Ian and 1001 Albums...

[stephenhannan]

Sinatra

Not really one of my favourites. But Respect. Yes.

[stephenhannan]

Parklife? Is that the Kinks meet the Small Faces. If not a worthy decsendant

[Captain Tancredi]

The Small Faces - Ogdens Nut Gone Flake (1968)

And so, rather like a Russell T Davies story arc, weve gone back and forth and find ourselves back where we started only a year later.
You can tell that Ogdens Nut Gone Flake is a psychedelic album, because after opening the tin in which the modern version comes, I was seeing multicoloured circles rolling all over the place. This is however less a reflection on the album itself than on the CD packaging. Im probably touching on a delicate subject by saying it, but Im not sure what it says about the music of the 1960s that a key album now comes repackaged so that in one tin (and yes, it is nice that an album originally designed to look like a tobacco tin now comes in a tin which looks exactly like a tobacco tin) you get mono and stereo versions of the album together with a Radio 1 documentary on the making of said album (although being a Radio 1 documentary, the interesting comments, interviews and analysis are interspersed with a presenter telling you at ten-minute intervals what it is youre listening to, as the documentary is presumably aimed at todays younger generation with their goldfish attention spans or old stoners who have to be reminded what decade it is. I suppose there are two schools of thought- one that Ogdens is now considered an important milestone in the story of popular music and therefore worthy of the treatment, and the other that the Small Faces fans of 1968 didnt so much drop out as become corporate lawyers and sales managers wholl gladly fork out for the nostalgia trip.
On to the album, though- the one track everybody knows is Lazy Sunday, although to be honest I was slightly surprised that it went back that far- growing up in the late 1970s and early 1980s, on the radio its sense of irreverence and cheeky provocativeness didnt seem a million miles away from the punk which was just enough in the past to become playable for BBC local radio. Its a perceptive take on common themes- clash of generations, successful musicians not necessarily getting on with the neighbours- but also says enough about the way British people get on with each other (or fail to) to have a ring of truth to it. Similarly, Rene is a piece of good old-fashioned bawdry which is pulled off with such a sense of fun that its impossible to dislike (although the Radio 1 documentary goes so far as to give you the original Renes name and the street where she lived!). The other highlights of the first half must be Afterglow (the album not having much in the way of traditional love songs, its good to have one this powerful and heartfelt) and Song of a Baker, which approaches the heights of metaphysical poetry in its simple but effective use of the bakery conceit.
The second half of the album is famously taken up with the Happiness Stan sequence. While its perhaps unsurprising to read in the cover notes that the band originally contemplated the sequence of songs as a piece for performance, it would equally well have suited animation or maybe even puppetry, although its debatable whether its a series of songs punctuated by Stanley Unwins links or a Stanley Unwin monologue with songs by the Small Faces. The themes are as old as some our oldest stories- the innocents quest for knowledge, the reasons why things in the natural world happen the way they do, the outcasts (the fly and Mad John) who, when treated with respect and kindness, help our protagonist on his quest- but at the same time, Stans quest is a little like the search for the Wizard of Oz, as theres no great secret at the end of the rainbow but the advice is to enjoy life and let things take care of themselves. The musical styles make the difference, though- the sinister chords and voice manipulation early on for the lines think of black and black will think for you are really quite chilling (it may be me but I cant help thinking of Anthony Ainley), while the ballad style for Mad John is suitably emotive and the finale, Happydays Toytown, a wonderful release of fun and energy.
In retrospect, whats particularly interesting about Ogdens is that such an inventive album was at the same time the Small Faces attempt to break out of being the boy band of their day and ultimately their epitaph as a band. Its imaginative and diverse, probably doesnt have any awesomely insightful revelation into the human condition but in its conception and approach is definitely something special. Stay cool, wont you?
7 down, 994 to go...

[Carol Baynes]

Are you hearing the influence it had on "Parklife" yet (along with several other bands and LPs)?

But Cor Blimey guv, I've plenty more to say about "Ogdens.." A Mod girls first line of defence against a bad mood! But later, I'm off to bed soon so I can't be that Immediate. There's a joke in there if your a record geek like me.

[Captain Tancredi]

Are you hearing the influence it had on "Parklife" yet (along with several other bands and LPs)?

Well, 'Lazy Sunday' and 'Bank Holiday' are clearly from the same stable, for a start- and the sense of humour is very similar. I'll wait to hear what you have to add, anyway- just goes to show that no matter what happens at work, at least one person here is listening to what you're saying!

[SiHart]

It's one of my favourite albums!

Si xx

[Milky Tears]

It is also one of my favourite albums. Well, at least top twenty.

[Carol Baynes]

it would equally well have suited animation or maybe even puppetry, .... Stans quest is a little like the search for the Wizard of Oz, as theres no great secret at the end of the rainbow but the advice is to enjoy life and let things take care of themselves.

Don't bogart that joint, Ian, pass it on to me!

[Captain Tancredi]

Saint Etienne- Foxbase Alpha (1991)

Not to mince my words, my knowledge of music in the late 1980s and first half of the 1990s is quite frankly appalling. Theres a good reason- having rediscovered classical music in 1988 during my GCSE revision, I listened to next to nothing else (apart from a bit of Suzanne Vega and going to a Half Man Half Biscuit gig) for the next five years, developing some very obscure tastes in the process but (thanks to not having to share a room at university) also totally isolated from the music which was going on at the time. There were some other reasons as well- being more right-wing than most at the time, it seemed that the choice was between Smiths-type politicised bands and apparently mindless dance music and it all seemed quite frankly degenerate. What I probably didnt appreciate at the time was that, done properly, dance music and sampling can ask some interesting questions about what music actually is, and how what goes on top of a basic beat can itself be creative and imaginative. At the time I used to joke to friends that you could probably make a fortune by recording a simple dance beat and play it back with basic variations over six hours in a club, neatly avoiding the need for DJs and actual records- well, in todays MP3 age itd be the simplest thing in the world to set up a program which did that. Coming from the perspective of classical music, however, it was easy to see dance-type music as a bastardisation of instrumental music because the emphasis is on using beats and melodies to create an ambience rather than make a statement or express a world-view - and so having built the wall in my mind I didnt have any incentive to try to climb over it.

I must admit, it made me smile when I started playing the first track- Radio Etienne is made up entirely of French radio continuity, from France-Inter if Im not mistaken- the reason being that it took me right back to A-Levels again and listening to the evening news in French once a week or so for listening practice. So I understand every word- its the lead-in to a football match at St-Ouen, with Saint Etienne providing the opposition. Now in the 1970s, Saint-Etienne (the place in France, not the group) had a fairly decent football team and a painfully cool green kit- in fact my dad once saw them playing in a European tie at Liverpool- and the other thing I know about the place is that the natives are called Stephanois, Etienne being a French form of Stephen. A fact clearly unknown to the only Etienne Ive ever met, who was one heck of a girl. But back to the music.

One of the intriguing things about the album is the way that music which is so apparently made rather than played can at the same time be so wistful and slowly produce a cumulative gentle melancholy. Tracks like Only Love Can break Your Heart and Shes the One have simple lyrics sung almost hypnotically, while the likes of Spring and Nothing Can Stop Us are coolly beautiful in a fragile way, so by the end of the album I was left with this strange emotional wrench which seemed to come from nowhere. By the same token, Wilson is a fascinating experiment in sound- over a gradual crescendo, we hear various lines (according to the sleeve notes, from a record explaining decimal currency) repeated and repeated in different orders. It doesnt take much imagination to recreate the record; Willie and Auntie go into a shop to buy some sweets but Auntie doesnt understand the new money- and Ive always been a sucker for the apparent simplicity of worlds like this, where missing the bus is the worst thing that can happen- but there are other things going on. Not least of these is the faint mention of l.s.d. (which it would have been in the original situation) while Willie is saying Ill have one of these and one of these and two of those, please- which I think is an intentional joke when put alongside Too stoned to care- seven minutes of blatant repetition introduced by Richard Whiteley. Either this is an intentional joke at the caricature of the drug-fuelled student raving all night and coming down to Countdown the following afternoon or it started the caricature in the first place, but the point is surely that you have to be pretty far gone not to realise just how repetitive and strung-out the track is. So dance can have a sense of humour after all.

I do feel that I havent really got to the heart of the album, though- I suspect one of the problems with having quite so much instrumental and not so many lyrics is that it isnt always easy to put your finger on quite what the musicians are aiming for, and theres an impenetrability which hasnt been there with the other albums Ive looked at. But its made me think a lot about music and words- whether repeating a phrase until it becomes meaningless turns it into music, because the words are broken down into units of sound and pitch- and to what extent dance music can be creative while being tied to the need to provide a rhythm and create a mood. I can tell Im going to be coming back to this one- its almost like having something cool and polished which doesnt give up the secrets beneath its polished surface.

7 down, 994 to go...

[Carol Baynes]

I'm thinking you've missed the point of "Foxbase Alpha" and the band that made it, but I'll have to come back when I've got time. Saint Etienne aren't easy to pigeonhole (which will become clear if you listen to one of their later albums where they are quite obviously no longer just a studio concern). To tie them in with the club scene is a lazy move, because they are not as strongly tied to it as your review suggests. Certainly not anymore. I never heard Saint Etienne played in a dance club of a Saturday night, I have to say (although I recall they used to get played a lot in The Cornerhouse, Dry and other bars in Manchester, way back when). I loved "Foxbase Alpha" because of it's modernisation of 'Swinging London' to be frank, and was led to it through an interest in that era and music, not through club sounds. Elsewhere Stanley and Wiggs had a mainstream hit as Cola boy and "7 ways to love" (remmeber that?)

I'm also not sure what you meant with your comment about The Smiths? Politicised band? Are they really?

But also remember, the first instrument was surely the drum and to question if rythmic beats are truly music is a sure sign that you are thinking way to much and not feeling enough, perhaps. Perhaps you should try an album that is really designed to make you dance!

[Captain Tancredi]

I'm also not sure what you meant with your comment about The Smiths? Politicised band? Are they really?

I can see I've done this the wrong way around. In the original order of things, 'Meat is Murder' would have been the seventh album on my list and 'Foxbase Alpha' the ninth (and you can probably guess what the eighth is going to be). But I was overtaken by enthusiasm when the Saint Etienne thread had a new burst of activity and decided to do that first. And you're right in saying that I haven't "got" the album- in fact I found it very difficult to write about and only wrote what I did in the end to say something and be able to move on. I know next to nothing about what was and wasn't played in clubs and bars at the time- I was 19 before I had my first legal drink in a hotel bar, and not following bands at all, I couldn't tell you whether I'd heard one thing or another. With the exception of 'Loveshack', which was on the jukebox in the student union bar every Friday night for the three years I was there- funny how you can associate a song with the smell of cider in plastic glasses.

To be honest I'm really not very satisfied at all with what I've written but didn't know what else to say, but I was committed to The Project and wanted to try to find something. Hence a lot of intellectualisation and not a lot about the album itself.

[Carol Baynes]

Mmm...I like northern soul, Sandie Shaw, '60s realist Brit-cinema, Swinging London...that's why I like that album as it's emotive of all those things. The electronic trappings interested me less. It's a great feel good pop album with a few uplifting tunes on it and many that envoke a bittersweet feeling. It's a great favourite.

What I'm sying to you is that the mainstream club scene (small town Ritzy) didn't have a clue about them and the underground club scene was usually nothing like "Foxbase Alpha" (for that you'll have to look for the extended mixes of many Etienne tracks. There's a great one of "Like a motorway").

And just so you know- "Meat is murder" isn't the Smiths' best album. In my opinion of course!

[Captain Tancredi]

I think I probably have to ask myself whether I'm trying to listen to music emotionally or intellectually- in the majority of cases it's usually the latter because that's the background I come from, and I'm interested in things like structure, contrast, instrumentation and so on. It's probably also true that I tend to shrink from emotional reactions to things because I don't know how to cope with them, which is one of the reasons why I keep putting the Smiths off because I don't know how I'll react. But at least we can see where we're coming from, which is something of a relief.

[Captain Tancredi]

Having let this lapse for a few weeks, it's time to come back with the next album which (to those unfamiliar with my tagline of the last few weeks) is...

The Kinks are The Village Green Preservation Society (1968)

If I ever fell in love with a song on the first hearing, the title track of this album was it. 'The Village Green Preservation Society' is just...beautiful, which makes it all the more special, because the common perception of 1968 is of the idealism of the earlier 1960s turning into politicised violence in Paris and the campuses of America. But what we also forget is that it was in the 1960s that, faced with a technological revolution and the suspicion that post-war planning was simply tearing towns and cities apart without putting anything in their place, people like John Betjeman were rediscovering the value of traditional English ways and the Victorian past in particular. 'Village Green Preservation Society' is a wonderfully even-handed song; it sees the value in old-fashioned things and popular culture- and you don't have to look far to see how passionate people can get about things like draught beer and Sherlock Holmes- but also the need for social change- and it's a tremendously generous gesture for a band in 1968 to sing "God save the George Cross and all those who were awarded them". Similarly topical is "Last of the Steam-Powered Trains', as only a couple of months before the album's release, the last of Sir William Stanier's Black Fives was retired from service and, with much media coverage, 138 years of steam power on Britain's railways came to an end, providing a supremely powerful metaphor for the change from Victorian industry to modern technology and all the social changes that involved.

Moving on to the rest of the album, many of the songs are deeply wistful- 'Do You Remember Walter' traces how two friends can end up going in different directions, and the titular Walter settles for comfortable domesticity, while the block of songs formed by 'Sitting by the Riverside', 'Animal Farm' and 'Village Green' either look back to simpler times or yearn for a retreat to the country and away from the false world of stardom. 'Johnny Thunder' and 'Wicked Annabella' both celebrate outsiders and mavericks; it's never actually stated in so many words, for example, that Annabella is a witch, but it could just as easily be that she's an eccentric neglected by society and her family alike. 'Picture Book' and 'People Take Pictures of Each Other' clearly belong together and use the same metaphor of photography to say a lot about human relationships- it's probably true that most people's family albums have (or had) roughly the same kind of pictures, shots of children, holidays at the seaside and family gatherings, but at the same time it can become obsessive and a substitute for relationships- and the line about taking a picture of the summer "just in case somebody though they had missed it" is priceless.

The humour of the album is one of its best features- in many ways it's a warm and affectionate collection, with only the occasional, more reflective song such as 'Big Sky', with its view of a universe where God exists but is just too busy to get involved, and 'Starstruck', the Kinks' contribution to the sub-genre of songs about groupies and hangers-on. Funny and off-the-wall songs like 'Phenomenal Cat' and 'All of My Friends Were There' (with a very astute observation on the meaning of friendship) help create a generally good-humoured album, but it's difficult not to think of the album in its time. The dramatic difference in approach between the various songs show a group enjoying playing around with their music and trying different styles- the slower approach on the more reflective songs contrasts well with the manic accompaniment on 'People Take Pictures' and the music-hall backing on 'All of My Friends'. And then there's Ray Davies's voice, which has always struck me as particularly special- there's a kind of precision and subtletly of inflection which I can never quite pin down, but it's particularly suited to the ironic tone of many of the lyrics. The impoprtant thing is that it's fun, it's warm and it's almost totally free of any anger or malice.

8 down, 993 to go...

[SiHart]

I like that one too. It's a lovely, gorgeously warm album. I remember hearing the title track about 12 years ago now and falling in love with it straight away too.

Great album!

Si xx

[Captain Tancredi]

The Smiths - Meat is Murder (1985)

Institutionalised bullying, angst, republicanism, militant vegetarianism...these are just a few of the elements which went into Meat is Murder, a bizarre concoction of wit, lyricism, conviction and alienation. Having grown up in a terraced house in the north of England myself, I approached the album with a few reservations- wondering perhaps whether the songs would challenge me more than I could bear, or evoke something I tried too hard to leave behind. In spite of having been in my teens while the Smiths were at their height, although i was aware of the name Id never really connected with their music, being far too right-wing and conformist at eighteen, say, to be prepared to listen. And now I work in between two Smiths fans- its probably the nearest thing a Doctor Who fan can experience to the way the outside world perceives us, with the back-and-forth interchange of odd lyrics and song titles (although my Texan friend Ashley once went out with someone whod taken Rusholme Ruffians literally, to the point of self-tattooing Morrissey 4 Ever on his arm with a pen and Im not aware of anybody ever making a similar tribute to Barry Letts). So it was with a certain caution that I stuck the album on and let it work on me.

One of the dominant notes of the album is struck by the angry songs- specifically the trio of The Headmaster Ritual, with its venom directed against the kind of habitual bullying which probably doesnt take place in quite the same way any more, Barbarism Begins at Home- short and simplistic, but devastating in its insight into casual domestic violence perpetrated against children, and the titular Meat is Murder. Having been the fat boy in a state primary, I can understand something of what The Headmaster Ritual is getting at- a cult of bullying perpetrated as much by teachers as by pupils, where a teacher can get away with destroying a childs confidence and yet dismiss it with a wink because hes popular and the child isnt, but in this day and age when most of the teachers in the country run scared of separating two fighting pupils for fear or ending up in court, Im not sure that such a phenomenon exists in the same way or to the same extent. The kind of teacher Morrissey sings about would probably not be teaching today- or at least too worried about SAT scores and Ofsted inspections to risk throwing his pension away by roughing up the occasional lame duck. Barbarism Begins at Home is spare and unnerving in the way it enters the psychology of the kind of people who have no better argument than blows to control their family, while Meat is Murder, for all its passion and conviction, is surely as much a personal statement as an argument for vegetarianism. There are a dozen and one reasons to stop eating meat, and Morrisseys no more and no less valid than mine, but while its an argument no doubt certain people need to have put in a certain way, in its emotion and forcefulness, as an argument its as likely to alienate as many people as it converts.

Much of the rest of the album takes a more lyrical and incisive key- theres an ocean and a half of lost or unfulfilled love (and occasionally lust- I Want the One I Cant Have is edgy now and was probably doubly so in 1985), and once you can get past the trouser-dropping antics of Nowhere Fast, theres a recognisable sense of life happening somewhere else which strikes a chord from the experience of growing up in a run-down Northern town, and the train going by (we used to live opposite Birkenhead North carriage sheds!) could just as easily be the one which, in the 1980s, used to leave Liverpool at about 7.30 on a Monday morning carrying several hundred Scouse builders down to the sites in London. Whats interesting from a musical point of view is the energy of the accompaniment to the songs- while Morrissey is equally good at the more lyrical side of things and the fast, vivid lyrics of the likes of Rusholme Ruffians, more often than not (except in the emphatically slow rhythms of the final song) the backing is insistent and almost manic in places- it emphasises the wit and intelligence of Morrisseys lyrics, but often disguises their meaning too. And I havent decided yet whether thats cleverness or an accident, but while I cant really say that the album leaves me with much of a feeling of coming from the same background, I can see how Ive spent much of the last twenty years moving away from that, so it really shouldnt come as a surprise.

9 down, 992 to go...

[Carol Baynes]

Nice review, and a good album, but it's not their best in my opinion.

[Captain Tancredi]

The Beach Boys - Pet Sounds (1966)

There were a couple of reasons why I picked on this one- for a start, Ive been fond of some of the Beach Boys standards like Good Vibrations and California Girls for a long time, and it also happens to occupy the place in my book opposite the Beatles Revolver, positively inviting a contrast with what the Beatles were doing at around the same time. Getting the CD home and looking at the track listing, I discovered that the songs I was looking for werent actually on this album, but the contrast is still, I think, an interesting one. Perhaps the most obvious point of departure is the way in which the Beatles albums tended to be very much a creative collaboration, Pet Sounds is by all accounts Brian Wilsons attempt to create an equivalent, which is reflected in the amount of lyrics written in the first person without the Beatles talent for populating their songs with all manner of characters and fictional creations. Roughly half the songs (You Still Believe in Me, Thats Not Me, Im Waiting for the Day, God Only Knows, I Know Theres An Answer, I Just Wasnt Made For These Times) come across as songs of troubled youth coming terms with the complex and uncertain adult world- theyre songs about finding (or being unsure of) your place in the world, faith and the power of emotional support, even if they do occasionally sound rather too anguished. There are also some very tender love songs (the innocence of Wouldnt It Be Nice contrasts badly with the worldliness of something like Norwegian Wood, though) with Dont Talk particularly moving and Caroline No also poignant in its own way.

My first encounter with Sloop John B came at primary school, when it was one of the pieces chosen for the school Recorder Ensemble to play (along with the Beatles Michelle) at a schools music festival, so although the experience of having it firstly drummed into you and then being performed off-key and off the beat by thirty or so ten-year-olds, would probably put most people off a song for life, its at least interesting to hear the Beach Boys taking on what turns out to be a traditional West Indian sea song rather than an original composition. The other stand-out track is the titular Pet Sounds, an interesting musical collage which perhaps just sounds ever so slightly dated nowadays because of the instrumentation. In fact, if the album has one weakness compared with something like a Beatles album of the same period, its the comparative lack of variety in the instrumentation and sound world of the album. If it has two, its that the lyrics have a tendency to come across as somewhat immature and self-pitying, and while every album has a right to have one or two of those, when the backbone of an album is made up of such introspection it leaves Pet Sounds a comparatively poor relation in terms of wit and enjoyment of life.

That said, seeing it through the filter of the Beatles is doing the Beach Boys and Brian Wilson a disservice- if there hadnt been any Beatles, Pet Sounds would still be a major album of its era. In spite of the failings of individual songs, theres still a sense of unity and vision about the project which does echo the way the Beatles had started to structure their albums and how an LP could be constructed to be more than a collection of singles and B-sides. In the end its probably just a question of personal taste and my preference for the complex unaccompanied harmonies of something like Good Vibrations and the open skies and California sunshine of their earlier records, but theres something self-indulgent about Pet Sounds which detracts from the albums ambition.

10 down, 991 to go...

[SiHart]

God Only Knows is my favourite song from this album. There's just something so spine chillingly fragile and beautiful about it. It sends shivers down my spine every time I hear it. It's so sad, and yet rather life affirming at the same time.

I rather like this album. It wasn't really what I expected when I first put it on, expecting undemanding songs about surfing, like the Beach Boys hits, but this is something else, something far more sophisticated. I love the complex instrumentation and the sound of the album, which is quite unlike anything else ever (well that I've heard anyway) and very memorable.

I know someone else, sitiing upstairs who doesn't like Sloop John B either!

Si xx