Rockhunter, Issue 9, Dec 2003/Jan 2004
“I’ve lost all my pride; Ive been through paradise and out the other side / With no one to guide me, torn apart by a fiery wheel inside me.” — West Coast Pop Art
Greasers Doin’ The Boogie: The Best of 1970s Pre-Pub Rockers! — Part 3
Say the words Ginger Tom to most people in the Bury St Edmunds area these days and you’ll get a shrug and a funny look. But it was a different story back in the mid-70s, when the dance halls were being torn up by a bunch of Suffolk renegade rockers.
I first encountered the Ginger Tom sound in early 1978 at roughly the same time I was getting bored of clocking so-called punk rock bands that only a few months previously had been doin the hand-jive boogie with the best of ‘em. You know who I mean — previously — flared-up geezers like The Vibrators, and the rest. I was a contrary old sod even then, so just as the provinces were beginning to get it on to the new-style beat-boom bands, I was time-tunnelling back to the roots of rock.
In the January I found a copy of the Wild Angels LP, Live at the Revolution and was getting off on their tough bop. By the March I had given up on the so-called new wave. By the April I was galvanised in my choice after being given a cassette featuring various unknown English rockers by a bloke I met at a record fair in Norwich. So if you’re reading this, mate, thanksand the rest of you ‘orrible lot now know who to blame!!
Up until hearing the hoary old rockers contained therein that cassette, I’d thought that Johnny Kidd and the Pirates were the livin’ end of British rock ‘n’ roll. How wrong was I, eh? (Er, any chance of actually getting to the matter in hand? — Hopeful Ed.)
Among the many not-so-memorable names on that fateful tape was Ginger Tom. Well, that was it for me. The Tom’s huge-sounding “Can It Be True”, a grinding barrage of hate-you, filthy dirty bastard boogie, was all the nudge I needed to hurl myself off the waggon and dive right back into the hard rock Id dodged since hearing the Sex Pistols for the first time.
The Pistols attracted me up the garden path with their slinky, boogie-heavy take on sleazebag punk rock. Unfortunately, the aftermath of their trawl through the self-satisfied, smug little London of the mid-70s seemed to lead straight back to the art school, rather than the boozer via the record shop, which is the route I favoured at the time. I’ve no problem with art schools, it’s just that I’m full of envious hatred for something I never had. Anyway, for what it’s worth, that, my friends, is how I fell out of love with the big idea of 70s punk.
I was horrified to discover that none of the so-called experts had ever heard of this ace new outfit I;d just come across called Ginger Tom. I found out then that ignorance is the Achilles Heel of the record collector — they never want to admit they don’t know something. (Blimey, this is becoming a memoir, lemme outta here!!! — Ed.)
Oh, Just Get On With It!
So, to cut a short story long, suffice it to say it took me some years to track down more of the Ginger’s output, but track it down I certainly did (see my exclusive and exhaustive discography at the end of this feature)!! And that’s not all. Just a couple of months ago I managed to get in touch with their main man Dave Bacon — Ginger Tom hisself — the man for whom the group hath been named.
Boy was he surprised to get a Tom-related phone call after all those years!! I blagged an exclusive interview with him for this ish.
But enough of this! I hear you sob impatiently!! So, without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you, for one night only, the majestic, raw, and dare I say slightly frightening, GINGER TOM!!!! May God have mercy on our souls.
Ginger, Youre Barmy!
Dave Bacon now lives in a very nice property in Cavenham, a quiet little village 5 miles west of the middle of nowhere (Er, that should read “Thetford” — Geog. Ed.). He divides his time between here and the Algarve.
Anyway, picture two middle-aged men drinking cans of lager in the sunshine in an idyllic rural setting…
RH: Could you tell me a bit about how you started playing?
Dave “Ginger Tom” Bacon: The main thing to remember is, none of us never had any illusions about playing in a band, we basically wanted to have a laugh, get laid, and rip it up a bit. At no time did any of us sit down and say, I’ll do this and you do that. All we did was get some guitars and that, then get it together a couple of nights a week after work. It’s as simple as that.
RH: And your first gig?
GT: My first ever gig was playing in a band with some mates at a party in Tuddenham. We rocked the joint with two little old guitar amps.
RH: For the connoisseurs of guitars, amps and such, what sort of gear were you using?
GT: Let me see. I had a Fenton Weil six-string, Rich [Rich Andrews, rhythm guitar] had a proper Fender Stratocaster, lucky bastard — the first one in Bury, as far as I’m aware. He worked for the GPO as an electrician or something, so say no more. At that time Barry would have been using a little Hofner bass, one of those 3/4-size-looking things. I can’t remember what drum set Bernie [Bernie Leggett, drums] had during the Tom years, but it would have been a decent one, cos his mum and dad weren’t short of a few bob.
As for amps, I had a Watkins something-or-other, and Rich had a Selmer Treble n Bass, which the bass had to go through as well. And we bunged the vocal mike through a homemade amp and cab we borrowed off a mate. I’ll admit to failing to blow the roof off the joint!
RH: What were you called then?
GT: Er — that would’ve been The Chocolate Fire. We were great — did a bit of Cheer, Buddy Holly, Arthur Brown, a bit of The Seeds, a bit of this and a bit of that.
The girls loved it, though, and that was that main point of the whole thing. We’d obviously laid on a load of booze, which helped.
RH: How old were you when you first started playing?
GT: I was 16, but by the time I’d started Ginger Tom I was 19.
RH: And the others?
GT: As for the others in the Tom, Rich was 21, Barry was 20, and Bernie was just 17 — he was a shit-hot drummer though.
RH: When did Ginger Tom start?
GT: That would’ve been around 1973 — in the January, I seem to remember. New year, new start, and all that.
RH: And how did things kick off?
GT: Well, I hadn’t played for a few months and I bumped into Rich and Leggy [Bernie Leggett’s nickname]. They were in a dance-band kind of outfit called The Magic Lantern Band.
Rich was a right old boy, I can tell you, always running around. In his prime no woman could resist him. I wish I’d bottled it and sold it. We could’ve made a fortune.
Anyway, the money from the dances was good, but the boys had got a bit bored doing the same old crap night after night. One night we ended up going for a drink or eight and decided there and then to form a band.
RH: On a different tack, and without wanting to sound rude, its pretty obvious how you got the nickname!
GT: Yeah, its fair to say. It never bothered me, all the ginger stuff you used to get at school. I’m proud of what I’ve done with my life, what I’ve achieved and, basically, who I am.
I had a whale of a time as a kid, playing in bands, getting my end away, and that. Christ, I hope my old lady don’t read that!! Well, she knows what I was like.
RH: When did you decide on the name?
GT: Same night as the band started. It started out as a joke, but it just stuck.
RH: We you rehearsing for long?
GT: Well, no more than a couple of months, then we were out playing — BANG! — just like that. So we were a going concern almost from the off.
RH: Where was your first gig as Ginger Tom?
GT: Pass. But I remember a very early one at a birthday party in Thetford — a friend of a friend. We thought wed stand a better chance if the audience was half pissed. Went down a storm, though.
RH: Most local scenes are fairly competitive. Who were your main rivals at the time?
GT: Well, there wasnt really anyone doing the kind of thing we were doing — you know, all the running around the audience, geeing them up and that. But there was a few really good rock bands doing the rounds, like Lead Pencil — they were tight — Finesse, Marsh Grass.
Actually, thinking back, there was quite a few, I suppose, but most of them were doing covers. I suppose there was always a bit of competition, but never any aggro as such. The difference with us was that we were mostly doing our own tunes.
RH: How come you never got wider recognition outside your own area if you were doing something so different? Did you not get the breaks you deserved?
GT: I wouldnt say that, exactly. The thing is, we never really felt the need to do showcase gigs and the like. I don’t even like London, so why would I want to spend my time chatting up a load of ponces up there? As I remember it, I think we were all pretty happy just knocking about playing here and there.
We all had jobs, you see, apart from Leggy. I cant even remember now what he did. Anyway, he was the best drummer I’d ever seen at the time. (Apparently, he went on to do session work with the likes of Jona Lewie, Linton Kwesi Johnson, and Kate Bush — True Facts Ed.) Apart from him, we all knew none of us was going set the world on fire as players. You’ve got to remember we all had jobs and were making a load of extra money as such when we did a concert.
RH: It’s unusual to hear someone who made such great sounds that went pretty much unnoticed not being bitter about it.
GT: Thats me all over.
RH: Could you tell me a bit about where you played in the local area?
GT: There was the place they did the folk club in Bury — cant remember its name now. Basically, we played all over the place in Cambridge, Norwich, and, well, loads of places, really. We were never short of a place to play. Trouble was, we weren’t often asked back.
RH: Really? Okay, so your stuff was a bit near at timesIm talking about the famous “On Your Knees” routine you used to do for encores — but I’d have thought that it would have gone down a storm out of the sticks. Did you never play in London?
GT: Yeah, well, we did some pub gigs around London in our later period. At that time everyone wanted to get a bit of rockin’, to coin a phrase. There was Dr Feelgood, who were basically my heroes, and Brinsley Schwartz, then there was Ducks Deluxe, and the rest. We never played with them, though. Because of travelling time we were limited to playing more in North London, around your Camdens and Finsbury Parks, that style of thing. I do regret that now — you know, not gigging more down there.
Ah, now, that whole “On Your Knees” tune only started as a bet. These days birds are queuing up for the same treatment by male strippers. Mind you, they’re a damn sight better looking than we were!!! Anyway, least said, soonest mended I think!!
RH: You were telling me earlier about the records. The Tom was quite unusual because you got your own records pressed up. How did you come to the decision to be a DIY band rather than disappear in the industry sausage machine? And — dare I say it? — did you sell any discs?
GT: Oh, yeah. I suppose we were something of an oddity in terms of attitude. Like I said, we had no real idea of hitting it big, Mind you, I’d have jumped at the chance if any money had actually come our way!
The long and the short of it is that we did the records ourselves. We used to sell them in a few local shops, and then at our concerts. We sold quite a few. Looking back, it was a laugh more than anything else. You know, actually getting a record out was all we wanted to do.
RH: Everyone normally thinks that independent labels and bands doing their own thing came about during the punk rock explosion.
GT: Well, I suppose you could say we were punk rockers before our time. No, there was always bands chancing their arm all over the place. The thing is, we all loved the music and we just wanted to have something to call our own, if you know what I mean. You know, something to put next to all our favourite singles wed bought over the years.
RH: I’ve got to say that at least two of the single tracks “Can It Be True?” and “Memphis, Suffolk” are world-class numbers. Not to mention my personal favourite, “All Right My Woman”, a bluesy rockin’ revelation. I’m surprised the Tom aren’t considered a classic pub rock act.
GT: I could get to like you, mate!! Yeah, well, the thing is, we never distributed them. There was no way we could sell them in shops outside the local area, because one knew who we were, did they? Like I said, we sold quite a few when we played, but there was no way we were going to hit the big time selling 10 here and half a dozen there. Of course, by the time Chiswick and that were doing their thing, it was a whole different ball game, but of course by then we were old history.
And that, dear readers, is where my tapes ran out!! Anyway, Dave had already broken out the Stellas and, not to put too fine a point on it, we got pissed, so there wasnt much in the way of coherence after this point anyway!!
Ginger Tom Personnel
Dave “Ginger Tom” Bacon — Lead guitar, vocals
Barry Kett — Bass guitar, backing vocals
Rich Andrews — Rhythm guitar, backing vocals
Bernie “Leggy” Leggett — Drums, backing vocals
Ginger Tom Discography
Torreador/7 singles
“Can It Be True?” b/w/ “Kinda Strange” (Bacon/Andrews/Kett/Leggett) (1974)
“Memphis, Suffolk” b/w “All Right My Woman?” (Bacon/Andrews/Kett/Leggett) (1975)
“I Was My Own Double” b/w “Loading Bay Blues” (Bacon/Andrews/Kett/Leggett) (1975)
Poof!
Having gone on about how punk has become the lazy label for all things cool in rock, I probably shouldn’t be mentioning a rock band that did exactly what I hate most and ditched the flares in favour of straights and went punk. However, during my Ginger Tom odyssey I discovered that Dave was in a punk band that I’d never heard of. Oh yes, Poof — for it was they!!
As you can imagine, I was pretty made up about that, and so I decided to question the man about it. Luckily, I’d gone into the ins and outs a bit earlier in the day, before we both lost the plot. So here goes nothing!!!
RH: How on earth did a boogie band get into the new sound?
Dave: Basically, I got pissed at a Tom gig and somehow ended up telling the local paper we’d gone punk!!
So that was that. Anyway, there was this old boy from the paper there to write us up — stupid boozy old sod knew as much about rock n roll as I do about astral physics — and I just said the first thing that came into my head!! Maybe I thought we could make a bit of cash in the punk game, or something!!
Basically, what with Chiswick and that cranking out all this new-sounding stuff, I could see we’d had our day belting out oldies to the rock ‘n’ rollers.
RH: But you always included your own tunes in your sets?
Dave: Mmm, oh yeah, but you’ve got to realise that people wanted to hear stuff they knew, so there wasn’t much room for all the stuff we wanted to do.
RH: How did that name come to you?
Dave: One Saturday night we was going up the town and these old boys walked past us. They seemed a bit speechless with how we looked. You know, we all had the Rod the Mod cuts and that. I asked the nearest one if he had a light. He just stared at me for a minute, and then he just blurted it out — POOF!
[At this point Dave laughs like a drain for a full minute!!]
So from that point on there was only one choice for the band name, weren’t there?! We had a right laugh about it later, when the write-up appeared in the paper, and of course that was it. The next time the Tom played, there was all these herberts in black bags, safety pins, all sorts — theyd come from miles around to see what a punk rock band looked like!! (Anyone who was young enough to care about such things in East Anglia in the mid to late 70s will recognise that syndrome all too well. — Ed.)
RH: So when did the one finish and the other one start?
Dave: There was a bit of an overlap. The Tom had already packed it in, but there was still some gigs to do, and we didnt want to let anyone down. We used to turn up, tell ‘em we were Poof, and — Wallop! — thered be a mini-riot, with blokes offering us out and all sorts!! It was all a bit light the blue paper, stand back and watch the fireworks!!! The only bad bit was Rich going. He got fed up of making a cunt of himself. He packed in playing and the last thing I heard hed got a job working on the oil rigs.
RH: Was it all new material?
Dave: Was it bollocks!! We ended up doing half my old tunes! We were playing some of them only a couple of weeks previous to forming Poof!! I wasn’t going to give up perfectly good tunes what I wrote, was I? I remember in 76 a lot of the people coming to see us as Poof were the same ones who’d loved us as Ginger Tom. But the funny thing was, most of them now hated us!!!
You know how it works. Of course, there was also the other side of the coin, with a right load of tossers who were now turning up to see a punk rock band. You know — last week you were a load of bollocks, this week we love you. Wankers!!
RH: Did you play much?
Dave: Not really. Thing is, we thought rock is rock, but no one else seemed to get it. At the time, I couldn’t see how punk rock was dividing up the whole rock ‘n’ roll scene. You know, people either really got it or really hated the whole thing.
Anyway, we’d been looning about for years playing the same old crap and we were bored out of our minds. Obviously, London was where it was at, but we thought, Fuck that for a game of soldiers.
Postscript: Dave promised to give me an exclusive by supplying me with the unexpurgated Poof tapes!! Watch out for the exclusive here soon!! And I even got a Christmas card from him!!!
Poof Personnel
Dave “Ginger Tom” Bacon — Lead guitar, vocals
Barry Kett — Bass guitar, backing vocals
Bernie “Leggy” Leggett — Drums, backing vocals
Poof Discography
Cassette tape, 1976 (courtesy Dave Bacon)
“My Baby’s Got Rabies”, “Mental Hospital”, “Cool It Carol”, “Gimme Time To See”, “I’m Gonna Die In A Hail Of Bullets”.
Boogie Done Gone, Chillun
And that, my dear readers, is just about enough of Greasers Doin’ the Boogie. Here endeth the lethen! I could go on and on about this stuff. But what the *****?!
I reckon it’s time to let the dust gather on the needle and let the rockin boogie merchants be for the time being, as we move on to pastures new. And what better time for a change than the beginning of the New Year? Like I always say, the record has to stop sometimebut I can go on forever!!!
Look out for some new retrospective series in future issues of yer everlovin’ Rockhunter, including a sideways look at time travel in rock n roll. Intrigued? You betcha! Lets get it on, people!!
Thought For The Month: The Ages of Rock n Roll
The Golden Age of Rock has passed, with only Richard and Diddley the remaining big name survivors. And the Silver Age — Beach Boys et al — is dead and buried. The Bronze Age has gone, too — that was heralded in 1977 by the emergence of Bronze Records, on which Mötörhead released their later-early singles. So what name should we give to the current age of Rock n Roll?
If rock ages work the opposite way to the wedding anniversary cycle, the depressing conclusion is that we seem to be hurtling forwards into the ages of onyx, wood, tin and paper
Is The Comp Dead?
In the wake of the CD re-releases of just about everything ever recorded, and with the vinyl trawlers over-fishing the ocean of rock and turning up even the smallest sprat-like acetates ignored for years by all but the most gastronomic collectors, the question has to be asked — Is the compilation LP dead?
Basically, everyone and his cat is now able to buy anything ever made on any format and have it delivered to their doorstep or desktop. (First it’s the fish and now with the cats, already?! Please tell me theres not a bulldog with a mouse on its head around the corner!! — Ed.) So where’s the thrill in getting yer hands on antiquarian sounds?
When I was in me prime there was only one way to get yer mitts on cryptic sounds — that was by shelling out for a new comp. And you got to know others who had the same idea. We spent our time copping an earful of covers done by various new-style garage bands, and meeting up with people at gigs. Pretty soon you had a mini-scene and everyone was rushing about trying to get one over on each other.
Obviously, there were always the clever sods who had the cash to splash on actual records, but they were few and far between. Rich bastards. But generally, there was enough of us around so that we didnt feel too shabby. (Oh-ho! That comes later, when you realise you’re stuffed and weighed down with 100 tons of shite to haul around when you move. — Ed.)
In my book, there’s two things that are putting the old dog, or mouse, to sleep. Here goes.
Firstly, where’s the fun in getting the ancient world delivered to your door? Second, I don’t reckon there’s anything in the notion that it’s all about education — as The Man from Central Music Publishing would have us believe — although, if pushed, I’d grudgingly admit that people have got to start somewhere. Basically, it’s a money thing. Back catalogue stuff has long since moved on from being a wheezy collector’s day out.
Thirdly, another thing killing the comp stone dead is the elbowing-in of tossers who want to re-write history in their misshapen image. I’m fed up with smart alec come-latelies, like John “Mojo” Mills and his Shindig! mates (He’s got more than one?! — Ed.)and similar cats on the scene (Goldarnit! I’ve run out of quote marks!! — Punctuation Ed.) telling me how essential or inessential this or that comp is. Oh, and I’m sick of hearing that cunt Mark Lamarr’s voice. Who died and made them the hipster kings? When Lamarr gets as funny as Peter Kay, then he can start telling me about music
Those are the sort of arseholes who give each waxing an out-of-10 mark in their poxy rags and webshites!! (How dare they? The bastards!! — Ed.)
For me, its always been about making up my own mind, and I don’t need some self-styled scene expert telling me whats cool and whats not!!!
Some berk on the internet even has a page on his site devoted to the best and the worst — in his over-inflated, dull-arse opinion!! It’s all very well letting people know comps exist — its all part of our history — but part of the fun is that they come and go. It’s like waves on a beach. This cat reckons he’s sussed, but says, “I doubt they [Moxies Garage Zone 3 & 4] were actually released.”
I’ve got ‘em indoors, you twat!!
I shan’t name this character or his webshite but his harking bark to the halcyon days of the early 80s marks him down as one of those dumb US tossers who confuse reality with their own backyard — from the 60s to the present — and still believe the Yanks invented psych, full stop. His entry for Pebbles 17 is priceless: “here we have yet another loser.” I mean… come on!!! The Dutch rocked like bastards! And there’s no English Freakbeat, no Rubbles.
Like most people I love the sheer force of Tim Warren’s anti-history of rock enshrined in his superb Back From The Grave series. We love his collector zeal, and his vivid prose. But God save us from his stoopid, dreary opinion that US guitar rock was fatally infected by flugelhorns, choirboys, mellotrons, and all kindsa lame homo limey crap — as he might say — coming out of England.
And that’s half the problem. The comp has become a mini-manifesto broadcasting the last word in cool from the edges of the known rockin universe. But, unfortunately, they’re produced by the worst minds of our generation, if you dig my drift.
I, and many others like me, learned half of what I know from comps. And I’m ashamed to admit that I didnt bother to learn the other half at all!! Let’s face it, it’s all a load of underachieving nonsense, so whats the odds? Give us a break and let us make up our own minds. If I want a public information announcement, I’ll hang around the train station!!
Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got a lot of sympathy for the real vinyl-heads who see a lot of substandard bilge released by certain comp-meisters, although they know they’ve got better trade copies in carrier bags all over the place. But there’s no reason to complain — to coin a phrase — when someone does what they should’ve done all along but couldn’t be bothered to do.
Accusations of barrel-scraping have been around for as long as what I call the third generation comps hit the shops — the Boulders, and their ilk, out of Germany, France, and so on. After Nuggets and Pebbles, that is. You know the ones I mean.
Okay, so all of us poor saps have bellyached every now and than after shelling out £15 for a vinyl-only excursion consisting of two sides of utter plop. But as far as I’m concerned there’s no statutory limit on good fun rock ‘n’ roll. I know a lot of cynical buggers who conveniently forget the sneers that first spread across their faces when Bam-Caruso released the first two Rubbles… But, keep ‘em coming, say I. The more the better!! The only people who really complain are the total elitists, who want to keep the rest of us in the dark. Even as we speak theres good news in the racks, daughters!! Check out Ripples and some of the English Fading Yellows — the Yank stuffs a bit off, if you know what I mean — and try to take a rhythm and blues bus ride with the Amphetamine Generation…
And when they’ve all gone, we’ll get hip to even more old bollocks.
But enough, already! The good news goes something like this: No, the comp is not dead, thats just an over-amplified rumour spread by a bunch of miseries who’ve invested too much of their life, time and money chasing the primitivist hype — the dream of the ultimate monster earthquake history-killing punk-blues teenage feedback riff-fuck.
However, music history is in imminent danger of being covered in aspic and served up as a horses dervers at the annual dinner of the Boring Cool Bastards With Good Taste. So, set the comps free from the dungeons of cool!! Let them befoul the feast of good taste with their uncool shit!!!
Believe me, we ain’t even started! And as they say, it ain’t over til the fat bassist sings!!
Fen Punk Fantoms
And on that note, here’s — wait for it — another comp full of rarities and lost sides from the mists of tyme. Woo-oo-oo!! — shaky effect — out-of-kilter colour separation overlay — Tomorrow People stares into far-off dimensions of understanding.
I’m talking about the Fire Dept’s The History of Fen Punk, Vol. III, on Cormorant Recordings out of Brighton, yet! (Where do they hide, already? They all find me!!! They want I should change my hairstyle and maybe aftershave? What do I gotta do to make ‘em lose the scent? — Undercover Jewish Ed.)
Anyone remember The 3 Spartans, The Vladds, or Neale & The Fauns? No, I thought not! Even I had to scratch my head and think hard!! I checked my diaries and discovered that I saw one of those bands — The 3 Spartans — in the late-80s at the dearly departed Basement on Brightons Grand Parade. Aah! The Basement. Gone daze of yore. Quick snog, toilet swill and psychedelic excursions courtesy of cheap continental lager, mad dog 20/20 and the ubiquitous £2.50 Brighton acid tab. Z-x-z-x! Where was I? (Stay away from the light!!! — Ed.)
Anyway, I’d gone along because 300 Spartans is one of my fave epics, and anyone whos hip to epics is okay in my book. The venue was empty, the band couldn’t keep their guitars in tune, and their set was made up of some totally inept originals and covers, including their own Link Wray-style social comment instro called “String Dog”, and The Misfits’ “Attitude” done in a frat style!! Go tell the bloomin’ Spartans that!!
Reader, I ended up buying the Fire Dept’s two LPs in 1996, the basic, mental L’Oeuf D’Or. (Thats their description! — Legal Ed.) and the sweeping concept psych-punk epic for berks, Elpee for Another Time. (That ones mine! — Ditto) But at that time I never linked the shoddy Basement gig with the flaming freakbeat howl of these two waxings!!
Anyway, it turns out I didn’t know the half of it! According to the sleeve notes on Fen Punk the Fire Dept were so out of it and up the wall they had to get gigs by playing under aliases each time, otherwise the promoters and venues wouldnt give em the time of day!! On one hand, I have to say, “Well done, that man!” On the other hand, I’m not surprised, given the talent on show on some of the tunes collected together here.
The History of Fen Punk, Vol. III brings together unreleased tunes the Dept recorded in rehearsal rooms and proper studios and is basically a concept comp, by dint of using the aforementioned name-change gimmick. How to describe? Here goes.
The bands the Dept formed to hide their ineptitude played Fire Dept tunes, so the guys were actually covering their own material at the same time as inventing the tunes and playing them!! Wow! It makes me tired even thinking about it!! I’m not sure the idea will take off, but its a neat one!! And it sure beats lame-o 80s stunts like Spaz Gonad and the Right-Mares or the Flukes of the Fart-o-Fear!!!
Where was I? Oh yes, the Fire Dept — playing as The Spartan Dreggs, The Cnuts, The Vladds, Neale & The Fauns, and the Fire Dept — have let us have it with both barrels (Scraped or unscraped?!Continuity Ed.).
This CD is as primitive as a stoneage TV being used to bang nails into the first wheel in frustration at not being able to tune in to the wife-dragging world cup final!!! Frankly, though, half the tracks are shit.
There’s some nice flourishes of plank-spanking mayhem on The Spartan Dreggs’ “Yes I Can”, a Sonics-style rave-up, and an alternate version of the Fire Dept’s “Mental Block” to the one your eagle-eyed reviewer spotted on the Sympathetic Sounds of Toe-Rag LP out on Sympathy for the Record Industry earlier in 2003. This version ditches the industrial-strength tape phasing and relies on heavy controlled feedback. Basically, it howls like a cat on heat. Useless fact, useless fact fans (On the contrary, in my opinion fact fans are actually quite useful! — Ed.), “Mental Block” was originally done by early-80s Bristol mods The Reaction, as written by Sean Thomas, who was guitarist in Dover folk-rockers The Mystreated for a bit in the mid-90s, before he buggered off to the Continent to pursue his abiding interest in ball-squeezing hipsters, smoked meats and fine cheeses.
There’s a range of stuff on offer on Fen Punk that goes way beyond the psych-punk-folk-rockin fare of their 90s garage contemporaries. Examples are the Fire Dept’s Kinks-style “Dolly Clackett”, a sturdy belter with a heart of gold, the toe-curling fuzz punk of The Right Hand Path’s “When”, and the smooth, blue-eyed Frat-Soul of Neale & The Fauns’ “Who’s Got My Love?” With the exception of the last half dozen tracks, which were recorded at Toe-Rag in its long-demolished underground Shoreditch baseapparently, a former MoD command and control centremost of the stuff here is grade-Z ultra-primitive thud, with some oddball looning thrown in for light relief. Like I said, about 50% is sheer crap-ola, but its got balls of steel. In fact, some of the early recordings make The Gories sound like Spiritualized!!! Even better, unlike most limited edition comps, this one’s not even for sale — they’re givin ‘em away!!!!
On the strength of Fen Punk, the Fire Dept could be in the running in any new reassessment of 80s-90s UK garage band sceneGod help them. (But it sure ain’t gonna be me writing a piece of fly-blown garbage about that sorry scene!! — Ed.) Some of us still remember the trebly hell of those dark days. Yeah, I saw The (or was it Thee) Green Hornets, The Mourning After, The Nuthins, and so on — and on, and on. And boy, what a world series of totally underwhelming experiences that was! Bored? I nearly shat!!
The Mystreated and The Thanes were ace — the real deal — but mostly the ratty little garage-bound nerks from fuzzy felt provincial dead-ends had as much charisma and interest to em as a bunch of young adults thrown together by fate and the smallness of the burgs they grew up in playing no-count versions of 13th-rate tunes off 5th-rate garage comps to their mates and girlfriends in empty rooms. Aaargh!! The red mist again!!!
Anyhow, to end on a happier note, it seems that the Fire Dept are playing once again after being tempted out of a well-deserved, and possibly forced, retirement. (Happy?! For who?!! — Ed.) They’ve already done a couple of supports with Billy Childish’s Buff Medways at the Dirty Water Club, and more are planned. But as to whether theyll ever again reach the dizzy heights of the super recordings on Elpee for Another Time, only time will tell.
Whatever. I shall always think of the Fire Dept fondly as the underachieving Barron Knights of the 80s-90s 60s scene, which puts them a little further down the bill of cred than Armitage Shanks. (Sorry, chaps! — Obituary Ed.)
Trends Around Town
It looks like rockin’s back in — but it’s all gone horribly Brighton. Gone are the days of toothless Teds in grimy drapes gurning at girls and gulping ale. The current crop of rockin’ fools seem more inspired by some weird 80s version of rent-boy chic than pill-crazy bop!! The clothing details are very studied, and the sneers are all in place, but the cleanliness of the new breed is all wrong.
Rockin’ guys and gals of days gone by would’ve avoided the noisenik shite of 80s Matchbox, and the rest of ‘em, like the plague. These days, however, its apparently all the go.
Jack White’s got to shoulder a lot of the blame. But he’s not the only one responsible. Again, it comes back to the inability of rock musicians and journalists to get it into their thick skulls that history counts. They avoid talking about old stuff (1) either because they dont know about itand thats hardly a sin, we all have to learnor (2) because old stuff isn’t currently fashionable. In other words, not knowing at the right time is the greatest crime for rock journos.
And if you know something they don’t, they wheel out the elitism shit. Some of us still remember people who liked classic garage rock, and even all-time cosmic greats like Funkadelic, being styled as retro elitists by NME shithead hacks and other fashion tossers in the late-80s to early-90s. For younger readers, retro used to mean naff, derivative and underachieving. These days, of course, it means clever, niche-marketed and cool.
Whatever your style, if you are unfortunate enough to appreciate something that isnt in fashion, they call you a timewarped mug. The berks. Of course, once a trend is established — usually outside the foetid world of the music mags — and becomes fashionable, you can’t avoid retrospection ad flippin nauseam. Basically, the past isnt, like, you know, like, kind of like, sexy?unless it, er, sort of is? And they talk like that, too. Somebody stop me(Okay, consider it done. — Ed.)
Lost the thread a bit there!! Anyhow, listen, I guess weve been there before with rockin style, but what the heck? It’s a good look — sunglasses, noggin full of grease, and a scowl for one and all. Even your humble scribe was once known to run a steel comb through his boyish locks in pursuit of the romance of roots rock.
Malcolm and Vivien’s Worlds End world of Sex toyed with rockin’ style, and Rotten was sporting peg slax right through early PiL. Unfortunately, the current trend smacks of the same sort of exploitation bollocks that those idiots used to shove down our throats.
Let’s cut to the chase, kids, and just dig the crazy bop! Forget the latest thing, all the Detroit twerps, and anyone with a record deal. Heres the only three rockin tracks you needand no answering back, neither.
1. Richie Deran and the Nu-Tones, Girl and a Hot Rod
2. Doug Powell, The Lord Made a Woman
3. Pretty Boy, Bip Bop Bip
Get with these howlin raves and die!!!
Editorials
At one time I never ceased to be amazed with the music media’s total and utter shock about the fact that rock can actually survive outside metropolitan areas without a life support system. And why the total obsession with London, Manchester, etc., anyway? Do the music journalists and media tossers all emerge from cocoons in large cities at the age of 22?!!
Bollocks do they!! Most are from provincial shit-holes up and down the country, and theyre in love with the big city, which is why they conveniently forget they come from elsewhere. So just imagine their surprise at The Darkness!! Hard rock out of Lowestoft?!! Whatever next?
Where do the music press think all the good rockin’ went when London disappeared up its own arsehole in the late-60s to mid-70s? The shires, the valleys and the heaths, the moors, the fens, the levels and the coastal resorts of the British Isles — thats where!!!!!!
Mea Maxima-Bloomin-Culpa x 2
1. Many thousand apologies on your noble house, Reader San. So much for the bumper Xmas extravaganza I promised you!! Due to the fun-related pressures of the past festive season, this current ish has been on ice since mid-December. It was either that or cancel Christmas. So I went with the holly and the ivy and the carols — and the Sandras, and the Brendas. Heh, heh, heh!!! Basically, owing to booze and fags, I ran out of steam and got a bit lost. But you’d better believe I’m back.
2. Okay, as loads of you hunters out there have realised (and mailed me!!) I got it wrong a couple of issues back. The Jams “Something’s Gone” is on Pebbles 12, not 9. Just one error this year and everybody wants a piece of my assBah!!
Year-End Retrospective
I dunno how editors fill whole monthly magazines with this shit. I’ve had my thinking cap on for days, and this is all I could come up with:
There’s no such thing as a garage band in the charts. Detroit is not heaven. Punk rock is not a religion. Cool is for cretins. And dont tell me how great rockabilly is, I already know.
One Love,
The Editor XXXXX
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.