1. Main Title (Blow-Up) – Herbie Hancock
2. Just When
You’re Thinkin' Things Over – The Charlatans
3. Anesthesia –
Luna
4. Breather –
Chapterhouse
5. Something and
Nothing – The Wedding Present
6. Stroll On – The
Yardbirds
7. Lamento –
Antonio Carlos Jobim
8. The Nile – A
Guy Called Gerald
9. Percolator –
Stereolab
10.
The Game of
Eyes – Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci
11.
Only Love Can
Break Your Heart – Saint Etienne
12.
Sick and Tired
– The Cardigans
13.
Do the Strand –
Roxy Music
14.
The Joy Circuit
– Gary Numan
15.
Moonlit Lungs –
Sandy Dirt
16.
Underwear –
Pulp
17.
Across the
Universe (Wildlife Version) – The Beatles
18.
Tere Siva
Duniya Mein – Nahid Akhtar
19.
Token
Collecting – The Pastels
20.
So it Goes –
The Verve
21.
Planet Telex –
Radiohead
Bonus tracks:
22.
Sugar Kane –
Sonic Youth
23.
Twisterella –
Ride
24. Peaches – The Orchids
24. Peaches – The Orchids
25.
F=GmM(moon)/R2 – Man or Astro-man?
26.
Rozmaryn – Hana A Petr
Ulrychovi
27. Be My Girl – James Taylor Quartet
27. Be My Girl – James Taylor Quartet
28.
The Ipcress File – Roland Shaw and his Orchestra
29. Alright Hear This – Beastie Boys
30.
Pinto’s New Car
– Money Mark
There are many ways to while away the hours in Hounslow in the year
1995. Charity shops abound and are well stocked: Fred
Perry tracksuit tops, brown leather jackets with
collars courtesy of the 1970s, Gabicci polo shirts in man-made fabrics, all liable to attract the wrong sort of attention when out and
about.
Let the lad who lent you The Sound of the Suburbs pay for a few games of snooker at Rileys off Bell Road, which you will invariably lose, and then head down to Inwood Park for a kick about with whoever else is around.
Wander around Hounslow with the guy with the tapes, who has bought himself a secondhand camera, posing for photographs with the chap who introduced you to Sarah Records, standing in front of mirrors.
Hang out in the Treaty Centre café drinking cheap tea with the chap who introduced you to Sarah Records and the lad who lent you The Sound of the Suburbs, or maybe the pretty girl who lives across the road.
Stroll across to The Rifleman for a few pints and games of pool. Banter with the landlord, who suspects we might be local band The Bluetones, will normally ensue.
The cohabitant from Brighton had
bolted back to Brighton and the guy with the indie tapes offered to fill the
vacuum. We employed the same tactic as the year before but batted a little
straighter: we asked around for three bedroom houses or flats, and failing that
for somewhere with four evenly sized rooms. We would then give tapes guy the
option of moving in with us, should the property be to his satisfaction, which
it more than likely would be.
And so it came to pass. We found a
terraced house on Hanworth Road with a little more character than the last, in middle of Hounslow town
centre, around the back of Argos, opposite The Rifleman, around the corner from the Noble Half, and only a few minutes’ walk from the bus
station and thus The Chariot. The guy with the tapes took what was ostensibly
the living room at the front of house, whereas I took the territory at the back beside the kitchen. The lad who lent me The Sound of the Suburbs was upstairs-front
and the Cornish friend who swooned in Debenhams upstairs-back next to the bathroom.
There was a pipe that travelled up through my room into that of my Cornish
friend, which we tapped to alert each other to our awakened states, a signal to open
our windows to discuss exit strategies. The guy with the indie tapes was best avoided early in the day. Rarely hungover,
and with boundless energy, he could be very demanding of one's attention.
The former cohabitant from
Brighton arrived bearing records: Chop Suey Rock - Songs about the Orient
Vol. 1, Decade of Instrumentals: 1959~1967, Rare Tunes Chapter One “From Latin… to Jazz Dance, Mission Impossible and The Money Spyder by the James Taylor
Quartet, and Intravenous Television
Continuum by Man or Astro-man?. He also had a tape to give to me: the
soundtrack to the film Blow-Up. 'Main Title' lasts a little more than a minute and a half. Short songs introduce playlists better than long ones do.
'Just When You’re Thinkin' Things Over' by The Charlatans rips off 'Torn and Frayed' by The Rolling Stones. I didn’t know this at the time, but when I purchased Exile on Main Street some years later it was
immediately apparent. 'Just When You’re Thinkin' Things Over' was released
on the 7th August 1995, exactly one week prior to 'Country House' by Blur
and 'Roll with It' by Oasis. The kids down at JFKs on Union Street,
Plymouth, went mad for all of this, but 'Just When You’re Thinkin' Things
Over' is a much better tune than either 'Country House' or 'Roll with It', in spite of its plagiarism.
Luna was the group Dean Wareham
put together after dissolving Galaxie 500. Lunapark was played a lot
during that first term at Hanworth Road. I say term but I was actually on a
sabbatical: I’d semi-flunked my sophomore year, swapped American Studies for
English but wasn’t due to recommence university until February. So I signed on and spent
a lot of time in the room of the guy with tapes – the only room with a sofa and
a television – drinking tea and sifting through his back-catalogue with whoever
was around – hence 'Breather' by Chapterhouse and 'Something and
Nothing' by The Wedding Present. I’d already been beguiled by Bizarro
earlier in the year, so it was no surprise when I fell for George Best,
or that I then bought the Mini EP on its release in January.
The soundtrack to Blow-Up is
mainly the work of Herbie Hancock but also includes a contribution by The
Yardbirds: the hard, psychedelic rock of 'Stroll On'. Perhaps this
dichotomy explains Britpop’s bizarre fascination with easy-listening jazz and
orchestral pop, exemplified by acts like The Divine Comedy and My Life Story, and the canonisation of Burt Bacharach as some sort of musical saint. I didn’t
have much time for The Divine Comedy or My Life Story but I didn’t mind a bit of
easy listening. While the guy with the tapes bought second-hand Herb Alpert
records and Bruton Music from charity shops, I reverted to my parents’ record
collection to see what I could find, and found Wave by Antonio Carlos
Jobim. It might seem odd to follow on from this with A Guy Called Gerald but it makes the transition
from the ‘60s loungecore of Jobim to the avant-garde pop of Stereolab a smoother one.
Gorky's Zygotic Mynci’s 'Game of Eyes' off
of the charming album Bwyd Time,
which the guy with the taps had purchased in the summer. This is not the sort
of music that the chap who introduced me to Sarah Records much appreciated, but
was right up the street of the friend who lent me The Sound
of the Suburbs. Saint Etienne was another product of Mr Tapes’ archives, but it was Mr. Sound of the Suburbs who provided The Cardigans, his first
contribution to one of my playlists in some while.
What the hell was Romo? Whatever it was, the guy with the
indie tapes was into it and insisted that the former cohabitant from
Brighton and I accompany him to Club Skinny in Camden to find out. Apart from
that one night, I don’t recall hearing anything directly
associated with this Melody
Maker championed scene, but we did suddenly find ourselves
listening to Telekon by Gary Numan, For Your
Pleasure by Roxy Music and Hunky Dory by David Bowie, all delivered by the guy with the tapes.
In the
autumn of 1995, Blur, Oasis and Pulp each released albums, their third, second
and fifth respectively. Of these three records, the only one that was played
with any degree of regularity at 27 Hanworth Road, with wood-chip literally on
every wall, was Pulp’s Different Class.
Oasis’s (What's the
Story) Morning Glory? – possibly the most overrated album of its
time – was ubiquitous: heard on the radio, television, in bars, out of cars, in
shops. Blur’s The Great Escape was the oddest of the three. Almost
impenetrable, I didn’t know what to make of it. I didn’t consider it to be a
bad record but I didn’t like that Blur had all of a sudden embraced sportswear, and so couldn’t muster the enthusiasm to persevere with it.
It
is often assumed that The Verve, Radiohead and Suede were actively part of the
Britpop scene. They have in fact been affiliated in retrospect. All three
groups were doing their own thing before the term was invented. When it was,
they did not affect an about face, a change of musical direction or an artistic
reinvention of any kind. The accusation that any of them adapted their sound to
exploit the fashion cannot be made. Only Radiohead somehow managed to shrug off
the association, but whenever a magazine runs a retrospective piece on the
Britpop movement, the mugs of Messrs Ashcroft, Yorke and Anderson will more
often than not present themselves among the accompanying montage of images.
The
opposite might be said of Stereolab and Saint Etienne, despite them
understanding better the essence of Britpop – 1960s hairdos, the films of
Michael Caine, vintage synthesizers, La Nouvelle Vague – than many of the more visible
protagonists. Stereolab supported Pulp on much of their 1995 tour, while Saint
Etienne were profiled alongside Suede, The Auteurs, Denim and Pulp in that
April edition of Select magazine that all but prophesied Britpop’s coming.
Stereolab covered the theme tune to Get
Carter; Bob Stanley and Pete Wiggs had the right hair. Nonetheless, time
appears to have freed both groups from Britpop’s shackles, probably to their
advantage. As with Radiohead, they have amassed bodies of work that have been
allowed to stand on their own merit.
Then
there are groups that were willingly subsumed into the movement having
previously been associated with entirely different genres: bands like The
Charlatans, Lush, The Boo Radleys, maybe Ride. I’m guessing the reason why, at
least in part, is because they integrated socially and were party to the empty
decadence that came to typify the Britpop scene. (How PJ Harvey
managed to be both involved – she participated in the BBC 2 showcase Britpop Now – yet completely detached
from the very notion of ‘British Pop’ is a testament to her musical genius.)
When
I’d visited Mr. Tapes at his old house in May he’d impressed me with The
Verve’s new single, 'This is Music'.
Now he had their latest album, A Northern
Soul, an expansive work anathema to the poppy urbanism that typified
Britpop. Nick McCabe’s guitar
work is more expressive, more measured and the overall sound more textured than
was fashionable at the time, and the drum work is of a higher order entirely. The
Verve had more in common with Radiohead, who also eschewed the cheap thrills of
Britpop for something more ambitious. I’d contest that A Northern Soul has the edge over Radiohead’s The Bends, but both albums have dated far better than much of what fell under the umbrella of Britpop. I also liked the way the band presented themselves – shabbier and darker than their contemporaries – and Richard Ashcroft came across as genuinely eccentric; he claimed he could fly. In fact, so impressed was I that one of the first things I did after cashing my first giro was buy A Northern Soul on vinyl from HMV on Hounslow High Street. (The first thing I actually did was go for a pint in The Chariot with the chap who introduced me to Sarah Records.)
Yet Ashcroft would ultimately succumb to the fascistic elements of Britpop just like the rest, for what was Britpop if not a syncretistic, quasi-fascistic movement? Consider the evidence. Just as Italian Fascism eschewed peace, Britpop repudiated both the ethos of independent music and the concept of ‘selling out’, making it hypercompetitive. As with National Socialism, Britpop simultaneously looked backward to an idealised past – a cult of tradition, doffing its cap to the 1960s* – while regarding itself as relevant and current, rejecting the perceived nihilism and degeneracy of grunge and indie rock, yet in denial of the creative liberalism that permeated the contemporary scene. Self-appointed Britpop commander-in-chief Damon Albarn admitted as much when he professed that, 'The whole thing about pop music is that… you’re ripping off as many people as you possibly can, and the trick is just to listen to the right people.'
Yet Ashcroft would ultimately succumb to the fascistic elements of Britpop just like the rest, for what was Britpop if not a syncretistic, quasi-fascistic movement? Consider the evidence. Just as Italian Fascism eschewed peace, Britpop repudiated both the ethos of independent music and the concept of ‘selling out’, making it hypercompetitive. As with National Socialism, Britpop simultaneously looked backward to an idealised past – a cult of tradition, doffing its cap to the 1960s* – while regarding itself as relevant and current, rejecting the perceived nihilism and degeneracy of grunge and indie rock, yet in denial of the creative liberalism that permeated the contemporary scene. Self-appointed Britpop commander-in-chief Damon Albarn admitted as much when he professed that, 'The whole thing about pop music is that… you’re ripping off as many people as you possibly can, and the trick is just to listen to the right people.'
Fundamentally a populist movement,
Britpop embraced youth, flirted with violence and promoted masculinity (the
Gallagher brothers presenting themselves as a physical force to be reckoned
with; Damon Albarn getting into football). It exploited a fear of difference
by encouraging its followers to dress a certain way, shedding more obscure
sartorial references – desert boots and blazers – and replacing them with items
of clothing that appealed to the man on the street – trainers and anoraks. A
looser fit was also appropriated. (Jarvis Cocker managed to circumvent this
problem by making a virtue of his vestiary eccentricity, qualifying him as
Britpop’s very own Herman Goring.)
Just as Hitler and many of his
cronies were wacked out on barbiturates and amphetamines, the taking of heroin, ecstasy and cocaine became de rigueur, supplanting what had previously been a minor association with drugs such as speed, acid and marijuana. The film Trainspotting –
essentially an extended trailer for the Britpop movement – featured a drug addict
as its protagonist. Those involved don’t like to admit it, but the use of heroin soared off the back of that film. Members of Elastica, Blur, Suede and Marion all confessed to taking the stuff, others to ingesting prodigious quantities of
cocaine. This mindset perpetuates the idea that everybody can become a hero,
just like Ewan McGregor/Renton.
Treaty Centre
The Beatles Anthology documentary
series was first broadcast in November 1995. The television at 27 Hanworth
Road wasn’t up to much, so tapes guy and I would walk around to the house where the Scottish bloke who resembled the control freak from the Volvo ad lived and watch it on their much bigger set. A period of heavy Beatles rotation followed: 'The White
Album', 1967-1970 (aka 'The Blue Album'), and Rarities,
wherefrom I obtained the World Wildlife version of 'Across the Universe'. Take 7, as it’s also known, begins with the sound of tweeting birds and incorporates
the backing vocals of two teenage girls who were found loitering outside
the Beatles’ studio on the day it was recorded. Apart from that it’s just a
slightly speeded up version of the original, but without the strings.
As well as lending me his copy of Rarities
(which on vinyl is itself quite rare), the Scottish bloke introduced me to
the culinary delights of curry. He didn’t mean to – he just wanted something
else to drink – but we ended up sharing a chicken madras and a few pints at the
Khyber Pass after hours. My Cornish friend was taken aback when I
suggested we make our own curry, but very willing, and it became a semi-regular
thing, normally on a Saturday when the guy with the tapes was out of town and
we felt relaxed enough to commandeer the kitchen. The chap who introduced me to
Sarah Records soon got wind of our new ritual and would begin to call around late
in the afternoon looking for a free feed – he even bought us a large curry
pot from a charity shop to facilitate his extra portion. To get us in the mood
we’d put on the Nahid Akhtar
tape that the house had gifted the guy who collapsed in Debenhams for his 21st birthday. Nahid Akhtar was a Pakistani playback singer and the music on the
tape derives from various Urdu and Punjabi film scores, 'Tere Siva Duniya' Mein being my favourite.
The chap who introduced me to
Sarah Records had aborted college by this stage and his lifestyle had become peripatetic.
I don’t know where he kept his records but he was able to lend me a couple of The
Pastels’ albums after I took a shine to their latest, Mobile Safari, which was loaned to me by someone else entirely.
This in turn led me to the Sandy Dirt EP,
a collaboration between The Pastels
and Al Larsen of Some Velvet Sidewalk, which I purchased from Rival Records in
Plymouth over Christmas. Comprised of five tracks, the last is the most interesting,
incorporating the line, 'and the mechanisms for transporting oxygen to the
cells which require it, is the same for you and me.'
The guy with the indie tapes’
contribution to this playlist probably stands at something like 40%, which is
comparable to the impact he had upon The
Sounds of Baden Pearce. Sonic Youth was him, as was Ride, The Orchids and Man or Astro-man?.
He didn’t own a record player, but the Hana A Petr Ulrychovi LP was his and so too was The Return Of
James Bond In Diamonds Are Forever And Other Secret Agent Themes by Roland Shaw and his Orchestra, from which The Ipcress File theme was taken. But 'Pinto’s New Car' by Money Mark wasn’t
from him; that was from the pretty girl who lived across the road, as was Radiohead, while my brother
fixed me up with copies of Check Your
Head and Ill Communication by the
Beastie Boys and swapped his spare copy of Paul's
Boutique for my spare copy of One For
All by Brand Nubian.
But this period cannot be adequately
conveyed musically via one compilation alone – not even with the addition of
bonus tracks, which I added retrospectively as and when I was able to acquire
digital copies. Rather than just being something heard at parties, or maybe
through headphones, I began playing dance music at home. For this
reason I felt the need to complete a sister compilation entitled The Hanworth of Heroes, which never
existed at the time but does fairly encapsulate what we listened to:
1. Saint Angel –
Goldie
2. The Reno – A
Guy Called Gerald
3. Energy Flash – Joey Beltram
4. Shuffle – Dave
Angel
5. Turbulence –
Sonic Solution
6. X-Trak 1 –
Percy X
7. Purple Road –
DJ Misjah & DJ Tim
8. Mathematics –
Barada
9. Ecsta Deal – Emmanuel
Top
10. Dodeccaheedron – Aphex Twin
10. Dodeccaheedron – Aphex Twin
11. Break and Enter
– The Prodigy
12. Chemical Beats
– Chemical Brothers
13. Pearl’s Girl –
Underworld
14. The Girl with
the Sun in her Head – Orbital
The first seven tracks were provided by my brother. He copied the whole of Timeless by Goldie and Black
Secret Technology by A Guy Called Gerald for me, and the others appeared on
a mixtape he compiled under my direction – he played a number of tunes he
thought I might like and I told him which ones I did. Tracks 8 and 9 came from a cassette entitled Journeys by DJ: 60 Minute
non-stop dance mix by Justin Robertson that came free with Select Magazine,
which I would often put on after a night down the pub. Aphex Twin was also from my brother but I purchased Music for the Jilted Generation by The Prodigy myself. The Chemical
Brothers and Underworld records were recorded off of the girl across the road, and
my brother gave me the Orbital album In
Sides for my birthday.
The bigger picture
was this: the dance and indie scenes were converging. The Prodigy was perceived to be punk rock, at least in spirit. The Chemical Brothers invited Tim Burgess from The Charlatans to add vocals to the single 'Life is Sweet' and would ask Noel
Gallagher to contribute to their next album. Everybody was into the Wu-Tang
Clan all of a sudden. Big Beat, year of the trainer, Loaded magazine, football's coming home. And away with it went all notions of
political correctness and integrity. Sarah Records folded
in the summer of 1995 in an act that now seems symbolic.
____________
*In an essay entitled ‘Eternal Fascism’ the author Umberto Eco proposed 14 ‘qualities’ that could be said to typify it, including the cult of tradition, the rejection of Modernism, fear of difference and that everyone is educated to be a hero. While we’re at it, we might also like to consider an appeal to a frustrated middle class and selective populism.
[Listen to here.]
I enjoyed this. I know nothing about music but did live in Hanworth and worked at Royal Mail, Godfrey Way. Strange what you happen across looking for blogs about Italian football. #staysafe
ReplyDeleteThanks. You may also enjoy 'CARRINGTON CLASSICS' which recalls living on the fringes of Whitton. As a West Country lad, moving to Hounslow was quite a revelation.
DeleteMoving to Hounslow from anywhere is quite a revelation! I came from the Costa Blanca. The Beaver Estate has little in common with views of the Mediterranean. #staysafe
ReplyDelete