BEST OF 2012: Another Twenty

The process of putting together the end of year list is long and drawn out. Albums move up and down a large document until the final thirty reveal themselves. But what of the late bloomers, forgotten charmers or even albums released in December? Well, they miss out. Simple as that and, as I said back at the start of the month, a year from now I’ll be looking back and wanting to move a few around. In an attempt to stave off some of that geek disillusionment, here are another twenty albums which for one reason or another were not in that main list to help you while away the hours betwixt Christmas and New Year. Enjoy!

Andy Burrows – Company

If albums could make the main list on one song, this would have. ‘Maybe You’ is one of the most beautiful things I’ve heard all year.

Calexico – Algiers

Meatier, smoother and no less melodic. Calexico in fighting form.

Chromatics – Kill For Love

Shimmering Eighties-inflected Italian disco for the ‘Drive’ soundtrack fan in your life.

Colorama – Good Music

Welsh guitar pop which starts slinky and gradually unfurls into an array of gorgeous melodies

Dark Dark Dark – Who Needs Who

Following up ‘Wild Go’, this continues the sparse, piano-led arrangements circling Nona Marie Invie’s naggingly familiar voice.

Ellen And The Escapades – All The Crooked Scenes

Has to be heard for Ellen’s voice. Country tinged indie rock. Beautiful.

Father John Misty – Fear Fun

So close to the original list, a Bella Union delight. J Tillman’s new moniker with fleshed out sounds but the same devastating voice.

Bill Fay – Life Is People

Even closer to the original list. I may have done Mr Fay a disservice. A folk legend based on two albums from forty years ago, this is him now. Luscious production, a lived-in voice and a little help from his friends. Wonderful stuff.

Grizzly Bear – Shields

I really like this lot and the album is perhaps their most measured, crafted outing to date. Still have capacity to surprise and enthrall.

Julia Holter – Ekstasis

Twinkly, squelchy electronica below floaty vocals. A bewitching album.

Jesca Hoop – The House That Jack Built

After the true quirkiness of her earlier releases, this seemed relatively reserved, with some purposeful power pop chops on show. The quieter tracks truly shine however.

La Sera – Sees The Light

Gently jangling, girl group indie pop with a ferocious underbelly. All about the classic melodies.

Lambchop – Mr M

A little like Calexico, some bands reach a point where their majesty is taken for granted. This is a luscious, beautifully recorded record with Kurt Wagner in fine form vocally and lyrically. His best in some time.

Cate Le Bon – Cyrk

A little ragged around edges and blessed with a unique voice, this Seventies rock jangle is endorsed by Gruff Rhys and a very infectious brew.

Moon Duo – Circles

Plain bloody noisy. Buy it on vinyl. Turn it up loud. Leap around the room.

Race Horses – Furniture

Quirky indie pop with hints of Pulp, Dogs Die In Hot Cars and an alternative Morrissey who liked to go to discos. Great fun.

Max Richter – Vivaldi’s Four Seasons Recomposed

I know the original, but this meticulously crafted reworking is right up there with his usual work

Spiritualized – Sweet Heart Sweet Light

The formula went unmessed with and there was much to love. The songwriting was back up to scratch after several middling efforts.

Wild Nothing – Nocturne

Swoonsome indie jangle for fans of Real Estate via the Bella Union stable. Delightful packaging too.

Rachel Zeffira – The Deserters

Released far too late to make the end of year lists, this is a majestic and stirring record. Glacial, orchestral, beautiful.

BEST OF 2011: 22. Sarabeth Tucek – Get Well Soon

An album which has been criminally ignored, this one. Miss the right breeze of softly massaged hype, fail to arrive in the right month or go to the right person for review and truly beautiful records like this can sometimes go almost completely unnoticed. That said, but for my exposure to her debut four years ago, I might not have noticed its many charms. Indeed, I first happened upon the charms of this particular artist when skimming through one of Spillers Records’ weekly mailouts at the end of 2007. Ashli Todd, who now runs the whole shebang, was wildly enthusing about Sarabeth Tucek and I clicked through to listen to a few samples before ordering the CD. Some months later, whilst visiting Britain’s finest city, in feverishly optimistic pursuit of success in the rugby, I popped into Spillers, situated as it still was then on The Hayes, for a quick rummage in the vinyl racks. Happening upon a vinyl copy, I was overcome with a sense I’ve since learnt to not even fight: the need to have a record I love on my favourite format, despite already owning the tunes. As I took it to the counter, Ashli began wildly enthusing about how good it was and I replied that I already knew as I’d bought the CD some months ago. After a slightly odd look, we then rhapsodised about that particular debut for several minutes before I went off to watch the boys in red take a hiding.

‘Get Well Soon’ is a very different record to that debut, documenting the death of Tucek’s father and borne out of a period of lows and self-destructive behaviour which ensured that this was never simply going to be more of the same. It sounds like the kind of album you’d dig out of the crates at a record fair, pick up on the basis of its beautiful sleeve and buy on a whim, only to find you’ve unearthed a lost classic. ‘The Fireman’ is a warm, spacious recording and Tucek’s vocal, which sits atop, delivering lines like “The Fireman saved many a home but the fireman could save his own,” is utterly beautiful. When the plucked guitar line comes in, my day is quantifiably improved. It’s one of those little moments in songs which cause the hairs to go up on your neck and other assorted clichés which describe discernable psychical reactions. Soft and measured seems to be the musical order of the day here but, as anyone who likes a little Cat Power or ‘Sometimes I Wish We Were An Eagle’ knows, when this is executed to perfection, it can be genuinely very affecting.

‘State I Am In’ lilts and chugs with a nod to down-tempo Pretenders and early Nineties American indie. It’s a charming bit of musical self-confidence amongst a great deal of heartache and melodic fragility. In contrast, the faintly unsettling drone-like introduction to ‘Rising’ gradually rumbles its way to an outburst of guitars and the parting shot, “I can’t wait to see you again and I cannot see you again.” That said, gorgeously arranged material, evoking late Sixties, early Seventies singer-songwriters of note, remains the staple fare. If Karen Dalton brightens and emboldens your world, then this album will occupying a similar place in your heart after a number of listens. If the name Karen Dalton means nothing to you, do some research, spend £20 on her two studio albums and thank me later.

‘Get Well Soon’ is an album which definitely benefits from regular plays. While its delights are not in any way hard to find on initial listens, repeated exposure will allow it to slowly curl its way around your emotions and eek out a little place in your heart. It’s the sort of album you’ll tell people about excitedly and buy for the sensitive types in your life. The album’s final lines offer a measured sense of optimism and triumph: “It just takes time, get well soon. I was once just like you, get well soon.” Many great records have been birthed out of traumatic or intense periods of an artist’s life, and to that list of fine albums can be added ‘Get Well Soon’.

Laura Marling – Legendary Status Assured

This was the first time I’ve felt old at a gig. Plenty where I’ve felt young but never previously old. Laura Marling has a lot of young fans. Who like to ‘woooo’ at their favourite songs. Mainly the girls, to be absolutely fair, although there were many ludicrously complex hairstyles from the lads, so as not to let the side down. Pleasant bunch, nonetheless. Just very young. Did I mention that?

Furnishing the assembled throng in Birmingham’s Alexandra Theatre with not one but two high quality support acts was rather generous and the first of these, Boy And Bear, might be best described as a cross between Fleet Foxes and Mumford & Sons with additional ‘wooos’. Which is not to say they’re made up of young, female Laura Marling fans. It’s more to convey their fondness for rather lovely harmonies. Decent stage banter and a splendidly warm sound too, topped off by a bloody wonderful rendition of Bon Iver‘s ‘Flume‘. They did point out that you can get some free music from their Myspace, so it seems only polite to do so

Next up was Alessi’s Ark, and Alessi’s initial, fluttery, kooky utterances make me worry that I might be about to witness a low budget Bjork impression, but she soon gets into her flow. She passes on wisdom learnt from one of Marling’s band too: "Did you know that the supermarket Iceland is run by a company from Iceland?" Such irreverent banter is entirely at odds with her bewitching songs and I look forward to getting to know her better when she releases an album on Bella Union in the second half of the year. Her thoroughly splendid EP, ‘Soul Proprietor‘ is already available and you can sample it on Spotify.

The night, perhaps unsurprisingly, still very much belonged to Laura Marling, however, and her set demonstrated exactly how far she has come since the relatively tentative steps of ‘Alas I Cannot Swim’. The peroxide hair colour now transformed to autumnal browns (something she appeared to have at least partly reversed by the time she appeared on Later) and stage banter something which has been thankfully added to the repertoire, this performance had little in common with the last time I saw her, towards the end of 2008, in a small venue in Nottingham. Equally spellbinding, I’ll concede, but on this evidence, Marling will be a musical force for decades to come because there is something genuinely distinctive about her style, her performance and her music.

The set was heavily weighted in favour of the new album which suited me just fine, only serving to further clarify just how strong the new material is. She’s a captivating presence from the off and when her band melt into the shadows leaving the entire middle section of the show as a solo performance, it’s hard not to sit there slack-jawed in conspicuous awe. Unassuming, pathologically straight-forward and simply magnificent, Marling’s recent surge in popularity is both heartening and just. With a third album on the way before the end of the year, there will surely be another tour. I will consider you something of a fool if you don’t possess yourself of a ticket.

It’s only bloody Record Store Day!

Go get yourself some. Blur review coming soon.

It’s any day I get the chance for me…

Saturday is the second fully blown UK version of Record Store Day and this time around it seems to be considerably more high profile. As much as I still cherish my Rough Trade tape, signed Lucky Soul LP, Graham Coxon 10” and Magnolia Electric Co 7” from last year, the avalanche of splendour on offer from 9am on April 17th is quite something to behold.

I was a little dismayed to see the NME taking a sneery pot-shot at independent record shop staff in amongst their otherwise fairly sizeable mentions of this important day. I refuse to believe that there are that many record shops left full of surly, elitist staff with meticulously crafted enormo-hair. Yes, they still exist and, yes, you may occasionally encounter them, but with the dramatic decline in record shops in the UK, few establishments are so carefree with their clientele. Every bit of footfall, every physical visitor is crucial and those of us who still value the unique service provided by actual record shops can tell of many, many positive experiences in the nation’s musical emporiums. Emporia. Emporiums. Oh, sod it.

I’ve previously written about numerous wonderful record shops that you’d be well advised to visit this Saturday and this seems a convenient time to remind you of those pieces.

Rough Trade East – The Record Store Day hub and a vast pleasuredome, the likes of which were the reason for the invention of credit cards. You will enjoy yourself, you will buy loads and you will spot loads of albums you’ve already bought with frustrating ‘free bonus discs’ available.

Action Records – An online presence to be proud of, but also a marvellous shop in the great tradition of record stores, situated in Preston. Stuff piled everywhere, racks creaking with superb stock and staff who can answer pretty much any question you put to them, They take vinyl seriously and their prices are very competitive.

Rockaboom – There’s no website for this cracking little shop in Leicester. Carl, the one man music dispensing machine, is a laid back chap with a shop full of wonderful music. His increased leaning towards vinyl is helping matters for him, while his CD prices easily match or often outclass local rivals, HMV and Powerplay. He is as obsessed with music as you are and I’ve enjoyed numerous conversations with him about all sorts of records, most recently the illustrious Tindersticks back catalogue and the splendid Galaxie 500 reissues.

Resident – Probably my favourite out of a number of wonderful record shops in Brighton, Resident was mentioned as part of FUTUREMUSIC 09’s exploration of how we purchase music. It uses staff-written labels to recommend records to you, it’s priced competitively, has a good stash of vinyl and genuinely seems to be run by people who likely blow almost all of their wages before they even leave work. It’s one of those shops I wish I lived near enough to that I could visit regularly.

RPM / Reflex – Newcastle, like Edinburgh and Glasgow (more on both soon), is a city that still has a reasonably healthy record shopping climate. Windows, Steel Wheels, Reflex and RPM are all well worth a visit. RPM tickled me most, looking as it does like a truly old-school record shop. Posters everywhere, old plastic racks on the wall, plain price stickers and stock in every available space. The music was not only up nice and loud but also bloody decent. As I said in that original piece, it smells like a proper record shop. Would love to revisit it some time soon.

Spillers – I don’t appear to have ever written a full piece about this most spellbinding of shops in Cardiff and, apparently, the oldest record shop in the world. However you want to describe it, it is a veritable treasure trove, with the available space used to great effect thanks to their notorious ‘photocopied sleeves on a bit of plastic’ display technique. Prices are great, stock is wide and with a great depth – the era of the back catalogue being easily available may have been stabbed by the HMV bosses, but Spillers provides the life-support machine. The vinyl range is far from comprehensive, but suitably quirky and curious and always worth a browse. And, inevitably, about £20. The display of box sets at the counter is an age old tricks, but there’s a something about the way this lot do it that makes it harder to resist than in most shops. Add to all of this their wonderful, wonderful staff and their delightful t-shirts, including one I have from last year which actually marked Record Store Day and you’re on to a winner. I’ve had conversations at the till not just about my purchases, but also a three-way chit-chat about what the person next to me was buying. They are part therapists, part feeders, but they’re bloody good.

Jumbo – Not the cheapest, by any stretch, but you can feel the record shop heritage hit you in the face as you enter the fabulously timeless Jumbo in Leeds. Nearby fellow indie Crash is well worth a visit too, although Jumbo’s size and thus variety of stock makes for a more satisfying browse. The simple window displays using LP sleeves are tantalising and the vinyl selection is pretty bloody substantial. It may not be the cheapest price in the country, but if you want it, there’s a fair chance they’ve got it.

Avalanche – Now, my experience of both Avalanche stores is pretty recent, having been up in Scotland only last week. I have to say, I’m a Glasgow shop man, myself, but they’re both decent places to buy your music. I got the impression that the Glasgow shop is thriving rather more and a little more on top of the new releases. While there wasn’t masses of vinyl, what they had was very good. Very knowledgeable staff, with whom I discussed Record Store Day and, in particular, the special Blur release. Regular readers will remember how I used to always budget an extra £10 when I went to the now deceased Reveal Records of Derby because I knew I’d end up buying whatever was playing in store. And so, in Glasgow, I ended up adding King Creosote’s ‘Rocket D.I.Y.’ to my bundle of purchases as a result of thoroughly enjoying it whilst browsing.

Monorail – Another Glasgow based palace of delights, this one. Situated in the Mono cafe, Monorail is the most esoteric shop on this list and the one least likely to be able to furnish you with the indie chart smash you’re trying to track down. No bad thing. The enormous quantity of vinyl available provides a dangerous thrill and the staff are friendly, knowledgeable and, as with a few examples I’ve already mentioned, clearly as obsessed with it all as much as their customers. Whether it’s Mazzy Star vinyl reissues you’re after, vintage Four Tet 12”s or the vinyl box set of Tom Waits’ ‘Orphans’, they’re all there waiting for you, along with piles and piles of other great stuff. The really noteworthy point is how decent their prices are – clearly, there’s a market for a shop dealing only in the more cult side of alternative music, and it’s a market that’s sufficiently successful that the customers don’t need to pay a little extra to keep it afloat. Works for me.

Obviously, there are bloody loads of brilliant independent record shops that I’ve missed off this list. Please, feel free to comment and post about your favourites. The more positive comment about physical record shops, the better. Few music fans have not had a positive experience of one kind or another, and it’s a great shame to think that there might be future generations coming through soon for whom the whole concept of record shopping may mean nothing. All of the shops participating in Saturday’s festivities can be found by clicking here whilst a reasonably comprehensive list of the special releases for the day can be found here. Just loading that list of shops to get the link has reminded me of wonderful places like Diverse in Newport, Badlands in Cheltenham, Polar Bear in Birmingham and Head in Leamington Spa. While we don’t have many independent record shops left now, so many of the survivors are truly great. Please, give them your custom on Saturday and mark Record Story Day with your fellow music obsessives.

 

Just make sure I get a Blur single, ok?

***

(For general musings and updates on RSD and new releases as and when I feel inclined, why not follow Just Played on twitter by clicking here or on the massive logo below?)

Can a serious font succeed?

After declining sales and declining standards with Conor McNicholas at the helm, the NME has undergone a major facelift and an editorial repositioning under the direction of Krissi Murison. The new editor of one of the music world’s legendary publications certainly talks the talk, as evidenced by a great interview in Monday’s Guardian, but can the redesigned magazine walk the walk?

It’s certainly a striking new look, whichever of the ten covers you happen to end up with, even if Laura Marling‘s drooping fag isn’t the greatest stylistic decision I’ve ever seen. Most of the ten are worthy cover stars (Kasabian can piss off though) even if I’d have been a little more impressed if someone like Marling had got the cover in a normal week. Everywhere I went today, there were plenty of Florence, Jack White and Kasabian covers but less of the others. To continue to use Marling as our example, I saw one copy across a massive city. Still, I’m being picky.

The new main font is best described as ‘serious’ and, whisper it, it does bring back a few memories of the ill-advised and short-lived Q redesign from eighteen months ago. In Monday’s Guardian piece, Murison talked of focus groups wanting the NME to be "heavyweight." I can’t help wondering if that, rather simplistically, played into the font choice. That said, I think it looks rather nice, if not especially urgent. Pages seem simultaneously airy and ‘busy’, deliberate space contrasting with little fact sections and overspilling reviews. The idea seems splendid, even if the initial execution is a little cluttered. The format for the ten features for the ‘State of Music Today‘ piece is excellent: simple, clear and easy to read. It looks authoritative, informative and, unusually for the NME, like it’s designed with a slightly older reader in mind.

Praise be for the continued presence of the muso-baiting Peter Robinson and the reintroduction of a singles review. The redesigned news section is perfectly satisfactory, although the notion of a big piece on the big story, entitled ‘The Main Event’, is spoiled by it being yet another puff piece about The Libertines. Album reviews are now considerably less garish, though little else appears to have changed. ‘On The Road with…’ looks promising, a little like the main live review in Q where the journo has spent time with the act prior to the gig in question. All jolly entertaining stuff.

However, while much of the effort seems to have been concerned with making NME a publication to take seriously, the letters page is a bit like Jonathan Ross‘ appearance at the Brits. For a start, it is trying far too bloody hard to be cool and, secondly, it might think it looks good, but it appears to have got dressed in the dark. We just want largely inane missives being ripped apart and mocked by a rotating collection of NME staffers. Putting ‘From’ and ‘To’ before each letter AND reply, is just rampant twattery. Oh, and just call it ‘Letters’ again, please. Sadly, nothing from Kinross in this week’s mailbag.

‘We Want Answers’ is now ‘Speed Dial’, which is a marginal improvement in name despite there being no discernable change in content. The usual ‘music that matters to me’ page is now called ‘Pieces Of Me’, while the ‘Talking Heads’ bit is basically the old section they got rid of that used to have a regular column by Mark Beaumont in it. Only without Mark Beaumont in it, sadly. But with Kate Nash guest writing this week, even more sadly. ‘What Rock’n'Roll Has Taught Me’ has been binned in favour of entertaining quiz feature, ‘Does Rock’n'Roll Kill Brain Cells?‘ Johnny Marr is a fine first contestant and this does have the potential to dig up some cracking anecdotes from music royalty.

In conclusion, it looks largely lovely and I genuinely believe that Krissi Murison is capable of great things as NME editor, having already improved things greatly in recent months. The change is not as massive as you might be expecting and a lot of it seems to hinge on a typographical shift, but it’s nice to see someone aiming high. How many of these changes will still be in place in six months? Who knows, but there’s plenty there to enjoy and if you’ve not purchased for a while, now might be the time.

From: Just Played
To: NME

Good work. But, next time you put Laura Marling on the cover, wait till she’s finished her cigarette.

A Week With… 14. Suede – Coming Up

It all sounds rather tinny these days. Still absolutely fucking glorious, but pretty tinny. At the time it sounded vital: stirring music for indie outsiders, the length and breadth of the country. ‘Coming Up’ can never match ‘Suede’ or ‘Dog Man Star’ for atmosphere, songcraft and so many other things but then those two records can’t match ‘Coming Up’ for its thoroughly dirty, unashamedly trashy fixation with decadent living in the nineties. It celebrates not fitting in, not doing the right thing and not giving a shit. It is one of the most confident sounding records I own and it couldn’t really have been released at any other time than the summer of 1996.

Suede are back now and garnering the rave reviews that pretty much nobody was willing to give them around the time they originally decided to pack it all in, back in 2003. The only time I’ve ever actually seen them live was the tour supporting their last album, ‘A New Morning’, which represented the death throes of a once great band. Having developed a monumental crush on Gemma Hayes, across the duration of her all-too-brief support set, I was even less receptive than I may have otherwise been to Brett Anderson’s dispiriting angry, bitter man routine. I’ve never seen a frontman so completely propelled by seeming disgust and it only served to set the tone for the night.

Despite all of this, I actually rather liked their final outing, and had bought tickets off the back of it, rather than hoping for a nostalgia trip. And yet, left baffled by an almost self-parodying performance it was the irresistible high of ‘Beautiful Ones’ which really connected that night and brought back memories of buying both CD singles so as to complete my ‘collector’s wallet’, right off the back of the CD single of ‘Trash’ having contained a poster of Brett’s handwritten lyrics to that enormous track. Indeed, while subject of much mirth and fairly constant ridicule, it’s Anderson’s lyrics that provided my route back to Suede recently with the publication of ‘The Words Of Brett Anderson’, a signed, miniature hardback book collecting the vast majority of his lyrics from the past eighteen years. It’s a delightful little title and, while there are still moments that make you want to stab your own eyes out to spare your brain any further suffering (“And she’s as similar as you can get, to the shape of a cigarette” anyone?) there are plenty of examples to evoke genuinely fond memories of Anderson and Suede in their pomp. I’ve always adored the heartfelt simplicity of the closing track on ‘Coming Up’, ‘Saturday Night’. “Tonight, we’ll go drinking, we’ll do silly things, and never let the winter in. And it’ll be okay, like everyone says, it’ll be alright and ever so nice.” While hardly groundbreaking, it paints a pretty vivid picture for me and, coupled with a perfectly measured musical backdrop, it is one of my very favourite songs by this quite spectacular band.

The nineties indie-glam swagger of tracks like ‘Filmstar’, ‘Trash’ and ‘She’ are neatly counterbalanced by the epic crooners like ‘Picnic By The Motorway’, ‘The Chemistry Between Us’ and the aforementioned ‘Saturday Night’. One of the band’s best b-sides also dates from the ‘Coming Up’ era. ‘Another No One’, which appeared as back up to ‘Trash’ but which has since become more readily available via the compilation, ‘Sci-Fi Lullabies’, is a stark, stirring and pretty pissed off account of the end of a relationship. If you’ve never had the pleasure, allow me…

Listening back to ‘Coming Up’ now, it sounds very much of a time, without sounding particularly dated. Though that may sound contradictory, I would argue that although it richly evokes a particular moment in time, bringing back vivid cultural and personal memories, it hasn’t become jaded by that association. It doesn’t sound like it’s not fit for purpose in 2010. The reviews that have greeted their recent live comeback would seem to suggest that they’ve all still got it, even if the record buying public decreed eight years ago that that wasn’t actually the case. Spend a little time revisiting whatever Suede you have in your collection and see if their charm is still alive for you; it’s been a strangely invigorating experience for me.

A Week With… 13. Big Star

You know that feeling when you become completely and utterly obsessed with an artist? You track down every little detail, attempt to get hold of the rarest of releases and even, if you’re me, find yourself buying multiple biographies in the hope of somehow further enhancing that irresistible buzz. You arrive at this point from any one of numerous reasons known to prompt such an outbreak of hysteria and teenage style fandom. On this occasion, it was the sad news of the passing of Alex Chilton.

Last week, I wrote about how this initially sent me scampering towards prime Teenage Fanclub, a band oh so very heavily indebted to Chilton’s band, Big Star. However, after doing a little reading and digging out a few items from the shelves, it’s been all things Big Star this week.

I should say now that I’m not writing this for the Big Star aficionados of this world. They will likely think me a gibbering brain dribbler based on my current depth of understanding of this quite magnificent group. This is for those of you who haven’t really given the band any of your time in the past or who simply haven’t really heard of them before. The crux of my message is: you need Big Star in your life. If you’re weak-willed and easily led and that has already done the trick, off you go and order the records now. Should you need a little more convincing, read on.

To be assured of musical greatness, you really need to have a couple of songs which make the alternative music world swoon. Too popular? Fear the backlash. Too obscure? Nobody can buy your bloody records. In fact, it took until the early nineties for Big Star’s albums to be anything like readily available again after their initial shelf life in the early seventies. Those reissues came about due to said alternative types swooning over some of the finest power pop music ever pressed to wax and while they came to it late, thank fuck they got there in the end.

The ‘couple of songs’ which make Big Star essential? Well, firstly, it’s got to be four actually and, secondly, you should really just buy all the albums and get going. ‘Thirteen’ and ‘The Ballad Of El Goodo’ from their debut, ‘#1 Record’, along with ‘September Gurls’ and ‘I’m In Love With A Girl’ from ‘Radio City’, would make up my Big Star primer EP. Two janglers, two acoustic heart-melters, this quarter of brilliance are, arguably, all songs which no self-respecting music fan should be without.

‘Thirteen’ recounts the beautifully observed feelings and experiences of being that particular age, expertly capturing the absurdly real fashion in which we amplified the trivial and lived in the, albeit adolescently awkward, moment. ‘I’m In Love With A Girl’ pretty much does what it says on the tin. It is all the more effective as a result of its simple structure and purposeful brevity. Its breezy excitement about the power of human emotions is fabulously infectious and I’m not sure that there’s a better sub-two minutes song in the world. ‘The Ballad Of El Goodo’ is the blueprint for about a third of Teenage Fanclub’s output (and, if I’m being ever so slightly disingenuous about one of my favourite bands, ‘In The Street’ accounts for close to another third) and is ludicrously good for the second track on a band’s debut album. ‘September Gurls’ is a summer song in the same way that Joni Mitchell’s ‘River’ is a winter song. Think of hazy sunshine and the last of the drawn out days so prevalent in the titular month and that’s what this song sounds like. It’s the sound of looking out over open fields, stillness in the air, a cold beverage of your choice in your hand and not a care in the world in your head.

I have, thus far, not commented on the band’s third album, variably titled ‘3rd’, ‘Sisters/Lovers’ or ‘Third/ Sisters Lovers’, which was never properly finished, emerged six years after the group stopped working on it and is widely regarded as NOT the place to start with Big Star. That’s not to say it’s not worth your time, or quids. A sprawling, audibly unpolished set, it still contains some enchanting tunes. The concise, breezy jangle is less conspicuous however, and, to carry on the Teenage Fanclub references, it’s a bit like how every time the latter band release a new album these days, loads of people hope that it’ll contain some of the fully upbeat number last really attempted on ‘Grand Prix’ or ‘Songs From Northern Britain’. The fact is, they’ve been there and done that. Similarly, Big Star’s third record is a fairly logical progression, in the same way that ‘Radio City’ followed on from ‘#1 Record’.

Last year’s superlative box set, ‘Keep An Eye On The Sky’, is an absolute feast for the ears with remarkably decent sound for a modern mastering job, alongside delightful packaging and a robust bit of writing in the accompanying booklet. While there’s much to take in, once the three albums have taken hold this box is absolutely the way to go. For now, in order to gain my additional fix, I’m juggling Rob Jovanovic’s biography of the band and Bruce Eaton’s 33 1/3 tome on ‘Radio City’. Chronic typos aside, the latter text features some hugely engaging recent interview material, particularly an extensive chat with Alex Chilton, while the former is the accepted (and pretty much only) overall guide to their music. There’s plenty to take in and much to love. The reaction provoked by the news of Chilton’s death demonstrates how much of an influence he had on many of today’s musicians and, in the hope of discovering the silver lining for this one, it should at least cause more people to discover some wonderful, wonderful music.

A Week With… 12. Teenage Fanclub – Songs From Northern Britain

The sad news of the death of Alex Chilton last week sent me scurrying back to my Big Star records and the majesty of ‘Thirteen’, ‘I’m In Love With A Girl’ and ‘The Ballad Of El Goodo’ offered a welcome respite at the end of a tiring week. While the songs, and their parent albums, had more than a couple of plays, in amongst them was an album that unashamedly acknowledges its influences, confident in the knowledge that it’s good enough to stand tall in the exultant company of both Big Star and The Beatles. That album, as you may have guessed by this point, was ‘Songs From Northern Britain’ by Teenage Fanclub, a record which I’m increasingly certain belongs in my all time top ten, if not top five.

The luscious vocals, soaring guitars and heart-melting melodies of Big Star are here in abundance, but that’s not to say that this is simply an homage. ‘Songs From Northern Britain’ is an out and out pop masterpiece. There isn’t a song you’d want to lose, a track to wish away in anticipation of the next or a chorus devoid of a hook. This is pretty much the result of an attempt to calculate how to make utterly beguiling, suitably concise and indefatigably effervescent songs to soothe the soul. It never sounds old, hackneyed or clichéd and I can say, quite unashamedly, that every time I play this record it gives me an undeniable lift.

‘Start Again’ and ‘Ain’t That Enough’ form a bright, shiny, soaring opening salvo, doing an admirable job of setting out the album’s stall. If you don’t like jangle and exemplary harmonies then this is not the record for you.Having said that, if ‘Songs From Northern Britain’ doesn’t make you truly glad you have ears then I’m not sure I ever really want to know you. I’m not sure you can really feel. You poor person, you. ‘I Don’t Want Control Of You’, replete with early seconds of farm noise, slightly confused me as a single choice around the time when the album first appeared, seeming too laid back for an assault on the chart, but, in the context of the record, it’s a simple, affecting love song which would be the highlight of so many other records, but not this one. Not that that’s an easy title to give out.

‘Planets’, with its gleaming guitar part is essentially a live recording of wistful summer evening sunshine while ‘Your Love Is The Place Where I Come From’ is so utterly bare and heartfelt it may have a legitimate claim to being the best Teenage Fanclub song of all time, let alone best on the album. Essentially little more than a gentle strum with some lolloping drums and an occasional burst of restrained, lilting piano, ‘Your Love…’ seems to simple to be special, but don’t be fooled. Listen again and noticed the radiant if relatively muted organ notes serving as the song’s undercurrent, notice the slowly increasingly volume and presence of those trademark soaring guitar riffs and be rendered agog by what is almost an anti-crescendo when the track beautifully manoeuvres itself to a close.

And that’s all without mentioning the sublime Beatles-esque plonking piano of ‘Mount Everest’, the chiming splendour of ‘Take The Long Way Home’ and the unassumingly magical album closer, ‘Speed Of Light’. ‘Songs From Northern Britain’ is a truly special record from a truly special band. I make no apologies for having a second ‘A Week With…’ feature about them for two very good reasons. Firstly, it’s my blog so nur. Eloquently argued, no? Secondly, I genuinely don’t believe that enough people know about this spinetinglingly magnificent collection of music and, with their new album due to emerge at the end of May, it’ll do nobody any harm to get acquainted. I once saw copies of this record, boxed with their second best album, ‘Grand Prix’, selling at £3 in Fopp and considered buying the entire stock so as to give them to the uninitiated. Sadly, I didn’t, but I cannot urge you strongly enough to get yourself a copy. Feel free to come and hurl abuse my way should you, for whatever almost incomprehensible reason, find it not to your liking.

Good cover choice for 6 Music

A few years ago, I encountered Jo Good hosting a report from some summer festival or other on one of the MTV channels. Her clear passion for the music combined with an intelligent and, most enjoyably, surreal sense of humour left its mark on me and I duly noted the name and resolved to keep an eye and ear out for her in the future. Her barely disguised ridiculing of some of the cheesier soft-porn offerings found in the dance music countdown, The Galaxy Chart, which it turned out she also hosted, was a refreshing alternative from the customary ‘that was… this is…. aren’t they both amazing?’ style of MTV presenting.

Some time later, Good turned up at Xfm, having previously been networked around numerous commercial stations doing a live music programme sponsored by one of the big mobile phone companies. This struck me as a remarkably good fit, although her stint there didn’t last all that long in the end. As the playlist got ever more strict and depressingly predictable, it seemed that Xfm was determined to dispatch, or drive out, most of the decent on air talent and Jo’s show was shown the door.

Last year, she then popped up on her ‘local’ commercial station, Key 103, doing weekend lates, playing NOW albums on shuffle. But then, in a stroke of genius, the 6 Music chiefs opted to use Jo for some cover on the station and a perfect match was uncovered. With sufficient musical freedom to influence and shape the sound of the programmes and a core playlist of splendid stuff, it meant that you weren’t only listening for the bits between the songs. Whereas many DJs are criticised for not caring about the music or for not communicating honestly with their audience, Jo sounds like an intelligent, articulate, fanatical consumer of music who is simply speaking to like minded people and loving every second of it. Her approach to her shows on 6 Music so far has been hugely endearing, her genuine love of the station and its audience so audibly clear for all listening. She’s back on the station from tomorrow (Sunday 14th March) for six days solid, 10am-1pm, firstly filling the slot freshly vacated by Jon Richardson and then as part of a week of cover for Lauren Laverne. I suspect she’ll do the remaining couple of Sundays before Cerys starts in April, but I don’t know for certain. In light of recent news about the station, it seems a little odd to describe Jo Good as a rising star at 6 Music, but the controllers would do well to ensure that we get to hear more of her in the future. If you can have a listen at some point this week, I really recommend you give her show a go. Last time she was on, Jo caused me to buy the Beyond The Wizard’s Sleeve remix of Midlake’s ‘Roscoe’ and an album by Margo Guryan, entitled ‘Take A Picture’ and both are well worth a listen. In that sense, she fits in perfectly with the culture of the very best shows on 6 Music – Gideon Coe, Steve Lamacq, Marc Riley, the Freak Zone – in that she’s a trustworthy voice in the wilderness of discovering music that’s new to you. Exactly what the BBC should do, no?