The Long Ryders - September November

 

1985-1986 was an important year in my life musically. My first year at university, my first year away from the parental home, and surrounded by people with similar musical tastes to me for the first time in my life.

It was a year which coincided with the last days of The Paisley Underground. A music scene of American West Coast guitar bands briefly heralded by the Melody Maker and supported in the UK by fans, (quite often older ones), of the Sixties bands they were inspired by; The Velvet Underground and The Byrds most notably.

I had bought albums by the movements leading lights in the year before university; The Rain Parade, The Dream Syndicate, Green on Red and True West.

I'd hung back on The Long Ryders. I hadn't discovered Gram Parsons yet and Country & Western was mostly alien territory for me apart from Jason & the Scorchers, (who came with R.E.M's blessing), that band's (Don't Go Back to) Rockville, and a collection of the best known C & W classics. Jolene, Blanket on the Ground and the like.

One of the girls in the halls of residence block I lived had a copy of their debut album Native Sons and I borrowed and liked it without it supplanting the likes of Marquee Moon and Fear of Music in my affections. 

But it, and the Looking For Lewis & Clark single which preceded their second album, piqued my interest and I went to see them when they played my university venue in the Spring Term with Rod and Andy, two of the best friends I made in the first year.

They were supported by That Petrol Emotion, whose performance I preferred. The Long Ryders, and particularly lead singer Syd Griffin were decidedly corny although they could obviously play. Syd was no Sid Vicious, that's for sure 'Hope you're all studying hard...' was his initial greeting to the audience when the band came onstage and they encored, with a cover of The Public Image with a couple of That Petrol Emotion in tow, Griffin did so wearing a pair of Mickey Mouse ears. It took something away from the song's magnificent rage.  Definitely not cool.

I warmed to them though in the following years and now have my own copy of Native Sons and play and enjoy it when I do. We've all discovered Gram, The Flying Burrito Brothers, The Byrds, Johnny Cash, Waylon and the rest since and it's allowed us to realise that a lot of classic Country, like a lot of classic Folk, is simply indispensable. That wasn't the case in the UK in 1986 when a lot of us were still in thrall to the Laws of Punk and not yet ready for stetsons, which we primarily associated with Dallas.

It's 2023 now The Long Ryders are back with a new album September November. They're a man down, to use Western parlance, (bassist Tom Stevens passed in 2021), which seems appropriate, as the cover photo of  Native Sons was a shot of the band glaring out at the lens at the camera like a cowboy gang of outlaws, in tribute to Buffalo Springfield's never released Stampede and Moby Grape and the cover of their own debut album.

I won't talk too much about September November. It's OK. It's full of decent C & W flecked Rock songs. It's not the major return to form that the review in Uncut claimed it to be a couple of months ago. I think the writer of that was overcome with nostalgia for his youth. It's not nearly as good as Native Sons which is the one you want in addition maybe to 10-5-60 the EP that preceded it. Griffin is still as prone to cliche as he ever was. Still, nothing wrong with getting the gang back together for one last hurrah. Seven.