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No Halloween post this year. But last year’s was a belter….
In the best Ringo traditions, “With peace and love, NO MORE HALLOWEEN GUISERS. Please. I hate you all. Peace and love.“
Pass me the Haribo!
Hands in the air, this is a stick up!
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Now, this is a good bit of music. I’ve noticed that I’m getting a whole load of new people finding Plain Or Pan? by Googling ‘Elliott Smith’, so especially for those folks and also any regular visitors who are partial to a bit of introspective melancholia, here follows some assorted versions of 2 of the greatest songs George Harrison never wrote.
‘Stickman’ is just one of many unreleased gems in Elliott Smith’s grand body of work. Leftover from the recording sessions that spawned the material that appeared on the posthumously released ‘From The Basement On A Hill’ album, it wouldn’t have sounded out of place on ‘Figure 8′, his sophomore major label release (as our American friends would say). I have a collection of unreleased tracks loosely titled ‘Basement II‘. Elliott’s original idea was for ‘From The Basement On A Hill’ to be a double, but once he died that idea was vetoed. Shame, as ‘Stickman;’ would undoubtedly have been on it. But which version?
Stickman (Version 1) is the clearer version, with full band, backing vocals and everything in place. It features a fantastic wonky sounding guitar riff and this version is my favourite Elliott recording in the world….ever! Stickman (Version 2) is the more introverted acoustic demo, featuring some nice shakers, backwards percussion, some lovely “aaaah” backing vocals and a honky tonk piano towards the end. Kind of psychedelic naked soul bearing. Here it is.
The ghost of George Harrison playing slide guitar is all over ‘Dancing On The Highway’. Or ‘Still Here’. Or ‘Here If You Want Me’. Yep. Three titles for the same song. Each version features an assortment of chiming guitar riffs, “wooo-ooo” backing vocals just behind the George Harrison guitar part and backwards percussion. Very Beatles and very, very good. Happy downloading!
All images taken from this book. It’s a good buy.
Comes with a free CD too.
Have a poke about the site – there’s quite a bit of Elliott Smith material still available for download.
Larry, Moe, Curly and Iggy
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I was watching the BBC’s fairly decent Alan Yentob-presented 3 part documentary on the history of the guitar last night. The Johnny Marr bit was excellent. You’ll find it here. Learn how to play ‘There Is A Light..’ from the man himself! Iggy Pop was also on, waxing lyrical about how being a guitar player was all just about being a bit of a prick (!) He must know something I suppose, and given that The Stooges only recently became friends again, he may be right.
Ron Asheton was the bit of a prick he was referring to. At the tail end of the 60s he was the proto-punk, perma-shaded, primal riffmeister on ‘The Stooges’ and ‘Funhouse’, The Stooges first 2 albums. By the mid 70’s, James Williamson’s introduction as co-writer and lead guitarist had relegated Asheton to bass playing duties on the Bowie-assisted and aptly named ‘Raw Power’. To these ears, the riffs became less prowling and menacing as a result. Iggy talks about writing the riff for ‘Search & Destroy’ here. It’s very funny. Johnny Marr rates ‘Raw Power’ highly, and while it’s still a fantastic record, for me it’s just shaded by the first two albums, in particular ‘Funhouse’.
When I first got broadband I went absolutely nuts, downloading anything I could get my hands on. Well, not anything. I wasn’t interested in the latest Bloc Party album (is anyone?) or The Doors back catalogue (I’d buy that), but I actively sought out hard-to-find gems. I was in heaven when I found the Complete Funhouse Sessions, a 7 CD set that presented in chronological order every take of every track that The Stooges recorded for Funhouse. Plus all the studio chatter you could want. “Someone’s guitar string was ringing on that one!” moans Iggy at one point. Clocking in at 7 hours and 52 minutes long, it’s not the sort of thing you’d want to play all day. Well, maybe you would. But it would drive you crazeeee. The box set was quickly out of print (only 3000 made for sale), so I had no qualms about downloading it.
Dipping into it now and again reveals wee bits and pieces I had never noticed before, and it gives you a great insight into how the tracks developed as the sessions continued. Some of the squaking sax that made the final cut isn’t on these sessions. Other tracks had the squaking sax and wah-wah mayhem taken off before the final album was sequenced. Much as I love them, Spacemen 3 clearly made a career out of re-hashing these cast offs. Much of this is uneasy listening. In fact Mrs Pan hates this stuff when I play any of it, so I tend to keep it for when I’m washing the floor. Mop in hand, I’ll strut about like Iggy. Only, with my trousers on. Here’s some of my favourite outtakes.
Down On The Street (take 2)
Fun House (take 1)
Loose (take 3 – false start)
Studio chat regarding drum roll in ‘Loose’
Loose (take 4)
See That Cat aka TV Eye (take 1)
1970 (take 1)
now go and get yer mop!
Kinks, Konkers and Kids in Kasualty
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Autumn. The nights are drawing in and the curtains are drawing shut. The heating comes on a bit earlier than normal and stays on that wee bit longer. You can smell winter coming in the air. The leaves are turning red and yellow. Conkers are on the ground and in the playground. Kids are off to the medical room for a good dose of TCP and a telling off. It’s round about now that I like to dig out ‘Autumn Almanac’ by The Kinks, a song that so perfectly sums up this time of year. You don’t even have to be quintessentially English to appreciate lines such as, “I like my football on a Saturday, roast beef on Sundays, alright! I go to Blackpool for my holidays, sit in the open sunlight.” No doubt about it, it’s one of my all-time top 5 favourite songs ever. Just behind ‘There She Goes’ by The La’s and just ahead of ‘Ally’s Tartan Army’ by the Scotland World Cup Squad 1978. Lee Mavers once lectured me on the brilliance of Autumn Almanac and Waterloo Sunset for a good 10 minutes, but that’s for another time. “I wish I’d written Waterloo Sunset,” is one of the things he said.
David Watts
Sunny Afternoon
Susannah’s Still Alive
My computer’s playing silly buggers. Can’t get the spacing to work out. You don’t mind? Recorded for Top Gear on October 25th 1967 in BBC Maida Vale Studio 4 and broadcast 4 days later, the above 5 tracks are taken from a well-known Kinks bootleg called ‘The Songs We Sang For Auntie’, a 3 CD set that compiles most of (or all?) the unreleased BBC session stuff from 1964-1994. A must-have for any fan of a band who were matched only by The Beatles in terms of high quality output. But that’s just my opinion.
The voice between tracks is Brian Matthews (I think), who still presents the Sounds of the 60s show on Radio 2 every Saturday morning. The time really is ripe for a Kinks re-appraisal. The single version of Autumn Almanac was recorded in September 67 and released 3 weeks later. No great strategic marketing campaign with focus groups, target audiences and avoidance of any other big act’s single being released at the same time. Get in the studio, cut the record, release the record. Times being simpler then, Autumn Almanac climbed to either number 3 or number 5 on the charts, depending on which music paper you were reading. But ask anyone to name 3 Kinks singles and it’d be unlikely Autumn Almanac would feature in too many lists. It’s an under appreciated stone cold classic. Just ask Lee Mavers.
Yes, yes, yes! It’s my Autumn Almanyac!
Unmasked And Unanimous
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(Dylan fans’ll get it)
Unmasked? That’ll be the files for disc 3 of Tell Tale Signs, volume 8 of the excellent and seemingly never-ending Bootleg Series. Unanimous? That’ll be the verdict from you, the paying public who don’t like being ripped off and conned into paying an extra £85-odd for a 3rd disc of rarities.
I ordered my copy of Tell Tale Signs a few weeks ago, to make sure it would land on the day of release. I think internet retailers are becoming increasingly lax with their service. It used to be you could order a new release about a week before it was due out and it’d arrive on the Saturday before release. These days, you can order something 2 weeks ahead of it’s release and not receive it till the Wednesday or Thursday after the release day. Yes Mr Play.com, I’m looking at you. Anyway. After I ordered the 2 CD set I read about a 3 CD set. With a free book. Shit. Too late to cancel my order. I’ll maybe order it anyway. Then I saw the price. £99.99. £99.99!!! Free delivery mind. But £99.99. For an extra CD of 12 tracks (some of which are featured on discs 1 and 2) and a nice big book. Screw that, I thought. Some enterprising kind soul will put the files up on the internet somewhere. A quick look about on Monday night and, voila, there they were. And here they are. In mp4 format though. It’ll play on iTunes and you can burn your CD from there. Stick it to The Man!
Tracks (in a .rar file) are:
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Duncan And Brady (Unreleased, 1992)
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Cold Irons Bound (Live, Bonnaroo, June 2004)
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Mississippi (Unreleased Version #3, Time Out Of Mind)
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Most Of The Time (Alternate Version #2, Oh Mercy)
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Ring Them Bells (Alternate Version, Oh Mercy)
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Things Have Changed (Live, Portland, Oregon, 2000)
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Red River Shore (Unreleased Version #2, Time Out Of Mind)
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Born In Time (Unreleased Version #2, Oh Mercy)
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Tryin’ To Get To Heaven (Live, London, England, 2000)
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Marchin’ To The City (Version #2, Time Out Of Mind)
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Can’t Wait (Alternate Version #2, Time Out Of Mind)
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Mary And The Soldier (Unreleased, World Gone Wrong)
(looks beautiful right enough)
Big fat dead guy in a bath tub.
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So I’m on the lookout yesterday for a decent Sunday paper. A big thick one with lots of magazines, a decent sports section, a challenging sudoku and a crossword that’s impossibly hard. Perhaps even with something free in it. And I find The Sunday Times. The Sunday Times is the Sunday papers, they say. It’s big and thick, has lots of magazines, a decent sudoku, and I can’t do the crossword. And there’s a free Doors album with it. Even though I have ‘Strange Days’ (on vinyl and CD) this sways me and I buy it.
After reading the paper it’s clear they’ve done some sort of deal with Elektra/Rhino, because for the rest of the week they’re giving away a classic album every day. Today was Love’s ‘Forever Changes’. Tomorrow is ‘Unknown Pleasures’ by Joy Divison. Later on you’ll get some Jesus and Mary Chain, New Order and Echo & the Bunnymen. There appears to be no rhyme or reason to these freebies, but if you haven’t got them, get yerself down to WH Smiths in the morning and nab yourself a classic album. Strange Days indeed.
Listening again to Strange Days had me scurryng for a bootleg I have called ‘Television Bleeding’, which features 7 studio tracks and some live TV stuff. The live stuff can wait for another day, but for now, here’s the studio tracks.
1. Hello I Love You (no drums, no second vocal overdub)
2. People Are Strange (no drums, no guitar solo, no second vocal overdub)
3. Love Her Madly (no reverb, no drums, no echo on voice)
4. Love Me Two Times (no tambourine, no guitars)
5. Riders On The Storm (no second vocal overdub, no echo, no drums)
6. Touch Me (no drums)
7. Soul Kitchen (different bass sound)
The blurb on the cover says, “Tracks 1-7 are alternate studio mixes, done by Paul Rothchild during the production of “The Best of the Doors” Quadrodisc. I find it very interesting to listen to these, sometimes you have the feeling of listening to totally new recordings. But they are absolutely the same as on the albums but in different mixes. Anyway, have you ever heard Riders On The Storm without the whispering and without drums? And People Are Strange without drums and guitar solo? Both open whole new categories of listening experiences. All songs with Morrison are in excellent stereo. You won’t believe your ears!”
Jim Morrison. A wanker.
The above poster also reminds me of Denis Leary’s biting quote about Jim Morrison. “Let me tell you something. We need a two and a half hour movie about the Doors? Folks, no we don’t. I can sum it up for you in five seconds, ok. I’m drunk. I’m nobody. I’m drunk. I’m famous. I’m drunk. I’m fucking dead. There’s the whole movie, ok!? Big fat dead guy in a bath tub, there’s your title for you.”
Big fat dead guy who’s band made some fairly decent psychedelic organ-based music. I love them! Julian Cope loves them too! Happy listening!
