Plain Or Pan?

Some say ‘Pet Sounds’ is the greatest album ever made etc etc blah blah blah. It may well be, but for what it’s worth, ‘Abbey Road’, ‘Never Mind the Bollocks’, ‘Hunky Dory’, ‘Grand Prix’ by Teenage Fanclub and ‘Blonde On Blonde’ (or ‘Bringing It All Back Home’, Highway 61 Revisited, Nashville Skyline, yawn) have been or are currently my own personal ‘Best Album Ever’. Even ‘Life’s Too Good’ by The Sugarcubes is in my eyes/to my ears one of the best albums ever made. Honest. The fact is, there is no one ‘Best Album Ever’. But for many, ‘Pet Sounds’ is right up there. I saw the Brian Wilson ‘Pet Sounds’ tour a couple of times in 2002, and the show at the Edinburgh Playhouse was fantastic, way better than the Glasgow show earlier that year. My memories of Glasgow were of folk continually shouting out combinations of “Genius!” or requests for the next song, when everyone there knew what was coming next. Duh. It was the ‘Pet Sounds’ show. We all had the album. Edinburgh was better. We were 3 rows from the front, right in front of Brian. At one point I was convinced he was smiling at me. Then I realised he was screwing up his big fat hang dog face to read the auto-cue. True. The one major blip came at the end of the night, right after I had acquired a typed out set list from the stage. There at the top were the immortal words. ‘Brian Wilson. Pet Sounds. Edinburgh, England.’ Genius? Not at geography.

Anyway. The music. Before I go on, a disclaimer. There are plenty, plenty of Beach Boys trainspotters out there. Some of you may even stumble across this site. If you do, please don’t take great delight in correcting any inaccuracies I may write with regards to ‘Pet Sounds’. For this reason I am keeping any such info at a minimum. In fact. I’m not going to write any. There are plenty, plenty of Beach Boys websites, blogsites and fansites scattered throughout hyperspace that do just that. There’s a very good one right here in fact. Me? I prefer to focus on the music. Or lack of, as today may be. What follows is the 11 songs from ‘Pet Sounds’ done in acappella style. No music, except for the odd leakage of backing tape that the assembled Beach Boys could hear in their headphones. Beach Boys stack-o-vocals, as Brian liked to call them. All the harmonies, coughs, whispered count-ins, duh-duh-duh-duh-duhs you could ever want to hear. In fact, it might all be too much for the one sitting, but it does make a great wee compilation. If it does appear all too much, I’d suggest going for the version of ‘Here Today’. But really, you need all of this, you really do.

In a rare fit of praise, Murry Wilson once said of his son, “Brian thinks in six-part harmony instead of two or three part. He’s not only a writer, he’s an arranger and he has a concept of harmonics which is uncanny.” These six-part harmonies blew the socks off of 1970s slush merchant Eric Carmen (‘All By Myself’ etc). In a famous quote he says, “Their vocal harmonies are unsurpassed…..I think Brian was a French Horn, Carl was a flute, Al Jardine a trumpet, Dennis a trombone and Mike Love (booooo!) a baritone sax, before their incarnation as The Beach Boys.” So here you go….the human orchestra that was the Beach Boys:

Wouldn’t It Be Nice

You Still Believe In Me

That’s Not Me

Don’t Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder)

I’m Waiting For The Day

Sloop John B

God Only Knows

I Know There’s An Answer

Here Today

I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times

Caroline, No

*special bonus track God Only Knows (alternative ending – very nice!)

All in all, not a bad day at the office for a 23 year old. Genius? Maybe. Talented bastard? Aye, definitely. Happy downloading!

Weirdy and Beardy

…to be a great northern soul singer in the style of Dean Parrish? So thought a 15 year old Paul Weller when he recorded ‘Left, Right & Centre’ at one of his first recording sessions. Jim didn’t quite fix it for Weller at the time but 35+ years later, ‘Left, Right & Centre’ has seen the light of day, with northern soul legend Dean Parrish doing the vocals.

It’s out on Acid Jazz, under the nom de plume of Lord Large and it sounds just like the Weller demo from all those years ago. In fact, I imagine it sounds like something straight off of the turntable at the Wigan Casino in the 1970’s. Which is no bad thing. Weird thing is, on the demo Paul Weller sings like Dean Parrish. And on the new version, Dean Parrish sings like Paul Weller. Or maybe Paul Weller’s been singing like Dean Parrish all along and no-one’s noticed. I’ve only heard ‘I’m On My Way’, so I can’t claim to be the biggest Dean Parrish fan ever. So what do I know? I don’t even know if Paul Weller plays on the new track. Neither does Mr Google or Mr Wiki. Maybe you do?

Get yer brogues on, talc down your floor and have a northern soul night in front of your computer. Go on! You know you want to! And if you don’t like the track you can blame the bald mod himself, Steve Cradock. Apparently he found the demo in a box of old stuff when he was round at Weller’s one night and got it released. He even gets to play guitar on the Lord Large version too. The wee arse licker.

A self-satisfied Paul Weller yesterday. Just out of frame, Steve Cradock’s tongue.

If you’ve ever read this previous post, you’ll know how much I like Tapes ‘n’ Tapes. It’s been a while since they’ve done anything new. In fact, it’s been a while since they’ve done anything at all. Played a few shows across America maybe, but there’s not been much action this side of the world. So I got quite excited when I received one of the band’s emails saying they’d finished their 2nd album and were about to start touring it. Yeeha!

The following tracks are not new in any way, shape or form. I spent a few months and a few pennies (but not that much) on eBay last year tracking down the various singles, promos and odd releases that had slipped through my Tapes ‘n ‘ Tapes radar. If you have ‘The Loon’ do yourself a favour and download this wee selection of b-sides, session tracks and remixes to complete your collection. If you don’t have ‘The Loon’, why not? Try before you buy from the menu below, then go and buy ‘The Loon’.

1. Cowbell (KEXP session, previously only available as a free download.

Now it’s available as a, er, download again…for free…)

2. Jacov’s Suite (KEXP session, b-side of ‘Cowbell‘ CD single)

3. Omaha (KEXP session, b-side of ‘Cowbell‘ 7″ single)

4. Cowbell (Blackeyes Remix – Promo only release – rare as hens teeth)

These instruments below made that racket above

…..but I’m hung like a donkey. That’s my favourite Shaun Ryder lyric that is. I might be the honky, but I’m a gullible so and so, and don’t I know it. Amongst other albums, my recent music purchases have included the Deluxe Edition reissues of Happy Mondays ‘Bummed‘ and ‘Pills, Thrills & Bellyaches’. Now I own 3 versions of each – the original Factory Records vinyl, the original Factory CDs and now these London Records versions. Both are double CDs and are packed full of extra tracks, rare remixes, stuff that hasn’t been on CD before, the whole shebang. Well. ‘Bummed‘ is, anyway. ‘Pills, Thrills…‘ 2nd disc is a DVD of the band’s videos. Nice and all that, but for me ‘Bummed‘ is the far better one of the two to buy.

“On one, in one, doin’ one doin’ one doin’ one doin’ one and two and three…….

do it do it do it do it do it do it do it do it

double-double good, double-double good.”

The extra tracks on ‘Bummed‘ capture a band at the height of their powers. Big enough for the good venues (Barrowlands) but not big enough that the neds were into them (a couple of years yet), Happy Mondays sound majestic, none more so than on the ‘Madchester Rave On’-era tracks. Occupying a place between the Martin Hannet productions of ‘Mad Cyril’, ‘Fat Lady Wrestlers’ et al and the LA Oakenfold sheen of ‘Step On’, ‘God’s Cop’ and the rest you get some fantastic scuzzy clattering industrial funk. ‘Holy Ghost’ sticks closely to the sound of ‘Bummed‘ – Ryder bawls some nonsensical, hard-to-decipher poetry, the scratchy guitar wouldn’t sound out of place in The Fall and a bucket full of reverb has been poured over the whole thing. But listen closely and you’ll hear some sort of bass sampler. The first sign of things to come. ‘Clap Your Hands’ is another belter, with some nice wonky sounding guitar all the way through it. If you’ve ever played through a Roland Jazz Chorus and had the tremelo setting on full you’ll know what I mean. ‘Spastic guitar’ my pal used to call it, but I don’t think you can really say that these days.

Still with us?

Good.

‘Wrote For Luck’ on Bummed is of course the standout track. You could be pendantic and say ‘Do It Better’ is right up there (and it is. So is ‘Performance’ – see this video on YouTube for proof), but ‘Wrote For Luck’ does it for me every time. This version (12″ b-side) takes the original and stretches it out to almost 6 minutes, adds some stabby keyboards, some cowbell-y percussion and invents that most horrible of genres, indie dance. Yes. Without this record there would have been no Farm, no Soup Dragons (they’d died a death in 1987 before the Happy Mondays arrived on the scene) and no sitting on the floor at indie discos to crappy James records. Arguably there’d have been no ‘Screamadelica’, no ‘Weekender‘ by Flowered Up and no ‘Joe’ by Inspiral Carpets either, but we’ll keep quiet about that. The 12″ version of ‘Wrote For Luck’ was bloody influential, no doubt about it.

I only saw the Happy Mondays once. It was in the Glasgow Barrowlands around Christmas 1990. The gig had originally been booked for Level 8 in  Strathclyde Uni, but the band were far too big for that venue by the time December came round. Shaun sat on the drum riser for the whole show smoking endless amounts of Blackpool rock-sized spliffs, Bez did his dance and the whole building shook as we jumped up and down on the Barrowland’s sprung dancefloor as one. It was easily one of the most rock ‘n’ roll shows I’ve ever been too. I remember hearing the still-to-be-released ‘Hallelujah‘ with the piercing female vocals at the start played by the DJ before the band came on, and those of us with keen hearing getting down to these new sounds. This was pre ned fanbase Happy Mondays, and most of the crowd were probably ‘on one’. The atmosphere was magic. (Unlike the Stone Roses at Glasgow Green where I got punched in the face. But that’s another story). Here’s the ‘MacColl Mix’ of ‘Hallelujah‘. I’m not a big fan of Kirsty MacColl, in fact, I cannae really stand her, but this mix is my favourite. I love the way the guitar slides down and out of the guitar solo (around 1:56, if you’re still reading…) 

The last track closes the gap between Bummed and ‘Pills ‘n’ Thrills..’ ‘Kilamenjaro‘ (or ‘Rave On’) has plenty of weird noises, plenty of rhythm, a wee bit of glockenspiel plonking around in the background, a killer guitar riff (again – what an under rated guitarist Cow was. Hated by his band mates as well) and a fantastic Shaun Ryder vocal. “We’ve got speed we’ll raise the crowd. Eat a magic boogie till we all black out.” What more d’you need?

Well, you might need this – extra bonus track – Happy Mondays ‘Wrote For Luck’ live at Brixton Academy 27th April 1999. ‘Bang Chitty Bang Bang! Chitty Chitty Bang Bang!’ It’s a belter. And you might need this – extra extra bonus track - Manic Street Preachers version of ‘Wrote For Luck’, with added super-horrible Slash-esque guitar solo, originally on the b-side of the red vinyl 7″ of ‘Roses In The Hospital’ if I recall. It sounds exactly like you remember/expect (delete as appropriate)

That was a big post today, as I’ve been busy at work, hence quiet on here. Normal regular blogging will resume over the next few days. Keep visiting!

*Extra extra extra bonus track – ‘Beyonce’s Twistin My Melon’ mash-up bootleg thang of ‘Step On/Crazy In Love’. Phew! I’m away for a beer. Happy downloading!