A Guy Called Gerald: Finlay’s Rainbow (Remixes)

a

Juice Box 1994.  JB26

Discogs

This single is taken from Black Secret Technology which I posted a while ago, but it’s such a great track it deserves another outing.  The beautiful vocals are provided by a pre-fame Finley Quaye in quite a jazzy style which works well with the sparse jungle backing from Gerald.  It’s the least experimental track on the album, although of course the remixes here mess with the simplicity, but it really doesn’t need any embellishments – it just works really well as it is.

Gerald Simpson is one of the most important and innovative electronic musicians of the last few decades, and he’s never less than essential listening.  He has a new album out which I’d have bought had he not issued it through the infuriating Bowers & Wilkins.

Big In Japan: From Y to X And Never Again

front

Zoo 1978 (Bootlegged 1989).  Zoo 135

Discogs

Big In Japan are more interesting for the line-up than the music.  Everyone in the band went on to be pretty successful in future ventures, although didn’t show much promise here.  It was like a supergroup in reverse.  So we have Holly Johnson (Frankie Goes To Hollywood), Bill Drummond (KLF), David Balfe (Teardrop Explodes), Ian Broudie (The Lightning Seeds), Budgie (Siouxsie and the Banshees) and others.

The music was conceptual art-punk with little emphasis on proficiency and is really only of interest as a curiosity.  It’s listenable though and worth a download if you’re into any of the bands these guys were later successful with.

My copy is a bootleg, bought in Virgin.  I do find it irritating that the music industry makes such a fuss about piracy, but are more than happy to stock dodgy product if they think they can make a few quid.  This had the tell-tale “Import Licence” which is usually a sign of a bootleg.  As a result the sound quality isn’t great – it sounds like it was ripped (poorly) from an original 7″.

Butthole Surfers: Hurdy Gurdy Man Remixes

R-2173279-1332602930

Rough Trade 1991.  RTT240R

Discogs

This 12″ came free with the first few (UK) copies of the Piouhgd album.  It comes with no information at all, nor can I find anything on the net about it, so all I can tell you is that it contains three remixes of Hurdy Gurdy Man, originally on the album and also a single.  I have no idea what the remixes are called or who did them.  I suspect that it was intended as a separate release, but only a handful of test pressings were made which were given away when the project was abandoned.

The song is a Donovan composition from 1968, and the Butties are surprisingly faithful to the original, especially the extreme vibrato Donovan used.  Donovan used John-Paul Jones (of Led Zep) for the noisy guitars on his version – there are more noisy guitars here.  The result I think is excellent and it suits their style very well.  These remixes mostly obsess over detail – picking a small element of the original which they emphasise and repeat it to make something which is both instantly recognisable as a remix, but also totally new.  The idea of a Butthole Surfers remix 12″ is bizarre, but the quality of these mixes means they pull it off I think.

Piouhgd has been re-issued and you should buy it.  It’s not their best work, but it’s a fine album and includes the Widdowermaker EP, but not these tracks.

The Times: Beat Torture

Beat+Torture

Creation records 1988.  CRELP038

Discogs

I reckon if this had come out 15 years earlier, and been on, say Elektra it would have been huge.  As it is, it lies forgotten by nearly everyone.

The Times (more accurately Ed Ball who is the band) have always been a bit of a puzzle to me.  He was one of the label’s most prolific artists, and what I’ve heard I like very much.   There never seemed to be any buzz around him, and despite the label, he was never really cool.  I guess this album was a bit too rock n roll for Creation and for 1988.

So what we have here is a series of quite anthemic rock songs, some of which sound as though they ought to be classics, but none of them are.  The material is a bit ambitious for his voice, but the album is so good, he gets away with it anyway.

The cover art is typical of what Creation used to do when they’d run out of money, although my first pressing comes in a custom plastic carrier bag with a picture of Ed Ball with a noose, which must have cost a few quid.

download