An absolutely fabulous record that's been brought to my attention of late. 1800 by the plain as plainly named could be Big Supermarket, which seems to have come out at some point last year. The name is plain but the record isn't, distilling the essence and beauty of the Flying Nun Record Label's finest moments of the Eighties over its 35 minute playing span.
One of the things that was most appealing about The Clean, The Chills, The Bats, The Verlaines, Look Blue Go Purple and the other main players of that Dunedin scene was how the minimalism and simplicity of their musical approach was channelled so creatively through ingenuity and drive to forge records of marvellous warmth, mystery and unfathomable depths.
Big Supermarket harness a similar modus operandi. The early Fall records were a particular spiritual influence on that scene, particularly The Clean, and you can trace the surly Mancs centrifugal pull here too on the abstract chug of tracks like Personal Pronouns and SuoerHwy.
It's that version of The Fall that I still like the most, before Martin Bramah, Una Baines and Marc Riley gave up knocking heads with Mark E. Smith and surrendered the reins to him in the early Eighties. Big Supermarket have plenty of their shambling charm and though 1800 is by no means a coherent record it's certainly a highly compelling one.
There's very little information available about who exactly Big Supermarket are except that they appear to hail from Australia. No band photos or social media presence seem to be available at all. Which leads you to suppose they're a collaboration of some kind. Really it matters little. 1800 is happy to stand on its own merits and they're quite considerable.
The number of Australian bands putting out superior product these days is frankly beyond comprehension. Big Supermarket stand shoulder to shoulder with the very best of them, even though we don't really even know who they are. Many thanks to Darren, supporter and occasional poster on this blog for bringing these to my notice. Something of an instant, if obscure, classic.
Awesome, glad you like it! Hits my all sweet spots, too.
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