Back on message this time round with six tunes tenuously linked to the week gone by with five (5!) of the acts making their WIS debut. Enjoy!
Broken Man – St Vincent (2024)
We’re kicking off April with a shiny new track from 2024 and, as my daughter’s London based boyfriend Nick likes to say in his terrible Scottish accent, it’s a wee belter! Broken Man is the lead single from the appropriately titled All Born Screaming LP, St Vincent’s first in three years which is due at the end of this month. And it sounds more like Nine Inch Nails than the artist who I first became aware of back in 2014 through her Grammy-winning, self-titled fourth album and its great single Digital Witness when I saw her perform it on Later… Before adopting the St Vincent stage name, Oklahoma-born indie-rock multi-instrumentalist Annie Clark began her career with The Polyphonic Spree and then toured with Sufjan Stevens. Her sonically experimental debut record as St Vincent, Marry Me, was released in 2007 to critical acclaim. She built on this with her subsequent records and by 2012, she was collaborating with David Byrne on a record entitled Love This Giant, with it’s horn riffs and reversed beauty and the beast cover. Since then, she has built her reputation for artful rock/pop (the title track from 2017 album MassEducation winning her a second Grammy) and continued to collaborate with artists ranging from Beck to Taylor Swift.
Broken Man has arrived at the point where her last album, Daddy’s Home, had disappointed her fan base – so it has a lot to do. It is her first sole production role and she certainly cranks up her guitar, recruiting Dave Grohl to deliver some thundering drums into the mix as the song build to a noisy crescendo. Famously, ‘gender-fluid’, she deploys her trademark vocal on some in-your-face lyrics: “Lover nail yourself right to me/If you go I won’t be well/I can hold my arms wide open/But I need you to drive the nail”. The supporting video sees St. Vincent performing the single dressed androgynously as she slowly bursts into flames, an image that also features on the single cover above. Fire walk with me…
Oh Sweet Nuthin’ – The Velvet Underground (1970)
After that blistering start, a slight change in pace is required. Twenty four years ago this week, the movie High Fidelity was released on 31 March 2000. I am sure you will not be surprised to hear that I absolutely loved the music anorak detail in the fantastic book by Nick Hornby, with its mix-tape obsession and constantly changing list of Top 5 Elvis Costello Songs. So I was a bit concerned when the movie was re-located from London to Chicago. But I have to admit the choice of John Cusak as star and co-screenwriter was inspired. As was persuading Jack Black to take the role as the music snob record store assistant Barry after passing on it. Black considers the role as his breakout in Hollywood and the scene where he berates a customer for asking for a copy of I Just Called To Say I Love You for his daughter is just glorious. “Do you even know your daughter? There is no way she likes that song!” Springsteen playing himself (and his butterscotch Telecaster) in Cusak’s character Rob’s dream sequence as his subconscious guide was another coup for the film. As per a reference in Hornby’s novel to his song Bobby Jean, Springsteen advises Rob to “give that big final good luck and goodbye to your all time Top 5 and just move on down the road”.
The soundtrack album to the movie is a eclectic mix of the known and the obscure, befitting of one of the mixtapes that could have been made by the characters. From the 13th Floor Elevators to Bob Dylan, the Beta Band to Stevie Wonder and Stereolab to The Kinks, it’s a winner all the way. Slightly strangely, it has two tracks from Loaded, the last true Velvet Underground album with the original group line up, although both tracks feature bassist Doug Yule on lead vocal. Both songs are very welcome additions to the piece and I’ve opted to playlist the long track that ends Loaded. Oh Sweet Nothing‘s tale of disaffected street people “who ain’t got nothing at all” can sound quite downbeat at first. But as the song builds towards the repeated refrain at the end and the music goes into overdrive (particularly Yule’s drumming as he sat in for Mo Tucker), I think it feels strangely life affirming! But maybe that’s just me…
Town To Town – Microdisney (1987)
I finally managed to catch up with the raw, but ultimately heart-warming BBC4 documentary telling the story of Cork band Microdisney. It opens with the following statement on the screen: “Microdisney made some of the finest music of the 80s…” And then, after a beat, the sentence is completed with “… that nobody ever bought”. And that is the essence of the film.
Cathal Coughlan and Sean O’Hagan met in Cork at a New Year party in 1980 and formed a band which blended O’Hagan’s melodic arrangements with Coughlan’s poetic lyrics. After a couple of years gigging, they recorded a couple of singles which were picked up by John Peel who called Helicopter Of The Holy Ghost the greatest b-side ever. Relocating to squat in London in 1983, they hooked a deal with Rough Trade who funded a debut LP and single. Their cult status grew and in 1985 their second album The Clock Comes Down The Stairs (full of songs about being exiled far from home) reached number one in the UK Indie Chart and they were on the Whistle Test. With this level of interest, the catchy single Birthday Girl should have been a crossover hit in keeping with many indie bands before them – except it wasn’t. Tensions grew with Rough Trade and the band sought the support of a major label deal with Virgin who released The Crooked Mile and threw some hefty weight behind the brilliant single Town To Town, playlisted here. Witty 80s video – check, limited edition double pack single – check, TV appearances – check. The single struggled to just 55 in the UK chart and then dropped out of sight. One more time round the dancefloor with Virgin for the 39 Minutes LP and when the single Singer’s Hampstead Home again failed to sell, the band split acrimoniously and moved on to other careers in music.
The documentary will be available on iPlayer all year. So, if you find yourself with a glass of something in your hand and 90 minutes to burn, search it out and enjoy the partial happy ending to the story. Filmaker Julie Perkins attended a mutual friend’s birthday party in a pub in 2016 where O’Hagan and Coughlan jammed together for the first time in years – she had her camera with her and captured the songs they played. The event became the catalyst for two reunion shows in Dublin and London in 2018 and a final ever show with an adoring home crowd back in Cork in 2019. The gigs were a triumph, overdue acclaim was rightly given and Perkins’ camera catches it all. The sting in the tale is that Coughlan had been ill at the time of the shows. Sadly, his condition worsened and he died in 2022 aged just 61.
Whine & Grine/Stand Down Margaret – The Beat (1980)
And another sad anniversary this week marks five years since Ranking Roger of The Beat died of cancer at the age of 56. Part of the 2-Tone ska revival in the late 70s, the band was formed in Birmingham and featured two vocalists in Dave Wakeling and Roger Charlery, known as Ranking Roger. He brought a Jamaican influence to their music with his ‘toasting’ (talking his lyrics over the rhythm) in the style of 70s reggae artists like U-Roy and Big Youth. They also had another Jamaican player in the band; 50-year-old Saxa who had blown his saxophone for Prince Buster and Desmond Dekker in the 60s. The combination of these artists with Wakeling’s distinctive voice gave the band a unique and instantly recognisable sound.
Like Madness, their stay on 2-Tone was limited to one single, a double A side with their cover of Smokey Robinson’s Tears Of A Clown coupled with their own composition Ranking Full Stop released as TT6 in 1979 – Roger’s “Riddim’ come forwahd” spoken intro to the latter is ace. They then formed their own label Go-Feet (with a similar graphic style) and released their debut LP I Just Can’t Stop It in 1980 and it’s follow-up Wha’appen in 1981. The early 80s were turbulent times in the UK and the ska movement was politicised in the face of an unrelenting Tory government headed up by Margaret Thatcher. The band had written a song called Stand Down Margaret which appeared on their first album mashed up with a Prince Buster track Whine & Grine. I’ve playlisted it this week as it highlights Roger’s brilliant toasting although it’s as polite an insurrection song as you will hear! The lyrics still cut it, though. “I see no joy, I see only sorrow/I see no chance of your bright new tomorrow/So stand down Margaret, stand down please”.
For their fourth single, they decided to release a glorious dub mix of the song as a double A with Best Friend and it gave them carte blanche to perform it on their TV appearances. I can’t find any footage of them singing it on their famous slot on Cheggers Plays Pop but here is some Lenny Henry-introduced footage of them belting it out in 1982 on OTT, the late-night adult Tiswas. Sadly, not with Saxa on stage – probably past his bed-time.
Totally Wired – The Fall (1980)
On 1 April 2007, the famous Hammersmith Palais in London hosted its final gig before it closed for good. Originally known as the Palais de Danse, it was built by American entrepreneurs as first palais de danse in the UK and featured a sprung dance floor. It opened on 28 Nov 1919 with a set by Nick LaRocca’s Original Dixieland Jazz Band and went on to host many famous jazz bands over the years. The Joe Loss Orchestra were the resident band throughout the sixties although by 1970 it was hosting The Who on their tour promoting Tommy. By the late 70s and 80s it became an established rock and pop venue with all manner of bands including it in their tours when playing London.
Most famously, the venue is enshrined in the title of The Clash song (White Man) In Hammersmith Palais inspired by Joe Strummer and Don Letts attending a reggae all-nighter at the venue, which I wrote about in WIS 7Jul23. It also gets a memorable namecheck as one of the many Reasons To Be Cheerful in the Ian Dury & The Blockheads song. “Some of Buddy Holly, the working folly, Good Golly Miss Molly and boats/Hammersmith Palais, the Bolshoi Ballet, jump back in the alley, add nanny goats”. The venue also gets a mention in the Elvis Costello song London’s Brilliant Parade, from the 1994 album Brutal Youth. All three of these artists played the Palais in their careers but Costello had a much earlier memory of the place as he would frequently visit to watch from the balcony as his father Ross MacManus performed with the Joe Loss Orchestra.
The Palais was finally knocked down and redeveloped into ‘luxury’ student flats in 2013 after a long planning battle. When the end came, it was The Fall who graced the stage at the Last Night Of The Palais, as the live album recorded on 1 April 2007 was titled. Mark E Smith’s 2007 incarnation of the legendary revolving door band were touring their Reformation LP and it was the title track that was played as the last ever encore at the venue. Having listened to the ramshackle nature of the live recording, I’ve decided that the first track on the blog by the legendary caustic Mancunian noise-niks needs to be something not played that night! So, I’ve gone back to their original line-up with Marc ‘Lard’ Riley on bass and their great 1980 single on Rough Trade. Totally Wired was on uber-fan John Peel’s Festive Fifty in both 1980 and 1981. “You don’t have to be weird to be wired”. Quite!
Amerciian Requiem – Beyoncé (2024)
OK – I know its not been that long since I playlisted Beyoncé’s single Texas Hold ‘Em but the media noise and frenzy surrounding the release of the single’s parent album Cowboy Carter last weekend was so deafening that I decided to join the hype and playlist another track from the album this week. And what’s more, my son’s girlfriend Karina suggested to me that the release was the most important music event of the week and should be on the blog!
Although she claims to be the “the grandbaby of a moonshine man” from Gadsden, Alabama, Beyoncé’s grand plan to take on the country music ‘genre’ seems to date from her appearing at the Country Music Association Awards alongside The (Dixie) Chicks in 2016. Dressed all in white to contrast them in black (are you getting the imagery there?), they performed her country-ish song Daddy Lessons from her Lemonade LP, which segued into The Chick’s Long Time Gone. The white establishment of the CMA was unimpressed and social media inevitably got ugly.
And so, five years in the making, Cowboy Carter has appeared, 27 tracks and 80 minutes long and with statement guest slots by Willie Nelson, Dolly Parton and legendary black country singer Linda Martell. There’s a cover of Jolene (with a new bridge and coda) but, while the acoustic instrumentation lends the album an Americana feel on tracks like Protector, it’s far from full-on country and has plenty of Queen Bey style on there. As Martell says in the intro to the very hip-hop Spaghetti, “Genres are a funny little concept, eh?”
The obvious WIS thing to do would be to playlist her excellent cover of Paul McCartney’s Blackbiird (double i?), which he has said he wrote just after the assassination of MLK as a tribute to the vilified black students in the Little Rock Nine. It is followed on the record by the equally excellent 16 Carriages, where Beyoncé seems to be setting her very early days touring with Destiny’s Child as some sort of Nashville tale of a lonely travelling outcast, struggling to survive. But I’ve gone for the moody opener Ameriican Requiem (another double i) which sets the scene for the record and seems to refer back to that CMA appearance: “There’s a lot of chatter in here/But let me make myself clear/Can you hear me?/Or do you fear me?”. It’s a powerful, genre-defying song with elements of country, blues, jazz, soul and gospel – a declaration of intent in a half-spoken requiem for the hidden contribution of African-Americans to what is known as ‘country music’. You know, Karina may well have been right.
Last Word
Not only has the word count gone a bit mental this week – there was just so much to say! – but I also realise that there is less familiar stuff in the grooves this time round. I’m not going to apologise for this (the obscurity I mean, I’m always sorry about the verbosity) but I am going to say thanks for sticking with it. Not many blogs would segue The Fall into Beyoncé and so I am grateful for your resilience and your readership.
Regular readers will be aware that the Master Playlist rolls over into its second day of fine tunes by the addition of these songs. Get on it!
AR
Week In Sound 
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