LINER NOTES: THE LOCKDOWN TAPES [2020]

 

    1.     Side Street Walker – Dolly Mixture
    2.     Splashing Along – Jesse Garon & The Desperadoes
    3.     Bad Night at The Whiskey – The Byrds
    4.     I am So Blue – The Poets
    5.     Four Women – Nina Simone
    6.     George Hamilton’s Dead – The Golden Dawn
    7.     The Helicopter Spies – Swell Maps
    8.     No (Personal) Connection – Soft Walls
    9.     Stepping Stones – Johnny Harris
    10.   A Ra – Joao Donato
    11.   Nonstop Disco Powerpack – Beastie Boys
    12.   McFlurry – Sleaford Mods
    13.   Dry the Rain – The Beta Band
    14.   French Press – Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever
    15.   Televised Mind – Fontaines D.C.
    16.   In Dreams – Peggy Sue
    17.   Black and Brown Blues – Silver Jews
    18.   Plastic Bird – Galaxie 500
    19.   Sand – Nancy Sinatra & Lee Hazlewood
    20.   Old World – The Modern Lovers
    21.   Broadway Jungle – The Maytals
    22.   Glue – Bicep
    23.   Leave the Planet – Galaxie 500

 
 
It happened quickly. On Tuesday, the 17th of March, I was advised that my place of work was likely to close within a week, by the afternoon this became a certainty, then on Wednesday it did. At the same time the Government was advocating that the public avoid communal spaces. The pubs around my way were noticeably quieter, although in central London they were reportedly as busy as ever. Come Friday, pubs, bars, restaurants, cafes and gyms were ordered to shut up shop. You could still walk the streets freely, but then that changed too. On the 23rd it was announced that you could only leave the house for the purpose of buying victuals or for daily exercise. In other words, lockdown. Airplanes continued to offload passengers unchecked.

In December, before COVID-19 officially became a thing, Dolly Mixture reissued the album Demonstration Tapes and also put out Other Music, a collection of alternative takes and unreleased demos. By the end of the month these limited pressings had sold out, but not before I got my hands on a pair. They are splendid records and it was hard to choose just one song for inclusion on my annual compilation. 'Side Street Walker' is as good a choice as any and functions well as a lead-off track.

Lockdown coincided with a bout of unseasonably warm weather. This was something of a double-edged sword. On the one hand, being out of doors in the sunshine kept people's spirits up, on the other it meant that parks and greens were mobbed, which defeated the object. The roads, though, were clear and I cycled into town regularly on a single-speed bike I'd purchased in February. I also found myself going to the supermarket on an almost daily basis, savouring the reduced capacity. By night the streets were deserted and the air smelt fresh. In these respects, lockdown was a rather pleasant experience.

There’s only so much cycling and shopping you can do in a day, under any circumstances, so when my partner was summoned back to school in late April, to supervise the children of key-workers and provide online lesson plans for everyone else’s, I had to contrive alternative ways to while away the days. One idea was to re-watch My Secret World: The Story of Sarah Records, which prompted a series of email exchanges between myself and the chap who introduced me to Sarah Records, who then passed on a link to a website screening Teenage Superstars. This documentary focuses on the independent music scene in Glasgow from 1982 to ’92 and features the likes of Teenage Fanclub, The Pastels, The Vaselines, BMX Bandits. A group called The Shop Assistants are mentioned along the way, and I asked the chap who introduced me to Sarah Records whether they were worth bothering with. He thought not, which surprised me, and instead pointed me in the direction of Jesse Garon & The Desperadoes, an Edinburgh band from the same era. I was indifferent to the song he provided as an example but found another that I liked a lot: 'Splashing Along', the group’s debut single, dating back to October 1986.

I uncovered 'Bad Night at the Whiskey' by The Byrds in April. I was trying to track down one of Roger McGuinn’s better haircuts and found it on a programme called Playboy After Dark, hosted by Hugh Hefner. The Byrds play 'You Ain't Goin' Nowhere' and 'This Wheel's On Fire', the latter taken from the 1969 album Dr. Byrds & Mr. Hyde, a record I had ignored; Chris Hillman and Gram Parsons had recently left The Byrds to form The Flying Burrito Brothers and only McGuinn remained from the original line-up, so I doubted its quality. The band’s performance on Hefner’s show corrected my mistake. Clarence White, who had worked as a session musician on The Byrds’ previous three albums, was by now a fully paid-up member, while John York replaced Hillman on bass and Gene Parsons took over from Kevin Kelly on drums. The Whiskey in question is a club called Whisky a Go Go in West Hollywood, California, where The Byrds once performed badly. We don’t know what was so bad about it because the lyrics pertain to something else entirely.

I’d been furloughed and made the decision to sell some of my lesser played records, effectively so I could purchase others. One of the discs I elected to get shot of was a compilation entitled The Clouds Have Groovy Faces, released via the Bam-Caruso imprint in 1986. As the title suggests, it’s a compendium of 1960s psychedelia, and fairly obscure psychedelia at that, but not the best. 'I Am So Blue' by The Poets is the standout track, so I added it to this playlist for posterity. (Readers of my liner notes might recall that The Poets kicked off my 2005 anthology with 'That’s the Way It’s Got to Be'.)

The Nina Simone tune came later after listening to BBC Radio 6 in the company of my Cornish friend on a Sunday afternoon, drinking cans of lager and a parting shot of Drambuie, which became a kind of (socially distanced) lockdown ritual. I’d always found Nina Simone intriguing but never came across anything by her that especially appealed. In June I did. 'Four Women' is the only song on the 1966 album Wild is the Wind that she wrote herself – a perfectly normal state of affairs within the genre. It’s an emotive tune but delicately rendered, until Nina lets rip with the last line: 'MY NAME IS PEACHES!'

 
Early May, and there is cause for optimism. Despite the Government’s manipulation of the statistics (in which direction remains unclear), reported deaths ‘with’ COVID-19 have been on a downward trend getting on for three weeks. In other news, the gormless article we call our Prime Minister is back at work having spent a week in intensive care, and another two recuperating, after an attack of the covoids.

There are generally two schools of thought concerning the efficacy of lockdown. The first – and it seems to be where most people stand – is that we were a good two weeks late in shutting things down but have managed to contain the virus and less people are now dying. The other is that COVID-19 has been doing the rounds since the turn of the year, many of us have already had it asymptomatically, that the whole thing is a waste of time and we’re going to be worse off for it in the long run; we will be poorer and more people are going to die as an indirect result of lockdown than would’ve otherwise perished from the disease itself.

I’ve just been into Richmond to post Stevie Wonder’s Music of My Mind to someone and to pick up groceries, and it looked like an awful lot of people had the same idea. Yet we’re only in what I’m calling the second phase of lockdown and we’re told there’s still a very real threat lurking out there. Is everybody bored of staying in, or has there been a shift in their thinking?

Placing 'George Hamilton’s Dead' by The Golden Dawn directly after 'Four Woman' works surprisingly well. It’s one of a number of tracks that stood out when re-watching My Secret World: The Story of Sarah Records. I cannot understand why the chap who introduced me to Sarah Records never made me aware of it, for it amuses in a way that satisfies the both of us. The song also dispels the myth that Sarah was all about jangly guitars and heightened sensitivity. (The same goes for 'Dirty Mags' by Blueboy, another new find that I came very close to including on this compilation.)

I’d been meaning to look into Swell Maps for ages, so when Stephen Pastel alluded to them in Teenage Superstars I got on the case. They only recorded two albums, the second being 1980’s …In “Jane from Occupied Europe”, which I’d like to buy on the strength of the title alone. I can’t find a copy on-line, so for now I’ve downloaded 'The Helicopter Spies', the fifth track from its first side. Sounds like Magazine, but better.

In 2020 Soft Walls released Not as Bad as it Seems on vinyl. (You could get it on cassette in 2019.) I pre-ordered the record in December and it arrived late January. This was supposed to tally with seeing them in April but the gig was cancelled outright. Perhaps when all this is over I’ll try and get down to Brighton and see them, because they don’t come to London very often.

 

June: the weather has become unsettled, and it seems that lockdown is entering its third phase. Pubs and cafes are still shut, although some are offering take-outs. Non-essential shops have yet to open but are preparing for it. Museums, galleries, cinemas, theatres, hairdressers and sports and leisure facilities remain resolutely closed. On the streets, however, life appears to have returned to how it once was. A number of factors have contributed to this: a declining infection/death rate; a relaxing of the rules regarding meeting up with other households in an external setting; Dominic Cummings showing a disregard for the regulations and the Government sticking by him, the social contract broken.

Richmond Green is proving to be a particularly pleasing environment. Despite the heavy clouds and occasional rain, it is fairly warm and there’s a pent-up energy about the place. The Cricketers is selling takeaway draught, although financially it makes sense to bring your own. Towards the end of the month the heat begins to build again. While I cycle to Parsons Green to meet up with a couple of my bouldering buddies, half a million people travel down to Dorset to hang around on beaches. That’s the price the Conservatives pay for letting their PR man keep his job.

I don’t really get the point of Twitter, but I’m on there nonetheless. If I wasn’t then I may never have found out about the Scottish composer/arranger/producer Johnny Harris. Someone had been playing the album Movements in their car and tweeted a link to Harris’s impressive cover of 'Paint it Black' by the Stones. Further investigation proved another track, the self-penned 'Stepping Stones', to be more so. It's hard to know what to call this sort of music but there are elements of jazz, rock and even funk, all with a psychedelic undertone. You can imagine it appearing on the soundtrack to a film set in the swinging sixties.

The guy who used to own a pager now owns a boat. Prior to lockdown we saw Das Boot on it and the other day we watched Jaws. After watching Jaws we put on music. The guy who used to own a pager was under the impression that he introduced me to Joao Donato around the period we were listening to the Blue Brazil series (Blue Note in a Latin Groove). That was approximately 20 years ago so it’s possible he did, although of the two of us I have the stronger memory. I don’t recall having heard 'A Ra' so it can go on this compilation.

In between watching films documenting obscure indie-pop and hanging out on boats, I’ve been reading the Beastie Boys Book, its hard-backed 570 pages having remained undisturbed on my shelf since December 2018. The parts that reference the trio’s final record, Hot Sauce Committee Part Two, made me realise how little I’ve listened to it, which is something else I’ve put right. The album's concept was to use invented samples that were subsequently credited to fictional songs by imagined artistes. 'Nonstop Disco Powerpack' is the exception, which is a shame because it’s the best track on the album.

It was my birthday the other week so I’ve got the Sleaford Mods’ compilation All That Glue to listen to, personally delivered by one of the chaps from Eel Pie Records. I’m familiar with about half the double-album's content. I know and like 'Fizzy', and contemplate including it on this compendium, but decide that the novelty of either 'Snake It' or 'McFlurry' would be more appropriate, and opt for the latter.
 

Das Boot

Pubs have been permitted to re-open as of the 4th of July. Some will but others won’t, perhaps because they’ve not been given enough notice to sufficiently prepare, or maybe because they want to see if it’s worth the hassle. Many people are against it. Others – myself included – are enjoying drinking in parks, on greens, in gardens, and feel ambivalent. Moreover, this latest liberty comes with terms and conditions: table service, no standing, strict social distancing and prodigious amounts of hand sanitizer.

A few weeks before lockdown, Mr Wilkinson and I were climbing at Urban Ascent near Parsons Green when a song played we both recognised but couldn't name. It came to me later: 'Dry the Rain' by The Beta Band. Smashing tune and the way it starts off allows it to follow on from Sleaford Mods quite freely.

'French Press' by Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever sounds like Shaun Ryder singing over War on Drugs if Shaun Ryder could actually sing a bit. They’re an Australian 5-piece incorporating three guitarists, not counting bass, and 'French Press' is the title track of an EP they issued in 2017. I discovered them at the beginning of April by way of another track of theirs called 'Cars in Space'. I preferred 'French Press' and decided early on that I wanted this tune to appear further down the running order, due to its uplifting nature (musically at least; the lyrics concern estranged siblings).

Since the release of their debut LP a little more than a year ago, Fontaines D.C. have told us they’ve been kicking back to the sounds of the Beach Boys. You wouldn’t know it from the single 'Televised Mind', nor from the two singles that preceded it. 'Televised Mind' is a ridiculously simple ditty, but I kept hearing it on the radio throughout the summer and was slowly won over by its sheer doggedness.

I happened upon 'In Dreams' by Peggy Sue listening to the radio with my Cornish friend just days before lockdown. Peggy Sue are in fact two ladies from Brighton, and their music sounds a bit like Dolly Mixture as if produced by Phil Spector. As with 'French Press', it occurred to me that this tune would be better placed towards the end of this compilation, marking the point at which I begin to wind things down.

The actor and musician John Henry Westhead – best known for playing 'Olaf the Russian Metalhead' in the art-house comedy film Clerks – lives somewhere around my way. I know this because he’s posted songs relating to Isleworth on YouTube, and there’s footage of his band, The Shed Dwellers, paying tribute to the late David Berman down at the Cross Lances in Hounslow. This is how I came by the song 'Black and Brown Blues' by Berman’s old band, Silver Jews.

Dissatisfied with my Levi’s denim jacket I started looking on eBay for another. I searched specifically for the slimmer fitting 70500, identified one that was 'new with tags', made an offer, was counter offered, paid for it and then sold my 72334 to someone in Aberdeen for the same price – a neat piece of business. For some reason I associate denim jackets with a certain type of indie music, and I ended up mulling over the gaps in my knowledge regarding the group Galaxie 500 and then buying their second album, On Fire. An ostensibly dull turn of events, but it's worth pondering how one seemingly innocuous thing can lead to another. Consider also the possibility that anyone reading this might go about acquiring On Fire and be equally affected by the song 'Plastic Bird' as I am, all because I fussed over my wardrobe while on furlough.

Actually, by the time I received the denim jacket I was back at work. This coincided with the Government postponing a number of lockdown-easing measures scheduled to start at the beginning of August and simultaneously introducing this thing called Eat Out to Help Out. I didn’t think anything of it back then, but as the rate of infection slowly began to rise, and quarantine measures were introduced for people returning from selected foreign territories, the absurdity of the scheme became retrospectively apparent.

Apropos of nothing, I decided to put on a CD my partner gave to me some years ago: These Boots Are Made For Walkin' - The Complete MGM Recordings by Lee Hazlewood. The songs therein predate Hazlewood’s partnership with Nancy Sinatra but include some that were later re-recorded with her. 'Sand' is one such tune, appearing first on 1966’s The Very Special World of Lee Hazlewood, featuring the vocal of Suzi Jane Hokum, and in 1968 on Nancy & Lee. The collaboration with Nancy Sinatra edges it, not so much because of her intonation but more the song’s bizarre arrangement and orchestration. Producer and guitarist Billy Strange was responsible for this, and I assume it's his deranged guitar playing backwards during the instrumental breakout.

In August I resolved to sell my copy of The Original Modern Lovers and replace it with The Modern Lovers, the version released in 1976 five years prior to the so-called original. It’s generally accepted that the ’76 iteration is the definitive article, and I wouldn’t disagree with that. 'Someone I Care About', 'Pablo Picasso' and 'Old World' are all missing from the Kim Fowley produced record, although he does give us 'I Wanna Sleep in Your Arms', but it’s John Cale’s superior production that makes the real difference.

Frederick 'Toots' Hibbert passed away on 11 September 2020, the same day as stage 13 of what turned out to be an enthralling edition of the Tour de France. At some point in the stage Stefan Kung, wearing number 54, was out front, which got ITV presenter Gary Imlach thinking: if Kung finished first and Dries Devenyns, sporting number 46, came in second, it would present the perfect opportunity to play out with '54-46 Was My Number'. In the event, Daniel Martinez won the stage and so 'Broadway Jungle' was used instead – or 'Dog War' as it was originally known when The Maytals cut the tune in 1964. Unbeknown to them, the track was leased to Island Records who retitled it 'Broadway Jungle', credited it to The Flames and put it out in the UK. The new name stuck but has been re-attributed to (Toots &) The Maytals whenever it's appeared on any ska and reggae anthology.
 

The summer ended abruptly: temperatures pushing 30 degrees one weekend, scraping 15 the next. Nights drawing in, falling leaves, jumpers on. If that wasn't bad enough the Government imposed a ten o'clock curfew on all pubs and restaurants and made it a requirement that customers wear masks until they sat down at their table. Such measures made little sense. If public houses were that dangerous then they shouldn't have been open at all, and the curfew merely encouraged people to head out an hour or so earlier. What's more, because pub owners were overly mindful of the new arrangements, everybody was forced to leave at exactly the same moment, whereupon they loitered in streets and maybe accepted an invitation to continue drinking back at someone's house – the night was young, after all.

On the 24th of September – the date these restrictions came into effect – I tried to have a drink with my partner in the pub over the road. Twenty minutes after our arrival we were still trying, and so departed. As we waited, 'Glue' by Bicep came on. My Cornish friend introduced me to this tune in early March and it took a while to decide how much I really liked it. I understood that this was dance music, but was it too repetitive? In the end it grew on me, and there’s a wistful quality to it that felt pertinent to the situation.

And I was going to leave it at that, but I like odd numbers and fancied more Galaxie 500 – undoubtedly the discovery of the year. A lot of this has to do with the rhythm section: Damon Krukowski’s irregular drum patterns and Naomi Yang’s counter-melodies on bass. I’ve heard On Fire described as an ‘ambient’ rock record, and it’s not a bad way of putting it – certainly more indicative than terms like slowcore or dreampop. 'Leave the Planet' is mellower than 'Plastic Bird', and shorter too, which is a good note to end on before we're all locked down again.

[Listen to here.]

LINER NOTES: HOUNSLOW TO BRENTFORD, PART 1 [1997-98]

1.     Me and the Black and White Dream – The Orchids

2.     The Stars of Track and Field – Belle and Sebastian

3.     On the Way – The Pastels

4.     Miss Modular – Stereolab

5.     Spanish Harlem – Aretha Franklin

6.     Thin Line Between Love and Hate – The Persuaders

7.     Down Down Down – The Chiffons

8.     Give Away None of My Love – Otis Redding

9.     Slipped, Tripped and Fell in Love – Clarence Carter

10.   Funky Nassau Part 1 – The Beginning of the End

11.   I Want You – Bob Dylan

12.   See Emily Play – Pink Floyd

13.   Coz I Luv You – Slade

14.   There, There, My Dear – Dexys Midnight Runners

15.   A Wave Crashed on Rocks – Felt

16.   Songs for Children – Belle and Sebastian

17.   A Living Ken and Barbie – The Orchids
18.   Sensitive – The Field Mice
19.   Over – Portishead

20.   Sexy Boy – Air

21.   Revolution 909 – Daft Punk

22.   Body Movin’ (Album Version) – Beastie Boys

11 Penderel Road, Hounslow, my fifth residence in as many years, not too dissimilar in size, shape and general state to 23 Carrington Avenue, an untidy and slightly squalid abode. After a fruitless search for a two-bedroom flat, my Cornish friend and I have moved in with two undomesticated first-year students. It’s a regression of sorts, and I will spend too much of my time playing Super Mario Kart on the SNES (Super Nintendo Entertainment System) with our new acquaintances. Glenryck Pilchards in Tomato Sauce replaces Heinz Baked Beans with Pork Sausages as my go-to brunch, which is no bad thing.

The nearest pub is The Warren on Hanworth Road (now a Tesco Express), which is a bit grim. It’s worth making the longer walk to the Pickled Newt on Staines Road (also deceased) if only because they have a free jukebox stacked with half-decent tunes. The Chariot has closed but will re-open as Shannon’s, which as the name suggests will be an ‘Irish’ pub. The Noble Half is also suffering a period of transition. To compensate, and buoyed by our younger housemates’ enthusiasm, we drink more often in Isleworth (The Town Wharf), Twickenham (The Cabbage Patch, The George), and Richmond (The Prince's Head, The Bull & Bush).

Although I am still in touch with both the guy with the indie tapes and the chap who introduced me to Sarah Records, actual contact is sporadic. We don’t possess email addresses and nor do we own mobile phones: they exist but are perceived as an extravagance, a luxury item. I know someone who owns a pager, but for most of us the landline is our only means of communication. (Pager guy will actually prove to be a positive source of musical inspiration – but not yet.)

The tapes did not survive the migration to MiniDisc. Did they ever exist? I certainly recall listening to Stereolab within the context of a broader compilation – on the train down to Plymouth precisely – but my memory of what else was on that cassette is patchy.

Contemporary music was in a bad state. The Britpop scene had given way to a whole host of average-at-best guitar bands, including, but not limited to: Mansun, Marion, Placebo, Texas, Kula Shaker, Embrace, Hurricane #1, Heavy Stereo, Catatonia, Dodgy, 60 Ft. Dolls, Space, Symposium, The Seahorses, Theaudience, and many of the bands that featured at some time or another on Chris Evans’s despicable vanity project TFI Friday. Groups like the Stereophonics and Travis were the next big thing. All The Verve’s latest singles incorporated strings. The kids were going mad for the novelty dance act that was Fatboy Slim. OK Computer was being held up as a work of genius. Tony Blair had recently taken office.

Stereolab’s Dots and Loops and Illumination by The Pastels – both released in September 1997 – offered succour. So did Belle and Sebastian’s If You’re Feeling Sinister, released in November 1996, which the guy with the indie tapes recommended to me. Dots and Loops was Stereolab’s most successful album to date, both commercially (sitting at no. 19 in the album charts for a whole week!) and critically. As is the story of their life, The Pastels’ album passed by almost unnoticed. Yet Belle and Sebastian had managed a breakthrough of sorts. The sports student I was now living with was strangely taken with them, perhaps on account of their song 'The Stars of Track and Field', which concerned itself with the physical prowess of athletes. In July and October of the same year, Belle and Sebastian released two EPs: Lazy Line Painter Jane and 3.. 6.. 9 Seconds of Light. I acquired both, the latter being the source of the unlisted 'Songs for Children'.

I’d been contemplating soul music and 1960s girl groups: Otis Redding, The Ronettes, The Shangri-Las, stuff like that. My lady friend picked up on this and for Christmas presented me with That’s Soul Volume 2 – an Atlantic Soul compilation – and Sweet Talkin’ Guy by The Chiffons. I played these records a lot, and whatever tape I put together back then would be bound to reflect this. Tracks 5 through to 10 are the most likely to have appeared on such a compilation.

Star of Track & Field

On leaving Penderel Road I entered what I refer to as my nomadic phase. I spent much of this period at my lady friend’s house in Isle of Dogs. Besides that, I stayed for a week with my parents in Plymouth, slept on the couch from time to time at Bulstrode Avenue, and spent nights here and there at the new house of the Cornish friend who stacked it in Debenhams and guy who liked The Stars of Track and Field, which they shared with the fellow who owned the SNES. I also visited the former cohabitant from Brighton, who had moved back there after a rough time of it in Tottenham. It was here that I made an association with the Bob Dylan tune 'I Want You', either by way of the album Blonde on Blonde or a greatest hits compendium.

At some juncture I purchased a tatty copy of Relics by Pink Floyd, but I couldn’t swear when it was. It could have been before, during, or shortly after my residence at Penderel Road, but it was no earlier than 1997 and no later than 1999. I’m not much of a Pink Floyd fan but I am of Syd Barrett, and 'See Emily Play' and 'Arnold Layne' were missing from my collection.

I’m not a fan of Slade either but there’s something quite rousing about 'Coz I Luv You'. Oasis’s cover of 'Cum on Feel the Noize' a few years earlier had made it perfectly acceptable to like Slade, despite their preposterous appearance. Judging by the age of the clientele who drank in The Pickled Newt, this would have had no bearing on its inclusion on their jukebox. Actually, in 1971, before 'Coz I Luv You' was released, Slade looked vaguely presentable and were still relatively unknown. The tune went straight to number 1 and a lucrative career in glam rock beckoned.

It was the guy who introduced me to Sarah Records who introduced me to Dexys Midnight Runners. I’d heard of them, of course, but it hadn’t occurred to me that they were worth listening to – too many bad memories of 'Come On Eileen' being played down Ritzy’s nightclub. I think it was the album Too-Rye-Ay he initially pushed my way – he’d rant on about this amazing tune called 'Plan B'. I preferred 'Let’s Make this Precious', but he was right about Dexys being something special. Ultimately, it was their first album, Searching for the Young Soul Rebels, I listened to more, so in reconstructing the past I’ve opted for 'There, There, My Dear'.

Belle and Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch has expressed publicly an admiration for the band Felt. If asked, I would expect he would say similarly nice things about Sarah Records’ bands The Orchids and The Field Mice. I bought two of The Orchids’ albums – Unholy Soul and Striving for the Lazy Perfection – second-hand, on vinyl, in relatively quick succession. It’s possible that I actually purchased Unholy Soul when I lived on Bulstrode Avenue. What’s more, indie tapes guy had it on cassette and we used to listen to it at Hanworth Road. As such, it is 'Striving for the Lazy Perfection' that aligns itself in my mind with Penderel Road, the song 'A Living Ken and Barbie' in particular. The Field Mice, meanwhile, released a career retrospective entitled Where'd You Learn to Kiss That Way? which is the opening line from 'So Said Kay'. I knew of 'Sensitive' from a Sarah Records mixtape the guy who introduced me to Sarah Records made for me and subsequently borrowed back, to never return. I knew a fair few of The Field Mice's songs by now, but it was handy having the bulk of them collected together on two CDs.

Regarding Felt, the chap who introduced me to Sarah Records loaned me the compilation Bubblegum Perfume and the LP The Pictorial Jackson Review. Over time, these records have merged in my mind and it took a lot of digging around to establish the name of the tune I wanted to include on this compendium. All I had in to go on was a rough memory of the line, 'I'm not your Jesus, so will you get off my cross.' It was enough, but very few Felt albums are available commercially and are rare and expensive bought secondhand, so I had to download 'A Wave Crashed on Rocks' off the internet.

I can't remember listening to Portishead's second album while living on Penderel Road, but I have a copy so I must have done. (It was a Christmas present, I know that much.) The last three tracks, however, are all evocative of the house my lady friend shared on the Isle of Dogs with a girl with whom she used to go to school. Daft Punk even reminds me of helping to paint their living room, which is appropriate because the album in question is called Homework. I had to rely on my lady friend for all of this – these were some of my poorest times – and I think she also paid for me to watch the Beastie Boys play at the Brixton Academy in June 1998, accompanied by our friend No Eyes, which is something that would have bowled over my 13 year old self.

[Listen to here.]

LINER NOTES: CARRINGTON CLASSICS [1994-95]

1.     Cherub Rock – Smashing Pumpkins

2.     Brassneck – The Wedding Present

3.     She’s So High – Blur

4.     That’s Entertainment – The Jam

5.     Inbetweener – Sleeper

6.     Lipgloss – Pulp

7.     Brenda – The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion

8.     Itchycoo Park – Small Faces

9.     Jumpin’ Jack Flash – The Rolling Stones

10.   Cucaraca Macara – Harvey Averne Barrio Band
11.   Teenage Kicks – Undertones

12.   Deny – The Clash

13.   A Morning Odyssey – The Sea Urchins
14.   Try – Razorcuts
15.   Maybe the People Would be the Times or Between Clark and Hilldale – Love

16.   Sweet Jane – The Velvet Underground

17.   She’s so Loose – Supergrass
18.   Sour Times – Portishead

19.   Science Friction – Orbital

20.   Sing – Blur

21.   I Don’t Know – Teenage Fanclub
22.   Starlust – Lush

23.   Stop Me if You Think You’ve Heard This One Before – The Smiths
24.   You Should All be Murdered – Another Sunny Day
25.   Sunflower – The Springfields

26.   Sure to See – 14 Iced Bears

27.   So Said Kay – The Field Mice
28.   Sabotage – Beastie Boys

The Treaty Centre presides over Hounslow like a red-bricked monolith – only the modernist Holy Trinity Church can compete. The Chariot, The Noble Half and the South Western are our pubs of choice, although if we’ve just missed the H37 we’ll stop off for a swift bourbon & coke (easy on the coke) in the Duke of Cambridge on Kingsley Road while we wait for another. The high street has recently been, and only partially, pedestrianised. In spite of this, people continuously get in your way, careering out of Boots without due care or attention. Maybe that’s why we seem to spend so much time in The Noble Half, The Chariot and the South Western.

       The Chariot is what’s been termed a flat-roofed pub. It is not necessarily a description to be taken literally. The appellation is supposed to convey the building’s age, interior decor and its clientele (post-war, brightly lit, hard drinking). The Chariot does have a flat roof but only if you take into consideration the office space between. Like the Treaty Centre, it has a red-bricked facade. Inside, there are fake plants, faux Roman busts, large mirrors, paintings of Piccadilly Circus on rain sodden nights and an actual red telephone box. The people it attracts are a strange mix: students, leather clad rockers and an assortment of downtrodden locals. The jukebox contains Hot Rocks 1964-1971 by The Rolling Stones. Despite the lighting being a bit on the bright side, it is a wonderful place to drink.

         The Noble Half is also flat roofed but it is smaller and darker. Tuesday night is student night, and the many students who reside locally, in shabby semi-detached domiciles with archaic furnishings and neglected gardens, will turn up and take full advantage of the cheap booze. People we know have organised the event and called it Lyfe. I don’t know why they chose this name or elected to spell it that way.

The South Western on Whitton Road is a more traditional drinking establishment. Prodigious fenestrations flanked by faded velvet drapery, the carpet is well worn. Students don’t tend to rent around these parts and it pays to be a little more discreet. We mainly go there to play pool and put money in the jukebox: more Rolling Stones (Jagger warming up in the wings), and the Small Faces too.

Carrington Avenue is a road in a residential area of Hounslow rife with avenues (Argyle, Park, Murray, Grasmere). It lies south of the train line that runs diagonally through Hounslow’s south-eastern corner, as close to Whitton high street than to Hounslow town centre. The feeling is of being on the periphery of something, separate from it.

 

The South Western

I was supposed to be moving in with a fellow from Cornwall, the lad who lent me The Sound of the Suburbs and the guy with the indie tapes. I’m not really sure how it happened but the guy with tapes backed out after the rest of us found a house and offered him the smallest room. We advertised for someone to fill the void and ended up taking in a first-year student from Brighton, who was our age but had taken a year out to make movies.

The house itself was a bit of a dive, very typical of student accommodation in the Hounslow area: a semi-detached three-bedroom dwelling with an interior that looked like it hadn’t been re-decorated since the 1970s, and maybe hadn't. We had to move the dining room table to the lounge to free up the dining room to be used as a fourth bedroom, which was taken by our Cornish friend. I took upstairs-front, ‘Sound of the Suburbs’ took upstairs-back and the bloke from Brighton the box room adjacent to that. The rent on the whole house was about £700 a month.

Britpop was now recognised as a distinct movement, but the residents of 23 Carrington Avenue perceived it only as a vaguely entertaining sideshow. I’d sooner listen to Smashing Pumpkins or The Wedding Present than the likes of Cast or Shed 7. Actually, I wasn't sure about Smashing Pumpkins but could get on with Siamese Dream, which one of my Plymouth friends played for me while visiting him in Portsmouth. The jukebox down the student union had 'Brassneck' by The Wedding Present on it, and I then borrowed the album Bizarro from a Scottish bloke who resembled the ‘control freak’ from an advert for the Volvo 850 T-5. The Wedding Present’s guitars are fast, repetitive, and David Gedge’s vocal style is droll, almost deadpan. Both these bands could be described as voluminous, in that guitars – loud guitars – are integral to their sound. Britpop tends not to paint broadly with guitars. Oasis are the exception, and in this respect maybe they’re not really a Britpop band at all. If there is a signature Britpop sound – and you’ll struggle to identify one – then it’s the stabbing, staccato guitars of punk and new wave.

This not to say we were completely disinterested in what was going on. When a chap I’d got to know towards the end of my first year (who would later introduce me to Sarah Records) informed us that he was going to see Blur at Alexandra Palace, the residents of Carrington Avenue expressed interest. The chap who later introduced me to Sarah Records went on ahead with his associate from Ealing, while the rest of us – save our Cornish friend, who wasn’t up for it – went about the business of trying to find tickets. With a limited budget our situation initially looked precarious, but we were given hope after a tout said to us, 'don't go home just yet.' We found a pub, played some pool, put on The Jam to get us in the mood, returned about an hour later and managed to buy three tickets at pretty much face value. We missed Corduroy and Supergrass but did arrive in time to see Pulp. For any Blur fans out there, here’s the set-list:

Lot 105 / Sunday Sunday / Jubilee / Tracy Jacks / Magic America / End of A Century / Popscene / Trouble in the Message Centre / She's So High / For Tomorrow / Chemical World / Badhead / There's No Other Way / To The End / Advert – 1st Encore: Supa Shoppa / Mr. Robinson's Quango / Parklife (with Phil Daniels) – 2nd Encore: Girls & Boys / Bank Holiday / This Is a Low.

We were especially pleased when they played 'She’s So High', which was a ‘can night' favourite. Can nights started off as a precursor to Friday evenings at the student union but might often happen before a Saturday night at The Chariot, or just randomly in the middle of the week. As the name suggests, they involved buying four cans of cheap lager or bitter – in my case Castlemaine XXXX – and then sitting around in someone’s room – usually mine – and listening to records, often at great volume.

Can’t remember who picked up a copy of The Jam greatest hits compilation Snap! but I recall taping what of it I could onto the B-side of my Rolling Stones compendium. I think the Stones material had been recorded off of Shaky Tim, a music student who had been my neighbour in our halls of residence and was now living with the girl who was a massive Blondie fan (not in the biblical sense). The girl who was a massive Blondie fan was also into Manic Street Preachers, Senseless Things, Jane's Addiction, Porno for Pyros, and she had recently discovered Green Day. None of this appealed to me, shedding some light on our increasingly rocky relationship.

According to lead singer Louise Wener’s T-shirt, Sleeper were just ‘another female fronted band’. She had a point – there was Elastica, Salad, Echobelly, and more on the way – but if Wener was trying to utilise irony to suggest Sleeper offered anything different she was wide of the mark. 'Inbetweener' is a jolly enough single though, as is the lesser known B-side, 'Little Annie'.

Pulp's His ‘n’ Hers had been out since April '94 but I’d invested more time listening to Intro – The Gift Recordings, released the previous October. I eventually bonded with His ‘n’ Hers on a National Express coach back to London at the start of a new term, disembarking at Heathrow Airport whereupon I got on the tube to Hounslow Central for a pint(s) in the Bulstrode with the chap who was to introduce me to Sarah Records. His 'n' Hers is probably the best record of the Britpop era. Take your pick: 'Joyriders', 'Lipgloss', 'Have You Seen Her Lately?', 'Pink Glove', 'David's Last Summer'. These songs invoke the spirit of Britpop in the way others seldom did. They spoke of people and situations that were relatable, if only from a distance. As opposed to Blur, whose lyrics were informed by the novels of Martin Amis and the city of London. Or Oasis, who didn't really sing about anything at all.

The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion are chaotic, exultant – punk meets blues. I taped the album Orange off of the guy with the indie tapes. I liked it so much I later bought it on vinyl. The record did well. Despite Britpop, there was still an interest in things like this, in Beck or Pavement or Sonic Youth, even if it wasn’t what was getting the mainstream airplay.

Britpop's sense of fashion was confused, a diffuse spread of influences ranging from '60s mod to '70s punk to '80s casual, consisting of desert boots, Ben Sherman button-down shirts, roll neck sweaters, Chelsea boots, anything by Fred Perry, Harrington jackets, anoraks, wide collared shirts in man-made fabrics, flares, corduroy trousers, Adidas tracksuit tops, old-school trainers, blazers, even ties (especially if you were in Blur). It should be appreciated that wearing this sort of gear bid trouble. Having your hair layered, over the ears but not as far as your collar, invited derision. People would laugh openly at your flared jeans. You were neither a 'townie' nor a 'metaller' or a 'raver' and therefore an object of suspicion. We didn't let it bother us, and tunes like 'Itchycoo Park' and 'Lazy Sunday' by the Small Faces and 'Jumpin’ Jack Flash' and 'Wild Horses' by The Rolling Stones provided a backdrop to games of pool in the back room of The South Western in amongst the locals.

The influence of punk and new wave, although slightly diminished since that new wave of new wave thing had been supplanted by Britpop, persisted. As well as The Jam, groups like The Clash and The Undertones would find their way onto any respectable indie DJ’s set list. 'Teenage Kicks' was ready to go courtesy of The Sound of the Suburbs and I found The Clash’s first album in a charity shop in Plymouth, probably while shopping for second-hand Fred Perry polo shirts and Adidas tracksuit tops.

The chap who introduced me to Sarah Records came around with a stack of records he thought I might like: Storyteller by Razorcuts, Stardust by The Sea Urchins, Loaded by the Velvet Underground, Forever Changes by Love, Singles Going Steady by Buzzcocks, a couple of Field Mice albums and EPs, and a few Sarah Records compilations. The Sarah Records’ records made a firm impression. Formed in Bristol in 1987, the record label was resolutely anti-fashion, anti-London music scene and anti-lad rock, which is what Britpop was mutating into. This political sensibility was married to a very British sort of aesthetic. But if Britpop fixated on, say, Get Carter, Blow-Up and Quadrophenia as its cinematic archetypes then Sarah Records channelled more the spirit of Kes or Billy Liar, as well as French New Wave.

The Sarah Records’ band I really took to was probably the band least representative of that particular scene: The Sea Urchins. In Sam Knee’s excellent indie-fashion retrospective A Scene In Between he describes The Sea Urchins as veering off 'in a more militant pop-art mod fashion direction'. Think Jeff Beck in the Yardbirds.

The Razorcuts could have very easily been a Sarah Records act but were instead signed to Creation. I put their album Storyteller onto the other side of the cassette I recorded The Sea Urchins’ Stardust, a tape I would often listen to on the two mile walk into college, along Whitton Dene and past Twickenham Ruby Stadium.

If 23 Carrington Avenue had a specific soundtrack then it would be Love’s third album, 1967's Forever Changes. I’d never heard of it before but was quickly won over by its string arrangements, Tijuana horns and Flamenco guitar. The chap who introduced us to it – who would often join us for can nights – was quite taken aback by our enthusiasm and returned to his record collection to bring us Da Capo, Love's earlier work, which was almost as well received.

Loaded was Velvet Underground’s last proper LP (Squeeze was a contractual obligation written and recorded by Doug Yule featuring none of the original group members). Having wasted the opportunity to get to know the band during my first year, I wasn’t well versed in Velvet Underground mythology and so took the record at face value. It's probably the band's most accessible work, and the reason why the chap who introduced me to Sarah Records had hold of it. The idea of him grooving away to the noise-rock of something like 'Sister Ray' or 'Venus in Furs' is barely conceivable.

I wonder if I’d seen Supergrass supporting Pulp supporting Blur at Alexandra Palace I would have liked them more. I didn’t have anything against Supergrass per se, but their whole shtick seemed a little silly. Almost 20, maybe I was too old for it. Nevertheless, 'She’s So Loose' is a very good tune, and so lip service is paid.

Orbital and Portishead were a portent of things to come, the acceptability – nay, the expectancy – of absorbing genres that beforehand had been perceived as tribally distinct. I came across Dummy by Portishead on the same trip to Portsmouth that had me re-evaluating the Smashing Pumpkins. The hype surrounding the record had yet to transpire, and I didn’t see it coming, but I ended up copying the copy I took back with me to London for a number of friends. The Orbital album was recorded off of my brother in the summer before I left for university but proved less popular among my inner circle. Such eclecticism reflected the limitations of Britpop. I even took to playing some of my old Acid Jazz records, much to the delight of our cohabitant from Brighton who fell for 'Cucaraca Macara' by the Harvey Averne Barrio Band in a big way.

Which leads to the missing pieces of this aural jigsaw: techno, acid and trance. This sort of music came ready-mixed, be it via the DJ Tsuyoshi cassette somebody copied for me or the tape exploring similar themes compiled by my brother, who was bang into this sort of stuff. It couldn’t very well be assimilated into my other, more identifiable, auditory explorations and so stood alone, to be listened to on my Walkman. This, along with hard house, was the music that would play at any student house party worth its salt. The idea of a load of kids jumping around in someone’s living room to an Oasis record appals me. Fortunately such abominations never came to pass. Carrington’s classics were confined to my bedroom mostly, or my headphones, or around the house of the guy who continued to amass tapes.

By the time we moved out there were eleven empty bottles of High Commissioner whiskey lined up on the mantelpiece and we owed a couple of months’ rent – taking into account the deposits we’d already surrendered in lieu. A few days after the May Ball my Cornish friend passed out in Debenhams and was taken to hospital concussed, requiring stitches. The cohabitant from Brighton had abandoned university altogether and I'd lost too much weight through not eating enough.

It had been a strange and tumultuous year. The summer would usher in the farce that was Blur vs. Oasis. It is amazing how quickly Britpop revealed itself for the asinine nonsense that for the most part comprised it, and so I got back into the Beastie Boys and continued to harvest my brother’s record collection for sonic alternatives.

[Listen to here.]