Complete Peel Sessions (Disc 4) - The Wedding Present

Track list:

1. What Have I Said Now?
2. Crushed
3. Kennedy
4. Thanks
5. Bewitched
6. Granadaland
7. John Peel Interviews David Gedge, Part 1
8. Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah
9. Kennedy
10. Swimming Pools, Movie Stars
11. Click Click
12. It's a Gas
13. Spangle (Acoustic)
14. Gazebo (Acoustic)
15. Fleshworld
16. Sucker
17. The Queen of Outer Space
18. John Peel Interviews David Gedge, Part 2

Running time: 59 minutes
Released: 2007

I've made it half-way through The Wedding Present's assembled Peel Sessions. What lies ahead now? We have the first repeats that I can spot - Kennedy appearing twice, and acoustic renditions of Gazebo and Spangle from disc 3.

This disc is kicked off with an intro espousing the continuation of "fabness" (or so I hear). How very British. I guess this must be a festival recording or something because the voice was not Peel's and there is a background noise on the track that sounds a bit like general crowd sounds though it is not very distinct and could be the rough edges around the instrument parts. This doesn't sound like a very clean recording. The song, for what it's worth, is a sort of plodding but pleasant indie cycle, one very prominent guitar line and some very structural drumming. There's no sense of real interest, but neither is there anything pushing me away. It's a gently enjoyable tune, but far too long for the lack of any real hook.

Yep, definitely in front of an audience. The applause is a giveaway!

OK, so I think all of these 6 discs are live anyway (as part of the conceit of the Peel Session), but these tracks being in front of an audience not just live in a studio  it lends a different interpretation. The sounds here hark back to the first disc, the tinniness of the guitars, a flatness to the overall sound and a distance in the vocal. I am sure I have a better version of  Crushed, though ironically it's on another live album; I didn't go back and buy the studio output.

There's definitely a dullness in these recordings which lends a distance to the music. It is as if the recording was incidental and unplanned. The richness that I had become used to over the latter parts of disc 2 and all of disc 3 is absent, and with it some of the engagement. That said, Crushed and Kennedy - which here both suffer by the measures mentioned - are both tunes that showcase the energy of The Wedding Present really well. The breakneck pace is evident and a key part of their makeup, it is just a shame that the sound is a little flat.

The paciness of these first few tunes is really welcome, a good jolt to what has been a lethargic Sunday so far. I've been playing Pyre, finally, and finding it a little bit of a chore in terms of the UI and the amount of clicking it appears to take to get anywhere. It sucked up most of my morning - the characterisation is great, but I wish you could move through the story a bit faster. Now this listen is serving as a break point; this afternoon is cooking and other productive pursuits, at least it is per plan.

I don't know what it says that I find myself half loving and half loathing the tuneset so far. I love the energy and pace, the solid structure and the general tone but I am massively frustrated by the distance of the sound. A few tracks in and this is not the disc 1 scenario of guitars so spangly I had to go lie down with my eyes closed to clear my head; the harsher edge to the instruments is there, but the level of the recording neuters that effect. I'm not sure which is worse... being affected to the extent of headaches or not really feeling the effect at all because of the distance. I've looked it up in the meantime and the live event covering the first 6 tracks, which all flow together well, is the occasion of John Peel's 50th birthday. The subsequent 12 tracks, including both interviews to bookend the show, are another festival performance from the mid 90s. This disc, then, has a distinctly different flavour for those crowd dynamics.

Hearing John Peel's voice, even many years after his death (14 years ago now... how time flies) is still massively evocative, oh so familiar. I have never been the biggest listener of the radio - too much guff to put up with - but somehow Peel's style and tone made it through to me. He was a giant presence, a huge influence. For those of my generation and the one before, a true legend.

The second rendition of Kennedy loses something for being included here so soon after the first. Of course when this was originally broadcast it wouldn't have had the proximity, but here only 5 tracks have passed since it concluded last. Sound quality here is better though. Oh, but I really like the opening of Swimming Pools, Movie Stars. The peppiness here is balanced perfectly by the dryness of the vocal, the pace is positive, the sound rounded. The track loses some lustre as is goes as the pattern is set and becomes familiar, but the opening is really strong. It's dragged back, too - the lull is fought off by more guitars, a little acoustic twang then an overdriven fuzz. Nice.

Isn't our mood and appreciation fickle? Suddenly I am not feeling all that engaged, in the space of two tracks I've gone from stoked to burnt out as my mind wandered. Sure, the over-long Click Click wasn't the best thing ever but neither was it that bad, so why do I now feel nothing but a desire for the listen to close out? So frustrating (as Gedge sings on It's a Gas). That frustration and ending-wish is intensified as the acoustic delivery of Spangle kicks in. Here everything feels off, its almost like a spoiler of an insert - the sound balancing is really weird. All the focus is on Gedge's vocal and the predominant instrumentation is a really shonky piano sound from some form of keyboard. The keys sound so wrong... part out of tune, part utterly incompetent rendering of an actual piano sound.

Thankfully Gazebo seems to drop the keyboard into the background more, and here the softer sound of the amped-up acoustic guitar is nice. The focus on the vocal is still a bit too strong, and the backing becomes a mess as the bonkers keyboard asserts itself some more towards the end of the track, so overall I think I can do without these acoustic interludes.

I am struggling to reconnect, and with only two short tunes and a 30 second interview clip left to go I am not sure I will. Sucker is not an easy tune to like, but I do appreciate how it plays with the formula, particularly in the rhythm. The chorus, which involves repeating the title a few times with some vocalisations before each one, is weak, but the rhythmic structure of the verses makes up for that. It hasn't drawn me back in, but it has rather arrested the slide.

I think disc 3 is likely to remain my favourite of the set. 5 and 6 follow similar patterns to this one - live performances captured and broadcast rather than true session recordings. Still I'll make my way through them soon enough.

Complete Peel Sessions (Disc 3) - The Wedding Present

Track List:

1. California
2. Flying Saucer
3. Softly Softly
4. Come Play with Me
5. Gazebo
6. So Long, Baby
7. Spangle
8. Him or Me (What's it Gonna Be?)
9. Drive
10. Love Machine
11. Sports Car
12. Go, Man, Go
13. Blue Eyes
14. Ringway to Seatac
15. Shivers
16. Queen Anne
17. White Horses

Running time: 54 Minutes
Released: 2007

On to the third disc. After this one I'll be half way through John Peel's obsession with The Wedding Present. The first disc gave me headaches, the second gave me warm fuzzies, what will the third disc bring?

The first strains suggest this will be more like 2 than 1. The guitars are muted, relaxed even, giving more space to the voice, which feels for a change to be layered over the backing rather than embedded in it. There is a nice cadence to California, and an airiness which makes it both highly enjoyable and instantly forgettable, which is an odd combination but reflective of convergence with a more general trend in guitar music. It feels less clearly like a Wedding Present track is what I'm saying.

Flying Saucer disabuses me of the notion that they have lost their personality though. The guitar pattern has filled in again, and whilst there is still a certain distance in the vocal it isn't as far removed. A long bridge with just the wailing guitars reminds us where they came from - a more controlled snarl than anything from the early days, it feels a little dad-rock-ish, but it is also a lot more, dare I say, musical than those earlier energy filled blasts.

When the pace does rise, it maintains that extra musicality, and some added depths through a changes of tone. It's the natural rhythm of the pieces that carries you along though. No longer a youthful energy, but there all the same. When the pace is removed, such as on Come Play With Me, there is now a real character about the cocoon built by those slower strummings. That said, I am not sure the atmosphere created is quite enough to sustain the song as long as it does, and I am very grateful for the change up for the second half of the track even if it is just a loop.

It has been a long couple of weeks since I managed the last disc in this set. Life has been a bit too busy for my liking, so I have taken a couple of days off and eventually found time to do  this one, but not the two I was hoping for. Still have a tone of boring household admin to fit in today, too. Days off are just for a different type of work these days.

There is a significantly different feel to So Long, Baby. A relaxation, a "Parklife-esque" insouciance, a change of pace. Then for a track called Spangle, the sound is more of a dull growl than the titular bright sound. Ironically the next track has that very clearly, albeit wrapped in the deeper, gurning sounds. The tracks are flying by and I am only barely finding thoughts to commit to type. I am rather enjoying it though as a form of procrastination. I could do with some of the energy that has gone into thrashing those guitars; getting started on anything is causing me some issues of late.

This disc feels very different from the previous two in a couple of notable ways. Most obviously there are no Ukrainian folk songs to chunk up the indie tracks, but I think the second difference is actually the more impactful one and that is the changes of tempo. Disc 3 is for the most part significantly slower than the previous two. This drop in tempo comes with the consideration and the sophistication of the compositions; it is a more mature collection of performances of more mature songs, and probably my favourite of the three so far (remember this is just the half way mark of the collected Peel Sessions).

Go, Man, Go has a really nice melancholy to it, and that is part of the overall theme. I think these slower, broader songs suit the mood of their pieces better. Whilst the fast pace creates a nice contrast with the lyrical content on the earlier tracks, here the two feel in sync, building a more coherent song set.

I am falling into repetition; the only thoughts I have to share are the ones already written. On that basis I might just relax through the... oh wait. What the hell is that? Shivers is really odd, a complete change of tone and instrumentation. All muffled, old-timey strings and off-key piano. I find the whole thing rather unsettling and unpleasant. In another context it might work but here it feels off and I am not sure I want to maintain it. Thankfully a more familiar sound is back for Queen Anne - though it has a consistency of vocal approach with Shivers. There is a little more of an edge to the guitar parts here too, a nice ringing sound that fleshes out the sound on the track.

The final number is slow, percussion given prominence, the voice given a wide crucible. It is a bit slow and low for a finale and doesn't really work in its positioning here; it is a rather nice track but a huge let down on the end of the disc.

Complete Peel Sessions (Disc 2) - The Wedding Present

Track List:

1. Davni Chasy
2. Vasya Vasyliok
3. Zadumav Didochok
4. Verkhovyno
5. Why Are You Being So Reasonable Now?
6. Unfaithful
7. Take Me!
8. Happy Birthday
9. Zavtra
10. Sertsem I Dusheyu
11. Cherez Richku, Cherez Hai
12. Dalliance
13. Heather
14. Blonde
15. Niagara

Running time: 57 Minutes
Released: 2007

So, after part 1 of this set underwhelmed me, before picking up towards the back end, what of part 2? There are two more sets of Ukrainian folk songs here, which bodes well, and an overall longer runtime which I hope means that things will be slightly less frantic.

We start where the first disc left off, in the middle of sessions dedicated to Ukrainian folk songs. Davni Chasy actually reminds me of Greek music a little, but I think that is because this sort of structure is common to a lot of different folk cultures in parts of Europe east of here. It's the slower moments that give me that link, when it speeds up, or when the vocal is present there is much less of a Grecian feel. It's nice enough, but really not likely to sell anyone on the concept.

Sunday evening. I have just about recovered from last week, and am using this as my lead in to a wind-down, knowing I have a busy couple of days, at least, to start the week. Fitting this listen in feels a little forced, and I find myself a bit distant from it in these early stages as a result. If I had more energy or people about, this high tempo, high flux folk would be much more appealing. As it is, I can't relax into it because it is unfamiliar, and I cannot share in the motion with anyone. The third track is slower, darker, and more immediately relevant to how I feel, I find myself getting swept up a little in its melodies, the big brooding vocal carrying me along.

I find this fascinating, the cultural crossover. It's not as if The Wedding Present were a folk band in Blighty, so for them to go to the other edge of Europe to get these tunes and faithfully capture them is a stretch. I'm glad they did, making them more accessible to ears such as mine. Sure - you could argue that there are plenty of traditional artists who could do with the custom instead, but without being in the region how likely was I to ever stumble across their fare?

When the true British indie returns, it is with a far more muted sound than on disc 1. There isn't anything like the harsh edge to the guitar part, freeing me up to enjoy the tempo, the growl and the peppy backing. Here the guitars are freed to sing without that really tinny, metallic ring. Yes, they get repetitive, but that structure is what carries the track forwards, gives it the momentum it needs to support the characteristic vocal.

There's something reassuring about this.

I wonder how Take Me! is going to work as an 8 minute epic at the breakneck pace that the guitars and drums go at. Chords strummed so fast they're just structure. It works though - because all the character comes from David Gedge. I suppose the energy output must've kept everyone warm; it's shaping up to be sub-zero here in the coming week, lots of boring scraping ice off the car in the mornings. Must remember that and get an early night, and hit snooze less first thing. I realise this will sound odd, but the lack of a fine melody in these tracks helps. You can sort of tune out the higher functions and get swept away on the rush of energy without losing too much. It carries you along, unworried, imparting a sense and tone rather than specific notation. The song never drags, despite never seeming to vary all that much, it just is, and that works really, really, well.

We then get an audio sample of Marilyn Monroe's presidential Happy Birthday before the guitars launch back in. I have to say I am enjoying this disc way more than the last one.

We dive back into foreign roots music again next. Three more tunes, the first of which starts very slow and dark before a crescendo starts to up the pace... then it stops, resets. Frustration, in a good way. I love things like this - the start slow, build up approach. Here we get it a few times over in the one track, though on balance the energy is killed slightly too soon on the first couple. The third is given a good run at speed to take us through and out the other end of the track.

Oh, nice. The third track of this trio is the first time the spangly Wedding Present guitar sound has felt so prevalent in the folk-inspired material, the drums are modern and snappy too, making this a really effective hybrid. It all bottoms out midway through and you hear snatches of what I guess is a more traditional sound for the second half of the track, but the synergy in style really works well.

The last four tracks are firmly back in northern England, though Dalliance is slower, with far more space than I have become used to. Busier sounds creep in as it goes and it builds up to a big sound, driven again by those guitars - harsher again, but that edge welcome as they fill in the hole that was left for them. There is a really satisfying growl to the track by the time it closes rather suddenly. I get the feeling that these are tracks from a matured band - more space, more assurance in their sound, less need for the big noise for the sake of it, but the nous to use it for effect.

I like this more considered Wedding Present, and as with the first disc I am ending the listen with more of a connection to the music than in the early stages of the album. There it was a switch to the folk songs, here it is the mellowing, the slowing, and the rounding out of the sounds winning me over. There are still big rich noises here, but they are more immediately inviting ones, encouraging that gentle head nod, or slight sway. I'm smiling as Niagara progresses. I know it will all close out soon but it has mellowed me out well. This is why I didn't cut anything from disc one... it was all too much in order, but I know this band can do good things for me; right place, right time this time. It was less frantic, it was more mature, it was more me. I liked this one a lot.

Complete Peel Sessions (Disc 1) - The Wedding Present

Track list:

1. You Should Always Keep in Touch With Your Friends
2. It's What You Want That Matters
3. This Boy Can Wait
4. Felicity
5. All About Eve
6. Don't Laugh
7. Never Said
8. Don't Be So Hard
9. Hopak
10. Give My Love to Kevin
11. Something and Nothing
12. A Million Miles
13. Getting Nowhere Fast
14. Katrusya
15. Svitit Misyats
16. Tiutiunyk
17. Yikhav Kozak Za Dunai
18. Hude Dnipro Hude

Running time: 46 minutes
Released: 2007

The first of a big box set now. A former friend got me into The Wedding Present, a big favourite of the late legendary DJ John Peel, and as a result I picked up this compilation of sessions the band recorded for Peel's show. There are 6 discs in total... that could take me a while.

Thankfully this first disc is a packed one, 16 in 46, and it kicks us off with a number which sets a tone I expect to be kept. All frantic guitars, northern vocals and pacy tempo. The title is a little rebuke, too. I'm not good at keeping in touch with anyone, friend or otherwise.

I feel a little like there is a time and a place for this sort of guitar band, and that time and place doesn't really feel like mid-afternoon on a Sunday in January when I have other things to do, but I am squeezing this in to try to keep some kind of rhythm up. My weeks have been so tiring that finding space for more than one listen in 7 days is unlikely at the moment. If I can stick to one a week I'll be doing alright in general. That aside, I am dissing the music a bit that sentiment... I have never been a big fan of guitar for the sake of guitar, which is what a whole load of indie bands feel like to me. There is more to The Wedding Present than that - David Gedge's lyrics and vocals are a real touchpoint - but when crunching a lot of these tunes into a short period of time it does get a little overbearing.

The super-fast nature of the playing gives a level of intricacy that I struggle to follow, so I am left with a more generic sense of tone and pace that becomes a bit wearing after a while. There is a sort of similarity with the hardcore of, say, the Minor Threat discography I listened to recently in terms of the dominant feeling, but there are a couple of key differences. One, these tracks go on a little longer, and two the edge is a little less. This means that each track has a less powerful impact and also has just long enough to tick over into trying. This makes a complete works like this quite punishing.

I suspect that, too, it catches me in a bad frame of mind for this up-tempo, slightly downtrodden but spangly combo. I really feel like I need space and time right now, and these claustrophobic guitars are a polar opposite of that. I like the songs better when the guitar work recedes to play second fiddle to the vocal, it feels a little as though the balance isn't quite right elsewhere. Part of it is that the guitars are really stark and harsh, a metallic spangle that rattles around in my head, echoing off the inside of my skull and causing my temples to flare. I suspect this might be something that is less of an obstacle on their studio albums, when post-production may have toned down some of the rougher edges. At points here and there I find snatches of more refined sound that I really like, but that burning itch of annoyance at the harsher sounds is not going away.

It must sound like I hate this, right?

Well, that's not entirely true. I think it's fair to say that I don't like consuming it like this - my problem is the concentration of tracks not the songs themselves. I would never choose to take this disc and play it in a scenario like this one, where I have to listen to the tracks in order again, but remove the persistence and things look a lot nicer. A single track or really fast and busy guitars supporting that distinctive melancholic half-spoken vocal? Much more appealing. Likewise the rhythms - it's all a little one-paced (express!) to be consumed like this.

Every time the guitar is toned down a bit - its harsher edge tempered or the volume lowered, either one - the songs come alive for me. A Million Miles (yeah, we've got that far without a single tune being called out by name after the first) is a really nice track, the guitars are still urgent, fast and incessant, but they are flattened so that they don't feel like someone is rattling my head around. That carries over to Getting Nowhere Fast, too. These tracks have all the energy and attitude of the earlier numbers but tempered, the instrumentation lacking the piercing qualities that have made enjoying this tough.

We then dive into the Ukrainian folk songs. I don't really know anything of the story about how a northern English indie band ended up playing folk tunes from the eastern edge of Europe. I suppose I could and should Google it. I immediately find myself relating to this though. Sure, it's a little cheesy and conforming to stereotypes in places, but there is a sense of fun and joy in these tunes that the original Wedding Present material didn't quite share, despite some common characteristics. These tunes also lack the vocals (for the most part), not surprisingly.  I am as surprised as anyone else at how when you take away the bit I most enjoyed from the earlier tracks you end up with tunes I enjoy more... but of course there are other changes. Here the forms that are being followed are more respectful of space and time than the frenetic indie tracks, the sounds are more dictated by tradition than individual vision.

As the final number begins, starting at a stately pace, but promising to speed up - quickly delivered - I am left wondering what to make of this disc. It is just one sixth of the peel sessions. It was tough going for me to being with - the latter half has been very pleasing. I do like the combination of high energy and blue emotion that characterize the band, but those strings need tempering to become something I can truly appreciate. Tempted to scrap a large part of this, but I will hold off for now to see how the rest of the box set goes.

Complete Madness - Madness

Track list:

1. Embarrassment
2. Shut Up
3. My Girl
4. Baggy Trousers
5. It Must Be Love
6. The Prince
7. Bed and Breakfast Man
8. Night Boat to Cairo
9. House of Fun
10. One Step Beyond
11. Cardiac Arrest
12. Grey Day
13. Take It or Leave It
14. In the City
15. Madness
16. The Return of the Los Palmas 7

Running time: 45 minutes
Released: 1982

Why did I buy this? I'm not sure.

I am shocked at the release date. I remember a number of these tunes from my childhood, yet this best-of was released when I wasn't yet two. They were clearly baked into the British psyche of the 80s.

OK, so that opening line is a little unfair. The very first chords of Embarassment remind me why I picked this up... there's a grubby but honest charm about Madness' upbeat tones. It's never ever going to touch "favourite" levels, but its good for injecting a simple small smile into a grey day. It's been trying pathetically to snow outside, so the warm brassy sounds are a nice antidote.

That these 16 old tunes are crammed into 45 minutes like sardines in a tin means the listen will fly by fast and I can move on to more considered musical selections. There is a definite element of lowest common denominator about these lads, but popular does not have to mean bad. I am actually surprised at the amount of space and time there has been in the first two songs given the sub-3 minute average running.

I don't find these tunes to be very provoking of thought or words. There's something too familiar about them I guess... a sort of comfort space that has my mind switched off. That said, as Baggy Trousers starts, I am reminded that this song formed part of my English lessons at school, some 25 years ago. OK, only one lesson, but it came out of the blue, and unfortunately I can't remember the explanation or outcomes that would make that odd anecdote more interesting. I guess with the state of my music library now, this era of Madness is the equivalent of a palette cleanser between courses of a posh meal, though one that can throw occasional surprises.

It Must Be Love is one of those tunes that is so heavily scorched into my mind through over-saturation, and cheesy though it undoubtedly is, I think it holds up pretty well. That doesn't mean an awful lot since we can be frighteningly uncritical of things that have become second nature in this way, however for my purposes this un-self-conscious and mushy track manages to bring a smile.  This ballad is followed by a bouncy number that has me thinking of The Beatles over and above the other influences, one song in particular which I cannot recall the name of (as I have never been a Beatles fan).

I have made that admission on this blog before. It's almost a crime in the UK to be a music snob but not see the Beatles as the best thing ever, though I somehow suspect that is not so true for the generation behind me in snobbery. Wait, did I just call myself a music snob whilst listening to Madness? Something doesn't add up there.

Snob cannot be the right word.

I try to avoid the term "fan" as far as possible, because fandom is not something I identify with at all. Sure, the point of this blog is to go through my music, calling out what I like, what I don't like, what surprises me, etc., and in the course of that we'll encounter several artists I value very highly, but fan carries connotations that go beyond any level of devotion that I have been able to find.

I remain surprised by how much space and time these tunes seem to have, by the by. They pack a fair bit into short runs, perhaps because the general tempo is high. The other side of that is that yes, I am finding my thoughts riffing off general themes and trends rather than specific cues in the songs, which, thinking about it, might come back to the level of subconscious familiarity, not the conscious one. What do I mean by that? I think with the tunes that I am consciously familiar with - those that I have sought out and played to death, I would be more inclined to spout off about why I am so attached to them. Here the patterns are kind of ingrained, rote, unthinking. I am not following the grooves, the melodies, the beats of the tracks, rather I am letting my mind wander off whilst old patterns unwind around me.

Yet in doing so, this is turning out to produce more words than most listens, even if fewer of them directly relate to the sounds playing out. There has been no comment on the style, little consideration of the instrumentation etc. Perhaps that is because I rather expect everyone else to have had Madness baked into them too, which will not be true for children of the 90s, or anyone not British. It seems to me that there is no point me typing out a summary though since I can link to one instead.

Ugh, I got distracted by reading the Wiki link, bad form. I pull myself away as some less familiar songs hit. Sure, the same old patterns are evident in the music but I am not sure where they are going this time. It's nice to be mildly surprised for a change though. There are some odd, but effective vocalisations on In the City, for example, that make me think of old videogame sound effects.

My typing has run out of steam, my brain run out of words. The denouement is in effect, this Madness is over. I think I will cut a couple off the end in the final reckoning, as the fun quotient dipped sufficiently to not make the tracks interesting.

The Complete Kismet Acoustic - Jesca Hoop

Track list:

1. Silverscreen
2. Summertime
3. Out the Back Door
4. Seed of Wonder
5. Enemy
6. Love Is All We Have
7. Intelligentactile101
8. Havoc in Heaven
9. Reves dans le creux
10. Money
11. Love and Love Again
12. Paradise
13. Worried Mind

Running time: 56 minutes
Released: 2012

I don't recall what got me into Jesca Hoop. I mean, I remember that it was Undress, but not the whys of picking up that album. I loved it though, and still do, although to be fair my epiphany wasn't that long ago... maybe 2 years tops? It wasn't until late last year I got around to ordering more older material though, including this one; I haven't received the physical disc yet - sourcing is apparently an issue - but the digital auto-rip will do!  It is a first listen for me too... digital buys not usually getting dedicated play when they are grabbed.

The opening guitar is not quite what I was expecting... a touch classical. The vocal reminds me of Lisa Hannigan, and someone else I cannot immediately place, in its tone, breathy and close. When the chorus hits, it is more reminiscent of the Jesca Hoop tunes that first engaged me, and overall its a gentle start, but Silverscreen feels like it goes on too long at least twice; it fakes an end then finds a continuation.

I am hoping this listen will put an end to my listlessness. The past few evenings, and all day today (it's Saturday) I have done nothing of note, not feeling like I want to do anything. Brain won't countenance thinky things, body (and the woeful winter weather) not supporting ideas of doing anything more active. I pine for what Hoop is singing about now... summer; I would take spring. I dislike the dark, I care not for the cold.

So far there hasn't been any of the really cool use of rhythm that sold Undress to me utterly. Instead these seem more traditional songs, less creative, less sure. The guitar has a nice snap to it, and there is a lively beat to Out the Back Door, but it feels... young? Uncertain, following more than leading... this tune is a step up from the first two though in terms of more than a passing interest. Hoop's voice here is light, also reinforcing the feeling of youth - though I'm pretty sure she was not that young when this was recorded.

I start to hear some themes and tells that tie this to the other material I am familiar with. Nice use of lyrics outside of traditional line structures, for instance, was one of the features that made me fall in thrall of Hoop's songs, and her vocal style really supports this approach, apparent sharp short breaths punctuating long stretches with constant vocal, hold-overs with long notes as the tune catches up. I like the way it draws my ear in, I like the way it stands out, and the sense of falling forward, onward ever after.

I have had an odd start to the year one way or another, and I feel a little all at sea with 2018. I have been finding it hard to focus my mind right outside of work, which has eaten up the odd evening too. Sleep has been hard to come by, waking early regardless of what time I bed down, not wanting to crawl out into cold mornings. I have been more or less constantly tired... except when I was ill, when I felt sparkier than I had been for a while. Life is odd, as I say. I am finding this album soothing and a little soporific. I don't mean that it is boring me, but that it is relaxing. The single guitar is clear and tuneful, but also soft and repetitive. The lone female voice not always urgent... those long lines absent from some songs, lapsing into repeated choruses.

Looking down the track list at the start of this listen - which is a nice break from "Complete" works - I had hopes for Intelligentactile101. Based on the name alone I figured this would be one of the less conventional tracks. There is a child-like aspect to it, a playfulness to the simple melody. That said it also feels a little underdone, like the structure really needed a bit more (most noticeably percussion) to make it work. I suspect I might prefer the original version. Like Undress, The Complete Kismet Acoustic is a re-take of another album. I don't (currently) own Kismet but I think its fair to say that I will soon. I didn't own Hunting My Dress first either.

This line here to break up the sadly uniform paragraph structures.

Sad that I had to do that, but I haven't been flowing with ideas for short, snappy insights relating to the music. It feels like I have been listening to this for a very long time, but I am only just over half way through. I think this is probably more a statement on how restless and unsettled I have been feeling more than a stick to beat the album with though. Anyone who has read one of these posts before will be aware that I am never keen to over-criticise first listens - not that those people exist.

Ooh, Hoop has gone for French. I think I have another version of Reves dans le Creux on another disc, I vaguely remember having to rip it from physical media. Yeah. Snowglobe. I really like the effect that songs in foreign tongues can elicit, I am reminded of Julie Fowlis' Gaelic, or Regina Spektor lapsing into Russian. I don't think its pure exoticism, I think it is more the change up.

Money has more to it, there is a little more instrumentation here, another layer, and more interest as a result. This has the air of a track that could grow into a favourite, even if at the same time it seems to flout the premise (I doubt that all these extra sounds are acoustic). There is a hint here of the playing with rhythm that sucks me in every time I hear the undressed version of Tulip, for example. It's not as pronounced here, but there's a cool to it all the same.

As the music falls back into a more sparse and less immediately engaging pattern, I find myself thinking this doesn't really work as an album. Tonally something like Money, but to a lesser extent things like Out the Back Door and Intelligentactile101 too, don't sit well alongside noodle-y little songs over classical-style guitar sounds. I find myself wondering whether the same applies to the non-acoustic original. I will be able to hear in due course.

Complete Discography - Minor Threat

Track list:
  
1. Filler
2. I Don't Wanna Hear It
3. Seeing Red
4. Straight Edge
5. Small Man, Big Mouth
6. Screaming at a Wall
7. Bottled Violence
8. Minor Threat
9. Stand Up
10. 12XU
11. In My Eyes
12. Out of Step (With the World)
13. Guilty of Being White
14. Steppin' Stone
15. Betray
16. It Follows
17. Think Again
18. Look Back and Laugh
19. Sob Story
20. No Reason
21. Little Friend
22. Out of Step
23. Cashing In
24. Stumped
25. Good Guys (Don't Wear White)
26. Salad Days

Running time: 47 minutes
Released: 1989

I am hoping this ends up being another Action Image Exchange, a surprising and intense experience but one well worth stepping outside of my normal boundaries for. Similar crunching of tracks into a small run time, similar provenance (I believe I received both together)... similar outcome? We shall see.

It is pretty amazing how short songs can begin with long notes. I suspect it might be perceptions - they seem long in hindsight because everything that follows is so short and sharp - but nonetheless you can pack a lot into a sub-2 minute runtime if you try. 

The opening exchanges are not as full on or utterly mind blowing as after-impression of Fig 4.0 that comes to my mind, but the pace is vital and the sound is constantly shifting. I guess this form of punk is music's equivalent of sprinters... go all out for a short while, burn out and recover to go again. All action, all mouth, all strut. A million miles from my normal fare, but totally relate-able and enjoyable. I write that with a knowing smirk, because I don't really feel that in the moment. 

I am feeling a detachment from myself, a tiredness and ennui that made starting this listen harder than it should have been and has led to finding ways around doing other things today, too. I am self-aware enough to put the detachment on me though, not the sound. 

I am still tapping along, head bobbing, slight side sway. I am appreciating, but not really feeling it. 

Looking down the track list, the tempo of the album might slow down - the tracks trend longer later, and this concerns me because I can't see these rough edges supporting a more traditional length of piece. Not only that, but it is the constant cutting from one riff to another, one screed to a second, one pulsing, hammering beat to a facsimile, that gives the form its pulse, its lifeblood. Sure the band could write decent tracks, produce skilled output, but the really sweet piece about the short but intense track is that... it doesn't last long enough for its violence, its abrasiveness, to really hit home. It's like the classic trope of being dazed, shocked and surprised by an attack and not realizing the actual physical damage.

Sure enough, as I hit the second half, and the longer tracks (meaning those over 2 minutes - it's not like these are epics) I feel a little bit of the magic wearing off. The repetitions become too frequent, the impact lost by their familiarity. The same tricks have been employed all the way through, but they are seen and heard now, the wow factor is gone. I suppose I can point to my ears starting to feel like they have been assaulted to illustrate that the tone and pace hasn't all gone, but my ethereal detachment has vanished and now I am a glum guy giving less shits. 

You know what though? I would quite like more of this really fast, visceral material. My attempts to find more in the punk field that gels with me have not worked out that well. Steps taken away from the groups or albums I received together as a package have resulted in anemic, impact-less finds. Yet I am loathed to stick my toe in deeper for fear of the bad and the bile that can sometimes swill around counter-cultures. Basically I don't trust myself to find the good stuff and don't want to wade through the shit, which is likely to be actively un-enjoyable. Bad buys in other genres might be boring or bland, but they are less likely to be offensive. 

That same ability to polarise though... that is absolutely critical to the impact. Without it, if these tracks were anodyne, there would be nothing. 

I should be glad for what I have. Isn't that kind of the point of this site?

As ever with these inserts that lie outside the majority direction of these pages, which I guess I would characterise as Folk/Jazz/Singer-Songwriter... cue loss of train of thought. I don't know where I was going with that. It might have been "good to expand horizons", it might have been "quality wins out" it might have been "music has more in common..." or any number of other half-baked or half-formed thoughts.  I am glad for these little inserts though... the harder edge to the guitars, the driving riffs, the shouted lyrics, the additional personality. 

The longest track on the album is Cashing In, at 3:44. Actually I really like this one; there is something cathartic about the commonly repeated chorus. I get the sense that this track has a story behind it and the softer sound on the track is part of a deliberate sell out narrative - but that the band have still managed to make their deliberately half-assed effort sound and feel like them. If you're in, you're in, or something. I'm probably way off base here, but it felt like a statement, and not a face value one. 

The disc meanders to a close really, Good Guys doesn't have the heart, and Salad Days is Minor Threat Lite, not full fat. Overall I am less astounded and enraptured by this than I was hoping to be, but still pretty pleased in the end. Fig 4.0 made more of an impression, And None Of Them Knew They Were Robots stick with me more, but I am pleased to have heard all Minor Threat chose to offer.

The Complete Anthology (Disc 3) - Stump

Track list:
  
1. The Queen And The Pope
2. Seven Sisters
3. The Rats
4. Warm In The Knowledge
5. The Song's Remains
6. Safe Sex
7. The Lipstick Maker
8. Maggie
9. Love Is Too Small A Word
10. Ice The Levant
11. Thelma
12. Angst Forecast
13. Heathers In Shelter

Running time: 40 minutes
Released: 2007

More Stump now, such is the way with multi-disc retrospectives. You may wonder, if you are reading in order (as if you are) why I jump from Disc 1 to Disc 3. Where is Disc 2? Well, that is filed under the album it represents, A Fierce Pancake. I'm not sure why but I am not about to go and restructure things for consistency - it simply wouldn't be in the spirit of this band!

Disc one was a mess, but with some interesting bits and pieces mixed in, and I kept more than I thought I might. That was the last post of 2017, this the first of 2018. What does the new year bring?

My first thought is that the sound is more matured than yesterday's fare. There is more obviously a tune, albeit one realised through odd sounds and weird lyrics. The Queen and the Pope is much more clearly a song than Tupperware Stripper was (or many of the other offerings). It feels milder, too... watered down somehow. This is both good and bad. If the more extreme tendencies have been reigned in then there might be some more palatable sounds here, but on the other hand if it dulls the spirit, then it might end up with a bunch of dull tripe.

Early impressions are more the latter.

I was not expecting folksy sounds. The Rats opens with a very exaggerated Irish vocal, and a twangy little string accompaniment. I rather like it, moreso for the surprise, but it really does not belong on the same album as the first couple of tracks. It is over quickly and replaced by more of the quirky electro peaks and troughs that remind me of the small volume of Devo tracks I acquired at some point. It's spikey, hard to get into, but I think it largely works. The fast-paced vocal offsets the janky sounds well, though it goes a little tuneless in places and the end is bizarrely sudden.

This disc is jumping all over the place as the next number goes slower and darker. There is a nice atmosphere to it, the thrum of the bass in particular. The top end is light touch, soft, subservient and layers well for the most part - but then it takes over as a focus, a sort of evil magic tingle (if you've seen the same films or played the same games I have that might mean something) and it's an awkward, unpleasant central passage. Thankfully order is restored on the track so as not to sour me on it.

Then ugh. Safe Sex is just noises, unpleasant noises - bubbling sounds and nasal vocalisations. It does not belong on any record, ever.

It's a struggle not to be distracted by shopping... my brain is clearly in an "acquiring things" mode and with the sales on, I have a couple of wardrobe requirements to fill. Yet I haven't been motivated to look for things when not sat here listening. Classic attention and focus problems that have affected me for a few months now, and I am not sure why. In any case, after the horror interlude, the sounds have returned to something more tuneful. It is all very dated, but there is an 80s charm to Stump when they are palatable, and an 80s horror to them when they are not.

I have not been as immediately aware of, and uncomfortable with, the nonsense lyrics today. My instinct is that they are as all over the place as before, but they are less of a front and centre feature. Now there is a repeat of a track from yesterday... Ice the Levant has improved marginally on this later recording. Like many of the tracks here there is a more definite sense of a tune behind the screams and proclamations of oddity. It's still not worth holding on to, though there is a really pleasing resonance to some of the lower notes that I don't recall from disc 1. The screeches are too much though, as they were before.

Now that I am most of the way through, I will re-assert that yes, this is a more mature sound. By the time these tunes were recorded Stump had obviously refined their songwriting and performance. There is less random cacophony and more consideration. More of a standard pattern to subvert with their randomness rather than noise for noise's sake. There might not be anything as iconic as a man shouting "does the fish have chips?" but I prefer this more harnessed, controlled weirdness. They still have the interesting sounds here, they just use them in the production of tunes that are more, well, tuneful. For all my distractions and reluctance to fit this in today I have rather enjoyed it and am surprised to find myself keeping much more than not. The last track puts me in mind of Laika & the Cosmonauts, which is a very positive thing. Happy New Year.

The Complete Anthology (Disc 1) - Stump

Track list:
  
1. Tupperware Stripper
2. Our Fathers
3. Kitchen Table
4. Buffalo
5. Everything In Its Place
6. Bit Part Actor
7. Orgasm Way
8. Ice The Levant
9. Grab Hands
10. 50-0-55   
11. Big End

Running time: 35 minutes
Released: 2007

Complete random insert now. Back when I was getting into Microdisney via Cathal Coughlan's solo work, Stump were recommended to me by some algorithm somewhere (I don't recall whether it was a shop or a music site). I fell for the trap, bought the recently released Complete Anthology and then... thought it was odd and ignored it. Was that a good move?

By the by, this is apparently a concatenation of two releases, Quirk Out and Mud on a Colon.

The first sounds are hardly tuneful, and the early voice sounds more like a lead in to a budget 60's sci-fi tune than a pop song... my first musical point of reference is early Pink Floyd. There are some quite funky sounds buried in this track, in and amongst the rubble of the rest, but it is hard to see myself ever choosing to listen to Tupperware Stripper again. Amusing title, though, and the drive of the rhythm is a positive that hints there may be something salvageable in the anthology as a whole. We shall see!

This listen is my New Year's Eve; I've never been a fan of this night of the year and a safe, low key solo pursuit is just the ticket... even if the content I am consuming is not immediately lovable. I like Our Fathers a lot more than the first number though - there is a more definite tune here, whilst preserving some of the interest and quirkiness. The ending is a little but anti-climactic though, and the cutover to the next track is jarring. It jumps into precisely the kind of experimental noise-pop that I was expecting from my brief experiences of Stump when ripping the CDs... and it's not a culture I buy into, though that said I think the vocals that clearly don't fit standard lines and structures provide interest and creativity; it's the music around that which lets it down.

I am more parochial about my music these days for practical reasons. I have too much, I've never liked radio and the ways that I expanded my horizons in the past are less effective now - the lists of new releases on big online stores are dominated by re-releases and multiple different formats of mainstream items which I have no interest in, so I don't get to discover. I'd like to think I would be open to new artists, new sounds etc. - certainly I've been pleasantly surprised by some of the less familiar works I have listened to - but I don't go out of my way to find them. I also just... don't get to gigs anymore. No idea what is on, where, and no-one to go with if I were make for live music retreating out of my life.

I guess it is a question of priorities to some degree, but I do think it's got harder to sort wheat from chaff because there is now so much more... and the latter has always dominated in scale.

Anyhow - meaningless digression aside, if you overlook the questionable lyrics and suppress the suspicion that they're being weird for the sake of being weird, Stump had some talent in there. There is experimentation and there is cacophony, but there are also funky structures, rhythms and good pace. Nothing can save the horrible noise of Bit Part Actor though... it's just awful. It marks the end of the first EP; the latter 5 tracks are the second.

No song I have heard so far this evening has been entirely likable, but equally not everything has been a write off. For all the noise and weirdness in the construction of the sound, I think the most dubious element of the tracks is the lyrical content. The other parts wax and wane in quality, but the lyrics are just sheer nonsense throughout, and "adult" in that particularly juvenile way more often than I am comfortable with. I find it odd that I bring that up here, but for once I actually feel able to track the words to some degree... perhaps the lack of traditional tune structures throws a little more focus on the script?

Experimentation can be a good thing, but by its nature it is hit and miss. On this disc I feel the balance is more miss than hit. For every cool hook and each sweet sound there are two or three unpalatable items - crap words, walls of tuneless sound, incoherent track structure and so on. On the plus side, the tracks have been short and the whole disc is less than 40 minutes so it's not like it's eaten too much of my life. I find that I am keeping about half of it, much more than I thought I would, because enough of the tracks contained little positives to warrant another listen. By rights I should nuke it all, really, but sometimes that spirit of experimentation is welcome, and for when it is, there is Stump.

Compendium - The Second Hand Marching Band

Track list:
   
1. Mad Sense
2. Lies
3. A Dance to Half Death
4. Don't!
5. Not Yet
6. We Walk in the Room
7. BonBon
8. Grit and Determination
9. My Gift is Waiting
10. Next Year
11. Bottle of Anger/Lies (BBC Scotland Radio Session)
12. A Hurricane, a Thunderstorm (BBC Radio Scotland Session)
13. Love is a Fragile Thing (Sleazy version)
14. Learn to Love (2007 demo)
15. Bypass (2007 demo)
16. Transformers (2007 demo)
17. Dawn Raid (2009 demo with Benni Hemm Hemm)
18. Alexander and Angela (2009 demo)

Running time: 69 minutes
Released: 2010

I've written about how I came across The Second Hand Marching Band before. This has the look of a best-of and retrospective, including tracks I have elsewhere, but that's alright by me. Twee Scottish low-fidelity amateur charm is OK in my book.

It is a suitably low key starter for 10. Mad Sense's slow tempo, a lone voice, adding another. It's disarmingly charming. Yes, I was biasing myself towards this before I started, but there really is something comforting about the simplicity here. That said, I am happier for the bigger sound and a bit more life in Lies as that takes over, its intro more than half its length before the vocal joins. 

I can't help but feel, though, that I should stop this listen after three tracks, because A Dance to Half Death is undoubtedly the summit. I have loved this track since the first time I heard it. There's some fragility in the voice that endears, whilst the main theme, the twiddling tunes behind the vocal and the pace all strike emotional chords (pun intended) in me.  There is a rawness to it all, a heart laid bare, a pleading appeal. In some ways the song is amateurish, the voice almost fades away in places and it sounds like only an indie-effort could... a little rough around the edges. Yet the earnestness, the genuine intent and belief of the performers and the tones of their strings stir feelings in me, a sort of comfortable loneliness and longing. It is, I think, a masterpiece, albeit one most people will never hear or appreciate.

The sense that everything is slightly off-key can't be as easily brushed off on the more bombastic Don't!, and here the effect of everyone playing and singing together has more of a cacophony about it, and then we hit the first of the tracks on this album that I don't recognise. Not Yet jettisons the noise for a stripped back sound, a female main vocal, it reminds me more of Strike the Colours' less pop-y pieces in places with the intricate little strumming loops, though overall the similarities aren't that great. It builds nicely and I find myself enjoying it a lot.

Of course, my liking this should not be any surprise; The Second Hand Marching Band shares (shared?) some overlap in membership with eagleowl, a lot of their tunes exhibit that very clearly, and eagleowl are the best band no-one ever heard of and the group that I keep going back to when being alone all the time tips over into loneliness. The downside of that is that hearing those sounds when I wasn't feeling lonely (like just now) can tip me over into the very loneliness that I use these sounds to escape. Today is a calm day of not much between two days of hosting people for board games and in the aftermath of family Christmas. The quiet and peace are - or were - welcome, especially as I don't really feel like I have been off work for a week yet!

The album loses its way a bit in the middle. All pace slips from the tunes, and they strip back too far to be interesting. They retain a gentle charm, but it is a detached one, rather than an intimately engaging one.

The combination of Bottle of Anger/Lies brings back the energy. Yes, it is in part a repeat, and I could have sworn it was something I had elsewhere, and a quick search suggests that I axed it! Huh. Context matters - here this combo really worked to bring back something that was lacking as the mid-section drifted. There I found the raucousness abrasive. Odd. I am still not that enamoured of A Hurricane, A Thunderstorm though and I may axe that again (especially as I have other versions).

It amuses me that there is a sleazy version of, well, anything that would be advertised as such, but that is where we are with Love is a Fragile Thing... I can't hear anything immediately worthy of that term, so I guess it is a bit tongue in cheek (or I am tone-deaf). Then we are into a bunch of demos to finish off the offerings.

Learn to Love starts these off with the same trembling vocals that endeared A Dance to Half Death to me. Here there is less to back that up, but it is still plenty pleasant. Actually it may end up being these demos are the real reason to have this album... the search for where I had Bottle of Anger/Lies before laid open how Compendium is less a greatest hits and more the collected works. The first 10 tracks come from two EPs, 11 and 12 from the BBC sessions linked above. Happily thus far they are well worth having. The recording is a little harsher, louder, than perhaps would be ideal but the tone of the songs is right.

My attention wandered, and I find myself suddenly at the end of Transformers without consciously processing the bits in between - nice soft guitars, low key vocal and not a lot to do with the track name as far as I can tell...

Two to go, then; 10 more minutes.

I find my words are gone. My drive to type MIA. Suffice to say I really like Dawn Raid even though I cannot find the lines to explain why. The closing track I am less keen on. Musically its more of the same and OK, but the lyrics are mean-spirited in places. Not a good finish.