeat from Antibatas,
Metal Knives’ is a homage to the rough-hewn funk from Naomi Shelton
Smash advert aliens, while ‘Meltdown and down-home gospel with Como
At Magnox’ invokes every ’70s kids Mamas.
worst nightmare. The Sine Waves have Dapper stuff indeed.
hit on a winning formula – get into Paul Ritchie
them or be a four-sided polygon.
Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker Kate Hodges VARIOUS ARTISTS
Weasels Re-Ripped
TAME IMPALA ★★★★
with a fiery solo. There’s an obvious ever wish for. Perfectly executed, Currents Cordelia CD
comparison with Beachwood Sparks beautifully played and catchily written ★★★ Cordelia are no
(‘Canfield Drive’ comes on like a lost – I dare anyone to try and match this Modular Recordings CD/LP strangers to
Sparks classic) but there’s enough in the heavy-psych stakes this year. An The rise of Tame messing with the
happening here sonically for PLS to absolute behemoth of a record. Impala from stoned music of Frank
transcend their influences and stand David Savage psychedelic Zappa. They have
on their own as major contenders. newcomers to previously released
Paul Osborne THE SHIFTING SANDS global stars is one an album of surf instrumental
Cosmic Radio Station that many of us re-workings of a wide range of Zappa
PROPHETS OF SATURN ★★★★ have watched with satisfaction and, as clas-sics (Lemme Take You To The
Retronauts Fishrider/Occultation CD/LP the first neo-psych band to infiltrate Beach) and this time around the
★★★★★ Fresh out of the mainstream with their carefully subject for reappraisal is The
HeviSike CD/LP Dunedin, home to crafted space-rock, they paved the way Mothers’ 1970 opus, Weasels
There’s been quite such New Zealand for Temples, Pond et al to follow in Ripped My Flesh.
an onslaught of greats as 3Ds, The their wake. But where to go when Faithfully retaining the original
retro heavy-rock Chills and The you’ve explored outer space and every album’s running order, the re-ripping
this year so far, and Verlaines, come band and his uncle with some of Weasels proceeds via bending,
though thoroughly The Shifting Sands, a psychedelic backwards guitar is claiming they’re stretching and extrapolating the
enjoyable, shoegaze trio whose promising second cosmic voyagers? The answer, it original album tracks in all manner of
accusations of formulaic Iommi and co album suggests there may finally be seems, is straight to the disco. directions by a cast of participants
homages can be sometimes justifiably an heir to those pioneering bands who Whilst many will throw up their arms operating under the suitably Zappa-
knocked about. There are few first laid down the Dunedin Sound that Kevin Parker has embraced his fied IDs of Inventionis Mater, Gumbo
occasions when a band truly stamps back 30 years ago (unsurprising, as inner Bee Gee and made his most Varation, Muffin Men, Zappatistas and
their mark on a genre that is David Kilgour of semi-legendary locals “pop” record yet, Currents still The Early Zappa Renaissance
retrogressive by its very nature in a The Clean makes an appearance on a maintains enough of its predecessor’s Orchestra.
fresh and new way. Australia’s Child is few tracks). sonic vision to make it distinctively From the complete out thereness
one such example; another is found Opener ‘Waiting For The Sun’ Tame Impala. ‘Let It Happen’ and ‘The of the opening ‘Didja Get Any Onya?’
here with Leicester doom metal riff comes on like a poppier, more clean- Less I Know’ are perfect reverb-heavy through the pseudo-jazz ramblings of
crushers, Prophets Of Saturn. living Jesus And Mary Chain, whilst meshes of dreamy, danceable pop and, ‘Toads Of The Short Forest’ and ‘The
Never more aptly named, single ‘All The Stars’ shows off an although there’s a bit too much Eric Dolphy Memorial Barbecue’ to
Retronauts is a potent mix of Sabbath elegiac side to the band, a string- emphasis on ’80s style synths and little the comparative sanity of ‘My Guitar
and Blue Cheer, with a few slices of laden ballad with hazy vocals that variation in sound, surely you’d rather Wants To Kill Your Mama’, Weasels is
The Sonics thrown in good measure, wouldn’t feel out of place on an Elliott the kids were into this than the latest comprehensively deconstructed and
then chugged out at a beautiful head- Smith album. Elsewhere, the ghosts of musical vomit served up by David reassembled with predictably
nodding pace that has more down Slowdive, Ride, Sonic Youth and NZ Guetta or Calvin Harris? Thought so. challenging results.
tuned low end weight than you could artists like Bailter Space flit by, the Paul Osborne Grahame Bent

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BEGINNER'S MYND
I Found You Out / When You Go
sound which the group produces seeks
to blow away any old cobwebs that
Innerspeaker’s ragged charms might
care to welcome his fellow
45s
★★★★ your own mind may be housing. countryman and sonic explorer Wesley
13 O'Clock With the flipside, 'When You Go', Fuller’s similarly exotic, glam/psych- is more subdued, inhabiting a
This is the debut we hear something altogether different, indebted take on the classic pop song diabolical hinterland somewhere
from Beginner's more authentically Fading Yellow-like in into their hearts. Not that Fuller’s between an early ’80s John Hughes
Mynd, a combo its jauntily rhythmic patterns, oddly recordings – few as they currently are movie soundtrack, prime early ’70s
originating from the treated vocals, brief bursts of piano – invite comparison with the free- Beach Boys and some obscure
US capital, and thick dollops of fuzz. flowing looseness of the Impala. This Belgian psych cash-in 45 from ’69.
Washington D.C. Lenny Helsing is precision engineering; there’s no fat Album please.
Essentially, the overall sound and here, just tightly constructed and Andy Morten
approach of the Mynd, especially on WESLEY FULLER dynamically recorded pop that
the featured topside 'I Found You Out', The Dancer / Shock Me screams 2015 as much as it does HASHISH
appears deeply rooted in the realms of ★★★★ 1975. Outer Spaced /
folk-imbued garage-rock. The bright Self-released ‘The Dancer’ is built round a tasty The Smoke Of Hashish
12-string tones and organic feel also As Kevin Parker guitar riff, glammy hand claps and ★★
serves to accentuate some of the steers his Tame multi-layered vocal harmonies that Subliminal Sounds
more melodic, and lyrical pathways Impala further into bring mid-70s Yes to this writer’s I usually make it a
that, while not blindingly obvious, are pastures new with mind. But it’s the drums – crisp, policy to avoid
nonetheless thoroughly effective and each album, those centre-stage and high in the mix – groups that too
infectious. However temporary, the of us left mourning that drive the whole thing. ‘Shock Me’ heavily reference
their recreational
drug of choice. In
this case it’s as obvious as you can

Eight Miles Above Sea Level get, but there’s also a feeling that
somewhere through the haze, there
might be something worthy of your
GRAHAME BENT scrutinises Fruit de Mer’s latest batch of plastic attention going on.
What emerges are a couple of
pleasures (rather similar) tracks of dancey,
soundtracky, atmospheric stuff,
Fruits de Mer continue its love affair From the seriously trippy to the odd years, Ireland’s veteran acid-folk propelled by a head-nodding (not too
with the 7” single with this fistful of mildly so, new recruits to the Fruits double act TIR NA NOG return with vigorously, of course) rhythm track that
limited edition new releases to add to de Mer stable and proponents of The a 45 that combines the new with the The Prodigy might have laid down in
their rapidly expanding and ever Classic Canterbury Sound, Devon’s old in the form of ‘Richochet’ the mid-90s, all put together by
diversifying discography. MAGIC BUS compliment ‘Seven (★★★★ ) from the new LP, The Swedish producer and label man,
The third and final Wonders’ (★★★★ ) with an Dark Dance, backed with a live Stefan Kéry.
instalment of the understated reworking of The Byrds’ recording of ‘Tir na nOg’, the song In fact, were it 1996, this would be
Momentary series, ‘Eight Miles High’. which gave the duo their name way huge. Even so, there’s enough quality
MOMENTARY Finally, not content with releasing back on their self-titled debut album in the dense production to make one
THREE their first new studio album in 40- in ’71. curious for the promised album later
(★★★★ ) this year, even if the musical ideas feel
arrives offering two more stretched thin at times. It’ll be
interpretations of classic Pink Floyd interesting to see what variety Kéry
compositions one of which, can bring to proceedings beyond this
Sendelica’s fearsome re-modelling of sampler.
‘The Nile Song’, first saw the light of Christopher Budd
day on the Momentary Lapse Of Vinyl
CD, while the other is an all new THE HIGHER STATE
revisitation of ‘Set The Controls For The (Consider It) A Debt Repaid /
Heart Of The Sun’ by Astralasia. In A World That Just Don't
Once upon a time (circa 1982) Care
NICK NICELY released the sublime ★★★★
and decidedly Barrett-esque ‘Hilly 13 O'Clock
Fields (1892)’ 45. Not only was it a When news filtered
bona fide slice of classic home-grown out over the last
Brit psych, the same was also true of 18 months or so
the single’s B-side, the frankly surreal that The Higher
‘49 Cigars’, which is now once again State had
back in circulation on the 49 Cigars experienced a split
four-track EP (★★★★ ) which, for within their ranks, some folks,
good measure, also includes an unsurprisingly, were shocked and
extended live version of said marvel. saddened. Yet, on the evidence of
Not to be outdone by their British these new fruits, you'd have to know
cousins, Dusseldorf psychonauts their sound intimately to know that
VIBRAVOID get in on the act with anything drastic had taken place.
the Stepping Stone three-track EP Cast your mind back to the snotty
(★★★★ ) which finds them '66 folk-punk trajectory the group
revisiting ’60s garage band staple ‘(I’m would take us through on their debut
Not Your) Stepping Stone’, Traffic’s From Round Here album and it's that
‘Hole In My Shoe’ and HP Lovecraft ‘s similar freshness that coats '(Consider
‘The White Ship’. While The Monkees It) A Debt Repaid' and its smouldering
and Traffic covers stay faithful to the counterpart, 'In A World That Just Don't
originals, Vibravoid get considerably Care'. Guitarist, lead singer and
spacier on their take of the already nick nicely wonders where his 50th cigar went founder Marty Ratcliffe's mystic martyr
seriously spectral ‘The White Ship’. whine still tells of things unfair, and
unjust in his/our hypocritical, apathetic

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45s pensive guitar lines and dreamy,

distant-sounding vocals, it shifts up a
it’s obscure origins (if a release
delayed from 2008 can really claim to
gear into a more insistent, melodic be “re-discovered”). Any more where
groove, with pleasingly warm, fuzzed-up this came from?
bass, and guitar lines which jangle Christopher Budd
rather than strafe. There’s a nice, hooky
chorus too. THE SEVENTH RING OF
All in all, an interesting start. A band SATURN
to watch out for, I think. Mountains Of The Moon / All
Neil Hussey The World Is Love
★★★★
THE OPTIC NERVE Nusrat
Penelope Tuesday / Northampton, MA
Here To Stay quartet TSROS are
★★★★ veterans of the
State Fruits de Mer
New Yorkers The stable but have
Optic Nerve skirted opted to release
the lower regions of their second album (and first since
the late ’80s 2007’s self-titled debut) and this
garage revival, and accompanying single on their own
never really gained imprint, complete with indier-than-thou
the same foothold as, say, The Lyres or hand-stamped sleeves.
The Cynics, disappearing pretty much Inside you’ll find The Grateful
traceless with a posthumous album Dead’s Aoxomoxoa highlight,
released five years after its creation in ‘Mountains Of The Moon’, stripped of
1993. The Optic Nerve stood out for its original acoustic setting and
having an altogether softer folk-rock baroque flourishes and re-presented as
sound and a grasp of analogue a chooglin’ road tune more akin to that
authenticity. album’s ‘Doin’ That Rag’, with Ted
This State Record single features Selke’s agreeably breathy Garcia-esque
two unreleased cuts, and displays both vocal tone centre stage. And it works.
sides of the Optics’ distinct poles. The Flip the 45 over and you’ll hear a
topside, ‘Penelope Tuesday’, is a pre- similarly brave deconstruction of The
psych Beatles stomper similar in Hollies’ trippy ’67 B-side redrawn as a
stature to Detroit’s Ellie Pop and owing Dukes Of Stratosphear cartoon,
Photo by Sanne Glasbergen

more to The Dukes Of Stratosphear complete with Floydian, middle-Eastern

than The Fuzztones. The flip, ‘Here To organ runs and Leslied vocals.
Stay’, (even the title could have been What’s not to like?
one of Gene’s) is so Turn, Turn, Turn: Andy Morten
Cut-up method with Night Dials sad and moody with brooding, crisp
harmonies, and a hypnotic guitar VARIOUS ARTISTS
jangle. The only missing ingredient is Ace 40
and uncaring world. Chiming flecks of kept one of the most memorable cuts (unfortunately) a tambourine. ★★★★
12-string guitar action and cheesed-off for last with the flowing cool of 'Sigue A belting single. Ace 7-45 box set
vocals spur the songs onward. Pensando Igual'. Should appeal to Louis Comfort-Wiggett This set celebrates
Augmented by cool garagey organ lines discerning appreciators of vintage indie the 40th
and simplistic drumming, the group jangle as much as to fans of mid-to- PROSIECT CERDDOROL anniversary of Ace
sounds lean and mean with a spirit late ’60s pop-mod-ops. INCA Music Project Records, the label
that still thrives and soars. Lenny Helsing ★★★ that grew from
Lenny Helsing Salvation beneath the wings
NIGHT DIALS The story of this of Chiswick Records and is now a
LOS MONTGOMERY I’ve Done More Things / I’ll release presses all byword for quality reissues. The
Escondida EP Sleep When I Die the right buttons – challenge for a label that owns the
★★★★ ★★★ lost recordings by a rights to so many back catalogues and
Los Montgomery Ciao Ketchup Welsh art-house has some 2,300 titles currently
Pleasing sounds Night Dials are a cinema band of available is which 14 tracks to pluck
from modern-day London-based charity shop diggers, creating new from the goldmine?
Chile in the shape psych quintet who soundtracks for half-remembered Well, there’s classic blues from BB
of newcomers Los cut half of this animations, inspired by American ’60s King, the terrific and dynamic ‘Tough
Montgomery. While debut 45 at Liam psychedelic electronicists. It’s a Lover’ by Etta James, rockabilly from
they may reflect a Watson’s ultra-hip hauntology fever-dream and it’s so stalwart Glenn Glenn and an
passion for The Electric Prunes and Toe Rag studios, before running out of credentials-heavy it could only be true. unreleased Platters version of Johnny
13th Floor Elevators (and incorporate a cash and ending up in the basement of The music itself could never quite Hampton’s northern soul classic, ‘Not
smart period-style logo too) let’s make a dingy London pub, making live up to the folklore, but this is a My Girl’. Add to this an alternate mix
it plain that these young guys are underground music of the most literal sufficiently accomplished trio of tracks, of the fantastic ‘Get The Picture’ by The
nowhere near as unhinged, sort. lurching from the bucolic to the Scot Richard Case and you have a
uncompromising or as psychedelic ‘I’ve Done More Things’ is a real raucous via some plainchant on formidable collection.
sounding. Their effort is noted, however, ’60s throwback (in a good way), a ‘Agoriad Swyddogol’, ‘Cor Cymysg’ The sound quality is superb and, in
and 'Bajo El Sol' and 'Pocion No. 6' do reverb-heavy, hip-shaking groover with coming off, rather curiously, as a slice true Möbius strip fashion, the B-side of
have a full-on presence, and a rather pummelling, insistent rhythms and of fuzzy acid-jazz, and finally the last single is one of the earliest
distinctive head-nodding quality – nicely serrated guitars. It sounds raw ‘Beathoven’ bringing all those original tracks released by Chiswick,
including a bit of Hammond and funk- and ragged, infused with an effortless influences together with a nice featuring the young Joe Strummer
u-like drums – similar to the English aura of cool, and teeming with louche, earworm hook and a funky bass line. fronting The 101ers: ‘Keys To Your
Charlatans over 20 years ago now. Britpop swagger. ‘I’ll Sleep When I Die’ All in all this is fascinating and Heart’. All this and replica sleevage too
Although the opening title track of is slower, more considered, more deep-rooted stuff which ends up – from the Rock On stall to roll on 50!
this EP is also pretty strong, they've interesting. Opening with almost feeling unpretentious and fun, despite Henry Hutton

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JAZZ ON A
SUMMER’S DAY
released on bluray following the
complete restoration of the film and the
success of the British realist movement
of the early ’60s. Based on Allan
DVDs
★★★★ addition of English language subtitles – Sillitoe’s novel and short story
Charly DVD+CD a process partly funded by Garcia and, respectively – one of the key writers of tipping point of the downturn to the first
Alongside DA following his death, Martin Scorsese – the so-called “Angry Young Men” school – phase of their career (spectacularly
Pennebaker’s Don’t it’s not hard to see why The Saragossa both films are set in Sillitoe’s home city revived at the 1980 Reading Festival,
Look Back, Manuscript found such a receptive of Nottingham and focus on the lives of but that’s another story). Teenage fans
Monterey Pop and audience in both the UK and the US two rebellious outsiders played by two of turned up to the local fleapit expecting
Albert and David during the culturally adventurous times the hottest new acting talents of the era. the glam-rock A Hard Day’s Night and
Maysles and of the late ’60s and early ’70s with its Namely, Albert Finney’s portrayal of Albert instead found themselves watching an
Charlotte Zwerin’s Gimme Shelter, Bert labyrinthine narrative of interlocking “Don’t let the bastards grind you down” occasionally besequined episode of
Stern’s Jazz On A Summer’s Day is one stories within stories offering a Seaton – an outspoken, hard drinking The ----Sweeney.
of a handful of films which can be said mystifying head trip not entirely womaniser who was effectively British This gritty insider tale of the
to have both laid the foundations and dissimilar in terms of effect to another cinema’s first anti-hero, and Tom machinations of the music biz featuring
shaped the future evolution of the music much lauded underground box office hit Courtenay’s equally memorable portrayal Don Arden style management
documentary. of the period – Alejandro Jodorowsky’s El of Colin Smith, a rather more complex techniques, publicity stunts and violent
Shot in vibrant colour over the four Topo. teenager who finds himself fighting the dirty dealings did not lend itself to the
days of the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival, Set in Spain during the Napoleonic system from the inside when fate hands average Top Of the Pops fan’s shiny view
Stern’s film is far from purely a record of Wars, the film catalogues the exotic him a stretch in borstal after several of the music world but is eminently
selected live appearances being rather a adventures of Alfonso Van Worden, a brushes with the law. more plausible. The cast includes a
complete document of the sights and captain of guards, when he chances While Saturday Night And Sunday swathe of British quota actors: Alan Lake
sounds of Newport ’58, which arguably upon an antique manuscript in a battle Morning is undoubtedly the grittier of – Diana Dors’ squeeze and ’70s soft
pays as much attention to the locale, damaged inn. What follows is a the two films, The Loneliness Of The porn actor – is superb as the cowardly,
the environs of the festival location showcase in cinematic narrative worthy Long Distance Runner has a haunting talentless and immoral Jack Daniels.
(including the Americas Cup yacht race of Orson Welles which takes its reference poetic quality all of its own. Both DVDs Johnny Shannon as the tyrannical Ron
trials taking place on its doorstep) and points from all manner of sources come with an interesting supporting Harding is genuinely intimidating, whilst
the audience itself as it does to the all including mysticism, occultism, programme of extras including an this movie also marks the first starring
star cast of performers seen onstage. surrealism, illusionism and, of course, interview with Shirley Anne field role of Tom Conti. The boys in the band
Originally a fashion photographer the age old mechanics of storytelling. (Saturday Night), a featurette on just about pull it off in the acting
(Stern’s celebrated portfolio of late Grahame Bent cinematographer Walter Lassally’s work department too with Jimmy Lea
Marilyn Monroe portraits being his other on Loneliness and the Free Cinema particularly showing his latent thespian
best known work) Jazz On A Summer’s SATURDAY NIGHT AND documentaries, We Are The Lambeth talent. The set piece scenes filmed
Day is shot with a photographer’s eye SUNDAY MORNING Boys (’59) and Mamma Don’t Allow against pigeon lofts, grim slum
which lends the images a poetic, almost ★★★★ (’56), both incidentally shot by Lassally, clearance terraces, offshore pirate radio
painterly quality which when added to THE LONELINESS OF THE and which gave Reisz and Richardson stations and, eventually, packed
the film’s gentle, easy going pace makes LONG DISTANCE RUNNER their first outlets as fledgling directors. auditoriums are all the more believable
for a memorable viewing experience. ★★★★ Grahame Bent due to bit part appearances by the like
Artists featured include Thelonious Both BFI DVDs of Tommy Vance and Emperor Rosko.
Monk, Gerry Mulligan, Dinah Karel Reisz’s SLADE IN FLAME The re-mastering of the film from the
Washington, The Chico Hamilton Quartet, Saturday Night And ★★★★★ original negative has been competently
Louis Armstrong, Mahalia Jackson and a Sunday Morning Salvo DVD+CD done, despite the Technibeige feel of the
very youthful looking Chuck Berry, with (1960) and Tony Despite this being a original and the CD of the cracking
the performances of The Jimmy Giuffre Richardson’s The story that Slade soundtrack is a gratifying extra. As an
Trio and Anita O’Day providing some of Loneliness Of The themselves wanted exercise in illuminating the concept of
the film’s most memorable moments. Long Distance to tell it was, in the pop group as “product” this flick
Reissued in a gatefold digibook Runner (’62) survive hindsight, a glorious remains peerless.
edition, this deluxe repacking of the film as two key films in the history and mistake and the Henry Hutton
comes complete with a separate audio
CD of the complete soundtrack.
Grahame Bent

THE SARAGOSSA
MANUSCRIPT:
RESTORED EDITION
★★★★
Mr Bongo Bluray
Just where do you
start with The
Saragossa
Manuscript? An
opulent mid-60s
Polish art-house
film with a
meandering,
picaresque tale within a tale narrative
structure of quite mind blowing
complexity much beloved of Luis Bunuel
and David Lynch and, in counter culture
circles, reputedly the favourite film of
Jerry Garcia.
Based on Polish author Jan Potocki’s
rambling early 19th century novel, The
Manuscript Found At Saragossa,
Wojciech Has’s category-defying 183
minute cinematic tour de force from
1965 remains one of the genuine Jim, Nod, Don and Dave turn the heat up
unsung jewels of ’60s cinema. Now

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FLASHBACK ISSUE 7 commencing a lifetime voraciously

★★★★ consuming hard drugs. He hit New York
The 200-page tome City in ’39, dividing his time between
Flashback can’t be hustling around Times Square, both as
called a magazine – rent boy and robber, and many
it’s a series of stretches in jail. In the mid-40s,
paperback books. Huncke collided with Burroughs (who
This issue’s described being injected by him in
cover star is Vashti Junky) and Ginsberg, who
Bunyan, whose immortalised him in Howl, but was
candid and often grim ruminations on relentlessly ripped off during their
her ’60s career and subsequent fraut, lifelong relationship. Huncke
disowning of same, give new depth to would even offer Ginsberg the pawn
the phrase “in-depth”. Want to know tickets to get back the rare books he
which local tinker fixed her wagon as it had just stolen from him.
stumbled through the Lake District in Huncke, who died in ’86 aged 81,
the late summer of ’68? It’s all here. wrote marvellously descriptive prose
Flashback’s stock-in-trade – the but wasn't published until much later
adventures of the short-lived/unlucky in life, including his autobiography
hairy underground rock band – is Guilty Of Everything. Now, thanks to
represented by lengthy essays on Raw her immaculate research and finely
Material and Fuzzy Duck, while an hued way with words, Hilary Holladay
increasing coverage of jazz in its pages has given this previously little-known
sees troubled pianist Bill Evans and UK giant his long-deserved account and
Merrell Fankhauser and friend, Maui bound... sessioneers Dave Green and Trevor consummate tribute. Unreservedly
Tomkins eulogised. recommended.
Another field in which Flashback is Kris Needs
CALLING FROM A STAR DO IT YOURSELF: A ploughing a furrow is in its reproduction
Merrell Fankhauser HISTORY OF MUSIC IN of original ’60s and ’70s music paper HOW CAN IT BE? A ROCK
★★★ MEDWAY interviews. Michael Vosse’s ’69 ’N’ ROLL DIARY
Gonzo Multimedia Stephen H Morris eyewitness account of The Beach Boys’ Ronnie Wood
Merrell Fankhauser’s ★★★ Smile saga is thoroughly engrossing; a ★★★★★
legend extends from Cultured Llama pair of Van Morrison interviews Genesis Publications
the surf album he Though Dartford can conducted during the immediate Fear not, paupers!
cut with The Impacts crow about Mick and aftermath of Astral Weeks, and another This isn’t one of
in 1962 through to Keef, the Medway Jimmy Page outing from ’70 will thrill Genesis’s 300 quid
work he recorded conurbation of five fans. hand-crafted luxury
with Fapardokly, HMS small-to-medium Elsewhere, globe-trotting US duo editions, sealed with
Bounty and MU, sized towns, 15 miles Euphoria’s extraordinary story is the artist’s own spit
alongside numerous solo releases. The east, last pierced the chronicled, Norwegian psych-folk and wrapped in one
first half of his autobiography zips along hit parade with enigmas Oriental Sunshine have their of his old vests. No.
at pace as he moves through the surf Chicory Tip, not long after the invention bubble burst and we’re treated to plenty It’s an affordable alternative, still a thing
and beat scenes, encounters the rip-off of the steam engine. Too close to of the lengthy reviews we’ve come to of beauty and wonder but half the size
merchants of LA, and experiences a London for touring big names to ignore, expect from this esteemed publication. and a tenth of the price.
psychedelic awakening – heftily aided but too far for indigenous acts to attract Andy Morten When Ronnie Wood was slogging
by numerous substances, of which he a following from the Metropolis, Medway around the pubs, clubs and ballrooms
writes candidly. Of particular note are has long revelled in its Land That Time HERBERT HUNCKE: of Britain as a member of The Birds in
the creepy run-ins that MU had with the Forgot place in musical history. A few THE TIMES SQUARE 1965, he kept a diary. Said diary
nearby house of Captain Beefheart’s have made ripples beyond the district, HUSTLER WHO INSPIRED recently turned up “at the back of a
Magic Band and the curious controlling (JTQ, Nitin Sawhney, Pete Molinari, The JACK KEROUAC AND THE drawer in me mum’s house” and, so
power that Don Van Vliet exercised over Dentists, The Claim and The Len Price BEAT GENERATION smitten was our Ron that he decided to
his former band mate, Jeff Cotton. 3), but this book is centred around the Hilary Holladay reproduce it in book form. You’ll be glad
In ’73 three quarters of MU legacy of two wonderful bands: The ★★★★★ he did.
decided to decamp to Hawaii in a true Milkshakes and The Prisoners, with Schnaffner Press First, the presentation. The pages are
embodiment of hippie ideals. Even if particular focus upon the methods and It's rare to come literally replicas of the diary, complete
you’re not a fan of the music, the tales influence of the prolific Billy Childish. across a book that with Ronnie’s hand-written thoughts and
in Maui still make for entertaining Morris makes a valiant stab at exudes such a crammed with details of the fascinating
reading given the parade of “every chronicling a DIY ethic that has rubbed beautiful grip from minutiae of his life as a semi-pro
guru, healer and cosmic spiritual leader off on a few hundred musicians of start to finish while musician in the mid-60s. As for the
on the planet” that passed through the varying talents from 1977 to the present adding something content, everything is recorded, from
island in the ’70s and ’80s. day. It’s a tremendous and well-written genuinely new to almost daily live engagements
Fankhauser’s brushes with Sky Saxon, effort, with a huge breadth, yet, in well-trodden myths (“Morecombe (sic): Terrible, the most
who retreated to the island to live in a attempting to be as exhaustive as and history. Herbert Huncke was the useless booking ever!”) to band
van with his two “wives”, are a humanly possible, the gaps, where there incorrigible real deal character who practices (“Did ‘Fire’ and ‘You Must
highlight. are any, show all the more. The careers of inspired Allen Ginsberg, William Believe Me’”) and all that falls between
Sadly the last 60 pages of the book the legendary Sexton Ming and Childish’s Burroughs and Jack Kerouac by living (“Second night with Ali’s new Marshall
are tough going, peppered with Milkshakes cohort Mick Hampshire are the kind of extreme low-life they could PA (which he swopped from Dave Taylor
marginal projects and awkward skirted over. Sawhney is barely only marvel at, but gladly work into for his scooter)”.
personal circumstances. In addition, the mentioned. Also, very conspicuous is the their era-defining prose. Kerouac, who As The Birds’ popularity increases
accompanying images throughout the lack of any female perspective. placed Huncke in On The Road as (“The record is 45 in Record Mirror!”),
book are very poorly reproduced and Despite little discernible link to Elmer Hassel, hailed him as the avatar so do their encounters with members of
various grammatical and typographical mainstream musical success, this is the of The Beat Movement, unwitting The Who, Kinks, Yardbirds, Pretty Things
errors persist. A decent edit and more second book to cover the same ground inventor of its name and greatest of its and pretty much every other beat and
professional repackaging could easily in as many years. The good news is that writers. R&B in the country at the time. The
improve what is, at its heart, a very this 490-page work, is better than The Born in 1915, Huncke grew up in action is illustrated with Ronnie’s
enjoyable read. Kids Are All Square by a long chalk. Chicago and, from his early teens, was drawings and private photos and
Austin Matthews Vic Templar frequenting jazz bars while memorabilia and his comments from

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today’s standpoint are both lucid and

full of fondness for his formative days.
heavily on lists as a surrogate narrative
and the barrage of bands, clubs,
Hurricanes prior to joining The Beatles
in August 1962 and subsequently
BOOKS
Andy Morten scenesters and addresses becomes spreading the pop culture gospel across
both overwhelming and slightly the globe throughout the whirlwind of down to the simple reason that the vast
RIOT ON SUNSET STRIP: relentless. Also, given what’s now known the next eight years. majority of bands are deadly dull.
ROCK ’N’ ROLL’S LAST about Bob Markley’s sexual The second half of the book Bogged down in details of uncles and
STAND IN HOLLYWOOD predilections, there’s no excuse for meanwhile deals with Ringo’s post- cousins, what the set list was where and
Domenic Priore excising such grim realities from the Beatles solo and movie career who left when, their tales trudge from
★★★★ glowing West Coast Pop Art documenting both the early successes childhood reminiscences to fame and
Jawbone Press Experimental Band section. of his solo career in terms of the both onwards into the cosy glow of slippers-
While London is still That said, anything that weaves the early hits and the declining fortunes and-pipe reflection. Sick On You is a rare
generally regarded together the cinema and TV, nightlife, of each subsequent album release from exception to this rule.
as the epicentre of architecture, pop music, drug culture, the mid-70s onwards. Likewise, after Told with the verve, panache and
mid-60s cool and graphic design and political atmosphere the initial promise of his roles in The snarkiness you’d expect from a man who
San Francisco lives of the era quite so well deserves your Magic Christian and That’ll Be The Day, survived playing to Yeovil yokels in 1974
on in the popular undivided attention. the book charts the stalling of Ringo’s clad mostly in a ’50s cocktail dress,
imagination as the Hugh Dellar acting career while also chronicling the rouge and stack-heeled shoes, this book
city that then took ups and downs in his relationships with perfects that precarious balancing act of
on the mantle, this book makes the RINGO: WITH A John, Paul and George. being both self-aggrandising and self-
strongest possible case for LA actually LITTLE HELP Inevitably, Ringo’s slide into deprecating simultaneously – and works
being the glowing global heart of hip for Michael Seth Starr alcoholism is dealt with, as is the wonders as rock ’n’ roll mythology. It’s
at least two brief years of the hallowed ★★★★ formation of his succession of All Star also the funniest music book I’ve ever
decade. Backbeat Bands. Overall though, the abiding read by quite some measure.
Just a brief roll call of names that Given his ubiquity image is of Ringo the happy go lucky Skipping personal history almost
emerged from the white heat of the and charisma you survivor who, against all odds, is still completely, the book begins with our
city’s creative core during this time is could be forgiven out there doing what he does best – (anti-)hero’s arrival in The Smoke, armed
enough to cement the claim – The for thinking there being himself. with little more than tuppence ha’penny,
Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, Love, The must already have Grahame Bent a guitar, great hair and a manifesto for
Doors, Captain Beefheart, The Mothers, been numerous the creation of the perfect band. It then
Tim Buckley, The Seeds, The Music Ringo biographies SICK ON YOU: THE details his picaresque journey through
Machine and many more – but the in print but, DISASTROUS STORY OF the horror that was early ’70s London –
genius of this book is the way it insists surprisingly, Michael Seth Starr’s strictly BRITAIN’S GREAT LOST squats, ultra-violence, sleaze and all –
that it was only LA, with its size, its unauthorised and affectionately warts- PUNK BAND and the tragi-comic failure of his band,
diversity, its proximity to Hollywood and and-all account of the anything but Andrew Matheson The Hollywood Brats, to break into the
the newest technological innovations ordinary life and times of Richard ★★★★★ big time, despite being better than
that could possibly have allowed such a Starkey is the first such tome to make it Ebury Press anything else around. Along the way, we
diverse over-lapping range of acts to onto the bookshelves. The autobiographies encounter Cliff Richard, Freddie Mercury,
develop and cross-fertilise. The first half of the book is taken up of the vast majority Mick Jones, Talcy Malcy, Vivisect
Excellent on the racial, political and with a detailed portrayal of the young of musicians reach, Westwood and many more.
historical background to The Sunset Richey Starkey’s childhood and if you’re lucky, the As good as the glorious, gutter-punk,
Strip’s arrival as the ultimate teen adolescence, his life-defining excitement levels of razor-sharp racket that it takes its name
destination and packed full of fascination with drums and his early a wet Wednesday from – and that’s really saying
astounding facts, the book does excursions into first skiffle and then evening in something.
nevertheless occasionally rely over- rock ’n’ roll with Rory Storm & The Eastbourne. This is Hugh Dellar

The Birds in ’65, with Ronnie Wood, bottom

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Father John Misty

Charles Bradley & The Extraordinaires

Photo by Tommy Jackson/Redferns

Super Furry Animals’ Gruff Rhys

GREEN MAN FESTIVAL but let’s focus on the live music. The perfect conditions then for grabbing admired The Silver Globe. Weaver’s
Glanisk Park, Brecon, Powys Over the last year and a half the first beer of the day and lying on the spectral, icy tones and her band’s no-
Thursday 20th-Sunday 23rd August TEMPLES have been criss-crossing the grass in front of The Mountain Stage for frills motorik beats and electronic
After a few years gap between Shindig!’s globe with immense success. Their Friday THE LEFT OUTSIDES, in which the flourishes on ‘Argent’ and ‘Mission
attendances at Green Man – now in its night set showed what this experience husband and wife duo greeted the Desire’ almost define The Green Man
13th year – it was a relief to note on and newfound confidence has allowed morning sun with their beautiful psych- Sound.
arrival that although having grown in size them. Material from their heralded Sun folk mix of electric guitar, violin and There’s a face-off of sorts at 2000
this was still the same “Folk And Music Structures was revitalised with further voice. An early afternoon set by as CHARLES BRADLEY & THE
Festival” it has always been. Along with extemporisation, sonic textures and COLORAMA, the Welsh aggregation EXTRAORDINAIRES and WHITE
the magnificent array of music, there are energy whilst one of the new songs the headed by 21st century pop polymath, FENCE vie for our attention. Bradley’s
now even more things to see, do, eat band have been airing of late, ‘Henry’s Carwyn Ellis, offered a concise heartfelt soul showmanship – almost 50
and drink – the Courtyard beer tent Cake’, took toytown pop to dizzying introduction to their canon of fanciful, years in the making but not captured
offered 108 beers and ciders to choose heights. Temples have grown immensely often whimsical tunes, leaning heavily until 2011’s No Time For Dreaming and
from, including Saturday night headliners and their audience-pleasing set really on 2012’s Good Music. Highlights the following year’s Soul Of America
Super Furry Animals’ very own Fuzzy suited the Green Man spirit. Earlier that included that album’s irresistible ode to documentary film – is the perfect tonic
brew. DJ sets from Ghost Box and Pete evening London based Welsh scamps unrequited love, ‘Why Is She’, and a to those who need a break from the
Fowler, an array of interesting films from TRECCO BEIS mixed up garage and surprisingly dynamic, extended rip acoustic singer-songwriters and indie-
Peter Strickland’s S&M spin on Euro art psych influences with a slacker approach through its title track. rock that is Green Man’s stock-in-trade.
house, The Duke Of Burgundy, to the that hinted at both Gorky’s and Race All the cool kids like JANE Meanwhile, Tim Presley’s DIY recording
family fun of Paddington, an array of Horses and suggested The Allah-Las as a WEAVER – or so the saying goes – project turned bona fide band, White
book talks (Mick Houghton on his Sandy benchmark. Refreshing. On the main and today she wooed and wowed the Fence (now boasting Drinks partner
Denny biog and Rob Chapman stage CALEXICO played with inhabitants of The Walled Garden with a Cate Le Bon in its ranks), power through
discussing his new history of professional assuredness, blending their set largely drawn from last year’s much- a frantic set of guitar-heavy jangly
psychedelia), a plethora of Q&As, the token Tex-Mex with garage and alt-rock,
most entertaining being with Mark E including a spirited rendition of Love’s
Smith – who cordially slated all manner ‘Alone Again Or’.
“It wasn’t until the dying blips and feedback
of people and took great pleasure in Saturday morning revellers emerged squalls of a 10-minute ‘The Man Don’t Give A
discussing crisps before walking off mid- not to the Biblical storms of the previous Fuck’ had ceased that any of us realised it was
chat – and more workshops and events few days’ forecasts but to blue sky,
than we could even comprehend, dazzling sunshine and soaring pissing down again”
offered something for everyone – temperatures. Ha! That that, Met Office!

92
pp72-95_Shindig_50_ANDY 28/08/2015 13:14 Page 93

LIVE

Goat

Colorama’s Carwyn Ellis

psych-punk that recalls a 1976-vintage blasts from their estimable back Dead, Byrds etc. Fabulous, as was album? I listen to MP3s. Streamed
re-imagining of July and Faine Jade, to catalogue. ‘Demons’, ‘Run! Christian! Gunn’s recent touring partner RYLEY MP3s!” were greeted with chuckles
huge roars of acceptance from a turned- Run!’ and ‘Zoom!’ were welcome choices WALKER, who played over in The aplenty. Like his lyrics, the character of
on audience. and there was a mid-set triumvirate of Walled Garden with his quartet (12- Misty subverts splendidly on all counts
Before tonight's headliners, Mwng tunes, with the hypnotic, almost string acoustic and vocals, electric taking the piss out of our 21st century
TELEVISION take to the main stage to hymn-like ‘Pan Ddaw'r Wawr’ putting guitar, double bass and electric piano) foibles. Thing is, he can rock like a
perform their classic ’77 debut, Marquee many of us into a trance. Surprisingly, the hitting the avant-garde percussions of motherfucker too as the rawer material
Moon. Tom Verlaine’s voice and Richard hits didn’t come as thick and fast as Tim Buckley – no faint praise. Back on from debut Fear Fun attested. A one of a
Lloyd’s West Coast guitar passages some might have hoped, and there was The Mountain Stage, MATTHEW E kind performer in an often barren
remained undiminished by time. nothing from ’96 debut, Fuzzy Logic, but WHITE furthered the sense of why musical landscape.
As far as the most anticipated the joyous, country-tinged ‘Mountain American artists today trump the Far Our Stage headliners GOAT
performance of the weekend goes, all People’ (on The Mountain Stage. At the competition with soul, passion and may well have been the weekend’s
bets were off. Seen as something of a foot of a mountain. In front of people.) musical chops. From the oft White and highlight, but then when Super Furry
homecoming to a festival whose ethos couldn’t fail. It wasn’t until the dying his amazingly talented band stunned Animals blew our minds and Misty,
owes them a great deal, SUPER blips and feedback squalls of a 10- with their light and shade, from his White and others excelled it'd be unfair
FURRY ANIMALS have been on minute ‘The Man Don’t Give A Fuck’ had whispered growl to his sweet tenor, from to crown them alone, but they were the
hiatus for most of Green Man’s recent ceased that any of us realised it was country-rock to soul and Brazilian- ultimate tripped-out festival experience
years of success. But a series of live pissing down again. flecked brilliance. Next time this man though: frightening, sensual and as tight
shows over the summer to promote an After a night of torrential storms, and has to play when it's dark. Big Love as PJ Proby’s pants. These secretive,
expanded reissue of 2000’s with many campers essentially flooded indeed. costumed Swedes were the genuine
groundbreaking Welsh-language album, and washed away, the sun re-appeared Consummate America performer living embodiment of a stoned late ’60s
Mwng, have only reminded us how good on Sunday afternoon for the closing day, Father John Misty took to the stage and commune band. Transcendental.
they were and how much we’d missed with festival-goers still in high spirits. As ploughed through highlights from his Something that is both encouraging and
them. the skies cleared STEVE GUNN took already classic I Love You, Honeybear surprising is how such an authentically
Clad in their now-trademark white to The Mountain Stage and continued when night fell. As is the norm, he sang psychedelic outfit have won the heart of
overalls, the quintet ambled onto the the similar well-placed dexterous his open heart out and delivered. His the masses. A truly mind melting
stage to the strains of ‘Slow Life’’s hallucinogenic guitar breaks of the patter as a seasoned raconteur also hit performance – those girls don't stop!
fairground techno intro before regaling previous night’s Richard Lloyd. Primarily all of the right buttons with the crowd; After the burning of the Green Man
an adoring, swollen audience with a focusing on the Way Out Weather banter on the proliferation of painted and some rousing fireworks it was over...
thrillingly diverse selection of album, Gunn conjured up the feel of the faced hippy children, his dislike of for us at least. Roll on 2016.
electronically-enhanced kaleidoscopic American greats of yonder years – the Starbucks and best of all “My favourite Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills and Andy Morten

93
pp72-95_Shindig_50_ANDY 30/08/2015 09:11 Page 94

LIVE

Spooner Oldham and Dan

Penn weave their quiet magic

DAN PENN & turned into a hit by James and Bobby POWDER The Camden set consisted of
SPOONER OLDHAM Purify the following year. The sound the The Blues Kitchen, Camden, Powder material then and now. Key
Union Chapel, London duo makes is extraordinary, a pair of London pieces from from the anthology and
Tuesday July 14th men in their mid-70s sounding Thursday July 23rd new songs from the forthcoming
Outside it’s a rainy summer’s evening decades younger, Penn’s voice THE FROST BROTHERS Cellophane Lane merged together well,
in Islington but inside, the often especially powerful and affecting (even The Betsey Trotwood, if not seamlessly. Kopf with his mod
forbidding Union Chapel feels more like if his on-stage banter is hard to Farringdon, London gear, energetic presence and perfectly
a Southern back porch as American decipher thanks to a combination of Saturday July 25th enunciated Anglophile vocals recalled
soul legends Dan Penn and Spooner the venue’s acoustics and his semi- Since their dissolution in the late ’60s, the old band whilst adding something
Oldham run through a triumphant impenetrable accent). California’s Powder have reformed and without alienating the source; his
string of classic hits written for the likes For the next hour and a half, they played again on a few occasions: vocals combining Monkees Mickey
of Percy Sledge and Janis Joplin, all run through an incredible 22 song set initially on the back of Alec Palao’s Dolenz and Davy Jones. Drumming
interspersed with down home awash with modern standards like 1993 archival Biff Bang Powder set, a brother Mickey was splendid, Palao the
anecdotes delivered by Penn in his Aretha Franklin’s ‘Do Right Woman, Do release that has consistently gained a bedrock and Rich slashed power
thick as molasses Alabaman drawl. In Right Man’, James Carr’s ‘The Dark End cult following. Palao, the archivist and chords from his Rickenbacker and sang
their ’60s and ’70s heyday, the pair Of The Street’ and ‘You Left The Water bass player, learned from Powder’s harmony as if it was still ’68.
only released one solo album each Running’ (recorded by both Otis Rich Martin that it'd be fun to take Highlights were many and the Powder
(Oldham’s beautifully eccentric Pot Redding and Barbara Lynn), all these unreleased recordings on the fans loved it.
Luck from ’72 and Penn’s magnificent punctuated with newer tunes such as road, even though his brother Thomas Saturday’s show was a perfect, if
Nobody’s Fool from ’73, originals of ‘Memphis Women And Chicken’ from had retired from the industry. Kid very different, accompaniment. In the
which would both set you back a pretty Penn’s ’94 “comeback” album, Do brother Mickey was brought in on tiny upstairs room of the Betsey a
penny), but they wrote countless Right Man. The pair close with the drums and a few shows were played throng of fans gathered together to
classics for other artists, many of which stirring Irma Franklin cut, ‘Zero around the group’s Bay Area home. witness an intimate performance of
make up the bulk of the night’s set. Willpower’ from ’79 and, to the sound Now, over 20 years on, and with a Thomas & Richard Frost’s cult ’69
With a simple set up of Oldham on of a standing ovation, they head out lengthy break in between, Powder favourite, Visualise. With Mickey and
Wurlitzer electric piano and Penn, clad into the cool night having spread more return with the addition of Magic Rich playing acoustic guitars, Alec on
in a splendid pair of farmer-style than a little of their Muscle Shoals Christian man Paul Kopf on vocals. electric bass and Paul on vocals, the
dungarees, on acoustic guitar, the duo magic on this rainy corner of darkest That the band feature only one original group stunned the appreciative
open with ‘I’m Your Puppet’, a ’65 B- North London. member matters little in an era when audience with fine renditions of ‘She’s
side recorded by Penn which was Thomas Patterson heroes The Who are two men down. As Got Love’ et al. Rich sang brilliantly and
the anthology has just been re- clearly relished the opportunity,
“Penn’s on-stage banter is hard to decipher mastered and re-released on Big Beat peppering the songs with stories while
thanks to a combination of the venue’s as Ka-Pow! it makes perfect sense for clearly enamoured by the response.
the re-formed Powder to cross the Two gigs that were truly worth
acoustics and his semi-impenetrable accent” Atlantic for a few gigs in bass player’s witnessing.
Palao’s native England. Jon ‘Mojo’ Mills

94
p095_Shindig_50 27/08/2015 16:08 Page 3

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SD50 Vinyl Art 24/08/2015 19:40 Page 96

#37
MILES DAVIS
FILLES DE KILIMANJARO
CBS, UK, 1968
Cover: Hiro

CHRISTOPHER
BUDD looks through
the eyes and into
the psychedelic soul
of a modern jazz
icon

No wait! It’s only jazz, don’t go… oh well. Just hinted at what was to come. Mabry was part of simultaneously gracing the sleeve of Crown Of
you and me then. But it’s their loss, ’cause this a hip Greenwich Village scene in ’67 when she Creation. As well as his grounding in fashion
is the good stuff. With this and his previous met Miles Davis and became his second wife a photography, Hiro excelled in technical
album, Miles In The Sky (also 1968), Miles Davis year later. It was she that turned Davis on to Sly experimentations, particularly double-
was beginning a journey into jazz fusion, which Stone and, more importantly, Jimi Hendrix. He exposures, making him the ideal person to
would ultimately lead into his “electric period’ absorbed their psychedelic innovations and capture both Mabry’s beauty and the
and reach its apotheosis with two seminal pursued them to far-out ends of his own. The psychedelic vibes she was bringing to her
albums In A Silent Way and Bitches Brew just a influence of Hendrix is apparent on Filles de husband. Nor was it the last time Hiro would
couple of whirlwind years later. Kilimanjaro from the opening bars of ‘Frelon visit this style – his image of Mabry is strikingly
Brun’ – check out that ‘If 6 Was 9’ riff. similar to one he produced of Stephanie Farrow
Davis’ work rate and proliferation of material in for Harper’s Bazaar the following year.
this period was astonishing. Filles de Kilimanjaro That Davis was deeply in love with Mabry is
was released in the UK just months after made evident in the title of the album’s As I’m sure you’ve figured out, Betty Davis kept
Nefertiti, his last purely acoustic album, and the expansive closing track, ‘Mademoiselle Mabry’, her married name and became the Betty Davis
fourth with his second quintet (Wayne Shorter, and also on the striking cover, which features a of a string of should-have-been-huge mid-70s
Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony beautiful, and suitably psychedelic headshot of funk-rock records, much beloved of goateed
Williams). Some of his collaborators would stay; her. And that he would wear his heart on his collectors since the ’90s. Her marriage to Davis
Hancock and Williams for a while, Shorter for sleeve so boldly constitutes a rare glimpse into over after just a year, she relocated briefly to
longer. But there was someone else who had the inner life of a famously inscrutable man. London before returning to the US to begin
turned Miles’ head towards the explosive sounds Davis’ future third wife, Cicely Tyson, had graced working on her own material. A great band –
around him in ’68; sounds that would trickle in the cover of Sorcerer in ’67, but it’s perhaps including the rhythm section from the Family
to his own work and give him the creative and something of a reveal that when the female form Stone – brought the funk, but Betty expressed
commercial rejuvenation that he craved. And again appears on a Miles Davis cover after this something much more personal, more frankly
fittingly, she’s literally staring us in the face. point, it’s always represented in a deeply stylised sexual. Never finding commercial success (her
way. Perhaps after Mabry, at least for a while, no fourth album, recorded in ’76, was shelved until
Betty Mabry was a busy (if bored) working other real woman would quite do. 2009), Betty was nevertheless a progenitor of
model and burgeoning musician. She’d had uncompromising, unafraid women in music to
some songwriting success with The Chambers This photo was taken by fashion photographer the present day; “a free spirit” as Miles wrote of
Brothers, penning their hit ‘Uptown’, a bluesy Yasuhiro Wakabayashi – known as Hiro – his one-time muse in his ’89 autobiography,
nugget of strutting down-tempo funk that whose shots of Jefferson Airplane were “talented as a motherfucker”.

96 96
SD50 crossword 24/08/2015 19:41 Page 1

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Across 5 The Chocolate Watchband had this

1 Partner of Bardot and Birkin (5,10) Mystique (5)
9 Kaptain Kopter and Commander 6 Provided a Soul Sacrifice (7)
Cassidy travelled through this land (6) 7 What Wilburn Burchette does to The
10 Aerie Faerie stuff from The Enid (8) Seven Gates Of Transcendental
11 Lindsay Anderson's role offscreen and Consciousness (5)
on in O Lucky Man! (8) 8 Velvet Crush were in the presence of this
14 Where was The Buoys' friend? (6) (9)
17 You'll find them in Dr Crippen's 12 A posthumous Landing for Jimi Hendrix (5)
Waiting Room (6,7) 13 Vehicle’s Mr ground one of these (5)
20 For What It's Worth, he wrote this 15 They found that Blue Turns To Grey (5)
(7,6) 16 Collections of musicians (9)
23 "It's shattering to hear / You ____ 17 This garage band went Searching in '66
listen with your ear" - Bee Gees, (5)
‘Jumbo’ (6) 18 A short-lived Silver San Francisco band (5)
25 Founder member of ELO and The Move 19 Baby, he said, Your Phrasing Is Bad (5)
(3,5) 20 "You claim that all that ____ is /
28 These Killers worship Hindu Gods (Of Breathing, eating, defecating" - Van Der
Love) (8) Graaf Generator, ‘Still Life’ (7)
29 They debuted with Distortions (6) 22 Snappy Berlin trio (6)
30 Joan Baez song, notably performed at 24 Early Rory Gallagher band (5)
Woodstock (5,3,7) 25 Knight, who wrote The WCPAEB’s ‘If You
Down Want This Love’ (5)
2 In 1969 Martin Denny gave us this 26 Nellcôte, where The Stones spent 1971
kind of Moog (6) (5)
3 After Moby but before fruit (5) 27 Hearts & Flowers’ Of Horses, Kids And
4 R Dean Taylor, The Fall and The Very Forgotten Women ended with two of
Things all had one in their house (5) these (5)

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1 97
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The 1966: Breaking Down The 1966: Breaking Down

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In Swinging London In Swinging London

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THE UK BAND OF 1965
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The enigmatic Josh Tillman returns with a scathing, The enigmatic Josh Tillman returns with a scathing, POST-ACID, PRE-TOMMY, THEIR 1968 ANNUS HORRIBILIS POST-ACID, PRE-TOMMY, THEIR 1968 ANNUS HORRIBILIS

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POST-ACID, PRE-TOMMY, THEIR 1968 ANNUS HORRIBILIS
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FATHER JOHN MISTY FATHER JOHN MISTY
The enigmatic Josh Tillman returns with a scathing, The enigmatic Josh Tillman returns with a scathing,

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