Rockhunter, Issue 18, April 2005
“Posthumous Iron Cross, citation lost / He’s got no whisky for his tea.” — Ringfinger, “Son of a Bastard’s Ghost”
They’ll Not C86 Again
Right, I’ll be quick as I really can’t be bothered doing this. I had this grand plan to chart the rise of Creation records as a low-key garage-band reaction against the overblown Yankee Invasion toss of the early to mid-80s, much like the British Invasion stuff crept into the local and regional petri dishes of American rock ‘n’ roll and bred some monstrous transatlantic hybrids. But I lost heart on listening to the records again. I mean, Revolving Paint Dream? Biff Bang Pow? Nein Danke!!
Basically, all the stuff that came to be gathered under the handmade paperchain banner of C86 was a redefinition of the provincial element of rock ‘n’ roll from the British Isles. We’re talking about a downbeat reactive trend against modern and retro Yanks trying to re-establish x-town in the States as the home of the blues. English, Scottish, Welsh and Irish boys ‘n’ girls purposefully styling themselves as provincial ingénues and self-consciously playing Laurie London to Run DMC’s Little Richard, or Johnny Kidd and the Pirates to the Rain Parade’s Byrds.
Or mining the diaphanous seam of fey, rickety, eccentric pop-the flipside to rockin’ sounds that’s re-emerged like a cold sore in every UK rock generation. Think about Mark Wirtz, Marc Bolan, the TV Personalities, some of Peter Perrett’s stuff from the earlier-70s, even. You know what I mean.
Creation mined that very seam. Some would say they almost mined it to exhaustion in the first few records. Whatever the ins and outs of monster that Creation created they had one thing right. It’s fun doing it. Rock ‘n’ roll is not all about going around with a face like a demon’s kiss. It’s also about pop, and the changing seasons of the collective mind. Or summat like that! Are you with me?
Anyway, if you really wanna get ahead of the retro game this year, try listening to anything by The 14 Iced Bears. Or, if you’ve got a yen to mine the trough, charity-shop for Bobby Squirrel’s ultra-shy 1987 45, “Ribena Smile” b/w “The Little One Said Roll Over”. Sold as a 45, of course, because if they uttered the words “7 inch”, they’d have fainted dead away with embarrassment. As it’s an unknown local thing-the guys and gals were all from Portslade-you should be able to find one easily and pick it up for pence. “Sunday caramel sweetheart hair / Flowerdew meathook sunshine flare.” For my money one of the sweetest couplets of the whole C86 era.
Okay, I’m prepared to admit the Yanks came in many good flavours, too. Get with the raving likes of The Crawdaddys, The Lyres, Chesterfield Kings, Fleshtones, Gravedigger V, The Unclaimed, Salvation Army, and fucking die!
But! If you want the English antidote, let me hip you to The[e] Milkshakes, instead of the Creation-born and what’s known as C86, ‘cos they were the ones doing the dirty fighting against the menace of rock bores in the shape of yer Green on Reds, Thin White Ropes, Long Ryders and other assorted shytes, like The Fuzztones. And although Thee Milkshakes lost the battle, they won the war. From Chatham, even. See, that’s where Billy Childish came from, already.
McNuggets
The other day I was trawling through a slew of old e-mails, tutting over the state of my bulging sack, when what should I come across but a post from the Bomp newsgroup about the new Children of Nuggets box set? It’s in its early days at the moment, and although the track-listing is strong in parts — like the bodybuilder’s egg — it’s looking fairly shabby in others, with many repeats from various nonentity bands and US bias that kind of negates the real hidden history of what was happening back in the retro day.
The whole point about the Nuggets thing is that there was more to US garage rock than LA in the 1960s. That’s why they did the extended box set, and then Vol. II. And even in the 80s the garage rock scene was US-wide and worldwide, with bands springing up from LA to the Arctic Circle, via Greece, Yugoslavia-as-was, Oz, Leicester-you name it.
The early track-listing looks okay-ish, with a flavour of what was going on 60s-wise in the mid-80s, but there are about 20 double entries from individual bands, which means that the public are getting 20 fewer genuine rockin’ obscurities for their money. I’m here to tell yez there was loads to choose from back then.
I’m dismayed that the utterly stinky Smithereens are included, as are the — Ahem! — Inspiral Carpets. Okay, so they’ve also comped a fair number of my faves mentioned above, but rather than give the world the Shamen and Jesus and Mary Chain — true psych-pop by any measure — what do do get? The Revolving Paint Dream and Biff! Bang! Pow! Duh!!!
I’m totally stoked that Hove’s own Vibrasonic made it on to the list. Vic Fitch is long overdue some big respect. And The Green Telescope are there, too. Go, Lenny Helsing! And the DMZ’s “Busy Man”: “Yow! Have some mo’! Need some mo’! I’m not yer busy man!”!! Let’s see if all the good stuff is still there when Children of Nuggets hits the record stores. We’ll see what happens when this shit hits the fans!!!
It’s like I’ve always said, once the fans become the scenesters, watch out for totalitarianism of the rockin’ kind!! They’ll try and control yer mind!!! Disobey!! Always do it the wrong way!!!!!
Missin’ Links: An Occasional Column
In an excited moment last week I sussed that there was a similarity between the atmospheric rainy interludes on Neu’s Neu and the ones on Mickey Newbury’s Frisco Mabel Joy (Elektra, 1968). What was the link? I bit my already ragged lip (Note to single self: ladies prefer moist lips to dry ones) and trawled my archive.
Obviously, Newbury did his military service in Europe but not, to my knowledge, in the land of sausage and pickled cabbage. He was stationed in England the whole time and ended his stay here in Swiss Cottage, London, of which he retained fond memories.
During their time together Neu may or may not have discovered the delights of the man Minnsy calls “The Newbs”, but like all men, on hearing him once they’d have found something to grok in his discs. And being German they would certainly appreciate his Romantic tendency to sweep through time, space and interlinked personal experiences in the course of a single song.
But the vital link evades me! I’ve lost the thread. Oh, Ariadne!!!! I’m left thinking about the connections between Neu’s and Erik Satie’s use of tension and fragile melody. But that’s for another time.
After the elation of my elliptical discovery wore off and I’d had a cuppa, I was then drawn to thinking that it might actually be the sound of the sea, in which case those krafty Krauts must have lifted the whole thing from Quadrophenia. Either that or they made it up themselves.
Reviews: A Cormorant for Punk ‘n’ Rock
It seems that the rumour about local types, The Shades of Meaning, planning a whole LP’s-worth of shinola-with the excellent working title of Seven Shades of Meaning-was more than a little wrong. So we’ll all be waiting for this “utterly regenerative creative spout” (it sed there!) till Hell freezes under.
Anyway, the Shades’s two cassingles are included on the Brighton compilation, Complete Cormorant Cassingles, 2004-2004, which is to be bunged out soon by the mighty Cormorant. Closely followed by a review in these pages, if I can keep up.
As the name suggests, the Cormorant cassingles LP contains the full roster of releases on the sadly, and let’s face it totally understandably, defunct cassette-only mini-label that lasted for two months at the end of last year. We await this new local product with bated breath, and enthusiasm.
I was going to review the new Puffinboy LP, but no bastard sent me one. Do I actually gotta buy this crap?!!
Local Graverobber Caught on CCTV
I’ve a mate who works as a CCTV operator. It’s not a bad life. Imagine T S Eliot’s Tiresias patching together his favourite moments for private hard-drive consumption in the privacy of his own bath. If you can’t imagine that, think of something else. In fact, even if you can, don’t. Anway, I’ve told him he’d better watch it. Look at the trouble those NCP boys got into with their car park sex DVD. Although that was a public service, if you ask me. They should be taken up Bartholomews by the Gay Mayor and given tea and medals.
Where was I? Ah, yes! Ever wondered how the Brighton poster men make their money? This chap’s provided me with evidence, as if any were needed, of where the profit comes from in the sordid job of promoting. Is it possible that a man aware of the arcane politics of the International Gravediggers could himself become a graverobber?
Picture the scene. On a dark, windy, rain-swept hill overlooking old Brighthelmstone, a Dickensian figure in a Crimean War-era hospital orderly’s tunic trudges up to St Nicholas’s Church, shovel over one shoulder and canvas gas mask case over the other. He surveys the pitch black for witnesses and gets down to business.
In the murkiest corner of this midnight churchyard, hunched against the wet dark and totally immersed in his solitary, charnel labour, the tousle-headed figure first removes the loosened turves from an unmarked grave, then digs down further and stuffs handsful of A3 and A5 sheets into the hole. Finally, his dark work ended, he purses his moist, brandy-sodden lips, makes the sign of the wanker & departs as swiftly as he came.
How many dreams has this man buried? How many bands and club-runners have gone to the grave dreaming fretfully of full houses and adoring fans? “Where are all the people?” the DJs and girls and boys in the bands ask, questioning the grey morning skies now emptied of God and hope. “Did we not make our posters eye-catching, new and lovely?”
One can only imagine the depths of his depravity. How many graves has he despoiled? How many ancient, gangling skeletons in this fair town are going to glory detourned, like so many unwitting low-rent pharoahs, by colour-photocopied collages done by Miss Pain, or those awfully nice chaps from It Came from the Sea?
Obviously, there’s no money in postering these days. Well, there’s only so many sites to cover. And people only bother reading the ones in the Heart and Hand anyway. You might as well chuck the rest away…
Following several phone calls by my chum to others in the local surveillance trade, there are rumours of similar footage from Shoreham Harbour, but at the time of printing these are as yet unconfirmed.
Top funny-Men of English Rock ‘n’ Roll: No. 1: Mark Lamarr
What a cunt he is. Sitting there with his finger on the rectal pulse of pop culture. Big mates with Phil Jupitus. Two cunts. And Bill Bailey. Two cunts and a prick. Now, in my book you’ve got the makings of a half-decent joke there about the makings of a half-decent movie. But the BBC actually go ahead and make another series of Never Mind the Buzzcocks, which isn’t either.
Funny guy. Got loads of records from the golden olden days. Let’s listen to him blowing the fluff off his needle…
This is the man who got Thee Headcoats on to do a session for him in the mid-90s, when he was sitting in for Mark and Lard when they did the late night show on Radio 1, then got huffy when his fave band didn’t show the proper appreciation for him doing them such a big favour.
Being a funny guy, he forgave the band and tried to make things better-and by doing so presumably hoped to form some sort of back-slapping English rock ‘n’ roll humour heritage association-by shmoozing backstage at a Headcoats gig sometime afterwards. Johnny Johnson, Thee Headcoats’ former bass player, was chuckling merrily as he told me that they weren’t having it, and the funniest man in rock ‘n’ roll was faced with around 80-something combined years of Medway-born horrorshow malice-banter which reduced the cunt virtually to tears. Now that’s funny.
Bad Luck Town
Hey, you lot!! It’s been a while!! Letsagettabittarockin’! One time!!
The year started with me and Jim “Sonic” Smith moving to the far East for our collective health. Getting old and oiled is no f**king joke. So we rented a fabulous apartment in Hastings, overlooking the smoke-houses and there we made a start on Smithy’s autobiography, “From Born Bad to Worse”, chronicalling the years and the tears of his love affair with the showbiz highlife.
Unfortunately, it all went a bit Suzy Wong and we split up. Yes, the rumours are true!! We went gay!! So what? It’s 2005 and the hole world’s queer. Anyway, he’s gone back to birds and I’ve gone to ground in Hove with my collection of vintage jazz mags. I keep swearing I’ll never live in Hove again, and this is the fourth time I’ve moved back. Hove is always nearer than you think.
You’ll have sussed that this is a bit of a stop-gap ish, due to reduced circumstances and me being on pills for me nerves/living in me car, etc. Needless to say, we’ll be back to the full gamut of sherry-induced mayhem sooner than you can say “Spunk”!!! Finally, thanks to the lovely chap/chappess known only as Z, who mailed me and flatteringly described me as the Thomas Carlyle of rock.
Keep it free!!
Hugs and XXXs,
Ed.
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