Virginia Astley - From Gardens Where We Feel Secure

If you have twenty minutes, listen to this. It's an independent record from 1983 that garnered quite a bit of attention at the time of its release and has continued to do so ever since. A collection of impressions and sounds from a day in the British countryside, it's an honest, courageous and moving expression of the feelings we all share just through being alive and experiencing the sensations of nature and time around us. An object of still but thrilling beauty.

The Heart of Rock & Soul # 966 Elvis Presley

100 Mavericks # 86 Jerry Dammers

Jerry shares a birthday with Morrissey and is also worthy of mention. The guiding force behind The Specials, one of the finest British bands there's ever been, he sat out their reformation as he wanted them to take a Sun Ra direction and the rest of the group weren't having it.

A few years ago he DJ'd an event at a club in Newcastle. It was sparsely attended considering who he is. A friend of mine and I went down. At the end of the evening he came over and chatted to us. He was charm itself, utterly unaffected and upfront. A maverick and a hero.

22nd May 1959 Morrissey

Song(s) of the Day # 854 Priscilla Paris

In the classic line of sixties female singers. Originally in the Paris sisters who hit with I Love How You Love Me with Phil Spector in the early sixties. Priscilla made a couple of solo record in the mid to late sixties and then another in 1978.

Although the songs themselves are very much of their time, and not vastly dissimilar from what Dusty, Marianne, Nico, Nancy et al were putting out at the time there is a stillness and simple purity about Priscilla's voice which make them noteworthy. Sadly, they sold very little. Down by the River particularly from her 1978 record Love Is is particularly special.

Plagued by ill health, she moved to Paris in the seventies. She died there in 2004 just shy of her sixtieth birthday.

Pop Culture Books # 3 - 1966 by Jon Savage

As with all really great books I felt a sense of sadness reaching the final line of 1966 and slapping the thing shut. It's a true monolith. One of the greatest treaties written about Pop Culture and its impact on the world around it. Savage of course has form in this respect, having already produced the still-definitive historical document on Punk, England's Dreaming in 1991.

That's a very, very fine book but I'd say 1966 is even better. Eschewing nostalgia or foresight of  any sort, Savage grounds himself in the year itself, a remarkable one for Pop Music of course but also for the world it inhabited and soundtracked. Dividing his book into twelve chapters, one for each calendar month, he focuses his writing on singles, as it was the last year that they took true precedence before albums overtook them as the serious format for expression from '67 onward, and things became serious and introverted, Pop became Rock, shifting inevitably towards self-conscious art.

It's an intense yet objective treatment of the year and what happened during it. Savage prose maintains a masterful balance between embodying the sheer excitement of the records he documents while placing them within their context and detailing the larger picture of the astonishing turbulence of the year in politics, society and the true birth of the counter-culture.

You get Beatles,Stones,Yardbirds, Dylan, Who, Kinks, James Brown, Motown, Love, Byrds, Stax, Beach Boys, Dusty Springfield, Velvets, Small Faces, Pink Floyd, Buffalo Springfield, Hendrix, Cream and Monkees. You also get the smaller players, and Savage knits them all in within a fabric of generational foment, Vietnam, social protest, racial strife, sexual revolution and the shock of violent, intense and tragic news events.

Savage excels himself. It's a lesson in how to write about these things. Capture the thrill of the times but more importantly, be true to them. Setting himself against the prevalent but regrettable trend of looking back at our recent history and its music as an exercise in dewy eyed nostalgia. In his own words.

'I'm very tired of the way a lot of music writing now is about personal experience and generational nostalgia. I'm not interested in talking about whether I ate Crunchies or Orange Aeros on my way back from school. That's by the by.'

Nevertheless, or possibly contrarily directly because of this way of going about things, it's all actually very moving. Because Savage obviously loves the music he writes about and determines to do it justice. In this respect it's an unqualified success:

'Because you know it doesn't matter if a right wing historian slags off John Lennon. It just doesn't matter. Those records will last.'

Bob Dylan, Al Kooper & Doug Sahm 1966

The Heart of Rock & Soul # 967 The Hues Corporation

'Disco's original trash classic. The cargo included an overload of lyric cliche and a heap of brief breaks that were about to be extended to the edge of annoyance on several thousand far less amusing records. But Rock the Boat gets over on its freshness and the pure sultriness of Fleming William's lead vocal.'

May 21st 1904 Fats Waller

100 Mavericks # 87 Nikki Sudden

And appropriately. A prolific and incredibly inventive artist hailing from Solihull whose legacy seemed to land most firmly in the States where he was name-checked by Sonic Youth and Pavement and backed on his 1991 album The Jewel Thief. He died, not yet fifty in 2006. A true bohemian spirit.

Song(s) of the Day # 853 Swell Maps

The ultimate hipsters band. Ask Thurston Moore, Steven Malkmus or Graham Coxon. A bedroom concern for seven years until punk forced their hand, their records still sound quite remarkable exercises in noisy, off the map DIY.

Things Found on my Local's Jukebox # 128 The Small Faces

Rosie's was rocking tonight. This was the song I put on and chose to post.

NME in the Seventies

From an NME feature in 2001

100 Mavericks # 88 Stevie Nicks

West Coast fairy lady and a definite focal point of uncool cool. The records speak for themselves.

The Heart of Rock & Soul # 968 Eddie Kendricks

May 20th 1947 Steve Currie

Song(s) of the Day # 852 Crystal Stilts

I'm a bit late on the case with this one but Crystal Stilts are my new current, favourite band. Not particularly active at the moment, their last single came out a couple of years ago, but I'm presently immersing myself in their records and particularly their last two albums, 2013's Nature Noir and 2011's In Love With Oblivion.

Brooklyn based, active in some form for over ten years, and very much a New York band in terms of sensibility though their two main members, singer Brad Hargett and guitarist JB Townsend hail originally from Florida, they draw on the heritage of driven, murky, melodic alternative guitar bands from the last fifty years, very much record collection rock, but with time their mix of sounds and feel becomes more distinctive and original, more and more their own voice.

I seem to be swimming against the tide here. They're receiving less attention rather than more with every successive release, as from my perspective, they get better and better. Nature Noir for example seemed to garner very little media attention or acclaim, even though it's a very fine record. The Velvet Underground is the clear start off point, but there' are also traces of those who picked up the baton from the Velvets years down the line, The Fall of Dragnet, The Blue Orchids, the Flying Nun bands, particularly The Clean, and also, as an aside, the mid-sixties garage bands, Aftermath period The Stones and 13th Floor Elevators.

Perhaps they're one of those bands whose reputation will build with time, as happened with many of those listed above, I certainly hope so. They have a dark, but inventive melodicism and lyrical focus that seems to touch on art, literature and the subconscious in the way that The Velvet Underground & Nico, Marquee Moon, The Modern Dance and Dragnet did. Listening to them is somewhat akin to being present at a seance among good friends all dressed in black and wearing shades.

It's difficult to make your voice heard playing this stuff nowadays, so prevalent is this psych sound that draws in turns from the decades that preceded it and walls the listener in with immersive, strangely familiar noise. I hope Crystal Stilts have more strings to their bow although I'm very happy just to have stumbled upon what they've put out up to date, I imagine they have.

Courtney Barnett

The latest Courtney Barnett Band pic. From New York City!

B Sides # 57 Dusty Springfield

B Side of Little by Little.

Songs Heard on the Radio # 129 Brook Benton

This sounded pretty good as the sun goes down.

John Peel Announces the Death of Ian Curtis on Air.

A day after the anniversary but still relevant. A moment of history. You get New Dawn Fades as well.

100 Mavericks # 89 Peter Gabriel

Became somewhat less eccentric the more his solo career kicked in but he certainly did his bit during his time prowling the stage in the seventies at the front of Genesis, dressed as a flower, a fox, and goodness knows what else.

May 19th 1952 Joey Ramone

The Heart of Rock & Soul # 969 Louis Armstrong

'Armstrong was almost unquestionably the greatest musical talent this country has produced, a brilliant instrumentalist and band leader, improviser and recording artist, and one of the half-dozen most inspired and influential vocalists of the century. His use of his voice for emotional effects, damn the miceties, helped set the stage for a rock and soul generation that seemed to offer nothing but such displays. That is, eighteen years after his death, a record Armstrong tossed off as a minor artifact when he was fifty-eight years old could shoot 'cross the horizon as one of the warmest, wittiest specimens of musical humanity and seem not only as contemporary but quite a bit more compelling than anything that surrounded it.'

Song(s) of the Day # 851 Stockholm Monsters

Factory Records second rankers. Much of their output does fit firmly within that template but here are two tracks that strike out on a small but distinctive path. Odd instrumentation, it sounds like there's some recorder within the mix of Fairy Tales.

As for National Pastime, it was only a B Side but I think it's their finest moment. Sounding like Robert Smith fronting New Order with woozy trumpet and tinkling piano thrown in. 'Every time I see your face. I just have to run and hide...' Clearly the nice boy in the class who's never found his voice before, it's gone within two and a half minutes but is a small, imperfectly formed indie moment.

Ian Curtis

The Heart of Rock & Soul # 970 Prince

May 18th 1946 Bruce Gilbert

100 Mavericks # 90 Gordon Gano

Strange to think that in 1983, R.E.M's Murmur and The Violent Femmes eponymous debut record were truly neck and neck as the most important records of the year they both came out. Perhaps not so strange, as they're still listed thirty three years on as number one and two on the Best Ever Albums site in the poll for that year. Murmur just wins by a head.

The Violent Femmes record though, was and still is very, very, very good. As perfect a distillation of hormonal teenage rage and angst as could ever be imagined. Here it's actually realised. With Gano always at the heart of it. A screaming, maniacal, slightly scary, eternal adolescent. But oddly a lovable one. With the Femmes next album, Hallowed Ground he turned vicious, Gothic and evil. It was a good record too but this is how they will be remembered as they didn't hit a wrong note here. Teenagers tell certain truths!

Song(s) of the Day # 850 Maysa Matarazzo

Fabulously melodramatic Brazilian Torch and Bossa Nova singer who lived as she sang. At her best when everything is cranked up to eleven.

A writer, actress and femme fatale of the classic mould. Died in a car crash in Rio in 1977 aged just forty. For those moments in your life when a bit of drama and colour are required.

Songs Heard on the Radio # 128 Claypool Lennon Delirium

Genes come good. The second time this has come on the radio and the second time it's turned my head to see what was playing. His dad would be proud!

Laura Nyro

Songs About People # 193 Patrick McGoohan

The Times, kitsch early eighties guitar band with their feet quite stuck in the mire of the sixties. Led by Ed Ball who also figured in the Television Personalities. Here, with their best known song, a tribute to The Prisoner, one of the best TV shows of its period and its star Patrick McGoohan, pictured above in the Welsh town of Portmeirion where it was filmed. You get snatches of the Spencer Davis Group and The Beatles here too.

Guy Clark 1941- 2016

Guy Clark was a spare and elegant songwriter. There's real space in his songs. And all kinds of life too. He's just passed. Here are a couple of his songs.

The Heart of Rock & Soul # 971 Boston

100 Mavericks # 91 Tjinder Singh

Another one of those great leftfield artists that swiped a Number One in the UK singles charts that was only partly representative of a wider, maverick skill, Over twenty years he has stayed true to his basic, original DIY ethic and is greatly deserving of appreciation.

May 17th 1958 Alan Rankine

Song of the Day # 849 Lera Lynn

Actress and performer in American HBO crime series True Detective. This track captures the smoky, David Lynch bar room cool of that.

Pet Sounds

A post where I have a conflicted discussion with myself about how much Pet Sounds means to me.

Pet Sounds is fifty years old today from its point of being released. It's quite an odd record in many  respects but since that point it has gradually established itself as the greatest Rock and Roll record ever made through a gradual process of consensus until it's been canonised as the absolute state of the art album that all others need to be measured up against. Such is the process of time.

There are reasons why it's achieved this status. For setting the bar in early days as the music market shifted from singles to albums. For understanding that there was an essential difference between 45s and the longer format which was set to be based on introversion and inner space, an idea which other, similar artists picked up and ran with, heading towards a different listening experience which we've all got used to and set our lives around ever since. For better or worse.

Listening to the record is a slightly cloying experience at fifty years remove, at least for me. Clogged with self-pity as well as wonder, despite it's obvious technical excellence. It's a point of removal from the immediate space, which paves the ground for the Roger Waters Floyd, The Eagles, Prog Rock and Radiohead but has very little to do with Punk Rock of any sort or for that matter any music which directed itself outwards rather than inwards, that's been released since then.

I'll never really love the whole of Pet Sounds personally although I do love a lot of the moments of exquisite beauty within it, because it's very difficult to locate its heart, despite its very obvious merits. All the very best records have a beating heart which you can locate immediately. Pet Sounds starts the grand high jump for the album format early on and also shifts the focus from singles to albums but also establishes a precedent that is still quite regrettable in many respects in terms of its introspection .

Still, I'm conflicted myself having listened through to it just now and been drawn into the tracks I do find completely wonderful in every way on there. Anyway, I''ll keep having the discussion and we'll see where we are ten or twenty years down the line. Pet Sounds will still be here.

The Heart of Rock & Soul # 972 Kathy Young with the Innocents

'Granted that A Thousand Stars is exactly the kind of stuff that led to the theory that rock was squelched by wimp in the pre-Beatles sixties, granted even that Kathy and her cronies are ripping off the Rivileers, an R&B group, this remains a remarkable record simply because the pure callowness of the lead vocals has never been matched. It's entirely possible that Karen Carpenter based her entire style on what Young sings here.

May 16th 1951 Jonathan Richman

I'm not giving away anything to reveal that Jonathan will reappear on the Maverick countdown at some point. But not until we get right towards the very top of the chart. He's sixty five today and I'd like to wish him a happy birthday.

100 Mavericks # 92 Stanard Ridgeway

For Mexican Radio obviously, their one immortal moment, but also for everything else he did with Wall of Voodoo. For bringing a weird particular amalgam of Film Noir, Paranoid Futurism and the Frontier Mindset into Rock and Roll. For his contribution to the Rumblefish soundtrack, for Camouflage, one of the oddest leftfield hits in the UK of the eighties. For singing/drawling out of the corner of his mouth and for forever flying the flag for individuality.

Song of the Day # 848 The Felice Brothers

The Felice Brothers. Wonderful song and video from their new record Aerosol Ball.

1966

                                                              On the tube in 1966.

100 Mavericks # 93 Pete Townshend

Because The Who's records from the offset to the early seventies, from Substitute to I'm a Boy, Pictures of Lily, Happy Jack, Call Me Lightning and all the rest were so incredibly strange while still selling by the tank load.

Death # 10 John Leyton

One of the very best death songs, from the early sixties period when they were most in vogue. Produced by Joe Meek. A masterpiece in trapped hysteria.

The Heart of Rock & Soul # 973 Dion

Quite an odd choice, as great as Dion is, this is almost a note for note re-creation of Runaround Sue.

May 15th 1948 Brian Eno

Song(s) of the Day # 847 Rokia Traore

Malian singer with a great minimalist set of songs entitled Ne So out this year. Slightly spoils the effect by switching to English for an unnecessary cover of Strange Fruit and a duet with Devendra Banhardt but the early part of the album is quite excellent.

 

100 Mavericks # 94 Courtney Barnett

One of the few proper modern day mavericks. She's had plenty of publicity on here and will continue to get it. Hopefully she won't play too much to the gallery and will stay true to herself.