And at Number 1.....But of course. The greatest day-glo power-pop rock n rollers ever. I've said it before - and will no doubt say it again and again - how this most magnificent band never took the universe by storm is beyond me. Sigh.
Thursday 30 March 2017
VIDEO CLIP OF THE WEEK (1): BRAD 'BUTTERCUP'
To coincide with my recent list of the 30 Most Underrated Albums Of The Last 30 Years, here's the bunch who featured at Number 3 in that rundown. A Seattle super-group of sorts, this was the opening track from the album Shame. Just listen to that astonishing voice. Shawn Smith , I salute you sir.
Sunday 26 March 2017
THE 30 MOST UNDERRATED
ALBUMS OF THE LAST 30 YEARS!!!
We all have them. Those fantastic lost records that we love so much. The ones that we think everyone else in the entire universe should listen to. The ones that we think should have been Number One for weeks, nay months, on end. The ones that never get mentioned in the usual Greatest Albums Of All Time lists. You all know what I'm talking about. For some of you it may be an album that got you through those tough final years at school. For some, it may be an album that soundtracked a glorious trip abroad. And for some, it may even be the album that you played constantly through a difficult break-up. And where there's one, there's usually tons more. For this piece, I have decided to narrow my list down to a particular time-frame - otherwise I'd be here all week to be honest. This selection focuses on albums released during the bulk of my record-buying life - the last 30 years. The albums you will read about here have been with me through the major ups and downs of my life and are still hugely important to me today. And they all most definitely come under the banner of MASSIVELY UNDERRATED...........
30: VANESSA PARADIS 'VANESSA PARADIS'
After a reasonably successful acting and singing career as a teenager - including one massive hit in the UK with the ageless Joe Le Taxi - Mademoiselle Paradis suddenly threw us all a curveball in 1992 by hooking up with blinkers wearing rock-fixated show pony Lenny Kravitz (both musically and romantically) to deliver this glorious combination of late 60's psychedelia, blue-eyed soul and crunchy funk. An absolute blast from top to bottom, and oozing French class, the album contained one big hit single in Be My Baby, as well as a cover of The Velvet's Waiting For My Man. Fab. And this is still the best thing Kravitz has been involved with since his debut from 1989.
Key Track: THE FUTURE SONG
29: HOBOTALK 'BEAUTY IN MADNESS'
A quite wondrous album from Scottish band Hobotalk - which was basically one chap called Marc Pilley - who released this debut offering in 2000 to some pretty hefty critical acclaim, as well as a Mercury Music Prize nod. A quiet, gentle collection of heartfelt, acoustic-led Americana, this was an album that should have nudged the band ahead of the likes of Travis and Snow Patrol in the 'lighters in the air anthems' queue. Unfortunately, nobody really gave a fig and Hobotalk sputtered to a halt a few years later. A real shame.
Key Track: I WAIT FOR YOU
28: EG & ALICE '24 YEARS OF HUNGER'
Released in early 91, this was a collaboration between former Brother Beyond muppet Eg White and model/singer/dancer Alice Temple. Nestling somewhere between Steely Dan, Prefab Sprout and Prince, the duo's one and only album was full of gloriously sophisticated soulful pop music that swooned, swayed and sashayed in spectacularly splendid style. Despite this, the album died a death on release and promptly disappeared. White released a couple more solo albums later in the 90's before resurrecting himself as a songwriter for hire for artists such as Adele, Will Young, Pink and Florence Welch. Temple, who's astonishing voice pretty much made this album what it is, escaped to the USA and basically retired from music all together.
Key Track: INDIAN
27: LUNA 'PENTHOUSE'
Dean Wareham was once the singer and guitarist in late 80's dream pop indie combo Galaxie 500. An extremely underrated band in their own right, they released three very special albums before Wareham acrimoniously left the group to form Luna in late 1991. After two decent albums of Velvets inspired indie, this delightful third appeared in 95. Chock full of chiming jangle and lush instrumentation, this was Luna's masterpiece. There were many albums since but nothing came close to this and it's monumental centrepiece, 23 Minutes In Brussels. They eventually split in 2005 before reuniting a couple of years ago for sporadic dates. It's great to have them back.
Key Track: 23 MINUTES IN BRUSSELS
26: DADA 'PUZZLE'
A three-piece power-pop trio from California, Dada released this debut album in 1992 and even though they looked the part - with their straggly hair and frayed plaid shirts - they never really fitted in to the whole grunge scene that was straddling the globe at the time. Peddling a more blue-collar rock sound, dripping with Beatles/Cheap Trick pop smarts, they were unsurprisingly more successful back home - although not by much. Dropped by their label after their second album, they've been scratching around off and on ever since. A travesty really as the songs on this cracking little album still stand up today.
Key Track: DIZZ KNEE LAND
25: UNBELIEVABLE TRUTH 'ALMOST HERE'
Debut album from an Oxford band led by Andy Yorke - brother of Radiohead's Thom. Released in 1998 - at the absolute apex of Radiohead's fame - there was much industry chatter over possible nepotism, but on hearing this album the general feeling was that there was some serious songwriting chops within all the Yorke genes. A quietly devastating collection of hushed, acoustic ballads, Almost Here now seems like a precursor to the kind of songs Coldplay broke through with a couple of years later. There's far more emotional heft here though. The band called it a day after their second album in 2000.
Key Track: BUILDING
24: STRESS 'STRESS'
Stress were a very short-lived psychedelia infused funk rock band from the early 90's who released one album and then promptly imploded. A trio of Hendrix and Lennon worshiping disciples dressed in flower power shirts and loon pants of contrasting widths, it was no surprise to see them lumped in with Lenny Kravitz and the like. Indeed, I saw them support The Kravmeister in 1991 and I most certainly remember exclaiming that they would be HUGE. I was wrong on about a million different levels of course but this corking record still gets played in my house.
Key Track: DAYTIME BELIEVER
23: GIN BLOSSOMS 'NEW MISERABLE EXPERIENCE'
A melodic, slightly grungy rock band from Arizona, the Gin Blossoms hit big in the wake of the success of fellow US College Rock faves Counting Crows. First released in 1992, New Miserable Experience took on a new lease of life a year or so later when the song Hey Jealousy got picked up by radio stations across the globe. A superb slice of janglesome driving rock, the single was just the tip of the iceberg. As a whole, this album was as good as anything R.E.M. released in the second half of the 90's. And coming from me, that's pretty much stratospheric praise. Their success was overshadowed somewhat though by the firing from the band and eventual suicide of principal songwriter Doug Hopkins. The rest of the group never really recovered.
Key Track: FOUND OUT ABOUT YOU
22: SOUTH 'FROM HERE ON IN'
Formed in the late 90's in North London, this mysterious trio found themselves being mentored by Ian Brown from The Stone Roses and signed to cult DJ James Lavelle's record label Mo Wax in quick succession. Multi-instrumentalists all, their sound was reminiscent of the late 80's baggy scene as well as finding room for the more trip-hoppy dance beats of the time. An extraordinarily groovesome listen, there were three more albums over the next decade, but none of them were anywhere nears as good as this one.
Key Track: PAINT THE SILENCE
21: MAD SEASON 'ABOVE'
A proper grunge supergroup, this. Featuring Layne Staley from Alice In Chains, Pearl Jam's Mike McCready, Barrett Martin from Screaming Trees and bassist John Baker Saunders. Borne out of various different meet-ups at various different rehab facilities - the 90's were a dark time, people - the resulting project was finally released in late 94, just as the grunge scene was listening out for it's death knell. It must be said however, that this was one of the finest examples of that particular genre. Dark and doomy of course, but wonderfully heavy and bursting with tunes. Plus, there's a cameo from gravel-voiced rock monolith Mark Lanegan. The tragic deaths of Staley and Saunders meant this stayed a complete one-off.
Key Track: RIVER OF DECEIT
20: JOSH ROUSE 'DRESSED UP LIKE NEBRASKA'
From the wonderfully named town of Oshkosh in Nebraska, folk/roots singer-songwriter Rouse appeared on the scene in 1998 with this tremendous raft of songs that struck a similar chord to peak-period Jayhawks or even the more acoustic side of Bruce Springsteen's canon. Brimming with chiming guitars and choruses to die for, this was the perfect soundtrack to speeding up the Pacific Coast Highway in a convertible. Rouse is still going too - there have been ten more albums since all covering a variety of different musical styles - but I still keep coming back to this one.
Key Track: LATE NIGHT CONVERSATION
19: MORPHINE 'CURE FOR PAIN'
Slinking out of Boston in the late 80's, Morphine were a real anomaly compared to the rest of the alternative Massachusetts scene - bands like Throwing Muses, Pixies and Dinosaur Jr for example. Fusing jazz and blues influences with a grungy, downbeat rock sound, their most interesting aspect was that there were no guitars. Fronting a rhythm section of drums and various saxophones, vocalist Mark Sandman thrashed away at his two-string bass, giving them a deep, throbbing feel. They basically came across as the kind of band Jack Kerouac would have been in if he was born in the 60's. Cure For Pain was their second album and contained all their best songs. There were three more records before they disbanded after Sandman's untimely passing whilst performing in Italy in 1999.
Key Track: BUENA
18: FEVER RAY 'FEVER RAY'
Karin Dreijer Andersson is nominally one half - along with her brother - of bonkers Swedish dance duo The Knife. In 2009 however, with her day job on hiatus, she completely knocked my socks off with this astonishing collection of stark and glacial - she is Swedish after all - electronica. Veering away from The Knife's more uptempo floor-fillers, this was enigmatic, gothic and austere but with enough playfulness dotted throughout so as not too be too gloomy. Coming across like Kate Bush fronting Disintegration-era The Cure, it was far and away my favourite album of that particular year.
Key Track: DRY AND DUSTY
17: BLUMFELD 'ICH-MASCHINE'
German indie, anyone?
In 1992 I found myself in possession of a sleeveless cassette tape that had been left behind at some social gathering or other. Upon listening to it, I discovered it featured a whole bunch of artists I liked - Tom Waits, Tori Amos, Dinosaur Jr - but also four short, sharp tracks of snappy, snarling indie-rock very much in the vein of Pavement and the Pixies. As this was a time before the internet, it took me many years to discover the group behind these songs. Hailing from Hamburg and plying their trade for nigh on twenty years before their dissolution in 2007, Ich-Maschine was their debut offering and is still a thoroughly superb listening experience.
Key Track; GHETTOWELT
16: SIMPLE KID '2'
Simple Kid was the nom-de-plume of Irish singer-songwriter Ciaran McFeeley who released his first album in 2003 and this second effort a couple of years later. Recording all of his music at home on an 8-Track cassette player before feeding them into his computer whilst simultaneously looping a variety of guitars and banjos into the mix, the results led many to cast him as a Celtic version of Beck. The first album was a ramshackle but endearing affair, but the songs on the second were a quantum leap forward. Fusing country, folk and rock together with dance beats and sweeping electronica, the whole project boded well for McFeeley's future. Unfortunately for any listeners, he decided the music game wasn't for him and retired into obscurity shortly afterward.
Key Track: SEROTONIN
15: IRON & WINE 'OUR ENDLESS NUMBERED DAYS'
14: LEWIS TAYLOR 'LEWIS TAYLOR'
Now this really was something very special indeed. London born multi-talented music and studio wizard Taylor released this astonishing debut through Island Records in 1996. Sounding for all the world like a young Brian Wilson hooking up with What's Going On era Marvin Gaye and driving round to Paisley Park for a session with Prince, this was a fantastically lush and stunningly realised cornucopia of modern soul. Awash with multi-tracked vocals and pristine instrumentation, the sky really was the limit for Taylor. As is so often the case though, he was unable to handle much of what came his way, and after a darker sophomore album and some offcuts here and there he drifted away. A real loss.
Key Track: LUCKY
13: SPARKLEHORSE 'VIVADIXIESUBMARINETRANSMISSIONPLOT'
Mark Linkous was born in Virginia in 1962 and after surviving a broken home and an itinerant adolescence, he threw himself into music full-time before bestowing himself the Sparklehorse moniker and releasing this incredible debut in 1995. A real mish-mash of styles, Vivadixie... embraced ramshackle indie, alt-country balladeering, crunchy rock and roll and esoteric sound-scapes, all hanging together nigh-on perfectly. Like a younger Tom Waits, Linkous had delivered the ideal late-night drinking opus. Whilst touring it though, he overdosed on a mix of heroin and anti-depressants in a London hotel room - collapsing with his legs pinned beneath him and laying undiscovered for fourteen hours. The resulting six-month paralysis and extensive recuperation led to much darker material across his next three albums, and then - tragically - to his suicide in 2010.
Key Track: COW
12: SPAIN 'SHE HAUNTS MY DREAMS'
11: THE REAL PEOPLE 'THE REAL PEOPLE'
In the early 90's I found myself working in a branch of a much-missed chain of record stores. Unlike the dwindling number of music emporiums around today where staff and customers alike are forced to listen to the - and I use this term loosely - popular hits of the day, I was able to play pretty much whatever I liked. One day in early 91, this debut album from a ruddy-faced bunch of rascals from Liverpool appeared in the shop and I couldn't stop playing it. In fact, my working day didn't really start properly until I'd given it a spin each morning. Short, sharp and sweet, the twelve tracks within were drawn from the same well as the indie-dance big hitters of the time, The Stone Roses and The Happy Mondays, but with a summery, jangly backbone that brought to mind The La's with Johnny Marr on guitar. (As a side note, I still maintain that Noel Gallagher was listening very closely to this when writing Definitely Maybe.) There were sporadic releases here and there over the next few years, but really, this lot were all about this debut album.
Key Track: WINDOW PANE
10: G LOVE & SPECIAL SAUCE 'GL&SS'
Formed in Philadelphia in 1993, this lot were a spectacular melange of laid-back grooves, slapdash hip-hop and crackly, old-timey blues textures that on paper at least, sounded like a recipe for disaster. Upon hearing this magnificent debut album - and most certainly watching them live - it all made perfect sense. Led by G Love himself - Garrett Dutton to his mum - a long, lanky and languid frontman perched on a stall with his guitar and harmonica, with Jeff Clemons on drums and Jimmy 'Jam' Prescott on the double bass, the trio's sloppy and relaxed attitude belied the strength of their songs and musicianship. The perfect soundtrack for top-down driving, dusty outdoor basketball courts and skateboarding on the sidewalk - although it still sounds fantastic whilst travelling on the 363 through Peckham on a drizzly Wednesday morning.
Key Track: FATMAN
9: SUNHOUSE 'CRAZY ON THE WEEKEND'
In the mid-90's when film director Shane Meadows was making his first feature, he contacted an old work-mate of his from their time together at Alton Towers to provide the music. Gavin Clark had been trying to escape his dead-end humdrum West Midlands life by writing songs but had as of yet been unsuccessful. Meadows eventually used Clark's songs in his first full-length movie, Twenty Four Seven. Downbeat, bleak and drenched in sadness and poignancy, the tracks struck a chord. Clark was signed, formed a band, called themselves Sunhouse and waited for lift-off. Unfortunately, Clark's personal demons and troubled history caused fractures and friction almost immediately and by the time this stunning album was released, Sunhouse were no more. Sitting somewhere between early Tom Waits and Elliott Smith, this album is a tough listen certainly, but a hugely rewarding one. Clark never really recovered though. After trying again with another band called Clayhill, collaborations with UNKLE and then some solo work, he drifted back to the margins and sadly died two years ago. A compilation of his work, Evangelist, was released posthumously and is also excellent.
Key Track: HARD SUN
8: THE BELOVED 'HAPPINESS'
You know when people say "If you remember the 60's, you weren't really there"? Well, I can pretty much say the same thing about the period between 1988 to 1991. An intense blur of memories and blank spaces, it's the music from that time that helps my ageing cerebellum put the pieces back together. This album in particular reminds me of late-night raving in darkened fields in the wilds of Surrey with nothing more than the odd pill-based refreshment and a bunch of like-minded souls for company. Formed by Jon Marsh and Steve Waddington in the mid-80's and originally a bog-standard indie band, the duo - like many of us at the time - embraced the whole Acid House scene and ran with it, combining both elements into this stonker of a debut. Released in 1990, the album was aural the equivalent of an acid trip, with full-blown uptempo bangers like Hello and Scarlet Beautiful, right through to the blissed-out comedown of The Sun Rising. The duo eventually went their separate ways and Marsh continued as The Beloved with his wife before moving into DJ-ing.
Key Track: HELLO
7: WORLD PARTY 'GOODBYE JUMBO'
In 1990, World Party won Album Of The Year at the inaugural Q Magazine awards and the stage seemed set fair for them to become one of the UK's biggest bands. That it never really turned out that way is testament not only to the vagaries of the music business in general, but also because most people don't see a good thing when they hear it. World Party were formed in 1987 after Karl Wallinger left his previous employers - raggle taggle folkies The Waterboys - frustrated with a lack of opportunities to write. Surrounding himself with a crack team of session musicians, and after a decent debut album, this second collection focused on the state of the planet and the ecological snafu the human race were responsible for, marrying those lyrical concerns with Beatles-esque pop, 70's soul, lush orchestration and on some tracks, out and out funk. It sounded - and still does - utterly glorious. Wallinger's next album, 93's Bang, aimed for the stars and fell slightly short, and there were a couple more albums before he was struck down by a massive brain aneurysm in 2001. Now thankfully fully recovered, Wallinger is back on the road touring.
Key Track: AIN'T GONNA COME TILL I'M READY
6: LOWGOLD 'JUST BACKWARDS FROM SQUARE'
Formed in the late 90's after meeting at the University of Hertfordshire, this great lost indie band suffered some of the worst luck in he world during their all-too brief career. Record labels collapsing days after they signed, wages being withheld, tours not paid for, drummers leaving left, right and centre, comeback singles promoted and then cancelled at the last minute, debts so stratospheric the three guys in the band had to take day jobs to buy guitars. It beggars belief that they were able to record three albums, with this debut from 2001 being the pick of the bunch by some distance. An absolute belter of a record, Just Backwards... covered similar ground to the debut albums from Elbow and Coldplay that were hitting big at the time, but the songs were just so much better. Full of spectral, chiming guitar fills, chugging riffs and choruses that wrapped their arms around you and wouldn't let go, this was tremendous fare. Unsurprisingly, considering all their trials, Lowgold split for good in 2009.
Key Track: LESS I OFFER
5: MARK KOZELEK & JIMMY LAVALLE 'PERILS FROM THE SEA'
To be fair, this entire list could have been made up of Mark Kozelek albums. With the exception of 2014's Benji - which he recorded under his Sun Kil Moon arm - hardly any of his projects have garnered any serious critical acclaim. It's possible that there are just too many of his records out there - he is ASTONISHINGLY prolific - but nobody ever said that about Prince during his peak years. Since 1992 Kozelek has released albums with his first band Red House Painters, his second group Sun Kil Moon, solo projects and a number of collaborations - the best of which was this stunning collection, recorded with electronica enthusiast Lavalle from the band The Album Leaf. With a hushed and delicate musical backdrop from Lavalle, Kozelek's lyrical themes were - like the majority of his recent work - farmed from events and experiences from his day-to-day life. The trials of touring, difficulties with airlines, insomnia, and on the heartbreaking Gustavo, the dilemma of how to deal with the deportation of your illegal immigrant handyman. There were also two of the most beautiful songs Kozelek has ever written in He Always Felt Like Dancing and Sometimes The Wonder Of Life Prevails which should soften the hardest of hearts.
Key Track: HE ALWAYS FELT LIKE DANCING
4: MATTHEW SWEET 'GIRLFRIEND'
Born in Nebraska but spending the majority of his adult life in Georgia, 52 year old Sweet has been churning out sparkly power-pop records for close to thirty years now. Most of them are worth a listen, some more than once, but nothing he's done before or since comes close to the majesty of the work on his third album, released in 1991. Girlfriend was written in the wake of his divorce, and it's lyrics are understandably dark and scathing in places, but the music is an utter joy. Recorded with New York punk rock royalty in Television's Richard Lloyd as well as Robert Quine and Fred Maher from Lou Reed's backing band, Sweet married the left of the dial discordia of late period post-punk with sunny, Byrdsian jangle to splendid effect. The whole album is joyous, but the first six tracks in particular could be the greatest opening salvo of any album I've ever heard. Like the majority of artists on this list though, Sweet garnered some critical acclaim but slipped the net and even though he's still out there ploughing his furrow, his time has gone.
Key Track: EVANGELINE
3: BRAD 'SHAME'
In 1992, after the globe-straddling success of Ten, Pearl Jam's guitarist Stone Gossard found himself back home in Seattle with some downtime. Hooking up with local musicians Regan Hagar and Jeremy Toback, he also enlisted the help and assistance of Seattle's secret weapon - vocalist and songwriter Shawn Smith. Smith is someone I will wax lyrical about until the cows come home: possessed of a quite incredible voice that brings to mind Marvin Gaye and Sam Cooke at their peak, whilst also retaining a rock edge that fitted perfectly with the funky grunge musical palette that Gossard was working on. Originally calling themselves Shame but forced into a name-change after threatened legal action by a band of the same moniker fronted by a chap called Brad Wilson - hence the new name. This album was meant to be nothing more than a side-project, but due to the Pearl Jam connection, gained enough buzz to allow for further records. This is still their best collection of songs though - running the gamut from fists-in-the-air rockers, slinky funk and heart-in-the-mouth piano ballads. Smith's extraordinary talents can also be heard with his other bands Satchel and Pigeonhed as well as a raft of splendid solo albums.
Key Track: SCREEN
2: BUFFALO TOM 'LET ME COME OVER'
Coming together at the University of Massachusetts in the late 80's, singer/guitarist Bill Janovitz, bassist Chris Colbourn and drummer Tom Maginnis befriended local legend J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr and persuaded him to produce their first two albums. Unfairly nicknamed Dinosaur Jr Junior, there was most definitely a little too much influence from Mascis on those records. This third album however, produced by Kolderie and Slade and released in early 1992, was a quantum leap and an absolute tour de force. To this day, it's still my favourite album from that fertile and fecund period of alt-rock. Indeed, in an ideal world and with a prevailing wind, it could have been as big as Nevermind. Grungy guitars, pop smarts, anthemic choruses, and an incredibly moving song about a lost cat - truly, all life is here. The Tom released three more albums during the 90's before taking ten years off. There have been two more albums since their reformation. Cracking records all but this is their masterpiece - and it's 25 years old this year. Man alive.
Key Track: LARRY
1: JELLYFISH 'BELLYBUTTON'
Anyone who knows me well won't be surprised to learn that this is number one in the list of The 30 Most Underrated Albums Of The Last 30 Years. Not only is it most definitely that, it's also my favourite album of all-time, which by extension, makes it the greatest record ever made. You can keep your Revolvers, your Dark Side Of The Moons, your OK Computers - all splendid albums obviously, but none can hold a candle to this gigantically glorious power-pop confection. From the cover art to the sleeve notes - and all points inbetween - Bellybutton is just perfect. Rising from the ashes of short-lived - and yes, criminally underrated - SF glam rockers Beatnik Beatch, singer and stand-up drummer Andy Sturmer and keyboard wizard Roger Manning hooked up with teenage guitar virtuoso Jason Falkner in 1989 and set about work on their debut. Signing a major label deal and hooking up with Bee Gees producer Albhy Galuten gave the band a platform to basically throw everything into the songwriting process to see what would stick. The results were - and as I may have stated - still are utterly magisterial. Imagine a large mixing bowl full of The Beatles, ELO, XTC, Badfinger, The Beach Boys - as well as the late 80's psychedelia scene, 70's Motown, glam rock and the Laurel Canyon folk-rock vibe. Throw in some ice cream, jelly babies and sparkles and you're still only halfway there. Ten faultless songs that never fail to make me smile, the album was the soundtrack to a summer travelling around Europe in 1991, and upon my return I assumed the rest of the world would have fallen in love with it as well. Imagine my disdain and despair then when I realised this was not the case. Falkner left Jellyfish not long afterward to form the really rather special - and yes, criminally underrated - The Grays. Sturmer and Manning kept at it and went balls-to-the-wall with their second magnum opus, Spilt Milk. Again, the world wasn't listening and the pair went their separate ways in 1994. Sturmer drifted off to Japan where he has spent most of the last two decades writing music for television. A waste, quite frankly. Manning and Falkner have kept going, releasing various different projects over the years. Wonderfully, at last year's Glastonbury Festival, they both turned up as part of Beck's backing band. So, watching them at home on the telly performing on the Pyramid Stage to 100,000 people, I finally got to see what it might have been like if Jellyfish had made it. It was a beautiful thing.
Key Track: THE WHOLE FRICKIN' ALBUM, OBVIOUSLY........
Have I missed anything? Do you have albums that you feel are criminally underrated? Albums you reckon should be sitting atop the above list? Feel free to let me know via the comments link below. Healthy debate awaits!
ALBUMS OF THE LAST 30 YEARS!!!We all have them. Those fantastic lost records that we love so much. The ones that we think everyone else in the entire universe should listen to. The ones that we think should have been Number One for weeks, nay months, on end. The ones that never get mentioned in the usual Greatest Albums Of All Time lists. You all know what I'm talking about. For some of you it may be an album that got you through those tough final years at school. For some, it may be an album that soundtracked a glorious trip abroad. And for some, it may even be the album that you played constantly through a difficult break-up. And where there's one, there's usually tons more. For this piece, I have decided to narrow my list down to a particular time-frame - otherwise I'd be here all week to be honest. This selection focuses on albums released during the bulk of my record-buying life - the last 30 years. The albums you will read about here have been with me through the major ups and downs of my life and are still hugely important to me today. And they all most definitely come under the banner of MASSIVELY UNDERRATED...........
30: VANESSA PARADIS 'VANESSA PARADIS'
After a reasonably successful acting and singing career as a teenager - including one massive hit in the UK with the ageless Joe Le Taxi - Mademoiselle Paradis suddenly threw us all a curveball in 1992 by hooking up with blinkers wearing rock-fixated show pony Lenny Kravitz (both musically and romantically) to deliver this glorious combination of late 60's psychedelia, blue-eyed soul and crunchy funk. An absolute blast from top to bottom, and oozing French class, the album contained one big hit single in Be My Baby, as well as a cover of The Velvet's Waiting For My Man. Fab. And this is still the best thing Kravitz has been involved with since his debut from 1989.
Key Track: THE FUTURE SONG
29: HOBOTALK 'BEAUTY IN MADNESS'
Key Track: I WAIT FOR YOU
28: EG & ALICE '24 YEARS OF HUNGER'
Key Track: INDIAN
27: LUNA 'PENTHOUSE'
Key Track: 23 MINUTES IN BRUSSELS
26: DADA 'PUZZLE'
Key Track: DIZZ KNEE LAND
25: UNBELIEVABLE TRUTH 'ALMOST HERE'
Key Track: BUILDING
24: STRESS 'STRESS'
Key Track: DAYTIME BELIEVER
23: GIN BLOSSOMS 'NEW MISERABLE EXPERIENCE'
Key Track: FOUND OUT ABOUT YOU
22: SOUTH 'FROM HERE ON IN'
Key Track: PAINT THE SILENCE
21: MAD SEASON 'ABOVE'
Key Track: RIVER OF DECEIT
20: JOSH ROUSE 'DRESSED UP LIKE NEBRASKA'
Key Track: LATE NIGHT CONVERSATION
Key Track: BUENA
18: FEVER RAY 'FEVER RAY'
Karin Dreijer Andersson is nominally one half - along with her brother - of bonkers Swedish dance duo The Knife. In 2009 however, with her day job on hiatus, she completely knocked my socks off with this astonishing collection of stark and glacial - she is Swedish after all - electronica. Veering away from The Knife's more uptempo floor-fillers, this was enigmatic, gothic and austere but with enough playfulness dotted throughout so as not too be too gloomy. Coming across like Kate Bush fronting Disintegration-era The Cure, it was far and away my favourite album of that particular year.
Key Track: DRY AND DUSTY
17: BLUMFELD 'ICH-MASCHINE'
In 1992 I found myself in possession of a sleeveless cassette tape that had been left behind at some social gathering or other. Upon listening to it, I discovered it featured a whole bunch of artists I liked - Tom Waits, Tori Amos, Dinosaur Jr - but also four short, sharp tracks of snappy, snarling indie-rock very much in the vein of Pavement and the Pixies. As this was a time before the internet, it took me many years to discover the group behind these songs. Hailing from Hamburg and plying their trade for nigh on twenty years before their dissolution in 2007, Ich-Maschine was their debut offering and is still a thoroughly superb listening experience.
Key Track; GHETTOWELT
16: SIMPLE KID '2'
Key Track: SEROTONIN
15: IRON & WINE 'OUR ENDLESS NUMBERED DAYS'
Iron & Wine is basically one man - South Carolina's Sam Beam. Fulsomely bearded and in possession of a beautifully delicate voice akin to Nick Drake or Elliott Smith, in 2004 he released this second full-length album which was a more expansive affair after his relatively lo-fi debut. A stunning set of songs covering all of life's big themes like love, death, ennui - you know, the major stuff - it was full of gossamer-thin melodies and lyrics that brought a lump to the throat and a tear to the eye. Beam has since expanded his sound further with his more recent releases encompassing more traditional Americana tropes.
Key Track: NAKED AS WE CAME14: LEWIS TAYLOR 'LEWIS TAYLOR'
Key Track: LUCKY
13: SPARKLEHORSE 'VIVADIXIESUBMARINETRANSMISSIONPLOT'
Mark Linkous was born in Virginia in 1962 and after surviving a broken home and an itinerant adolescence, he threw himself into music full-time before bestowing himself the Sparklehorse moniker and releasing this incredible debut in 1995. A real mish-mash of styles, Vivadixie... embraced ramshackle indie, alt-country balladeering, crunchy rock and roll and esoteric sound-scapes, all hanging together nigh-on perfectly. Like a younger Tom Waits, Linkous had delivered the ideal late-night drinking opus. Whilst touring it though, he overdosed on a mix of heroin and anti-depressants in a London hotel room - collapsing with his legs pinned beneath him and laying undiscovered for fourteen hours. The resulting six-month paralysis and extensive recuperation led to much darker material across his next three albums, and then - tragically - to his suicide in 2010.
Key Track: COW
12: SPAIN 'SHE HAUNTS MY DREAMS'
Second album from California-based Josh Haden and crew. Spain were - and still are - a gorgeously chilled bunch of jazz-influenced musicians who - with this album in particular from 1999 - hit on that perfect sweet spot of hazy country and late-night blues jams that drifted along quite magically. Their previous album had contained the track Spiritual, which was later covered by The Man In Black himself, Johnny Cash. The songs on this album were even better though, and should be investigated forthwith. After a decade-long hiatus through most of the noughties, Haden reconvened Spain in 2012 and has continued producing glorious music ever since.
Key Track: NOBODY HAS TO KNOW
11: THE REAL PEOPLE 'THE REAL PEOPLE'
Key Track: WINDOW PANE
10: G LOVE & SPECIAL SAUCE 'GL&SS'
Key Track: FATMAN
9: SUNHOUSE 'CRAZY ON THE WEEKEND'
Key Track: HARD SUN
8: THE BELOVED 'HAPPINESS'
Key Track: HELLO
7: WORLD PARTY 'GOODBYE JUMBO'
Key Track: AIN'T GONNA COME TILL I'M READY
6: LOWGOLD 'JUST BACKWARDS FROM SQUARE'
Key Track: LESS I OFFER
5: MARK KOZELEK & JIMMY LAVALLE 'PERILS FROM THE SEA'
Key Track: HE ALWAYS FELT LIKE DANCING
4: MATTHEW SWEET 'GIRLFRIEND'
Key Track: EVANGELINE
3: BRAD 'SHAME'
In 1992, after the globe-straddling success of Ten, Pearl Jam's guitarist Stone Gossard found himself back home in Seattle with some downtime. Hooking up with local musicians Regan Hagar and Jeremy Toback, he also enlisted the help and assistance of Seattle's secret weapon - vocalist and songwriter Shawn Smith. Smith is someone I will wax lyrical about until the cows come home: possessed of a quite incredible voice that brings to mind Marvin Gaye and Sam Cooke at their peak, whilst also retaining a rock edge that fitted perfectly with the funky grunge musical palette that Gossard was working on. Originally calling themselves Shame but forced into a name-change after threatened legal action by a band of the same moniker fronted by a chap called Brad Wilson - hence the new name. This album was meant to be nothing more than a side-project, but due to the Pearl Jam connection, gained enough buzz to allow for further records. This is still their best collection of songs though - running the gamut from fists-in-the-air rockers, slinky funk and heart-in-the-mouth piano ballads. Smith's extraordinary talents can also be heard with his other bands Satchel and Pigeonhed as well as a raft of splendid solo albums.
Key Track: SCREEN
2: BUFFALO TOM 'LET ME COME OVER'
Key Track: LARRY
1: JELLYFISH 'BELLYBUTTON'
Anyone who knows me well won't be surprised to learn that this is number one in the list of The 30 Most Underrated Albums Of The Last 30 Years. Not only is it most definitely that, it's also my favourite album of all-time, which by extension, makes it the greatest record ever made. You can keep your Revolvers, your Dark Side Of The Moons, your OK Computers - all splendid albums obviously, but none can hold a candle to this gigantically glorious power-pop confection. From the cover art to the sleeve notes - and all points inbetween - Bellybutton is just perfect. Rising from the ashes of short-lived - and yes, criminally underrated - SF glam rockers Beatnik Beatch, singer and stand-up drummer Andy Sturmer and keyboard wizard Roger Manning hooked up with teenage guitar virtuoso Jason Falkner in 1989 and set about work on their debut. Signing a major label deal and hooking up with Bee Gees producer Albhy Galuten gave the band a platform to basically throw everything into the songwriting process to see what would stick. The results were - and as I may have stated - still are utterly magisterial. Imagine a large mixing bowl full of The Beatles, ELO, XTC, Badfinger, The Beach Boys - as well as the late 80's psychedelia scene, 70's Motown, glam rock and the Laurel Canyon folk-rock vibe. Throw in some ice cream, jelly babies and sparkles and you're still only halfway there. Ten faultless songs that never fail to make me smile, the album was the soundtrack to a summer travelling around Europe in 1991, and upon my return I assumed the rest of the world would have fallen in love with it as well. Imagine my disdain and despair then when I realised this was not the case. Falkner left Jellyfish not long afterward to form the really rather special - and yes, criminally underrated - The Grays. Sturmer and Manning kept at it and went balls-to-the-wall with their second magnum opus, Spilt Milk. Again, the world wasn't listening and the pair went their separate ways in 1994. Sturmer drifted off to Japan where he has spent most of the last two decades writing music for television. A waste, quite frankly. Manning and Falkner have kept going, releasing various different projects over the years. Wonderfully, at last year's Glastonbury Festival, they both turned up as part of Beck's backing band. So, watching them at home on the telly performing on the Pyramid Stage to 100,000 people, I finally got to see what it might have been like if Jellyfish had made it. It was a beautiful thing.
Key Track: THE WHOLE FRICKIN' ALBUM, OBVIOUSLY........
Have I missed anything? Do you have albums that you feel are criminally underrated? Albums you reckon should be sitting atop the above list? Feel free to let me know via the comments link below. Healthy debate awaits!
Thursday 16 March 2017
VIDEO CLIP OF THE WEEK: FUTURE ISLANDS "SEASONS"
Baltimore's Future Islands are back in a couple of weeks with their brand new album - and here at No Static Towers I couldn't be happier. Their previous effort, Singles, was a gorgeous collection of intelligent synth-pop and driving indie-rock all topped off with the somewhat unique vocal delivery of Samuel T Herring. This is the clip that broke them, from one of David Letterman's last shows from 3 years ago. Feast your eyes people, on Big Sam and his glorious death metal dad dancing amateur dramatics. Joyful. And Dave's reaction at the end is for the ages.
Tuesday 14 March 2017
THE BEST THING I'VE HEARD IN AGES!!!
Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever 'The French Press'
Well this is just utterly, utterly wonderful. Hailing from Melbourne, this quintet of annoyingly lean and handsome dudes call themselves Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever - an unwieldy slice of nomenclature to be sure but one which will stick in the cerebellums of any right-minded music fan for a long, long time. Formed in 2013 by joint vocalists and guitar players Fran Keaney and Tom Russo, the duo were soon joined by bassist Joe Russo, third guitarist Joe White and drummer Marcel Tussie. Inspired by a collective devotion to early 80s UK jangle bands like The Smiths and Orange Juice, along with fellow Antipodean indie-pop craftsmen The Clean and The Go-Betweens, it didn't take long for the group to take off. Last year's debut EP Talk Tight was a five-track love letter to all of the aforementioned bands with a further nod to What Goes On era Velvet Underground. It was no pastiche though. I had a similar reaction to the Fleet Foxes debut EP from ten years ago, where I was definitely able to draw a line between what each band had listened to and what they have produced themselves, but just like the Foxes, RBCF - you'll permit me the abbreviation - have stirred it all up and made a sound so much their own that it's like they've arrived on the scene totally fully formed. Indeed, their current EP - The French Press - sounds like it's been recorded by a band ten years into their lifespan. All six tracks on the new record are glorious, swooning nuggets of absolute joy. The title track alone - with it's call and response harmony-laden guitar licks, coupled with it's poignant lyric focusing on two brothers straining to connect emotionally over Skype - would normally be enough to make this lot my new favourite band, but the brilliance never flags. Julie's Place, Sick Bug - with it's fantastic "I want you! I want you! I want you!" refrain, Colours Run and Dig Up are tremendous slices of roistering and rollicking indie, bringing to mind Murmur-period R.E.M. as well as Teenage Fanclub, Pavement, The House Of Love, early Strokes and The War On Drugs too. On first listen, I had already been grinning like an idiot for fifteen minutes, such was my amazement at how astonishing the first five tracks were. Then the final song, Fountain Of Good Fortune, kicked in and that was it. I was a goner, bowled over by this very special band's songwriting confidence and downright musical excellence. An acoustic-led, dreamy haze of a song, Fountain builds and builds quite spectacularly across it's first half, with Keaney's lyrics seemingly bemoaning the stringent rules and constraints of organised religion, before a key-change of such wonder kicks in that I literally squealed with delight when I first heard it. The two-minute instrumental coda that ends the song - complete with duelling guitars and plaintive "Woo woos" from the band - is just the taste-bud caressing icing on the cake quite frankly. It is, as the title of this particular post has already stated, the best thing I've heard in ages. No hyperbole. There is not one ounce of chaff across these six tracks, and if they can keep up this kind of strike rate on their debut album - promised for later this year - then we're in for an absolute treat.
Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever 'The French Press'
Monday 13 March 2017
Shameless Plug Alert!!!
Apologies for blowing my own trumpet as it were, but here it is....
My good friend Ben - who also goes by the mysterious handle Benomaly - is currently entertaining folks far and wide with his own radio show on the Radio Confluence network. Last week, and most kindly of him, he gave a big shout-out to yours truly and this very blog. He also played a few tracks from my Top 50 Of 2016 list. If you'd like to tune into his show, you'll find it at:
http://mixlr.com/benomaly/showreel/
The March 8th show featured at the above link features tracks from this blog, and all of Ben's previous shows are worth a listen too. Dive in folks! And cheers Ben!
Apologies for blowing my own trumpet as it were, but here it is....
My good friend Ben - who also goes by the mysterious handle Benomaly - is currently entertaining folks far and wide with his own radio show on the Radio Confluence network. Last week, and most kindly of him, he gave a big shout-out to yours truly and this very blog. He also played a few tracks from my Top 50 Of 2016 list. If you'd like to tune into his show, you'll find it at:
http://mixlr.com/benomaly/showreel/
The March 8th show featured at the above link features tracks from this blog, and all of Ben's previous shows are worth a listen too. Dive in folks! And cheers Ben!
Thursday 9 March 2017
VIDEO CLIP OF THE WEEK: ADORABLE "SUNSHINE SMILE"
As the sun came out today in a major way, I thought it was only right and proper to take a trip back to 1992 and check in with those adorable Adorable chaps. This song reminds me of loud and late nights at the much-missed Loony Toons club in North London. Proustian rushes have never been more glorious. Sunshine Smile indeed....
LIVE REVIEWS
BAND OF HORSES 23/02 The Troxy
Seattle's premier troupe of laid-back, plaid-wearing honchos of the hirsute are back in good old London Town for the third time in 9 months - after two storming shows in Shepherd's Bush last summer - as they wind down the touring schedule for their excellent fifth album, Why Are You OK? Since 2004, the band's fan-base has increased exponentially with each new release, and tonight in East London's premier art deco inspired venue, the room is fit to bursting with followers old and new, ready to enjoy the groups biggest indoor UK gig to date. There's beards aplenty, bottles of cider being guzzled a hundred fold and an atmosphere crackling with anticipation.
After a short but gloriously sweet acoustic support set from fellow country-rock and choogle enthusiast Israel Nash, main BoH magus Ben Bridwell leads his compadres out on the stage to a monstrous reception from the faithful. Smiling broadly, he gives the crowd a quick nod as the band strike up the opening chords to Dull Times/The Moon - the first track from the current album. A lengthy, drone-rock inspired ballad, the song builds and builds to an epic, wigged-out climax that brings to mind The Grateful Dead in their pomp. Indeed, Band Of Horses themselves wouldn't have looked out of place strolling around Haight/Ashbury in '67 such are their influences - both musical and sartorial. However, even though their are nods to bands such as Creedence, CSNY, and the early 70s country version of The Byrds, BoH deftly weave the aforementioned influences into a sound most definitely their own. Bridwell himself - on all manner of guitars - and fellow lead guitarist Tyler Ramsey harmonise together quite beautifully throughout this gig, adding extra layers of pop nous to the earthy Americana grooves. With keyboard genius Ryan Monroe on fire this particular evening, songs from all five albums are performed with real verve and gusto. Casual Party, NW Apt. and the magnificent Laredo are thrilling examples of janglesome country rock at its finest. In A Drawer could have been a massive radio hit during the grunge explosion of the early 90s, while No One's Gonna Love You is a perfect example of a modern day alt-rock power ballad. There's even room for a porch-front style acoustic segment and an incendiary version of Neil Young's Powderfinger before set-closer Is There A Ghost has everyone in the room singing along lustily. Returning for an encore of the-hit-single-that-should-have-been The Funeral followed by fan favourite The General Specific was just spoiling us really. Quite splendid stuff.
The band are currently heading back across the pond for a run of US dates before returning to Europe for a series of festivals, culminating in their headline appearance at the glorious End Of The Road festival in Dorset.
SETLIST:
Dull Times/The Moon
Casual Party
Islands On The Coast
The Great Salt Lake
Solemn Oath
Laredo
Throw My Mess
Country Teen
The First Song
St. Augustine
Evening Kitchen
Part One
Cigarettes, Wedding Bands
Powderfinger
NW Apt.
No One's Gonna Love You
In A Drawer
Is There A Ghost
The Funeral
The General Specific
TEENAGE FANCLUB 28/02 Shepherd's Bush Empire
I first saw Teenage Fanclub (or TFC, The Fannies, or The Fancluberoonies - if you're not into the whole brevity thing) in 1991 at the late and lamented Astoria Theatre in Charing Cross Road. I fell for them - and fell hard - almost immediately. Four lairy, hairy Glaswegians deeply in love with The Beatles, Big Star and early period R.E.M. and who were peddling a grungy, jangle-filled melange of all three and having the time of their life whilst doing so. Their second proper album - the near-faultless Bandwagonesque - ended 1991 at the top of many a Best Of The Year list. No mean feat considering Nevermind, Loveless, Out Of Time, Blue Lines and Screamadelica also hit the shelves that year. Albums came thick and fast throughout the rest of the 90s: The slightly flawed Thirteen; The alt-pop classic Grand Prix; The wistful and elegiac Songs From Northern Britain; The ill-fated dalliance with a major label in Howdy. Since then, the band have reconvened far less frequently. Members are scattered across the globe living their own lives as family life has taken centre stage. Indeed, there has only been 3 albums in the last 15 years, with a 6 year gap before the release last September of Here which reached Number 8 in my Top 50 of 2016 list which you'll find elsewhere on this blog. The new album is a glorious reminder of how, when the core songwriting trio of Norman Blake, Gerry Love and Raymond McGinley get together, this most modest and understated band can tap into that musical sweet spot that most bands never manage.
Tonight's gig in West London is their third London show touring the new record, and it's another sell-out. The audience - mostly balding and paunchy chaps of a certain age - are in raptures from the off and, as hazy memories of cheap lager and good-natured moshing at indie clubs in the early 90s are triggered, the classics come thick and fast. Radio, Verisimilitude, Don't Look Back, About You, Sparky's Dream. It's a veritable treasure trove of tremendous tunes. As usual - and as on record - all three main songwriters get their chance to shine whilst singing their own songs. Blake excels on It's All In My Mind and the rarely-aired Did I Say. Love's finest moments are the fantastic chug and strum of the new album's The First Sight and possibly the sunniest moment in their canon - and their biggest hit single - in Ain't That Enough. As I've got older though, it's Raymond McGinley's nostalgia-tinged songs that I keep coming back to, and his versions tonight of My Uptight Life and Your Love Is The Place Where I Come From - which is up there with Brian Wilson's God Only Knows in the greatest love songs ever written list - are just spine-tingling. The three founder members are aided and abetted superbly on stage by long-standing third drummer Francis MacDonald and the relative newcomer on keyboards in Dave McGowan. The pace never flags and the connection between band and audience is a joy to behold. Blake's query about how many episodes of the Tom Hardy drama Taboo he's missed due to their touring commitments just shows how down to earth they are. "Nae bother - I'll catch up on IPlayer". Lovely.
They end the night with the real meat of their catalogue. Hearing 2000 voices singing along to the opening lines of the mighty The Concept - "She wears denim wherever she goes, says she's gonna get some records by the Status Quo" - is one of the highlights of my gigular life, whilst the bona fide power-pop masterpiece that is Star Sign is nigh on magnificent. And then there's Everything Flows. It's always their last song and everyone here knows it, but it still never fails to excite and tonight's rendition is no exception. A glorious progression of crunchy and gnarly chords all underpinned by that ear for melody as it builds to it's epic and windswept solo-filled climax. "I'll never know which way to flow, set a course that I don't know". Is there a better indie-rock anthem? Answers on a postcard, please.
If the band wait another 6 years before returning to the coalface I will be well into my 6th decade but on this evidence, I will definitely be pulling out my old faded TFC T-shirt and joining them once again. Scotland's finest.
SETLIST:
I'm In Love
Radio
Hold On
Thin Air
Verisimilitude
The Darkest Part Of The Night
Don't Look Back
My Uptight Life
The First Sight
Dumb Dumb Dumb
About You
I Need Direction
Did I Say
Your Love Is The Place Where I Come From
Ain't That Enough
I Don't Want Control Of You
Sparky's Dream
The Concept
Going Places
I Was Beautiful When I Was Alive
Star Sign
Everything Flows
Friday 3 March 2017
2016: THE YEAR IN MUSIC - LIVE!!!
I attended my first gig/concert/live music experience - delete as appropriate - in 1983. It was at the Hammersmith Odeon, and it was in the presence of gloriously camp Britfunk pioneers, Imagination. I was 12 years old and I had the time of my life. Being inside that venue with 2000 other like-minded souls, dancing my skinny little arse off to Flashback, Just An Illusion, Music And Lights and the rest. It was fantastic. And I returned home with my first bit of music merchandise: An Imagination headband. The Rubicon had been crossed - going to gigs had become just as important as buying the records. Since then, I have been to hundreds more gigs, and I hope - health and wealth permitting - to go to hundreds more. These days, with the traditional music business model of selling records disappearing in the rearview mirror, live performance has become the major money-spinner for the majority of artists. Unless you're Adele or Ed Sheeran or of similar size - sales-wise - then your best bet financially is to get out there and tour. And tour. And tour some more. Which of course is fantastic for us music-lovers. Less so for our wallets though.....
2016 was another hefty schedule of live events for your faithful scribe. Even though I missed out on some truly mouth-watering gigs, I was still able to get to see some of my old faves as well as ticking off some bucket list entries. There was classic Americana with The Jayhawks, Richmond Fontaine and Patty Griffin. There was downhome choogle with Band Of Horses and White Denim. Sixties-indebted psych-rock with Israel Nash, Wolf People and Black Mountain. Expansive, electronica-infused psychedelia with Tame Impala and Animal Collective. Brain-rattling epic indie rock with Desert Mountain Tribe and Silversun Pickups. Afrobeat inspired tribal beats and dance rhythms with Afro Celt Sound System and Goat. Reformed and reunited early 90s indie heroics with Lush and Belly. Crunchy, grungy ramshackle rock with Mudhoney and Bob Mould. There was also some deliciously dark and doomy electronica from Massive Attack, who took over Hyde Park on one splendid summer's eve and were ably supported by legendary post-punk priestess Patti Smith. And then there was Neil Young, who returned to London for the third time in as many years and blew the roof off the O2 with his latest combo, The Promise Of The Real. It truly was a banner year.
However, to paraphrase Morrissey, some gigs are better than others. So, as you'd expect, I've boiled it down to a Top 5. These were the gigs that truly stood out for me - the ones I'll remember for a long time. If you were there then you'll know what I mean. If you weren't, then well, more fool you....
5: SUN KIL MOON 22/7 Royal Festival Hall
SUN KIL MOON/JESU 17/9 Cadogan Hall
Bit of a cheat, this. Sun Kil Moon mainman Mark Kozelek usually pops over to London once a year and always puts on a show of extraordinary intensity and stunning songcraft, but in 2016 he really spoilt me, so I've got no choice really but to put both of his gigs in together. The first of these two astonishing shows was ostensibly the support gig for the SKM/Jesu album that had been released in February. However, Justin Broadrick - who is Jesu - had only very recently started rehearsing with Kozelek for this gig so another date was hastily added for later in the year. Both nights were utterly compelling from start to finish, featuring a number of tracks from their collaborative album as well as some highlights from Kozelek's last few Sun Kil Moon albums. There was even room for a few tracks - such as I Love Portugal - that have only just been released on the latest SKM opus. Highlights included a heartbreaking Sometimes The Wonder Of Life Prevails from the RFH show, and, at the Cadogan show, a hilarious new ditty called He's Bad, which skewers the legend of Michael Jackson like nothing I've ever heard before. Magnificent.
4: PIXIES 29/11 Brixton Academy
Legendary Boston alt-rock heroes and instigators of the early 90s classic 'loud/quiet/loud' sound returned to their English home from home - they've played here almost 20 times - for another thrilling evening of visceral, discordant songs about space, surfing, crabs, leper colonies and general weirdness. Having toured pretty solidly since their reformation in 2004, the band have only recently got round to releasing new music. 2014's Indie Cindy was a decent, albeit by-the-book in places, Pixies album that ultimately led to the departure of original member Kim Deal. Paz Lenchantin eventually took Deal's place and it is she who features strongly on the band's excellent latest album Head Carrier. As you would imagine, the new material formed the backbone of this gig, with all ten tracks getting an airing. Although, as most Pixies songs struggle to break the two-minute mark, there was still time for another 23 songs.....
River Euphrates, Broken Face, Bone Machine, No. 13 Baby, Cactus, Wave Of Mutilation, Monkey Gone To Heaven. All present and correct. Indeed, even without Debaser, Where Is Your Mind and Here Comes Your Man, this was still one of the best Pixies gigs I've ever been to. What a band.
3: JOHN CARPENTER 31/10 The Troxy
When I was a teenager and spending my time devouring music and movies, I fell in love with the work of horror auteur John Carpenter. Assault On Precinct 13 and Escape From New York were my entry points, swiftly followed by The Thing, Halloween, The Fog and Dark Star. Not only were the films all magnificent, but the soundtrack music to each of these works were glorious slabs of doom-laden electronica, and - with the exception of The Thing - all totally produced and performed by Carpenter himself. If you had said to me then that in 30 years time I'd be packed into a hot and sweaty East London venue waiting for the man himself - who is now pushing 70 - to take to the stage and perform these classic themes, I'd have questioned your sanity. But here I was - on All Hallow's Eve natch - and there he was. Flanked by a four-piece band, including his son Cody, Carpenter stood front and centre, dressed all in black and wearing sunglasses. Occasionally stabbing at a tiny keyboard and even more occasionally having a little dance, he and his compadres thrilled the starstruck throng with beefed-up versions of the greatest of his pieces. Interspersed within the soundtracks were tunes from his recent instrumental albums, Lost Themes 1 & 2. To top it all off, the huge video backdrop projected 3D clips from all the aforementioned movies as their specific themes were played. The audience, most of whom had dressed up as characters from the films, went suitably batshit. A fantastic night. If I can - almost - quote Assault: "He has his moments".
2: THE CURE 2/12 Wembley Arena
I wouldn't normally visit Wembley Arena for a gig - it's always been a huge, soulless barn of a venue - but when Robert Smith and The Cure are in town, one has to make an exception. Still filling out arenas almost 40 years into their lifespan - this was the second of three sold-out shows - and with no new product to promote, this had all the makings of an absolute classic, full-blown greatest hits extravaganza. Fortunately for all inside Wembley, the boys from Crawley did not disappoint. Core members Smith and Simon Gallup - who, rather wonderfully, look exactly the same as they've always done - have now been joined by ex-Bowie axeman Reeves Gabrels, and his rather left-of-centre guitar work added a new intensity and heft to the opening salvo of tracks. Plainsong, Pictures Of You, Burn and Fascination Street set the stall for this absolute beast of a gig, before the glorious Proustian rush of In Between Days tore the roof off and had everyone out of their seats and frugging furiously. Lovesong, Just Like Heaven and a magisterial Disintegration finished off the main set in magnificent style before the first of three - count em - three encores. The first two were of traditional encore length, each one ending with a belter: From The Edge Of The Deep Green Sea and a mindblowing A Forest respectively. Encore three was just showing off though, quite frankly. A nine-song humdinger that would put most bands to shame: Lullaby, The Walk, Friday I'm In Love, Doing The Unstuck, Boys Don't Cry, Close To Me, Why Can't I Be You, 10:15 Saturday Night, Killing An Arab.Immense stuff. For me, The Cure don't get anything like the recognition that they deserve. For their longevity, hit single strike rate, monstrous record sales, and worldwide fan-base, they should be garnering awards and gongs year-in and year-out. One of the UK's finest bands.
1: ENDLESS BOOGIE 24/7 The Lexington
Endless Boogie are a bit of an anomaly in the modern music world. No website presence of any real merit, no press, no interviews, no merchandise, hardly any social media. Just three albums of hulking, droning, crunching, grooving and downright pile-driving psych-rock infused with blues and prog textures that place the band outside of any pigeonhole you'd care to put them in. This was their first gig in London for over three years and - like The Cure above - there was no new album to promote. Just a cracking band playing in front of 200 hardy souls inside a sweltering and steamy room above a pub on a Sunday night in North London. Seriously, what's not to like? A mysterious cabal of grizzled veterans, The Boogie have been chipping away at the rock and roll coalface for nigh-on 20 years now, plying their trade with a succession of lengthy psych work-outs and heady blues grooves that come across like AC/DC jamming with The Velvet Underground. Led by 60 year old vocalist Paul 'Top Dollar' Major and earthy guitar virtuoso Jesper Eklow, the band's sound can also be compared to Can, ZZ Top and Canned Heat getting together and having a beano in a Louisiana speakeasy. Tremendous. Song titles escaped me on this particular evening - I was a tad refreshed - but I do most definitely remember wigging out rigorously to Smoking Figs In The Back Yard which you'll find on their debut album, Focus Level. That 10 minutes alone was enough to make this my gig of the year. They can't come back soon enough in my opinion......
I attended my first gig/concert/live music experience - delete as appropriate - in 1983. It was at the Hammersmith Odeon, and it was in the presence of gloriously camp Britfunk pioneers, Imagination. I was 12 years old and I had the time of my life. Being inside that venue with 2000 other like-minded souls, dancing my skinny little arse off to Flashback, Just An Illusion, Music And Lights and the rest. It was fantastic. And I returned home with my first bit of music merchandise: An Imagination headband. The Rubicon had been crossed - going to gigs had become just as important as buying the records. Since then, I have been to hundreds more gigs, and I hope - health and wealth permitting - to go to hundreds more. These days, with the traditional music business model of selling records disappearing in the rearview mirror, live performance has become the major money-spinner for the majority of artists. Unless you're Adele or Ed Sheeran or of similar size - sales-wise - then your best bet financially is to get out there and tour. And tour. And tour some more. Which of course is fantastic for us music-lovers. Less so for our wallets though.....
2016 was another hefty schedule of live events for your faithful scribe. Even though I missed out on some truly mouth-watering gigs, I was still able to get to see some of my old faves as well as ticking off some bucket list entries. There was classic Americana with The Jayhawks, Richmond Fontaine and Patty Griffin. There was downhome choogle with Band Of Horses and White Denim. Sixties-indebted psych-rock with Israel Nash, Wolf People and Black Mountain. Expansive, electronica-infused psychedelia with Tame Impala and Animal Collective. Brain-rattling epic indie rock with Desert Mountain Tribe and Silversun Pickups. Afrobeat inspired tribal beats and dance rhythms with Afro Celt Sound System and Goat. Reformed and reunited early 90s indie heroics with Lush and Belly. Crunchy, grungy ramshackle rock with Mudhoney and Bob Mould. There was also some deliciously dark and doomy electronica from Massive Attack, who took over Hyde Park on one splendid summer's eve and were ably supported by legendary post-punk priestess Patti Smith. And then there was Neil Young, who returned to London for the third time in as many years and blew the roof off the O2 with his latest combo, The Promise Of The Real. It truly was a banner year.
However, to paraphrase Morrissey, some gigs are better than others. So, as you'd expect, I've boiled it down to a Top 5. These were the gigs that truly stood out for me - the ones I'll remember for a long time. If you were there then you'll know what I mean. If you weren't, then well, more fool you....
5: SUN KIL MOON 22/7 Royal Festival Hall
SUN KIL MOON/JESU 17/9 Cadogan Hall
Bit of a cheat, this. Sun Kil Moon mainman Mark Kozelek usually pops over to London once a year and always puts on a show of extraordinary intensity and stunning songcraft, but in 2016 he really spoilt me, so I've got no choice really but to put both of his gigs in together. The first of these two astonishing shows was ostensibly the support gig for the SKM/Jesu album that had been released in February. However, Justin Broadrick - who is Jesu - had only very recently started rehearsing with Kozelek for this gig so another date was hastily added for later in the year. Both nights were utterly compelling from start to finish, featuring a number of tracks from their collaborative album as well as some highlights from Kozelek's last few Sun Kil Moon albums. There was even room for a few tracks - such as I Love Portugal - that have only just been released on the latest SKM opus. Highlights included a heartbreaking Sometimes The Wonder Of Life Prevails from the RFH show, and, at the Cadogan show, a hilarious new ditty called He's Bad, which skewers the legend of Michael Jackson like nothing I've ever heard before. Magnificent.4: PIXIES 29/11 Brixton Academy
Legendary Boston alt-rock heroes and instigators of the early 90s classic 'loud/quiet/loud' sound returned to their English home from home - they've played here almost 20 times - for another thrilling evening of visceral, discordant songs about space, surfing, crabs, leper colonies and general weirdness. Having toured pretty solidly since their reformation in 2004, the band have only recently got round to releasing new music. 2014's Indie Cindy was a decent, albeit by-the-book in places, Pixies album that ultimately led to the departure of original member Kim Deal. Paz Lenchantin eventually took Deal's place and it is she who features strongly on the band's excellent latest album Head Carrier. As you would imagine, the new material formed the backbone of this gig, with all ten tracks getting an airing. Although, as most Pixies songs struggle to break the two-minute mark, there was still time for another 23 songs.....
River Euphrates, Broken Face, Bone Machine, No. 13 Baby, Cactus, Wave Of Mutilation, Monkey Gone To Heaven. All present and correct. Indeed, even without Debaser, Where Is Your Mind and Here Comes Your Man, this was still one of the best Pixies gigs I've ever been to. What a band.
3: JOHN CARPENTER 31/10 The Troxy
When I was a teenager and spending my time devouring music and movies, I fell in love with the work of horror auteur John Carpenter. Assault On Precinct 13 and Escape From New York were my entry points, swiftly followed by The Thing, Halloween, The Fog and Dark Star. Not only were the films all magnificent, but the soundtrack music to each of these works were glorious slabs of doom-laden electronica, and - with the exception of The Thing - all totally produced and performed by Carpenter himself. If you had said to me then that in 30 years time I'd be packed into a hot and sweaty East London venue waiting for the man himself - who is now pushing 70 - to take to the stage and perform these classic themes, I'd have questioned your sanity. But here I was - on All Hallow's Eve natch - and there he was. Flanked by a four-piece band, including his son Cody, Carpenter stood front and centre, dressed all in black and wearing sunglasses. Occasionally stabbing at a tiny keyboard and even more occasionally having a little dance, he and his compadres thrilled the starstruck throng with beefed-up versions of the greatest of his pieces. Interspersed within the soundtracks were tunes from his recent instrumental albums, Lost Themes 1 & 2. To top it all off, the huge video backdrop projected 3D clips from all the aforementioned movies as their specific themes were played. The audience, most of whom had dressed up as characters from the films, went suitably batshit. A fantastic night. If I can - almost - quote Assault: "He has his moments".2: THE CURE 2/12 Wembley Arena
1: ENDLESS BOOGIE 24/7 The Lexington
Endless Boogie are a bit of an anomaly in the modern music world. No website presence of any real merit, no press, no interviews, no merchandise, hardly any social media. Just three albums of hulking, droning, crunching, grooving and downright pile-driving psych-rock infused with blues and prog textures that place the band outside of any pigeonhole you'd care to put them in. This was their first gig in London for over three years and - like The Cure above - there was no new album to promote. Just a cracking band playing in front of 200 hardy souls inside a sweltering and steamy room above a pub on a Sunday night in North London. Seriously, what's not to like? A mysterious cabal of grizzled veterans, The Boogie have been chipping away at the rock and roll coalface for nigh-on 20 years now, plying their trade with a succession of lengthy psych work-outs and heady blues grooves that come across like AC/DC jamming with The Velvet Underground. Led by 60 year old vocalist Paul 'Top Dollar' Major and earthy guitar virtuoso Jesper Eklow, the band's sound can also be compared to Can, ZZ Top and Canned Heat getting together and having a beano in a Louisiana speakeasy. Tremendous. Song titles escaped me on this particular evening - I was a tad refreshed - but I do most definitely remember wigging out rigorously to Smoking Figs In The Back Yard which you'll find on their debut album, Focus Level. That 10 minutes alone was enough to make this my gig of the year. They can't come back soon enough in my opinion......
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