LINER NOTES: IT'S RAINING TODAY [2023]

 

       1.   Elm Grove Window – The Clientele

       2.   Lovefingers – Silver Apples

       3.   It’s Raining Today – Scott Walker

       4.   Do Rainbows Have Ends – The Brian Jonestown Massacre

       5.   Templeroy – Felt

       6.   Along – Ghost Woman

       7.   Lose The Game – Holiday Ghosts

       8.   What I’m Missing - GracieHorse

       9.   Bell of Silence – Color Green

     10.   Child of the Moon – The Rolling Stones

     11.   Solicitor in Studio – The Fall

     12.   Dead Pool – Mission of Burma

     13.   When You Say - FACS

     14.   2 Lines – The Big Moon

     15.   Desert Nights – Lonnie Liston Smith & The Cosmic Echoes

     16.   Lwonesome Tonight – PJ Harvey

     17.   The Fool – Nighttime

     18.   Good Living Is Coming For You – Sweeping Promises

     19.   Mine Forever – Lord Huron

     20.   Strange Overtones – David Byrne & Brian Eno

     21.   Stars – Angel Olsen

     22.   Ballad of a Vision Pure – Cinema Red and Blue

     23.   Point That Thing Somewhere Else – The Clean

     24.   Chained to a Cloud – Slowdive

‘I Had to Say This’ by The Clientele was one of my favourite discoveries of 2019. Found on its own, as part of a compilation entitled Tim Peaks (Songs For A Late-Night Diner), I intended to follow up on my interest, but never did. In the end, it has taken a playlist on Spotify, compiled by the chap who introduced me to Sarah Records, for me to finally get around to it.

The methodology the chap employs when putting together such things appears to be unsound (or rather, I see no method at all). Yet the song that kicks off his anthology is the same that I’ve used to start mine. ‘Elm Grove Window’ is from The Clientele’s fourth album, It’s Art Dad, a collection of the band’s earliest recordings. On hearing it I immediately abandoned the chap’s playlist and proceeded to work my way chronologically through The Clientele’s entire back catalogue. Then I went back to the beginning and did it all over again. For a couple of weeks I listened to nothing else. When it was announced that the group were releasing a new album – their first in six years – I pre-ordered a copy, along with a ticket to see them play live at Rough Trade (East) in July.

‘Lovefingers’ by Silver Apples reminds me of trying to book a holiday in April, poring over google maps, searching for a suitable destination. The reason I was listening to them in the first place had to do with somebody on Twitter comparing them to Stereolab. I don’t think they sound much like Stereolab, but what they do share is a fondness of electronic oscillators and pulsating rhythms. Silver Apples got there first, and were probably the first to get there. Released in 1968, their eponymously named debut album was considerably ahead of the game – only the vocals in any way date it. Indeed, Simeon and Taylor’s voices are the group’s weakest link, displaying a naivete at odds with the music. (Their second album, 1969’s Contact, addresses this issue somewhat.)

‘It’s Raining Today’ by Scott Walker doesn’t remind me of anything specific. Either Mark Radcliffe or Stuart Maconie played it on their weekend show in January, telling us that it was a favourite of Thom Yorke’s. You can see why, although Walker’s baritone is in a different league to Yorke’s mumbled whine. ‘It’s Raining Today’ is taken from Scott 3, which was Walker’s third solo album. Upon further investigation I decided I preferred Scott 4, his fifth, but ‘It’s Raining Today’ hit a chord.

There is a connection in my mind between The Brian Jonestown Massacre and Brighton. This might be because the first record of theirs I bought – Tepid Peppermint Wonderland: A Retrospective – was from Rounder Records on Brighton Square, back in 2007. So it seemed fitting to go and see them play at the Concorde 2, rather than the Kentish Town Forum, especially considering my Brightonian friend (the former cohabitant) is also a fan.

Whether you thought it was a good gig would depend on whether or not you find the antics of temperamental artists entertaining or irritating. I've been lucky enough to witness Mark E Smith throwing microphones at sound engineers, but as amusing as it initially was it got boring pretty quickly. And so it was with Anton Newcombe, who aborted one of his songs less than a minute in to berate his band for their supposed lack of enthusiasm, which I doubt anybody in the audience had noticed. A few others were then dropped from the setlist entirely. But it was a good a gig, and we made a good day of it. The latest BJM album was released a few weeks later, and I was able to identify some of the new songs we’d heard. 'Do Rainbows Have Ends?' was one of them and sits nicely between Scott Walker and Felt.

‘Templeroy’ is the second track off of Felt’s first album to feature on one of my annual compilations, the other being ‘Cathedral’ in 2018. Why it took me that long to listen to the whole thing I’ve no idea, but it rounds off what amounts to a rather sombre introduction to this year’s almanac.

At the beginning of March, myself and a couple of friends flew to Milan to watch Inter play Lecce at football, walk around the place, and to marvel over Italian abstract art at the Museo del Novecento (highly recommended). The next month I was in Nice with my partner, to walk around the place, eat and drink, and to contemplate International Klein Blue at the Musée d'art Moderne et d'art Contemporain (don’t bother). There was plenty of sunshine in both instances.

Meanwhile in England, it rained a lot. February had been largely dry but March was the third wettest on record and April wasn’t much better. The end of the month was all right, but the rain returned in May, in time for the coronation of Prince Charles and his transmutation into a king.

Unless you believe in divine right, which hasn't been a thing since the Glorious Revolution of 1688, then there's no excuse for not recognising monarchy for what it really is: showbusiness. The pageantry, the pomposity, the costumes, the capes... it’s nothing more than light entertainment. The problem with all this mummery is that there are a lot of people who take it quite seriously and are intolerant of those who don't. And yet king, queen, emperor, et al. are just words, just job descriptions. Charles Mountbatten-Windsor is just a human being, as was his mother. If such people represent us they do so out of expediency, not because there's anything inherently special about them, let alone sacred.

On the day, I met my brother and a common friend in Croydon to embark on a pub crawl. They’d been following London’s Tramlink, starting in Mitcham, working their way to Beckenham, before turning back towards Croydon, so they were well ahead of me when I joined them at 'Art & Craft CR0' on Surrey Street. From there we moved on to the Dog & Bull, Riff Raffs, The William Morris Pub in Merton Abbey, The Sultan in South Wimbledon, and finished up at The Alexandra in Wimbledon proper. It rained almost continuously, but we were at least successful in our bid to evade the royal sideshow.

Amongst the gloom, Spotify presented me with Ghost Woman and Color Green. I then found Holiday Ghosts on one of Contraflow’s Mixcloud playlists. Ghost Woman had a new album out – Anne, If – but I listened to their self-titled debut as well, which is where ‘Along’ comes from. Holiday Ghosts also had a new album out, had also made others, but I got stuck into their latest offering, Absolute Reality. Originally from Falmouth, their record was the best I heard all year. In fact, I came close to including two tracks on this compilation: ‘Lose the Game’ and ‘B. Truck’.

‘Bell of Silence’ is from Color Green’s debut LP, released in 2022. When I heard Gracie Horse in June, I choose to put it before Color Green, given that they both make what could be described as ‘alternative country’ music. Together they round off the compilation’s second non-submersible unit, consisting of four relatively new songs.

It’s not often you discover an old track by one of your favourite bands, but this year it happened to me twice. ‘Child of the Moon’ by the Rolling Stones was the B-side to ‘Jumpin’ Jack Flash’ and came with its own video, directed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg and featuring Eileen Atkins done up to like Lyn Redgrave in Gregory’s Girl. They made one for the A-side too but it’s not as interesting, lacking any sort of obvious narrative. Digitally enhanced restorations were issued in August 2022, but I didn’t get wind of this until April 2023.

The Stones were at the time (1968) a band in transition, moving between the psychedelic experimentation of Their Satanic Majesties Request towards the rootsier blues and folk of Beggars Banquet. In between stood 'Jumpin' Jack Flash', which was neither of these things. 'Child of the Moon', though, wouldn't have felt out of place on Satanic Majesties. It might not be their finest moment, but that the Stones could afford to use it as a mere B-side speaks volumes.

The situation with The Fall was slightly different. 'Solicitor in Studio' is taken from the group's fifth (or sixth if you count Slates) studio album, Room to Live, which is not highly regarded. Knowing this, I'd steered clear, although I did already have a few of the tracks that comprise it, most notably 'Hard Life in Country'. Reading Steve Pringle's excellent book You Must Get Them All – literally a track-by-track breakdown of The Fall's entire canon – I was compelled to fill in the gaps. Room to Live isn't actually a bad record. More than anything, its reputation suffers because of that which preceded it: Hex Enduction Hour, released earlier in the same year and considered to be one of The Fall's best works, if not their best. 'Solicitor in Studio' is the standout track on Room to Live, both musically and vocally. Karl Burns adds a second layer of bass to what’s already a pretty thick bassline, and Marc Riley provides some pleasing flourishes on keys. Mark E Smith's villainous cackle near the end suggests he’s having ball. (I am now fairly certain that I've listened to everything The Fall have ever recorded up to and including 1995, but I could be wrong.)

‘Dead Pool’ by Mission of Burma is the third and final tune on this anthology to be released in 1982 (the others being ‘Solicitor in Studio’ and ‘Templeroy’). Mission of Burma was a Spotify suggestion: it proposed ‘Trem Two’ off of Vs., their first album, but I preferred ‘Dead Pool’. ‘When You Say’ by a group called FACS appeared on another one of Contraflow’s playlists (Sticks & Stones – Tomorrow’s Hits Today). That was in February, so when the Mission of Burma tune turned up I determined it would sit well between the jovial tone of ‘Solicitor in Studio’ and the bass-heavy groove of ‘When You Say’.

I heard ‘2 Lines’ by The Big Moon on the radio while driving through Teddington. I heard it again around at The Wilkinsons, in their souped-up garden shed over a game of pool. ‘2 Lines’ is the first song off their album Here is Everything, which came out in 2022. It’s quite a ‘big’ song and I did wonder whether it would be better placed further down the list, but I think it works here, bringing to a close the compilation’s third non-submersible unit.

It pains me to give Spotify any credit because I would rather not use it. The issue is I’ve been working from home a lot, on a different laptop to the one my music’s on, in a separate room to where my record player is kept, and it’s a convenient thing to use Spotify. I might go for one of my existing playlists or I might try something new – an artist I’ve heard of but not heard. What I won’t do is listen to one of the playlists that Spotify has thrown together for me, such as ‘Shoegaze Classics’ or ‘Alternative 70s’.

My last two compilations have included a number of jazz and instrumental tracks, and I was hoping for more of the same this year; a change of genre can give a playlist shape and direction. I had a couple of other tunes waiting that I felt needed to come later, and jazz or funk would be a good device by which to get to them. After giving McCoy Tyner a go I put on some Grant Green. Spotify then figured I might like Lonnie Liston Smith. I accepted its advice, selecting specifically Expansions, recorded in 1974. I was familiar with the opening track because the guy who used to own a pager would use it whenever he DJ’d at parties or bars. But why did he never play ‘Desert Nights’?

My next discovery was ‘The Fool’ by Nighttime, a band put together by an American singer-songwriter called Eva Louise Goodman. According to her Bandcamp page, Nighttime is a project that ‘locates itself on a musical tree planted on the British Isles, perched atop the branch of folk leaning into sixties rock,’ although there’s a flavour to it that’s very much American. The album, Keeper Is The Heart, is worth the money, and the video for ‘Curtain is Closing’ is also worth a look.

‘The Fool’ begins too abruptly to follow on from ‘Desert Nights’, and so I needed something else to place in between. PJ Harvey offered a solution, although it’s not the most satisfying passage in this collection. ‘Lwonesome Tonight’ [sic] is as slow as it needs to be but exhibits tension, whereas ‘Deserts Nights’ does not. I didn’t even know Polly had a new record out, her first in seven years. I did know Sweeping Promises had an album on the way, and a European tour too. As explained in my liner notes for Here Comes that Beat Again, Sweeping Promises were supposed to play at 2022’s Wide Awake festival in Brockwell Park but had to cancel due to insurance issues pertaining to Covid. Confident that they wouldn’t be pulling the same stunt twice, I purchased tickets to see them.

Café de Levante, Cadiz

It was about now – the beginning of August – that my partner and I flew to Cadiz. After a sultry June, July had been a complete washout and I was looking forward to a spell of uninterrupted sunshine and warmth. I was simultaneously apprehensive about the journey itself: an aeroplane to Seville and then a pre-booked train to Cadiz. We had a three hour window to get from the airport to the train station, which would more than likely be enough, unless there were severe delays.

There were delays, although not severe. Our (Easyjet) flight left an hour later than scheduled. However, the bus from the airport to Seville-Santa Justa took no more than 20 minutes, leaving plenty of time for something to eat and a quick beer. Outside it was baking hot. The train itself was running late, so we had another beer. Our locomotive was then overtaken by the one behind it, which had my partner speculating as to whether or not we could get on that one. We couldn't. Tickets are non-transferable and the Spanish rail services don't sell more than their trains can cater for, as they do in the UK. This would ordinarily be a positive thing, given how clean, comfortable and reasonably priced they are. Unfortunately, as our train got within 20 minutes reach, they wacked on another 15, and did so repeatedly. Over an hour and a half and several beers later, our train finally arrived. We booked into our hotel at quarter to midnight.

Never mind, Cadiz is a lovely place, and owing to its coastal proximity not nearly as hot as Seville. The food is of the highest quality and anything you drink tends to cost exactly €2: beer, coffee, wine, lemon soda, whatever. There aren't hordes of tourists and those who are there are themselves from Spain, so it makes little difference. On the way home we stopped for a day and a night in Seville, where I saw a roadside thermometer reading 46 degrees Celsius. It was all right as long you didn’t move.

Our Spanish vacation cut through summer like a knife. It was only August but when we got back it felt more like September, the record-breaking temperatures of June a distant memory. It wasn’t cold but it certainly wasn’t hot, and sunshine was in short supply.

'Mine Forever' by Lord Huron and 'Strange Overtones' by David Byrne & Brian Eno were those couple of tracks I had hanging around, waiting for an appropriate juncture. I chanced on both in The London Apprentice during Sunday Service (a few afternoon drinks in Isleworth with my Cornish friend, a custom that predates Jarvis Cocker's radio show of the same name by a good few years). Lord Huron – a group, rather than an entitled individual – are from Los Angeles. 'Mine Forever' reminds me of The Handsome Family. ‘Alternative country’ in other words.

The version of 'Strange Overtones' we heard was actually a cover by an American band called Whitney. It's a good effort but I read an interview with the group's two core members that rubbed me up the wrong way, so I went with the original. The London Apprentice isn’t cheap, the service is slow, and on a Friday night there’s usually some goon with an acoustic guitar banging out renditions of everybody's favourites, other than mine. But on a Saturday night or Sunday afternoon it’s not a bad place to drink, especially when they get the music right, as they had in this instance.

By the end of the month the weather was showing signs of recovery. Just as well, as I had a bank holiday date over in Wapping with my Cornish friend and the former cohabitant from Brighton. We were to repeat the previous year's pub crawl, but with minor alterations: The Prospect of Whitby and the Captain Kidd in Wapping, The Mayflower and The Angel in Rotherhithe, the Old Justice and Anchor Tap in Bermondsey, and one for the road in The Shipwright Arms, London Bridge.

The following evening I was in the St. Margarets Tavern’s, enjoying what I feared might be the last of the warm weather, when something caught my ear: ‘Forgiven/Forgotten’ by Angel Olsen. I had no way of telling who it was – the staff there wouldn’t have had a clue – and so I had to remember what words of it I could and then search online when I got home. It turned out to be the lead single off of Angel’s second album, 2014’s Burn Your Fire for No Witness, which sounds like a collaboration between Roy Orbison, Patti Smith and Leonard Cohen, in the best possible way. At first I was going to put ‘High & Wild’ on here but went with ‘Stars’ because I thought it would work better with what I was placing either side of it.

The next two tracks were added in July. Cinema Red and Blue is a musical collaboration centered around David Christian from Comet Gain, and it’s a lot of fun. ‘Ballad of a Vision Pure’ is a hard and fast number and kind of operates as the compilation’s climax – or in conjunction with ‘Stars’ it does. I was lucky enough to find a near-mint copy on eBay for £10.99, with free delivery, which considering how few were pressed is an absolute steal.

I’d found out about The Clean a month or so earlier but couldn't decide what song of theirs to include: ‘Billy Two’, ‘Anything Could Happen’ or ‘Point That Thing Somewhere Else’, all taken from the Boodle Boodle Boodle EP, released in 1981. In the end I went with ‘Point That Thing Somewhere Else’, despite it being less representative of the group’s output; a bit Velvet Underground, whereas their other stuff is more Modern Lovers. In any case, The Clean were pioneers of what’s been termed the ‘Dunedin Sound’ – Dunedin being the second-largest city on New Zealand’s South Island, the sound being a rough conglomeration of post-punk and psychedelic pop. [Incidentally, The Clean’s co-founder and drummer, Hamish Kilgour, contributes spoken-word vocals to the Cinema Red and Blue album track 'Jesse Lee Kincaid'. Sadly, Hamish passed away in 2022.]

Wapping

In mid-September, after a spell of unusually hot weather that just about made up for the tripe we were served up in July and August, I got myself to Banquet Records to purchase the last remaining copy of Keeper Is The Heart. The new record by Slowdive was playing – Everything Is Alive. I presumed my playlist to be complete at this point but decided I may as well stick ‘Chained to a Cloud’ on the end of it. Unfortunately, it has been brought to my attention that Slowdive have not been performing this song on their recent tour, which may influence whether or not I go and see them.

Before making a decision about that, I had a few of gigs lined for October. First up, Make Up at The Dome in Tufnell Park (where, slightly drunk, I accused Rachel Evans of being the 'Comet Gain girl', which of course she is). Then Sweeping Promises at Studio 9294 in Hackney Wick, overlooking the River Lee Navigation, surrounded by dilapidated warehouses, newbuild flats, artisan workshops and bars selling ‘craft’ beer. Whether by design or by accident, Studio 9294 has great acoustics. Either way, the gig was one of the best I’ve ever been to and more than made up for their absence at the Wide Awake festival.

A couple of days later and I was in Plymouth, with my partner, my Cornish friend and a few local associates, to watch Holiday Ghosts at the Underground on Mutley Plain. I can only think Holiday Ghosts were playing there due to their Falmouth connections, because bands like theirs don’t normally play in Plymouth, a city lacking in decent small-to-medium sized music venues. Another brilliant show, although I wouldn’t have got to hear ‘Lose the Game’ if I hadn’t uncharacteristically called out for it towards the end of their set.

When we left the venue it was raining heavily, as it had done throughout much of the time we were there and would continue to do on our return to London.

[Listen to here.]

LINER NOTES: TIED UP IN NOTTZ [2016-17]

1.    Nissim – The Gaslamp Killer (with Amir Yaghmai)

2.    The Zoo – FEWS

3.    Deceptacon – Le Tigre

4.    Low – Traams

5.    Sunday’s Coming – Eddy Current Suppression Ring

6.    Lake Superior – The Arcs

7.    Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings – Father John Misty

8.    Sketch for Summer – The Durutti Column

9.    Hard Hold – Jaala

10.  Tarantula Deadly Cargo – Sleaford Mods

11.  Excitissimo – William Sheller

12.  Soul Vibrations – Dorothy Ashby

13.  Balek – Placebo

14.  More Mess on My Thing – Poets of Rhythm
15.  All My Tears – The Frightnrs

16.  Nightbird – The Brian Jonestown Massacre

17.  The Wheel – PJ Harvey

18.  All I Wanna Do – Splashh

19.  Tied Up in Nottz – Sleaford Mods

20.  Gosh – Jamie XX

21.  Get Innocuous – LCD Soundsystem

22.  Star Roving – Slowdive

23.  Come Over – Chain & the Gang

24.  In the Mausoleum – Beirut

The Gaslamp Killer is the stage name of a hip hop producer and DJ from California. 'Nissim' is a reworking of an instrumental called 'Yekte' by Turkish guitarist Zafer Dilek, which itself seems to have been influenced by a track entitled 'Gurbet' by singer/songwriter Özdemir Erdoğan. To capture the flavour of the source material The Gaslamp Killer worked with a guitarist named Amir Yaghmai, who in turn brought in a number of Middle-Eastern musicians he knew to really nail it. The tune takes a while to get going, suggesting it might have worked better further down the playlist, but Spotify introduced me to it early in 2016.

FEWS are a Swedish band that play post-punk, although 'The Zoo' also echoes the sound of shoegaze. It was issued as a single first, in 2015, and then surfaced on the album Means a year later. 'The Zoo' is reminiscent of British band TOY but with a greater sense of urgency. Unfortunately for both acts, I get the feeling that the post-punk/garage rock revival has run its course. Or perhaps we’ve reached a state of perpetual revival where nothing ever really goes out of fashion but is recycled again and again by way of the internet.

On that note, I couldn’t believe that Le Tigre recorded 'Deceptacon' as long ago as 1999. There are clues – the use of an Alesis HR-16b drum machine, a bit of sampling – but it wouldn’t feel much out of step played next to anything around in 2017. The same could be said of 'Low' by UK band Traams, released in 2013, and 'Sunday’s Coming' by Australian group Eddy Current Suppression Ring, released in 2008. What does this all say about the evolution of music? Is Devo’s theory of devolution being played out before our very ears?

There are subtle differences. As I said, I detect the hint of shoegaze in FEWS; Le Tigre are quite lo-fi; Traams are sort of punk revival mixed with indie rock, as are Eddy Current Suppression Ring. All emanated from Discover Weekly on Spotify, bar Eddy Current Suppression Ring which the Australian at work accurately identified as something I might appreciate. What these songs all have in common is that they’re noisy, loud and faintly aggressive. Such sonic qualities can be sustained for only so long.

The Arcs are the side-project of Dan Auerbach of blues-rock band The Black Keys. I don’t mind the Black Keys but I prefer the lo-fi dreampop of The Arcs. Or rather, I prefer the lo-fi dreampop of 2016’s 'Lake Superior', because the record put out the previous year by The Arcs does sound a lot like The Black Keys. Perhaps this is the type of thing that’s now in fashion. Whatever, Father John Misty (real name: Josh Tillman) inhabits the folkier end of the spectrum, which isn’t surprising given his involvement with Fleet Foxes. Yet 'Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings' is no folksy ditty; only the vocals recall Tillman’s work with his previous band, for whom he played drums.

The Durutti Column derived their name from the Durruti Column, a phalanx of anarchists who fought against Franco’s Falangists in the Spanish Civil War. The name ‘Durruti’ acknowledged one of the column’s most admired commanders, Buenaventura Durruti, who led a pre-emptive attack on General Goded’s barracks in Atarazanas/Drassanes, ensuring that Barcelona remained under Republican control. Tony Wilson and Alan Erasmus intended the group as a sort of art statement and set about gathering musicians to implement their vision. By the time Wilson and Erasmus had established Factory Records and arranged for The Durutti Column to cut an album, only guitarist Vincent Reilly remained. Vini Reilly is one of those talented types who struggle within the music industry (see Syd Barrett, Dan Treacy of the Television Personalities, Lawrence from Felt). I’d given his music a go before but didn’t get very far with it. Discover Weekly offered up 'Sketch for Summer', which is an oddly beautiful instrumental backed by the sound of tweeting birds.

Jaala: another Australian band, again from Melbourne, but this time The Australian had nothing to do with it. Singer Cosima Jaala’s delivery is reminiscent of Lene Lovich – she of 'Lucky Number' fame, which I included on 2007-08’s Harmony in my Head. 'Hard Hold' jumps about in a way that can be divisive. Personally, I like their playful time signatures, but my partner can’t stand them.

I used to share a similar antipathy towards to the Sleaford Mods. A chap who I worked with during my days as a transcript writer inadvertently brought ‘the Mods’ to my attention after he posted a video on his blog of them performing 'Fizzy' outside of Rough Trade West. It’s not entirely comfortable viewing. To start off with, one of the crowd – perhaps mistaking the occasion for an open-mic event – attempts to get in on the act, and for a moment it looks like it might kick off. Then there’s the way the group presents itself. Andy Fearn, bedecked in a baseball cap, nods along nonchalantly; Jason Williamson’s twitching angrily, rubbing the back of his head and flicking the end of his nose like he might be on amphetamine. At first I tried to suppress the memory but soon found myself watching videos for 'Tied Up in Nottz', 'Tarantula Deadly Cargo', 'Jolly F*cker'. Before long, I was sharing my experience with my bouldering buddies. Even my boss was intrigued (although The Australian and the South African sales manager weren’t). Come November, I’d bought tickets to see them play live at The Roundhouse in Camden.

I try to avoid doubling up on artists but I’ve made an exception for the Sleaford Mods. 'Tarantula Deadly Cargo' is taken from the album Key Markets, which was released in 2015. Like most of their music, it’s fairly minimal: a deep, plodding bass-line layered over a brisk, repetitive beat. Their other contribution comes later.

Florence

An opportunity had been missed to visit Florence while we were out in Tuscany for a wedding in 2005. Instead, we’d been persuaded that Siena better catered for day-trips: it was smaller, slightly nearer, and parking more convenient. Florence is certainly the more prodigious town, and an afternoon would have never done it justice. Not that it did Siena justice either, but I was glad now to be going to Florence instead of Siena.

Walking through Piazza Pitti, we turned down a narrow street – Sdrucciolo de’ Pitti – and came across the sort of shop that my partner likes to browse in, selling a variety of disparate things. What wasn't for sale was the turntable or what was playing on it: Wizzz! French Psychorama 1966​-​1970, Volume 1. I made a note of the details, tried to find a copy, couldn’t locate one anywhere, so ended up ordering it directly from the record label, Born Bad Records, in France. The track that had been playing in that small shop in Italy had been an instrumental, which means it could only have been 'Exitissimo' by William Sheller.

Wizzz! French Psychorama 1966-1970, Volume 1 isn’t available on Spotify, so at work I settled for playing the Blue Break Beats series, which had previously given rise to the inclusion of 'Ain’t it Funky Now' by Grant Green on my 2000 compilation The Ladies of Varades. The algorithm kicked in and before long Discover Weekly was offering up tunes as delectable as 'Soul Vibrations' by Dorothy Ashby, a jazz harpist who recorded for the Chess Records subsidiary Cadet. Ashby struggled to find acceptance within the jazz community; the harp was a classical instrument, and a novelty one at that. Fortunately, in-house arranger Richard Evans, who had been given carte blanche to work with pretty much whomever he desired, saw potential and signed Ashby up. Afro-Harping was the result, released in 1968, garnering positive reviews, and where you’ll find the tune 'Soul Vibrations'. (Ashby went on to add the koto to her repertoire, specifically on 1970’s The Rubaiyat of Dorothy Ashby.)

'Balek' is not an obscure B-side by alternative-rock act Placebo but an obscure album track by a Belgian jazz combo of the same name. A guy called Marc Moulin was the prime mover, and his version of Placebo recorded three albums: Ball of Eyes in 1971, 1973 in 1973, and Placebo in 1974. 'Balek' is the fourth track on 1973 and it also makes a showing on It’s a Rocky Road: Volume 2, a mix compiled by The Gaslamp Killer, which might explain how it ended up here. We’re talking jazz-funk, but what attracted me to it was the way the second blast of the trumpet is truncated and set slightly ahead of the beat.

The Australian used to put on The Poets of Rhythm, often when he couldn’t be bothered to look for anything else. They play funk, but as the guy who used to own a pager was quick to point out there’s something not quite right about it. This is because they’re not black Americans recording in the 1970s but white Germans performing in the 1990s, and the guy who used to own a pager, who is a musician, could tell. 'More Mess on My Thing' is typical of their album Practice What You Preach, and if you like this sort of thing then don’t let my friend’s musical snobbery put you off.

Whereas I could see where my friend was coming from with regards to The Poets of Rhythm, The Frightnrs [sic] had me completely fooled. When Spotify generated them, I assumed I was hearing original rocksteady music from the late 1960s, when in fact it had been recorded as recently as 2015. The effect is deliberate. The band’s Brooklyn-based record label, Daptone Records, eschew digital recording techniques and work using analogue equipment. (It’s where Amy Winehouse recorded Back to Black.) Moreover, The Frightnrs’s debut LP, Nothing More to Say, was recorded monophonically. Tragically, their singer Dan Klein died from motor neurone disease while the record was still in post-production. His vocal possesses a delicacy that seems all the more poignant in light of this, but he leaves a powerful legacy.

After the bearing witness to the depredations on show in the documentary Dig! it had been gratifying to discover, in 2015, that Anton Newcombe continued to produce music to such a high standard. This is not to say that I'd purchased The Brian Jonestown Massacre album Revelation, but I had least deemed another of its tracks worthy for inclusion here – the acoustic 'Nightbird'.

I was excited to discover that PJ Harvey had a new album on the way and bought it almost on the day of release. Plenty of good tracks to choose from but I plumped for 'The Wheel' with its epic 1 minute-plus overture, replete with Iberian hand clapping, wailing guitar and saxophone. The lyric concerns Kosovo and the atrocities committed there.

The single 'All I Wanna Do' by Anglo-Antipodean band Splashh appeared on Discover Weekly, despite being approximately four years’ old. It seems the group were a victim of what’s often termed ‘difficult second album syndrome’. By the time their sophomore effort hit the shelves I’d completely forgotten about them, yet 'All I Wanna Do' remains one of my favourite tunes on this compilation, and I consider this to be a strong compilation.

Sleaford Mods in a more urgent mood. The ‘Nottz’ they’re tied up in refers to Nottingham, a town that gets a bad press these days but which I thought was rather pleasant when I went there 20-odd years ago. (Take a drink in Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem if you’re ever passing through).

I don’t like The xx. My primary objection is Oliver Sim’s vocals, which sound like they’ve been cut four sheets to the wind. This is particularly evident in the song 'VCR'. So when my Australian co-worker went to put on In Colour by Jamie xx, who’s the principle songwriter for The xx, I wasn’t expecting much. How wrong I was. 'Gosh' is an odd, almost industrial sounding tune that draws you in very slowly. As The Australian rightly pointed out, it’s best played at a high volume.

The Australian returned to Australia in early 2017. Before leaving he made a final, unwitting contribution to my playlist by utilising some sort of function on Spotify that randomly plays songs by the same artist, in this instance LCD Soundsystem. 'Daft Punk Is Playing at My House' was massive in the UK, but I never liked it enough to include it on 2005’s Aka 'Devil in Disguise'. Had I heard it I would certainly have made room for 'Get Innocuous!' on 2007-08’s Harmony In My Head, which sounds like a cross between Talking Heads and David Bowie, doing disco.

In October, my bouldering buddies and I travelled to Fontainebleau for a third year in succession. I again roomed with Mr Wilkinson, who brought along a musical device and the means by which to amplify it. 'Star Roving' by Slowdive was subsequently amplified, from their new album, their first in 22 years.

The chap who introduced me to Sarah Records and I once found ourselves hanging out with Slowdive at a house party in King's Cross – this must have been around 1995. I wasn’t familiar with their music back then and didn’t even realise who they were. It was an awkward situation, made more awkward when Miki Berenyi from Lush came over and offered around canapes. We went outside to consider our options just as Donna from Elastica arrived bearing booze. She smiled at first, and then, upon realising that she didn’t know who the hell we were, regarded us with complete contempt. Elsewhere, Jarvis Cocker played records to an empty room. After an hour or so the guy who invited us still hadn’t turned up, and we decided to leave. With not enough money for a bus, we proceeded to walk all the way back to Hounslow, which took us something like four hours.

My enthusiasm for Chain & the Gang was reinvigorated after 2014’s Minimum Rock n Roll and I made a point of buying their new album on its release. It proved impossible to get hold of on vinyl and I would have to wait until the band toured the UK in February 2018 to obtain a copy. In the meantime, I listened to the record on-line and downloaded the track I wanted for my compilation: 'Come Over'.

Seville

After numerous trips to Spain, Italy and France, I advocated for a return to central or eastern Europe. And so in the summer of 2016, I flew to Krakow with my partner for what should have been a relaxing four days and four nights. On the third night we ate bad goulash, and the rest of the holiday was spent in bed, in the bathroom, or tentatively wandering around the city’s main square, Rynek Główny.

Before consuming the offending meal, I had been privy to Krakow’s Fair of Folk Art (Targi Sztuki Ludowej), centered around Rynek Główny, which consisted of artisanal market stalls and traditional live music. These musical performances were a delight. They were more like plays really, acted out by players of various ages wearing traditional costumes, sang in that distinctive timbre that often typifies the vernacular.

The following Easter and we were back in Spain, just in time to celebrate Holy Week in Seville (Semana Santa de Sevilla). This was not a deliberate move on our part, but it made for an interesting holiday. We arrived on Holy Monday and departed on Good Friday, and on every day we were there, at around 16:00 the festivities would commence. Large floats called pasos, depicting various scenes pertaining to the crucifixion, were paraded around the city by their respective cofradías (brotherhoods). In front, cloaked nazarenos holding candles; behind, brass bands playing a maudlin sort of mariachi.

There must be so much music from around the world that’s worth listening to, but who has the time – or even the ear – to sift through it all and decide which of it is any good? There was a new guy at work who generally played stuff that didn’t interest me. One day he put on an album called The Flying Club Cup by a group called Beirut. ‘Balkan folk’ is how Wikipedia describes it, but the band are from the state of New Mexico. 'In the Mausoleum' was the track that stood out. Although sung in English, it feels authentic, even though it can’t be. Or can it? Band leader Zach Condon travelled around Europe in his early teens, and he cites the films of Federico Fellini, the mariachi music he was exposed to growing up in Sant Fe, and French chanson as influences. He’s not appropriating anything but absorbing various influences and reinterpreting them, and that's no bad thing.

[Listen to here.]

LINER NOTES: TAKE A RIDE [2013]

1.    Swim and Sleep (Like a Shark) – Unknown Mortal Orchestra

2.    Let England Shake – PJ Harvey

3.    Over the Ice – The Field

4.    Tugboat – Galaxie 500

5.    You Made Me Realise – My Bloody Valentine

6.    Who Do You Think You Are Kidding Mr. Hitler – Wild Billy Childish & The Blackhands

7.    Take a Ride – The Questions

8.    Damaged Goods – Gang of Four

9.    Stardust – Billy Ward and His Dominoes

10.  El Toro – Chico Hamilton

11.  I Put a Spell on You – Screamin’ Jay Hawkins

12.  Tramp – Lowell Fulson

13.  Come on In – The Music Machine

14.  Como El Agua – Camaron de la Isla y Paco de Lucia

15.  National Shite Day – Half Man Half Biscuit

16.  Ingenue – Atoms for Peace

17.  FFunny FFriends – Unknown Mortal Orchestra

18.  Flowers – Galaxie 500

19.  Swing Easy – The Soul Vendors

20.  Late in the Evening – Paul Simon

21.  Every Picture Tells a Story – Rod Stewart

Bouldering is indoor climbing utilising plastic holds, without ropes; you’re never so high off the ground that a deep crash mat won’t do should you fall. I bouldered at The Arch before they were kicked out of their premises by British Rail. They then moved to a warehouse in Bermondsey called The Biscuit Factory. This was a great shame, but London Bridge station was to be expanded, and now has been.

Contrary to the music the kids at Vauxhall Climbing Centre like to subject their clientele to, at The Biscuit Factory they normally do all right, and it was there that I came across Unknown Mortal Orchestra. They had released two albums at this point: an eponymously titled work and II. Both are represented here. 'Swim and Sleep (Like a Shark)' is taken from their second record. It works well as an opening track, although it isn’t used as such on the album. The music has been deliberately recorded to sound like the psychedelic records it takes inspiration from. That is to say, it sounds like you’re listening to it through an old Dansette record player, even though you’re more than likely not.

When I first began to take an interest in so-called indie music, PJ Harvey was one of the artists introduced to me. She was, compared to now, relatively unknown – this was around the time of her second album, Rid of Me – and the approaching juggernaut that was Britpop suggested it might remain that way. Instead, as Britpop was nearing its critical mass – early 1995 – she released To Bring You My Love, which was a success critically and to some degree commercially. And while bands like Suede, Radiohead and The Verve would be conveniently co-opted into the Britpop movement, once it had established itself, PJ Harvey stood apart. She was succeeding on her own terms, and Britpop’s sustainability was not her concern.

I took note of all this but PJ Harvey’s next album, Is This Desire, released in 1998, eluded me. Her fifth, Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea, made more of an impact but not enough for me to go out and buy a copy. 2004’s Uh Huh Her barely even registered. White Chalk, forget it. I guess I had my ears pressed against other things: Latin jazz, funk, soul, ska, psychedelia, garage rock, new wave.

It was my partner who broke the embargo. In 2012, she bought for me Let England Shake, reinvigorating my appreciation of PJ Harvey’s oeuvre as whole. I especially appreciated the use of the autoharp and zither on many of the tracks. This is Polly Harvey’s great strength: an ear for euphonic textures, off-beat rhythms, sound collages.

Living alone and left to his own devices, my Cornish friend was listening to electronic music, such as From Here We Go Sublime by The Field. Billed as techno, it’s closer to trance, although not of the Goa kind. Perhaps it’s neither for it leans heavily on sampling, inhabiting a wistful sort of groove. That said, 'Over the' Ice is fairly upbeat, even if the tune it borrows from – Kate Bush’s 'Under Ice' – isn’t.

My nostalgia for late old school indie music, which had started with Sebadoh, led me back to Galaxie 500 (although it was Dean Wareham’s other band, Luna, that I was more familiar with). It seemed to me that Galaxie 500 held more in common with the more sixties’ influenced groups on Sarah Records or Creation than they did alternative indie American rock. Wareham’s ostensibly simple guitar work is reminiscent of The Velvet Underground after John Cale was kicked out and their music became prettier. Except Wareham’s voice is far thinner than Lou Reed’s, and everything's slower.

Up pops My Bloody Valentine on a second, consecutive compilation. This time around it’s one of their more conservative numbers, 'You Made Me Realise'. Conservative in the sense that it possesses a verse and a chorus, what passes for a riff, vaguely melodic harmonies, and an instrumental breakout about halfway through. It then descends into a mess of feedback, which has been known to last, in a live setting, for over half an hour.

Adolf Hitler. There’s a certain attitude towards this monomaniacal piece of work that’s distinctly British. In the lead up to the Second World War and during it, the Fuhrer was perceived as a figure of fun, a caricature to be ridiculed and laughed at. This attitude is manifest in Allied propaganda: in posters (American placards were very much more aggressive than their British equivalents), songs ('Hitler Has Only Got One Ball'), films (The Great Dictator), plays (The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui), even cartoons (the Bugs Bunny short 'Herr Meets Hare'). Charlie Chaplin said that had he been cognizant of the holocaust he would never have made The Great Dictator. After 1945, once the strange terror of the Third Reich had been revealed to all, portrayals of Hitler became more considered and generally light on laughs, which in itself became a source of amusement: 'Just don’t mention the war'. (I say strange because so inimical to the German war effort was the holocaust that early reports of it were dismissed as preposterous. Knowing that it did indeed take place does not render it any less so.)

But we do mention the war. I mentioned the war, albeit obliquely, on a friend’s stag-do in Berlin that I’d been called upon to organise. Somebody had got wind of this thing called the Berlin Beer Bike Tour, and I took it on board. A 'beer bike' is no such thing. Although it is pedal-powered, it has four wheels and can accommodate up to 16 persons. It also incorporates a sound system, and so I prepared a CD especially for the occasion. As well as some old Acid Jazz numbers to bring back memories of the Quay Club in Plymouth, and few Britpop favourites to evoke Saturday nights down at JFKs, I included Wild Billy Childish & The Blackhands’ cover of the Dad’s Army theme tune. Billy Childish’s tribute is recorded in the ska tradition, and recorded live. It’s actually quite difficult to catch the words, all the more so in an open-air, urban setting. Nonetheless, a song was played that asks of Mr Hitler who he thinks he might be kidding, in the very heart of the German capital. To add another layer of subversion, I was done up like a member of the Red Army Faction: khaki field jacket, black cords, burgundy cable-knit pullover, brown shoes. As Luke Haines opines in his book, Bad Vibes, 'Terrorist chic, you’ve gotta love it,' although I doubt anybody made the connection.

Berlin

The Questions were (Les) Lou’s by another name. In their incarnation as The Questions, they appeared briefly in the obscure French punk flick La Brune et Moi, performing 'Take a Ride'. This track can be found on a hard-to-find compilation entitled My Girlfriend Was A Punk! Rare Early Female Punkrockers. I suspect The Questions were formed for the purpose of the film, because I can find no trace of anything else recorded by them. Not that Lou’s were prolific either, but they did at least support The Clash on their 1977 ‘Get Out of Control Tour’.

With their choppy guitar parts and slinky bass lines, Gang of Four are sort of like England’s answer to Talking Heads. Their debut album, Entertainment! might be the best album released under the auspices of post-punk (unless of course you think The Fall were post-punk, which I don’t). Footage of Gang of Four playing 'To Hell with Poverty' on the Old Grey Whistle Test drew my curiosity. The song, taken from the EP Another Day/Another Dollar, is available as a bonus track on the re-issue of their second album, Solid Gold. If I hadn’t quickly followed up with Gang of Four’s first LP, Entertainment! then it might have been that track, rather than 'Damaged Goods', that ended up on this compilation.

Sometimes a shift in style can be so pronounced that it somehow works. From post-punk to R&B with a doo-wop slant; you may be familiar with 'Stardust' from its inclusion in Martin Scorsese’s film Goodfellas. The tune itself dates back to 1927 but the Dominoes version was released in 1957, and it was a big hit. The lead vocal is sung by Eugene Mumford, who died in 1977, a month shy of his 52nd birthday.

I made the mistake of assuming that 'Conquistadors' was representative of Chico Hamilton’s output. The associated LP – El Chico – is an exercise in Latin influenced jazz that takes full advantage of Gábor Szabó’s underrated ability on guitar. The Dealer is not, although it is an interesting record in its own right. But a strange thing: reading up on where I went wrong, I discovered that the reissued CD of the album included another collaboration with Gábor Szabó, entitled 'El Toro', recorded four years earlier for the album Passin’ Thru. It’s not as full-on bossa nova as 'Conquistadors' but there’s enough exoticism going on to fulfil my remit – a sort of North African, hard bop vibe.

In 1993 I became fascinated with a Levi’s advert that depicted an inevitably handsome man dazzling in a pair of pristine indigo 501s, laying to rest the jeans he’d just replaced. This all plays out to Screamin’ Jay Hawkins singing 'Heartattack and Vine', which its author Tom Waits objected to. I’d been mesmerised by both the song and the jeans themselves, the iconic Red Tab looking almost violet beneath the colour-balancing filter. (If Levi Strauss had produced a limited edition 501 jean with a purple tab, I’d have bought them.) Anyway, I must have needed a new pair of jeans or something, because I looked up the commercial on YouTube and reacquainted myself with ‘Procession’. (Did you even know Levi’s gave their adverts actual names?) This in turn prompted an investigation into Screamin’ Jay Hawkins. The rest is history. I was familiar with Nina Simone’s recording of 'I Put a Spell on You' but not Screamin’ Jay’s. I prefer Screamin’ Jay’s.

In April, before the stag-do in Berlin, I completed a three-month tenure working for an independent tour operator in Kingston, for peanuts, during what was a cold and protracted winter. In some ways this was a blessing, because I needed to get fit for the London to Brighton Bike Ride in June. I'd started getting into cycling the previous year, and I was already on my third bike, but I'd never ridden any farther than 30 miles. And it was a good thing. Aside from the trip to Berlin, and a jaunt to Paris with my partner in August, 2013 was a dispiriting and financially challenging period of my life. Riding around London, and to Brighton itself, gave me respite and also provided a fascinating insight into how the city is geographically arranged.

I can pinpoint the precise moment I finally ‘got’ road cycling. It was during Stage 5 of the 2012 Vuelta a Espana, when Javier Chacón, racing for Team Andalucia, broke away from the rest of the field, built up a 12 minute lead before being chased down by the peloton approximately 30 km from the finish (in what was a 168 km stage). He was rewarded with the stage’s Combativity Award for his efforts, and deservedly so. Without anyone supporting him, Chacón had little chance of pulling off this audacious stab for victory, but he gave it a go anyway. What really left an impression was the instant he must have known it was all over, when Javier glanced back over his shoulder and saw the pack gradually bearing down on him. It was a singular spectacle that invoked both dread and excitement, like watching an explosion in slow-motion. Would he make it, or was the peloton going to swallow him up?

I have previously alluded to my quest to replace all my old hip hop cassettes with their vinyl counterpart – original pressings if at all possible – as and when I come across them. I was lucky enough to chance upon an immaculate copy of Cypress Hill’s first album for a very reasonable price, either in the Music & Video Exchange in Greenwich or Reckless Records on Berwick Street in Soho. (Whichever one it wasn’t may have been where I picked up an equally immaculate copy of Bazerk, Bazerk, Bazerk by Son Of Bazerk.) Released in the summer of 1991, 'How I Could Just Kill Man' was Cypress Hill’s first single. The eponymously titled record that followed teems with samples in the way It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold us Back does: ambient noise and people talking buried in deep among horns and percussion to create a mise-en-scène that evokes the sounds of 1960s/70s Los Angeles. 'How I Could Just Kill Man' is built around a guitar riff employed by West Coast bluesman Lowell Fulson in his song 'Tramp', although Lowell regulates its intensity to create a very different effect.

Another song sampled in 'How I Could Just Kill Man' – and there are at least five – is less congruous. The Music Machine were a sort of psychedelic proto-punk outfit in keeping with the sort you’ll find on the Nuggets and Rubble anthologies I’d been buying ten years earlier. 'Come On In' represents one of their more delicate moments, almost worthy of The Left Banke. The Music Machine were visually ahead of their time. Dressed in black and wearing pudding bowl haircuts, the singer and guitarist sporting single black gloves, they surely inspired the way bands like The Jesus and Mary Chain, The Telescopes or My Bloody Valentine would later present themselves.

A bit of a jolt but I didn’t know where else to put it. 'Como El Agua' is sung by Camarón de la Isla, the definitive singer of the flamenco revival that occurred in Spain in the latter third of the 20th Century. Likewise, Paco de Lucia, with whom Camarón often collaborated, was a virtuoso flamenco guitarist at the forefront of the same movement. 'Como El Agua' was used to play out an edition of the 2013 Vuelta a Espana highlights, and I was onto it. Camarón de la Isla was revered in Spain as a sort of gypsy Mick Jagger, although his recreational habits were apparently more in keeping with Keith Richards – hence is premature death at the age of 41 from lung cancer.

Paris

Come June, I'd found temporary, part-time employment with a medical publishing company in Holborn – the sort of place that liked to jazz up their weekly meetings with hypothetical questions pulled out of a hat. For the first month it seemed to rain constantly (although a heat wave was just around the corner) while prospective full-time employers rebuffed my solicitations. Half Man Half Biscuit captured the mood:

Down in the High Street somebody careered out of Boots without due care or attention.

I suggest that they learn some pedestrian etiquette:

i.e. sidle out of the store gingerly;

Embrace the margin.

The song 'National Shite Day' recounts a set of circumstances so infuriating that its protagonist is left to conclude that the day in question has been contrived to annoy. Really, it’s a frustrated rant offering up the sort of banal irritancies that afflict contemporary living. I could feel Nigel Blackwell’s pain.

Aside from Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Thom Yorke’s Atoms for Peace is really the only current music on this playlist. 'Ingenue' is mere filler, albeit of a pleasing kind, and not markedly different to anything Radiohead had been up to lately (2011’s The King of Limbs). 'FFunny FFriends' is the older of the two Unknown Mortal Orchestra tracks found here, although there’s no way of telling. 'Flowers' is off of 1988's Today, the same Galaxie 500 album that 'Tugboat' was taken from.

'Swing Easy' by The Soul Vendors is an instrumental rocksteady track, a hangover from my ska binge the previous year. The Soul Vendors were a band Clement ‘Coxsone’ Dodd threw together to tour England, comprised mostly of Studio One’s studio backing-band The Soul Brothers, who were in turn cobbled together after the dissolution of The Skatalites. Keyboard player Jackie Mittoo seems to be the guy who wrote most of the songs, and would continue to do so once The Soul Vendors mutated into Sound Dimension.

'Late in the Evening' by Paul Simon is pure whimsy on my part. It's a decent song but I have no idea why I suddenly decided to add it to one of my compilations. Not so with Rod Stewart. I turned to my copy of Reason to Believe, a bizarre LP put together in 1978 to be sold exclusively through the retailer Marks & Spencer, inherited from my parents. The last track on side 1 is 'Every Picture Tells a Story', co-written with Ronnie Wood and originally the title track of Stewart's third solo album released in 1971 (with 'vocal abrasives' credited to Mateus Rose). The lyrical content is contemptible by today's standards, but what a tune!

[Listen to here.]