“You can see people thinking, ‘These guys are not normal’” McGUINN
ROGER
THIS MONTH’S REVELATIONS FROM THE WORLD OF UNCUT FEATURING. . . The Byrds | End Of The Road | Buzzcocks | Dexys 4 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
However, The Byrds would undergo a seismic upheaval shortly after this photo session Drummer Michael Clarke quit during the Notorious Byrd Brothers sessions in August, and Crosby was fired later that autumn. While the band continued evolving without them, those losses marked the end of The Byrds’ remarkable first phase “I don’t remember how it all unravelled,” Crosby writes “I remember what I was starting to get into, and it was dark Deep down, I probably wanted to leave The Byrds any way because The Byrds didn’t swing. We did what we did real good, but I wanted to swing.”
D O N H U N S T E I N / S O N Y M U S C A R C H I V E J I M D I C K S O N A R C H V E C O U R T E S Y O F H E N R Y D L T Z P H O T O G R A P H Y
STEPHEN DEUSNER
Byrds on the street!
brolly
Notorious brothers:The Byrds
O this day The Byrds don’t know who gave them that yellow umbrella “It was not owned by any of us,” insists Chris Hillman to Uncut. “It was probably brought along by the photographer, Don Hunstein, who was Columbia Records’ staff photographer ”
The Byrds 1 9 6 4 1 9 6 7 is published by BMG Books on September 2 0
T
A in New York marks the beginning of the end for the folk-rock pioneers’first phase
Jangle
fever: during their first US tour July 1965
After playing the Monterey Pop Festival in June 1967, the band had f lown to New York for a television show but first they spent an afternoon walking around the city with Hunstein and that big yellow umbrella. They interacted with kids running through open fire hydrants and had beers at a local bar. Out among everyday New Yorkers, The Byrds looked the part of rock stars. “You can see people walking by and looking at us, thinking, ‘These guys are not normal,’” writes Roger McGuinn in The Byrds 1964 1967, a new book of photographs curated by Hillman, McGuinn and David Crosby
yellow umbrella
They were at the height of their psychedelic phase and tensions within the band had eased, if only brief ly. “Everybody was getting along well in that time period,” says Hillman. “There was nothing out of the ordinary with friction, although in all musical groups disagreements were common ”
Compiling these photographs many of which were pulled from the Sony archives and have never been published amounted to an unofficial reunion “We were all working remotely on the project,” says Hillman “We individually chose the photographs each of us liked, then we all reviewed the choices and came to the final cut together. Being in that band was the most important thing any of us have ever done, and for me this book represents the best period in the band’s history.”
in New York City 1967 OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 5
“It’s a real music lovers’ festival,” he says proudly “People aren’t there just to get fucked up and have this lair y party although it’s obviously not completely tame! Hopefully people notice the attention to detai l that we’ve put into it, from ever y art installation to the way we curate the bands.” Here are Taffe’s top tips for a short cut to EOTR nir vana we’ll see you down the front… SAM RICHARDS
I’m into a lot of Africa n music a nd this is just pounding live energy You feel like you’re in a workout session, they fully go for it for a solid hour. It’s like going into a boxing ring with lots of people a joyful boxing ring! You don’t ha ve to know the ba nd a t a ll, just turn up a nd you ca n’t not enjoy the show
ALABASTER DePLUME
End Of The Road takes place at Larmer Tree Gardens, Wiltshire, on September 1 4 Swing by the Talking Heads stage for Uncut’s daily Q&A sessions with some of the festival’s biggest names full details revealed soon!
NAIMA BOCK
’
BCUC
I’ve been following her for a couple of yea rs Obviously she wa s in Goa t Girl ba ck in the da y a nd she’s pa rt of this whole ‘rebirth of folk’ scene in South London a t the moment with Broa dside Ha cks a nd Shovel Da nce Collective But her solo stuff a lso ha s this Bra zilia n element, a nd her voice is just incredible I sa w her with a full ba nd a t Serva nt Ja zz Qua rters a nd it wa s one of my fa vourite shows of la st yea r.
He’s been on the scene a round the Tota l Refreshment Centre for yea rs, but there’s no one who sounds like him He’s doing something completely different where he’s mixing ja zz a nd folk a nd spoken word. He’s got this Northern wit a bout him, but a lso this pure joy. There’s something ma gica l a bout him, like a sha ma n You don’t ever know wha t to expect from his performa nce, but he ha s this qua lity where he ma kes you feel a ma zing.
6 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
End Of The Road
Woodland wonders
s Simon Taffe selects six of the best from this year ’ s festival
THE MAGNETIC FIELDS
GRACE CUMMINGS
She’s from Austra lia a nd she’s in the world of King Gizza rd, a ll those ba nds, but she’s nothing like them It’s kind of folk punk, I guess Actua lly the best wa y to describe her is like a blues singer. She’s got this rea lly deep, gra velly voice, a lmost like a fema le Nick Ca ve. I’m rea lly excited a bout her a s someone new on the scene a nd I think she’s going to go fa r
For me, they’re one of the most exciting English ba nds a round They pla yed la st yea r a nd we ha d to ha ve them ba ck Singer Ben Woods ha s got this rea lly dry style tha t’s kinda country ish, but not. I guess the best compa rison is Bill Ca lla ha n meets Da vid Byrne His songwriting’s so grown up a nd interesting a nd funny
THE GOLDEN DREGS
“WE always tr y to give people something they don’t expect,” says EOTR co founder and curator Simon Taffe. As well as the festival’s usual smattering of secret shows and pop up performances, the Disco Ship has been transformed into The Boat a new live stage dedicated to out there sounds that Taffe describes as “Cafe Oto in the forest”, hosting the likes of James Holden, Snapped Ankles and Duncan Marquiss.
S O N N Y M A L H O T R A C; H R S A L M E I D A S; H A U N G O R D O N G; E T T Y M A G E S
I think Stephin [Merritt] is one of the grea test living songwriters The wa y he uses words is so spot on, funny a nd wry It’s very underpla yed but still show y a s well I’ve been trying to get him to pla y since our first yea r in 2006. I don’t think he’s much of a festiva l person, but we convinced him with the a llure of the Ga rden Sta ge It’ll be quite a specia l Sa turda y night hea dline show even if some idiot’s put them up a ga inst the Pixies!
The ma na ger sa id, do you wa nt to ca rry on a s Steve Diggle a nd do it tha t wa y?
B E N P O L L A R D OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 7
“I didn’t realise the sound of the crowd was so important to me”
But we a lrea dy ha d gigs booked a s the Buzzcocks, so tha t decided it rea lly
Sonics In The Soul out Cherry Red
He’s your man! On sale now is the 148 page Deluxe Edition of our Ultimate Music Guide to Leonard Cohen We revisi t all his albums with the people who worked on them, there’s an expanded take on our ‘ on the road’ feature from 2008, plus a deep dive into Cohen’s turbulent early 1970s.You want i t darker? Dim the lights for a sneak preview of the forthcoming documentary and a new review of Len on film…
Also still in shops or available from Uncut co uk/single is our Curated By… Pavement special edition Essential reading for summer babes and range lifers everywhere!
dyna mics simila r, a bit of light a nd sha de here a nd there. Ha lf wa y through demoing songs, though, I did ha ve this nosta lgic moment I thought a bout the first rehea rsa l we ever ha d a nd I rea lised I’ll never ha ve tha t moment a ga in. Tha t wa s when I ca me up with [opening track] “Senses Out Of Control”, which wa s a bit of a nod to tha t time
And here you are still playing, as are many of your punk peers. There’s a lot of mythology a bout the punk da ys, but wha t I remember most is the first six months a nd the impa ct punk ha d. It wa s like a ca rpet bomb. I’ve never seen so ma ny people inspired. Every town we went to, pla ying on the White Riot tour a nd stuff, people would be like, “I’m so gla d you lot a re here this town wa s dea d before a ll this ha ppened a nd now it’s come a live.” You ha d to rethink your whole consciousness. And it inspired everyone, from people ma king films or writing books even a roa d sweeper wa s proba bly sweeping roa ds differently. It still inspires me now. But punk wa s a lso a bout looking forwa rd, not ba ck, a nd we’re still doing tha t. In fa ct, I’m a lrea dy writing songs for the next Buzzcocks a lbum a fter this one JOHNNY SHARP
I Steve. You’re about to release the f irst Buzzcocks album for eight years and of course the f irst without fellow founding member Pete Shelley. Was there ever any question of you winding up the g roup? Well, it wa s a very pa inful period I lost my brother of 43 yea rs But we ha d gigs booked, including one a t the Roya l Albert Ha ll, which turned into a memoria l for Pete.
H
You wrote much of Sonics In The Soul during lockdown… Yea h, I’ve got a studio a t home but I a lso ha ve a shed in my ga rden During lockdown with a ll our gigs ca ncelled, I wa s digging out a ll these old ta pes, pla ying a lot of live a lbums a nd old bootlegs I found, proba bly ’cos I wa s missing pla ying live
A standout song on the new record is “Manchester Rain”. It’s amazing that title hasn’t been used before… Yea h, I did think, “Bloody hell, it’s the most obvious title going!” But it ca me from being a t the sta ge door in Ma nchester I’m signing some things for some kids a nd they sa id, “We’re just sta rting a ba nd,” a nd I thought, ‘Tha t wa s me, 40 odd yea rs a go.’
on September 2 3
“Punk’s about looking forward”
November’s EFG London Jazz Festival has just revealed details of a Don Cherry tribute at the Barbican on November 20.Helmed by Kahil El’Zabar’ s Ethnic Heritage Ensemble, the concert will feature guest appearances from the extended Cherry clan, including David Ornette Cherry Neneh Cherry and Naima Karlsson
Buzzcocks’Steve Diggle on the bittersweet experience of making a new album without his “brother of 43 years ” Pete Shelley
I mea n, Johnny Ma rr does Smiths songs, a nd Peter Hook does Joy Division a nd New Order songs
is
A Q U I CK O N E
on
Was it a strange experience going into the studio without Pete? At first I ha d to trea t it just the sa me, a s if he wa s somewhere else writing his songs a nd I wa s doing mine But nonetheless it wa s like being with a woma n for the first time you’re not quite sure wha t’s going to ha ppen! Previously on a Buzzcocks record it would be Pete’s songs a nd mine a lterna ting, so when I chose the tra cklisting I tried to ma ke the
Your own bootlegs? Oh no, it wa s a ll other ba nds. I ca n’t a ctua lly listen to old Buzzcocks stuff now, ma inly beca use of Pete’s voice it’s too pa inful for me to hea r it No, I listened to old Stones gigs, Bowie gigs, Springsteen live stuff, a ll sorts of stuff. Anything live, rea lly The sound of the crowd, I didn’t rea lise it wa s so importa nt to me
Talking of Leonard Cohen, Blue Note are poised to issue an album of jazzy Cohen covers, sung by the likes of James Taylor, Norah Jones, Peter Gabriel, Mavis Staples and Iggy Pop Here It Is: A Tribute To Leonard Cohen is out on October 14
Post Pete:Steve Diggle fronts the new look Buzzcocks
I
Was it odd performing a song partly inspired by her romance (and subsequent break up) with Rowland? “You might have thought so, but I honestly gave it ver y little thought at the time Possibly because of my classical training, I’ve always been good at compartmentalising, at keeping the different aspects of my life in isolation. Again, it’s the discipline that’s always been part and parcel of working with Kevin your energ y is trained in one direction ”
After Rowland disbanded Dexys in the late ’80s, O’Hara went on to work with Tanita Tikaram before taking a 23 year break from music to raise a family Now back in the Dexys fold, she’s been involved in the remixing of Too Rye Ay, though their plans for an accompanying tour had to be scrapped owing to Rowland’s ongoing recovery from a motorcycle accident Instead, O’Hara has been recording and touring with Tim Burgess. Does she ever wonder what might have been had she chosen the other path back in 1982 and instead f lown to Bilbao to play symphonies? “Haha! Honestly, it’s not a question I’ve asked myself often over the years I suppose I could be f luent in Spanish by now ” TERRY STAUNTON
What’s She Like is released by Route Publishing on October 1 ; Too Rye Ay: As It Should Have Sounded is out on October 1 4
via UMC/Mercury Come on Helen! Dexys M idnight Runners at Diamond Sound RehearsalStudios, Birmingham September 1982;(right) Helen today “I watched Kevin throw his dungarees in a bin” As Too-Rye-Ay gets remixed,Dexys violinist Helen O’Hara reflects on her relationship – both musicaland romantic – with Kevin Rowland B R A N C O O K E / R E D F E R N S N A T A C H A H O R N E ; K I M K N O T T 8 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 Going preppy: Dexys in 1985
“In many ways, the discipline he demanded wasn’t that different to the classical world he would stand facing us like
N the summer of 1982, Helen O’Hara faced a difficult choice About to graduate from the Birmingham School Of Music, the violinist received an offer to join the Bilbao Symphony Orchestra She’d also been asked to join Dexys Midnight Runners a volatile band on the verge of splitting up “Although I still wasn’t a full time member and there were no guarantees, it was the most exciting thing I’d ever been part of,” she says of choosing the rock’n’roll path. “The general sense was that they were going to call it a day if their new song didn’t make the Top 40, so it was either mad or courageous. My mum wasn’t pleased!”
prominent foil to Kevin Rowland in the band’s live shows and videos The story of the song and the making of its parent album Too Rye Ay is recounted in evocative detail in her new memoir What’s She Like, published to coincide with a 40th anniversary makeover of the album
O’Hara paid little attention to the pop world while studying, and had only a vague idea who Dexys were when the group tracked her down at college and invited her along to rehearsals “My brother had to tell me they were the ones that did ‘Geno’, but I’d not heard much else by them,” she admits “I didn’t know what to expect, although I was immediately impressed by Kevin’s work ethic.
To compound the intensity, at the height of Too Rye Ay’s success O’Hara and Rowland became lovers. She observed at close quarters how Rowland shunned success and was determined to pursue his quixotic muse, even if that meant alienating fans with a new preppy look: “I watched Kevin throw his dungarees in a bin ” One of only two musicians retained for 1985’s Don’t Stand Me
Down, O’Hara’s expanded role saw her overseeing arrangements and co writing three tracks, including the 12 and a half minute centrepiece “This Is What She’s Like” that gives her book its title
a conductor and tell us exactly what to do. There was little room for improvisation, if any. He had everything worked out in his head beforehand ”
A month or so later, “Come On Eileen” was sitting pretty at the top of the charts on its way to becoming the year’s biggest selling single in the UK, with O’Hara an increasingly
AOIFE NESSA FRANCES
“An effortless synthesis of the best of the last 60 years of acoustic music” Robin Pecknold, Fleet Foxes M YO U R FAN
M A R C O L A F E R A N D I S A B E L A V D D E; M I L Y J O H N S T O N 1 0 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
N
JOHN CALE
HE thing about the Tropicá lia movement in the ’60s and ’70s is they would bring all the inf luences from the world of music and mix it in a Brazilian way I wanted to make something that would bring some of those elements back and connect it with music in the moment I feel that people are getting the connection.” So says Tim Bernardes, the 31 year old Sã o Paulo singer whose lush, metaphysical folk is making waves far beyond his homeland, where he’s something of an indie star (“I get recognised in certain neighbourhoods”) When we speak, Bernardes is in New York, halfway through his first US tour, opening for Fleet Foxes as the guest of Robin Pecknold, who also invited him to sing on “Going To The Sun Road” on their recent album Shore
PIERS MARTIN
Tableau HEAVENLY Talking of Eno,his Oblique Strategies have inspired this Halifax trio to cast off the chirpiness of thei r first records and open the door to a universe of experimental pop possibility
Bernardes was raised in a musical household. His father was in the experimental new wave act Os Mulheres Negras, who put out a couple of LPs on Warners in the late ’80s, and his mother is a teacher and therapist They’d listen to “the classics” of Brazilian pop Os Mutantes, Tom Zé, Veloso and noticed their son enjoyed the music too, enrolling him in classes and supporting him as he mastered guitar, bass, piano and drums. He learnt to record at home on his father’s equipment.
U N CUT PLAYLI ST
On the stereo this month...
Wearing shades and with a silver chain dangling over a white vest, Bernardes looks every inch the boho beatnik on Zoom as he does on the cover of his enchanting second album Mil Coisas Invisíveis A Thousand Invisible Pieces released online in June and available physically next month It’s a rich meander through the psyche of an unnaturally gifted performer whose poetic ruminations on love, life, truth and beauty give his svelte chamber pop a wryly existential quality. On “Meus 26” he compares his spirit to the geography of his country “I saw my inner map in the external map of Brazil, a philosophical ref lection,” he says while “A Balada De Tim Bernardes” is a joyous hymn to overthinking, where Caetano Veloso meets Paul McCartney.
Lush,philosophicalfolk in the tradition of the Tropicália greats
YOU’VE CHANGE D Toronto based stained glass restorer and member of Daniel Romano’s Outfi t (see p28) channels Judee,Dolly and Emmylou on a lustrous,emotional country rock set
BRIAN ENO
Avant R&B singer meets ambient jazz arranger and Chris Forsyth collaborator to explore the “ power of self expression through living art ” Pretentious,sure But also quite beautiful
“Herr Bar (Improv)” WARP
I ’
Encouraged to sing higher by Annette Peacock,LA’s Michael Collins ascends to soft rock heaven in the slipstream of Phi l Lynott, Ned Doheny and Boz Scaggs.
“Night Crawling” DOMINO
DRUGDEALER Hiding In Plain Sight
“There Were Bells” UMC Debuted at the Acropolis last summer, the lead single from vocal heavy new album Foreverandevernomore is a sad, slow threnody for a burning planet
M E RGE
The record took shape during lockdown in Sã o Paulo when Bernardes was forced to stop touring with his band of 10 years, O Terno, a
The Bowie collab that never was.Cale draws on his mid ’70s misadventures with the Thin White Duke for this coolly ambivalent ode to New York nightlife
popular psych rock trio started with a schoolfriend “I was writing stuff that was more abstract and loose than things I’ve written before,” he says of the Mil Coisas Invisíveis material “But if you want to see the profoundness in it, you can find it. I don’t like hard music or super erudite stuff.”
MEXICAN SUMMER
JULIANNA RIOLINO AllBlue
SUN RA ARKESTRA
Living Sky OMNI SOUND
He spent 2021 working in his home studio and adding strings and brass with other players at Estudio Canoa, where he recorded his solo debut, 2017’s Recomeçar (which was nominated for a Latin Grammy for best Portuguese language alternative album). “I was going to this professional studio, then coming back to my home studio, so the album was done in these two environments, between the very inner self and the outside world ”
THE ORIELLES
Tim Bernardes
Led by the astonishing Marshall Allen (98),the Arkestra remain one of earth’s most potent life giving forces Three soaring new tunes,a couple of Sun Ra reworks… and a spot of Chopin!
H
I ’
From a deluxe edition of Clark ’ s 2006 electronica landmark Body Double,a protean version of the album’s opening track featuring his much missed former labelmates Broadcast. M E W E R E
DAWN RICHARD & SPENCER ZAHN Pigments
Mil Coisas Invisíveis is out now digitally on Psychic Hotline; physical editions follow on September 9
“T
While Bernardes is plugged in to contemporary sounds, raving about Dirty Projectors and Mac DeMarco, it is the music of the ’60s and ’70s that resonates most strongly with this self confessed Beatles nut. “I like the idea that you got to create your own sound, your own thing, during that time,” he says “Discovering that kind of pop culture is profound It’s a multi phased expression of a subjective feeling and it inf luences everything I do in my life.”
Protector PART SAN Rich,mellifluent follow up to her dreamy debut Land Of No Junction,inspired by morning swims at County Kerry’s spectacular Inch Beach
CLARK
We end on afarewell, with acut from Mac Rebennack’s fina l album, Things Happen That Way
electronics, post rock and afro harp into its digitally cut up stew. Check out our lead review, plus Q& A with McCraven, on page 24
J O N M E D I N A ; S U L Y M A N P A T R I C A V Á Z Q U E Z G Ó M E Z
So There
1 3 MARISA ANDERSON The Crack Where The Light Gets In
Marisa Anderson
Dream Another
More than 40 years after his last album, swamp pop pioneer Tommy McLain is back with anew record, I Ran Down Ever y Dream Elvis Costello and Nick Lowe feature elsewhere, while this track finds the extravagantly bearded veteran in fine voice and agood mood
1 GA-2 0
7 LAMBCHOP
6 THE AFGHAN WHIGS
8 TOMMY McLAIN
Newly signed to Sub Pop, and even publicly lauded by superfan Bob Odenkirk, things are looking good for Doug Martsch W hen The Wind Forgets Your Name encapsulates all that’s grea t about his band, and takes him off into some bold directions with the help of anew rhythm section from Brazil’s Oruã .
1 1 PLAINS Problem With It
After acollaborative record with William Tyler, this most skilled guitarist has struck out on her own again. The eight track Still, Here is
Last year’s Showtunes marked ashift in Kurt Wagner’s music, but here’s another one: more rhythmically focused, the songs on new LP The Bible take the Nashville songwriter’s meditations on life, death and more into amoving new space He speaks on page 22
3 JAKE BLOUNT
Transplanted to rura l Wales during lockdown, this American songwriter and herbalist has crafted afine new album with Lessons For Mutants She speaks to Uncut on page 36 about rage in music and going “full kitchen witch”.
By My Lonesome
9 MAKAYA McCRAVEN
How Do You Burn? finds Greg Dulli back a t the helm of the Whigs for the first time in five years He takes us through his finest albums on page 68, describing this track as “amash of Buzzcocks and The Smiths”.
15 tracks of the month’s best new music 1 2 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 GA 20
The New Faith finds American folk musician Blount using traditiona l songs, field recordings and hip hop to tell an Afrofuturist tale of post apocalyptic rejuvenation. This unique record is our Album Of The Month on page 18
1 2 THE BLACK ANGELS Without A Trace
A pan Arabic collective led by a Parisian, and augmented by alternative icons like Lee Ranaldo, Al Qasa r make an invigorating noise Here their galloping rock’n’roll is fronted by Sudanese American exile Alsarah, calling for revolution in the language of love poetry. Check out our review and interview on page 37.
A little glossier, here’s ahighlight from Autofiction, Brett Anderson and co’s “nasty, brutish and short” new record They tell us all about the album in our six page feature on page 82.
Friday Night
Makaya McCraven
Following Alex Maas’s impressive 2020 solo album, Luca, his group are back with Wilderness Of Mirrors, their first record in five years. As “Without A Trace” suggests, the vibe is dark and transportive, the guitars, Mellotrons and bass ragged and wild
1 5 Again
A Line Of Shots
Now Playing
We begin with some lowdown, dirty rock’n’roll courtesy of this bass less blues rock trio Taken from their new album Crackdown, it’s raw and lo fi, as thrilling and lopsided as early rock’n’roll may have sounded in its heyday
4 JOHANNA WARREN Piscean Lover
More than just ajazz album, In These Times is astunning achievement by this Chicago drummer, taking in elements of
adiverse ref lection of her talents as an improviser, composer and player, with this song emphasising the desert blown prettiness she can conjure up.
1 0 BUILT TO SPILL Spiderweb
2 SUEDE
Once There Was No Sun
1 4 AL-QASAR Hobek Thawrat (feat Alsarah)
1 5 DR JOHN Sleeping Dogs Best Left Alone
After some hard years, Orton has returned with one of her strongest records, Weather Alive, written on
an unfamilia r piano and tracked with the likes of Tom Skinner of The Smile and Sons Of Kemet. Read our full review and Q& A on page 27
Livin’ On The Losin’ End
5 BETH ORTON
A new collaboration between fine Americanasinger songwriters Katie Crutchfield (Waxahatchee) and Jess Williamson, Plains is driven by easy rhythms and strident sibling esque harmonies, the partnership pushing both to a deeper sense of traditionalism.
Reviewed on page 32, it’s aspirited, understated hymn to country music, with “Sleeping Dogs ” atouching and very wise slice of bayou funk.
“When we introduced a computer in the studio, we didn’t play any more”
KarlBartos:“ Kraftwerk was the aestheticisation of technology”
14 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
You’ve helped shape electronic music and pop culture as a whole. However, what’s the one thing that you feelgoes unappreciated about Kraftwerk?
I’d like to know something about Die Mensch Maschine:which riffs did you write for that album?
Ra ther tha n crea ting his own sounds, Ba rtos is currently concerned with pa ying deeper a ttention to those tha t a lrea dy exist a round us. “Ambience is rea lly grea t. I’ve lea rned a lot from John Ca ge a bout tha t he sa id, the grea t symphony is if you go to a crossroa ds a nd listen to the rhythm of the ca rs Around here, you hea r ships a ll the time. But ba sica lly a nything ma kes a symphony. It’s rea lly a grea t va riety of noises in this world ”
Putting a new spin on sound: Pierre Schaeffer, November 1955
Interview by SA M RICH A RDS
Adriano Bonelli, Italy
Te ex Kraftwerk man on the secrets of Kling Klang, nights out with Neil Tennant, and Cliff Richard’s influence on New York electro
The a tmosphere wa s like wha t you ca n rea d a bout Andy Wa rhol’s Fa ctory It wa s this big va riety of useless things a nd useful things. In one corner of the room I sa w a neon la mp, a nd so I ha d this feeling of a n a rt pla ce, not rea lly a musica l studio The frst time I went there, we pla yed a t a low level I ha d these knitting needles in my ha nd a nd the sound of them hitting the meta l pa d wa s very loud in the room. You ca n’t rea lly use your technique if you ha ve a knitting needle! So I get a long, a nd it wa s OK But the next time we pla yed full volume, a nd tha t ma kes a diference beca use then suddenly the sounds were much louder tha n a norma l drum set. The a rticula tion wa s very low, you ha d just one boom! But over the yea rs we developed a style of modula ting it through ma chines, technica l
Ba sica lly I wrote on every song, so it’s not just a rif or a rhythm. For insta nce, my frst copyright wa s “Metropolis”. I don’t know where it ca me from but I wa s ca ught by this La tin America n rif you know these Cuba n pia no pla yers, a very syncopa ted rif. I twisted it a round a nd brought it into the studio, a nd tha t wa s it!
From my persona l point of view, we didn’t invent so much, beca use it wa s a ll there before There wa s electronic sound with Pierre Scha efer in Fra nce who invented musique concrète, trea ting everyda y sounds a s it were music. And if you listen ca refully to “Yellow Subma rine”, wha t you will discover is tha t it ha s this musique concrète a tmosphere Everybody is hitting meta l sta kes or ma king other noises, so it’s rea lly a n a coustic flm. This is the idea Kra fwerk took on, but the ma in diference between us a nd a ll these predecessors is tha t we ma de [ people] a wa re of the na ture of technology a nd tried not to hide the technology behind a wooden pa nel This is ma ybe wha t ha s been overlooked a ll the time in Kra fwerk.
OR a musicia n synonymous with the interfa ce between music a nd technology, Ka rl Ba rtos’s Ha mburg home studio is surprisingly spa rta n “I ha ve a pia no, a Ma rtin D 28 guita r a nd a computer,” he revea ls “The core of my old equipment like the MiniMoog a nd the Arp synthesiser is still there, but they seem to retire now. Usua lly I go out a nd record something in the streets.”
Can you describe your feelings the first time you entered Kling Klang studio and played the electronic drums? John Densmore, Sunderland
Ba rtos wa s a lwa ys a versa tile musicia n In his memoir The Sound Of The Machine, recently tra nsla ted into English, he describes hot footing it between Kra fwerk’s Kling Kling studio a nd the orchestra pit a t the Deutsche Oper a m Rhein, while a lso pla ying drums in a rock’n’roll ba nd a nd vibra phone in a ja zz qua rtet. The ra nge of infuences tha t powered minima list ma sterpieces like The Man Machine a nd Computer World wa s broa der tha n you think “I a lwa ys listen to music a s a whole,” sa ys Ba rtos, settling down to a nswer your questions. “It’s a ll the sound of being huma n.”
Ollie Storey, via email
A L O V E R D R I V E J O H N S A D O V Y / B I P S / G E T T Y M A G E S OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 15
efects, a nd so on It wa s a n interesting cha llenge, a nd it opened my ea rs to things I knew a lrea dy. Sly & The Fa mily Stone, they were using a drum ma chine but I didn’t notice so much beca use it wa s deep in the music Wha t ha ppened with Kra fwerk wa s the a estheticisa tion of technology Like the Eifel Tower there’s no fa ça de, it’s just this pure skeleton.
F
Karl Bartos AN AUDIENCE WITH...
In the German edition of your autobiography,you noted that you stillhad the Kling Klang studio session tapes.Is i t a possibility these could be released in the future?
Dave Fanshawe, Keighley
Hedonistic? I don’t know, they’re a ma zing good musicia ns They ca me to visit me in my studio when I still lived in Düsseldorf a nd it wa s just insta nt, I liked them very much. They were very funny a nd very serious a t the sa me time like music! We spent quite a lot of time together We went to the Ha çienda , a nd I went to Berlin with Berna rd for the Love Pa ra de. So we ha d good times together. Our night out with Neil Tenna nt in Soho? It wa s very priva te! He took us to some rea lly good pla ces a nd we were cruising through Soho in the night But I wa nt to rema in friends, you know?
computer, nothing is revolving, there’s no a ir to brea the inside the computer’s virtua l spa ce a nd nothing ha ppens It kills communica tion When we frst introduced a computer in the studio, we didn’t pla y a ny more. We didn’t look ea ch other in the eye a nd couldn’t pla y
I must sa y, I never wa s so much into techno. I think it’s good when you a re in a club a nd if you wa nt to da nce a ll night, a nd you’re in a pa rty mood But it’s just one little slice of music, a nd there’s so ma ny slices
Bartos in 1998, releasing the second album by his Elektric Music project
The Sound Of the Machine: My Life In Kraftwerk And Beyond is out now, published by Omnibus Press
James Testa, via email
What would have been your preferred direction for Kraftwerk to go in during the ’90s, had you remained a part of the band?
“They were very funny and very serious at the same time”:Bernard Sumner (left) and Johnny Marr hook up as Electronic
P A T R C K F O R D / R E D F E R N S 16 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
“Sometimes it’s better to climb the mountain instead of using a cable car”
from a n elite ba ckground, wha t you’re looking for, wha t you’ve been told, is tha t you’ve got to ha ve success As long a s we were successful, everything wa s OK. And then in the middle of the ’80s we did Electric Cafe, a nd it wa sn’t so successful It wa s rea lly a fop And a t the sa me time, everybody wa s now using electronic drums, electronic keyboa rds, synthesisers. My elite friends Ra lf a nd Floria n, they were overwhelmed by tha t. And so they stopped working. We were stuck in the studio for a lmost 10 yea rs, a nd tha t wa s too much for me in the end
Beau Waddell, via email Pla y live! We didn’t pla y live a fer 1981 until 1990. So it wa s ridiculous. Also, we just did one record a nd a fer we ca me up with Electric Cafe we ma de a terrible mista ke, to remix our own records. In the second ha lf of the ’80s, we were listening too much to wha t’s going on in the world a nd on other records We went to the da ncefoor a nd pla yed our songs there, a nd we compa red them to other tra cks like competition. And from a utonomous a rtists, we cha nged into sound designers.
I ha ve to confess tha t since Ea ster, I’m stuck in the St Matthew Passion I’m a big fa n of Ba ch a nd I will a lwa ys listen to Stra vinsky or to John Ca ge. But a pa rt from cla ssica l music I will only listen to people I know persona lly So I listened to Fever Dream by Johnny Ma rr, beca use I know him I will listen to the next New Order record, defnitely. But too ma ny people a re sending me records a ll the time! I ha ve to ma ke my decision, I ca n’t listen to everybody
After Kraftwerk you worked with Johnny Marr and Bernard Sumner on an Electronic album.How did you adapt to their more hedonistic world?
I read somewhere that Ral f was the bad cop and Florian [Schneider] was the good cop is that how you remember them? Peter Fors, Stockholm
The gentlema n ha s to wa it until I die! I ca n’t relea se it I will fa ce some problems if I do. Ma ybe I will fnd a museum to ma ke a real [Kraf werk] retrospective. I don’t hea r the ta pes very ofen, but when I wrote the book I wa s listening to it And it brought me ba ck to this idea I ha ve of the Kla ng Kla ng studio a s a room where time wa s revolving a round itself on the ta pe ma chine. Now, if you open up a
Claud Smith, via email
What did you think when you first heard Afrika Bambaataa’s “Planet Rock”? Laurence Gibbs, Walthamstow, London
Clarisse Quilino, via email
I wa s with Ra lf [Hütter] on the da ncefoor in Cologne. There were so ma ny good records a t this moment, a ll these electronic pop sounds. But “Pla net Rock” wa s a celebra tion of the da ncefoor in a diferent style tha n disco Disco wa s just ma rching music, I thought the ma rching drums! They picked up my bea t, the “Numbers” bea t, a ppa rently with a n 808 ma chine. But a ctua lly I pla yed it by ha nd with a nother record in mind. You know Clif Richa rd, the funny singer with the grea t voice? He recorded a song [originally by Bobby Freeman] ca lled “Do You Wa nna Da nce?” The drummer, Bria n Bennett, he pla yed a n introduction four or eight ba rs a nd when I wa s very young I thought, ‘Wow!’ The drumbea t wa s so cool a nd this song stuck in my mind And for some rea son on this evening a t the Kling Kla ng studio, my subconscious is bringing the feeling of this drumbea t a nd I pla yed somehow the feeling inside not the drumbea t itself, but my subconscious did a tra nsforma tion This got rea lly lost in the computer a ge beca use it’s so simple to ma ke a n a coustic photogra ph of the event or sa mple it directly. But sometimes it’s better to climb the mounta in instea d of using a ca ble ca r.
Kraftwerk were a major influence on techno,which became a huge scene in Germany Did you ever visi t any of the famous German techno clubs like Tresor or Berghain,and i f so what did you think?
They were a ctua lly much a like They ca me both from a very wea lthy ba ckground they ha d deep pockets! If you come
What kind of music do you like listening to nowadays? Any recent tracks on repeat?
JAKE BLOUNT The
Ambitious Afrofuturist
Your wallet looks a little thin/If you can t pay you d better learn to swim T A D N B R E G O ALB U M O F TH E M O NTH 9/10 1 8 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
OCTOB E R 2022 TAKE 305 1 LAM BCHOP (P22) 2 BETH ORTON (P27) 3 PIXIES (P30) 4 DR JOH N (P32)
A multi instrumentalist and singer from Washington DC, Blount’s recorded CV is still pretty slim. He self released an EP in 2017, cut an old time folk album as part of The Moose Whisperers a year later, then followed up with a similar efort (alongside fddler Libby Weitnauer) as Tui. But it was 2020’s solo debut, Spider Tales, that brought him wider notice A scintillating set of repurposed old tunes, centred around banjo and fddle, the album sought to uncover the hidden codes of American roots music, reframing them from a black and queer perspective Blount is better qualifed than most when it comes to this stuf. Armed with a degree
CTAVIA BUTLER’S 1993 sci f novel, Parable Of The Sower, traces the plight of a young black woman in a post apocalyptic world, gathering companions on a journey to form a new community in Northern California. The contributing factors are made depressingly clear climate change, the fall of society, corporate shithousery leading her to set up an entirely new religion, Earthseed An early example of Afrofuturism, the story has now inspired a direct corollary in Jake Blount’s remarkable The New Faith.
in ethnomusicology, he’s a scholar with an informed take on black and indigenous American folk tradition, highlighting the centuries deep connection to a form of Appalachian music that’s ofen perceived as primarily white When he’s not playing or recording, you’ll most likely fnd Blount teaching banjo, undertaking duties as a founder member of Bluegrass Pride, or maybe sharing his knowledge at prestigious bodies like Berklee and Yale. All of this may suggest a somewhat dry approach to his art Yet Blount evidently values the innate physicality of the music he loves, making for the thrillingly raw and intimate nature of Spider Tales.
SMITHSONIAN FOLKWAYS concept work from roots music’s latest rising star. By Rob Hughes
T H E U N C U T G U I D E T O T H I S M O N T H ’ S K E Y R E L E A S E S
Richer, fuller and more complex, The New Faith develops the sound and allegorical ideas of its predecessor and hurls them forward into an imagined future
The album’s premise borrows from Octavia Butler’s dystopian template in ofen spectacular ways. The planet has been decimated by human folly, its ecosystem destroyed, its cities ravaged by warfare A small group of black refugees, “worn down by storms and starvation”, are cursed to wander northwards up the coast, eventually setting up home on an island in Maine Aside from one another, their only comforts are the songs New Faith
O
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dwindling of hope, Blount sings of fnding a home in the great beyond, guided by those ancestors who’ve already passed on: “My blood runs so chilly and so slow/The ones who have gone before me/Gon’pilot me through as I go” Skip James’ “They Are Waiting For Me” is a natural companion piece, though this takes a more celebratory tack, an airy folk tune convinced of its destiny through “those beautiful pearly white gates”.
10 Just As Well Get Ready,You Got To Die
Produced by:Jake Blount and Brian Slattery
The middle section of The New Faith, ‘The Psalms of the Gravedigger’, fnds its subjects reaching into spiritual and religious ritual for solace, seeking salvation in the promise of an aferlife Vera Hall’s late ’50s version is the key text for “Death Have Mercy”. Blount and Slattery choose to forgo the song’s customary mood a mournful lament, as popularised by Ralph Stanley’s “O Death” on the soundtrack of O Brother, Where Art Thou? for an upbeat, churchy kind of gospel stirrer, intercut with Demeanor rhymes.
Blount and co producer Brian Slattery soundtrack the refugees’ trek as a modern feld recording, based on black religious services from the frst half of last century. And while the source material is second hand (a thoughtful mixture of the arcane and the familiar), vivid new arrangements bring it to dazzling new life, together with periodic raps, fresh lyrical twists and Blount as omniscient narrator. A number of recorded samples, largely from the Caribbean and rural America, are defly looped through the songs, which are dominated by banjo, fddle and stomps and handclaps percussion
The key to The New Faith, you feel, lies in its fnal act Blount’s spoken word passage talks of the refugees drawing renewed strength in the depths of destitution, inspired by the terrible hardships undergone by their ancestors. To illustrate the idea of shared struggle, Blind Willie McTell’s “Just As Well To Get Ready, You Got To Die” is imprinted with another refrain of “Angola”, as Blount plays the same overlapping motif on banjo and strings.
of ancestral tradition they carry with them, time worn spirituals that remind them of home
The beautiful “Once There Was No Sun” closes the album on an equally forceful note Again gleaned from Bessie Jones, and making fnal use of “Angola”, it brings together everything that makes The New Faith so memorable: rousing gospel voices, a gorgeous banjo melody, carefully arranged strings and a historical through line that unites centuries of shared experience and human tribulation The secret to navigating the future, Blount suggests, is to assimilate the lessons of the past and remain vigil in the present.
“Give Up The World”, a 19th century slave song of unknown origin, cuts to the heart of the refugees’ essential dilemma: life or death, fght or fight Both options are presented almost within the same breath: “Why won’t you give up the world?/ My brother, don’t you give up the world!”
Personnel:Jake Blount (vocals fiddle banjo bass percussion strings) Brian Slattery (percussion, guitar,strings), Demeanor (vocals,banjo), MaliObomsawin (bass),Joe DeJarnette (bass),Samuel James (guitar), D’orjay The Singing Shaman, Kaia Kater,Lizzie No BrandiPace
7 City Called Heaven
Divided into three sections under the umbrella heading of psalms, The New Faith begins, naturally, with a baptism. “Take Me To The Water”, drawn from Bessie Jones’ recording in the mid ’60s, serves to cleanse the protagonists from the sins of their forefathers. Environmental sounds give the song a sense of locale, underpinned by an ominous drone, the result of Blount sampling a slamming metal door on an abandoned fort in Maine Crucially, too, it signals the frst use of a recurring historical source, “Angola”, sung by enslaved Africans in Jamaica in 1688 and collected by travelling British physician, Hans Sloane
2 The Downward Road
9 Psalms
T A D N B R E G O JAKE BLOUNT WITH TATIANA HARGREAVES “Reparations” SELF RELEASED 2017
FREE D RT 2020
Recorded at: Firehouse 12, New Haven, Connecticut; Acadia Recording Co , Portland,Maine; Jake s studio, Providence, Rhode Island; Brian’s studio, New Haven, Connecticut
TUI Pretty Little Mister
As the song segues into “Didn’t It Rain”, the Biblical account of Noah’s food made famous by Sister Rosetta Tharpe and Mahalia Jackson, the same opportunistic theme stalks its waves: “Cryin’brother, can’t you take a couple more/Brother said, Well, your wallet looks a little thin/If you can’t pay, you’d better learn to swim”.
A deep bass thrum plunges into the fathoms, before Blount’s voice is echoed by a gospel call and response from a trio of female guests: Rissi Palmer, D’orjay The Singing Shaman and the Uncut endorsed Kaïa Kater.
S L E E V E N O T E S
12 Once There Was No Sun
2019
A stirring set of mountain folk,blues and country songs,recorded with Tennessean fiddle player and singer Libby Weitnauer,drawn from mostly obscure sources and often selected for thei r inclusivity and diversity “Make Me A Pallet” highlights the plight of black migratory works in the post Civi l War era;the terrific “Woah Mule” is gleaned from Buffalo Soldier and fiddle player,Elijah Cox.8/10
3 Didn’ t It Rain
“City Of Heaven” is recast as a moody, slouching electric blues Here, amid the
SELF RELEASED
the rulers that failed to act on keeping the earth alive, leaving the remaining populace to walk a crowded path into darkness It also marks the entry of rapper Demeanor, aka Justin Harrington, nephew of another cutting edge roots musician, Rhiannon Giddens Blount’s lyrics
6
Blount’s personal vision of trad folk is pulled into sharp focus on his solo debut,a magisterial set that decrypts the pain,rage and resilience of black voices in historical Appalachian song, viewed through his own perspective as an LGBTQ activist Lead Belly’s “Where Did You Sleep Last Night” becomes a paean to friends lost to homelessness; “Brown Skin Baby” addresses ongoing issues of freedom and identity.8/10
1 Take Me To The Water/Prayer
The New Faith doesn’t pretend to be a prophecy or some kind of survival manual It is, instead, a celebration of the inherent power of community and music’s ability to connect and resonate through the ages, created by someone fast becoming one of the most important young voices in modern American folk music
5 Parable Death Have Mercy
11 Give Up The World
allude to centuries of pitiless exploitation, including the present day migrant crisis.
“The Downward Road” establishes the album’s narrative context, denouncing
Blount’s him team th fiddler Tatiana Hargreaves for a duets project that sought to reclaim and resurrect traditional black and Native American stringband and vocal forms The arrangements are simple and lively, from the much covered “John Henry” to Blount’s own instrumental,“Running Home To Doris”.7/10
wi
“They heard about the water rising/Made a plan to take advantage, had to enterprise it”, aps Demeanor “We can sell a boat, and can sell a boatload more for sure”.
8 They Are Waiting For Me
RissiPalmer Lillian Werbin (vocals)
debut EP saw
JAKE BLOUNT Spider Tales
H OW TO B UY. . . FAITH’S FOUNDATIONS From stripped-back debut EP to 2020 solo visions 2 0 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
4 Tangle Eye Blues
Below:Justin Harrington, aka Demeanor at the 2021 Newport Folk Festival Rhode Island, July 24 2021
What made Afrofuturism the idealway to present this idea?
When I pitched the a lbum to Smithsonia n Folkwa ys, it wa s like, “I wa nt to ma ke a n Afrofuturist a lbum tha t’s kind of a feld recording of bla ck religious music from a fer the clima te crisis ” So I went into it with tha t idea And when I go ba ck a nd listen to those old songs, I tend to feel tha t some of them a re not a ctua lly about religion. Religion is just the a va ila ble a llegory to discuss the topic tha t they wa nt to get to. So I listened through old recordings a nd rea d through old books, looking for things tha t ha d minima l Christia n ima gery, if a nything. I wa nted to think a bout things tha t could be fexible, tha t could lea ve brea thing room for the cultura l context tha t this thing is ha ppening in.
I think so. There a re moments on Spider Tales tha t a nticipa te The New Faith I defnitely a gree tha t this new a lbum is more complex, more persona l, a nd ha s a diferent kind of depth to it In some wa ys, it’s ta king the idea s behind Spider Tales, which were to explore these old tra ditions from within the community a nd the wa y tha t they progress through the genera tions, a nd throwing tha t hundreds of yea rs into the future It’s like, ‘Wha t would future people be singing if they went ba ck a nd dug through centuries old songs a nd interpreted them with the sounds a nd technology a va ila ble?’
It’s just been too big of a n infuence He a lso pla ys the ba njo, so I could send him a tra ck a nd he’d know wha t to do with it. It could’ve gone poorly if I’d chosen the wrong person, but he did just a n incredible job
Was there a moment during recording where i t suddenly started to come into focus for you?
T A D N B R E G O D O U G L A S M A S O N / G E T T Y I M A G E S OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 21
Jake Blount: “I feel like I was at the cutting edge of what I could do…”
Q& A
Afrofuturism ha s become a n importa nt pa rt of how I think a bout these tra ditions, pa rtia lly beca use I sometimes feel so disloca ted I’m a bi ra cia l bla ck person from a city tha t’s kind of Southern a nd kind of Northern, who grew up in a n upper middle cla ss setting but is performing working cla ss music So there’s a degree of closeness a nd a lso a degree of sepa ra tion between me a nd the things tha t I do, a rtistica lly. Thinking a bout the future gives me the a bility to see myself a s pa rt of the continuum, even though I don’t feel grounded in something tha t goes ba ck to a ncient times So much of Afrofuturism is a bout fguring out where we ft when we’re old a nd new a t the sa me time.
When everybody records tha t song, they tend to do a slow, da rk, minima list version of it Which is not to sa y those versions a ren’t grea t, but it didn’t necessa rily feel tha t honest for wha t we were trying to do. We were trying to embody a bla ck religious service tha t would ha ve a lot of people singing. And even though there a re some solo singing moments on the a lbum, we wa nted most of it to feel like a n ensemble The song kind of guided itself We knew we wa nted tha t four to the foor bea t, so I sa ng the lyrics over it a nd then Bria n [Slattery] went: “Wha t if I do a disco ba ss pa rt?” The rest developed out of tha t Tha t song proba bly ha s more moving pa rts tha n a nything else on the a lbum, except ma ybe “The Downwa rd Roa d”.
What were you looking for with Demeanor and the rap textures he brings to the album?
I think the moment where I found the pulse of wha t I set out to do wa s “Once There Wa s No Sun”. It just ha s this vibe a nd fexibility a nd a living, brea thing qua lity tha t so ma ny of the source recordings I wa s trying to emula te ha ve. But it a lso ha s the expa nsive, futuristic a nd deep ha rmonic vibe tha t I wa s looking for in the sweeping string pa rts a nd everything else And the rhythmic complexity, things tha t I’m ma king up a s I go a long a nd melodies tha t I’m dra wing from a document from 400 yea rs a go. It felt like tha t wa s the whole point of the a lbum “Once There Wa s No Sun” is this ma jestic song a bout the music of the spheres a nd wha tever else So I wa s like, “OK, this ha s to be big!” It wa s a powerful moment to be a ble to bring a ll those things together a nd feel like I wa s a t the cutting edge of wha t I could do.
This album feels deeper and more ambitious than Spider Tales. Do you see i t as a continuation?
Your version of “Death Have Mercy” gives the song a completely different spin.
NEW ALBUMS
Demea nor is a good friend of mine from North Ca rolina a nd I knew, going into this, tha t I wa nted a ra pper on it Beca use a fer wha t ha s ha ppened in the pa st 50 yea rs, how could I ima gine a future in which bla ck music doesn’t involve ra pping front a nd centre?
I’ve a ctua lly been doing a lot of blues guita r pla ying recently Some of tha t a ppea red in a very odd wa y on The New Faith in the form of “Didn’t It Ra in” a nd its of the ra ils guita r solo. My fa mily’s from Virginia a nd Piedmont blues is a rea lly big pa rt of the musica l la ndsca pe there So I’ve been digging into tha t a lot more I think tha t’ll fgure pretty prominently in wha tever I do going forwa rd. INTERVIEW ROB HUGHES
What was the criteria for selecting the songs?
“How could I imagine a future in which black music doesn’t involve rapping?” JAKE BLOUNT
So what’s next for you?
ESPITE being in the midst of one of the most prolifc periods of his career releasing four albums and one EP between 2016 and 2021 Kurt Wagner wa s questioning things. “Wha t the fuck am I doing?” he asked himself last year, momentarily trapped in aperiod of despair, before getting back to work and making another album.
D
NEW ALBUMS
honeyed vocals with delicate piano (here provided by Andrew Broder) It captures the tone of an album tha t is rich in ambition, scope and innovation, and for which genre categorisation feels utterly futile.
Lead single “Police Dog Blues” is abeautiful encapsulation of such ajourney; a vast amalgamation of styles tha t takes in soaring soul, sprawling rock, subtle jazz, buoyant funk and tha t distinctive Lambchop quality tha t comes from the simple but potent combination of Wagner’s low hum
LAMBCHOP The Bible CITY SLANG 9/10 Kurt Wagner bounces back from self doubt with help from a community of collaborators.
Wray 2 2 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 M C K E W I N T E R S
On 2021’s Showtunes, asonic departure in itself, there wa s an almost ambient stillness, the album unfurling along in gently rippling waves While there are simila r moments to be heard, such a s on the deeply atmospheric “So There”, there’s much more dynamism, punch and vitality here. “Little Black Books’’ is a s close to dance music a s Lambchop ha s ever been It’s atrack tha t glides from futuristic electronic funk to snapping beats coupled with melodic stabs of piano and wobbly Auto Tune. It’s abold and expansive song tha t feels emblematic of where Wagner is a s an artist: making ceaselessly unpredictable music Perhaps this track’s closest musica l relationship is to be found with contemporary hip hop a s it increasingly embraces more dance leaning elements.
spirituality in anon religious manner, tha t is foated out
On the opening “His Song Is Sung”, atrack rich in engulfng yet dramatic strings, tender piano and warm production, Wagner sings: “I confess I have no purpose/I’m not complaining/ Now these days are measured by the number/Thirt y summers f rom today” It may present an image of an artist 30 years into his career, who was already alate bloomer, feeling alittle a t seaor losing their creative footing, but the artistic transition tha t follows on the album indicates anything but
The resulting record is one steeped in refection. With the backdrop of Wagner acting a s primary caregiver for his father, along with his own uneasiness around life and ageing, mortality naturally seeped into his consciousness and an album exploring the essence of life, self and
“Whatever Mortal” begins a s almost straight up jazz, with bouncing double bass standing frmly a s the skeleton of the song, before spirited gospel vocals appea r in harmony around an infectiously By DanielDylan
Kurt Wagner: steeped in reflection
P27 BETH ORTON
P31 JESCA HOOP
This month…
8 Every Child Begins the World Again
3 Daisy
Recorded at:Ryan Olson’s studio
This soon becomes enveloped by a stirring brass section that lifs the song into a rousing section before it settles into a distinctly unique groove, existing somewhere between jazz, soul and introspective electronica. The opening lyrics of “I am not OK with this but here we are” once again suggest a disafected state, but the musical counterpoint employed takes the song from a position of seeming despondency into an enhanced state of musical joy. It’s a tactic deployed throughout the record, one with moments of intense melancholia that can border on the depressive, but are constantly elevated by surprise musical bursts This creates great clashes of feelings, as refective soul searching and rousing joy collide simultaneously If Wagner is shooting for something
P37 AL QASAR
8/10
LOUIS PATTISON
It’ s the work of an artist attempting to stretch out the parameters of their own sonic world
OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 2 3 NEW ALBUMS
There is a point where many of us question our lives and where we stand in the midst of adversity and overwhelming circumstances beyond our control I never felt like I would stop making things but rather try to find a way to continue to do so through the course of my ability,as I step into an age group not particularly known for its creative breakthroughs
P34 SUEDE
1 His Song Is Sung
ROYAL CREAM/BMG
the record needed to have a diverse approach to songs and should reflect the collaboration with Ryan and Andrew being part of the writing process and production
AtoZ
Produced by:Ryan Olson and Andrew Broder
Last year, City Slang label boss Christof Ellinghaus told Uncut, “Kurt doesn’t have a single nostalgic bone in his body”, and that’s no more evident than here Ever ything about The Bible suggests a ferce, steely gaze locked onto the horizon, proving that maybe more artists should stop for a moment and ask, “What the fuck am I doing?” In this instance, it has resulted in yet another late career highlight
For some two decades, Oren Ambarchi has drifed around the borders of metal, electronic music and free improvisation, aligning himself with veteran avant names like Sunn O))) and Merzbow along the way. Shebang fnds him in the driving seat for four expansive guitar compositions, recorded remotely with the aid of collaborator Konrad Sprenger and a host of guests including Jim O’Rourke and BJ Cole Like the cake that adorns Shebang’s cover, this music is about layers upon layers Pointillistic and polyrhythmic, apparently made of a thousand interlocking parts, tracks like the piano accompanied “Shebang 3” feel comparable to the music of Steve Reich or Tortoise. Fastidiously complex, yes, but also capable of moments of disarming prettiness.
P32 DR JOHN
Personnel includes:Kurt Wagner (vocals processing nylon guitar arrangements), Andrew Broder (piano, arrangements, programming, electric guitar, synths,beats, turntables, bongos), Ryan Olson (arrangements, editing, programing, processing beats)
SHARON O’CONNELL
OREN AMBARCHI Shebang
4 Whatever Mortal
fundamentally spiritual here, perhaps it’s linked to the overwhelming feeling of fnding surprising beauty and connection in life during a period when it seems most unlikely. The huge list of contributors for this album reads more like a community than a credit list, and this kind of collective energy is clearly something Wagner has harnessed
Did you have an aim/mission statement going into this record?
7 Dylan at the Mousetrap
If this is an album that asks a lot of the questions, did you come away with any big answers? In some way finding answers isn’ t always the point The point is the looking the examining of one ’ s existence and putting things in perspective If there is a big takeaway,it’s the fact that it’s still possible for me to make something that feels like a fresh breath from an infant wrapped in a new blanket as i t opens its eyes to a new day
In the last 20 years, Greg Dulli has steered two fne side projects and recorded his solo debut, but now he’s pulled the Whigs back into (sharp) focus Their frst in fve years taps classic rock and pop, going in hard with a QOTSA like guitar vamp to open the barrelling “I’ll Make You See God” There’s a ton of variety here, though: “The Getaway” borrows from the psychedelic Beatles, while “Take Me There” is driven by a bluesy, chain gang rhythm and “Concealer” hits a tender spot via acoustic guitar and Dulli’s echoing croon. Closer “In Flames” is a welcome reminder that few can match the Whigs in the slow burn desperation stakes.
These endless twists and turns that Wagner keeps making musically that in many ways have come to defne Lambchop’s late career may feel disorientating for some early day adopters used to that more classically Americana sound However, despite being born from a period of deep questioning and self refection, The Bible doesn’t feel like a confused or lost musician chasing the zeitgeist or wandering aimlessly Instead, it’s the work of a focused artist who is consistently attempting to stretch out the parameters of their own ever expanding sonic world.
DRAG CITY
7/10
2 Little Black Boxes
P30 PIXIES
6 Police Dog Blues
INTERVIEW:DANIEL DYLAN WRAY
P24 MAKAYA McCRAVEN
9 So There 10 That s Music
Alt rock vets’impassioned ninth
You were considering your options as a musician prior to making this record. Were you close to stopping?
Q&A
What does this record represent to you? Surprise comes to mind That there still is life in the old hound dog yet Also that there are still incredible artists out there that are willing to see what happens when we do things together.It really is a joy and a joyful noise we made together.
melodic refrain
I had an idea that spirituality,like art itself,is something that resides in us all It helps to guide us in our perspective of the world and helps us deal with being a part of it.Living outside of organised religion does not preclude us from having this spiritual experience through our expression.So this together with the idea that
Kurt Wagner “Spirituality, like art, is something that resides in us all ”
5 A Major Minor Drag
Jim Anton Chris Bierden John Fields Alex Nutter Matt Swanson (electric bass), Lutheran Bells Choir (vocals), Tony Crow (inspiration),CJ Carmen Camerieri (horns,horn arrangements), Cole Davis (upright bass),Tim Fain (violin),Madison Hallman,Sid Sriram (vocals), Bridget Kibbey (harp) Kim Kim and Harmony (gospel choir) Matthew McCaughan (processing, arrangement), Blake Morgan (throat singing, vocals),Paul Niehaus (steel guitar),Jeremy Nutzman,Twi t One (beats),Evan Slack (electric guitar),Alastair Sung (cello)
Rhythm powered modern composition from Australian guitar improvisor
THE AFGHAN WHIGS How Do You Burn?
P26 TIM BURGESS
S L E E V E N O T E S
INTERVIEW STEPHEN DEUSNER The Another Lullaby This Place That Place The Calling Seventh String So Ubuji The Knew Untitled
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Dorothy Ashby’s afro harping, Brandee Younger’s harp becomes a prominent element, appear on every song to add a lushness to “The Calling” and a dreaminess to “So Ubuji”. Junius Paul’s double bass keeps the low end elastic and agile, creating an almost subliminal churning underneath these compositions
11 The Title
MAKAYA
Performing this music live,I developed the concept on the road That’s where we started to record.“This Place That Place” may be the oldest. I wrote i t a few years after moving to Chicago.
Produced by:Makaya McCraven
more in an in your body way and not so much as just an intellectual exercise
Taking its title from a magazine associated with Terkel, In These Times is a solo album in name only As on previous albums, McCraven works with a sprawling crew of players, and he foregrounds that collaborative spirit within the music, as though fnishing “what these people have died for” is a responsibility much larger than one man They recorded these performances over the last seven years at diferent venues, mostly in the Midwest: some takes were played live, complete with audience applause, while others were captured at studios and rehearsal spaces. Aferwards, he manipulated the recordings as though arranging personalities rather than instrument, much the way a big band leader might conduct his orchestra. With its shades of
You’ve been working on this album for seven years. What has that process been like?
“Lullaby” was co written by your mother. Why did you want to put your mark on that song?
Fours 3 High Fives 4 Dream
There’s a liquid quality to these arrangements, with instruments bobbing briefy to the surface before foating away. The sitar on the title track recall Thom Bell’s sophisticated Philly soul arrangements, while De’Sean Jones’ conspiratorial fute on “Dream Another” alludes to Bobbi Humphrey. On the complex “High Fives”, Jef Parker’s electric guitar sneaks in for a few minutes, changing the course of the song profoundly He then delivers a bluesy solo on “The Knew Untitled”, channeling both BB King and King Crimson As a drummer, McCraven busily keeps time in unexpected ways, counting out complex time signatures and even acting as a foil for the other players. On “This Place That Place” he lands his snare taps right in between the sax notes, as though trying to disrupt them, then launches into a hyperactive drum and bass beat. Elsewhere, he supplements his playing with programmed beats, which blend into the swirl of sounds while connecting the music to the early days of hip hop
Recorded at:Co Prosperity Sphere Symphony Center JAMDEK Studios Palisade Studios Shirk Studios,Makaya Music Studios,all Chicago;Walker Arts Center, Minneapolis; Submerge Studios,Detroit; Sholo Studios,LA
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i t out and found a chart from my mom It s been in my repertoire almost as long as I ve been leading bands It’s always been very dear to me And I like to bring a lot of personal touches to the music,especially with my family.This whole record is very personal.It’s also a very communal record which has always been my musical approach I’ve built deep bonds over the years with everybody who plays on here We’ve become like family
McCR AVEN’s seventh album under his own name, In These Times, opens with the sound of applause and a swarm of strings that quickly coalesce into a galloping rhythm, and then something unexpected happens: a human voice asserts, somewhat mysteriously, “I never want to be known as anybody opposed to progress… It just kinda seems to me that nobody has the right to take away our responsibility to fnish what these people have died for”
MAKAYA McCRAVEN In These Times INTERNATIONAL ANTHEM/NONESUCH 9/10 Te Chicago drummer/ producer/arranger mines the past to speak to the present. By Stephen Deusner
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considered one of the leading lights of contemporary jazz, yet to call him simply a jazz musician understates the range of his playing and the scope of his vision. He favours the spontaneity of that genre, as well as the emotional hef of spiritual jazz, but ofen manipulates recorded performances to fnd something new within the music. As he cuts and pastes, the computer becomes an instrument in and of itself Whether he’s piecing together his own compositions or reimagining those by Gil Scott Heron (2020’s We’re New Again) or Blue Note recording artists (2021’s Deciphering The Message), he favours dense textures and revelatory repetition, the kind of acute rhythmic variations that recall the futtery avant garde compositions of Philip Glass or Steve Reich and the local post rock of Tortoise or The Sea & Cake.
“It’s a very communal record”
“Lullaby” is a tune that comes from my childhood I picked
6
Personnel includes:Makaya McCraven (perc, drums,sampler, baby sitar, synths kalimba handclaps vibraphone Wurlitzer organ) Junius Paul (bass perc),Jeff Parker (guitar),Brandee Younger (harp), Lia Kohl (cello)
Q&A 2 4 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 S U L Y I M A N
But it’s not just old sounds that McCraven is chasing. It’s the spirit of invention and wonder and determination that originally inspired those sounds. He’s not trying to fnish what his heroes started or “died for” but he knows he has a duty to continue those traditions, to extend those ideas and struggles in these times
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S L E E V E N O T E S 1 In These Times 2
On “Lullaby” the hero is his own mother, Agnes Zsgimondi, who co wrote and originally recorded the song in the 1970s with the Hungarian prog folk band Kolinda There’s a tenderness to the way he puts the instruments in conversation with one another, drawing out Younger’s harp and Macie Stewart’s melancholy violin solo. That’s ultimately what makes this record so powerful, even if you’re not familiar with its touchstones: by colliding the past with the present, McCraven makes a point of making progress
Makaya McCraven
The recording part started about seven years ago when we were coming off the road and the band was sounding really nice I’ve been working on this concept with some rhythms that are in odd meters,but I wanted to bring them across to people
It’s a clip of Harry Belafonte speaking with broadcaster Studs Terkel for his Chicago Public Radio show, and the statement neatly encapsulates McCraven’s mission as a drummer, producer and arranger He draws from the music of the past to comment on the present, which allows the album to bound gracefully from one idea to the next from free jazz to classical, from soul music to hip hop, from prog to minimalism
Born in Paris, raised in Massachusetts and based in Chicago, McCraven is
The Beths arrived in 2018 as eager power poppers hot footing from New Zealand. Over the course of three albums they have slowly expanded on that initial promise without losing their endearing hook laden indie buzzsaw edge Songwriter and frontwoman Elizabeth Stokes is a disarming presence, whose laconic approach disguises the emotional content of the lyrics The mood of Expert In A Dying Field is yearning and refective, as Stokes picks over the bones of relationships on mournful janglers like “Your Side”, punky rocker “Silence Is Golden”, the shimmering “Best Lef” and terrifc closer “2am”. PETER WATTS
7/10
BEYONCÉ
DANIEL DYLAN WRAY
Fine third album from Kiwi indie poppers
BORIS
More speaker rattling riffs from the psych rock stalwarts
MARISA ANDERSON
It comes with an encyclopaedia’s worth of samples, interpolations and references, but Beyoncé’s seventh solo album is a fawlessly structured feast. Drawing from house (“Cozy”), disco (“Virgo’s Groove”), hip hop (“Thique”), dancehall (“Pure/Honey”) and Afrobeat (“Move”, featuring a commanding vocal turn from Grace Jones), the frst in a planned trilogy of pandemic recorded material is an invitation to return to the streets and to the clubs The seamless mix, as from the decks at the club night of your dreams, threads together black and LGBTQ+ musical innovators from Donna Summer, to Big Freedia, to ballroom emcee Kevin JZ Prodigy with Beyoncé’s own messages of joy, hedonism and self love. LISA MARIE FERLA
punctuate Vick’s plaintive tones. But most evocative of all is “Inspiration And Fun”, a lilting acoustic lament, gilded with pillow y harmonies as Vick wearily admits, “I don’t claim to know it all” Enough to prick up our ears here, though
8/10
THE BETHS
Mischievous electronics from West Coast rhythm section
PIERS MARTIN
Expert In A Dying Field CARPARK
Wilderness Of Mirrors PARTISAN
8/10
8/10
7/10
Belief is the unlikely techno project of Bryan “Boom Bip” Hollon and Warpaint drummer Stella Mozgawa, whose friendship led to Mozgawa drumming for Neon Neon, Hollon’s conceptual synthpop act with Gruf Rhys Belief is a more hands on afair: 11 dirty, analogue box jams inspired by the impish spirit of LFO’s Mark Bell but executed in a functional manner With its motivational vocal and big room rave rif, “I Want To Be” could be a Moby remix of Primal Scream’s “Come Together”, while “Anx” and “Charch” indulge in Aphex style organ grinding. Ultimately, this is confdent, atmospheric electronics that doesn’t stray far from the party.
TIM BERNARDES MilCoisas Invisíveis PSYCHIC HOTLINE
HORACE ANDY Midnight Scorchers
JOHNNY SHARP
Blessed with a luminous voice and a fair for radiantly melodic, Tropicá lia infused psych pop, Brazil’s Tim Bernardes has a blossoming international profle following collaborations with Fleet Foxes, David Byrne, Tom Zé and more On his second self produced solo album, the Sã o Paulo singer songwriter clothes soul searching ballads in airy orchestral arrangements that sound simultaneously rich and spare, from the falsetto harmonies and ambient dub undulations of “Nascer, Viver, Morrer” to the sublime, slow mo bossa nova of “Esse Ar” Bernardes namechecks The Beatles, though these knowingly retro exercises in wistful saudade also call to mind Jef Buckley, Beirut and Gruf Rhys in their delicate, stoned beauty. STEPHEN DALTON
ON U SOUND
P A T R I C A V Á Z Q U E Z G Ó M E Z OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 2 5
Pop diva’s masterclass in queer Black musicology
Renaissance PARKWOOD/COLUMBIA 8/10
STEPHEN DEUSNER
Midnight Rockers gets dubbed up Midnight Rockers reafrmed Horace Andy’s regal reggae status earlier this year, irrespective of his latter day Massive Attack fame Its producer Adrian Sherwood now completes the picture with this sound system style refashioning, breaking tracks open, resetting them in eerie dubscapes, as with the title track’s rough, warping synths, and adding session of cuts. Sinuous melodica melts into strings in “Sleepy’s Night Cap”, and sax and trombone trade languid solos in “Feverish”, organic elements in “the On U sound box” where, Andy confesses, “I love to play” The protest ballad “Ain’t No Love In The Heart Of The City” reduces his sweet croon to its essential “ain’t no love” refrain, foating in a mournful dub chamber NICK HASTED
ANTI
BELIEF Belief
Heavy Rocks RELAPSE
7/10
NEW ALBUMS
DANIEL DYLAN WRAY
Marisa Anderson
THE BLACK ANGELS
The result of Boy Scouts singer songwriter Taylor Vick’s resolution to create something soundtracky with the help of Ezra Furman drummer Sam Durkes and engineer Trevor Brooks, Art Moore conjure up some compelling scenes on their debut There are faint echoes of Cigarettes Afer Sex’s somnambulant reveries on “Bell”, while “October” is a decorated by shimmering beams of synth to
Fleet Foxes collaborator gives vintage tropical psych folk a lightly experimental twist
8/10
Classically trained Oregon guitar picker broadens her palette
High octane metal meets punk on Japanese outfit’s latest Afer the slowed down and more atmospheric leaning album W, released early in 2022 as a partner to 2020’s NO, Boris return to full on raucous mode here. The intense, rumbling, droning groans that ofen accompany some of their heavier work are largely swapped in favour of more straight up heav y rock here hence the title, which it shares with some earlier albums The opening “She Is Burning” sets the tone for a record of full throttle guitar squealing and drum thrashing Tracks such as “My Name is Blank” capture the album’s essence a middle ground between metal and punk on a record that barely lets up for a single second.
For almost 20 years now, Austin’s The Black Angels have traded of a blend of heady, heav y rifs, psychedelic swirls of feedback and driving blasts of bass and drums, all frmly in the lineage of the psych rock genre, with nods from 13th Floor Elevators to Brian Jonestown Massacre It’s business as usual here, with “History Of The Future” emitting flthy, speaker rattling rifs Tracks such as “Firefy” veer more towards the melodic and whimsical, but it’s mostly overdriven guitars and bulging bass that sets the tone, with the occasional Mellotron warble. There’s little to be found here that doesn’t already sound inescapably familiar, but it’s perfectly rock solid stuf all the same
Having cut her teeth in jazz, country and even circus bands, Marisa Anderson brings all those styles and many more to her solo guitar albums. She continues to use post Fahey folk as a foundation, but Still, Here, her second for Thrill Jockey, switches between acoustic and electric, adding graceful fourishes of piano on “Night Air” and the “The Crack Where The Light Gets In” On “La Llorona” her picking is crisp and exquisitely expressive as she draws from Spanish traditions, while “Beat The Drum Slowly” begins as an earthy march before unravelling into celestial ambience. The result is quietly dizzying.
The Beths: yearning janglers
Ezra Furman affiliated trio’s widescreen debut
LEX
7/10
Still , Here THRILL JOCKEY
ART MOORE Art Moore
NEW ALBUMS 2 6 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
DEATH CAB FOR CUTIE
JOHN ROBINSON
MARIEL BUCKLEY
The Fantasy of Reality MADFISH
Irrealis
7/10
8/10
rifs led by Martsch’s idiosyncratic vocal delivery that sits somewhere between J Mascis and Neil Young. Album highlight “Understood” sounds particularly Young like here too, but elsewhere Martsch sounds confdent in his own skin, merging interlocking layered guitars, subtle melodic touches and licks that veer from crunchy to blissed out DANIEL DYLAN WRAY
“Please Yourself” pairs abrasive, speak sung vocals and warped electric guitar with moments of angelic, melodic unison; “The Politician” casts Zach as a misanthropic Morrissey soundalike amid a clanging, propulsive soundscape; the title track hoists a shimmering, piano and horn driven chorus above a nastily rapped bridge It’s rarely coherent and not always pretty, but the most efective therapy rarely is LISA MARIE FERLA
6/10
Lost in action Beefheart guitarist born again
7/10
Queer country singer recalls growing up a misfit
BIRTHDAY CAKE
7/10
Built To Spill have had an ever changing lineup with Doug Martsch as the only constant member, and here he teams up with Le Almeida and Joã o Casaes of the psychedelic jazz rock band Oruã .
Two Sisters LATE MUSIC
7/10
Charlatans singer goes double top…
Burnett’s intriguing voyage into the avant garde continues Second instalment of a collaboration between Burnett, long serving composer compadre Ciancia and drummer/percussionist Bellerose. 2019’s The Invisible Light: Acoustic Space was a notably un Burnettish Burnett album, venturing beyond his familiar realm of terse, rootsy Americana into expansive beat poetry soundtracked by gloomy electronica Spells continues the journey, Burnett’s semi spoken meditations on a world driving itself insane with its own technological genius accompanied by appropriately deranged and claustrophobic soundscapes The likes of “Casting A Spell” and “You May Leave But This Will Bring You Back” reassure that Burnett’s formidable facility for waspish wordplay remains intact.
Built To Spill
Asphal t Meadows ATLANTIC
SARAH DAVACHI
CRACK CLOUD
On her second album, the Calgary singer songwriter Mariel Buckley drives around her old hometown and points out all the local landmarks: that’s the corner where she used to firt with a girl named Mary, there’s the Circle K where she scored coke “Hate This Town” suggests her feelings about the place are deeply fraught (“I don’t wanna hate this town”), and her relationship with country music is no less complicated She sings her keenly observed lyrics in a sleepy, sensitive twang, but adds synths, chiming guitars and weightless pedal steel to create a sound as wide open as the Alberta plains.
ANDREW MUELLER
BUILT TO SPILL
There’s something very stately about Sarah Davachi’s compositions. She’s never been one for rushing things, but her last few albums have felt disarmed and rigorous, in their patient, coaxing exploration of the possibilities aforded by minimal, incrementally developing gestures Two Sisters continues to unwind the thread that Davachi began to unpick on its precursors Antiphonals and Cantus, Descant, and the seemingly simple yet thoroughly conceptualised material here, all held within specifc harmonic language, is beautifully realised. The two “Icon Studies” are particularly devastating in their slow blooming, laminar detail. JON DALE
BUD SCOPPA
Everywhere I Used To Be
THE LEAF LABEL 8/10
Indie rock veterans sounding content 30 years in on Sub Pop debut
MATTHEW BOURNE
When The Wind Forgets Your Name
TIM BURGESS TypicalMusic
NIGEL WILLIAMSON
7/10
T BONE BURNETT, JAY BELLEROSE & KEEFUS CIANCIA The Invisible Light:Spells VERVE FORECAST
Second round of Vancouverites’ music as therapy
This is Burgess’s third solo album in four years, and he’s in the middle of a prolifc spell, for it’s a double featuring no fewer than 22 tracks recorded in 30 days. With support from Spiritualized’s thighpaulsandra and Grumbling Fur’s Dan O’Sullivan, wiggy electronics abound, from the urgent gallop of the title track and the woozy psych pop of “Kinetic Connection” to the cinematic orchestrations of “Slacker” and “A Quarter To Eight” Think The Flaming Lips’ sci f sonics given a very English twist which makes it no surprise to read in the small print that Burgess recruited Lips producer Dave Fridmann to sprinkle his magic dust over the mix.
You may recall Cotton as Antennae Jimmy Semens, playing “steel appendage guitar” on Strictly Personal and Trout Mask Replica afer he had replaced Ry Cooder in Don Van Vliet’s Magic Band Afer that he made one album with the band MU and then disappeared to become a church minister More than half a century on at the age of 74 he re emerges with a debut solo LP of psyched up blues (“Does It Work For You”), avant jazz (“He Made The Eagle”), pop whimsy (“Green Bamboo”) and Beefeartian weirdness (“Elvirus”), topped incongruously with God bothering lyrics about “He who makes all things new” and “unlocks eternity” NIGEL WILLIAMSON
7/10
“Write nice songs,” urges vocalist Zach Choy’s father in the snippet of tape that opens Crack Cloud’s second album “It’s an excellent way to let your anger out ” The elder Choy’s posthumous message, recorded at the age his son is now, sets the tone for the nine tracks of solidarity, creativity and catharsis that follow.
STEPHEN DEUSNER
Slowly yielding works for chamber ensemble and solo pipe organ
BELLA UNION
Stately compositions: Sarah Davachi
JEFF COTTON
SUB POP
Gibbard and co vividly capture the roiling uncertainty of right now Now in their 25th year, Death Cab For Cutie have forged a sound so immutable that Ben Gibbard’s precisely enunciated lyrics inevitably take centrestage on the Seattle band’s 10th. The frontman’s preoccupations with life’s impermanence and the consequent preciousness of the moment dominate the 11 songs, starting with “I Don’t Know How I Survive”, which vividly describes a dark of night panic attack, deepens with “Here To Forever”, and crescendos with “Foxglove Through The Clearcut”, whose oracular spoken verses erupt into a cavernous, eerily beautiful chorus Gibbard’s freighted eloquence gives Asphalt Meadows its unsettling immediacy
A stylistic deviation to that genre this is not, with the opening “Gonna Lose” all archetypal fuzz drenched heavy
Tough Baby MEAT MACHINE
One-take “prepared piano” set from UK jazz man
Prepared piano which is to say jamming something in between its strings; maybe chucking something randomly inside serves to reveal unexpected pathways into the instrument. For Matthew Bourne, a prolifc, multi disciplinary UK jazzer, an experiment with woodscrews and what looks like chewing gum turns his instrument into something capable of classic beauty, but also percussive clanks and ferce Derek Bailey style harmonic twangs This succinct album, recorded in one sitting, displays a lovely range of textures, where hypnotising Satie like miniatures (“Asaf”, “Jane”), sit alongside the woozy uncertainty of “Shri”, glitch piano (“Dusan”), and the virtuosic crackle of “Armando” in which Bourne breaks through to the keyboard metaverse.
Recorded at: Dawnstar Studios, Manchester;Fish Factory Studios, Studio Mute, David Wrench’s studio,London
BETH ORTON Weather Alive PARTISAN ambient sixth hangs on to love.By Nick Hasted
1 Weather Alive 2 Friday Night 3 Fractals 4 Haunted Satellite 5 Forever Young 6 Lonely 7 Arms Around A Memory 8 Unwritten
in Camden that had this incredible resonance.It just had a lovely tone and a warmth i t wasn ’ t bright.I built the music around that
to add to her homemade palette. He was joined by other ofen jazz minded collaborators, such as the ecstatic poet saxophonist Alabaster dePlume, suiting Orton’s fascination with Alice Coltrane’s spiritual jazz, alongside ambient vistas from Talk Talk to Springsteen’s stark Nebraska. Thrown further back on her own resources by lockdown, Orton self produced Weather Alive, a project which began with her identity in crisis ending as her most personal statement
Your voice dramatises these songs in an emotionally truthful way. I feel like I’ve spent a long time hijacking myself in various ways But this is the voice that comes most naturally These songs have come by listening to a quieter voice,to a yearning to exist in this world on my own terms
The result is both viscerally corporeal music, full of gristle and breath, and richly ambient. There is a sense of real lives at stake, Orton’s especially, in a world capable of wrenching transmutation by love and death It is, she confrms, “existential” music, the result of “trying to make sense of what it is to be alive”.
In the course of the album, you seem to find your way back to a sense of love. It’s compassion to human suffering Because how can you manage to get out of bed and not be completely lacerated? People go through so much They lose people they love How the fuck are they supposed to survive? This album s a love song to the dying memory, and to those who feel they are being unwritten
“Lonely” seems implacably beref, as Orton repeats its title like a fatal mantra. Yet as Weather Alive proceeds, the depth of her remembered pain becomes present hope, a reminder of how much she can feel. This meaning is framed in equally autobiographical music. Orton’s 1996 breakthrough Trailer Park ’s warm, simple folktronica has ascended into sound as a complex atmospheric condition, wrapping around you like steam, and seeping under your skin
Personnel includes:Beth Orton (vocals piano) Tom Skinner (drums) Tom Herbert (bass) Alabaster dePlume (saxophone), Shahzad Ismaily (guitar,drums, harmonica,bass, Moog),Sam Beste (vibraphone), Francine Perry (synths)
“Friday Night” begins with psychedelic warps, as she invokes Proust to dream deep, returning to a rain glinting city where “we put all the love that we still have to give”. “Arms Around A Memory” later pines for “New York Cit y summer streets”, asking “kiss me as deep as you know how”
The title track is a world of its own Orton’s piano suggests Paul Harris’s wry, riverine grace on Nick Drake’s records, and Skinner’s drums set a steady heartbeat pace, a sof edged yet certain spine. We are in liminal light on dawn’s cusp, in woodland or maybe Orton’s garden, ecstatically envisioned from her London shed It’s a place of spells, of hide and seek counts and copse rendezvous, an alchemical, fairytale scene. “Almost
“Forever Young” gets into the past’s blood and guts, reading its runes for something to salvage. “Come and see what a mess they’ve made of me”, Orton cries with novelistic ferceness “Lonely” then goes so deep into the purging pain of nostalgia and loss that she asks her late mother what to do: “She said, shut your mouth/There’s someone desires you”. Orton’s mature voice carves through here with rough, unforced emotional power, or cradles words in a cracked embrace DePlume’s sax is her Bacharach romantic partner in a sighing dance, as her battered piano rolls on.
Relying on simple, modal patterns, she then began to sculpt homemade soundscapes using her midi setup In the process, vivid memories rose up, ranging from old afairs in New York to the loss of her friend Andy Weatherall, becoming the nascent album’s fickering heart. “I kept reliving these fragments of past lives,” Orton recalls, “and putting them in music was like putting them in amber A moment would be there like light on a wall, it didn’t hang around long, and I’d write around that.” These sensual visions were then rigorously honed into songs, as Orton tested if “something so fallible and amorphous” could hold compositional weight
STOR MY psychic and physical weather bufeted Beth Orton as she made this record
Q&A NEW ALBUMS OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 2 7 E L O T L E E H A Z E L
INTERVIEW: NICK HASTED E E V E N O T E S
Eventually, Orton invited The Smile and Sons Of Kemet drummer Tom Skinner
Weather Alive then becomes its own memory as the album proceeds, a rooted place of possibility which subsequent songs return to in their own smoky codas, ofen centred on the buzz and breath of dePlume’s sax. The soul deep troubles which caused Orton to make this album have, though, hardly been cured
When long standing health issues were correctly diagnosed and medicated in 2014, the ground perversely shifed beneath her feet. Meanwhile, 2016 saw the release of Kidsticks, the most electronic album of a career which has eased between her pioneering ’90s folktronica’s polar extremes. But as this personal fux continued, the organic sound of a battered, stand up piano in her garden shed became her anchor Playing this unfamiliar instrument recalled picking up a guitar to write songs in the ’90s, returning Orton to frst principles.
8/10 Self produced, viscerally
Beth Orton:“People go through so much”
These songs spend a lot of time conjuring sensually evocative, specific moments from your past. There was this sense of,‘OK,where did you feel most yourself in your life, the closest to the source,to what matters? And I was definitely using the senses almost as an instrument, to evoke atmosphere It really centred on a battered old upright piano I bought
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Produced by: Beth Orton
makes me want to cry”, Orton shivers, “the weather’s so beautiful outside” The music brings that natural world in waves, with vibraphone cascades, piano peals and guitar clangs hanging in the air. That air thickens as instruments eddy and melt together In a coda, Orton’s voice suggests one of Van Morrison’s whispered, Blakean reveries “Slipping from the hand, falling from the grasp”, she sighs, in a place where she can safely let go.
ROB HUGHES
JOHN LEWIS
Chicago post-punkers’sophomore work moves beyond retro pastiche
Album of the month
As they approach thei r 20th anniversary, Minnesota folkgrass
INNOVATIVE LEISURE
types Trampled By Turtles are back in late October with Alpenglow THIRTY TIGERS .The sextet have brought in Jeff Tweedy to produce, with the Wilco leader also contributing “A Lifetime To Find”, a back and forth dialogue with death Overseen by Tucker Martine, Alela Diane’ s Looking Glass NAÏVE is the Portland singer songwriter’s first in four years and examines ideas of identity, reflection and belonging “It’s a portal to past and future,” she says And look out for Margo Price’ s Maybe We’ ll Make It, “ a memoi r of loss, motherhood, and the search for artistic freedom”.
DANIEL ROMANO’S OUTFIT CHANGED
An expanded lineup brings broader horizons
8/10
Courtney Marie Andrews
7/10
DENDRONS 5-3-8
Get ready for a host of significant releases as we head into autumn.Courtney Marie Andrews follows up 2020’s Grammy nominated Old Flowers with Loose Future
Thematically, things are no less weighty or bewildering on the 15 minute “Part 2” Strings billow and fall a s we’re introduced to “the cosmic illusion of time” . A quieter passage, mostly just piano and violin, is swept aside by voluminous psych pop harmonies and horns, ending in agrand fnale tha t wrestles abstract notions of love, death and universa l light. An accompanying full length flm, starring Julie Doiron in the lead role, is due this autumn Let’s hope it’s just a s weirdly exhilarating
Hrdy-Grdy
JEM FINER
On their seventh album, Montreal’s Esmerine locate an especially tender spot between post rock and post classica l Beckie Foon’s cello is still key, driving the refective, Max Richter esque “Blackout” and embellishing “Imaginary Pasts”’ looping echoes of Spiritualized, while “Entropy: Incantation Radiance The Wild Sea” and “Number Stations” nod to Godspeed, with whom Foon and drumming co founder Bruce Cawdon once played But “Entropy” adds brass and pianos, suggesting afunerea l take on Tortoise’s “Gamera ” , and the all too brief “Foxtails And Firefies” employs mallet instruments to cast apeaceful, bucolic spell WYNDHAM WALLACE
AM E R I CANA RO U N D U P
The opening section, “Genuine Light”, is amicro rock operawith shades of Rufus Wainwright and Queen, the choir singing back to Romano a t his own urging: “Love is all reality” . And a s it moves into something funkier and more trippy, McHone and Riolino trade verses on wha t feels like some neo Aquarian dream, rising into an ecstatic chorus tha t hails divine conception The search for enlightenment continues, morphing through country and chamber folk, a s Romano reaches into the heavens: “Nothing is hidden from the eyes of the realised soul”
La Luna YOU VE
ROB HUGHES
FAT POSSUM at the beginning of October. Conceived in a beach shack on Cape Cod, and produced by Sam Evian, the album marks something of a rebirth “I’ve come into the full spectrum of my own creativity and selfhood,” explains Andrews Musically, expect layered harmonies and percussive rhythms.
AMERICANA
Everything Was Forever UntilIt Was No More
Hurdy gurdy man, the lockdown version Jem Finer you may know as the former Pogue whose composition “Longplayer” began in 2000 and ha s around 978 years lef to run This frst physica l release from Thanet Tape Centre ahome for mossy, entrancing work in folkloric drone is more modest in scale, being 52 minutes long and in atape run of 50, but develops, a s Finer duets with asqueaky gate and passing trafc, stirring musica l relationships between his titula r hurdy gurdy, electronic processes and his environment. The 2020 lockdown gave rise to many meditations on place and time, but something like the melancholic “Fugue Number Two” transcends context for a more… eterna l place. JOHN ROBINSON
CONSTELLATION
THANET TAPE CENTRE
ESMERINE
7/10
2 8 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 C O L I N M E D L E Y B R E T T W A R R E N NEW ALBUMS
The second album by Dendrons is named 5 3 8 afer the repeated lyric in “High In Circle K” and other songs where the singer chants “ffhs, thirds, octaves”, areference to the simple, spartan intervals tha t the band claim to use But Dendrons’ wiry basslines and heavily chorused guita r rifs are actually quite harmonically complex, with interlinked songs tha t segue together to form discreet suites “Interlude” is a hypnotically motorik piece of krautrock with backwards voca l samples, “Vain Repeating” ha s the gleefully discordant properties of early Scritti Politti; the dreamy, one chord “Tangle” recalls Blur. More than just retro pastiche.
8/10 Mystical prog country opera from Canadian polymath
IT’S almost impossible to keep track of Daniel Romano. When he’s not publishing collections of poetry or art, the Ontario musician is either recording solo, producing others (most recently Carson McHone’s Still Life) or creating ambient epics under the guise of varianzaTo call him prolifc feels reductive In 2020 alone, grounded by the pandemic, he released no fewer than eight albums, either solo or fronting Daniel Romano’s Outft, including an entire reimagining of Bob Dylan’s Infdels La Luna might be his most ambitious project to date A celestia l song cycle in 14 chapters, served in two lengthy parts, it’s amodern psychedelic musica l tha t seeks to address the big stuf: spirituality, God, creation, destiny and the like. The music, lyrics and arrangements are all Romano’s, though his Outft chiefy McHone, JuliannaRiolino, Roddy Rosetti, David Nardi and brother Ian Romano helps bring them to life in expansive, polyphonic detail. It’s rich in brass, orchestra l strings and massed harmonies, with Romano sharing voca l turns with others
7/10
NORMALTOWN/NEW WEST
7/10
Gabe Gurnsey’s solo music picks up where that of his band, Factory Floor, paused a few years back: a pulsating hi NRG dance music delivered with a certain acidic intensity On Diablo, Gurnsey is joined by his girlfriend Tilly Morris, and the pair share vocal duties, playing of one another on “So Sweet” and “Hey Diablo” A drummer by trade, Gurnsey approaches production in a hard hitting, pugilistic manner But there’s a seam of pop here that his parent band largely lacked, which flls moments like “You Remind Me” with a warm fush of romance. “You remind me of a sunrise”, breathes Morris. “You remind me of a good time”. LOUIS PATTISON
8/10
Diamanda Galás: unflinching in focus
GA 20
Hefty return by Piano Day founder Nils Frahm composed a lot of music during lockdown and more than three hours of it has ended up on Music For Animals, his frst new studio album since 2018’s All Melody. The Piano Day founder eschews the piano for these 10 pieces, two of which nudge the half hour mark, preferring to conjure a generally downcast mood of slowly unfurled tones and drones, through which chinks of light can be glimpsed occasionally, as in “Lemon Day”’s cautiously optimistic melody The idea is to immerse yourself in the natural fow of the music; admirable, though who these days has time to experience it all in one go? PIERS MARTIN
PHOEBE GREEN Lucky Me CHESS CLUB
Whigs frontman’s second solo joint recalls the golden years of alt.rock
OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 29 A U S T I N Y O U N G GA 20: bass free bluesmen
PHANTASY
Broken Gargoyles
When the Athens, Georgia band The Whigs went on hiatus in 2017, Parker Gispert wasted little time going solo on 2018’s Sunlight Tonight, which jettisoned that band’s rowdy rock for a more acoustic, more obviously introspective folk pop His follow up is bigger, better, more inventive and more urgent With producer Roger Moutenot (Lambchop, Yo La Tengo), Gispert emphasises crunching guitars and spacy synths Songs like “Evil Euphoria” and “All The Rage” recall the heyday of ’90s alt rock without getting mired in CD era nostalgia, while the dreamy “You And I Forever” showcases his knack for resourceful hooks and sharp turns of phrase.
5/10
Crackdown COLEMINE
ALEX G
Indie visionary lets it all hang out on dreamlike opus Alex Giannascoli is part avant garde provocateur, part pop classicist, recalling Justin Vernon at some moments and fellow Philly native Todd Rundgren at others On the prolifc songwriter’s most accomplished album to date, he voices a cavalcade of disparate characters who shape shif within songs via fuid changes in register, tone and efects. “Runner” morphs from an acoustic, “Beast Of Burden” intro to a sprightly canter startlingly punctuated by a primal scream His Auto Tuned vocal gives “Cross The Sea” the feel of a futuristic fable before the soundscape darkens as an ominous synth introduces “Blessing”, whose grunting protagonist searches for signs of a higher power The album maintains its hallucinatory aura throughout; it’s a dazzling aural anime from a wildly original artist BUD SCOPPA
STEPHEN DEUSNER
8/10
8/10
PARKER GISPERT
Retro blues rockers with a punk edge This Boston trio tap into early, primal versions of the blues using vintage gear, writing well crafed songs that sound
It would be shorter to list which Stranger Things stars don’t have musical projects; Maya Hawke, who plays Robin, isn’t even the only one putting out an album this month (Joe Keery, aka Djo aka Steve Harrington, is the other) This is Hawke’s second record, co produced with Okkervil River’s Benjamin Lazar Davis, yet it sounds more tentative than her 2020 debut, Blush all sof fngerpicking and whispery, stretched vocals (ofen unnecessarily adorned with sugar backing from OR’s Will Graefe, who also duets on “Crazy Kid”) There are strong moments, from the sweet, mixtape ready “Backup Plan” to “Sweet Tooth”, which brings pep and rockier guitar. But Moss badly needs a bit more Upside Down energy.
Golden Years
9/10
instantly familiar With something like “Dry Run”, that’s probably because it’s so similar to Fats Domino’s “Walking To New Orleans”; on tracks like “Fairweather Friend” and “Easy On The Eyes”, it’s possibly because their singalong chants recall The White Stripes Like Jack and Meg, GA 20 feature no bass guitar one guitarist plays low end rifs, the other plays choppy rhythm licks and there’s something about the funky syncopation between the two and their slightly punky sensibility that elevates GA 20 way above so many dreary blues revivalists JOH N LEWIS
INTRAVENAL SOUND OPERATIONS
Rave bangers with a side of romance
HARLEM GOSPEL TRAVELLERS
Look Up! COLEMINE
Pew rattling party vibes worthy of praise
Music For Animals LEITER
7/10
MAYA HAWKE
7/10
Another staggering composition of both darkness and compassion from American vocal acrobat
With Broken Gargoyles, the great singer composer Diamanda Galá s has pared her work yet further back. This may seem a curious statement for a composition that, at times, threads multiple voices, electronic textures and the low clang of piano across a complex soundstage, but Galá s composes with necessity: everything that is there, needs to be there; no more, no less Broken Gargoyles folds the poems of expressionist writer Georg Heym into a tightly visionary work addressing the isolation and mutilation of World War I soldiers; if it’s unforgiving and unfinching in focus, that’s needed, to give voice to such sufering. JON DALE
Moss MOM + POP
EMILY MACKAY
God Save The Animals DOMINO
NILS FRAHM
DIAMANDA GALÁS
“I wanted to be the biggest thing in the recording,” Green has said of her debut proper, and on that count, mission accomplished This set blasts the artist from her teen indie pop beginnings into the beats heavy, electronic pop sphere, where her candid, self interrogating lyrics and glassy, soulful voice take centrestage Kaines (Everything Everything’s Alex Robertshaw) and Tom AD run the de nos jours production, fipping it with a slight Auto Tune stutter on “Break Your Heart” and on “Leach”, an electroclash rewind. At 13 tracks, it’s overlong and “Just A Game” is anodyne, but the title track’s Propaganda ish drama, the synth rocking “Sweat” and groovy swell of “Won’t Sit Still” compensate SHARON O CONNNELL
From the opening bars of the title track of their second album, the testifying trio set their stall out with unbridled joy
Fearless diarising in smart Big Pop
GABE GURNSEY Diablo
Stranger Things star puts out tentative second album
Welcome a world where the funk infused faith of The Staple Singers rubs shoulders with the dance fuelled thrills of The Temptations in their pop prime; a relentlessly upbeat positivity party The proselytising may be a little too full on for some ears (the happy clappy “God’s In Control”, the spoken word sermonising of “God Will Take Care Of You”), but the grit and strut of “Hold Your Head Up” and slinky grooves of “Let Me Tell You” ofer dazzling variations on a classic soul template to charm even the staunchest unbeliever TERRY STAUNTON
Pixies
A breath of fresh ai r from Royal Blood’s producer Tom Dalgety and Paz Lechantin,now established on bass duty, brought a more confident, together feel on the thrashy strop of “Um Chagga Lagga” and the power poppy “Classic Masher” Overall,though, still on the side of chuggy and unremarkable
kind of what the new, mature Pixies sounded like: solid, comforting late ’90s alt rock, if not the piss and vinegar kind played by Pixies Mk I. Doggerel, on which they reunite with Beneath The Eyrie and Head Carrier producer Tom Dalgety, continues that settling in process, eschewing reinvention in favour of refnement. Its 12 songs were selected from a furry of 40 written when Black Francis was reluctantly dragged from the cocoon of home, having enjoyed the escape and peace of lockdown, and its title seems to allude ironically to the critical reception of Pixies Mk II, the idea that they’re churning out boilerplate. Yet if “Nomatterday” opens proceedings on a classic, ominous bassline and builds to a shouty punch of a chorus that could have been generated by a Pixies AI model, the gothic famboyance of Joey Santiago’s guitar is full of life and energy, and the song’s halfway shif of speed into chunky rifs lit by Paz Lenchantin’s sour sweet vocals stops things settling into a groove This is a band not agonising, just being And if you stop ranking them against Surfer Rosa for just a second, the Pixies in 2022 sound relaxed, happy, and wide ranging, stretching out into airy melodies and gothic country swagger where they feel like it This is also the frst of their albums to feature writing credits for Santiago: he contributed the music of the fun, thrashy “Dregs Of The Wine”, which
PIXIESMUSIC
The reunion had now lasted twice as long as thei r original career,and the Pixies were beginning to reach for more than just sounding like the Pixies. Songs like “Silver Bullet” had more development and better dynamics (beyond the old quiet loud) while “St Nazaire ” and “Bird Of Prey” fizzed with energy
This collection of three EPs needed to be exceptional. It wasn ’ t,though i t also wasn ’ t the sacrilege that critics made out.Failed attempts to recapture the bile of yore on the wacky likes of “Bagboy” and “Blue Eyed Hexe” were irksome,but the country tinged melodicism of “Greens And Blues” pointed a way forward
Pixies Mk II now have as many albums as Pixies Mk I if you’ve given up in recent years, perhaps now is the time to reopen the door to some small joys If we can now safely conclude that the Pixies are unlikely to hit the heights of early days, then let’s face it, it’s the rare mortal who can; but it’s also the only slightly less rare mortal who can make albums as solidly good as this one As long as the Pixies keep making good Pixies songs, maybe we should learn to stop worrying and love the Doggerel headline this year ’ s End Of The Road Festival on Saturday, September 3 2022: Joey Santiago (right) steps up
INDIE CINDY
Afer her departure, the release of Indie Cindy and Head Carrier mediocre and unconvincing if not actively terrible records, sometimes fippantly trying to shrug of the burden of the past, sometimes audibly crushed beneath it did little to disprove her point (plus for many old fans, the Pixies without Kim wasn’t really the Pixies) Yet by 2019’s Beneath The Eyrie, Pixies Mk II had settled into their new skin, sounding more assured and no longer thrashing on the hook of their reputation on the likes of the breezy balladry of “Daniel Boone” And if the die hard purist Pixies fan might still be lef wishing the past two decades had never happened, coincidentally, that’s
IT’S a good thing a legacy as towering as the Pixies’ is so hard to topple, because they did have a good go for a while there. Endless and increasingly joyless touring afer their 2004 reunion lowered the value of their legend, while bassist Kim Deal refused to make a new record because, she said, as a music fan, she wouldn’t want to listen to a new Pixies album.
contrasts Mudhoneyish grungy chug with vaulting classic rock rifs (and a classic Black Francis oblique opening: “While I prefer the original version of ‘You Really Got Me’/She will defer to the Van Halen version”) He also wrote the lyrics of the Leonard Cohen ish funky gothic country title track, probably the most interesting song on Doggerel.
/ PIAS 2014
T O M O X L E Y PIXIES Doggerel PIXIES RECORD NG NC/BMG 7/10 Album eight takes it a little easier. By Emily Mackay
INFECTIOUS/ BMG 2019
And listening to them enjoy themselves is in itself enjoyable on lead single “There’s A Moon On”, with its Halloween swagger, and despite reaching for “asunder” as a rhyme, the country punk “Thunder & Lightning” has a totally irresistible chorus hook “Don’t piss in the fountain” , Black Francis asserts, and maybe it’s sage advice
BENEATH THE EYRIE
Elsewhere, the warm and peppy likes of “Haunted House”, with its lush backing vocals and theremin, and “The Lord Has Come Back Today” recall the sense of liberation of the early Frank Black albums. And if the band aren’t pushing hard at any envelopes on the surly, slinky, slightly psychedelic “Get Simulated”, or the rompy straight ahead indie rock of “You’re Such A Sadducee”, they are tinkering enjoyably at the edges on “Vault Of Heaven”’s lush melody and Morricone atmospherics, or the famenco thrum, shimmering Fleetwood Mac licks and sweet nagging chorus of “Who’s More Sorry Now” (“I swept the closet foor/I found some metaphors”). They’re happy to explore being a bit more plush, a bit more cosy, luxurious and gentle, and if it would make Steve Albini nauseous, what of it?
S L E E V E N O T E S 1 Nomatterday 2 Vault Of Heaven 3 Dregs Of The Wine 4 Haunted House 5 Get Simulated 6 The Lord Has Come Back Today 7 Thunder & Lightning 8 There’s A Moon On 9 Pagan Man 10 Who’s More Sorry Now? 11 You’re Such A Sadducee 12 Doggerel Produced by: Tom Dalgety Recorded at: Guilford Sound, Guilford,Vermont Personnel includes:Black Francis (guitar, vocals),Joey Santiago (lead guitar),Paz Lenchantin (bass, backing vocals, keyboards),David Lovering (drums) Pixies
NEW ALBUMS 3 0 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
HEAD CARRIER
PIXIESMUSIC/ PIAS 2014
H OW TO B UY. . .
NEW ALBUMS
TERRY STAUNTON
Equal parts Harry Chapin and Jarvis Cocker, Heaton and Abbott’s ffh breaks taboos about infant deaths on the quietly moving “Still” and nobly restores self belief on the uplifing “When The World Would Actually Listen” They remain impervious to musical snobbery, too, masking “The Good Times”’ brutal twist with ska and underlining “I Ain’t Going Nowhere”’s lockdown madness with country, while humour’s deployed like Nancy & Lee on “Too Much For One (Not Enough For Two)” Of course, there’s still room for social politics: “Baby It’s Cold Inside” nails sexual harassers and “Sunny Side Up”’s subtle rockabilly cheerfully warns “the only real democracy sees the Eton mob in jail”. WYNDHAM WALLACE
7/10
SON LITTLE
Garageband Superstar
When all else fails, though, Heaton’s always got a quip. “I look at a song like The Contours’ ‘First I Look At The Purse’ It’s so clever and funny and just brilliant If I could ever write a song like that I’d retire, but I won ’ t, so I’ll just have to keep going!”
“I
National Treasures provide welcome empathy
NIGEL WILLIAMSON
Fender picking combine to pleasing efect on “Lightning Love” and the title track in particular, while “Our Happy Hour” evokes tear stained memories of prime George Jones Subject matter tends to be rooted in recognisable Nashville templates, but eloquent vignettes like the make do compromises of the Mary Gauthier co write “We’re All We’ve Got” are none the worse for it TERRY STAUNTON
VIRGIN MUSIC
REVELATIONS
’ ve had reviews saying, ‘You know where he lives, now go and kill him,’” Paul Heaton recalls One might expect that over time he’d have become bitter, but that’s not been the case, especially as his last album with JacquiAbbott topped the UK charts.“I’m a big one for ‘kindness begets kindness’,” he says.“I’ve seen it, particularly during lockdown.
“I got a thing from the students across the road saying, ‘If you need us to go to the shops for you because you ’ re scared or whatever, we’ll go ’ They didn’ t know I was a young, fit, lithe, 58 year old singer who jogs everywhere!”
JESCA HOOP
WYNDHAM WALLACE
LAURAN HIBBERD
Hoop, who relocated from California to Chorley some years ago, has spanned everything from fnger picking troubadour tropes to indie rock exultation on past albums Here she tries something diferent again, framing her songs in chamber pop arrangements with a horn and woodwind quintet supporting her multi tracked vocal harmonies. As ever, her lyrics are full of literate
/
Despite the current state of the nation, this, and similar acts of street level cooperation, have helped maintain his spirits: “I’m optimistic about the future as long as we can gain control of i t ourselves and reward kindness with more kindness. We’ve seen how negativity spreads like a herpes through a country like England.”
8/10
6/10
Order Of Romance
complexity, the personal and political intertwined on songs about such heav yweight subjects as gun control (“Seven Pounds Of Press”), religious cults (“One Way Mirror”) and climate change (“Firestorm”) John Parish’s production keeps the sound suitably sharp and edgy on a set that eschews easy options in pursuit of a challenging but satisfying singularity.
JULIAN LENNON Jude BMG
Solid if unspectacular musings from an oft uncomfortable spotlight
PAUL HEATON & JACQUI ABBOTT
MEMPHIS INDUSTRIES
The title of Lennon’s frst album in 11 years, a nod to the Beatles hit Paul McCartney wrote for him afer the breakup of his parents’ marriage, is a pointer to the record being one of his more personal projects Its release date coincides with his late mother Cynthia’s birthday, and memories of his upbringing pepper the likes of the acoustic strummer “Not One Night”, the strident “Every Little Moment” (referencing John’s earlier “war is over” mantra), and the pensive piano ballad “Love Never Dies”. He describes the album as a “coming of age” project, and at 59 it’s evident he’s still processing the past.
Sixth studio album from Tom Waits’protégée
8 10
incompatible styles and with a broad emotional range. “Concrete Over Water’’ starts with Black Country, New Road member Ellery crooning over a gently wheezing organ, then morphs into a strutting, Technicolor monster, while “Debra” comes on like Weyes Blood given a Turkish EDM rinse “Greatest Hits”, meanwhile, welds summery ’70s soul and ’80s synthpop to a piano house tune and could potentially deliver on its cheeky title SHARON O CONNELL
7/10
JIM LAUDERDALE Game Changer SKY CRUNCH
6/10
Buzzy London duo’s ear swivelling debut Georgia Ellery and Taylor Skye Guildhall School graduates in jazz and electronic composition respectively have both an unbounded vision and the skills to realise it. Together they make smart but unstudied pop music, as invigoratingly weird as it is instantly winning, stufed with gleefully
Why at least one of them is “optimistic about the future”
PAUL HEATON & JACQUI ABBOTT
During a lengthy career comprising 35 albums, Lauderdale has proved to be a master crafsman, especially at home when giving honky tonk or rockabilly a fresh lick of paint, but Game Changer fnds him mining what many consider the classic country sound of the 1960s The swoop of steel guitar and fancy
JOCKSTRAP
I Love You Jennifer B ROUGH TRADE
Veteran singer songwriter keeping the quality high
Jockstrap: smart but unstudied OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 3 1
The Roots, but since his 2015 debut as Son Little, he’s simultaneously built a burnished rep as a potent solo artist, mixing R&B grit, a rock’n’roll sensibility and primordial blues in thrilling style Singing in a rich and soulful baritone, he conceived the 10 songs here afer undergoing therapy to come to terms with childhood abuse It must have worked, for songs such as the languid “Deeper” and the joyous “Stoned Love” are full of spiritual healing, as self doubt is replaced by a hard won inner radiance NIGEL WILLIAMSON
This Isle Of Wight native’s brand of gobby songwriting has seen her labelled slacker pop, but on her debut album she’s settling into a style that might draw on American musical tropes but mines a distinctly British lyrical tradition. “Step Mum” and “Average Joe” are Kinksian urban vignettes translated into Gen Z speak, and the latter track could have ft quite snugly onto Elastica’s debut She’s also more than able to conjure up Katy Perry style pop rock earworms in the shape of “Hot Boys” and “Still Running”, and even if the reggae metal of “I’m Insecure” is a little club footed, the charisma of her delivery still wins through. JOHNNY SHARP
Like Neptune ANTI
Fourth solo album from neo soul maven Aaron Livingstone won a Grammy for producing Mavis Staples and has collaborated with fellow black activists
NK-POP EMI 8/10
Sardonic southerner’s likeably Atlantic-straddling debut
A loose limbed take on the Traveling Wilbury’s “End Of The Line” does little more than mark the halfway point, but there are two highlights beyond tha t The frst is Rebennack’s own “Sleeping Dogs Best Lef Alone”, whose good time, bayou funk swing belies his message about the danger and futility of trying to undo the past As his daughter, KarlaR Pratt, the album’s executive producer, tells Uncut: “Dad started writing this afer getting clean from narcotics and becoming actively involved in a12 step programme. He wa s very proud of being in recovery It’s about life’s ups and downs and tha t how we dea l with it can require spiritua l help ‘the seen and the unseen’ to fnd abetter way to live.” There’s no denying the song’s uncanny resemblance to the theme from Minder, but tha t musica l gene pool is deep and democratic
S L E E V E N O
rewind to the singer’s childhood with the traditiona l “Gimme Tha t Old Time Religion”, which he chose to cut acopy of a t an arcade amusement, aged seven, though it’s played (with Nelson) a s aslice of back porch Southern soul/boogie woogie, with backup singers Rerecording his best known song, which introduced the character of Dr John The Night Tripper wa s potentially risky a s well a s redundant, but the new version of “I Walk On Guilded Splinters” lands with authoria l weight.
It’s arecord inevitably weighted with both the memory of asingula r artist and broader intimations of mortality “Funny How Time Slips Away” is apoignant choice of opener tha t sees Rebennack in arefective mood on his origina l songs At some point, he must have known for certain this would be his last album, but there’s nothing maudlin here. Though Things Happen That Way ha s its sparky moments, it plays more a s aresonant and well pitched, easy swinging record full of cross generationa l spirit and the pleasure won from collaborative creativity.
How was his health during recording?
Country music was a genre Dad had always enjoyed and wanted to further explore;he recalled country & western songs he heard playing in his childhood and was inspired to create songs on this album to have the qualities he admired in those classics He wanted the songs to be beautiful and moving,so that
Dad was 77 and dealing with being that age He was private about his health issues and didn’ t put i t in the street he preferred to focus his energy on recording his record his way.The feel of his album the finishing touches and sound quality were very important to him Having toured for six decades,Dad was an old school professional, the ultimate showman who
John:easy
What was your father’s intent with this album?
E S DR JOHN Things THappen hat Way ROUNDER 7/10 Storied veteran tips his hat to country music on understated yet spirited farewell. By Sharon O’Connell
10
Personnel:Dr John (vocals,piano, keys) Shane Theriot (guitars,bass,perc), Tony Hall,Will Lee, Corey McCormick (bass) Anthony LoGerfo (drums), Carlo Nuccio,Herlin Riley (drums perc)
Recorded at: Rebennack ’ s and Theriot ’ s homes, Esplanade Studios, New Orleans
they stay with you long after hearing them
GIVEN the range of Mac Rebennack’s decades long journeying and his talent for transmuting roots and folk music into arock’n’roll style so distinctive it’s almost its own genre, it’s odd tha t he never made acountry album Afer all, country music wa s one of his frst loves: along with the blues and jazz records in his father’s collection, he grew up listening to Hank Williams and Roy Rogers, and came to admire its strong narrative tradition. With Things Happen That Way, which he saw through to completion before his death in 2019, Rebennack is both paying respect and indulging his afection.
numbers, two songs recorded by Johnny Cash (the title track, written by Jack Clement, and the Willie Nelson penned “Funny How Time Slips Away”), one reworking of a Traveling Wilburys tune and one gospel traditiona l A re recorded “I Walk On Guilded Splinters” also features, with three new originals completing the set To realise these songs, Rebennack called on New Orleans session players, while Theriot does most of the acoustic and electric guita r work.
Despite the covers’ origina l sources, it’s fa r from astrict country set; every track is slung Rebennack’s way via blues, Southern soul, R&B, gospel and boogie woogie, with fresh arrangements and piano and/or keyboard doing most of the melodic lead work, his voice, with its familia r growl, capable and true There’s no hint of voodoo shtick tha t wa s expunged long ago
INTERVIEW: SHARON O CONNELL
Way
Dad wrote i t and originally recorded i t at Gold Star Studios,LA,in 1967;half a century later he wanted to revisi t i t with a fresh spiritual vibe.This version is putting a new spin on this classic From his first album to his final studio album the song came full circle it’s current,yet timeless
3 2 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
Good Talkin’
Produced by: Malcolm John Rebennack Jr Shane Theriot, Lukas Nelson & Promise Of The Real (“I Walk On Guilded Splinters”)
It features Luka s Nelson & Promise Of The Real, trims over two and ahalf minutes from the original, minimises the percussion and restyles it a s amodern blues prowler with rippling steel guita r work and alight psychedelic shimmer.
Q&A
always wanted to create new music for his fans
Dr swingin’and voodoo A To Guess Things Happen That
Willie Nelson,Lukas Nelson (vocals, guitar) Jon Cleary (keys),Logan Metz (keys,steel guitar), David Torkanowsky (piano) Alonzo Bowens (sax), Leon Brown (trumpet) Mark Mullins (trombone), Yolanda Robinson, Jolynda Chapman (backing vocals) T
Karla R Pratt:“Dad was an old school professional”
It wa s recorded in 2017, frst a t co producer Shane Theriot’s home in New Orleans, then in aloca l studio and fnally, a s his health deteriorated, a t Rebennack’s house As the title suggests, it’s heav y on the covers: there are two Hank Williams
The other standout is the closing title track, which Cash released a s asingle in 1958. Rebennack and Theriot have completely transformed it from the original’s odd mix of rock’n’roll, country and barbershop quartet into atender and languid Southern soul hymn to philosophica l acceptance, lightly brushed with steel guitar, Rebennack measuring his phrases with long practised ease. Things Happen That Way isn’t an exempla r of his style, nor (clearly) is it alate career blooming, but it is arichly resonant farewell from amaverick veteran That’s status enough
free B R U C E W E B E R NEW ALBUMS 1 Funny How Time Slips Away 2 Ramblin’ Man 3 Gimme That Old Time Religion 4 I Walk On Guilded Splinters 5 I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry 6 End Of The Line 7 Holy Water 8 Sleeping Dogs Best Left Alone 9 Give Myself
Why the decision to rerecord “I Walk On Guilded Splinters”?
Afer tha t bittersweet opener, the deep grooved take on “Ramblin’ Man” swings in, with its bluesy, chain gang drive, grubby guita r vamp and piano counterpoint both abeefy reinvention tha t keeps Williams’ haunting origina l in mind and areminder of Rebennack’s work with Dan Auerbach. There’s a
Nostalgic yet exhilarating debut from Devon three piece
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Having provided a psychogeographic map of his Wigan childhood on 2018’s instrumental Innerland, Mark Peters was provoked by a local lockdown arts project to explore recollections of the town’s former Canada Picture Palace and its favoured cowboy flms Consequently, he turns to banjo and lap steel to enhance shoegaze y landscapes sometimes reminiscent of erstwhile collaborator Ulrich Schnauss, with “Tamaroa” and “Golden Cloud” akin to ambient US pioneers like Suss, while BJ Cole contributes pedal steel to the dusky “Silver River”. A hushed Dot Allison also adds divine melodies to the transcendent “Switch On The Sky” and climactic “Sundowning”. WYNDHAM WALLACE
Fourth from US drone composer Summer 2022 presented two diferent Kali Malones, live: the one ofering ecclesiastical drone on a grand church organ; the other unsettling a Sunn O))) crowd with dark electronics Living Torch, the US born, Stockholm based composer’s fourth full album, brokers something like a compromise Here recording with a small ensemble, “Living Torch I” is gentle and organic, a hypnotic four note refrain ofering some of the spiritual uplif of her organ work The shorter “Living Torch II” presents something like the same ingredients, but strafes them with electronic attack, to see how they might adapt and endure. It’s possibly a smaller development than the one suggested by the scale of her Sacrifcial Code in 2019, but a welcome one nonetheless.
TOMMY McLAIN
A Louisiana swamp pop pioneer makes a comeback with some famous friends
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KALI MALONE
Blockbuster stadium rockers turn post-pandemic angst into disco metal anthems
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YEP ROC
Artful reconstruction for Calgary quartet’s fourth Vocalist/songwriter Matthew Flegel has said of the post punks’ latest, “It’s basically about the world blowing up and no one giving a shit.” A dystopian mindset, maybe, but one that’s defned the goth edged band since their 2015 debut as Viet Cong Pandemic restrictions demanded some creative rethinking for these seven tracks; that included the doubling of various parts on other instruments, which were then sampled and turned into new parts, as on “Slowly”, with its roar of tumbling synths and drum rattle Guitars are still central, however, whipping the Chameleons like “Ricochet” along and performing as bedrock melodic clanging for the six minute, Sisters adjacent closer, “Tearing Up The Grass”. SHARON O’CONNELL
Aged 74, Yanna Momina is a member of the Afar people, a rural group displaced around the Horn Of Africa She has, traditionally, sung to entertain her neighbours, and her voice is an extraordinary instrument that shines throughout this very spartan, home recorded set. Momina delivers heartbroken poetry in a conversational growl; she leaps into an idiosyncratic
SELF RELEASED
Tommy McLain
NEW ALBUMS OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 3
MARK PETERS
Red Sunset Dreams SONIC CATHEDRAL
Souvenirs FULL TIME HOBBY
Engineer looks to western horizons on second solo album
STEVE PILGRIM BeautifulBlue
Living Torch PORTRAITS GRM
YANNA MOMINA
Afar Ways GL TTERBEAT
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Los Angeles duo keep it gnarly on scrappy sixth
On No Age’s ferocious early releases for Sub Pop, guitarist Randy Randall and drummer/singer Dean Allen Spunt were mostly content to keep the pedal to the metal Since switching over to Drag City for 2018’s Snares Like A Haircut, a more experimental sensibility has come to the fore People Helping People is evenly split between eerie, washed out rumblings and more frenzied outbursts of Sonic Youth ful skronk and motorik madness What initially seems erratic eventually coheres into something genuinely exciting, with standouts like “Violence” demonstrating the band’s continued fealty to Hüsker Dü, the Minutemen and other long gone heroes of the American underground. JASON ANDERSON
In the 1950s and ’60s, Tommy McLain notched up a series of singles that deployed elements of New Orleans country and R&B rolling piano basslines, shivers of zydeco accordion, chiming guitars to convey the dreaminess of young love For his frst album in more than 40 years, the octogenarian uses many of those same sounds and styles to express a late life wistfulness Produced by swamp blues maestro CC Adcock and featuring Elvis Costello and Nick Lowe, these songs balance the regrets with the triumphs, which lends songs like the title track and “My Hidden Heart” a playfulness as well as an immense poignancy.
Pilgrim’s excellent sixth solo album has been a while in the making, with title track “Beautiful Blue” frst emerging as a demo in 2018 The rest of the album was completed with the help of Paul Weller Pilgrim drums in Weller’s band and Weller has fve co writes on this graceful folk album that centres on Pilgrim’s gentle voice, precise lyrics and delicate acoustic guitar. Hannah Peel adds strings, bringing additional weight to tracks like the mournful “Whistle In The Wind” and “One With All”, while backing vocals enhance the haunting Nick Drake like opener “New Skies” or gospel tinged “Universe” PETER WATTS
Afer slipping into an alternative sci f metaverse on their synth heav y 2018 chart topper, Simulation Theory, Matt Bellamy’s pomp rock overlords return to real life apocalyptic angst rooted in the post Trump pandemic era on this blockbuster ninth Though easily mocked for his conspiratorial paranoia, Bellamy remains an unassailable master of operatic melodrama and sumptuous arrangements A new career peak, “Compliance” is a majestic disco funk anthem with a classic Daf Punk vibe, while “Liberation” shamelessly invokes Queen in their piano crashing orchestral prime and the gloriously titled “We Are Fucking Fucked” explodes with delirious tempo changing glam metal mania. Muse are so bursting with energy and ideas, even their joke songs are stadium sized barnstormers
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DRAG C TY
WillOf The People WARNER
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R O B N C L E W L E Y D A N B U R N F O R T
I Ran Down Every Dream
People Helping People
Lonesome cowboy: Mark Peters
Fragile folk from Weller drummer’s solo offering
STEPHEN DEUSNER
7/10
PREOCCUPATIONS Arrangements
Taking their musical cues from krautrock, Cocteau Twins and the KLF, Pale Blue Eyes are unashamed in the nostalgia that pervades their debut album Souvenirs captures some turbulent and even painful times in the lives of the Totnes trio art school sweethearts Matt and Lucy Board plus bassist Aubrey Simpson but it does so in a way that is joyful, propulsive; the sort of conscious positivity that is an active choice. Opener “Globe” is a bubblegum headrush: giddy, kinetic, punctuated by smile inducing cries of “you got this” ; “Champagne”, with its shared bassline, a bittersweet mirror image. The skittish “TV Flicker”, inspired by a sudden family bereavement, breaks the mould somewhat, adding range to the mix LISA MARIE FERLA
Thrillingly spartan set from an East African singer
NO AGE
PALE BLUE EYES
MUSE
MUDDY LEAF
JOHN ROBINSON
vibrato; she trades call and response chants with her male backing band. Best of all is “The Donkey Doesn’t Listen”, where she raps, over handclaps and a beat boxing bassline, about the perils of farming, before going into an ululating howl that resembles a burglar alarm JOHN LEWIS
STEPHEN DALTON
8/10
Nailing
Developing the compelling mix of rap, world rhythms, R&B and neo soul of her debut, Athena, Natural Brown Prom Queen revels in ear catching beats and hooks while still maintaining Parks’ mile a minute rate of musical ideas “Home Maker” elevates snappy, glitchy boom bap with a soaring, soul steeped chorus, while “OMG Britt” dips into heav y, trappish beats and “Homesick (Gorgeous & Arrogant)” is a stoned erotic reverie lit by liquid guitar. “Am I good enough?” she wonders momentarily on “Selfsh Soul”, a searching tribute to black women’s hair More than: we scarcely deserve this EMILY MACKAY
Dentures Out is the Reids’ sketch of Britannia, as descended to a toothless invalid, morbidly fxated on bygone glories These brisk tunes only one of the 13 tracks clears three minutes elaborate on this theme, not exclusively at everyone else’s expense (“The Recent Past”, features a partially self deprecating dig at ’80s pop stars playing Butlin’s) Most of the album is upbeat country rock, with a couple of songs lent extra punch by James Dean Bradfeld’s guitar but the best track by some stretch is “Sundays By John Calvin”, a string lashed ballad recalling the interminable Auchtermuchty weekends of the Reids’ childhoods.
Sampa Tembo moved to Australia from Botswana in 2013, winning support from Kendrick Lamar to Michelle Obama for her hip hop debut The Return (2019) Covid, though, made her fall back to her Zambian birthplace, where she found the newly cogent identity which gives As Above, So Below its title “Never Forget” is a pulsing, breezily exultant tribute to the ’70s golden age of Zamrock’s psych trad fusion Sampa’s cultural and personal assertion similarly merge Her fow has a bratty edge and unhurried, authoritative core, capable of Philly soul sweetness on “Lo Rain”, or riding low, squelching beats on “IDGAF”, where she decides: “Lately, I don’t give a fuck/I think it’s
Hell for leather:Londoners’postpunk detour
Afer regaining their adventurous spirit with an ever grander trilogy, Suede have now ditched the orchestras and conceptual conceits for a simpler, hard hitting record Richard Oakes is on fne form, channelling John McGeoch on the spellbound rifs of “15 Again” and “Personality Disorder”; these tracks,
Second album from Belgian Egyptian balladeer
ALEX REX MouthfulOf Earth NEOLITHIC
SUDAN ARCHIVES
Divine confidence drips from the second album by Cincinnati’s Brittney Parks
Sahar COMMUNION
6/10
ANDREW MUELLER
COOKING VINYL
7/10
JOHN LEWIS
it: Sudan Archives
Hideous Bastard XL 8/10
Following the post grief glam resurgence of last year’s Paradise, Alex Neilson dives back into underground hell with these pustular, absurdly misanthropic poems set largely to his 2006 drone album Belayer Time “It Must Be Love” sees him on a Terminator like mission from the future, prophesying his own future abuse of a lover; “Alcoholic Parabola” ofers demonic string scrapes and insect wing hisses, like The Exorcist remade in Eraserhead’s basement. “Pleased as a drunk pissing/Typical me” , Alex refects with satisfaction. By the time of ex Trembling Bells bandmate Lavinia Blackwall’s spiritual jazz ululations on “Charity Shop Prophet”, the Irvine Welsh like comic edge of these screeds is peeking through NICK HASTED
LOMA VISTA
6/10
The
Like his grandfather, celebrated singer and actor Muharram Fouad, Tamino Amir Moharam Fouad’s voice is distinguished by a notable quiver, but his European upbringing ensures a dominant style whose sensitivity ofen recalls Thom Yorke’s. Indeed, Radiohead’s Colin Greenwood provides basslines throughout, and “Fascination”’s and “Sunfower”’s sluggish melancholy would suit The Bends, while “The Flame”’s string arrangements wouldn’t sound out of place on A Moon Shaped Pool His rich tenor and occasional falsetto embellishments also evoke Rufus Wainwright on “You Don’t Own Me”, but his roots still show in his oud playing on the fragile “A Drop Of Blood” and tense “The First Disciple”. WYNDHAM WALLACE
THE PROCLAIMERS Dentures Out
L&R
SHARON O CONNELL
beneath me now” Meanwhile, “Let Me Be Great” is a pan African frework display celebrating her rooted rebirth NICK HASTED
Autofiction BMG
7/10
Frankfurt duo lead a 21st century Indo-jazz collective
NaturalBrown Prom Queen STONES THROW 9/10
Two maverick sound sculptors, one original soundtrack CFT’s creation of an original score for Caroline Catz’s acclaimed biopic on Derbyshire was a voyage of discovery, as well as a labour of love and respect: it saw her trawling the composer’s archives for recordings and texts to deepen her understanding of DD. These 18 compositions, then, bear CFT’s authorial stamp but are informed by the other’s style and practice The LP is obviously a set piece but there are peak moments: the eerie, slow mo synth drifs of “Delia Tones”, “Corridor”, with its ominous nuclear pulsations, and the wyrd folk shimmerings of “Samson Pub” All works of integration, rather than deference or domination
RAGAWERK Ragawerk
34 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 M U R D O M A C L E O D E D W G H E N S O N
TAMINO
CONSPIRACY INTERNATIONAL
along with the pounding “Black Ice” and “Shadow Self”, fnd Suede in a deeply thrilling mode: infectious, silly and even a little dangerous again. Through it all even on the two quieter tracks, which stick out a little awkwardly among the Killing Joke fuzz Brett Anderson is the consummate guide, vocally at his peak TOM PINNOCK
7/10
Ragawerk are guitarist Max Clouth and drummer Martin Standke, leading a large collective of German and Indian musicians through an Indo jazz workout that tries to avoid some of the tried and tested ’70s fusion tropes Standke’s rhythms lurch between drum’n’bass (“Nature Of The Self”), funk in 7/4 (“Das Modul”) and industrial techno (“Theta Wave”), but the real focus is on guitarist Clouth, who moves between McLaughlin style pyrotechnics, smooth jazz, hypnotic minimalism and U2 style “hands free” solos The piano and tabla driven sitar funk of “Ab Yeh Kya?” is fun, but the highlight is “Mangal”, a mid tempo synthpop ballad featuring Ornette Coleman sidekick Asha Puthli on vocals.
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Oz hip-hop star returns to Zambian roots
The xx bassist and singer bares his soul on bracing solo debut
OLIVER SIM
Reflective mood: Proclaimers
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COSEY FANNI TUTTI
SAMPA THE GREAT As Above,So Below
SUEDE
Craig and Charlie Reid see in their 60ths in fine fettle
“Been living with HIV since 17, am I hideous?” Oliver Sim sings in “Hideous”, the opening song on The xx bassist and singer’s solo debut There are many more moments here in which Sim is equally frank about feelings of shame, hurt and fear. Yet Hideous Bastard is hardly the long dark night of the soul it might’ve been thanks to the beguiling musical settings Sim provides alongside producer Jamie xx. With the chilly avant pop of “Never Here” and more inviting likes of “Run The Credits”, the xx duo eagerly depart from the templates that have served their band so well, thereby imparting Hideous Bastard with a spontaneity that complements the courage and candour in the lyrics JASON ANDERSON
Delia Derbyshire:The Myths And The Legendary Tapes
Purgatorial poetry and demonic drones
8/10
“I’m connecting with cathartic expressions of rage… ”
Warren was faced with a choice:up sticks from New York to Wales, to a place she had never been, to be with a person with whom she had spent all of two weeks “Or move back in with my parents, and cry every day ”
Having dabbled in bluegrass, folk and Southern gothic tinged pop on previous releases, this Kiwi seems to
I N the early days of the pandemic, Johanna
She also found time to finish her sixth studio album, the stunning Lessons For Mutants Begun in New York, and completed in Ramsgate, its songs mark an unleashing in both sound and emotion for Warren “A lot of my earlier work is so gentle and soft and pretty and kind of delicate,” she says.“But I feel increasingly I’m connecting with cathartic expressions of rage.Looking back on my younger self, there was almost more of a performative need to be seen as angelic, and now I’m like, ‘Fuck it, I’m a demon too ’” LAURA BARTON
Lockdown in rural mid Wales treated her well “It was a revelation for me to be in one place,” she says, “ as someone who’s just been blowing around in the wind for years. A qualified herbalist, she spent her days “wildcrafting and fermenting and making homemade alcoholic beverages and pickling and
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New Zealander’s smartly dressed third solo set
Lessons For Mutants WAX NINE
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My BeautifulEngland
SECRETLY CANADIAN
Sixth album from spiritually questing Californian
TINY GLOBAL PRODUCTIONS
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“I have a story I tell, about a god who came to grief ”
NEW ALBUMS 3 6 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 P H I L P R A N D A L L
The coolest of ’00s art punks, Karen O, Brian Chase and Nick Zinner always had the depth to blossom into more Sadly, their fourth album, the dubby, grubby, weird Mosquito, didn’t quite stick its transitional landing, and was followed by nine years of silence A nostalgic comeback would have been almost sadder, but lead single “Spitting Of The Edge Of The World” kapowed such fears: chilly, cosmic grandeur, haunted by the silvery tones of Perfume Genius. Space and darkness are a constant among these eight tight songs, but there’s also plenty of punch; the space cathedral synth stabs of “Wolf” hit transcendence hard, while “Flee” is a sleazy disco punk riot
Stripped down second set of 2022
CoolIt Down
SADDLE CREEK
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Young Jesus began with an acid trip, and sole mainstay John Rossiter, burnt out with his band, continues his inner explorations largely alone here (folk labelmate Tomberlin guests) You can almost hear doors swinging shut in monastic apartments, as he abandons his perfectionist MO to grapple with faith and loss over mangled voice demos and musique concrète sheets of rain Gated drums crash into harp like keyboards on opener “Rose Eaters”, setting out a style of ’80s informed lo f baroque, interspersed with ’90s rave bliss outs. Rossiter’s voice switches between Stephin Merritt lugubrious and a fragile, abstracted croon, as he contemplates conficted tenets which come to a head in “Believer”:
MARLON WILLIAMS
YEAH YEAH YEAHS
EMILY MACKAY
My Boy DEAD OCEANS
JACK WHITE Entering Heaven Alive THIRD MAN
Former Servant’s first solo album in 20 years
JOHNNY SHARP
making tinctures and salves, just going full kitchen witch.”
While White’s ffh solo album was written at the same time as April’s Fear Of The Dark, it’s presented as an acoustically oriented counterpart to that album’s fuzz caked rock feel. The theme is also unashamedly romantic, and sweetly violin laced paean “Help Me Along” is a sublime vignette of stripped down chamber pop replete with what sounds suspiciously like a xylophone Equally emotionally informed are the slow rolling piano led opener “A Tip From You To Me”, the folk textured devotional “Love Is Selfsh” and fute laced plea “If I Die Tomorrow” Although his dabblings in bluegrass pastiche are less convincing elsewhere, it’s all shot through with characteristic, likeable idiosyncrasy. JOHNNY SHARP
90 In November KEELED SCALES
JOHANNA WARREN
JOHANNA WARREN
Although they are now located in New York, Why Bonnie returned to their home state of Texas to record this debut album, which combines a country feel with a muscular indie rock rhythm section. That sense of C&W is enhanced by occasional pedal steel and Blair Howerton’s vocals, which sound like Lucinda Williams crossed with Tanya Donnelly, as she explores her Texan upbringing on songs such as “Galveston” There’s a strong Big Thief vibe to tracks like “Lot’s Wife” and “Silsbee” named afer the small town where the album was recorded but Why Bonnie have a more traditional concept of melody, best expressed on the excellent “Sharp Town” PETER WATTS
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Fine Americana indie album from NY based Texans
Enchanting sixth from US musician and actor American Welsh transplant Johanna Warren’s sixth solo record is as masterful as it is enchanting. From the lo f lilt of “I’d Be Orange” to the wrought up fervency of “Oaths” and the warm smoke of “Tooth For A Tooth”, Warren displays her stylistic fantail without the musical shifs ever seeming to jar Begun in 2018, and carried across both the pandemic and the Atlantic, geography and time have allowed these tales of ambition and iconoclasm to deepen Warren lands at “Involvulus”, a short, piano led closer that draws on the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. It’s the most perfectly poised song you’ll hear all year. LAURA BARTON
Welcome back David Westlake
DAVID WESTLAKE
NYC scenesters’first album in nine years, dark but punchy
Although The Servants’ C86 compilation appearance didn’t kickstart a glittering career in indie rock, their chief songwriter David Westlake retains great respect from that era’s cognoscenti His frst album under his own name since 2002, My Beautiful England is a Britpop concept album from a man who’d surely wince at either label Yet it’s a delight: “Bethnal Green Museum” ofers a gently jaunty, Belle & Sebastian style brand of sof pop in its nostalgic tribute, while “Mallory Kept Climbing The Mountain” blends impishly plucked guitar and black humour as a wry, wistful vocal refects, “He was still 37 when they found him” . Welcome back. JOHNNY SHARP
WHY BONNIE
have let the sunshine in on My Boy The breezy strumming and falsetto vocal hooks of the title track promise a sunny, soulful, gently funky afair and “Easy Does It” is similarly blissful, draped in lap steel and strings. But underlying darkness remains as the irresistible “Sof Boys Make The Grade” admits, afer innocent initial sentiments, “I don’t wanna build you up, I wanna destroy you” Throughout, though, an ear for arrangement detail be it fuzzy synths or rustic washboard like percussion lifs ofen simple, acoustic led songs into enduringly captivating territory
YOUNG JESUS Shepherd Head
NICK HASTED
REVELATIONS
Thomas Attar Bellier: “Our lyrics are pretty serious and political…”
4 Hobek Thawrat (feat Alsarah)
3 Ya Malak (feat Jello Biafra)
Paris based psych rockers gather a punky outlaw army from the Middle East to the West Coast.By Stephen Dalton
Al Qasar were formed by guitarist and oud player Thomas Attar Bellier, a veteran of various psych and prog metal bands, and sometime collaborator with feted Middle Eastern artists like Emel Mathlouthi The project began as a more fuid collective featuring Bellier alongside various friends, mostly poets from the Arab world They recorded their frst EP, “Miraj”, in Cairo But as this debut album began to take shape, the lineup solidifed into a more traditional rock group based in Paris, fronted by Moroccan vocalist Jaouad El Garouge. Both live and on record, Al Qasar present as a fairly conservative set up with drums, bass, guitars, leather jackets, sunglasses and
wild facial hair. But there are more experimental post rock drones and avant metal textures buried in the mix too, amd a rich array of Middle Eastern and North African instruments like the electric saz, bendir, darbuka and sagat.
Al Qasar’s earliest rehearsals and live shows took place in Barbès, a grungy, un gentrifed, historically Arab district of Paris Indeed, they pay tongue in cheek tribute to the area here with the doomy, propulsive, swampy track “Barbès Barbès” Rich in theatrical drama and ironic humour, this lyrical paean to low rent lives and illicit parties also features feted Franco Algerian oud player Mehdi Haddab of Speed Caravan fame, whose long list of previous collaborators include legendary rai icon Rachid Taha and Damon Albarn’s Africa Express collective Bellier initially contacted Ranaldo through mutual friends with the idea of recording together in Sonic Youth’s New York studio, but Covid got in the way Instead, the veteran guitar mangler sent over a mountain of treatments, which feed onto two of the album’s stand outs. The short opening instrumental “Awtar Al Sharq” is a mood setting swirl of plucked strings, drones and stormy clatter But the more muscular, expansive “Awal” is a full blooded set piece anthem, with an incantatory Arabic lyric that builds from guttural growl to siren howl, its propulsive overdriven rhythm sounding almost like a Franco Maghrebian variant of krautrock.
In places, Al Qasar still sound like the embryonic work in progress that they are, while Who Are We? is sometimes let down by its oddly staid faith in the bludgeoning moral force of declamatory, sloganeering urchin rock. Alien beauty, pop glamour and wild new sonic horizons can also be revolutionary voices for change But there is a healthy spread of sense rupturing potential and exhilarating skronk here, from the petrochemical protest anthem “Benzine” to the funky, discordant instrumental “Sham System” Bellier and his gang are not reinventing the wheel, but they are making a potent racket with gusto, passion and cool outlaw swagger.
How did you persuade Jello Biafra and Lee Ranaldo to collaborate with Al-Qasar?
Why did you pay homage to the Parisian district of Barbès on the album? Our lyrics are pretty serious and political,but that s the one song that s more jovial Barbès is an area that Fox News called a no go zone! It s bi t edgy,one of the few areas of Paris that is still un gentrified,and historically Algerian That’s where the band started,that’s where we had our first practice studio and our first live residence,so i t just made perfect sense.INTERVIEW: STEPHEN DALTON I S C O V E R E D
6 Barbès Barbès (feat Mehdi Haddab)
Recorded at: Museum Studio, Paris;Haus Estudio,Lisbon
You call Al Qasar’s music “Arabian Fuzz”, what does that mean to you? The basic idea is to take the fuzz pedal sound of rock ’ n ’roll and juxtapose i t with more traditional Arab music At core we ’ re a psych rock band,but a psych rock band that embraces North African and Middle Eastern influences
Although Who Are We? is a fairly testosterone heavy afair, several of the strongest tracks are driven by female vocalists and feminist slanted messages.
Outwardly a romantic song, the percussive, kinetic, feverish “Hobek Thawrat” features Sudanese American siren Alsarah aka Sarah Mohamed Abunama Elgadi, the daughter of political exiles and human rights activists who clothes her call for revolution back home in the wily ambiguous language of love poetry Meanwhile, mighty closer “Mal Wa Jamal” showcases Egyptian vocalist Hend Elrawy, who paints an empathetic portrait of sex workers over a bass throbbing, string plucking, centrifugal racket that invokes Primal Scream in their future punk prime
5 Sham System
OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 3 7 K I D R I C H A R D S NEW ALBUMS
Bellier’s connections to US punk godfather Jello Biafra, as a former member of his sometime backing band Spindrif, also pay of here with “Ya Malak”, a coldly furious rant against political corruption and social inequality laid over a punchy, percussive tangle of strings, drums and strings. Initially sounding fuzzy and remote, then boomingly close, Biafra’s signature blowtorch scorn makes a good match for the spoken word lyric by Egyptian revolutionary poet Ahmed Fouad Negm, an auspicious vehicle for his debut English translation “Who are they and who are we?” Biafra howls. “They are the emirs and they are the sultans... they wear the latest fashions, but we live seven in a single room”
S L E E V E N O T E S
Personnel:Thomas Attar Bellier (electric saz,guiters,keys), Jaouad El Garouge (vocals,awtar, karkabou tbilat bendir,claves, caxixi,cowbell), Guillaume Théoden (bass,sub bass), Nicolas Derolin (darbuka,daf, bongos bendi r shakers,sagat), Paul Void (drums)
ENLISTING radical US veterans Lee Ranaldo and Jello Biafra, alongside the rising generation of rebel poets, political exiles and roots rock revolutionaries forged during the Arab Spring, polyglot Parisians Al Qasar whip up a globalised psych rock storm on this gutsy debut. The band bill their self styled “Arabian Fuzz” sound as an authentic snapshot of multicultural Paris in 2022: this loosely translates as an agreeably grimy mongrelised mixtape of punk, grunge and garage rock signifers interwoven with gnawa, rai and desert blues infuences, all overlaid with Arabic and Berber language lyrics
AL- QASAR Who Are We? GLITTERBEAT
7 Benzine
Jello is an old friend,I used to know him a bi t when I lived in California, when I played in Spindrift we were his backing band for a series of shows. Lee Ranaldo was a bi t more out of
8 Mal Wa Jamal (feat Hend Elrawy)
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the blue,but we have a good friend in common,the poet Ron Whitehead. He’s like the last of the beat poets,the ultimate gonzo bad ass and they did a record together.Ron put me in touch with Lee because he said Lee would be great for the record and Lee dug our stuff right away
S e a rc h in g o ut t h e b e st a lb u m s n ew to U n cu t
Q&A D
2 Awal (feat Lee Ranaldo)
Produced by: Thomas Attar Bellier
1 Awtar Al Sharq (feat Lee Ranaldo)
Some amazing musical dynasties emerge There is the Ghanaian born blues musician Augustus Kwamiah Quaye, who settled in England afer the First World War and fathered Cab Kaye, a bandleader here represented by the 1962 single “Everything Is Go”, which mixes calypso with Ghanaian highlife music Cab’s sons would include the singer Finley Quaye and Finley’s older half brother Caleb Quaye, who played guitar with Elton John for many years and is here represented by his solo 1967 single “Baby Your Phrasing Is Bad”, a rather fne piece of Syd Barrett style freakbeat There’s bandleader Ray Ellington, born in London in 1916, here represented by the epic Bacharach style orchestral pop of “Rhythm Of The World”, written by Leslie Bricusse and Lionel Bart Best known for leading the house band on The Goon Show, Ellington was the father of Lance Ellington, now the lead singer on Strictly Come Dancing And there’s Harry Wilmot, a Jamaican R AF pilot who emigrated to the UK in 1948 and established
HER E’S a painted parchment in the British Museum which depicts the court of Henry VIII in 1511 where, among the royal musicians, you’ll fnd a black trumpeter by the name of John Blanke Blanke probably wasn’t the frst black musician to make a living in these isles, and certainly wasn’t the last. In the subsequent fve centuries there have been fgures as diverse as the violinist George Bridgetower (1778 1860), the “black Mahler” Samuel Coleridge Taylor (1875 1912), aristocrats’ favourite Leslie “Jiver” Hutchinson (1900 1969), star cabaret pianist Evelyn Dove (1902 1987) and jazz bandleader Ken “Snakehips” Johnson (1914 1941, killed in the Blitz while playing onstage).
1 MARIANNE FAITHFULL (P42) 2 DAVID SYLVIAN (P44) 3 NEU! (P46) 4 RE M (P48) 5 WILCO (P49) R E I S S U E S | C O M P S | B O X S E T S | L O S T R E C O R D I N G S I ve got something here to tell you, something s on my mind
VARIOUS ARTISTS Gotta Get A Good Thing Goin’:The Music Of Black Britain In The Sixties CHERRY RED Stunning compilation takes us from Winifred Atwell to Te Foundations, via ska, R&B, doo wop and jazz.By John Lewis R E I SS U E O F TH E M O NTH 8/10 G E T T Y M A G E S • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
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bag that includes jazz, blues and doo wop (the closing track is bandleader Geof Love’s hit recording of that most British of tunes, the theme to Coronation Street). The quality varies there is some stupendously good music and some highly average music but even the mediocre songs are accompanied by compelling backstories
By the 1960s, there were plenty of black faces on the British pop scene, although they haven’t always been prominently recorded by history. It’s something partly addressed by this mammoth, 116 track, 4CD boxset of black British music recorded between 1960 and 1969 It’s arranged thematically the frst two CDs are of soul, pop and R&B; the third is of ska and early reggae (including the likes of Rico Rodriguez, Laurel Aitken and Millie, and songs that namecheck everything from Brixton Market to Ena Sharples to The Beatles); the fnal disc is a mixed
DORRIS HENDERSON The Stars
Watch
Like him, many of these artists would become famous in the 1970s. Jamaica born Carl Douglas was, in 1968, recording the proto Northern Soul of “Serving A Sentence Of Life” but, six years later, would be selling an incredible 11 million copies of “Kung Fu Fighting”. The Chants, a black doo wop band from Liverpool who guested with The Beatles at The Cavern, later turned into global chart toppers as The Real Thing In 1968, however, they were recording songs like “Man Without A Face”, a plaintive ballad about racism.
Rereleased on CD by Fledgling Records in 2006,this is a fascinating mix of the New York and London folk revivals, where singer and autoharp player Henderson is backed by Pentanglers John Renbourn (on guitar and harmony vocals) and Danny Thompson (on double bass) 8/10
himself as the distinctive, baritone voiced crooner behind the London doo wop quartet The Southlanders, best known for their 1958 novelty single “I Am A Mole And I Live In A Hole”. In 1961, he died of a brain tumour, aged only 42 one of his very young sons went on to become West End actor, singer and comedian Gary Wilmot
Throughout this compilation, some names re emerge in very diferent contexts. The trombonist Eric Allandale, born in Dominica in 1936, formed trad jazz outft the New Orleans Knights (their rambunctious 1962 version of Guy Lombardo’s “Enjoy Yourself” is here); then he joined the multiracial soul band The Foundations (here represented by the wonderfully freaky 1968 B side “New Direction”, which sounds like something by the 13th Floor Elevators); he later lived in Zambia, Kenya and Paris and worked with Duke Ellington drummer Sam Woodyard. There is Katie Kissoon, born in Trinidad in 1951: in 1966, aged only 15, she made a furious Stax style cover of The Rolling Stones’ “Satisfaction”; a few months later she was singing Brian Wilson’s “I’m Waiting For The Day” under the pseudonym Peanut; two years later she was crooning country music in a duo called McFarthing Kissoon. By the ’70s she was having huge international hits as part of the brother sister duo Mac and Katie; by the ’80s she was an in demand backing
compi
FONTANA 1967
THE FERRIS WHEEL
S L E E V E N O T E S
t Break
Around
It’s one of the few songs on this album that get even close to social commentary the other one being a Martin Luther King tribute by Trinidad born singer Mel Turner By and large, this is apolitical stuf, all love songs and good time party music Where the Civil Rights movement was slowly leading to socially conscious soul anthems and secular hymns in the States, black British music was still fnding its feet The anger would come later
More interesting are the tracks where the Americans “go native” There’s a fascinating 1967 duet between Florida born, LA raised African American folk singer Dorris Henderson and Pentangle guitarist John Renbourn, which sonically unites New York’s Café au Go Go with London’s Les Cousins There’s Marsha Hunt, the Philadelphia born singer who moved to London in 1966, married Mike Ratledge from Sof Machine to get a British passport, briefy joined psych rockers The Ferris Wheel, recorded a fantastic Indo funk version of Dr John’s “I Walk On Guilded Splinters” in 1969 with producer Tony Visconti and had much publicised relationships with Marc Bolan and Mick Jagger before becoming a West End star. South Carolina born boxer turned soul growler Freddy Mack features on two wonderfully rabble rousing tracks 1966’s “Get Down With It” (later covered by Slade) is reminiscent of “Skinhead Moonstomp”; while “Sock It To ’Em, JB” is a frenzied live recording, where the “JB” in question switches, hilariously, between James Brown and James Bond
Can’
thei r
This multiracial London band,managed by Simon Napier Bell,seem ripe for reappraisal Here thei r first incarnation, fronted by Trinidad born Diane Ferraz, perform swaggering,trippy,psych rock edged readings of contemporary Stax and Motown songs Re released on CD by Sequel in 2000 7/10 of 1967 to 1973’s Showaddywaddy ish glam album Rock The a lation
The adjective “British” is a moot point with many of these artists. Some were born in the UK, including household names like Kenny Lynch, Shirley Bassey and Cleo Laine Most were Caribbean immigrants of the Windrush generation; a few are from west Africa. Many were African Americans who moved to London in the late ’50s and 1960s, which is where the compilation slightly loses focus Disc Four contains some great blues cuts from pianist Otis Spann, macabre singer Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, acoustic country blues guitarist Champion Jack Dupree and Memphis R&B howler Ray Gates, but it’s hard to see much of a UK connection
This compilation does suggest that the relationship between black Britain and American R&B in the ’60s was one of awed reverence Ofen this led to rather pointless fdelity: a lot of the labels featured here, like Beacon, CBM and Ember, were desperate to create London’s answer to Motown or Stax (some of the records they made are almost identical to contemporaneous songs by the likes of the Isleys or the Temptations). Sometimes the imitations are surprisingly good 1968’s “Nothing But A Heartache”, by London based South Carolina trio The Flirtations, written by UK songwriters Tony Waddington and Wayne Bickerton, is a total Northern Soul classic, and one you’ll recognise from a recent KFC ad campaign. But some of the best songs here move beyond US or Jamaican templates Many edge into psychedelia, including the swirling, orchestral “I Can’t Break The Habit” by The Ferris Wheel On the 1968 single “Waterfall”, Jimmy Clif, a few years before The Harder They Come turned him into a reggae superstar, is being sold by Chris Blackwell as a mainstream pop singer, produced by Tony Visconti and featuring psych rockers Nirvana as his backing band.
DISC 2 : The Chants; Marsha Hunt;The Foundations;Caleb; John Fitch And Associates;Simon K And The Meantimers; The Sugarlumps; Flamma Sherman; Jack Hammer;The Shadrocks (Featuring Little John);Clyde McPhatter;Ronnie Jones;This N That; JJ Jackson And The Jeeps;Ernest Ranglin And The GBs;Norma Lee;The Corduroys; Errol Dixon;Sonny Childe;Ray Gates; Paula And The Jetliners;Maynell Wilson;B B James And Derv;Blue Rivers And H is Maroons; McFarthing Kissoon; Laris McLennon; Freddy Mack;The Reaction
E T T Y M A G E S The Southlanders September 1960
DISC 1 : The Soul Brothers;The Flirtations;Carl Douglas;Jimmy Thomas;Jimmy James And The Vagabonds;Jackie Edwards;Chris Rayburn;Herbie Goins And The N ight Timers;Jimmy Cliff; The Ferris Wheel; Geno Washington & The Ram Jam Band;Cleo Laine; Danny Williams; Madeline Bell; Watson T Browne And The Explosive; Ebony Keyes;Sugar Simone;Kim D; Brothers Grimm; Lucas And The M ike Cotton Sound;The Fantastics;Oliver Norman;Owen Gray; John L Watson And The Hummelflugs; Kenny Lynch;Root And Jenny Jackson; Kenny Bernard;Ram John Holder;Hoagy Benson
THE EQUALS First Among Equals: The Greatest Hits ICE 1994 All thei r albums (from the raw,ska tinged bounce
The Habi t PYE 1967
This 2CD set features a terrific range of material 9/10 H OW TO B UY. . . MORE GOOD THINGS Three fullalbums ripe for further investigation 4 0 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
Clock) have something to recommend them, but they’re best appreciated on
DISC 3 : Black Velvet; Rico’s Combo; M illie;Laurel Aitken; Winston Groovy;Pat Rhoden;King Horror; Beresford Ricketts & The Blue Beats;The Classics;Sonny And The Daffodils;The Brixton Market;Tony Washington And The DC ’s;Joe’s All Stars; The Fabulous Blue Beats;The Rudies; Bobby Johnson And The Atoms; Laurel And Girlie; Ambrose Campbell; Sugar N Dandy; The Gruvy Beats; The Bluebeaters; Winston And Pat; Top Grant;Seven Letters;Dimples And Eddie With Rico s Combo;Cab Kaye With H is M usic From Ghana;Cy Grant;The Barnaby Rudge H ip Band;Rupert And The Red Devils
debut Unequalled Equals
vocalist for the likes of Dexys, George Harrison, Roger Waters and the Pet Shop Boys
DISC 4 : Shirley Bassey;Maxine N ightingale;Peter Straker;Peanut;Mel Turner;Joy Marshall; Eldridge Devlin;Cleo; Lorraine Child;Dorris Henderson And John Renbourn;Mabel Hillery;Champion Jack Dupree With TS Mcphee;Otis Spann;Screamin Jay Hawkins;Joe Harriott Quintet; Flash Domincii& The Supersonics;Shake Keane;The New Orleans Knights; The Chariots;The Southlanders; Winifred Atwell;Emile Ford And The Big Six; Howie Casey And The Seniors;Ricky Wayne With The Fabulous Flee Rackers;Ray Ellington;The Ray King Soul Band; Fitzroy Coleman And His Guitars;Davy Jones;Geoff Love And H is GOrchestra
Unlike a lot of the people on this compilation, I came from a theatre background I was an actor who had been in the West End production of Hair. It was a multi racial cast, backed by a rock band, there were mics onstage, it was groundbreaking And a musician called Andrew Pryce Jackman ofered to arrange some music for me The record company chose a Dusty Springfeld song, “Breakfast In Bed”, but it was very diferent to her version. I think people thought it sounded a bit too risqué, and it didn’t get any radio airplay And if you don’t get any radio play, you’re dead in the fucking water!
Was there pressure on black British artists in the 1960s to play African American and Caribbean music? Yes, that was ofen the unspoken expectation As it happens, I liked the authentic blues stuf, John Lee Hooker, Howlin’ Wolf. And we were all big fans of early rock’n’roll. I remember sneaking into the Finsbury Park Astoria to see Carl Perkins and Chuck Berry But the problem with playing covers is that audiences want authenticity We couldn’t play authentic ska or blues, so the way around that was to write our own material. You can hear all our infuences in our music you listen to “Baby Come Back” and you can hear ska, bluebeat and rock
“If you don’t get radio play you’re dead in the fucking water” PETER STRAKER
Your legacy seems to quietly grow every year there have been recent covers of your songs by The Specials and Ty Segall,among others… I’m afraid I thought that Ty Segall’s version of “Diversion” was awful! Ha ha! But I suppose you’ve got to play songs as you hear them, right? But yeah, there
How unusualwas i t to have black and white musicians in the same group at that time?
How did you get into music?
Were there certain expectations of you,as a black Brit,when you started making music? I suppose people might have expected a Jamaican born person like me to be making Caribbean music, but my music has always been eclectic I always loved rock’n’roll, but there weren’t many black rock singers at the time in England.
G U N T E R Z N T / K & K U L F K R U G E R O H G / R E D F E R N S E V E N N G S T A N D A R D / H U L T O N A R C H V E / G E T T Y I M A G E S OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 4 1
visits from the likes of Rod Stewart and Elton John, before they were famous It was where they learned their craf There were also predominantly black venues like the Q Club in Paddington, and a rough old place on the Holloway Road I remember seeing a fght where someone got an ear bitten of while we were playing! And there were smaller black clubs in Brixton and west London
Initially South Africa and Rhodesia wouldn’t let us play, as an integrated band They wouldn’t even release our albums with our photographs on the front the South African release of our frst album Unequal Equals replaced our picture with that of a black domino and a white domino, which was quite clever So we’d play in Zambia and people would come across the border! Eventually we did play South Africa, but we demanded to play to a racially integrated audience, which was almost unheard of at the time We never played America, although “Baby Come Back” was a hit there It wasn’t until 2017 when I was encouraged to come out of retirement and play in San Francisco, which was terrifc.
How did you become friends with Freddie Mercury? We met in a restaurant our managers knew each other. And we got on like a house on fre. He was tremendous company, very funny. We’d always bump into each other, as musicians and actors would ofen go to the same restaurants and clubs So it seemed natural to ask him to produce an album in 1977, him and Roy Thomas Baker. He said, ‘Oh, I’ll do it, but I’m not terribly fashionable at the moment, darling, what with all this punk rock stuf ’ Punks thought he was pompous and bombastic Music is very factional, isn’t it? INTERVIEW: JOHN LEWIS
Q& A
Peter Straker
Peter Straker January 1970
ARCHIVE
have been quite a lot of covers of Equals songs over the years There are lots of versions of “Black Skinned Blue Eyed Boys”. I co wrote “Rough Rider”, which was covered by Prince Buster and then by The Beat I still get royalty cheques. That wasn’t actually an Equals song, it was a side project, like the track on this compilation But I’m proud of it all
Were there many black British actors who sang at that time?
Derv Gordon, The Equals
A few of the black actors in Hair were Americans Marsha Hunt was one But there were a lot of black British actors you’d bump into at auditions. I was born in Jamaica in 1943 and moved here in the early ’50s. We’re the Windrush Generation, which apparently lasted from 1948 until ’72 West Indian parents, like mine, were ofen reluctant to let their children enter the arts my mum, even though she was a very good lieder singer, would say I needed to get a profession. It took me a long time to convince her that showbiz was a profession!
It was very rare Afer us came The Foundations, and obviously Sly & The Family Stone, who were both multi racial bands. But it was rare. For us, it seemed quite natural. I came to the UK as a seven year old from Jamaica We’d grown up in Islington, which was then a predominantly white area Most of my friends were white, or Indian, or Cypriot. We were given our name by friends of the drummer, John Hall. They said, three of you are black, two of you are white, but you’re all equal So you should be called The Equals
The Equals in Germany 1968:(l r) Lincoln Gordon John Hall, Derv Gordon Pat Lloyd and Eddy Grant
Were there many black clubs in ’60s London? I remember we used to play at a black club on Artillery Passage near Liverpool Street station called The All Star Club The DJs used to play music from the Caribbean calypso and ska and stuf, as well as real blues We were the house band there for a while which meant backing visiting guests like Wilson Pickett, Solomon Burke, Irma Thomas, Rufus Thomas, Bo Diddley Real heroes of ours! And a great apprenticeship for us And you’d also get
Did you play abroad a lot?
Knowingly innocent: Faithfull in 1965
synthesisers go in and out of fashion, but they have a whif of post punk cosplay, just as Mark Miller Mundy’s production is identifably from the Island Records colour chart with its understated insinuations of reggae and roots What makes the record work is the surprising harshness of Faithfull’s voice colouring the proud alienation of the songs.
her storied life, Marianne Faithfull has been in a tussle with her reputation Sometimes it looks like a dance. Ofen, it is more like a fght. Though she’s now revered as an elder stateswoman and a valued collaborator Warren Ellis is her latest pet this compilation explores the frst two acts of Faithfull’s career In the clichéd telling of it, Faithfull MARIANNE FAITHFULL Songs Of Innocence And Experience, 1965–1995 UMC 8/10 Te Blakean years of an English rose, reconsidered. By Alastair Mckay
HROUGHOUT
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was manipulated and underestimated, if not exploited, during her pop career, before clambering from the wreckage and fnding her own voice If Faithfull sounded damaged vocally, she did the point was underlined She has dismissed her early recordings as “cheesecake”, though her habitual fintiness has prompted others to diminish her achievements too: in a famously combative interview with Lynn Barber, the journalist tried to extract some small revenge by suggesting that Faithfull was “a singer with one good album”. In which case, why does she continue to fascinate?
The good album in Barber’s reckoning is Broken English While it’s true that the 1979 LP marked a clear kink in the road and is widely considered to be Faithfull’s masterpiece, it now sounds like a time stamped product of the new wave era. Those squelching
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D A V I D W E D G B U R Y / D E C C A U N V E R S A L
The broken English thing is Faithfull, but the album’s title track here in the 1980 single version has a lyric which reportedly admonishes Ulrike Meinhof of the terrorist Red Army Faction, though the lyric evinces a more general mood of Cold War world weariness The guitar sounds like a bear taking a chainsaw to a barbed wire fence The actual stand out from Broken English is “Why’d Ya Do It?”, which is a bit reggae, somewhat rock, a lot Grace Jones (though Jones was still in the business of perfecting her brand of Island ice) “Why’d Ya Do It?” remains an extreme song, with a jealous Faithfull snarling through a litany of sexual grievances (cock sucking, snatch spitting, cobwebbed
7 Running For Our Lives (7” Version)
INTERVIEW: ALASTAIR
Faithfull is said to prefer the folkier material, and as a performer she’s smart enough to know that heightened innocence can be chilling “What Have They Done To The Rain?” adds percussive raindrops to Faithfull’s English rose, and if you spritz on some sulking contains the raw ingredients of The Jesus And Mary Chain’s entire career.
20 Something Better (Original 7 ) 21 Sister Morphine (Original 7 )
8 She’s Got A Problem
12 Sunny Goodge Street (Unreleased)
18 Is This What I Get For Loving You?
She has better luck with Donovan and Bert Jansch. A pretty, chaste interpretation of “Sunny Goodge Street” (a previously unreleased take) clears some of the fog from Donovan’s song “Green Are Your Eyes” (Jansch’s “Courting Blues”) has a chilly simplicity to it. “Love can be broken, though no words are spoken”, she sings, suddenly sounding more than girlish. Then there is “Hier Ou Demain”, a playful collaboration with Serge Gainsbourg, written for the TV comedy musical
22 It s All Over Now Baby Blue 23 Chords Of Fame
Mick [Jagger] was going around the
Disc 2
17 Hier Ou Demain (From the Film Anna)
Faithfull is less convincing with more famous songs A live version of “Yesterday” recorded for the BBC Saturday Club doesn’t quite catch the full power of the song’s yearning, and a faintly gothic folk arrangement of Ewan MacColl’s “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” is closer to Peggy Seeger than Roberta Flack, but remains underpowered
Wi
13 The First Time (Ever I Saw Your Face) [Faithfull Forever Version]
4 Intrigue (7” Version)
That was a wonderful record to make because of Hal [Willner] Hal was a soulmate He adored me and I adored him Hal was the first person in the music business I ever met apart from Mick and Keith who was really clever, and had a vision I really miss him
14 With You In Mind
11 As Tears Go By (Re recorded Version)
8/10
4 Come My Way (Version 2)
10 Strange Weather
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P46 NEU!
I was very popular in Paris I met all those French musicians and singers Serge Gainsbourg was the most brilliant He teased me a lot,because I couldn t speak French properly
Heading into Harold Dessau Recording Studios in 1992 to record the follow up to their 1991 debut Frigid Stars LP, Codeine soon had eight tracks in the bag However, dissatisfaction with production, performance and a mysterious to some inaudible high pitched sound meant the album was binned Some tracks were rerecorded for 1992’s “Barely Real” EP and 1994’s White Birch album, but these are the original sessions unearthed afer 30 years. It’s difcult to see what was deemed so unusable; the band’s slow burn
P45 DEAD KENNEDYS
P48 REM P49 WILCO
1 Broken English (1980 7” Remix)
6 Falling From Grace
Q&A
AtoZ
P46 VINCE GUARALDI
19 Don t Make Promises
13 The Calm Before The Storm
LAST NIGHT FROM GLASGOW 7/10
15 Brain Drain 16 The Boulevard Of Broken Dreams Times Square
2 What Have They Done To The Rain?
Extras:None ALASTAIR McKAY
Anna. It represents a path not taken. The mood switches abruptly with “Sister Morphine”, which Faithfull mostly wrote (while having to fght for her credit) It’s an extraordinary lyric, sung from a hospital bed with the scream of an ambulance in the narrator’s ear. Just as it signalled a darkening of Faithfull’s perspective, it became a kind of Frankenstein, haunting her with its drug soaked morbidity
25 What’s The Hurry
And so we come to the songs of experience Looking backwards, the shadow y corners of Faithfull’s songbook defne her image. “Where did it go to, my youth?” she croaks on “Truth Bitter Truth”, while on Tom Waits’ “Strange Weather” producer Hal Willner repurposes her half spoken narrative style into the manners of a Kurt Weill cabaret. We know about “The Ballad Of Lucy Jordan” (a slightly odd electro production) and the cabaret phrasing of “Strange Weather” But listen to the way Faithfull repoints the Ruben Blades/ Lou Reed song “Calm Before The Storm”, difusing the epic pomposity of Blades’ recording, replacing it with a note of chilly resilience It’s the Marianne Faithfull thing: stay calm, embrace the storm Extras:None
Unearthed abandoned album sessions from slowcore pioneers
Dessau NUMERO GROUP
8 Yesterday (Live on the BBC) Cockleshells Green Are Your Eyes
6 This Little Bird Nui t D’ Été (Summer Nights French Version)
Glaswegian trio’ s lost third album rediscovered
McKAY
What are your memories of working with Serge Gainsbourg?
P44 DAVID SYLVIAN
P48 PENTANGLE
17
This month…
Disc 1
Marianne lucky I’ve been…”
This two disc set spans 1965 95. The title is a neat steal from a book of William Blake’s poems. So what of the cheesecake? What if we ignore the prejudices which came from Faithfull being a symbol of dumb beauty the “angel with big tits” exploited by Andrew Loog Oldham, the girl in Mick Jagger’s rug and listen to the songs? They are mannered, certainly. Even Faithfull’s innocence has its duality The chamber pop songs are very 1960s, while the folk tunes are more knowing in their evocation of olden times
1990s Nude Restaurant
CODEINE
10
5 Truth Bitter Truth (7” Version)
9 I m In Love Again
3 Once I Had A Sweetheart
In the beginning,i t must be insecurity,because I need someone to help me It’s like magic We choose each other.Somehow, i t works out.
What do you remember about Strange Weather?
S L E E V E N O T E S
5 Go Away From My World
1 Come And Stay th Me
15 Hang On To A Dream
How did you write “Sister Morphine”?
She has dismissed her early recordings as ‘cheesecake’
14 When I Find My Life
24 The Ballad Of Lucy Jordan
For a while in the mid 2000s the glammy rock of Jackie McKeown’s Glasgow group threatened to follow Franz Ferdinand’s path to mainstream success They imploded afer two Rough Trade albums, leaving McKeown to collaborate with producer Bernard Butler in the more experimental Trans A third 1990s album was recorded in Glasgow’s Green Door studio around 2011, and promptly forgotten about Revived and remixed by Paul McGeechan, it embraces rock tropes with self mocking charm. “Fassbinder Would Have Loved Techno” wraps a Jonathan Richman style conceit in a crunchy Franz style rif, and “Fun Size” adds an inch to Iggy Pop’s “Five Foot Two” and turns it into a chat up song (“small fry, it’s all right ”) Sometimes the playfulness threatens to topple into novelty, as on “Psyche Ward Pick Up No 9”, which is Chicory Tip repurposed as a mental illness comedy Conversely, “Psychic Canada” succeeds by knitting a scarf from a tangle of frayed Velvet Underground yarn
2 Why D’Ya Do It (12” Version)
P45 THE KINKS
7
Marianne Faithfull: very popular in Paris
9
16 Young Girl Blues
fannies) It’s interesting once, but you wouldn’t want to share a bathroom with it
12 A Stranger On Earth
18 Bored By Dreams The Stars Line Up
OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 4 3 ARCHIVE
Faithfull:“I can’t believe how
house,playing this tune for months I got sick of i t I wrote the lyrics to finish i t I could see i t was going to be something very beautiful
3 Over Here (No Time For Justice)
11 Sally Free And Easy
What makes you want to collaborate with someone?
I was very young It was a very sexist world I managed to get what I wanted I didn’ t just make very simple pop music
At the start, you had a battle with the record company. They wanted pop, you wanted folk.
Contrary to its bleak reputation, though, the moments of lightness on Blemish have become more apparent “Late Night Shopping” feels like a Mogadon cousin of
For some in the audience Manafon might have been the fnal straw: a suite of atonal, meandering narratives concerned with cantankerous, antisocial poets (RS Thomas and Emily Dickinson were presiding spirits). Sylvian himself suggested that the record might be best appreciated posthumously
Of course he was already ahead of us “Manafon is a pop album,” he told a sceptical Keith Rowe way back in 2010.
“You could replace my voice with voices of the past and it would take a small step into an alternate future Imagine Sinatra or Hartmann singing these songs! It takes just the smallest of leaps ”
INTERVIEWED in 2009, David Sylvian mused upon the supposed difculty of Manafon, his last vocal studio album to date. “I don’t personally hear it as being a difcult album, but I’ve always known the experience would be diferent for others. Time will sofen its edges. It may sow the seeds for what might develop into a new genre for vocal music perhaps? Or maybe it’s simply a passing glitch on the digital face of popular music I don’t know. But what I am sure of is that, over time, its abstractions will become much easier to embrace.”
But listening to it today, without the dashed hope that he might return to more conventional songforms, what you hear more than ever are the continuities. On the opening track, “Small Metal Gods”, even as he puts away his childish things in a ziplock back, as he sings of “the wretched story line” , “the narrative that must go on” , backed by Werner Dafeldecker’s woody bass, you can hear the same delicate, devastating deconstruction of the pop song that began in earnest with “Ghosts” back in 1982
Bailey’s abstract plucking and fretting like curious crows pecking at the remains of the relationship seemed to prompt Sylvian’s own reinvention of the guitar, whether in new tunings or electronic treatments But the songs are anchored in an awful profundity of feeling. “Life’ s for the taking” , he sings with abject gravity on the title track, “so take it away” .
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The reissue of Manafon, along with its older sibling, 2003’s Blemish, on 180g vinyl, ofers an opportunity to reconsider what increasingly look like the last works of David Sylvian’s long, brilliant and elliptical pop career. It’s fair to say they haven’t yet seeded a new genre though you might fnd echoes of these spectral artsongs in the work of Björk and Julia Holter But as predicted, they now seem
eminently embraceable: tatterdemalion torchsongs, that for all their atmospheric disturbances you might fle alongside Nick Drake’s Pink Moon, Frank Sinatra’s W here Are You?, John Cale’s Music For A New Societ y
Blemish was the turning point It’s a case study in not letting a good crisis go to waste, composed as Sylvian’s relationship and domestic life with Ingrid Chavez was disintegrating With 2000’s Everything And Nothing compilation serving as a timely epitaph of his two decades at Virgin, Sylvian was free of commercial imperatives and already casting around for new directions. He had detected new signals in the glitchy electronica of acts like Oval, and found fresh succour in the abstract laments of Derek Bailey’s Ballads And with his home studio in New Hampshire complete, he had a sonic fortress of solitude all ready and waiting.
Recording sessions in Vienna, Tokyo and London, with a shifing cast of players, including the Erstwhile crew plus members of drone ensemble Polwechsel, pianist John Tilbury, saxophonist Evan Parker and turntablist Otomo Yoshihide, Sylvian compared his role to that of a flm director with characteristic arthouse dolour he suggested Bergman, but the Swede loathed improvisation A better analogue might be Mike Leigh, encouraging and nudging group discovery, for material to be edited and cut together later.
Iggy’s “Nightclubbing”, while “Fire In The Forest”, Sylvian’s frst collaboration with guitar alchemist Christian Fennesz, feels almost like a “You’ll Never Walk Alone” moment of showstopping uplif “There is always sunshine above the grey sk y/I will tr y to fnd it ” .
The old forms that had ser ved him to abundant success on Dead Bees were simply no longer adequate, and the urgency of his midlife soulstorm facilitated his voyage into improvisation It was a process that had always been on his horizon, from his teenage Stockhausen infatuation, through collaborations with Holger Czukay and Keith Tippett Now he had Derek Bailey, Virgil to his Dante, as a guide
Fennesz proved to be a crucial stargate to a new galaxy of free and electro acoustic improvisers While Sylvian was in Cologne touring Blemish in 2004, Fennesz invited him to the opening night of a showcase for Jon Abbey’s Erstwhile label, featuring Keith Rowe, Otomo Yoshihide, Toshi Nakamura and Sachiko Matsubara among others. The introduction helped materialise Sylvian’s tentative plans for an album of new chamber music, cultivating the seeds that had been planted on Blemish into a rich and strange forest of free improvisation and narrative song.
S L E E V E N O T E S BLE M ISH 1 Blemish 2 The Good Son 3 The Only Daughter 4 The Heart Knows Better 5 She Is Not 6 Late Night Shopping 7 How Little We Need To Be Happy 8 A Fire In The Forest MANAFON 1 Small Metal Gods 2 The Rabbi t Skinner 3 Random Acts Of Senseless Violence 4 The Greatest Living Englishman 5 125 Spheres 6 Snow White In Appalachia 7 Emily Dickinson 8 The Department Of Dead Letters 9 Manafon DAVID SYLVIAN Blemish/Manafon (reissues,2003,2009) SAMADHISOUND/UMC 9/10,9/10 Glitch improv confessionals revealed as deconstructed pop standards on new vinyl reissues.By Stephen Troussé ARCHIVE
David Sylvian: never a dull improvisational moment
ARCHIVE
9/10
Jazz boss’s legendary ’82 shows restored from a C60 cassette
Nineties Bristol psychonauts The Heads were a band caught between eras, bringing post Spacemen rock to the UK, when indie tastes tended towards the less than hairy Their debut album was even scored 0/10 in the music press, but that didn’t slow them down and by 2002 The Heads had found their rhythm release an epic album every couple of years in strictly limited editions, play a few shows and then disappear until it was time to do it again Under Sided, their third LP, came out in 2002, by which time a heav y rock renaissance was getting underway. It was an eight track double, a typically monstrous afair of explosive drums, Sabbath grind and Hawkwind sprawl, embellished with amusing samples from flm and TV This remastered 20th anniversary edition reissued in myriad versions adds lost tracks (including a 12 minute cover of Hawkwind’s “Born To Go”), demos, Peel sessions and outtakes The Heads have a complicated catalogue, but this is a great place to start Extras:8/10 The deluxe box has four LPs plus two CDs featuring live performances and rehearsals; stickers; slip mat; sleevenotes by band and Stewart Lee. PETER WATTS
Raging and ridiculous: Manic Street Preachers
The Asylum Albums (1972 1975) RHINO
E S T C
Live At Parnell’s SOUL BANK
rhythmic”), Still Air (“atmos songs”), etc It may be a nod to playlist culture but it’s also an inspired move, showing up their multifaceted aesthetic and illuminating obscurities along the way Picking highlights from 102 songs is tough, but the deep grooved angst of “Faceless”, “John Of Patmos”’s staccato programmed beats, honking sax and stentorian vocals, and the divine folk drone of “Inky Blue Sky” are among the many delights. Extras:7/10 Sleevenotes and song by song reminiscences by Martyn Bates SHARON O CONNELL
The messy 2001 epic, reimagined The Manics responded to mainstream success with the alienating Know Your Enemy, launched with a Havana gig in front of Fidel Castro. A scrambled curate’s egg, the record’s 16 tracks were confused and hard to love: now they’re releasing it as Nicky Wire intended, lightly remixed and split into two more cohesive albums Door To The River is quieter, sadder, enhanced with a strings less version of the title track (originally released on 2002’s Forever Delayed comp), the previously unreleased “Rosebud” and choice B sides The noisier Solidarit y disc is the surprising highlight, though, raging and ridiculous in equal measure, and now including standalone No 1 “The Masses Against The Classes”. In this new setting, even “Intravenous Agnostic” and “The Convalescent”, hardly highlights of the original, shine like Castro’s belt buckle Extras:8/10 Available in various formats, but the 2CD version includes extra tracks; the 3CD adds demos Liner notes from band confdant Robin Turner TOM PINNOCK
Her post Blue musical flourishing
Hardcore uproar:controversial makeover for SF hXc mavens’first Remaining just about diplomatic as he assessed this upgrade of the Dead Kennedys incendiary 1980 debut, singer Jello Biafra wrote: “I’m not sure I’d fork over 30 bills for it ” The ugly aferlife of San Francisco’s punk conquistadors hangs heav y over their back catalogue, now controlled by guitarist East Bay Ray and bassist Klaus Fluoride following a bruising legal dispute This new Fresh Fruit remains ripe enough, Biafra’s power sander sarcasm and his thirty something bandmates’ rev ved up Frank Zappa chops undiminished by iPhone age tinkering. “Chemical Warfare”, “Let’s Lynch The Landlord” and “Drug Me” remain giddily caustic, and if the album version of “Holiday In Cambodia” lacks the single’s concision, Biafra’s takedown of privileged student radicals remains the sickest of burns
EYELESS IN GAZA
10/10
Fine 5CD collection, in undersung duo’s 42nd year
Extras:None DANIEL DYLAN WRAY
8/10
THE HEADS Under Sided (reissue,2002) ROOSTER
OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 45
year’s Ever ybody’s In Show Bi z has always seemed transitional, marking out space for an overt theatricalit y to exist in Davies’ writing, placed in ser vice to narratives of touring and life on the road, Davies using music hall and dramatic composition to intensif y emotional peaks and troughs The studio material is uniformly lovely, though a bit slight at times; the live album, from Carnegie Hall, is a rough joy. Extras:8/10.Plenty, if you buy the boxset: tour travel montage, Ray Davies home movie on Blu ray, deluxe hardback book, A2 map, photos, badge The albums are also available individually JON DALE
7/10
T T
/10
JONI MITCHELL
In the wave of renewed enthusiasm for ’80s post punk, EIG seem to have been largely overlooked But Martyn Bates and Peter Becker, who are still active, were only ever post punks in the loosest taxonomic sense: they’re built of more experimental stuf that once saw them sharing bills with Throbbing Gristle and This Heat. For this boxset of their Cherry Red recordings, 1981 86, the duo decided to order their tracks thematically, in fve “suites” thus, Looking Daggers (“rock and
8
Giddily caustic: Dead Kennedys
8/10
Relying on new AI audio restoration technology, and the painstaking patience of audio engineers, the barely listenable has become deeply involving From fat fusion grooves to vamped up standards, it’s a terrifc set Still not the highest of hi f, the grit remains Brilliantly, you can hear a ripped bass woofer every time Jack plays the B fat pedal.
JIM WIRTH
Superior slab of heavy rock by Bristol hairies
MANIC STREET PREACHERS Know Your Enemy SONY
The late Brother Jack like Jimmy Smith, one of the 1960s masters of the Hammond B 3 used his June 1982 residency at Seattle’s coolest jazz venue to showcase a great quartet, and an ear for newer sounds. These sweaty recordings were originally captured on a wobbly C60 cassette, which had degraded even when Soul Bank’s Greg Boraman frst heard it in 1999
Extras:None. Available as a 2CD set or a single vinyl LP. MARK BENTLEY
JACK McDUFF
8/10
THE KINKS
approach, engulfng atmospherics, restrained, ofen mumbled, vocals with rumbling guitars that detonate in eruptive bursts is as efective as ever. Tracks such as “Jr” feel especially punchy, with drums that snap, rattle and hiss with taut dynamism, while the unfurling subtlety of “Waiting Room”, which leans heavily into space, texture and silence, captures the versatility of a band to whom the likes of Mogwai owe a great debt
For many, 1971’s Muswell Hillbillies is both The Kinks’ and Ray Davies’ last great statement That’s always been reductive: there’s plent y to celebrate through the group’s ’70s and ’80s material. But it’s certainly a gem, a surprisingly minimal, naked collection of songs, some countrifed, winding back to the Davies brothers’ roots in Muswell Hill. The following W O
Extras:7/10 Sleevenotes including Dave Grohl’s memories of seeing DKs on the Rock Against Reagan tour: “As a 13 year old kid, that was like my own little revolution.”
The fact this even exists is remarkable: the culmination of a 23 year journey of digitisation, Live At Parnell’s ofers hope that other lost music can be revived
DEAD KENNEDYS
MuswellHillbillies/ Everybody’s In Show Biz Everyone’s A Star BMG
The fêting of the Mitchell oeuvre continues apace with this boxset of the four albums that marked the singer’s post Blue ship jump from Reprise to Asylum Records in 1972 David Gefen and Elliot Roberts had established the label just one year earlier, swifly signing a host of talent, from Jackson Browne to Linda Ronstadt via Tom Waits and Judee Sill. It proved a fertile atmosphere for Mitchell, and over those frst three years she released For The Roses, Court And Spark, The Hissing Of Summer Lawns, and the double live album Miles Of Aisles This period encompassed both Mitchell’s greatest commercial success and a shif in musical style, away from her early folk sound to explore jazz, pop and self production To listen to these albums afresh, and as a quartet, is to hear the great fourishing of a musical mind. Extras:9/10.Cover art of an unseen Mitchell painting, essay by Neil Young, remastered recordings. LAURA BARTON
Fresh Frui t For Rotting Vegetables HERRY RED
SkeletalFramework CHERRY RED
A Kinks classic, and a misunderstood ‘life on the road’travelogue, reinvigorated
Boxset of four albums, and tribute set, for krautrock anti-heroes
FOR millions around the world who were children between the mid ’60s and the early 1980s, Vince Guaraldi’s music for the Peanuts cartoons is deeply engrained It was ofen the frst jazz music they will have heard, although, at the time, Guaraldi’s upbeat, cheerful themes must have seemed an odd choice to soundtrack the grim, bleakly comic world of Charles M Schulz.
He did have a way with simple, catchy melodies, delivered with a bluesy fourish, and a track on the Black Orpheus album, “Cast Your Fate To The Wind”, was a surprise hit, earning a Grammy for best jazz song One fan was TV producer Lee Mendelson, who thought that Guaraldi’s style likeable, slightly yearning, hip but not too out there was a perfect ft for the animated adaptations of the Peanuts strip he was making
Much maligned overblown third reissued in remastered form on vinyl
You can fnd versions of Guaraldi’s tunes from Charlie Brown “Linus And Lucy”, “The Red Baron”, “The Great Pumpkin Waltz”, “Charlie Brown Theme”, “Christmas Time Is Here”, “Skating” and “Baseball Theme” on many of his albums, but this is the frst LP featuring the complete tunes, mood music and “stings” from a single soundtrack. Craf released a CD of this 1966 soundtrack in 2018 that was, rather clumsily, taken from the actual broadcast, featuring sound efects and snippets of speech, but this version is taken from recently unearthed original analogue tapes It’s a little disjointed and frustrating to hear in one go (there is a lot of repetition, and many tracks are less than a minute long) but, for us Peanuts obsessives, it’s
7/10
CHERRY
46 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 C O U R T E S Y O F C R A F T R E C O R D N G S ARCHIVE
Where most of Guaraldi’s LPs are piano/bass/ drums recordings, this is more lavishly arranged in partnership with conductor John Scott Trotter (best known as Bing Crosby’s long term musical director), featuring Mannie Klein on trumpet, John
Born in San Francisco in 1928, Guaraldi emerged in the ’50s accompanying the vibist Cal Tjader, later joining Woody Herman’s big band In 1962 he belatedly jumped on the bossa nova bandwagon with Jazz Impressions Of Black Orpheus, an album of Antonio Carlos Jobim and Luiz Bonfa songs from the 1959 flm, although you got the impression that Guaraldi ofen got bored of playing to a bossa rhythm, instead lapsing back into the comforting world of swing beats and funky piano licks
Although it has become a metaphor for hubris to rival The Titanic, the album released at the height of Oasis’s stadium bursting ubiquity in 1997 has now at least beneftted from aremaster which you’d hope might start to remedy the original’s narcotically infuenced production. The trebly sound is given some welcome middle here, meaning highlights such as the awesomely thunderous, rif led “My Big Mouth” crash from the speakers with atruly canyon shaking sound Elsewhere, though, deeper issues remain, not least its 72 minute length “Magic Pie” starts promisingly but soon starts to plod towards the seven minute mark, as the swagger of Oasis’s frst two albums seems to have turned into aslog Even on the sometimes soaring “Stand By Me”, when Liam sings “What’s the matter with you, sing me something new” it sounds less like attitude than disinterest Meanwhile, elsewhere, asurfeit of naf, windy Beatleisms and psych by numbers touches such as backwards sounds haven’t aged well. They weren’t really there “now” and all told, they still aren’t. Extras:None. JOHNNY SHARP
ff
By now, Neu!’s legend is cemented, and you can tick of indicators of their signifcance: krautrock pioneers; rock minimalists; abstract, Pop Art reductionists; inspiration to generations of artists, from David Bowie to Stereolab. Listen to their three albums, released between 1972 and 1975 their 1986 ‘reunion’ efort is patchy, at best and Klaus Dinger’s Apache beat and Michael Rother’s steel reels of guitar still have elemental power; their tonal and textural experiments, ofen hovering near chaos, like the astonishing “Negativland”, also echo the internecine tensions between the pair The tribute album appended to 50! is unnecessary, though, these interpretations adding little to the originals The National, and Stephen Morris (of New Order) and Gabe Gurnsey, acquit themselves adequately, but Neu!’s music is so singular, there’s next to no point trying to take the material on, even in tribute form.
50! GRÖNLAND 9/10
NEU!
Vince Guaraldi: king of simple catchy melodies
fascinating to hear a sonically fawless original soundtrack recording.
Gray on guitar and Ronald Lang on woodwind Lang’s fute is, for many, a signature sound of the series On tracks like “Snoopy And The Leaf”, it is oddly reminiscent of Harold McNair’s heartbreaking fute solos on the soundtrack to Kes (another poignant hymn to childhood)
6
The cartoons were regular fxtures of network television around the world well into the 1990s, and the royalties made Guaraldi very rich by jazz standards. But he didn’t enjoy his lifestyle for long in February 1976, he sufered a massive heart attack and died, aged only 47. His music, however, lives on forever Extras:8/10 Seven previously unreleased alternate takes, liner notes by Derrick Bang JOHN LEWIS
Uncovering the underrated and overlooked
Extras:7/10.Stencil and booklet. JON DALE
6/10
Five studio albums and a German live set from the folk jazzers’forgotten era We’re familiar with the groundbreaking folk jazz they made between 1967 and 1973, but Jacqui McShee and Bert Jansch led several iterations of Pentangle in the ’80s and ’90s, long before anew generation rediscovered them. Open The Door, from 1985, features a great version of Milton Nascimento’s “Mother Earth”, the jazzy 5/4 workout “Dragonfy”
Jazz pianist’s 1966 Peanuts soundtrack dusted o and tidily tooned up
It’s
CPumpkin,
Brown
VINCE GUARALDI The Great harlie CRAFT RECORDINGS
PENTANGLE Through The Ages 1984 95 TREE /10
REDISCOVERED
OASIS Be Here Now (reissue 1997) BIG BROTHER
There’s something unca nny in hea ring “Chronic Town”, a fer a ll this time; even if you only ca ught this fve tra ck EP la ter on, when it wa s reissued a s pa rt of the Dead Letter
REM Chronic Town (reissue,1982) IRS/UME 8/10
8/10
IM AGINE a pla ce where Muslims a nd Christia ns live in pea ce a nd ha rmony, a nd the da ncefoor is a sa cred pla ce where those of a ll fa iths, or none, ca n get down together. Afenma ila nd in southern Nigeria ’s Edo sta te is not pa ra dise, for the ubiquitous problems of poverty a nd disea se persist; but in the 1970s a nd 1980s when Alha ji Wa ziri Oshoma h recorded the tra cks compiled here, the region seemed to exist in a heterogeneous ha rmony tha t wa s a world a wa y from the hostilities a nd divisions tha t trouble so much of our pla net
STEREOLAB
It’s a unique sui generis sound tha t doesn’t rea dily lent itself to glib ca tegorisa tion Let’s just ca ll it loca l music from out there, with a universa l messa ge tha t the da ncefoor is indeed a holy pla ce Extras:6/10 Booklet with informa tive historica l essa y a nd lyrics NIGEL WILLIAMSON
ALHAJI WAZIRI OSHOMAH World Spirituality Classics 3:The Muslim Highlife Of AlhajiWaziriOshomah LUAKA BOP 8/10 Joyously pantheistic ’80s afrobeat from Nigerian crusader
When he sta rted his ba nd in 1970 they would wa lk miles to gigs ca rrying their equipment on their hea ds, including a self ma de a mp powered by torch ba tteries, but his
Now in his mid seventies a nd a devout Muslim who still performs regula rly, Oshoma h wa s disowned by his Isla mic pa rents who fea red he would stra y from the fa ith when he beca me a professiona l musicia n He responded by infusing his music with the tea chings of the Kora n a nd singing a bout his pilgrima ge to Mecca , while a t the sa me dropping biblica l quota tions such a s “forgive them for they know not wha t they do” into his songs.
“Ga rdening At Night”, in pa rticula r, a stonishes Extras:6/10 Liner notes by Ea ster JON DALE
Pulse Of The Early Brain (Switched On Volume 5) WARP/DUOPHONIC
a nd the 7/4 prog folk of “Sa d La dy”, a ll of which a re recognisa ble a s cla ssic Penta ngle, even though guita rist John Renbourn ha d been repla ced by violinist/guita rist Mike Piggott
Extras:None. PIERS MARTIN
This la test insta lment of Stereola b ra rities, ofcuts a nd tour singles, la rgely from the ’90s, could be the best one yet a nd shows how prolifc a nd open minded the ba nd were during tha t time. Worth the price a lone is the inclusion of their peerless ’97 Nurse With Wound colla bora tion “Simple Hea dphone Mind”/“Trippin’ With The Birds”, ha lf a n hour of sublime Neu! sozzled psych a s Steven Sta pleton ca resses the ’la b’s “Long Ha ir Of Dea th” Coa sting from ga uzy chug to shoega ze cha nson, 1992’s four song “Low Fi” EP is one of their most sa tisfying ea rly relea ses, “[Va room!]” a nd “La issez Fa ire” setting out their swinging socia lism Other highlights from these 21 tra cks include a lovely “Ma gne Music” a nd “The Nth Degrees” from the Chemical Chords era , the Autechre remix of “Refra ctions In The Pla stic Pulse” a nd the ja zzy delirium of “Symbolic Logic Of Now!”. With the a rchive running dry, is a new LP out of the question?
Following Alice Coltra ne’s Turiyasangitananda a nd the gospel soul compila tion The Time For Peace Is Now, this is the third volume in Lua ka Bop’s World Spiritua lity Cla ssics series a nd fnds Oshoma h mixing Judeo Christia n ima gery a nd the tea chings of Isla m in lyrics which sermonise ecumenica lly a bout piety a nd reverence over throbbing, sinuous da nce rhythms tha t fuse Nigeria n highlife, pa lm wine guita rs a nd other Africa n triba l styles with western pop tropes.
THE
Seminal first EP, after the “Radio Free Europe” single, by Athens, GA contenders
SPECIALIST Crusaders: Waziriand his band in 1978 48 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 E R C W E L L E S N Y S T R Ö M
ARCHIVE
By 1986’s In The Round, double ba ssist Da nny Thompson ha d been repla ced by ba ss guita rist Nigel Portma n Smith a nd, by 1989’s So Early In The Spring, drummer Terry Cox wa s repla ced by Gerry Conwa y, lea ving McShee a nd Ja nsch a s the only origina l members. Wha t emerges is a very diferent ba nd, pitched somewhere between Lindisfa rne style folk rock, Dire Stra its ish rootsy blues a nd Kiki Dee’s mid ’70s MOR ba cking ba nd. But there a re glorious moments where Portma n’s fretless ba ss a nd Piggott’s soa ring violin solos combine to crea te a n oddly English form of cosmic America na , one tha t reca lls Joni Mitchell’s lineup with Ja co Pa storius Extras:7/10 BBC Ra dio 2 sessions (with a nnouncements), live versions a nd a 1994 concert LP recorded in Ha mburg JOHN LEWIS
The ca ll a nd response voca ls a re simila rly steeped in Africa n tra dition, a lthough the orna menta l tones of his ma in foil Ma da m Ha ssa na h Wa ziri one of his severa l polyga mous wives owes something to Bollywood pla yba ck singing.
music wa s soon popula r enough to a ttra ct rich sponsors who funded these recordings. Singing in English a nd the loca l Etsa ko la ngua ge in a guttura l exhorta tion over rumbling drumbea ts, hypnotic guita r motifs a nd psych keyboa rds with occa siona l bla ring trumpet sta bs, Oshoma h ha s described his music a s “the Afenma i bra nd of Afrobea t” Yet it’s a mislea ding ta g, for his fusion of Nigeria n tra dition a nd Western styles sounds nothing like Fela Kuti Nor is his music politica lly rebellious ra ther, ma ny of his compositions a re in the a ncient tra dition of ‘pra ise singing’, not only to his God but pa ying tribute to elders, triba l lea ders a nd even ca pta ins of industry one such tra ck dedica ted to a pa tron, a nd 17 minutes long, is simply titled “Alha ji Yesufu Sa do Ma na ging Director”
More loose-ends gathering from the Groop
Ofce collection, it’s a surprise to hea r REM in forma tive sta ges, well before they beca me one of the biggest ba nds in the world They sound a mbitious here, not to become huge, but ra ther to na viga te songwriting a nd a rra ngement crea tively a nd uniquely Helped by producer Mitch Ea ster, the fve songs here tell of a young group quietly but determinedly ma rking out their diference from their peers on the Athens post punk scene, still in the sha dow of groups like The B 52’s, Love Tra ctor a nd Pylon, but fnding their own wa y, ma tching Micha el Stipe’s cryptic lyrics with Peter Buck’s endless strea ms of a rpeggio a nd ja ngling guita rs.
GENERATOR Interference
...
kosmische syndicalism OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 4 9 D A V I D C O W L A R D SUBSCRIBE TO UNCUT AND SAVE UP TO 4 0 %! Subscribe online at uncut.co.uk/subscribe Or call01371 851882 and quote code UCPR2022 *Offer closes December 31,2022 For enquiries please call:01371 851882 or email:support@uncut co uk G R E AT S AV IN G S
OBJECTS FOREVER
JOHN LEWIS
Difcult creative circumstances are hardly required for the making of masterpieces but it’s hard to fault the
Lush, folksy hymnals:a closing statement from one of Britain’s modern greats
New York born pianist Mal Waldron was heavily infuenced by Thelonious Monk, but his stately style tended to iron out all the clunky, discordant, dissonant elements we associate with Monk, so he ofen sounds like Monk quantised in ProTools It sounds like a criticism, but this live solo set shows how devastatingly efective Waldron could be On standards “You Don’t Know What Love Is”, “I Thought About You” and his own much covered ballad “Soul Eyes” he mixes slow, logical improvisations with rippling runs. Better still are his meditative originals, flled with lef hand vamps, orchestral chord voicings and hypnotic improvs, like the romantic, Satie ish “Petite Gemeaux”, the slow burning “Fire Waltz” or the rattling right hand octaves of “All Alone” Sometimes he just meditates over a single chord: “Here There And Everywhere” and “Snake Out” really do edge into the world of subtractive minimalism Extras:8/10 Liner notes include interviews with experimental pianists Matthew Shipp and Ran Blake, pieces by critics Adam Shatz and Pascal Rozat and an interview with Waldron’s daughter, Mala.
VARIOUS ARTISTS Between The Music
Yankee HotelFoxtrot: Super Deluxe Edition NONESUCH 10/10
EXT time, there’ll be reviews of new records from Brian Eno, The Comet Is Coming, Bonny Light Horseman, Buzzcocks, Parekh & Singh, the Sun Ra Arkestra and much more.In the world of archival releases we’ll be taking a closer look at albums and boxsets from Pink Floyd, The Cure and Can, some fascinating, crate digging compilations, plus weird and/or wonderful oddities
Every year, afer End Of The Road fnishes, its founder Simon Tafe is inundated with messages asking what music they heard playing in between bands In order to answer that question more thoroughly he has compiled all that music together, the result of which is described as “a passion project compilation of deep cuts, rare grooves and new discoveries”. There are some familiar names, from Link Wray to Beefeart, but largely the 28 tracks are a plunge into less familiar terrain. From the eerie art pop of the enigmatic and prolifc Swiss outft Die Wellttaumforscher to the Egyptian jazz grooves of Hailu Mergia and Dahlak Band to the stirring voice of pioneering trans soul singer Jackie Shane The result is far from some thoughtless merch tie in and a pretty stunning comp that, as the best ones do, act as a gateway into some wondrous worlds, from the outsider blues folk of Abner Jay to the Zambian rock of Amanaz Extras:None. DANIEL DYLAN WRAY
Extras:8/10 Liner notes by Goldman ALASTAIR McKAY
Jeff Tweedy’s mission statement swells to epic proportions
Extras:11LP/1CD or 8CD editions both come with new book of interviews, essays and previously unseen photos
Deeply impressive compilation from End Of The Road festival founder
8/10
WILCO
Beautiful, revelatory revisiting of prog legend’s second reign
ING
Numbers is surprisingly melancholy and lush; on 2008’s Trisector, the songs are taut and sinewy, ready to snap at any point Extras:6/10.Booklet with liner notes JON DALE
Stereolab:
JASON ANDERSON
7/10
Recently unearthed ’78 solo gig from Holiday/Coltrane accompanist
results on Wilco’s epochal fourth album Nonesuch commemorates the 20th anniversary and the band’s own recent performances of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot in full with a shelf buckling box that includes 82 unreleased tracks Punchier takes on “Pot Kettle Black” and “War On War” and a sofer edged “Ashes Of American Flags” stand out amid the deluge of embryonic and alternate versions. An album of interviews and performances on Greg Kot and Jim DeRogatis’ Sound Opinions radio show in late 2001 and a live set from St Louis in July 2002 provide equally interesting views on the roads travelled here Indeed, it took an epic journey for Jef Tweedy to fully adopt the more open and freewheeling sensibility that would carry him and his band through the years and challenges to come
COM N EXT MONTH
JON DALE DER GRAAF Patterns:The Recordings 2005–2016 ESOTERIC
A genial presence in the British underground, Michael Tanner might already be known to Uncut readers through his appearance on the recent covermount compilation Blackwaterside: Sounds Of The New Weird Albion But he’s been working away at music for a few decades now. His early music, as Plinth, was supported by The Pastels and their Geographic imprint; since then he’s collaborated with the likes of United Bible Studies, Mark Fry, Alison Cotton and Nick Palmer of Directorsound Cotton turns up here, playing typically elevated viola on the long reels that spool around the 38 minute “The Blackening”, which also features some lush vibraphone from Italian éminence grise Lino Capra Vaccina Vespers, a relatively recent work, is some of Tanner’s most gorgeous music yet, particularly the glistening spires of zither, autoharp and stroviol that luxuriate, lovingly, through “Vespers Pt 3”. A real shame that these are his fnal two LPs.
Punk reframed as female energy
7/10
EMAIL:TOM PINNOCK@UNCUT CO UK
9/10
Extras:None.
ARCHIVE
N
Much like their closest peers long running, expansive outfts like Magma and King Crimson Van Der Graaf Generator can appear impossibly forbidding. Their decades long pursuit of a very particular, complex account of song side steps the possibility of passing engagement; consequently, their fanbase is both dedicated and staunch And while it’d be hard to argue that a 13 disc set like Interference Patterns is a welcoming entry point, there’s something about the material Van Der Graaf Generator have recorded across the early 21st century that feels more open, inviting, than their fearsome ’70s classics. So while the live recordings may read as the draw here and there are some great ones included the studio albums are the keepers: for example, 2012’s A Grounding In
VARIOUS ARTISTS Revenge Of The She Punks Compilation Inspired By The Book By Vivien Goldman TAPETE
In her 2019 book, Revenge Of The She Punks, Vivien Goldman (once of Sounds, now academia’s “punk professor”) explored the way punk empowered women This compilation makes the argument over 38 tracks, a selection based “on spirit rather than adherence to the venerated concept of the genre”. So, while the inclusion of X Ray Spex’s “Identity” highlights one of Goldman’s central themes, and “Spend Spend Spend” by The Slits represents the way female DIY music ploughed its own rhythmic furrow, the presence of the ultra slick Grace Jones (“My Jamaican Guy”) and Neneh Cherry (the itchy scratchy rap of “Bufalo Stance”) underscores Goldman’s defnition of she punk as female strength, rather than an expression of a musical style The pearls are the obscurities Skinny Girl Diet’s “Silver Spoons” has a neurotic Sonic Youth swirl, and “Maintain Control” by Jayne Cortez And The Firespitters takes the argument into the realms of jazz poetry.
MAL WALDRON Searching In Grenoble: The 1978 Piano Concert TOMPKINS SQUARE 8/10
VAN
END OF THE ROAD
MICHAEL TANNER Vespers/The Blackening
K HRU A NGBIN/ V IEU X FA R K A T OUR É
HE idea of escape to distant climes is baked into Khruangbin’s soul. After all, they are named after the Thai word for aeroplane a tribute to the psychedelic Southeast Asian pop that, according to bassist and occasional singer Laura Lee Ochoa, “was one of the first seeds in the Khruangbin DNA” Ochoa is a seasoned traveller; her uncle worked for the American embassy and she used to go and stay with him in various far f lung corners of the world. When she was 17, she visited him in Singapore, hopping up the Malay peninsula for that first life changing visit to Thailand By contrast, drummer Donald “DJ” Johnson didn’t have a passport until he joined the band. But it turns out that their home city of Houston is a better place than you might think to hear music from across the globe.
Photo by JACK I E L EE YOU NG
“It’s actually the number one most diverse city in America,” explains Ochoa. “As well as the oil and gas, it’s the biggest medical research centre in the whole of the United States, so you get people from all over the world. There’s the Mahatma Gandhi District where you can go to find Indian cassette tapes, there’s Little Saigon where you can find the Vietnamese and Korean VHS tapes which Iused to get. It’s pretty easy to find these different parts of the world in Houston.”
T
Frictionless Borders
First they travelled the world, then they conquered i t with their languid, cosmopolitan funk.Now KHRUANGBIN have pulled off their most impressive musicalfusion to date, covering the songs of AliFarka Touré in a seat-of-the-pants collaboration with the Malian legend’s son VIEUX FARKA TOURÉ.“We were allflying blind,” they admi t to Sam Richards
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“We want to pave our own path : (l r) Donald “ DJ ” Johnson,Laura Lee Ochoa and Mark Speer OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 51
K
“I was so impressed with them as musicians and as really cool people,” says Touré “It is clear in their music that they have wide open ears and hearts for music from around the world But more than that they are sympathetic and thoughtful people. They told me how they loved my father’s music and I could feel that in their hearts they wanted to honour him It felt like a perfect fit ”
Johnson and Speer first met when playing in the band of St John’s Methodist Church in Houston,
But while Khruangbin’s music is proud to f launt its cosmopolitan hues you can add dub, cumbia, Ethio jazz, Turkish psych and more to the mix the band are careful not to evoke any particular destination “I hope that the music takes you somewhere in your mind,” says Ochoa. “Not a specific country, just in a daydream sort of way. I don’t want to paint the picture for everyone, I want them to paint their own ”
As Speer makes clear, just being on the same page musically isn’t necessarily enough. “Like Laura said, we get a lot of requests and it’s like: I don’t know you, I’ve never met you I don’t know what you’re really about I know what your music sounds like but it doesn’t tell me a ton about who you are.” Khruangbin have made two acclaimed EPs with their fellow Texan Leon Bridges, but only after having a chance to bond with the dapper soulman on tour With Touré, they had to make a quicker decision. But the instant connection, across languages and continents, was undeniable “When he reached out to us,” says Ochoa, “it was a unanimous ‘Yes’ It felt right ”
“It is a very nice energy between them” V IE U X FAR KA TO UR É
“He’s a lovely human being,” adds Johnson Not to mention the fact that the trio’s curiosity was piqued when Touré refused to tell them which of his father’s songs they’d be recording until he turned up in Houston ready to roll tape Another great adventure had begun…
J A C K E L E E Y O U N G ; P O O N E H G H A N A
“They did capture something magical”: Khruangbin and (inset) their new album with Vieux Farka Touré
Their latest project, an inspired mindmeld with Mali’s Vieux Farka Touré, continues their global voyage of the imagination. So it’s a surprise to find that the collaboration took root in the distinctly unexotic locale of a London pub Touré was looking for a Western group to help record an album of songs by his father, the legendary Ali Farka Touré, and he’d gone to watch Khruangbin on the suggestion of his manager, Eric Herman Within moments of sitting down to a dinner of fish and chips with the Texan trio, he knew he’d found what he was looking for.
With soulman and fellow Texan Leon Bridges
HRUANGBIN’S wanderlust extends to the distances covered by their current Casa Surreal world tour, which has already swung through the UK three times this year, including prestigious dates at Alexandra Palace and the Glastonbury festival On each occasion, they’ve been moving so fast that it’s proved impossible to schedule an interview, but we finally corner the band backstage at the Nos Primavera Sound festival in Porto, where they’ve been given the entirely appropriate sunset slot on the Cupra stage, overlooking the Atlantic Ocean.
Yet it wasn’t a given that Khruangbin would agree to the proposal. Despite their adventurous outlook they are cautious collaborators, keen to retain a distinct identity and protect their minimalist sound They wearily recount the avalanche of unwanted solicitations they’ve had from budding singer songwriters since breaking through with their second album, 2018’s Con Todo El Mundo “Because we’re mainly instrumental,” says Ochoa, “people are like, ‘Oh, you need words.’ The amount of times I’ve been sent something where people are just singing over the songs that have already been made ”
52 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 K HRU A NGBIN/ V IEU X FA R K A T OUR É
In case you were wondering: yes, Khruangbin do wear their wigs for an interview with Uncut (apart from Johnson, who instead peers out from beneath a wide brimmed hat). Admittedly Speer’s looks a little skew whiff, as if he’s hurriedly pulled it on just before coming through the door, but you have to admire the commitment to maintaining a sense of theatre. Ochoa is dressed to kill in a shimmering blue dress and a pair of bright yellow heels that require her to grip the arm of her tour manager as she descends the grassy slope to the press cabin. When she takes the stage four hours later, she’s wearing a completely different but equally dazzling outfit the mark of a true pro It’s easy to see how these three distinct personalities complement and tessellate with each other. Ochoa is friendly and talkative, radiating a positive charisma. Speer is more guarded, thoughtful, occasionally sarcastic It’s his self confessed stubbornness that has kept Khruangbin focused, wringing maximum returns from their “less is more” mantra. Johnson is simply the coolest man in the room. He doesn’t say much, but when he does speak it’s with calmness and wisdom “They have a very close connection to each other, like they are brothers and sister,” notes Touré. “They are all very open to each other, they listen to each other’s ideas, they tease each other It is a very nice energy between them ”
providing them both with avaluable musica l education “We had three services on Sunday tha t were more or less the same songs, but each service had its own identity,” explains Johnson, who back then played the organ rather than the drums “We did play gospel music, but tha t encompasses alot of different genres within itself. So we could be playing something rock inf luenced, something from jazz, soul, R&B, classica l I spent alot of time with Mark we’d go out after rehearsals and just talk about music.”
VIEUX FARKA TOURÉ & KHRUANGBIN
VIEUX FARKA TOURÉ
A fellow son of Niafunké,Afel Bocoum joined AliFarka Touré’s band in 1968 when he was just 13 With his mentor’s death from bone cancer sti ll raw, Bocoum recorded the heartrending “AliFarka” one line translates as "My life's best friend is gone " as the opening track on his second album.
Keen to show how his father’s songs could thrive in a different context,Vieux Farka Touré took them all the way to Texas and encouraged Khruangbin to sti r in thei r own “flavour profile” of minimalist,heat haze funk.The resulting fusion is fluid and natural,as i f the music was always intended to sound this way.
Four tributes to the late,great AliFarka Touré
Speer was already aveteran of numerous other Houston ensembles, and he’d seen enough to know how to make Khruangbin stand out from the crowd: “It was amatter of here’s wha t we’re not going to do, these are the limitations ” Rules were laid down, including no laptops on stage. “Everything tha t wa s going to be accomplished needed to be accomplished
AliFarka Touré in 1987 and (bottom) with his son Vieux
Another essentia l component of Khruangbin lore is the corrugated tin barn on Speer’s parents’ farm in the hill country between Houston and Austin It’s where the band honed their easygoing sound and where they’ve recorded their three albums to date.
“ It was a unanimous ‘Yes’”:Vieux Farka Touré, Khruangbin’s most recent collaborator
“If you’re in awarehouse divided into a hundred rehearsa l rooms and you’re right next to agrindcore band, you’re gonnastart competing with them volume wise,” reasons Speer. “And there’s nothing wrong with grindcore, tha t stuff's amazing But we didn’t want to do tha t So we were able to go out to the barn and play softly and tha t definitely changed the sound of wha t we were doing because we weren't competing with anything except for bees or f lowers or the wind ”
SAM BA TOURÉ
Although no relation,Samba Touré was another Malian musician to receive the patronage of AliFarka Touré;his mother sang with Ali ’ s band and Samba learned to play guitar on one of his cast offs This upbeat international debut followed very much in the footsteps of the desert blues trailblazer
NIGER (CONTRE-JOUR, 2 0 0 6 )
SONGHAI BLUES: HOMAGE TO ALI FARKA TOURÉ
AFE L BOCOUM & ALKIBAR
ALICATS
Ali wasn’t made a t the barn, mainly because it’s difficult to accommodate more than three people playing live there a t once. Nonetheless, they attempted to preserve some of its magic by recording on the same equipment with the same engineer, Steve Christensen, a t his studio in Houston’s EaDo district, which the band have dubbed “Termina l C” Owing to the difficulties of synchronising the schedules of two hard touring internationa l outfits, they were
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(RIVERBOAT RECORDS, 2 0 0 9 )
LES RACINES (WORLD CIRCUIT, 2 0 2 2 )
Soon those “post rehearsa l hangs” began to include Ochoa , who’d attend the church just to watch the band play. “The music was half the service,” she marvels. “I’d grown up going to Catholic church, where tha t really wasn’t the thing ” Eventually she decided to learn bass, primarily so she could play with Johnson and Speer. “It was very obvious who my band was gonnabe,” she laughs.
with three people,” confirms Ochoa
A N D Y B O Y L E D; A V E P E A B O D Y / R E D F E R N S
ALI (DEAD OCEANS, 2 0 2 2 )
AliFarka Touré’s second son has worked hard to establish himself as a musical force in his own right, often favouring the electric guitar and collaborating with a wide range of musicians,including jazzer John Scofield and Israelisinger songwriter Idan Raichel But his most recent solo album returned to his roots, recorded in a Bamako studio named after his dad
For that reason, he declined to give the band any indication of the songs they would be recording ahead of time Some, such as “Savane” (from Ali Farka Touré’s posthumous album of the same name) and “Diarabi” (from 1994’s Talking Timbuktu collaboration with Ry Cooder), are well known But others were more obscure, or even unreleased. Thrown in at the deep end, Khruangbin couldn’t do much more than paddle to keep up “He’d say, ‘You know this, it’s traditional!’” remembers Speer “I was like, ‘I don’t know this!’”
“The entire experience was insane to me!” Christensen recounts “We spent three intense and emotional weeks out at the barn recording Mordechai. When we got to the finish line, we were all spent. Then I had to immediately pack up all my gear, drive it back to Houston, and set up my studio for three days later when Vieux arrived We were all burned to a crisp creatively, but it was great because none of us could overthink. Vieux’s an amazing charismatic talent, but it was a little bit of a culture shock because his English isn’t great, and none of us speak French Nobody knew any of the songs He would just start playing, like, ‘OK, here’s how it goes one, two, three, four’ and then boom, ready to go.”
forced to start work on Ali less than a week after wrapping 2020’s Mordechai.
Khruangbin returned the favour by introducing him to the joys of Tex Mex cuisine at their local Houston hangout. Overall, they have nothing but fond memories of the exchange. “Vieux’s energy as a human is joyous,” says Ochoa “Just the way he talks is very encouraging There were a lot of beautiful moments of him laughing before the song, so we tried to leave as many of those as we could on the record.”
Touré’s culinary skills became a feature of the session. Every day, he’d go back to his Airbnb in Houston and prepare a traditional Malian feast, usually a variation on la capitaine sangha freshwater perch marinated in a hot tomato sauce and bring it into the studio for everyone to eat. “It was a really nice way to break the ice, to break bread together,” says Christensen “It was a delicious heav y meal We’d have a plate of it, do a couple hours more playing and then Vieux would usually fall asleep on the couch…”
“We were all f lying blind,” adds Johnson “I would play something and he'd be like, ‘No, just do this’. It’d be the most simplistic funk drum pattern that he wanted. ‘There you go, sounds great.’ I was more or less taking his direction because it’s his father’s songs So we played along a couple times, hit record, and he’d say, ‘Sounds good, we’re done.’ Then we ate fish and rice!”
Wigging out: Ochoa and Speer at Primavera Barcelona,
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Still, in the immediate aftermath of their whirlwind week at Terminal C, the band weren’t quite sure
K HRU A NGBIN/ V IEU X FA R K A T OUR É
“For me, the beauty and the magic of music is spontaneous,” he says. “That is how I like to play: don’t plan, don’t think about it before, just play. If the musicians are good and the energ y is good between them, the music that will come spontaneously will be the most pure, the most direct from the soul.”
“ Don’t plan… just play”: Vieux at TerminalC in Houston
X A V T O R R E N T / W R E M A G E ; S T E V E C H R I S T E N S E N
The only other musician on the album is Ruben Moreno, who used to play zydeco music with Speer around Houston in pre Khruangbin days “The atmosphere in the studio was electric,” says Moreno, who contributes accordion to “Mahini Me”. “As soon as I heard the track I felt something inside, something so familiar I felt like I had one foot in Mali and one foot in Opelousas, Louisiana. Everyone in this band is fantastic they really have something spiritual and special ”
It turns out that catching Khruangbin with their guard down was all part of Touré’s masterplan
in
For a band who rely so much on creating a vibe, these kind of people management skills are crucial especially given thei r contrasting temperaments
It’s too early for them to say where they might go next, but don’t expect them to take any conventional, commercial routes “I think if you have a specific idea of the things you will not do,” decides Speer, “that will open you up to the opportunities of things that you actually do want to do Usually our philosophy is: if it’s not a yes, it’s a no ”
“…But if there’s no question,” adds Ochoa, preferring to accentuate the positives, “the
OBODY knows Khruangbin better than Steve Christensen, who’s engineered and co produced all of thei r records going back to thei r 2015 debut, The Universe Smiles Upon You He plays down his role in the creative process, stressing that the band always have a strong idea of what they want.
“We’re very lucky that we have each other It’s much harder if you’re a solo artist because you don’t have your family to check you and you can get pulled in a lot of directions. But we can always get in a huddle and say, ‘How are we actually feeling about this?’ And there’s three of us, so if we ever have a disagreement there’s always a tiebreaker!”
“They have an interesting creative tension between them,” adds Christensen “Mark is one of the most musically particular people I’ve ever worked with, so i t can be intense Laura is kinda like the tastemaker If she’s not dancing, then it’s just not there yet So the challenge is getting both of them happy with i t ” Christensen, who’s also won a Grammy for his work on Steve Earle’s Townes, admits to having no inkling that his relationship with Khruangbin would prove so enduring and successful.“I don’t have any idea what’s going to hi t with the public! You’re just trying to execute the artist s vision, because they re the content creators, they’re the ones that get i t right. It’s like, stay out of thei r way.Nudge them a little bit, but stay out of thei r way. ”
Inside the studio with Khruangbin’ s co-producer and vibemaster Steve Christensen
N
Y the time you read this, Khruangbin and Vieux Farka Touré will have played a show together at Brooklyn’s Prospect Park Bandshell, but scheduling a full Ali tour may prove tricky. “I would love that!” says Touré hopefully For now though, Khruangbin are on the road or rather in the air for the rest of 2022, touching down in California, Hawaii, Mexico, Japan, Australia and New Zealand And after that, they’re itching to get back to the barn to daydream some new music into existence Live at Primavera, you can already hear Speer toying impatiently with their current setlist, testing their self imposed boundaries with a salvo of cosmic riffage
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B
Ali is released by Dead Oceans on September 2 3 ; Khruangbin headline the opening night of End Of The Road festival on September 1
She believes that Khruangbin’s solid triangular structure allows them to withstand all external pressures, so they can carry on ploughing their own unique furrow without interference.
L AUR A L E E O C H OA
It was always understood that the group would return to the recordings at a later date, in order to edit down some of the lengthy tracks, add their trademark whispered vocals and expand upon their original first take instrumental parts. But in true Khruangbin style, they realised that in many cases the best move was to do nothing “Vieux is an incredibly adept guitar player, just like his dad,” says Speer. “He doesn’t need anybody else, his guitar and vocal sounds beautiful as it is There’s something happening on the bottom, there’s something in the middle, there’s a melody on top, so it doesn’t really need a whole lot. And this is the struggle I was having Where do I fit in? This dude’s got the guitar covered One of my favourite tracks is where I’m just playing keyboards ”
“IT CAN B E IN TENS E”
answer’s yes! There are things we want to accomplish We want to have as diverse a crowd as possible, we want to travel the world and play our music for ever yone Those are the types of goals, rather than ‘I want to play this festival or get this award’. We want to pave our own path, we don’t want to follow what anyone has done before. Because the people we all admire the most are the ones who have done things their own way.”
“We want to play our music for everyone”
With Steve Christensen at his studio TerminalC in Houston
about what they had down on tape “I felt uncomfortable,” admits Christensen. “Do we need to dig deeper? Is this a disaster?” As the need to promote and tour Mordechai took over, the Ali tapes sat on his shelf for 18 months “But then when I opened it up with a fresh perspective I was like, ‘Wow, this is awesome.’ They did capture something magical, it was just an intense experience ”
“I am very, very happy with the finished album,” says Touré. “It is like a dream for me that I had this idea of a project I wanted to do, and it has become a greater reality than I could have imagined.” What does he think Ali would have made of it? “I think he would love it. He enjoyed many styles of music and had a very open heart I think he would find it very interesting and cool that his music was being honoured in this way.”
“I’m not helping them write or arrange the songs or anything like that, he says. They re pretty musically self sufficient.My input a lot of times is just helping them focus and keeping them emotionally on track.”
HER E COME
“Steve had two sides,” says engineer Alan O’Duff y “One was the cockney, happy stage man who’d played the Artful Dodger The other was a black soul singer When he worked with PP Arnold, she was like the ambition of Steve’s heart, in musical terms.” Arnold herself is keen that he’s properly remembered: “So long as I’m alive, I’m going to keep Steve’s vibe alive.”
Along with keyboardist Ian McLagan and bassist Ronnie Lane, all four Small Faces’ work is recalled here with equal affection and in chronological order
Some of these, he acknowledges, will finally see the light of day on an expanded boxset of their compilation album, The Autumn Stone
R
SM A L L FA CES – 20 GR EAT ES T SONGS
Originally released in 1969, The Autumn Stone capped the Small Faces’ brief but magnificent recording career. Although together for less than four years, the Small Faces’ mastered R&B, psychedelia, Essex folk rock reveries and blissed out spiritual ballads high water marks of ’60s pop. To celebrate The Autumn Stone boxset, Uncut has convened a panel of the band’s friends and labelmates to join Jones in considering 20 of their greatest songs These include former Humble Pie man Peter Frampton, erstwhile Immediate Records manager Andrew Loog Oldham, US soul singer PP Arnold and Brit R&B singer Chris Farlowe, along with rock photographer Gered Mankowitz, Jerr y Shirley a teenage signing to Oldham’s Immediate label who became Steve Marriott’s Humble Pie drummer and Lyn Dobson, session man for the Small Faces and folk rock loyalty such as Nick Drake. They all have fond stories to tell about the mod scamps and all concur that the Small Faces had the songs and the singer to take on the world.
As KENNEY JONES masterminds reissues of the SMALL FACES’ much loved albums and treasures from the vaul t we celebrate 20 of their greatest songs in the company of Jones, friends, labelmates and collaborators. Willyour favourite be among them…? By Nick Hasted
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Photo by J EFF HOCH BERG
ECENTLY, Kenney Jones has recently been digging through his personal archive. He has been searching for Small Faces songs he stored away as a young man, just hours after they were recorded, but which have since languished in obscurity. “Ever y time we recorded something, Ialways asked for a reel to reel copy to take home,” the sole sur viving Small Face explains. “So I’ve got backing tracks, rough mixes and unmixed tracks, among other things.”
T HE N ICE!
(1965 7 I NCH, A LSO ON 1966’S SMALL FACES LP)
SH A-L A-L A-L A-LEE (1966 7 I NCH A N D ON T H E 1966 DECC A A LBU M SMALL FACES) Near nonsense (penned by Kenny Lynch and Mort Shuman) made great by joyous,bulldozing conviction,taking it to No 3
A “ tricky” band to photograph, 1966:(l r) Kenney Jones, Ian McLagan
SM A L L FA CES
KENNEY JONES: Listen to this a nd you ca n hea r where Zeppelin who were grea t Sma ll Fa ces fa ns nicked some idea s. “E Too D” wa s going ba ck to our roots, before we got thrust into Don Arden’s ‘You must ha ve a hit’ routine We sa id “Fuck tha t” here We were into free form pla ying I often wonder wha t we would ha ve sounded like if we’d continued down tha t roa d, a s a blues rock a nd soul ba nd We were a lso getting more a dventurous here, with the percussion a nd India n style guita r Tha t’s when Pete Townshend
(1966 7 I NCH A N D ON 1967 A LBU M FROM THE BEGINNING) The chart-topping mod/ R&B pinnacle
This debut single was an impeccable mod pop calling card,reaching No 14
This fine album track shows off their burgeoning instrumental and lyrical ambition
W H ATCH A GONNA DO A BOUT IT
3 E TOO D ( TA K EN F ROM T H E 1966 DECC A A LBU M SMALL FACES)
4 A LL OR NOTHING
GER ED M A NKOWITZ: I liked the sound they ma de on “Sha La La La Lee” An irresistible R&B pop song tha t rides on the energ y of the ba nd, the bea t a nd Steve’s voice Ma ybe the song wa s nonsense, but I never focus too much on lyrics; it wa s the feel, it wa s emotiona l I’d a lrea dy known them for a yea r before tha t ca me out when Jimmy Winston wa s still in the ba nd a nd they were with Don Arden. The Sma ll Fa ces were their own people, with their own idea s. I felt very close to them, but they were quite tricky to work with, beca use they were a lwa ys sea rching for a prop to hide behind. Photogra phing them wa s a lwa ys compromised a nd sometimes the compromise would ma ke the picture, like when Steve’s f licking V signs a t the ca mera Tha t’s got a lot of the Sma ll Fa ces’ energ y a nd cha ra cter Not giving a tinker’s toss.
Ronnie Lane, Steve Marriott
PETER FR A MP TON: I sa t in live with the Sma ll Fa ces a couple of times. I pla yed “All Or Nothing” with them, which shows so ma ny sides of Steve. He could croon sweetly, even do a country thing, then with the explosive R&B choruses off he goes into a nother rea lm, where no other ma n ha s been. Like on “Tin Soldier” la ter it’s voca lly a lmost impossible to do wha t he did on tha t But he wa s Steve Pla ying with them, I lea rned how musica l the rest of the ba nd were Kenney ha d grea t feel, Ma c wa s so good the
entered our life With The Who a nd the [Small] Fa ces, the press ha d us a s riva ls, but it wa s like being in one ba nd, rea lly. Then Meher Ba ba comes into it a nd it rubs off So we sta rted exploring mea ningful lyrics
T O N Y G A L E / P I C T O R I A L P R E S S L T D / A L A M Y S T O C K P H O T O
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1
PETER FR A MP TON: The very first time I sa w the Sma ll Fa ces wa s on Ready Steady Go!, doing “Wha tcha Gonna Do About It” a song I ha dn’t hea rd yet It wa s a phenomena l rendition And you go, ‘Is that guy singing? He sounds like a 69 yea r old bla ck ma n. But he’s 20 odd a nd five foot nothing.’ About ha lf wa y through, when Steve does tha t feedba ck solo, I thought, ‘I wa nna pla y with tha t guy ’ I wa nted to join the Sma ll Fa ces, to be honest The song’s R&B with a rea l strut, the perfect first hit for them. Tha t wa s before Ma c wa s even in the ba nd. Tha t wa s it, I wa s so into the Sma ll Fa ces from tha t point on to the end Of course, I la ter joined Steve in Humble Pie So tha t song ha s grea t mea ning to me.
2
6 M Y WAY OF GI V ING
A M ER IC A N A LBU M THERE ARE BUT FOUR SMALL FACES)
I M M EDI AT E A LBU M SMALL FACES) Mac makes himself known with a rare writing credit,plus lead vocal and atmospheric organ swirls
A L A N O’DUFFY: When I worked in the studio with the Sma ll Fa ces on songs like “Tin Soldier”, Steve ha d a mischievous sense of humour, a nd a disrega rd for studio conventions. He wa s hypera ctive, beca use he ha d more energ y tha n wa s norma l Steve ma de a chord into a dra ma Glyn Johns a nd George Chkia ntz did “Green Circles”, a lovely, Pet Sounds inf luenced experiment with ha rmonies a nd guita rs. There wa s a continua lly explora tive interest in the studio a nd sound how ca n we expa nd the mystery a nd glory of the ba nd through fun experimenta tion? The fa de with the weird noises is a
Stones wa nted him la ter, Ronnie wa s writing melodies on ba ss Everyone wa s down to ea rth even Steve wa s the king of self depreca tion then. But people don’t give the other ba ndmembers credit, beca use Steve wa s so powerful a nd a ll encompa ssing
PP A R NOLD:
JER RY SHIR LEY:
Another Top 10 smash,full of surging soul energy ,capped by PP Arnold’s vocal harmonies
11TIN SOLDIER
GER ED M A NKOWITZ: Wa s it quite cheeky, to get a song a bout their
9 UP THE WOODEN HILLS TO BEDFORDSHIRE
I was on fire too : PP Arnold sings on Tin Soldier with the SmallFaces December 1967
wa s more subdued, Steve wa s outra geous Even la ter in life, when Steve wa s with Pa cket Of Three, a nd he’s losing his ha ir a nd he looks sort of disgruntled, when he pla yed the guita r, he wa s rea lly fa bulous.
5 I C A N’ T DA NCE W ITH YOU (1966 “M Y M I N D’S E Y E” B SI DE)
(1967 7-I NCH A N D T H E 1968
10 ITCH YCOO PA RK (1967 7 I NCH A N D T H E 1968 A M ER IC A N A LBU M THERE ARE BUT FOUR SMALL FACES) No 3 in the UK’s summer of love and the band’s only American hit,this pop masterpiece breezes in on strums of acoustic guitar, offering an enigmatic idyll KENNEY JONES: We a ll felt it wa s one of those commercia l songs, we did it for a la ugh But “Itchycoo Pa rk” ha s got substa nce to it Singing “it’s all too beautif ul” wa s a serious sentiment. It’s a bea utiful thing to get high, not necessa rily on drugs. We
hit record people, a nd he sa id, “I’d like to write a song for you ” Stevie wa s very clever with his lyrics
K EN N EY JON E S: The phra se mea ns ‘I’m going to bed now’ It’s wha t Ronnie’s da d used to sa y to him a s a sort of lulla by. It’s a bout a n a cid trip. A folk tune with a mod sound? Yea h It suggests the pa stora l feel where the ba nd were hea ded I used to go hop picking in Kent, which wa s a la nd of pea ce, discover y, a nd genera l well being. Ronnie a nd Steve used to go to Epping Forest a ll the time on their bikes Ma c writing tha t song tells me he wa s mea nt to be a Sma ll Fa ce Ma c coming into the ba nd a fter Jimmy Winston wa s a brea th of fresh a ir. The Ha mmond opened me up, a nd the whole ba nd got better It sea led our lega cy
A mod/soul floor-filler,one of several storming B-sides.
( TA K EN F ROM T H E 1967
I remember being in Steve’s house when he sa id, “Don Arden’s relea sed bloody ‘My Mind’s Eye’ a s a single ” Then he pla yed us the B side, a nd we sa id, “Oh, wow!” He sa id, “Yea h, I know ” They were still mods hea ded towa rds hippies when they did tha t, a nd da ncing wa s a big thing then It’s got a grea t chorus, a nd one of the best grooves they ever recorded This wa s when English drummers like Kenney ha d been listening to Motown a nd Sta x drummers like Berna rd Purdie. If you knew where the groove wa s, Steve would be ha ppy to work with you a s a drummer a nd Kenney knew exa ctly wha t he wa nted Steve wa s a n overpowering persona lity, but the ba nd a lwa ys worked a s a collective.
7 HERE COME THE NICE
G I L L E S P E T A R D / R E D F E R N S
OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 59
dea ler a lmost into the Top 10? They were a cheeky bunch of la ds Steve wa s a nipper, a ducker a nd diver Andrew didn’t ha ve much to do with their ima ge on Immedia te. I didn’t get into it with them either If you look a t the promo films they did, they were a lwa ys ra ther ra ucous a bit out of control There wa s tha t element, pa rticula rly with Steve. Kenney wa s a loof, on the edge of compositions. Ma c tended to be competitive with Steve Ronnie ha d his own extra ordina ry a ura a sort of gentle a nd studious na ture. I felt like they were hiding in photos. But it wa s a question of not wa nting to pose.
Another big R&B number, covered by Chris Farlowe.Two Small Faces takes were also released;uniquely,the Faces even tried it with Rod
ma rijua na expa nded, comedic interpreta tion of rea lity! It wa sn’t the pha sing they got la ter with “Itchycoo Pa rk” They were rea lly interested in ma king exciting, positive records.
CHRIS FARLOWE: Me a nd Stevie were ma tes a nywa y, before we were
Wha t a grea t intro, counting it in on the pia no with Ma c Kenney’s just kicking butt, a nd Steve’s on fire. I wa s kind of cool but I wa s on fire too It ma y be psychedelic, but tha t’s a ha rd driving song Steve sa id he wrote it for the girl he wa nted to be with, Jenny Ryla nce, a bout the non sexua l side of loving someone? Yea h, but it a lso ha s a kinda horny vibe. I mea n the first line just sa ys it a ll: [sings] ‘I, I’m a little tin soldier that wants to jump into your fire!’ I remember being a t the studio a nd everybody being tota lly out of it. High a nd ha ppy!
(1967 7 I NCH A N D 1968 A M ER IC A N A LBU M THERE ARE BUT FOUR SMALL FACES)
The first single for Andrew Loog Oldham’s Immediate label is a sly tribute to flatmate Mick O’Sullivan, “always there when I need some speed”
You ca n feel a n R&B element in everything Stevie did; you ca n hea r in his phra sing tha t he loved Sa m Cooke a nd Northern Soul stuff There wa s a psychedelic element to “My Wa y Of Giving” He a nd Ronnie [Lane] were completely opposite a s fa r a s a rt wa s concerned. Where Ronnie
used to get high on just being with ea ch other. For the whooshing, f la nging effect we looped the ta pe round the ba ck of a cha ir The rea l Itchycoo Pa rk wa s a pla ce between Ilford a nd Stra tford, which Ronnie a nd Steve knew. I told them my Itchycoo Pa rk wa s bombed ruins, where I used to pla y a nd get stung by these grea t stinging nettles It ca n be a ny where you wa nt it to be
( TA K EN F ROM 1967 A LBU M FROM THE BEGINNING A N D 1967’S I M M EDI AT E A LBU M SMALL FACES)
8 GREEN CIRCLES ( TA K EN F ROM T H E 1967 I M M EDI AT E A LBU M SMALL FACES) Ronnie Lane takes the lead on an acid trip report with an out-there outro
always had different sides”: about to release Ogdens’Nut Gone Flake, 1968
15 H A PPINESS STA N
Though it hit No 2 when Oldham released it behind the band’s backs, Marriott’s cockney caper reinforced the idea that they were a pop group, when what they wanted was respect Kenney Jones called it the band’s “epitaph”
Then we left early in the morning, that’s where Gered Mankowitz took all those great photos on Barnes and Roehampton heaths
band reacted to “Lazy Sunday” the same way Mick and Keith reacted to “Satisfaction” Understandable, subliminally both bands understood they were jumping into swimming pools that may not have water. The single was indeed a cheap shot to the stalls, and balcony. Was the song drawn from Steve’s life? More a defence mechanism, showing you ever ything, giving you nowt
13 A FTERGLOW
This bittersweet soul ballad from Ogdens’… concept free side would later be the Small Faces’ posthumous, farewell single PP ARNOLD: They wrote “Afterglow” for me. But then they liked it and kept it themselves! I like the way it starts out with a nice hooky thing, and then it goes into a really cool verse You make some really beautiful loving with somebody, you’re kind of laying there with ’em, and you’re in this magical kind of glow So what do you call it? Yeah, afterglow It’s all about that Steve
A LBU M OGDENS’ NUT GONE FLAKE)
14 M A D JOHN ( TA K EN F ROM T H E 1968 A LBU M OGDENS’ NUT GONE FLAKE) Ogdens’… surreal Side Two centres on the search for a cave-dwelling prophet JER RY SHIR LEY: I went up to Beehive Cottage right before Ogdens’ was released Steve had an acetate of the Stanley Unwin side. The f lute wasn’t there yet, just Stanley talking I don’t know if Mad John’s supposed to be a guru Ronnie was the first one who got into that philosophical stuff Sufi and Khalil Gibran. Steve offered my band Apostolic Intervention “Mad John” just after they recorded it, ’til he was stopped It was just a song when Steve offered it to us, an acoustic, folksy thing But then it became a central part of the Ogdens’… story.
( TA K EN F ROM T H E 1968
( TA K EN F ROM T H E 1968
“We
( TA K EN F ROM T H E 1968
A N DR EW LOOG OLDH A M: Glyn Johns was in the room with the Small Faces, plus wiz engineer George Chkiantz That was the magic “Lazy Sunday” was a brilliant work, just oh so clever and unique It was part of Steve’s final playing of the game with the Small Faces, and after that he got disgusted with himself and turned on himself and anyone who came near The
January
P C T O R A L P R E S S L T D / A L A M Y S T O C K P H O T O F A R F A X M E D I A V A G E T T Y M A G E S
SM A L L FA CES
was a beautiful guy He was my soul brother. We were lovers and of course we loved singing together. Steve Marriott’s the most soulful white British singer of anybody back then He knew how to ad lib, and you have to be really honest to sing like that, because you have to let go, then the spirit takes over.
16 SONG OF A BA K ER
They had this great bunch of songs, and then they went on this trip down the Thames on a couple of cruiser boats and had a writing session and realised they could put it all together
With Andrew Loog Oldham at Sydney Airport 1968
12 L A Z Y SUNDAY (1968 7-I NCH A N D T H E 1968 A LBU M OGDENS’ NUT GONE FLAKE)
A hard rocking take on Sufi precepts, pointing to Marriott’s heavy Humble Pie future
A LBU M OGDENS’ NUT GONE FLAKE) Stanley Unwin introduces Ogdens’… questing hero in trademark, absurd Unwinese LYN DOB SON: I knew Steve Marriott and Ronnie Lane very well. I took my first acid trip with those two and their girlfriends, up the Thames where Jerome K Jerome used to live, which was fantastic It bonded me deeply to them, Steve especially I spent most of my time jamming on sitar in his house. Did using my f lute suit Ogdens’… concept side, with it being a sort of folk tale? Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, because the f lute is a pastoral instrument Having Stanley Unwin narrating a spiritual quest in “Happiness Stan” makes sense too, because there’s a lot of humour in deep spirituality. Look at the Dalai Lama, he’s very funny It’s all part of the same thing like The Goon Show It’s a very English way of approaching it.
A LBU M OGDENS’ NUT GONE FLAKE)
Marriott’s self destructive response to the success of “Lazy Sunday” has its own rickety charm
“docker’s delight”…
19 THE UNI V ERSA L (1968 7-I NCH A N D THE AUTUMN STONE)
Soul Survivor: The Autobiography by PP Arnold is out now, published by Nine Eight Books. Jerry Shirley’s book Best Seat In The House: Drumming In The ’7 0 s With Marriott, Frampton And Humble Pie is published by Rebeat to beat European copyright law’s looming 50 year limit.“I revived
KENNEY JONES: I loved the sentiment behind it a nd I loved the wa y Steve ca me up with it But it wa s rushed I overdubbed drums to pa rts of Steve’s a coustic guita r pa rts tha t he’d recorded on a little ca ssette a t home, with his dog in the ba ckground If we’d ha ve gone in a nd redone it [ properly], would we ha ve reca ptured tha t a tmosphere? I don’t think so It’s quite like “Give Pea ce A
Nice Records to protect the catalogue,” Jones says “I intend to release as much of i t as I can in the best way I can With all this EU ‘ use i t or lose it’ stuff, I thought, ‘Fuck that shi t ’”
( TA K EN F ROM T H E 1969
from albums we ’ ve done in the past and make a completely new one up, ” Jones adds “It can be my idea of a great Small Faces album ”
The Autumn Stone boxset will be released on Nice Records this autumn
“The Small Faces got screwed at the time,” Jones adds “The legacy is with me now I’m in charge, I’m the caretaker, and I’m doing the best I can in memory of Steve and Ronnie and Mac I feel like the keeper of the flame ”
“I’M T H E K EEPER OF T H E F L A M E” Kenney Jones on his plans for the SmallFaces catalogue T HE Small Faces catalogue hasn’t always been best served But last year saw Kenney Jones reactivate his Nice Records label, with the intention of lovingly reissuing all of thei r work, in time
20 RED BA LLOON
A dream passing by…” : Marriott at his Essex home with modelJenny Rylance 1968
Cha nce”, with lovely tra d ja zz trombone The B side, “Donkey Rides, A Penny, A Gla ss”, ca me a bout beca use when we found ourselves in Bla ckpool, a guy selling donkey rides wa s shouting tha t out. We ha d to write a song stra ight a wa y “Snowf lakes falling like leaves in the summertime/ Fishcakes, cabbage and mash” Grea t, innit? It’s writing down our pa st, things tha t ha ppened to us. Ronnie or Steve? Tha t one wa s a bit of ea ch.
17 RENE ( TA K EN F ROM T H E 1968 A LBU M OGDENS’ NUT GONE FLAKE) Ogdens’… insatiable
The title track of this posthumous compilation is a blissful reverie, with the latter day Small Faces getting it together in the country LYN DOB SON: This is a spiritua l love song to Steve’s girlfriend Jenny, with a sita r coda which I suppose
JER RY SHIR LEY: It’s wha t we’d ca ll a slow shuff le Lyrica lly it’s hila rious, the chorus is fa bulous, a nd then there’s the ja m a t the end with the guita r going nuts a nd Ma c going cra zy a t the pia no I think he ga ve himself a hernia , litera lly There’s va rious stories a s to who Rene rea lly wa s, depending on who you believe It’s a grea t exa mple of the Sma ll Fa ces
18 THE AUTUMN STONE
A LBU M THE AUTUMN STONE)
( TA K EN F ROM T H E 1969 A LBU M THE AUTUMN STONE)
Among The Autumn Stone’s unreleased tracks, this Tim Hardin cover is a brooding folk-rocker
must be me! I a lso overdubbed sessions for Nick Dra ke The pa ra llels you could ma ke with Nick Dra ke a nd Steve a nd Ronnie is they were spiritua l, feeling musicia ns, who put their hea rt into wha t they did. The fa ct tha t they ma de money a nd beca me fa mous wa s incidenta l. I wa s four or five yea rs older But they were a lwa ys old beyond their yea rs I remember Steve telling me he wa s in the West End production of Oliver! when he wa s 12, a nd he wa lked from the Ea st End to the West End every night Tha t’s old before your time I found them incredibly sensitive a nd ma ture In fa ct in ma ny wa ys, they were older tha n me
OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 1 P I C T O R A L P R E S S L T D / A L A M Y S T O C K P H O T O K; N G C O L L E C T O N / A V A L O N / G E T T Y M A G E S
KENNEY JONES: Oh, I love tha t song The lyrics come from Ronnie’s Sufi investiga tions, with the importa nce of the “wheat in the field” a nd a ll tha t I love his melodic ba ss pla ying on it. He used to think like he wa s pla ying lea d guita r a nd tha t menta lly fused into his ba ss pla ying. A hea v y song with a mellow groove? Yea h, we a lwa ys ha d different sides People used to sa y to me, “You’re a pop ba nd,” or “You’re a rock ba nd ” No the Sma ll Fa ces used to love listening to Chuck Berry a nd stuff like tha t a nd ja m with it But the nea rest we got to rock’n’roll wa s our very la st B side, “Wha m Ba m Tha nk You Ma m” You ca n’t sa y our songs a re rock’n’roll. They were Sma ll Fa ces songs. You ca n’t describe wha t they were like a ny other wa y.
A NDR EW LOOG OLDH A M: “Red Ba lloon” shows the development of Steve’s gift a s a n interpreter a nd wha t he might ha ve been doing ha d he sta yed in the Sma ll Fa ces. I’ve been rea ding a book on the ma king of Easy Rider Immedia te wa s just a s wha cked, divisive a nd perverse, a nd my pa rtner Tony Ca lder wa s like Dennis Hopper, a nd tha t’s a compliment. My running out of money a nd interest ended the ga me, a nd like the movie you could sa y we blew it But the ride until we fell over wa s life giving Steve ha d one more brillia nt run with Humble Pie a nd then it wa s over, until it fina lly wa s. I ha ve not mentioned the rest of the group beca use I never rea lly knew them Steve dema nded a ll of you a nd wa s wonderful while he got it
The first release wi ll be a boxset expanding on 1969’s valedictory double album The Autumn Stone The intention is for all the original Small Faces albums to follow.“I’d like to nick a few tracks
pla ying together. The biggest sha me a bout them is tha t, like The Bea tles a nd Stones, they stopped pla ying live a nd concentra ted entirely on the studio Where they were so brillia nt live a t the beginning, they lost their edge on sta ge. Then they brought out this wonderful a lbum a nd they felt they couldn’t pla y it live though “Rene” would ha ve sounded so grea t Mea nwhile, The Who kept trucking into America
“There was quite a lot of tension :Mark E Smith, Marc Riley and Steve Hanley on stage at Muso’s Club Sydney,
July 22, 1982 62 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
UNDISPUTABLE SLANG TRUTH!
before we joined, so to play with Karl was a great thing. Karl had an effect on my playing He knew how to build a song up and take it down again The rest of us were just learning our instruments. He could be a total pain, but he was great
On returning, the band keep both players and travel to play (and record two songs) in Iceland…
CR A IG SCA N LON (g uitar, 1979–1995): As a band we were very rehearsal averse, so working songs out on the stage was always the preferred method You can always eliminate bits that don’t work at the next gig. I think, from Hex…, “Deer Park” and “Jawbone And The Air Rif le” got the most live outings, then “Winter” and “Fortress” PAUL HANLEY (drums, 1980–1986) : I didn’t go to America. I don’t know, still, if it was a legal thing or Mark just didn’t think I was up to it I was only 17 They went off and did this huge tour They were well drilled and then they
OLD US IDEAS
STEVE H A NLEY (bass, 1979 1998): That was quite a long, intensive tour a lot of driving. We were fans of The Fall
GR A NT SHOWBIZ (sound eng ineer/producer, Drag net; co-producer, Slates; Hex Enduction Hour): Coming down those steps at JFK the first time, seeing New York, as ludicrous as it may seem, it felt like we were in The Beatles, in my mind It was astonishing that we got there. Did we even have guitars? I think we turned up and borrowed shit
M A RC R ILEY (g uitar, 1978 1982): We knew we were out on our own the release of Slates had taken us up another notch We were a confident unit and we knew we were capable of great things
Mark E Smith led THE FALL to the USA, Iceland, and Hertfordshire – and onwards into the gritty, detailed landscape of their 1982 masterpiece, Hex En duction Hour. Band members and close associates tell Un cut how The Fall grew inscope and power as a two-guitar/two-drummer lineup, and propelled Smith’s transformative visions of modernculture to greatness. “We knew there was no other band onEarth like us at that point,” Marc Riley tells JohnRobinson. But could it last?
The Fall and producer/ sound engineer Grant Showbiz tour the United States. Drummer Paul Hanley (17) is too young to play American clubs, so remains in the UK. He is replaced by 1978’s Fall drummer Karl Burns
In1981,
S
Photo by TASSO TA R A BOU LSI
T HE FA L L T A S S O T A R A B O U L S I / P O L A R I S / E Y E V I N E OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 63
UM MER AUTUMN 1981.
N December 1981, The Fall continue recording their new album with sessions at a studio located in a former cinema in Hitchin, for a new label Kamera and with a new producer, Richard Mazda…
PAUL H A NLEY: We didn’t feel especia lly a t home a t Rough Tra de. Songs like “Fortress/Deer Pa rk”, they were like a dia ry: moa ning a bout the
GR A NT SHOWBIZ: We didn’t go to Icela nd in the summer like norma l people, we went in September Cold? It wa s like ha ving your fa ce torn off by ra zors! It wa s the most a stonishing experience Icela nd wa s weird then it’s weird now. There wa s no television on Sunda ys. Every where you went people ha d, like, a thousa nd books The wa ter sta nk of sulphur they ha dn’t worked tha t out
M A RC R ILEY: To begin with [writing] would be myself a nd Cra ig, usua lly a t my fa mily home in Wythensha we, sitting down a nd knitting our riffs together Most of the ea rly songs for the Riley/ Sca nlon/Ha nley lineup sta rted like tha t We’d a lrea dy been writing stuff together for a few yea rs
GR A NT SHOWBIZ: There were people who believed in gods in ever y rock a nd tree. Beer wa s illega l Only wines a nd spirits were a llowed There’s a lyric in “Icela nd” a bout a guy in a suit fa lling down in front of you in the middle of the da y. Tha t ha ppened they were drinking vodka .
S T E V E R A P P O R T / G E T T Y M A G E S
12 1981 T HE FA L L 64 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
Before the fallout: Mark E Smith with Marc Riley in the background The Venue, London, July
I
M A RC R ILEY: At tha t point in time Icela nd wa s on a bsolutely no one’s ‘bucket list’, I’d sa y. It wa s da rk for most of the da y It wa s a n otherworldly experience a s I reca ll
SAUL GA LPER N [Kamera Records staff, 1982; founder, Nude Records]: Chris Youle sta rted Ka mera there wa s a woma n upsta irs ca lled Versa , a brillia nt PR a nd she told Chris a bout The Fa ll. Chris, if I’m honest, spent most of his time in the pub, then he’d go to the bookies but he wa s a n a bsolute genius He knew how to pull everything together. Ma rk loved him, possibly beca use he a llowed him to do wha tever he wa nted When he wa s a t Rough Tra de, I think they ma ybe wa nted to get him to write songs tha t might cha rt, or cha nge a rtwork. Chris wa s more “do wha tever you like” he didn’t rea lly ca re.
BBC, moa ning a bout Rough Tra de a nd the a rea a round Notting Hill You could see wha t he wa s on a bout. I a lwa ys ta lk a bout Johnny Ma rr’s experience a t Rough Tra de compa red to ours. Johnny Ma rr went into Rough Tra de on the Frida y with a ca ssette, a nd he ca me out on Monda y morning with a dea l. I couldn’t get a cup of tea out of Rough Tra de.
PAUL H A NLEY: Ka mera were grea t, they weren’t like a nyone we’d ever met, they were la rger tha n life They took you for a pint Rough Tra de wa s a bit more mung bea n a nd lentilly. Ma rk rea lly liked the fa ct they weren’t like a n indie la bel. He thought The Fa ll weren’t like other ba nds Rough Tra de trea ted everyone the sa me, a nd I think Ma rk resented tha t. He didn’t wa nt it to be thought tha t The Fa ll were “a Rough Tra de ba nd”.
M A RC R ILEY: Everything a bout the record confused “Recorded in Hitchin a nd Icela nd” is a pretty good indica tion of wha t you were letting yourself in for. The cover wa s like no other. The nonsensica l title The bra very a nd recklessness of much of the music on it
GR A NT SHOWBIZ: “Hip Priest”, it wa s a n idea tha t got extended one of the best things I ever did wa s to tell the engineer [in Iceland] tha t they weren’t tuning up, this wa s the song a nd could they plea se record it? Tha t wa s pa rt of it I think it works well
CAS TING RUNES/ HE XEN-SCHULE
went ba ck to just ha ving me on the drums We did Peel, a few gigs, then we went to Icela nd with Ka rl
CR A IG SCA N LON: We formed most of the songs through the Europea n/US tours. The lighter, spa cier songs were still f luid, open for new bits, but “Fortress/Deer Pa rk”; “Mere Pseud Ma g Ed”; “Ja wbone ” were na iled down A good exa mple of our Fa ll “workshop” is “Hip Priest” we ma stered it pla ying live.
CR A IG SCA N LON: It wa s like Lennon a nd McCa rtney Guita rs rea dy, fa cing ea ch other, crea ting ma gic! Bless Ma rc tha t rea lly wound Ma rk up Seriously our guita rs just gelled We’re ma tes from schoolda ys, there wa s no a lpha ma le shit.
R ICH A R D M A ZDA: The ba nd wa s on fire. I’ve been in the studio ma ny times a nd I ca n tell you ma ybe 10 times where it’s like tha t Myself a nd the engineer were looking a t ea ch other sa ying, “This is outsta nding ” They weren’t King Crimson, drum wise, but there wa s a bea utiful cha os tha t ha ppened a ll the time.
The sleeve tells the bare bones of the story of The Fall’s literal finest hour.
MARC RILEY
M A RC R ILEY: I remember it being a bit cha otic. We recorded it in a n old cinema We were on the sta ge freezing our socks off Ma rk wa s off up in the gods in wha t I presume wa s [ formerly] the projection room. So there wa s litera lly a voice from the gods in our ea rs ta lking through wha t we ha d done or were a bout to do I suspect both Richa rd a nd Ma rk offered thoughts from a bove beca use they were the ones hea ring wha t we ha d la id down in rela tively civilised surroundings. It wa s bloody cold a nd quite da rk a s I reca ll
LOOK, KNOW (KAMERA SINGLE, 1982)
CR A IG SCA N LON: “In My Area ” is a good exa mple written up in Yvonne Pa wlett’s a ttic f la t Ma rc ca me up with the twa ngy two stringer, I a dded the murky chords, I think I ca me up with the VU ish chorus, then I followed Ma rc’s ending lea d pla yout It wa s a lwa ys different but I don’t reca ll either of us sa ying “Your pa rt’s shit” even if it wa s! We a lwa ys left spa ces for ea ch other.
CR A IG SCA N LON: The two drummer lineup wa s grea t Ka rl wa s by virtue a nd in Pa ul’s opinion the top dog. Pa ul’s a grea t drummer who is fa r too modest, but I believe he sa w the Hex/Ka rl thing a s a lea rning opportunity I couldn’t see Ka rl coming up with the drums Pa ul pla yed on “Icela nd”
Recorded in the Hitchin Fusion Hours this intermittently features a Marc Riley lead vocal
The imperial Fall play Auckland NZ’s Mainstreet Cabaret on August 21,1982
The Fall’s Hexen 1981–82, on record
ROOM TO LIVE (KAMERA, 1982)
SAUL GA LPER N: Chris wa s a n old hippy, he ha ted punk He ha ted The Cla sh a nd I think Ma rk liked him beca use of these rea sons. Chris proba bly didn’t listen to it, just put it out. He wa s a kindred spirit. I remember there being a n issue with the ma stering beca use it wa s a n hour long
LIE DREAM OF A CASINO SOUL (KAMERA SINGLE, 1981)
“Regal Cinema Hitchin ¾,Hljorite, Reykjavik,Iceland ¼”
SAUL GA LPER N: I went down to Hitchin with Chris once. There wa s no wa y you could go a nd sit with The Fa ll a nd listen to tra cks “Tha t’s a single!” or “Ca n we cha nge the drum sound?” There wa s none of tha t going on Visits down there would ha ve been more, “Here’s some money.”
FALL IN A HOLE (FLYING NUN, 1983)
“Winter” sta nds out: Ma rk ha d this bonkers idea tha t he would wipe the ba ss a nd drums a nd then ha ve them pla y a long with the tra ck There’s no click tra ck, so we got lost ha lf wa y through Which is grea t beca use conventions of time don’t work in the lyrics of the song
PAU L H A N LEY: We were down on the sta ge a nd he wa s up in the gods, which is how he sa w the rela tionship a ny wa y. It wa s a s good a s it ever got with the ba nd There wa s ver y little jigger y poker y Things didn’t go beyond third or fourth ta ke; it wa s a lwa ys, pretty much, pla yed a s a ba nd.
“Nick Cave pulled out all the stops. So we rolled our sleeves up...”
RICHARD MAZDA: If you went over 40 minutes you ra n the risk tha t you’d ha ve a record tha t wa s unma stera ble a nd unrelea sa ble Ma rk a sked me a few times, “Richa rd, ha ve you got this figured out?” I suggested we went to Telefunken [studio] in Ha mburg Deutsche Gra mmophon ha d experience of relea sing hour long cla ssica l records. We found a guy I f lew over to Ha mburg with the stereo ta pes wra pped in foil a nd a ll the things you used to ha ve to do. We get to the ma stering studio, the typica l
MES takes aim at the northern soul scene.
MARC RILEY: You felt like nothing could go wrong, a nd in rea lity it pretty much couldn’t. Even if Ka rl or Pa ul lost their wa y there wa s still one brillia nt drummer driving us But when they were locked in, which wa s nea rly a lwa ys, it wa s thrilling I think we could hold our own a ga inst a ny ba nd on those nights. I remember we pla yed the Ha mmersmith Pa la is with The Birthda y Pa rty Nick [Cave] a nd the ba nd pulled out a ll the stops so we rolled our sleeves up a nd I reckon ca me out victorious.
A PART OF AMERICA THEREIN (COTTAGE/ ROUGH TRADE, 1982) The USA experiences parts of Hex in June July 1981
Spite does n ot en ter in to this
when Cra ig a nd Steve joined the ba nd We ha d a ba nd ca lled The Sirens which wa s a na ive sta b a t Buzzcocks type ma teria l… a nd before tha t Cra ig a nd I formed a prog rock ba nd I don’t think we ever ha d a na me or more tha n one or two songs We could ba rely pla y our instruments, so prog wa sn’t to be our future. But tha t wa s when we’d first sa t down a nd wrote music together
M A RC R ILEY: Sometimes Cra ig a nd I would go to the Foresters [Arms, Smith’s local pub in Prest wich] a nd then go ba ck to Ma rk’s house a nd write songs with him in his loft in the ea rly hours of the morning He ha d a little pla stic Bea tles guita r a nd a n a coustic a nd we’d knock idea s a round.
Featuring guest artists Arthur Kadmon (guitar) and Adrian Niman (sax).MES fucks with the formula with sporadically brilliant results.
HEX ENDUCTION HOUR (KAMERA, 1982)
T HE FA L L OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 65
PAUL H A NLEY: One of the rea sons Hex is successful is tha t it ba la nced stuff we knew with stuff we didn’t know a t a ll: “Ja wbone…” we’d been pla ying for two yea rs, a nd then “And This Da y” no one’s ever going to rehea rse “And This Da y” I don’t think I rea lised how coherent it wa s. There’s stuff written on the sleeve it’s a n hour long, he mentions the “Hypnotic Induction Process”, which is “HIP” Then there’s Hex Enduction, “Hexen” the whole thing a bout time slips I didn’t rea lise how clever it wa s I knew it wa s good. I think Ma rk put a lot of thought into it.
On the flip,The Fall’s two drummer lineup is captured in the studio for the first time.
GR A NT SHOWBIZ: I’ve gone to a lot of improvisa tiona l gigs, Derek Ba iley a nd so on. It’s not a n ea sy skill, a nd it’s something Cra ig a nd Ma rc did rea lly well there wa s a sort of unknowing bond musica lly between them They knew ea ch other a s pa ls, but they could ima gine where things were going a nd they were trying to support ea ch other. Everyone wa s working with everyone else in The Fa ll R ICH A R D M A ZDA [producer, Hex Enduction Hour]: Ma rk wa s interested in sounding bigger. God knows wha t I sa id to him, but I clea rly convinced him I could do tha t The drummer, Ka rl Burns, wa s the most stra ightforwa rdly a ccomplished musicia n. I wa s brought on so they ha d someone who could dea l with this ra ucous double drummer a tta ck I produced a single with them before Hex Enduction Hour ca lled “Lie Drea m Of A Ca sino Soul”/“Fa nta stic Life”. “Fa nta stic Life” is a n exa mple of this juggerna ut of sound which Ma rk a nd I wa nted to crea te.
M A RC R ILEY: We knew we’d made a great record. We knew there was no other band on Earth like us at that point
A
MER E six months after Hex , a new Fall record is released. Rather than a follow up, the scattershot Room To Live seems to be a covert effort to undermine the continuity of The Fall’s lineup. On tour in Australia and New Zealand, the band hi t peak performance but the triumph proves short lived…
PAUL H A NLEY: I think Room… was Mark’s reaction to Hex…. He didn’t want to be the darling of NME he mistrusted that whole thing There had been Echo & The Bunnymen and Siouxsie & The Banshees reviews that mentioned Hex… as in “the best record since…”. He didn’t want to be a touchstone Room To Live was the opposite it was short where Hex was long It was not thought out He’d have this idea of having Karl
M A RC R ILEY: There are some good songs on Room To Live but it was, in essence, the start of Mark trying to split the band up. Particularly me, Craig and Steve. I had long since been a thorn in Mark’s side for not putting up with his contempt for us all. He was straddling the “all musicians are scum” philosophy for one thing… but after Hex he recognised that not only were the “four Jesuits” how Mark used to refer to us three and Paul inseparable, but we were also capable of making what many now regard to be The Fall’s masterpiece He needed to redress the balance That’s why the divide and conquer element crept in PAUL H A NLEY: It was a horrible atmosphere, especially after Hex… where it was an example of what the six of us could do together, he seemed to
D The Fallarrive at Christchurch Airport , NZ, August 17 1982 T HE FA L L 66 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
POOR PROCESS
PAUL H A NLEY: I thought The Fall were great on that tour There was quite a lot of tension, people falling out with each other. We were in a club dancing to “Rock The Casbah”, and Mark came along and slapped us It was a bit strange He didn’t punch me It was a little slap, like, “What’s he doing here? Is he having a joke?” By the time he got to Marc Riley, Marc was seriously pissed off and bashed him, basically.
S T U F F L M I T E
PAUL
be saying, “I’m not interested in what you can do any more ”
Fi t and working again:a post fracas Smith and Riley on Aussie TV show Sounds 1982
STEVE H A NLEY: Me and Marc Riley, Paul and Craig three schoolmates and my brother, we were a faction, and Kay the manager was Mark’s girlfriend. Karl broke that barrier down, not always in a good way He was a double agent: he’d tell us what we wanted to hear, then go and tell Mark what he wanted to hear
“Mark seemed to be saying, ‘I’m not interested inwhat you cando’” HANLEY
STEVE H A NLEY: That was coming to the end of Marc Riley’s time in the band; there were tensions, things weren’t great Mark was playing really silly games, like, “We’re going in the studio tomorrow.” He’d not tell Marc, I’d turn up and there’d be another guy playing guitar there.
CR A IG SCA N LON: Back at the hotel, Marc said, “Well that’s me done, they’ll be sending me home next f light.” As it turned out it was an even worst punishment: appearing with a bruised and heavily made up Mark on an Aussie talk show
German guys, these engineers, “Tonemeisters” they used to be called in those days. They said, “You like it loud?” The first words out of the speakers were “Who makes the Nazis?” You didn’t have moments like that in mastering sessions!
CR A IG SCA N LON: Nowadays Mark and Kay would be a Human Resources nightmare We had a few gigs of Kay screaming, “Turn down, Marc!” and other shit. But going to Australia for the first time was great for me It was a great adventure even when Mark was being a dick.
play guitar, and getting other musicians in to play guitar. It’s all very well getting people in to play the clarinet but you don’t get people in to play the guitar when you’re a band with two guitarists. It’s deliberately provocative
What did you think of him? Mark never really changed, actually He was always quite challenging, quite acerbic and sarcastic, but he was always OK with me because he knew I went to loads of gigs He’d tease his band members He’d have quite lengthy conversations in letters, in fact, that he sent to Tony Friel [Fall bassist, 1 9 7 7 7 8 ] where he’d say, “I’m going to see the Sex Pistols”, then describe what they were like and say, “Have you heard of them?” Always challenging them and trying to get some kind of reaction from them They were quite a bunch:they were all quite difficult Martin Bramah was quite difficult, but with
That early gig looks eventful That first gig, the opening shot of the book, they lasted about three numbers i t was a youth club, and the guy running the place came over and said, “You’re too loud and it’s not really the kind of music I thought i t was going to be.”
“It always felt something might happen…”
NCUT:When did you become aware of Mark E Smith? CUMMINS:You used to see a nucleus of about 30 people who went to every gig in Manchester.He was one there was always chat and rumours about people forming bands.The big problem was finding drummers.I have a picture of thei r second or third gig.
Mark as your frontman you always feel you ’ ve got to prove yourself
He then shut the night down, so the band went a mile down the road and finished the gig off at The Ranch
Pre Enduction:Martin Bramah (left) and M ES performing with The Fall at The Ranch,Manchester, August 1977
What set the band apart? We thought The Fall were very literary.We felt that Manchester bands were more like that and the London bands more poseur y. I talked to Paul Weller about this and he said when The Jam came up in 1977, the audience stood there as i f to say, “Show us what you ’ ve got, then.” Whereas people were supportive of local bands With Mark, i t always felt something might happen with The Fall
PAUL H A NLEY: By and large, we were really good. We had this thing “Cash And Carry” and when we did it on the Peel session we went into “Do The Hucklebuck” Then in Australia we did “Black Night” We just play the riff over and over again. We couldn’t do cover versions!
HE aftermath of the Australian tour. In early January 1983, Mark E Smith sacks Marc Riley and confusion reigns in The Fall not for the last time. Forty years after the event, the dust has settled on Hex Enduction Hour but mixed feelings endure…
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M A RC R ILEY: There is a belief that Mark intended for Hex to be the last ever Fall LP, but even if he did consider that possibility he must have quickly realised that he not only had a really great band behind him he also had a cash cow If he had have split the band and tried his hand at maybe writing a novel or making a solo record he would most likely have fallen f lat on his face The Fall proved to be the one vehicle that could harness his genius. So Plan B was to get rid of the member who probably railed most against his various liberties. Divide and conquer The fact that I decked him when he’d assaulted every band member on the first night of the Australian tour probably didn’t help my cause too much either.
Kevin Cummins,photographer of The Fall,1977–2014
Telling Stories: Photographs Of The Fall is published by Mitchell Beazely on October
M A RC R ILEY: Mark had a brilliant sense of humour and of course he was five years older than myself and Craig, so we’d laugh a lot and we’d learn a lot Well, I did any way He was like my big brother for the first few years I learnt a lot about life and music from him He’d play us Beef heart and Zappa and The Seeds… and he changed my attitude towards many things. You have to remember I was 16 years old when I joined The Fall He had a big effect on my outlook on life It wasn’t all good, mind By the time I got kicked out I was a decidedly cynical 21 year old man. It took a while to shake that off.
K E V N C U M M I N S
18
Paul Hanley’s book Have A Bleedin Guess and Steve Hanley’s The Big Midweek are published by Route. The Fall 1 9 8 2 box is out on Cherry Red. Thanks to Marc Riley and Craig Scanlon
PAUL H A NLEY: Mark seemed so much older than me. He seemed like a wise old man considering he was only in his twenties Employers are by their nature unreasonable: at the end of the day you do it their way. There’s something in the idea of him not liking things going too well. But you can’t argue, really. The band lasted 40 years.
R ESPECT-INDUCING HYPHEN
Te Afghan Whigs and beyond a grunge soul man’s torrid trail Greg Dulli
a ble to tour Europe a nd pla y Engla nd for the first time.
I would ca ll it not only our brea kthrough to a bigger public, but a lso a brea kthrough for us a s a group; I feel like tha t’s when we beca me The Afgha n Whigs Tha t’s when we put it a ll together a ll of the promise a nd a ll of the gigs a nd inf luences a nd I think my songwriting ca ught up to my a mbitions. [We felt] a fea rlessness to just do wha t we wa nted not be a fra id to pla y slow songs, for exa mple We were sort of guided a little bit by the la bel on Up In It [Sub Pop,1990] a nd I feel we broke through a nd just sta ted our independence within the structure of the la bel with this record I think Congregation wa s where I first sta rted to experiment with cinema tic structure the person’s voice who opens Congregation is the person who gets sung a bout in the next a lbum, Gentlemen I think [the songs’complexit y] ca me from the interpla y of the gigs we got to pla y, on a nightly ba sis A lot of touring ha ppened a fter Up In It; we were
THE AFGHAN WHIGS CONGREGATION
song [“My Curse”] to Ma rcy [Mays] There’s no one like her a nd we’ve been friends since the la te ’80s. Tha t wa s giving the subject a voice, which a lso a llowed me to ca ll in my own responsibility for the demise of the rela tionship And I wa s a ble to look a t the grey in between the two poles.
a ctua lly ca me to a sense of pea ce a bout it a ll. But I still didn’t sing “Be Sweet” So for wha tever rea son, tha t song never got sung a ga in “I Keep Coming Ba ck” is the f lip side to “Turn Ba ck The Ha nds Of Time”, by Tyrone Da vis I listened to it a lmost every night It beca me like a ritua l for me; I beca me rea lly fixa ted on tha t song a nd the simple messa ge tha t it wa s from one person to a nother. I remember introducing it to the group a t the la st minute a nd we a ll swa pped instruments, so everybody is pla ying a different instrument on tha t. It seemed like a good wa y to end it a nd then we turned it into a stra nge instrumenta l a t the end, which ga ve it the cinema tic closing
Recorded in Memphis,the Whigs’ fourth tells of a toxic relationship via intense songs full of swagger,shame and self loathing
Largely recorded live,and featuring broader instrumentation within a defined cinematic structure Live is definitely my preferred wa y to pla y: I love being a ble to look a t the people I’m
The Afghan Whigs in 1994:(l r) Rick McCollum John Curley,Greg Dulli and Steve Earle; (inset) Dulli,2019 I C
U N CUT CLASS
D A V I D T O N G E / G E T T Y M A G E S M A C I E K J A S I K 6 8 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
We wrote it on the roa d ba ck to ba ck records: Congregation ’92, Gentlemen ’93. Tha t’s something tha t rea lly doesn’t ha ppen a ny more We sort of went non stop: there wa s a n EP between Up In It a nd Congregation, so with “Uptown Avonda le” we ha d five relea ses in a row ba ng, ba ng, ba ng, ba ng, ba ng It wa s a very prolific period for the group When I look ba ck on Gentlemen I see someone trying to figure out rela tionships, a nd I think tha t’s why on side two I ga ve the big
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BLACK LOVE
THE AFGHAN WHIGS GENTLEMEN
ELEKTRA 1 9 6
THE AFGHAN WHIGS
“Ladies,let me tell you about myself/I got a dick for a brain” wa s the opening line of “Be Sweet”: clea rly, I rea lised tha t would get bold fa ced, so to spea k So much so tha t I ha ven’t pla yed tha t song since tha t tour. Which is not to sa y tha t I don’t think it’s a good song, beca use I do. I think the a lbum, Gentlemen, just got ha rd to sing for a little while During the Twilight Singers run, I wa s a ble to not pla y those songs a nd then, when we reunited in 2012, I
The Whigs’third,its debt to ’60s soul, funk and R&B carving out a singular alt.rock profile
ELEKTRA 1 9 9 3
R EG Dulli is the driving force of The Afgha n Whigs, whose ea rly debt to Hüsker Dü wa s displa ced by a love of ’60s soul a nd R&B tha t ma rked them out from the grunge pa ck. Ha ving survived both a brea kup a nd lengthy hia tus, a s well a s the dea th of guita rist Da ve Rosser, the Whigs rema in Dulli’s highest profile a nd most successful ba nd, with nine a lbums to their credit (including How Do You Burn?, due in September), but it’s by no mea ns his only project of substa nce During their tussle with Elektra , Dulli formed The Twilight Singers, a cha ngea ble group of simpático pla yers a nd friends. They ra cked up five studio a lbums, none of which pulled their lea der’s focus a wa y from emotiona l turmoil a nd existentia l a ngst There wa s a different working rela tionship, if no less intense songs, in pla y with Dulli/La nega n vehicle The Gutter Twins, who relea sed just one a lbum, but Dulli busted out of type with his surprise solo debut, Random Desire, a n a dventurous set whose libera ting effect seems to ha ve been ca rried forwa rd to the new Whigs record. Through a ll this, Dulli’s prime motiva tion for recording rema ins the sa me: “Will I ha ve a good time? Is this fulfilling? Do I wa nt to ta ke these songs out a nd pla y them for other people? It’s rea lly tha t simple” SHARON O’CONNELL
G
You sta rt to hone your best instincts a nd then you sta rt to trust them And tha t’s when you become specia l. I think the recording budget [$15,000] wa s looked a t a s extra va ga nt. It certa inly wa s extra va ga nt compa red to wha t we got before tha t! But I felt like we ha d ea rned our pla ce a nd were worth the investment. And clea rly, the investment pa id off
ONE L TTLE INDIAN 2 0 0 6 The Twilight Singers’third, recorded in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina I wa s in Ita ly when Ka trina ha ppened, but I ha d been in New Orlea ns a bout three or four weeks
The Twilight Singers in 2006: (l r) Scott Ford, Dulli,Dave Rosser, Bobby MacIntyre
THE TWILIGHT SINGERS POWDER BURNS
Fraught second from The Twilight Singers, marked by existential darkness following the death of Dulli’s friend Ted Demme
record so much; on the other, the crea tion of it wa s fra ught with a lot of sorrow a nd confusion, but I guess tha t’s ultima tely wha t tra nsforma tion is At first, it wa s going to be a bit more of a n exulta nt record ca lled ‘Amber Hea dlights’, tha t I la ter put out, but when Ted pa ssed a nd he died very suddenly it cha nged I just could not get with tha t mood a nd I sta rted a ll over I hung on to a couple of things: “Follow You Down” I think I ha d in a nother form a lrea dy. Tha t’s just a fter my friendship with Ma rk La nega n ha d rea lly begun a nd I wrote the song “Number Nine” for him to sing, where I would counter him. There wa s a period where I did not work on a nything beca use I wa s incredibly sa d a nd then a s time went on I sta rted to work on wha t beca me Blackberr y Belle
S A M H O L D E N OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 6 9
pla ying with a nd connect on severa l levels And we were a grea t live ba nd, so I wa nted to ha rness tha t energy Whenever it’s possible for a ny group to record live, tha t is my preference. Once I ha d the bookends [“Crime Scene Part 1” and “Faded”] a nd sta rted to build out the story within, I beca me committed to tha t wa y of telling it It’s rea lly the only time I’ve ever done it tha t conclusively. I enjoyed building a n a rc tha t wa s very persona l to me a nd it wa s cool to work in a script like fa shion I never did it a ga in: Congregation, Gentlemen a nd Black Love a re the trilogy in tha t rega rd, a nd Black Love is the big conclusion to tha t period of my life. “Bla me, Etc” is rea lly my a ttempt a t writing a Norma n Whitfield style Tempta tions song Tha t’s where I wa s coming from with tha t, with the wa h wa h a nd the strings I remember trying to get inside the Da vid Ruffin hea d, a little bit. Black Love is not a utobiogra phica l. Certa inly, there a re pa rts of me in there, but it’s definitely cha ra cter ba sed, a nd I’ve a lwa ys been fa scina ted by The Tempta tions’ story, in pa rticula r Da vid Ruffin’s. He seemed like a guy who ha d it a ll a nd just destroyed it. We performed Black Love in its entirety, twice, to benefit our guita r pla yer Da ve Rosser, who wa s suffering from colon ca ncer.
THE TWILIGHT SINGERS BLACKBERRY BELLE
ONE LITTLE INDIAN, 2 0 0 3
“Gentlemen just got hard to sing for a little while ” GREG DULLI
It might be my fa vourite record It’s proba bly from the da rkest pa rt of my life but there’s not one song I’d ta ke off it I think ma ybe it’s the most perfect thing I’ve ever been a pa rt of, a s fa r a s a recording process For something tha t sta rted so da rk, it ended up being very redemptive for me a nd helped me move into a more positive pa rt of my life [Demme’s death] wa s a ma jor loss for me a nd people tha t I wa s close to None of us were ta king pa rticula rly good ca re of ourselves a t tha t time. On one ha nd I love the
previously, when Hurrica ne Cindy ca me through it wa s sort of the precursor to Ka trina I wrote ma ny of the songs in New Orlea ns during the curfew While I’m not singing a bout a hurrica ne or a nything like tha t, it wa s impossible not to feel the weight of the experience while it wa s ha ppening The closer, “I Wish I Wa s”, wa s proba bly the closest to a Ka trina song tha t I ha ve very much inf luenced by the event tha t preceded it. I ha d never been under a ny kind of curfew a lmost a ma rtia l la w kind of environment before Ba rs were open in a nother pa rish a nd we would snea k out a nd drive a ca r with the lights out, to a void the Na tiona l Gua rd. It wa s wild. You couldn’t lea ve your house before 6a m, but I would ta ke my bike out a t 5a m a nd ride to the French Qua rter it wa s empty, like The Twilight Zone And the thing tha t I’ll sa y a bout the Powder Burns experience wa s the sense of community tha t I felt, people rea lly getting together to help ea ch other out It wa s one of the most unique experiences of my life I wa s working with [ producer] Mike Na polita no a nd sta ying in a n a pa rtment on his f loor, while he wa s beginning his rela tionship with the woma n who would become his wife Tha t wa s Ani DiFra nco, who sings on two of the songs on Powder Burns.
The Whigs’second post reunion LP finds them back in the game,but facing inevitable tragic change In Spades ha ppened so na tura lly. The ba nd tha t sta rted the Do To The Beast tour wa s not the
The Afghan Whigs,2022:
The Gutter Twins’debut (and only) long player fun to write,despite its dark and despairing mood Ma rk [Lanegan] a nd I sta rted working together a round 2001; we’d sit a round a nd pla y blues songs a nd just ha ng out. We’d listen to them on the turnta ble a nd sometimes we’d pla y a long or come up with our own a rra ngements Once we sta rted [Saturnalia] we worked on tha t thing for five yea rs, beca use we were both doing different things. It’s very hea v y. I na med the record, he na med the ba nd: it sounds da rk but the writing of the record wa s so hila rious We both loved the movie Ishtar, a nd tha t rea lly informed our beha viour a round it. Ma rk wa s one of the funniest people tha t I ever knew His public persona wa s so mislea ding to the person he rea lly wa s, it’s a lmost hila rious The whole Clint Ea stwood, squinted eyes, ma n with no na me vibe tha t he would give off I mea n, just a fucking goof ba ll.
ROYAL CREAM/BMG, 2 0 0
THE AFGHAN WHIGS HOW DO YOU BURN?
Voca l notwithsta nding, “Line Of Shots” is built on a ma sh of Buzzcocks a nd The Smiths I rea lly wa nt to underline the importa nce of Va n Hunt to the record He sings on the songs “Jyja ” a nd “Ta ke Me There” a nd a bsolutely tra nsformed them with his idea s a nd his voice a nd his ta lent they’re a bsolutely thrilling He’s kind of the secret wea pon of the record
2 0 0 8
THE AFGHAN WHIGS IN SPADES
GREG DULLI RANDOM DESIRE
ba sis of the song a bea tbox a nd a horn section pla yed on a Mellotron a nd then I bega n to spin the ta le. I rea lly liked [the album] a nd wa s so excited to ta ke it out on tour a nd then the world shut down
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a nd wa s going to be una ble to do tha t tour So this is his la st record With some records you either crea te the ca tha rsis for yourself or you a re in a pla ce where you’re on the precipice of something tha t you don’t know is going to ha ppen, but it becomes monumenta l We rea lised tha t we were completing a cha pter in one of our brother’s lives in tha t moment, so I think from ha ving the idea to get tha t hot ba nd into the studio two weeks a fter the tour to ha ving to tour the record without one of its crea tors wa s dra ma tic
H is public persona was so misleading”: with Mark Lanegan in The Gutter Twins
Everybody in my ba nd ha d something going on: Pa trick wa s pla ying with Ra conteurs, John Curley went ba ck to college, Jon Skibic wa s ha ving a nother ba by a nd Rick Nelson wa s building a studio in New Orlea ns, so there wa s definitely going to be a yea r of ina ctivity. I just sta rted working on some songs, not knowing wha t I wa s going to do with them. And I’m like, ma n, I wa nt to ma ke my own a lbums There’s nobody in my wa y a nd I get to try out things I’ve not done before. I could pla y a ll the instruments if I wa nted to, or I could sa y, “Hey, Jon Theodore, will you pla y drums on my song?” I did most of the pla ying a nd a lot of the drumming I wa s doing songs tha t did not remind me of Whigs songs or even Twilight songs. The first song, “Pa ntomima ” I’ve never rea lly done a nything like tha t The fa ct tha t I sta rted writing a song with two ba sslines I’ve never done tha t in my life “Lockless” is a nother song tha t I ha d never done a nything like; I sort of bea tboxed it. Tha t’s the
Creative liberation via a solo debut, partly recorded at Christopher Thorne’s studio in Joshua Tree
I think my fa vourite moment on the record in terms of when we ma de it, wa s when I litera lly wrote the song “Front Street” right in front of Ma rk a nd he sa t there a nd wa tched. And I wa s wa tching him look down a nd write stuff, too And then I’m done a nd he wa s like, “Ma n, tha t’s fa nta stic I wrote a couple of extra verses if you wa nt to use them.” And I looked a t them a nd it wa s like, oh my God, they’re the la st two verses of the song. I loved the music we ma de together a nd I’m so proud of the record I knew we were ma king something cool a nd we did.
ba nd tha t finished it, a nd the ba nd tha t finished it wa s pla ying so perfectly together ma ybe my fa vourite ba nd wa s with [ guitarists] Da ve Rosser a nd Jon Skibic They ha d both been in different pha ses of The Twilight Singers: they took turns until I ha d them both a t the sa me time, which is this record, a nd it’s the first a lbum tha t Pa trick Keeler is the drummer on We were in Ba rcelona a nd I wa s like, “Hey, ma n, we’re pla ying rea lly well together. Let’s jump in the studio rea lly soon.” We went into the studio two weeks a fter tha t tour a nd five of the songs tha t a re on the record ha ppened in a week Then it took a nother yea r for the other five Right towa rds the end of the recording wa s when Da ve Rosser got dia gnosed with ca ncer
SUB POP
SUB POP 2 1 7
(l r) Patrick Keeler, Christopher Thorn Dulli Rick G Nelson,John Curley
ROYAL CREAM/BMG 2 0 2 2 An unavoidable mix of ensemble and remote playing,the Whigs’first in five years taps classic/heavy rock When we were doing Powder Burns, there wa s a song ca lled “Ca ndy Ca ne Cra wl”; it wa s just me on Wurlitzer a nd we ha d Wiz [Greg Wieczorek] do the drums in New York, then I sent it to [W higs bassist] John Curley in Cincinna ti a nd he sent it ba ck Tha t wa s the first time we ha d recorded together in eight yea rs So, I a lrea dy ha d experience with the need to ha ve someone pla y the pa rt from a nother loca tion, ba sed on a nother a ct of God, so to spea k. So we ha d to a da pt a nd overcome the difficulties I freely a dmit my love of cla ssic rock a nd cla ssic meta l they’re elements of things I use to build [my songs] a ll the time. The first song is “I’ll Ma ke You See God” a nd somebody sa id it sounds like Queens Of The Stone Age, but I ca n tell you tha t [Deep Purple’s] “Highwa y Sta r” wa s my North Sta r, even down to the very Ritchie Bla ckmore like solos.
THE GUTTER TWINS SATURNALIA
How Do You Burn? is out via Royal Cream/BMG on September 9
“We’re not a casualone off : (l r) Bonny Light Horseman s Josh Kaufman Anaïs Mitchelland Eric D Johnson BONN Y L IGH T HOR SEM A N 72 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
Concludes Eric D Johnson: “We’re not a casual one off or a f leeting ’80s side project That term reminds me of something that would have a member of Yes in it ”
As BONNY LIGHT HORSEMAN, the trio of Anaïs Mitchell , Josh Kaufman and Eric D Johnson have reframed trad folk ballads for the present, earning a Grammy nomination and the patronage of Bon Iver and Te National’s Aaron Dessner along the way. Uncut meets them in Kansas to discuss dulcimers, the unifying power of the GratefulDead and the joy of late night jams. “Te energy was off the charts,” they tellErin Osmon. Photo by D JA M ES GOODW I N
However, it’s easy to understand why the term has stuck Each member joined the group as a proven artist with an established fanbase and celebrated body of work. Mitchell has released eight solo albums and won Tony awards for her musical Hadestown, Kaufman is an in demand multi instrumentalist and producer whose credits include Bob Weir, The National, Josh Ritter, The Hold Steady and Taylor Swift, while Johnson has been making indie rock under the Fruit Bats moniker for more than two decades It almost doesn’t make sense for the trio to form a humble folk act except that each artist is clearly not content to inhabit the same role over and over. Kaufman explains that he’s been craving the familial energy that comes with a band; Johnson began as a teacher at the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago; Mitchell has long wanted to be a part of something beyond her own silo. “I ran into someone recently who asked, ‘Aren’t you in that band Bonny Light Horseman?’” she recalls “I felt so
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STABLES SINGERS
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IK E every where else, Kansas City is in the grip of near unprecedented heatwave. From a shaded patio table adjacent to the swimming pool at the city’s Intercontinental hotel, the three principal members of Bonny Light Horseman who are here on tour, opening for Bon Iver, the band led by their friend and 37d03d label boss Justin Vernon are sheltering from the oppressive heat, water and coffee in hands, explaining why they’re not a supergroup. “A supergroup is about vaunting identities, and what we’re doing is about shedding identities,” contends Anaïs Mitchell “It’s not so much a Mount Rushmore of folk icons,” adds Josh Kaufman “It’s much more of a collective, making something together.”
Mitchellin 2019 with a Tony award for her musical Hadestown
Tonight, their lineup is rounded out with Michael Libramento on bass and JT Bates on drums. “They make me feel like apart of the band, live and in the studio,” says Bates, who first met Mitchell in 2012 and later toured with Kaufman in Hiss Golden Messenger He’s become an all but full member of Bonny Light Horseman, with the trio welcoming his creative input and
HE night before, a t the historic Starlight Theatre in Kansas City’s Swope Park, the sky is heav y with the threa t of a thunderstorm Swarms of pink and grey laced clouds frame the stage as the amphitheatre’s giant fans move the park’s notoriously humid, shiftless air Kaufman, Johnson and Mitchell stand in ahalf circle, their voices ringing angelically through the gorgeously ominous weather. “I thought we would play three songs and then the rain would come and they’d pull us,” Kaufman says “It was unexpected and really nice tha t we got through the whole setlist.”
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A N N E B E E D Y J E M A L C O U N T E S S / G E T T Y I M A G E S F O R T O N Y A W A R D S P R O D U C T O N S 74 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
The kinship doesn’t end a t the table. A few feet away, Mitchell’s two yea r old daughter Rosetta splashes in the kiddie pool with her babysitter The singer asks for cover as the group relocates to adifferent table to escape the sound of anearby industria l mower. “This will be all over if she sees
Their ravishing self titled debut album from 2020 reframed trad folk ballads for the present day, making fresh currency of Napoleonic Wa r era laments, Appalachian spirituals and Irish ballads They were rewarded for their efforts with a Grammy nomination for Best Folk Album. On Rolling Golden Holy, the band’s second album, and first composed of all origina l songs, they double down on the group dynamic. “There were moments where we went into Voltron mode, each using our superpower,” says Johnson “But it’s not like Anaïs wrote all the lyrics and I wrote all the melodies and Josh played all the instruments.”
Sitting with the trio in the sweltering heat, there is the sense tha t these people genuinely love each other. They have ahabit of commending and amplif ying one another’s insights.
“ Musicians… having a conversation together in a room ” : Kaufman, M itchell and Johnson at Isokon studio in Woodstock
me,” Mitchell says “We’re really close and bringing her on tour was the only way I could do it ” Kaufman, too, is aparent, and says tha t leaving his three children a t home is the hardest part of his work. When Bonny Light Horseman first formed, the trio swore to themselves tha t they weren’t going to road dog it “We said 15 shows ayear,” Mitchell explains “But then Bon Iver offered amonth of shows in beautiful outdoor venues and we couldn’t say no ” This leisurely break a t afour sta r hotel is afirst; anovel breath in the schedule “There’s been alot of Holiday Inns,” Mitchell says with alaugh.
“WE’RE ALL IN THE SANDBOX FOR THE MOST PART” A N A ÏS MIT CHEL L
ideas “Mutua l respect and listening will go along way to make folks feel heard and comfortable ”
incredibly happy to be identified tha t way.”
“That’s agrea t point,” may be the most common phrase uttered throughout this interview They don’t interrupt one another and frequently check in to make sure everyone’s OK “Do you have enough shade?” “Does anyone need water?” There’s afeeling of tota l unselfconsciousness tha t generally comes with ahealthy family. The band is just four years old, but it’s clea r they’ve found their people
“We’re all in the sandbox for the most part,” Mitchell confirms “There are moments where we use our individua l strengths There are also moments where I feel encouraged to do things tha t I’m not known for or even really tha t good at, which is exciting. I’m learning in this band.”
Hoping to bea t the storm, the band play the songs alittle faster than usual. Kaufman and Johnson keep between song banter to aminimum, leaving Mitchell to warm up the crowd “I have akid a t home who’s really into Rodgers and Hammerstein, and since we pulled into Kansa s City I can’t stop humming the song from Oklahoma, ” she says before breaking out into asped up rendition “She wrote Hadestown, so tha t makes sense,” anearby audience member explains to afriend a s she Googles the rest of the band “Oh, tha t guy’s in Fruit Bats ” It’s a common refrain Mitchell says concertgoers often recognise the members from their other projects, even if they’re unfamilia r with Bonny Light Horseman Conversely, fans of her award winning musica l attend BLH gigs holding its signature red f lower, or they show up in costume. “They’ll yell out Hadestown lines,” Kaufman says. Tonight, it’s clea r tha t many of the Starlight Theatre’s nearly 8,000 seats are occupied by Bon Iver fans, there to soak in Justin Vernon’s electronic rock symphony. Bon Iver’s saxophonist Mike Lewis, who contributes to Rolling Golden Holy, also brief ly joins the Horseman on stage “They’re family,” he says simply. “Somewhere along the line, I figured out how much more important it was to find and protect tha t space than one of persona l achievement or popularity In tha t way, it was almost unremarkable how quickly we were all able to find asafe vulnerability with each other and in my experience tha t correlates directly to how deep you can go, no matter the endeavour ” Another commonality between Bon Iver and Bonny Light Horseman? “I asked JT before this tour wha t aBon Iver audience is like,” Kaufman reveals “He thought about it for aminute and then said, ‘They like to watch people singing together.’ At tha t moment, I knew we were good.
Frui t Bats’ ninth album, the crown jewel in the catalogue, adds a bright twist of smooth sailing adult oriented rock to Johnson’s signature blend of folk and indie pop.Jams ahoy.
A few weeks la ter, when Ka ufma n wa s in LA a nd a bout to ha ve lunch with Johnson, Mitchell ca lled “She sa id, ‘Do you know this guy in Fruit Ba ts?’ a nd I wa s like, ‘I’m a bout to go see him!’” They quickly decided to bring Johnson into the folk ba nd fold Then Justin Vernon a nd Aa ron Dessner extended a n invita tion to perform a t their music festiva l Ea ux Cla ires, held in Vernon’s home sta te of Wisconsin. “They were very supportive of the idea of working on these old songs a nd kind of ma king them run,” sa ys Ka ufma n Tha t led to the three core members, a long with Lewis, Ba tes a nd ma ny others, f lying to Berlin for a week long, Dessner cura ted residency a t the city’s Funkha us, a Soviet era concert ha ll with severa l recording studios There, they la id the founda tion for Bonny Light Horsema n’s self titled debut, which reupholstered tra ditiona l folk songs with upda ted lyrics a nd a rra ngements “There were 100 other musicia ns a nd a rtists a round us a ll the time, coming in a nd pla ying things,” Ka ufma n ma rvels “The energy wa s off the cha rts.”
[RIGHTEOUS BAB E , 2 0 1 0 ] Mitchell’s soulful solo album, featuring Justin Vernon, Ani DiFranco and more, kick started her journey from folk singer to Broadway musical luminary
BOB WE IR BLU E MOU NTAI N
DE
[M E RGE , 2 0 1 9 ]
A N A Ï S M I T C H E L L
[B MG, 2 0 2 2 ]
W
ON PHENOMENAL NATU RE
Tha t’s kind of our whole dea l.” The crowd a gree, erupting in a ppla use a t the end of the ba nd’s 40 minute set, just before the clouds burst
After the initia l session a t Long Pond, they hea ded a cross the Hudson River with Ba tes a nd Lewis to Drea mla nd, which they describe a s their “spiritua l home.” Founded in 1986, a nd re opened in 2005 by the musicia n Jerry Ma rotta , it’s housed in a former rura l church, sma ll a nd cosy, complete with sta ined gla ss windows. It’s ea sy to sense the room’s high vibra tiona l energy; the spirit coursing through its wa lls. “I love tha t it’s old a nd weird,” Mitchell expla ins “Sometimes in a fa ncy studio I’ll sta rt to get a nxious, like the clock is running or I better not spill something ”
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TH E RU M INANT
ANAÏS M ITCH E LL
FRUIT BATS
T
SI SA DDLED
Rolling Golden Holy is the first a lbum where the three members wrote a ll the songs from the ground up Ea ch ha d recently left their longtime home to sta rt a new life elsewhere a nd themes of cha nge, physica l a nd spiritua l geogra phy a nd the f leeting na ture of perma nence a ll presented themselves in implicit a nd explicit wa ys “Goodbye to California/Seems like we hardly knew ya/Seems good a time as any/To believe in the land of plent y” , Johnson sings on the a lbum’s lea d single, na med for the Golden Sta te. Amid the pa ndemic, he a nd his wife left Los Angeles a nd spend a bout 18 months in Minnea polis, before deciding to return. “It’s funny beca use tha t song ca me out the da y we signed our new lea se ba ck in LA,” he sa ys. “I wa s D Y; D A V D A S M T H G E T T Y I M A G E S D; J A M E S G O O D W I N
OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 7 5
“Josh, Ana ïs a nd Eric a re a huge pa rt of the community of musicia ns tha t’s sort of developed a round a lot of the projects [I’m involved with],” sa ys Dessner “They generously sha re their ta lents, so it feels very much like our version of ma ybe Dyla n a nd The Ba nd living in Woodstock in the la te ’60s If I get stuck ma king a song, which I often do, I ca ll Josh or Ana ïs a nd they help me finish it. And I’m a lwa ys up for pla ying on a nything they’re working on.”
The Grateful Dead veteran’s third solo album, inspired by his time on a ranch in Wyoming, has Kaufman’s fingerprints all over its compositions, lyrics and instruments.
O cra ft their newest a lbum, Mitchell, Ka ufma n a nd Johnson first convened a t Dessner’s studio, Long Pond, in Upsta te New York “Ha ving a time a nd a pla ce to work, a nd tha t level of support for the fa ct tha t we’re lea ving our fa milies behind, is rea lly specia l,” sa ys Ka ufma n. “It’s grea t to know we’re not working in a va cuum.”
Kaufman features heavily on Jenkins’ revelatory, critically acclaimed second album, playing a multitude of instruments as well as producing and engineering i t
JOSH K AU F M A N
[COLU M BIA/LEGACY, 2 0 1 6 ]
Eight albums in, Mitchell released a self titled work that mines her past for remarkable, entirely graceful and poetic meditations on youth, memory, ageing and love.
A buyer’s guide to the extracurricular endeavours of Bonny Light Horseman’s trio ER IC D JOH N SON
J E N KI NS
[BA DA BI NG! , 2 0 2 1 ]
CASSAN DRA
BAN D [SU P POP, 2 0 0 9 ] Johnson takes the listener on an inventive stroll through his historical influences, ranging from Laurel Canyon to black gospel belters and country fried Southern rock
HADESTOWN
OR K ING within a va st, loose network of the likeminded, a nd rema ining open to the possibilities tha t come with colla bora tion, is key to Bonny Light Horsema n’s origin story a nd subsequent success. Johnson a nd Ka ufma n ca me together through drummer Bria n Ka ntor, who’s pla yed with Fruit Ba ts, a nd who Ka ufma n grew up with in New York. Mitchell wa s long a wa re of Ka ufma n’s work, a nd officia lly met him through a recording session for Ka te Sta bles of This Is The Kit Almost immedia tely, they bega n ta lking a bout pla ying folk music together Her introduction to Johnson a rrived la ter, via digita l serendipity. “I tweeted a t him a nd he tweeted ba ck, which I didn’t expect,” Mitchell sa ys “I wa s getting on sta ge in Colora do a nd ‘Humbug Mounta in Song’ wa s on the PA a nd I wa s like ‘Wha t is this?’ a nd someone sa id, ‘Fruit Ba ts.’ I knew I ha d to rea ch out.”
A N N E B E E
FRUIT BATS
GOLD PAST LI FE
AN OVE RVI EW
GRATE FU L DEAD
TUSK [WARNER BROS, 1979]
TH E STAPLES
The intimacy of the sessions at Dreamland also fostered a spirit of family, a communal energy that lies at the foundation of the folk music tradition. “The first day we were all tracking together in the live room, we ended up with our headphones off and just kept moving closer to each other while playing quieter and quieter,” Lewis recalls. “It’s not often that you’re able to play music that quietly any more, in any context to find the dynamic range that lets you really hear each other and truly become one organism ” This oneness also aided trust and an aleatoric willingness. “The
Rolling with such change was also liberating, fostering a spirit of experimentation when it came to arranging the songs. Dreamland is filled with instruments and the trio were like kids in a candy store when it came to trying them out Johnson had brought a small dulcimer to their writing sessions, which then inspired them to purchase a full size one. “It’s a really great springboard into melodic ideas,” he says “I was scared to play it,” adds Mitchell, “because I never had before, but these two were like, ‘You can do it!’” This kind of encouragement permeates much of the group dynamic, all the way through to deciding who’s going to sing lead. “We often try to make each other take it,” Johnson says. “Or we try it different ways with each one of us taking a verse Josh sings lead on this album, too ”
“I love The Staples Singers’ ability to bring the listener to thei r church and, again, it’s multiple lead singers working together to make something as a group I grew up Quaker, so I may have seen some people testifying, but when you see me raise my hands on stage I guess that’s more of an involuntary thing or a tic,” Mitchell offers.
S
SI NGE RS
“I would consider myself a pretty serious Deadhead, Johnson explains.“I’m old enough to have seen the Jerry era, like 15 shows toward the end That’s where I heard a lot of traditional music for the first time ” “That’s how I bonded with Bryce, Aaron and Bryan from The National,” Kaufman adds “In the early 2000s i t was not OK to be a Deadhead, because everyone was so ‘cool’ When i t came out that we all loved the Grateful Dead, i t brought us together ”
ACK at the hotel, as morning turns to afternoon and the sun’s blaze intensifies, BLH make plans for their day off Mitchell and her daughter Rosetta are headed to the zoo, not far from where the band played the night before. Kaufman and Johnson plan to stay and swim in the pool, where Kevin Morby, a local, will join the pair
Rolling Golden Holy is released on October 7 via 3 7 d0 3 d Records T T Y M A G E
BOB DYLAN AN D TH E BAN D THE BASEMENT TAPES
like, ‘I gotta tap into method acting for that one.’ But it’s more about leaving any where. It’s more about the geography of the soul ”
FLE ETWOOD MAC
A N N E B E E D Y; M E D I A P U N C H I N C / A L A M Y S T O C K P H O T O G; E
[COLUMBIA 1975]
“I’m a late blooming Deadhead I was exposed as a kid, so I’ve known some of the songs forever,” Mitchell says.“But actually, at the start of the pandemic, I ordered the complete annotated lyrics, and just read them like poems.I fell in love with Robert Hunter and the poetry of the band.”
This interchanging of lead singers lends a conspicuously dynamic and textural quality to the performances, especially the harmonies “Normally when you’re putting a harmony singer against a lead vocal, the harmony singer isn’t singing in their normal voice,” Kaufman observes. “They’re singing in a blend voice, making adjustments to fit the lead But with these two, they sound exactly like they do when they’re singing lead. It’s a really interesting sound that has so much personality and I love that in a band ” The trio points out that there’s an entire legacy of this type of singing, most notably in some of their favourite acts like the Grateful Dead, The Band and Fleetwood Mac “I like to be as much a folk band, a pop band and a Grateful Dead band as possible,” says Johnson “Those three things work really well together at the same time.”
The albums and artists that inspired Rolling Golden Holy
Tomorrow, they’ll head to St Louis, Missouri, where they’ll play another amphitheatre opening for Bon Iver. On their own headlining tour starting in October, they say they’ll likely jam out the songs a bit more, tapping into the energ y they feel while working on stage.
They generously share their talents”: the community minded Horseman
B
Like any great folk music performance, the making of Rolling Golden Holy wasn’t about perfection; it was about capturing spirit and energy. “Their musicianship and the organic way they approach recording, it’s somewhat of a lost art,” says Dessner “Hearing the music they make, the air in it, the soulfulness and warmth and seeing it grow, it gives me hope. Modern music has become so plastic over produced and slammed into oblivion with compression it’s refreshing to hear such inspired music that is made in an older way but feels so relevant today. Musicians playing together, having a conversation in a room ”
Multiple lead singers:the Mac, 1979
song ‘Sweet Bread’ is built on improvisation,” Kaufman says. “It started out as guitar informed, but then, late one night, we started jamming; I was playing bass, Mike was playing saxophone, JT was dancing around like he would at a jazz gig and Eric was playing clawhammer banjo Anaïs was sleeping and I was so excited for her to wake up to do the vocal It was very different from the way the first record was made.”
7 6 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
“I’m never not thinking about Tusk, ” Johnson says “It was such a folk record in many ways ” “I like that there’s multiple lead singers and i t feels like all of them,” Mitchell adds.“That’s it,” Kaufman concludes.“There’s a collective identity and that’s what we ’ re doing.”
“With Dylan and The Band in the Basement Tapes era, there’s a world of character,” Johnson says “There are characters and places that are interrelated, and you can walk from one song to the other With this second record, I wanted to explore that kind of geography in song That’s something I thought about ”
HOLY ROLLER S
“There’s usually a bit of a guitar journey moment,” says Johnson In this setting, their individual strengths within the band unit shine through, three distinctive voices joined for a remarkable moment: Kaufman, a dexterous and lyrical player, using his guitar as a voice; Johnson switching between banjo and acoustic, his reedy singing steadfast; and Mitchell with her trusty Martin, a faithful rhythm player with a soulful, mystical voice. Just don’t call them a supergroup
F
Once Earth Wind & Fire’s Maurice White got Williams into the studio with acrack team of musicians, including arranger Charles Stepney and most of his own band a s rhythm section, “Free” became something else: slower, more languid, almost psychedelic in its crystalline, blissful ambience. Much of tha t pioneering atmosphere wa s created by Jerry Peters’ Rhodes piano, fed through an Echoplex unit and inspired by the electronics enhanced fusion work of Herbie Hancock and Miles Davis
“It wa s just agrea t time,” says guitarist Al McKay. “Just to play music back then! Things have changed quite abit, and LA ha s changed, but tha t wa s the time of peace and love Remember those days? At the time, we were all free ” TOM PINNOCK
DENIECE WILLIAMS:I started to sing in the church when I wa s akid in the children’s choir, then I did some things in high school with the jazz band But being around Stevie wa s just an incredible learning experience for me in developing my musica l talents Three months into me travelling with Stevie, he wa s the opening
studios and be ajingle singer! But instead I got arecording contract.”
Susaye Greene Songwriter
“We were sort of glorifed teenagers,” laughs Susaye Greene, co writer of “Free” and afellow Wonderlove member “Really I mean, we had no responsibility except to get together and play abunch of amazing music, and then go on stage with Stevie Wonder of all people So we were like, ‘Oh, wow!’ all the time ”
“We were working with a genius : Williams in the early 1970s
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M C H A E L O C H S A R C H V E S G E T T Y M A G E S
Free by Deniece Williams
Tha t dea l wa s all down to “Free”, atrack co written by Williams and three other members of Stevie Wonder’s sensationa l backing group, Wonderlove, during rehearsals in 1975 Their leader wasn’t in the room when the song wa s written, but his free fowing creative spirit certainly acted a s aguide.
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Since its release in 1976, as asingle and as part of Williams’ debut album, This Is Niec y, “Free” has had some aferlife, covered by ahost of artists from Marcus Miller and Mariah Carey to The Pale Fountains
Al Mckay Guitar
KE Y PLAY E RS
ROM singing in achurch choir, to backing Stevie Wonder and then on to her own career, Deniece Williams certainly travelled along way in just a few short years Not bad, especially for someone who had no drive to be amillion selling artist solo artist “I wasn’t ambitious a t all,” she explains today, “I really didn’t want to be asinger. I didn’t want to tour because, by tha t time, I already had two children But I did want to be asong writer, tha t was wha t I was going for I wanted to go into the
I hadn’t been thinking in terms of it being songs until I got around him and got around some of the other musicians in the band. And that’s when I really started song writing ”
Deniece Williams Vocals, songwriter
“We were working with agenius,” says Williams “Being around him, I began to learn tha t poetr y plus music equals song I’d been writing alot of poetr y, but
A graduate of Stevie Wonder’s backing band, this reluctant star’s 1976 debut single would hit UK No 1, with help from a first class soul lineup
Jerry Peters Keyboards
Susaye came up with this brilliant idea I mean, my “I want to be free” wa s the inspiration behind it, and then she had an idea , and we worked on it. So wha t you hea r is the collaboration.
WILLIAMS:The new approach to the song wa s very diferent. It took me awhile to get used to it, because I’d been singing it the other way for so long But I wa s fascinated by wha t Maurice and Charles did with the song I wa s open to their interpretation of the song I trusted them, why wouldn’t I? This version wa s slower.
act for The Rolling Stones So I jumped from the church to Stevie Wonder to The Rolling Stones!
Tha t wa s how “Free” started It wa s almost like asamba , soulful but really melodic They just started playing, and others would join in Then Niecy jumped up on the stage and started singing.
“I was fascinated by what Maurice and Charles did with the song. I was open to their interpretation”
WILLIAMS:Stevie would let us play for 10 minutes before he came out One night we were playing in Los Angeles, and they said, “Let’s do Deniece’s song, let’s do ‘Free’ ” And I said, “Oh, OK!” It just happened tha t Maurice White, Philip Bailey and Freddie White were in the audience tha t night Maurice heard the song and heard my voice and decided tha t this wa s something he’d like to be apart of. He had just formed his
WILLIAMS:I looked it over and said, “Wait aminute, I can’t sing tha t exactly ” So we started working on the lyrics and changing things, and that’s how the song came about.
GREENE:It wa s just magic, like it wa s in the air We’d open for Stevie on the road Sometimes others opened too, like Rufus and Chaka Khan, but we’d still open for Stevie in our section.
own production company, Kalimba Productions with ColumbiaRecords, and he wa s looking for asolo female artist. It took me awhile to commit to acontract a s asolo vocalist, because tha t wa s not wha t I wa s Tha t wasn’t my desire, to be solo But I’m so glad tha t I did
WILLIAMS:I wa s just singing of wha t I heard them play I wa s singing this one phrase, “I want to be free/I want to be free”
WILLIAMS:I wa s there from the very beginning, I wanted to hea r wha t they were doing They were just these incredible musicians, some tha t I knew, some tha t I didn’t
DENIECE WILLIAMS
GREENE:The melody just fowed. It was unique and special, because of how easily it came together. I started writing lyrics, because lyrics are my thing “W hispering in his ear ” So I’m writing all these lyrics, then I walked up to Niecy and handed her this piece of paper, and I said, “Sing this!”
SUSAYE GREENE:Music just pours out of Stevie, it never ends, and it’s stunning to see I’ve worked with a lot of really amazing musicians, but to be able to sit on the piano bench with someone who just, a t the drop of ahat, just pours out diferent songs… It wa s so exciting Being around Steve and all the people tha t he works with, there wa s abuzz all the time He would even write songs on stage, so you had to really be on your toes all the time. Niecy and I started writing severa l songs together a t tha t time She didn’t like to write lyrics back then, even though she can she’s snappy, quick but melodies are wha t pours out of her. We’d rehearse six days aweek. WILLIAMS:We’d be there sometimes an hour or two before Stevie would show up We were in Los Angeles, in apretty nice rehearsa l room, just practising and waiting on Stevie to come.
JERRY PETERS:It wa s amazing to work with Charles Stepney, because he wa s really amajor inspiration I remember hearing the demo of “Free”
GREENE:The guys would just jump in and start rifng back and forth So I remember Hank Redd and Nate Watts who still is the bass player for Stevie Wonder, if you can imagine tha t starting it of.
AL McKAY:We recorded in Wally Heider Studios, I think, which was grea t It wasn’t the best studio we’d been in, but it worked for the budget and worked for wha t we needed to do.
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Deniece Williams on stage in New York, 1977, soon after “ Free” had given her a first transatlantic hi t
Written by: Deniece Williams, Hank Redd Nathan Watts, Susaye Greene
WILLIAMS:It wa s a shock when it topped the cha rts in the UK. It wa s the frst single to come of of my project. A lot of times then, not like toda y, it took a song being successful here in the US before it would tra nsla te over to the UK a nd to other countries. So it wa s slowly building the momentum here, a nd then it crossed over. Tha t wa s the cherr y on top of the ca ke, lea rning tha t the UK a udience ha d a ccepted it a nd loved it I wa s so thrilled I remember my frst Top Of The Pops, doing “Free”, it must ha ve been 1977 when I frst ca me over to the UK. Live, we still do “Free” pretty close to wha t you hea r on the record Why ruin a good thing! Ha ve I ever got bored of it? Never Only beca use the minute the keyboa rd pla yer sta rts tha t ver y bea utiful music in the beginning, the a udiences go wild. How a m I gonna get bored?
WILLIAMS:Ma urice White a nd Cha rles Stepney knew exa ctly wha t they wa nted from the songs a nd how to get to it. So to me, it didn’t seem to ta ke a long time. I mea n, I’ve been in the studio with Stevie Wonder, a nd tha t wa s very, very diferent It would ta ke Stevie a long time to get certa in sounds, a nd I think a lot of tha t wa s beca use he wa s doing most of the instrumenta tion himself. Wherea s with Ma urice, with Ea rth, Wind & Fire recording it, things ha ppened fa ster With their version of the song, it’s like, you know, there’s a woma n she’s got a dress on, somebody else comes in a nd they
a n Echoplex. Tha t wa s a grea t sound, fa scina ting; it repea ted the notes tha t you pla yed in rea l time. When I wa s younger, I’d met Herbie Ha ncock in New York I went to his house, I tra cked him down a nd I wa s dra wn to wha t wa s going on in tha t period with the ja zz fusion explosion. They were using electronics with keyboa rds, a nd the Echoplex wa s one of them. It wa s very experimenta l, just etherea l a nd very bea utiful I just sa t down a nd sta rted pla ying, a nd tha t intro ca me out I don't think we ha d hea rd tha t kind of thing on tha t type of song before. I wa s pla ying rea lly ja zzy extended chords too, with a lot of notes from the overtone series, which is gorgeous
C H A E L P U T L A N D / G E T T Y I M A G E S
Released: October 26,1976
8 0 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
McKAY:Jerry is just a grea t guy, a grea t a rra nger, a grea t pla yer, grea t producer He ca me up with the intro
PETERS:George Ma ssenburg engineered, a nd it wa s a grea t tea m tha t did a lot of music very fa st [ for Maurice White’s projects] In most ca ses, they used some fra gment of the Ea rth Wind & Fire rhythm section On “Free”, tha t’s me pla ying a Fender Rhodes pia no, then there’s Freddie White on drums, Verdine White on ba ss a nd Al McKa y pla ying guita r.
Produced by: Maurice White Charles Stepney
FACT F I LE
know but ha d hea rd a bout, a nd it wa s just a n honour for me to be there wa tching them record my music
put a purse on her, a nd they put pea rls a round her neck They give her a pretty ha t The woma n wa s origina lly there But somebody else ca me in a nd took it to the next level. And tha t’s wha t Ma urice White did with “Free”
I
PETERS:Ja zz wa s the centre of infuence for keyboa rd pla yers like me, a nd I wa s a ble to ta p into tha t on “Free”. We were very open to experimenta tion. It’s a bout crea tivity. It’s not a bout formula s.
Personnel includes: Deniece Williams (vocals),Maurice White (drums, backing vocals), Freddie White (drums, percussion), Verdine White (bass),Al McKay (guitar),Jerry Peters (electric piano)
Deniece Williams tours the UK as part of the Giants Of Soul tour in September Susaye Greene plays with Former Ladies Of The Supremes, and can also be found at @susayegreene on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram .
Al McKay Allstars can be found on Facebook and at almckay com Jerry Peters is currently working on a new solo album
McKAY:Niecy wa s rea dy She took a little sip of her Dry Sa ck [sherry], ca me on out, a nd sa ng. It wa s good, ma n. I miss those da ys, I rea lly do. It wa s just a good feeling tha t night in the studio. Niecy wa s a rea l comedia n, she kept you la ughing She wa s full of jokes
McKAY:It wa s a grea t song, so we ha d a cha nce to just pla y with it a bit a nd fnd the perfect groove a nd the perfect feeling “Free” wa s just one of those things tha t ha ppened in the studio. In fa ct, most of my guita r pa rts were overdubbed. I mostly remember Niecy ha ving a good time a nd la ughing She wa s very ha ppy tha t da y
1 9 7 5 Williams,Susaye Green,Hank Redd and Nathan Watts write “ Free” during a rehearsal while they’re waiting for
GREENE:I remember seeing the cover when “Free” ca me out it’s a very joyous cover! We were so plea sed for her, even though we were sa d to see her go from Wonderlove But, you know, a lot of grea t, grea t singers a nd musicia ns pa ssed through Wonderlove. It’s still my a ll time fa vourite ba nd to be with, beca use they could do a ny kind of music, seriously rock’n’roll, cla ssica l, ja zz, R&B, wha tever It wa s a n experienced group, extremely diverse, from a ll diferent pla ces
1 9 7 2 Deniece Williams becomes part of Wonderlove,Stevie Wonder’s ever evolving backing band
June 1 9 7 6 Williams, Maurice White and session players begin recording her debut album,This Is Niecy
Chart peak: UK 1; US 25
Wonder.The song is performed not long afterwards when the group open for Wonder in Los Angeles
PETERS:I don’t know how we got tha t idea for Niecy to sing over the intro, tha t ruba to pa rt before we went into tempo I don’t know whose idea tha t wa s, but it worked.
“Niecy was ready. She took a little sip of her Dry Sack, came on out, and sang” AL McKAY
PETERS:I pla yed the Rhodes through
TI M E LI N E
Recorded at: Wally Heider Studios, San Francisco,CA
May 1 9 7 7 “ Free” reaches No1 in the UK charts. remaining there for two weeks,the first of four UK Top 10 hi t Msingles
Growin g Suede 2022:(l r) Richard Oakes,Neil Codling Mat Osman Brett Anderson, Simon Gilbert SUEDE 82 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
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OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 83
Photo by DEA N CH A LK L EY
SUEDE have just made their best album in decades –just ask their biggest fan, BRETT ANDERSON. Along with the rest of the band, he explains to Uncut how fatherhood, family and “plummeting towards old age ” have helped bring fresh perspectives while simultaneously honouring their earliest influences. “We’ve got to find ways to be uncomfortable,” Brett tells Tom Pinnock
Insatiable ones: Osman and Anderson rehearse in King’s Cross, London, April
28 2022 84 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
But Anderson a nd the ba nd weren’t quite rea dy to ta ke tha t pa th ba ck then.
“Every few yea rs, we just ha ve to burn it ba ck to the stubble a nd sta rt a ga in, don’t we?” sa ys Osma n, a nd Anderson nods in a greement “Sometimes it’s been forced on us, with Berna rd lea ving or wha tever, or the ba nd splitting up.
Brett Anderson’s definition of Autofiction
UTOFICTION is half memoi r and half fiction. I love the title because I think, in a sense, all art is part manipulation and part truth every single song that’s ever written is not 100 per cent truth, and it’s not 100 per cent fiction They all si t on a spectrum, and that whole idea really fascinates me There’s a brilliant quote by the writer Mary McCarthy:she said that when she was writing novels, i t was like she was putting real plums in imaginary cakes It sums i t up absolutely brilliantly, because that’s exactly what you ’ re doing. And it’s Ballardian too? The fact that it’s like a car, yeah, that had occurred to me. That was a sort of secondary thing.” “
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The concept of a ‘Suede do punk’ a lbum wa s first mooted in producer Ed Buller’s kitchen a fter the ba nd performed a t the Roundhouse in 2016.
Tha t rea lisa tion of morta lity isn’t just confined to the individua l either, but ra ther a ll tied in with the preciousness of being in a unified group. “Every time we pla y live, still the ha irs on the ba ck of my neck go up,” sa ys Osma n “Beca use, you know, it could end tomorrow ”
“I didn’t wa nt to write a n a lbum pretending to be a young ma n,” he expla ins, “pretending tha t I ha ve the sa me cha llenges a s a 20 yea r old. I wa nted it to be a sna pshot of myself in my fifties, a nd the da rkness you sometimes find in tha t, a s you’re plummeting towa rds old a ge. I find tha t
“There a re so ma ny wa ys of just giving into nosta lgia , ” sa ys Ma t Osma n, “or just doing the sa me thing over a nd over a ga in. But it’s a dea th, you know? You ha ve to keep [creativit y] a live, don’t you? It ca n’t just be this thing tha t f loa ts a round you ha ve to keep moving forwa rd a t a ll times ”
We’re here to discuss Autofiction, Suede’s ninth a lbum A ra w bla st of post punk noise a nd stripped ba ck energy, it is a fa r cry from the more thea trica l, experimenta l soundsca pes of 2018’s The Blue Hour. It’s the group’s most exciting record in deca des.
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In these 11 songs, Anderson a ddresses the pa st, the future, fa therhood a nd fa mily, ga zing into the da rker side of life with his usua l f la mboya nt turn of phra se: “Our lives too will pass and fade like this moment ” , goes “Persona lity Disorder”. “Our clothes are like an anthem for sorrow ”
“I sa id, ‘You should do a punk a lbum,’” reca lls Buller “I think it wa s too ea rly then. We’ve a lwa ys ta lked a bout doing it, but we’ve never rea lly ha d the ba lls to But Autofiction is the idea of ‘wha t would Suede sound like if they were to come out in 1979?’ To be honest, wha t’s rea lly behind this record is the a uthenticity of the sound of the ba nd. Not ga dgetry, but wha t they sound like when they pla y together At the moment, Autofiction is proba bly my fa vourite Suede record.”
“REAL PLUMS IN IMAGINARY CAKES”
It wa s their la tter da y prowess on sta ge tha t eventua lly led to the ra w Autofiction After The Blue Hour, the group were keen to reinvent themselves once a ga in, a nd Buller’s origina l suggestion of a ‘Suede punk record’ seemed to chime with them a ll
R ET T Anderson is dressed in the cla ssic Suede uniform when he opens the door: tucked in shirt, sma rt trousers a nd, indeed, socks, a ll in va rious sha des of bla ck “I’ve spent a lot of time here,” he sa ys of his west London ba se, where he sta ys when he’s not with his fa mily in rura l Somerset “But I’ve not done much to it ” He implores Uncut not to judge him on the da ted kitchen, then turns to the lounge a rea . “The ra dia tors, I chose them, a nd the cha ndelier a nd sofa s, so write wha t you like a bout those ”
HEN Suede performed in Brussels on Ma y 23, they pla yed 1996’s Coming Up in full; a fter the glistening “Sa turda y Night” ended, they debuted “She Still Lea ds Me On”, a punchy a nd a nthemic new song. The messa ge couldn’t ha ve been clea rer: looking ba ckwa rds might pa y the bills, but Suede a re still entra nced by the future.
Like its owner, this city bolthole comprising one f loor of a gra nd, pilla red townhouse is stylish, bohemia n a nd a rty, with a touch of wea thered gla mour Green lea ves a nd a jetpla ne sky fill the windows, there’s a moka pot hea ting on the stove, da rk fa mily photos on the ma ntelpiece a nd a bla ck vinta ge guita r propped up a ga inst the firepla ce Suede ba ssist Ma t Osma n, a lso in bla ck, is simila rly a rra nged on a kitchen stool.
terrif ying in lots of wa ys ”
And so the pa st deca de ha s seen the group stretching out a nd developing their music in a wa y tha t few reformed groups ha ve ma na ged, a ll the while honing their cra ft a s a live a ct “Tha t seven yea rs a wa y from it wa s rea lly good,” expla ins Anderson “It ga ve us perspective we just completely lost our wa y before we split up, we didn’t know wha t the fuck we were doing, we didn’t know who we were But being a wa y from things you just sometimes remember who you a re, a nd tha t’s wha t ha ppened.”
“It’s just the wa y the pendulum swings,” sa ys Anderson “After ma king two quite conceptua l, a va nt ga rde records, you na tura lly wa nt to explore tha t na stier side. Whenever I do a ccidenta lly hea r one of our records on the ra dio, I’m a lwa ys a bit disa ppointed a nd I think ‘God, I wish we recorded tha t with a bit more fucking ba lls.’ So this is our a ttempt to redress tha t with a rea lly live sounding record It’s not theoretica l, more a feel record ”
“When we ca me ba ck, I’d forgotten wha t it wa s like to be on sta ge when it’s sounding grea t,” sa ys Osma n “I’d forgotten tha t physica l feeling of a PA going a nd people jumping up a nd down It’s this weird experience tha t 99 9 per cent of the popula tion never, ever ha ve.”
D E A N C H A L K L E Y
“People thin k
But sometimes it’s out of choice I think it’s a lwa ys good for us to just chop a wa y a t it a nd sta rt from thinking of ourselves a s teena gers a ga in.”
Autofiction, simila rly, presents a new wa y of doing things, a nd a llows Suede to showca se inf luences tha t ha ve a lwa ys been there, if slightly hidden punk, but “more PiL tha n Pistols”, a s Ma t Osma n puts it. Guiding them is Richa rd Oa kes’ pa ssion for the post punk of Siouxsie & The Ba nshees, Wire a nd Ma ga zine “I sta rted with punk,” he sa ys, “a nd then pretty quickly found tha t I liked ja gged post punk better tha n a ctua l punk. Those a re the ba nds tha t rea lly ma de me think, ‘I wa nt to pla y guita r a nd be in a ba nd ’”
M
My job is keeping Brett a t ba y, a s it were I let Richa rd a nd Neil fiddle, beca use Brett’s a lwa ys so ea ger: ‘Is it done yet? Is it finished?’”
UCH a s Pa ul McCa rtney often seems to be the world’s biggest Bea tles fa n, so it is with Brett Anderson a nd Suede With a ge, he’s only become more committed to the group, more pa ssiona te a bout pushing things forwa rd a nd surprising their fa ns Writing, especia lly, ha s ta ken on a whole new intensity, with Anderson, Richa rd Oa kes a nd Neil Codling working on scores of idea s together
“It wa s a n odd couple of yea rs,” he sa ys. “You do ha ve a bit of a n identity crisis, you get so used to hiding in tha t persona In the ’90s, I certa inly wa sn’t a wa re of constructing my own persona , or the persona being constructed for me It took me, wha t, 25 yea rs to see, a nd a ccept tha t. Everyone is constructing a persona a ll da y long, but when you’re in the public eye it’s ma gnified ”
One of their previous conceptua l debuts wa s undoubtedly Coming Up, the first full record ma de without Berna rd Butler; 2013’s Bloodsports, their first post split a lbum, wa s a nother. “Bloodsports is ba sica lly The Force Awakens, ” la ughs Ed Buller “Everybody wa nts to see a desert pla net a nd robots But Night Thoughts wa s a n opportunity for Richa rd [Oakes] a nd Neil [Codling] to show the world wha t they’re rea lly a bout, a nd they did a fa nta stic job People now rea lise it’s not a question of Suede Mk II being in the sha dows of Suede Mk I it’s a different ba nd.”
If a nything, Anderson is even hungrier since Covid, with the yea rs a wa y from the live circuit ha ving a mildly tra uma tic effect on his sense of self.
the sa ving gra ces of Suede wa s tha t we weren’t very good! All the other ba nds were a ble to do the indie da nce thing, they were a ble to sound like The Soup Dra gons, but we just couldn’t do tha t. We ha d to be us, a nd lea rn how to be Suede.”
His 2019 memoir, Afternoons With The Blinds Drawn, documented his struggles with being ‘Brett from Suede’, but the tria ls of the Covid a ge seem to ha ve helped him fina lly come to terms with tha t persona
Much of Autofiction, however, wa s written by Oa kes a nd Anderson before Covid a rrived on R O G R R G E N T D E A N C H A L K E Y
E
S A
Suited and rebooted:Suede in 2013 with their first new LP in 11 years, Bloodsports
Switch:Brett and Banshees fan Richard Oakes in rehearsals we listen to all day. the has been a
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T.Rex
But
always
big part” BRE T T ANDERSON SUEDE OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 85
“It wa s mostly the C86 stuff we bonded over,” sa ys Anderson, “where a ll the rock clichés were inverted There were a ll these ba nds doing quite prosa ic stuff, a nd tha t wa s exciting. I think one of
“Brett’s the most ea ger person in the ba nd a t a ll times,” sa ys Ed Buller “It’s inspiring how committed he is to being Brett, the lea d singer of Suede, a nd how committed he is to Suede. It just keeps the momentum going, but a t the sa me time, he’s very deferentia l to people’s contributions
“Me a nd Richa rd a nd Neil get together a nd we write a few pieces of music,” sa ys Anderson “Then I’ll ta ke them a wa y a nd try a nd turn them into songs I a lwa ys ha ve to do tha t on my own. It’s a bout how I use my voice I’m often trying to stretch my voice, but not stretch it too fa r where it sounds ridiculous. So I’m yelping a nd doing weird things when I’m writing a t home, I just ha ve to go cra zy I’m a lwa ys wondering wha t the clea ner must be thinking: ‘This guy’s a professiona l musicia n?! He’s a bsolutely rubbish! How does he a ctua lly ma ke a ny money?’”
Indeed, the sounds of post punk a nd ’80s indie a re wha t initia lly bonded Anderson a nd Osma n together in Ha y wa rds Hea th, West Sussex. They were into punk, but a lso current, a lterna tive music The Smiths, Echo & The Bunnymen, Lloyd Cole, The Housema rtins while Anderson brought in older stuff like The Bea tles.
pun k thin g
“It’s a lwa ys been a reference tha t people ha ve missed with Suede,” sa ys Anderson. “The a wful gla m thing a lwa ys comes out, a nd people think we’re listening to T Rex a ll da y But the punk thing ha s a lwa ys been a big pa rt, especia lly live This is the first record tha t feels like Richa rd owns it, a nd he’s been a bsolutely brillia nt, he’s driven it, a nd his confidence in the ba nd ha s been a ma zing He’s his own pla yer now the wa y in which he ca me into the ba nd, repla cing Berna rd in the ea rly yea rs, a nd consta ntly being compa red to him it’s ta ken a bloody long time, but these things la st a long time ”
“We ba sica lly wa nted to put down a drumbea t tha t thumps,” sa ys Oa kes, “a nd then a ba ssline tha t thumps, a nd then it wa s ba sica lly three a nd a ha lf minutes of thumping Tha t’s wha t we wa nted out of the song, a nd Brett knew exa ctly wha t to do with the voca l ”
Soon they were tra cking their new songs in rea l studios Amusingly, they ma de this wa rts a nd a ll a lbum in some ra ther gra nd pla ces, with the drums a nd ba ss recorded in London’s Air a nd Oa kes’ guita rs in Stockholm’s fa med R MV, owned by Abba ’s Benny Andersson
Show of hands: Suede at the Cirque Royal in Brussels, May 23 2022
Buller still remembers the first time he sa w Suede pla y, climbing to the top of a house in Ha ckney where the ba nd were first rehea rsing, a nd being struck by Anderson’s voice, a nd the wa y Berna rd Butler never pla yed a song in the sa me wa y He ha d to corra l tha t for the studio, but this time a round he wa s pushing for sponta neity.
Black and blue: the Bernard Butler lineup Belgium April1993 SUEDE 86 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 “We knew, th is time around, we’d h ave to cut out th e ch aff and make sure it was all wh eat” NEIL CODLING
the scene Once the world ha d cha nged, their pla ns to record the a lbum in the rehea rsa l room ha d to be a ba ndoned. Even so, they went into a n empty King’s Cross rehea rsa l spa ce to pra ctise the new ma teria l with Ed Buller in tow “If a nybody wa s going to ca pture tha t sound, it’s someone who’s been in a rehea rsa l room with us from the sta rt,” sa ys Neil Codling. “Ed wa s there in the very beginning of the ba nd, when they ha dn’t put out a ny music, he wa s there before Coming Up, when a lot of people thought the ba nd wa s over. So he knows how to sta rt a ga in, a nd he wa s the guy to help us ma ke this record ”
“We did ma ybe 12 weeks in the rehea rsa l room, on a nd off,” sa ys the producer, equa lly fond of a nd bemused by his cha rges “The first disa greement Brett a nd I ha d on Autofiction wa s the a mount of rehea rsing He wa nted to continue, but I sa id, ‘We’re bored.’ So tha t wa s the first hurdle. As the yea rs go on, Brett obsesses a bout tra cklistings more tha n a nything else it’s rea lly funny, he wa s coming to me with little lists a fter three weeks: ‘How a bout this for a running order?’ ‘For fuck’s sa ke...’ Tha t wa s a very integra l pa rt, beca use it’s a lwa ys a story to Brett ”
“We’re a lwa ys looking for a new bit of Suede territory to mine,” sa ys Anderson “I think of it a s a big piece of la nd, a nd you ca n mine a bit of it, then you’ve got to find a nother bit, but within the sa me bounda ry you ca n’t just suddenly go over there a nd do regga e, tha t would be ridiculous A ba nd is a funny thing, beca use you’ve got momentum, but not ma noeuvra bility ”
“Tha t wa s quite a stra nge one,” sa ys Anderson. “We thought, ‘Oh, this is going to be rea lly solid’, but there’s something a bout it tha t mea ns you ha ve to focus on it more, beca use it’s got the ta lking in the verse, so the timing is sort of odd.”
“For yea rs, I a voided my fa lsetto,” sa ys Anderson. “I a ssocia ted it with the cla ssic ’90s
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The most striking tra cks on Autofiction a re the loudest, such a s the sa va ge “Persona lity Disorder” a nd “Sha dow Self”. The former wa s one of the ha rdest for the ba nd to get right, with its simplicity a nd spoken word verses proving trickier to ma ster tha n something more complica ted
“Tha t wa s a week in Stockholm to do the guita rs,” sa ys Oa kes “It’s such a bea utiful studio, I’d love to go ba ck ”
The moody “Bla ck Ice” showca ses Anderson’s rediscovered fa lsetto, this time hoa rse a nd thrilling ra ther tha n the cooing, coy style he used on, sa y, Head Music’s “She’s In Fa shion”
G I E K N A E P S / G E T T Y I M A G E S
“From one extreme to the other!” la ughs Buller. “But you’re not hea ring tomfoolery a t work Especia lly on the uptempo tra cks, it’s pretty much a ll done live On ‘15 Aga in’, there’s only one overdub guita r.”
“It’s often tha t wa y,” a grees Osma n. “The rea lly dumb stuff is quite ha rd to pla y ”
UTOFICTION is ha rdly a lo fi a lbum, but it’s imbued with a pa ssion a nd vita lity tha t some of their other records ha ve la cked Crucia lly, they’re writing with sma ller venues in mind, not looking for sta dium filling a nthems.
they once believed tha t a ny music with Anderson’s voice over the top would sound like Suede, they’re now clea r a bout the supple bounda ries of the group’s sound.
“It’s a ll a bout performa nce for us,” expla ins Richa rd Oa kes “Songs ha ve to be a ble to be pla yed a t The Ga ra ge on a n incredibly hot summer evening. They ha ve to work in tha t setting, a nd tha t’s how they’re written rea lly We don’t write songs for a rena s.” “She Still Lea ds Me On” a ddresses the impa ct of Anderson’s mother, who pa ssed a wa y in the 1980s, but in typica l Suede style it lea ves plenty of room for da rkness too: “And I loved her/W hen she was unkind…” “Ha ving a fa mily of your own, it ma kes you ref lect on your own morta lity a nd on your pla ce in the linea ge,” sa ys Anderson “I see ‘She Still Lea ds Me On’ a s a compa nion piece to [The Blue Hour’ s] ‘Life Is Golden’, which I wrote for my son. Tha t wa s a song from the pa rent to the child, a nd this is a song from the child to the pa rent I’m very a wa re tha t ha ving a fa mily is not a lwa ys suga ry a nd lovely a nd cutesy, there’s neuroses within tha t a s well. There’s cha llenges, there’s wa ys in which it could go wrong, a nd huge responsibility a s well ”
Yet Covid a lso a llowed Suede time to write more songs for the record, a nd a fina l ba tch, including “She Still Lea ds Me On”, were recorded a t The Kinks’ Konk Studios, “a rea l rock’n’roll studio” a ccording to Oa kes Ultima tely, it’s a ll a bout wha t fits into the ‘Suede prism’: where
in the ’90s, it felt very adversarial and gladiatorial,” adds Anderson. “You entered this competition, knowing that you could become very damaged
“One of the things we were fighting was this orchestral Suede sound,” says Buller “We tried to minimise it on this record. But some songs don’t work without it, and so we went to Sweden to do that But for the rest of the album, we wanted to make it like we were performing a play rather than making a movie ”
T Brett Anderson’s f lat, he and Mat Osman are discussing just how tough the making of Autofiction was, and just how happy they are with the result. Good things, they explain, don’t come easily for Suede.
“Of course, when we were in the heart of it
NIGHT THOUGHTS
“He’s just obsessed with Suede,” says the producer, “which is great It's what his life is about I mean, now he’s married, and he’s a very full time parent, but other than that it’s Suede. I think Freddie Mercury was probably a similar sort of character in some respects, because he was very into the music too, he wasn’t just into being a pop star. The thing that made him really lose sleep at night was worrying about songs and how they turn out That’s Brett to a tee ”
Suede thing I’m using it a slightly different way we’ve been listening a lot to bands like Eagulls, they’re brilliant. Obviously, that comes from a lineage of things like Siouxsie & The Banshees, stuff like that I really like ‘Black Ice’, it’s one of my favourites, it’s just so primal.”
WARN E R M USIC UK, 2016
THE BLUE HOUR
Hair apparent: NeilCodling at north London s Roundhouse Nov 13, 2015
“We’re not part of the mainstream any more, and that’s really freeing,” he says “As soon as we were set free from the mainstream, we could kind of do what we wanted This is our fourth album after reforming and where we’re going feels really exciting It feels like we haven’t been in such a healthy place creatively for decades
Anderson’s heading back off to Somerset now, and, as Uncut leaves, he readies the f lat for his departure. Black coat on, he closes the shutters, and the darkness reassuringly returns
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The group ’ s most experimental effort, enlisting field recordings,interludes and the City Of Prague Philharmonic Orchestra to weave its conceptual,rural spell.It might be the hardcore fan’s favourite Suede record to date,and one of the strangest albums to make the UK Top 5.8 /1 0
Kicking off with six seconds of amp crunch and rarely letting up,Suede’s ninth album is packed with huge choruses,serpentine post punk riffs and unrelenting drums and bass Anderson is in fine voice and the rawer,monochrome settings allow these songs to soar 8 /1 0
AUTOFICTION BMG 2022
“We always need a bit of tension, we always need a bit of a battle,” says Osman “In the ’90s, all that competition between bands, I quite liked it. I can remember when we were making Dog Man Star, this sense of ‘We’ll fucking show them’ We’re never comfortable being comfortable.”
Key to this process, explains Ed Buller, is Brett Anderson’s drive, his passion for this 33 year old group that he and Mat Osman have guided since the start.
WARN E R BROS, 2013
“If you wanted to step into the arena, it was like the price you paid was your fucking dignity. Lots of people fell by the wayside. But whenever we’re too comfortable, that’s when we start making shit music We’ve got to find ways to be uncomfortable ”
C H R I S T O P H E D E H O U S S E B; U R A K C N G / R E D F E R N S OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 8 7
Typically, then, Anderson is still looking to the future, very proud of the band’s work over the last decade; how they expanded their horizons with Night Thoughts and The Blue Hour, and how they’ve blown that progression up with the raw left turn of Autofiction.
“On that and ‘That Boy On The Stage’, we finally get a bit of The Fall in there,” says Osman “It’s really weird, with us all being massive Fall fans, but whenever we talk about them people are like, ‘I don’t really hear it.’ But there’s something quite ramshackle about the sound on those tracks that I really like ”
Autofiction is released on September 1 6 through BMG
From its string drenched opener “When You Are Young” to the windswept,dramatic “The Fur & The Feathers” that closes the record almost 50 minutes later,this was a moody counterpart to the damaged second album of Suede’s initial run, Dog Man Star 8 /1 0
How to buy Suede Mk II
“The next record is not going to be like this one, though. I think we almost swing between poles, and the next one will be a lot more experimental again ”
“Like those monks,” says Osman. “Hair shirts and everything ” Neil Codling agrees, adding that they feel the pressure more from within the band as well as outside. “We thought second time around there was no time to waste really. I think you get forgiven a lot of things in your youth, but we knew, this time round, we’d have to cut out the chaff and make sure it was all wheat.”
There are moments of calm with “Drive Myself Home” evoking Radiohead in its lopsided piano and orchestral arrangement but they are rare in the onslaught of guitars, almost exclusively played by Oakes after Codling insisted the better guitarist should look after the parts on this six string focused record.
A 10 track album of stately, mature rock with a Suede twist, as exemplified by the lead single “It Starts And Ends With You”.A comeback album that solidified everything that had come before, and a strong base for the band’s evolution.7 /1 0
WARN E R M USIC UK, 2018
BLOODSPORTS
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When you’ve released a generation defining masterpiece, as JONI MITCHELL did with Blue, what exactly do you do for an encore? In Mitchell’s case, embark upon an extraordinary run of albums FOR THE ROSES, COURT AND SPARK and THE HISSING OF SUMMER LAWNS which pulled her far away from her folk roots and expanded her confessional writing into something tougher and more expansive.Graeme Tomson talks to friends and collaborators to discover fresh insights into these canonical records and the powerful and complex creative processes of their creator.“Tey’re all classics in my book,” says Neil Young
WOMAN OF HEART AND MIND
Photo by JOEL BER NST EI N
M A R T N M L L S / G E T T Y I M A G E S JONI MI T CHEL L 90 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
A month later, on July 24, Mitchell stunned the music world by performing in public for the first time in 20 years at the Newport folk festival Appearing alongside Brandi Carlile, Marcus Mumford, Wynonna Judd and sundry other friends, she played guitar and sang a slew of her classic compositions as well as covers of “Love Potion No 9” and “Summertime”
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These two wildly cheering events were closely connected, believes Patrick Milligan, director of A&R at Rhino Records, who has been working closely with Mitchell overseeing the ongoing reissue programme. “Joni has been going through therapy to get beyond her aneurysm, and in the three years I’ve known her, the improvement has been incredible,” he explains “She told me, ‘Working on these projects has helped me ’ I think we’re going to be hearing more from her all the time. She
The latest spate of legacy work on Mitchell’s back catalogue focuses on three studio albums For The Roses, Court And Spark, The Hissing Of Summer Lawns and the double live album, Miles Of Aisles “They are all classics in my book,” says her old friend and compatriot, Neil Young “I listened to every album as it came out The musicians she played with were always above my abilities. She had grown from folk to jazz and in between, creating a unique kind of sound that I loved to listen to over and over ”
At home in LA circa 1970
“SHE
is really getting back into the swing of things.”
Presented with the problem of following the generation defining Blue, Mitchell embarked on an extraordinary run of records which pulled her far away from her folk roots and expanded her confessional writing into something tougher and more expansive. Working with LA Express, a five piece group of skilled and versatile fusion players, Mitchell infused her music with rich musical textures, complex string and horn arrangements, and an overt jazz inf luence “She still wrote by herself, but now opened up the recording process to a bunch of virtuosos,” says Ellis Sorkin, who engineered Court And Spark and The Hissing Of Summer Lawns Harnessing the power of the collective, Mitchell expanded her ambitions, shaping and manipulating sound and texture, relishing the push and pull between control and release “She valued spontaneity, until she got her hands on the music after the fact,” says LA Express guitarist Larry Carlton. “With her great musicality she got to shape the final product off of our spontaneity That’s where her brilliance shines through I always like to make sure that she gets all the credit! She was such a great musical editor, and GREW FROM FOLK TO JAZZ AND IN BETWEEN” YOUNG
T is June 2022, and Joni Mitchell is in a playback studio in Los Angeles, listening to her most successful album, Court And Spark, being radically reborn. “I love the sound of my voice,” she tells Ken Caillat, the engineer overseeing new Dolby Atmos mixes of four albums Mitchell released between 1972 and 1976, rendering them as an immersive sound experience “I can’t believe how good my voice sounds!” Aged 78, and still recovering from the effects of the aneurysm she suffered in 2015, she is sufficiently moved to start dancing. “She was thrilled,” Caillat tells Uncut. “And we were thrilled that she was thrilled.”
This creative quantum leap had a profound commercial dividend These four years yielded Mitchell’s only Top 10 American hit single, a multi million selling album, arena tours and the kind of fame which eventually sent her diving into the weeds If Blue articulated the longings of her peers, what followed made her a rock star for ever yone What is remarkable is that she achieved mainstream supremacy while becoming more, rather than less, adventurous. It was a heady time. A perfect storm “We had the best of everything,” says Ellis Sorkin “The best studio, the best equipment, the best musicians, the best artist. You couldn’t really go wrong ”
J M M C C R A R Y / R E D F E R N S S; U L F A T M A G N U S O N / G E T T Y M A G E S G; J S B E R T H A N E K R O O T / R E D F E R N S OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 9 1
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“I think that put her in a mood to be a bi t more open minded on some of the other stuff.In the past she’s not been that open to looking into the vault and putting this stuff out. She told me when we were talking about this, ‘Well, I don’t know what you ’ re going to use, ’ cos I didn’t leave anything behind ’ As I’ve gotten to be a little closer to her, I’ve been able to say, ‘Well, with all due respect, that’s not exactly true!’
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ONI Mitchell released Blue in June 1971. Following its ground shifting impact on both audience and
Such personal upheavals were grist to the mill “She said once to me, ‘Whenever I’m in a relationship and it breaks up, that’s when I do my best album,’” confirms her former keyboard player Roger Kellaway On Court And Spark, her tryst with Browne was churned over on “Car On A Hill” and “Trouble Child” Before that, on For
Recording her debut album in 1967
With Elliot Roberts and Jackson Browne, 1972
In Canada, the songs on For The Roses began to bloom When she set off on tour in February 1972, Mitchell already had her next album written, and performed most of the material as she played dates around the States and in Europe Her fractious romantic relationship with James Taylor had ended the previous year. Now she began an unfulfilling affair with her touring partner, Jackson Browne, whom she later deemed a “leering narcissist”.
“Basically, I’ve gone through this stuff and presented i t to her, and she has said yea or nay On volume two [The Reprise Years: 1 9 6 8 1 9 7 1 ] she did go through and say, ‘Well, I don’t think we need that version of this song and I don’t want that song ’ She took off three things She is very much scrutinising this stuff and making the decisions.I mostly make CDs for her and take them to her.We don’t really listen to stuff together, but I’ll si t and talk to her about what the CD is and go over i t with her.It’s fascinating for me as a fan.It’s one pinch me moment after another.
HE typical approach for reissues is to look at original records and say, ‘OK, there’s stuff we can add for expanded versions, remastered with additional material ’ But even before I knew Joni , I felt somehow she doesn’t want to alter her records and add things The cliché is putting a moustache on the Mona Lisa. I thought, ‘What i f we do something that included that material but wasn’t adding i t to the records?’ I pitched the idea to her manager, Elliot Roberts, and he liked it.So, we ’ ve been doing this project by doing a box of the original albums followed by a box of the archive material that goes with that era “Elliot got Jonion board, but unfortunately, he passed [in June 2 0 1 9 ] before we got too far into the project So, we started meeting with Jonidirectly The first set in 2020 [Volume 1 : The Early Years] started with the 1963 tape recorded in Saskatoon at a radio station by a friend of hers, Barry Bowman.His kids found the tape in a box in the garage.He had i t transferred and got in touch with Joniand bless his heart, this meant the world to her he didn’t want anything for i t he just thought she should have i t She flew him to LA with the tape, and she loved i t It really opened her eyes to her early years, which she’d always discounted a bi t She said, ‘I really want this to be my next record,’ and so we did Early Joni 1 9 6 3 as a breakout on vinyl and she did a new sketch for the cover.
“It’s one pinch me moment after another”
Patrick Milligan, co producer of Rhino’s reissue series, outlines the aims of the project, Mitchell’s close involvement and the treasures to come “
With James Taylor 1971
if you gave her gems and pearls, she could put them together and make something wonderful out of what she received.”
The cumulative effect on the music she made during this period was enormous “It’s a tremendous amount of ground that she covers in these years,” says Milligan. “It’s Beatles like. Part of that is that she starts working more with outside musicians It’s her collaborating more and definitely getting into a bit more of a jazzy side, and that develops as the albums go on.”
“At this point, the next rarities box is five CDs.Without giving away too much, we have studio and live stuff.It should be out in spring 2023.I’m currently making some tweaks, and Jonihas the sets to listen to It depends on what she approves The interesting arc about these boxes is hearing her develop as a performer and songwriter, but also how she is making records and how that is changing That really informs the contents of the sets It’s pretty cool, because this is Joni ’ s current way of making records It’s not what she used to do, but she’s out there and she’s sti ll a presence I can’t speak for her, but I think she feels that way too She really loves the response that these have gotten, it’s meaning a lot to her She felt for years that she was underappreciated, so it’s a wonderful thing ”
artist, not least her sense of exposure at having such deeply personal songs picked over in public, she left Los Angeles and moved north to a little stone house in the wilds near Vancouver in British Columbia There she read, wrote, questioned. Confused and def lated by success, she sought answers from philosophy, music, self help books, and solace in the simplicity of the elements.
She recorded For The Roses a t A& M in Holly wood. Self produced, with the a ssista nce of Henry Lew y, it wa s relea sed in November 1972 a nd documents both where Mitchell ha d been a nd where she wa s hea ding. The somewha t bomba stic fa nfa re of reeds a nd woodwinds midwa y through “Judgement OfG I J S B E R T H A N E K R O O T R E D F E R N S M I C H A E L P U T L A N D G E T T Y I M A G E S
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The Roses, Ta ylor’s heroin a ddiction is referenced explicitly in “Ba nquet”, a cool eyed mea suring of wha tever gets us a ll through the night “Some turn to Jesus, some turn to heroin” a nd only slightly more obliquely in the sinister groove of “Cold Steel And Sweet Fire” “Red water in the bathroom sink/Fever and the scum brown bowl… Bashing in veins for peace”.
Recording Court And Spark at A&M Studios, La Brea Avenue Hollywood,1973
Ba ck to business in Ca lifornia , Mitchell left Reprise a nd signed to Asylum, Da vid Geffen’s new record la bel Geffen wa s a friend but he wa s a lso a mbitious, for himself a nd for his new signing. Mitchell responded to his overtures by writing “You Turn Me On, I’m A Ra dio”, which gently mocked the concept of a hit single while proving extremely effective a t delivering one It rea ched No 25, her first Top 40 success. “When she went to Asylum, she wa s obviously getting pressure to come up with hit singles,” sa ys Milliga n “It’s interesting hea ring how much focus those songs got [in the studio] ”
“AT ASYLUM SHE WAS PRESSURED FOR HITS” PATRICK MILLIGAN
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JONI MI T CHEL L 92 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
The Moon & Sta rs (Ludwig’s Tune)”; the big drum roll cra shing into “Blonde In The Blea chers” a t the precise moment she sta rts la menting the va ga ries of the “rock and roll man”, followed by a burst of spa cey electric guita r courtesy of Stephen Stills; the interlocking grooves on “Cold Steel And Sweet Fire”; the breezy tuned in pop of “You Turn Me On”; the ja zzily repetitive licks a nd percussive roll of “Woma n Of Hea rt And Mind” these were sure signs tha t Mitchell wa s beginning to think more deeply a bout the process of record ma king
Bruised by Blue, the a lbum fea tured a fistful of songs a bout the industry a nd its vena l wa ys As well a s “Blea chers” (ha lf self portra it, ha lf groupie’s la ment) a nd “You Turn Me On”, “Judgement Of The Moon & Sta rs (Ludwig’s Tune)” ref lects Mitchell’s a rtistic resolve through the prism of Beethoven’s struggles Determining to let her work be judged by posterity, Mitchell rea ffirms her gifts a nd voca tion in the fa ce of critica l ba rbs: “They’re going to aim the hoses on you, show ’em you won’t expire”
The bea utiful title tra ck wa s inspired by the rustling of the wind in the a rbutus trees outside her house, reminding her of the seductive da nger of a round of a ppla use The song outlines the compromises a nd dema nds of the media circus, the da nce between a rt a nd commerce, priva cy a nd openness. The title phra se likens the a ccla imed a rtist to a thoroughbred horse, tra ined “to run for the roses” Cha sing prizes a nd a dula tion in its prime, it is disca rded once it ha s outlived its usefulness. Mitchell wa s a lrea dy seeing pa ra llels with her own ca reer. It wa s going to get a whole lot worse or better, depending on your perspective
Ambitious: David Geffen, 1972
Being interviewed in Amsterdam,1972
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ITCHELL pla yed very few shows in 1973. She refocused on her music a nd occa siona lly lived the life of high Holly wood, dining with Ja ck Nicholson a nd Wa rren Bea tty while a ttempting to fend off their a dva nces.
COURT AND SPARK (ASYLUM, 1974)
eponymous debut album has been widely sampled, most notably by Massive Attack (“Blue Lines”) and Madonna (“Justif y My Love”) It was a band of virtuosi Sample and Carlton were also members of versatile jazz ensemble The Crusaders. Bennett had worked with ever yone from Stan Kenton and Ella Fitzgerald to Frank Zappa Guerin, who was Mitchell’s romantic partner between 1974 and 1976, had recorded with Frank Sinatra and Pegg y Lee but fully embraced the new age of jazz rock fusion In his presence, Mitchell’s interest deepened, falling hard in particular for Miles Davis and Duke Ellington’s alto sax man, Johnny Hodges
T took a while for each party to feel comfortable Mitchell was accustomed to painting most of the musical colours herself, while the band had to find a sweet spot between virtuosity and service. “There was no rehearsal,” says Larry Carlton “There were no charts when we got to the studio. We just listened to Joni’s demo tapes and wrote out our own charts for the rhythm section and went out and started running the tunes She had comments as we were getting our parts together, but not a lot We really went out as a unit and started figuring out how to make the song. What comes to mind right now is the relationship, both musically and personally, that John Guerin and Max Bennett had They did hundreds of sessions together and they were also best friends. There was just a connection between the two of them when they started putting their parts together for a song, and it made it lock really quick They both had personalities in their playing ” “She respected the band and we respected her completely and everybody got along just great,”
MILES OF AISLES (ASYLUM, 1974)
A transitional record,perhaps, but a fine one.The intricate piano ballads (“Banquet”,“See You Sometime”,“Lesson In Survival”) throw back to Blue but elsewhere Mitchell reaches for new horizons “You Turn Me On I’m A Radio”,with its breezy harmonica,lush vocal harmonies,easygoing acoustic groove and quick fade,illustrates how readily she could craft a pop hi t to order 8 /1 0
Prince’s favourite album,a slyly seductive blend of jazz,AOR, torch song and technological experimentation Lyrically,Mitchell digs mercilessly beneath the manicured values and pieties of her friends,her audience,her world.A gateway to further avant garde adventures,but a bold, beautiful and brilliant record in its own right.9 /1 0
Musically, she was exploring more deeply an interest which had been percolating for years “She and I both were very taken with jazz,” says David Crosby, who had been instrumental in bringing Mitchell to LA in 1967, later producing her first album; they’d been lovers and remained friends. “I think some of it was my inf luence, but by no means all She inf luenced me with her guitar tunings, and if I inf luenced her on jazz then the more the better, because she went whole hog in that direction The more complex and intricate her charts got, all to the good ”
The sweetly soulful “Help Me” was at the vanguard of Mitchell’s new jazz f lecked approach, while lyrically it finds her trying not without reservations to embrace a similarly freeform kind of love, both loose and tight: “We love our lovin’”, she sings. “But not like we love our freedom” She played the musicians a cassette of the song featuring her guitar and vocal, and they developed their parts. They had a take within hours “That was the very first thing we did,” said Bennett “I remember it so well. We came in, she played a bit of it and Joe Sample and I looked at each other like ‘Is this gonna work?!’ It was so different to what we were used to ”
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In 1973 Scott formed the LA Express with Carlton on guitar, Max Bennett on bass, Joe Sample on keyboards and recent Byrd John Guerin on drums The smoky shuff le of “Sneakin’ In The Back” on the group’s
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THE HISSING OF SUMMER LAWNS (ASYLUM, 1975)
The latter is likely the subject of “The Same Situation”, one of the most beautiful songs on Court And Spark, a portrait of a woman’s insecurities in the face of a Lothario who’s “had lots of lovely women/Now you turn your gaze to me/Weighing the beaut y and the imperfection/To see if I’m worthy”.
FOR THE ROSES (ASYLUM, 1972)
BU Y ER’S GUIDE THE ASY LU M YEARS, 1972 1975
Featuring big hi t “Help Me” and her winking tribute to David Geffen,“Free Man In Paris”,her first collaboration with LA Express is lush,rhythmic and panoramic; the songs uniformly fantastic, the arrangements ravishing The intensity of old remains,but now both words and music are imbued with dazzling range and colour 9 /1 0
Double live set offering sometimes radical band reworkings of classics (“Woodstock” is positively funkadelic) alongside poised solo performances and two new songs: “Jericho”,later recorded for Don Juan s Reckless Daughter,and “Love And Money”.The ambience is muted and the tracks lean heavily towards early albums, but it’s a terrific souveni r of a landmark tour 8 /1 0
She was further encouraged by other musician friends. A prodigy who had been working across the Los Angeles music scene since his teens, horn player Tom Scott had been a key presence on For The Roses “What can you say about Tom?” says Larry Carlton. “We’re the same age, and when I broke into the studios actively in 1970, he was already an established horn player in town doing sessions and movie calls He’s one of those unique upper echelon musicians who only come along once in a while.”
Through her connection with Scott and urged by For The Roses drummer Russ Kunkel to find “a jazz drummer” to match her songs Mitchell went to see LA Express play at The Baked Potato, a club in Studio City. Shortly after wards, she called them into the studio. “She went crazy for the band and so she asked if we would like to play on a couple of songs on her upcoming album,” the late Max Bennett told Uncut in 2015, recalling that the first track they tried at A& M was “Help Me”
Fine diners: Warren Beatty… and Jack Nicholson
The results were revelatory, breathing colour into each corner of Mitchell’s songs, negotiating everything from the elegantly understated title track to the supple swing of
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“She knew what she wanted, always,” says Sorkin “The basics went down fairly easily, especially on Court And Spark. Everybody would play live. The band would be there and she’d usually be in the control room with us Once in a blue moon she did a bit of a guide vocal It was quite orderly, compared to The Hissing Of Summer Lawns, which felt like it evolved as it went.”
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“SHE IS OUTSIDE POP AND ROCK… UNIQUE” ROGER KELLAWAY
M C H A E L P T G E T T M A G E S T O M O M C H A E L O C H S A R C H V E S / G E T T Y M A G E S
Roger Kellaway and Robben Ford
Tom Scott, whose horn arrangements and overdubs are elemental to Court And Spark, was “very involved from the get go, almost like a silent co producer to some degree,” says Sorkin. “Joni always knew exactly what she wanted with everything, but Tom was very instrumental in creating the musical end of things. There were a lot of brilliant players, but he was primary.”
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Roger Kellaway, who toured with Mitchell in 1974, plays a piano chord down the line. “This is a G major triad with a C in the bass,” he says. “That is one of the main harmonic staples of her music, and that comes right out of Stravinsky I don’t know if she knew that, but I did! It was another notch of appreciation for me. I think she is probably the greatest songwriter of… I was going to say the 20th century, but I don’t mean to take Jerome Kern and Gershwin out of the mix I don’t even know how to put a category on it, because she is outside of pop and rock. She has unique music. More than unique.”
NE of the recordings under consideration for volume three of the archive series, due next year, is a piece known as “The Piano Suite”.
All the musicians relished her unique musical qualities. “As a jazz inf luenced player I’m not a be bopper but I love harmony and have since I got into jazz aged 14 to me it was just like playing with a very sophisticated keyboard player,” says Carlton “You use your ears because you love the harmony and you recognise where the harmony is going. It really wasn’t any big challenge; it was just unique ”
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On stage with the LA Express at the New Victoria Theatre,London, April20,1974:(l r) Tom Scott,Victor Feldman and Robben Ford
Bennett recalled “We were all jazz musicians, not locked into any certain thing. She was totally impressed with that. She’ll skip beats and stuff, just on purpose to make the song the way she wants, and that never bothered us ”
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Digging into the multi tracks of these albums, Patrick Milligan has been struck by the extent to which Mitchell was “becoming not just more adventurous as a songwriter, but also as a record maker”. On Court And Spark, the layered complexities of “Down To You” exemplif y this shift “Something that fascinates me is just to hear the development of her making records,” says Milligan. “She is always in charge and she’s experimenting with things You’ll hear her do a vocal of what she wants as a horn part or something like that It’s fascinating to hear her as a producer in the studio I don’t think she gets a lot of credit for that.”
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“It was done right before Court And Spark, ” says Ken Caillat “It’s like a 20 minute piano piece with all the songs from the album, but just instrumental. She had all these licks which became string parts or horn parts, she had them all in her head It’s just amazing She is so articulate ”
Carlton recalls the sessions with LA Express lasting “at least five nights” Later, the likes of Graham Nash, David Crosby, Wayne Perkins, Robbie Robertson, José Feliciano and Dennis Budimir came in to sing and play overdubs “It was like a big family,” says Sorkin “She was friends with all those guys It was a good time Hanging out with her and Crosby and Nash in the control room, thinking, ‘I’m living history here!’”
Rehearsals took place at Studio Instrument Rentals in Los Angeles, where the entire band set up on sound stages “Right from the beginning it was absolutely magical,” says Kellaway “I didn’t know her music that well at the time, but I became much more interested. There’s a kind of circular, unending quality to Joni’s music It’s what I call ‘water music’ It’s almost like there’s no ending, it just goes round and round, into the next song and the next song. Now, some of her songs, like ‘Both Sides Now’, come out where other people can easily access them, but many of her songs aren’t that way. They are simply water music. They go on and connect to one another.”
After and between shows, Mitchell and Guerin tended to keep to themselves, but there were moments of group bonding “We would finish a concert and we all decided we liked to bowl, so her manager would go to a bowling alley and keep it open so we could bowl,” Max Bennett recalled. “We had some sport, because being on the road is not as glamorous as people think ”
HE early shows took place during winter
Dark horse:George Harrison on The Dick Cavett Show 1971
A certain swagger duly entered the shows. “Elliot Roberts was her manager,” says Kellaway. “He kept
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Each night LA Express played an opening set before joining Mitchell for the main show, which blended band and solo performances. They leaned into her songs, stretching them out “I loved playing her music,” says Kellaway “The structure of each piece was fixed, but in the moments where you had your solos you could improvise. In fact, that was expected Joni is untrained She had the strength to pick the LA Express, filled with every single member who is fully trained. That takes an extraordinary amount of courage. It could have been a train wreck, but it all worked very smoothly ”
G I N N Y W N N / M I C H A E L O C H S A R C H I V E S / G E T T Y M A G E S ; A N N L M O N G E L L O / D S N E Y G E N E R A L E N T E R T A I N M E N T C O N T E N T V A G E T T Y I M A G E S
In April, the tour came to London, for three concerts at the New Victoria Theatre. These were Mitchell’s first shows in the UK since 1972 That time, touring For The Roses, she performed alone with guitar, dulcimer and piano, demonstrably still the folk artist who had made Blue the summer before. This time she was backed by a furiously funky band. The shift left some people off balance Melody Maker reviewer Steve Clarke, for one, wasn’t convinced that LA Express added much to the party, preferring the solo performances Others felt Mitchell was becoming a little too grand. The audience at the New Victoria Theatre was told she would leave the stage immediately if any photographs were taken The same diktat was laid down at the afterparty, where Rod Stewart was in attendance. George Harrison come to one of the shows and afterwards invited the band back to his home Mitchell declined However, the rest of LA Express rolled up “We stayed overnight in his castle in Henley on Thames,” says Kellaway. “That was an extraordinary experience. In one end was a 24 track studio, in which he had 17 guitars I counted them!” They recorded two songs that night, “Hari’s On Tour (Express)” and “Simply Shady”, which ended up as the opening two tracks on Harrison’s next LP, Dark Horse.
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“We were responsible for changing a lot of different things,” said Bennett “She kept the format and the basics, harmonically speaking, but a lot of things were added to make it really better. ‘Big Yellow Taxi’ was really fun to play It went through metamorphoses, we just kept adding little things on the road ”
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Y the summer, Mitchell couldn’t avoid the fact that she had become a rock star. Court And Spark reached No 2 in the Billboard chart and sold two million copies in 1974 alone When she returned to the road in early July, it was with a Top 10 hit under her belt, the swooning “Help Me” having peaked at No 7 on the Billboard Hot 100 in June. “Free Man In Paris” climbed to No 22 by the end of the summer. The tour grew in length and pulling power as her popularity grew Five nights at the 5,200 capacity Universal Amphitheatre sealed her rise from connoisseur’s choice to marquee name. “She was adored by everyone,” says Ken Caillat, who was recording the tour for a live record “People yelled out, ‘I love you, Joni!’, and she would giggle ”
through the rehearsals and the concerts I don’t remember a single problem. I can even remember the soundchecks being fun, and they can be horrible. Joni was absolutely charming No diva stuff She was one of the guys, she just happened to be Joni Mitchell ”
On March 14, there was so much snow in Mitchell’s home town of Saskatoon that the truck carrying all the equipment couldn’t make it to the gig. “We actually played the concert on instruments from the local music store,” says Kellaway “We got to go to her house and where she grew up and to see a lot of her paintings. She was easy to get to know. That ease carried
“Just Like A Train”, the upscale blowout of “Raised On Robbery” to the closing cover of Annie Ross’s funny peculiar jazz romp, “Twisted”
“We rehearsed for two weeks in Los Angeles and went on the road for the most part of nine months all over the US,” Robben Ford told Uncut “First impressions? A goddess. An absolute goddess. She was beautiful, she was cheerful, she and John Guerin had pretty recently connected, and they were obviously in love and just having a ball together. It couldn’t have been a more cheerful scene; everyone was very happy in everything that they were doing Joni was just loving having these musicians around ”
“We had great success with Court And Spark, ” says Carlton. “I do remember loving the way it came out. That rhythm section really somehow gelled for Joni’s tunes, and of course, Tom Scott’s horn arrangements after the fact were impeccable. So: proud of that!”
Replacements were quickly recruited Young blues guitarist Robben Ford had earned his stripes playing with Jimmy Witherspoon and had appeared on the first LA Express record, while Roger Kellaway joined up on Fender Rhodes “In 1974, my trio drummer was John Guerin,” says Kellaway. “He called me one day and told me Tom Scott was putting together a band for a Joni Mitchell tour We started rehearsing, and 11 days later I had memorised the entire show It’s the only show I’ve ever done in my life that I’ve completely memorised.”
The album was released on January 17, 1974 From the start, Mitchell envisaged LA Express joining her on tour, the most intense she’d undertaken. She played around 75 dates in 1974, spanning January to April and July to September “She wanted us all to go with her, but myself and Joe Sample were still quite busy with The Crusaders and had commitments,” says Carlton “We couldn’t upset that and make it look we were joining another band to tour. It wasn’t a difficult decision. It would have been fun, but the other options were things that were happening at the time ”
By then, Mitchell wa s thinking a bout the next record Ha ving demoed ma ny of the songs a coustica lly, she reta ined the core of LA Express when she returned to A& M to record the follow up to Court And Spark Tom Scott wa sn’t a round this time, a nd John Guerin pla yed a more prominent role in the a rra ngements, even co writing the title tra ck Henry Lew y a nd Sorkin were a ga in ma nning the boa rds, though Lew y’s input wa s wa ning.
With CSNY at Wembley, September 14, 1974
The origina l version of “Big Yellow Ta xi”, from Ladies Of The Canyon, ha d given Mitchell her only British hit single in 1970 In the Sta tes, however, it wa s the live version from Miles Of Aisles which beca me a hit Its cha rt success propelled the a lbum to No 2 in Februa ry 1975, four months a fter its relea se.
Even when Kella wa y decided to jump ship, the mood didn’t sour “Tom Scott a nd I kind of a greed tha t I wa sn’t going to spend the rest of my life doing this, a nd so I left the ba nd,” he sa ys. “It wa s a mica ble. There wa s no ba d feeling ” Mitchell ga ve him a signed tour poster inscribed: ‘Roll Over Beethoven a nd tell Kella wa y the Blues!’ La rry Na sh wa s the pia nist for the rest of the tour, which ended on September 14 with a show a t Wembley Sta dium, where Mitchell a nd the ba nd supported Crosby, Stills, Na sh & Young on a bill which included The Ba nd a nd Jesse Colin Young.
“SHE WASN’T LOOKING FOR THE ORDINARY” ROBBEN FORD
To begin with, the ba cking tra cks were recorded the sa me wa y a s Court And Spark “The rhythm section live in the studio, no edits, no picking of different pa rts,” sa ys La rry Ca rlton. “Tha t’s the wa y we la id the tra cks down ”
her telling these stories It wa s a thrill On the a lbum, a ll the stories were gone. Ba ck in ’74 they ha d time issues with vinyl; they ha d to cut it down to ma inta in a decent volume on the record ”
The tour is ca ptured on Miles Of Aisles, a double live a lbum relea sed a t the end of 1974 Aside from two songs recorded in Berkeley, a nd one from Dorothy Cha ndler Pa vilion in Los Angeles, both from shows in ea rly Ma rch, the a lbum wa s recorded in July during the run a t the Universa l Amphithea tre It offers a pa rtia l sna pshot of the full concert experience For a sta rt, only one Court And Spark song, “People’s Pa rties”, wa s included, a lthough Mitchell performed most of the record on the tour “She wa s touring Court And Spark so obviously she wa s pla ying more songs from tha t a lbum in concert, but she didn’t wa nt to repea t too ma ny of the songs on a subsequent a lbum,” sa ys Pa trick Milliga n “It’s a pretty edited down version of the complete show a nd presented not to be too repetitive of Court And Spark ” Volume three in the ra rities series will include ma ny more live recordings from the 1974 tour.
JONI MI T CHEL L 96 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
encoura ging me to be more rock’n’roll Not just in bodily a ctions, but I ended up wea ring over the knee boots a nd f la shy coloured shirts. I remember doing a concert to 10,000 people a nd looking out a nd thinking, ‘These people a re mine!’”
These grumbles a side, the a uthentic live sound wa s la rgely una ltered in post production. Ca illa t thinks a couple of lea d voca ls were redone; Sorkin who helped mix the record isn’t sure “We did some minima l touch up overdubs,” he sa ys “I remember on ‘The Circle Ga me’, they brought in everybody from the studio ha llwa y, including myself, to sing ba ckground. I’m not a singer, but they wa nted people who didn’t sound like rea l singers I ha d a musicia n friend who ca me in a nd it’s perma nently etched in his life!”
“The running order of the concert wa s much different from the a lbum running order,” sa ys Ca illa t. “One da y she might sta rt the show with one song, the next da y with a nother. I wa s a lso disa ppointed tha t they left so much ta lking out She wa s a lwa ys putting her guita r into these stra nge tunings, a nd to cover the tunings she would tell stories. We ha d the ba ck of the truck open on these wa rm summer nights to hea r her music pla ying a ndD A V D W A R N E R E L L S / R E D F E R N S P A U L P O P P E R / P O P P E R F O T O
It wa s clea r, however, tha t Mitchell wa s consciously rea cting a ga inst the popula rity of her previous studio record. “Court And Spark wa s the most commercia l success she ha d,” sa ys Sorkin “I think even to her it wa s a little bit of a surprise how big it beca me. I picked up on it when we were sta rting Hissing…. I know it wa s a rea son why it wa s a complete depa rture in some wa ys Tha t wa s the beginning of her depa rture into ja zz, Mingus a nd a ll those following records tha t were much less [commercially] successful.”
“Henr y wa s getting a bit elderly by the time Hissing ca me a long,” sa ys Sorkin “He wa s sta rting to ha ve a lot of problems with a rthritis a nd I ended up doing quite a lot more tha n technica lly being the a ssista nt. Joni a nd I would spend some time a lone before Henr y got there It wa s a lwa ys just mind bending how this woma n wa s so intelligent a bout ever ything. She wa s ta lking a bout stuff tha t wa s going wa y a bove my hea d. She wa s cra zy brillia nt ”
A live a lbum wa s pla nned to ca pita lise on her popula rity. Ca illa t worked a t Wa lly Heider’s studio a nd ta ped severa l concerts on the West Coa st on a mobile recording truck “It feels like we did five or six shows, up a nd down Ca lifornia , ” he sa ys, while Kella wa y reca lls: “We’d recorded tha t a lbum nine times on tour, a nd Joni didn’t like a ny of them!”
“My first experience working with her in the studio wa s on The Hissing Of Summer Lawns, ” Robben Ford reca lled “She would a sk you to do things tha t weren’t necessa rily your instincts. The opening song on the record is ‘In Fra nce They Kiss On Ma in Street’ a nd I’m doing a ll the riffing. I wa s very young a nd inexperienced but I figured: I’m plugging into a n a mp in the studio, put mics on it a nd I put on hea dphones a nd pla y the guita r She sa id ‘Uh Robben? Let’s just plug the electric guita r into a fuzz tone, into the console.’ This to me wa s the most foreign request I could’ve ima gined But we plug it in, everybody wa s sitting a round the console a nd I’m sitting in the
It was as though the more mainstream Mitchell was becoming in terms of her audience appeal, the more sonically ambitious and experimenta l she was determined to be. The mesmeric “Don’t Interrupt The Sorrow” built layer upon layer over an unspooling rhythm, like a piece of futuristic classica l music “It doesn’t really have a dynamic range,” says Ford, who played dobro on the track “It doesn’t go higher, it doesn’t go lower, she has this groove tha t just keeps on going. Rather than things getting louder she just adds There’s this ver y interesting journey It’s agreat, unusua l piece of music and I’m ver y proud to have been on it ”
E L B E R N S T E N
J
Sunshine smile: backstage before opening for CSN&Y Roosevel t Raceway, Westbury New York
middle, and it turned out very cool, different and unique. She wasn’t looking for the ordinary, she wasn’t looking for wha t she’d heard before She was always reaching and it was always very gently, there was never any attitude Her demeanour was just fantastic, never stressed, never rushed.”
T W IST!
URING Ken Caillat’s recent meeting with Mitchell, the master storyteller revealed she’s been working on her Hollywood ending “I met Jonithe other day and I sti ll was pretty awestruck,” says Caillat. “She is 78, she walks with a cane, but she has a great mind and she sti ll tells so many stories. She told us that she’d bought a funeral plot in the cemetery She said i t was very expensive but very gorgeous, under a tree, with a grassy knoll She said i t cost so much money that she asked the people [at the cemetery] i f they’d mind i f she had a picnic there on occasion So, she took some of her good friends and they picnicked on her future grave site. That’s pretty clever, right? Before you spend eternity there, you can have a little afternoon delight on the lawn.”
“She was an innovator,” says Sorkin. “She gets credit for the tunings, but she maybe doesn’t get as much credit for the other stuff, the overdubs and production ”
OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 97
PLOT
The icy “Shadows And Light” comprised nothing but a stack of complex voca l harmonies and thick slabs of ARP and Moog synthesiser “The Jungle Line”, inspired by her musings on post impressionist painter Henri Rousseau, used afield recording of the Roya l Drummers of Burundi (nobody seems quite sure of the origina l source) as the basis for the track Mitchell looped the drums and overlaid vocals, synthesiser and guita r to form the song Listening back to multi tracks of “The Jungle Line”, Milligan says “you can physically hea r her making tha t record It was just amazing tha t she had the idea , to hea r those drums and build atrack around it People do tha t all the time now, but certainly not then. It’s arguably one of the earliest uses of sampling.” O
September 8,1974
The overdubs on Hissing were by fa r the more complex and time consuming part of the process Much of the work was done in Studio C, the smaller room a t A& M, where Carole King made Tapestr y. “There were so many vocals!” says Sorkin “‘Shadows And Light’ and ‘The Jungle Line’ had maybe 100 vocals on them Just as she experimented and developed her tunings, layering vocals to tha t extent was new. We spent endless amounts of time on them. I mean, weeks and weeks She was so specific and exacting in wha t she wanted, more so than anyone I’d ever worked with, apart from maybe Karen Carpenter, who had asimila r level of perfectionism but didn’t take as much time getting there as Joni did There was more editing on tha t stuff than on anything I’d ever seen Joni had avision and took as long as she needed to get there. She was appreciative and pleasant to be with, but there was some frustration a t times about just how long things were taking If the sessions were called for 7pm she generally wouldn’t show up until 10 or 11pm Tha t was the only frustration. It felt endless.”
D
“People were a bit weirded by Hissing…, ” says Sorkin “It was only in later years it became appreciated as much as it now is ”
Mercurial muse:Jaco Pastorius
J
“
… and so says Neil Young
It proved the precursor to a turbulent time The Hissing… tour began in Januar y 1976, again with LA Express in tow, but the harmony of 1974 gradually evaporated, partly because Mitchell and John Guerin were splitting messily “I don’t think we ever had any conf lict whatsoever, until the end, and that was a conf lict with her,” Bennett recalled. “She was going with John Guerin, and they broke up during the ’76 tour ”
“LONG LI V E JONI!”
During the 1975 Rolling Thunder Revue tour with Joan Baez and Bob Dylan
Taken from Joni Mitchell The Asylum Albums (1972 1975)
In the same month that the album was released, Mitchell hitched her wagon to the second leg of Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue She had loved Blood On The Tracks and wanted to pay homage to what she saw as Dylan’s creative rejuvenation, but the reality was rough: drug fuelled, ego driven, somewhat like being kidnapped by the circus Mitchell had f lu, and the blues, and felt out of her element much of the time. She refused to take part in Dylan’s movie project, Renaldo And Clara
“Her stuff is very complex and deep and intricate, and it goes over the heads of people who listen to shallow pop music,” David Crosby told Uncut “Pop music is about as deep as a bird bath It appeals to stupid people. Joni doesn’t. Joni appeals to bright people and there are less of those.”
G E T T Y I M A G E S ; P R E S T O R P C T U R E S L L C / A L A M Y S T O C K P H O T O J O N I M T C H E L L
“We both come from the Canadian prairies, where the wheatfields grow for miles and miles between grain elevators that dot the highway I feel that kinship with Joniand I know you hear and love this period of her music as much as I did when I first encountered these songs back in the day Long live Joniand her wonderful sound! Thanks, Joni!”
ONI’S music and her time at Asylum Records are a major contribution to our world of music. Since we first met and I played my song ‘Sugar Mountain’ for her, she has been my good friend. She wrote ‘The Circle Game’ and continued our young conversation! Joni ’ s music is so deep and transporting. She comes right from the source There is no mistaking i t
the stage at Cole Field House in Maryland before completing the first song. She didn’t return, leaving a crowd of 18,000 dangling. She played a handful more dates but cancelled most of her American concerts and an entire European leg She wouldn’t tour again until 1979
W
Glancing in her rear view mirror in March 1976, she could see just how far she had travelled from the artist who recorded Blue in 1971 The common denominator, then as now, was an eternally questing spirit “I visited her at the studio once, she was doing a synthesised keyboard overdub to one of the songs,” Robben Ford recalls. “She’s sitting in a chair that’s high up off the ground and she’s there playing this keyboard, and her legs are swinging in the air! Like a little girl with crayons, she just had that freedom, a childish kind of freedom, and at the same time a brilliant mind Not afraid to go any where with her music ”
HEN The Hissing Of Summer Lawns was finally released in November 1975 it was received with some caution by contemporar y critics It was a bold and uncompromising follow up to Court And Spark Both languid and terse, smooth yet sour, with a f lickering strangeness at its edges, it was widely perceived as Mitchell shunning the mainstream in favour of a wilder path Then again, nothing was quite that simple The beautiful but barbed “Boho Dance”, with its lilting f lute and f lugelhorn, took issue with rote notions of authenticity and the idea that her newfound success somehow betrayed some purer impulse “Some steps outside the boho dance,” she shrugged. “Have a fascination for me”.
Stressed and ill, on February 22, Mitchell bolted from
9 8 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
“Since those early days, her music on Reprise and then Asylum was definitive For The Roses, Court And Spark, Miles Of Aisles and The Hissing Of Summer Lawns they are all classics in my book I listened to every album as i t came out The musicians she played with were always above my abilities. She had grown from folk to jazz and in between, creating a unique kind of sound that I loved to listen to over and over.
JONI MI T CHEL L MORE JONI! –TURN THE PAGE FOR MITCHELL LIVE AT NEWPORT
Although members of the band continued to contribute to her records, the curtailed tour effectively marked the end of the LA Express connection, and to an extraordinar y chapter in her career. The next one would begin later in 1976, with an album she named Hejira, a word of Arabic origin which translates as ‘exodus’ or ‘escape from a dangerous situation’. For the Prophet Muhammad it signified a f light from Medina to Mecca For Mitchell it denoted an extended road trip and the discover y of mercurial bassist Jaco Pastorius, her next muse.
SETLIST 1 Carey 2 Come In From The Cold 3 Help Me 4 A Case Of You 5 Big Yellow Taxi 6 Just Like This Train 7 Why Do Fools FallIn Love 8 Amelia 9 Love Potion No 9 10 Shine 11 Summertime 12 Both Sides Now 13 The Circle Game JONI MI T CHEL L
The concert ha d been billed a s Bra ndi Ca rlile & Friends, a delibera tely “ma llea ble spa ce”, sa ys Sweet, for wha tever might, or might not, be a bout to ha ppen. Her set bega n a t 5 30pm Ea stern time At a round 6pm, a visibly ela ted Ca rlile introduced “ba ck to the Newport sta ge, for the first time since 1969: Joni Mitchell!”
The musicia ns ga thered for a rehea rsa l in Newport on the Frida y before the Sunda y show. “The logistica l complexities for the a rtists were immense,” sa ys Sweet Ca rlile, for exa mple, f lew in on Frida y for rehea rsa ls, f lew ba ck to Chica go for a Highwomen concert on Sa turda y, then returned the next morning to Newport Allison Russell a nd Sista Strings pla yed in Ca na da the night before, wa lked off sta ge, took a red eye into Boston a nd drove hours to get there in time.
Since her a neurysm in 2015, Mitchell ha s ha d to relea rn how to pla y guita r, a nd how to use her voice For Ca rlile, the moment tha t Newport beca me more tha n a pipe drea m wa s when she hea rd Mitchell “rea lly sing” Gershwin’s “Summertime”, prompting Herbie Ha ncock to burst into tea rs As her hea lth improved, sa ys Wolfe, “there wa s ta lk a bout ha ving a ll of the people tha t she’d wa nt to be there from her Joni Ja ms be on sta ge lifting her up. Then we get the text from Bra ndi.”
“On Frida y we ra n through the set,” sa ys Wolfe. “These were a ll songs tha t we ha d sung in her living room a t va rious points throughout the la st few yea rs They were
Beforeha nd, sa ys Holly, “Joni wa s so excited. She doesn’t get nervous. We sa ng something in her room a nd she wa s rea dy She wa s full of joy a nd energ y ”
N la te Ma y, Holly La essig a nd Jess Wolfe from US indie pop ba nd Lucius received a text from Bra ndi Ca rlile: “All right ja mmers, we’re on! We’re doing this ” The extra ordina ry pla n for Joni Mitchell to perform for the first time since pla ying the Wiltern Thea tre on November 13, 2002 wa s a foot
“Wha t we’d prepa red for wa s tha t everyone would proba bly ta ke a
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“We were singing ‘Jingle Bell Rock’ a nd wea ring Sa nta ha ts! Joni ma de us ca rol books tha t sa id, ‘Joni’s Jingle Ja m’.”
in the repertoire a lrea dy ” Sweet a lso a ttended rehea rsa ls, but only la sted two songs. “When she sta rted the third,” he sa ys, “I sta rted sobbing a nd ha d to lea ve ”
Backstage with an excited Celisse Henderson and a momentarily distracted Wynonna Judd
The inside story of JoniMitchellat Newport Folk Festival , July 24, 2022
Even a s she shimmied on sta ge, nobody on sta ge rea lly knew wha t Mitchell might do “There wa s no pressure for her to be or do a nything,” sa ys Wolfe “But her a ttitude wa s like, ‘I’m here a nd I wa nt to be a pa rt of it.’”
‘JoniJammers’ celebrate the return of a true legend to Newport
“OUR MINDS WERE ALL BLOWN”
On the morning of the festiva l, there wa s a growing sense loca lly tha t something specia l wa s brewing “It wa s mea nt to be a surprise, a nd I feel it wa s pretty well kept,” sa ys Wolfe. “One of the ba nd ha d gone into town on the morning of the gig, a nd the ba rista sa id, ‘I hea rd something big is going to ha ppen a t the festiva l tonight, a nd I’m pretty sure it’s the Ea gles…’”
beca use of Covid a nd how comforta ble Joni would be whether it would go down. You never knew until you were a ctua lly there tha t it wa s going to ha ppen. It wa s too much of a drea m come true ” “I wa nt[ed] it be good,” Mitchell sa id a fterwa rds, expla ining the hesita ncy, “And I wa sn’t sure I could be ”
I
“Tha t wa s the sta rt of these incredible series of specia l moments with insa nely ta lented people pla ying music with a nd for Joni Mitchell. It felt like we were in the living room of a fa mily member We were pa ssing a round lyrics, sha ring new songs a nd singing a s a group. It felt very sweet. Over the la st couple of yea rs Bra ndi sta rted singing some of Joni’s songs in the living room, a nd Joni sta rted singing a long. Slowly tha t morphed into Joni doing her own tunes a ga in ”
Between ea rly June a nd July 24, things “went up to the wire”, sa ys La essig. “Everyone wa s unsure
In October 2019, Ca rlile performed Blue in its entirety a t Disney Ha ll in LA. Wolfe a nd La essig joined her on sta ge a nd a t Christma s were invited to their first ‘Joni Ja m’ “Bra ndi a ssured us tha t Joni wa s rea lly excited a bout ha ving some young people ma king music in her living room,” sa ys Wolfe, who reca lls wa lking in to find Cha ka Kha n singing “At La st” a t the pia no.
N N A W E S T E R V E L T
Mitchell’s a lrea dy legenda ry a ppea ra nce a t Newport Folk Festiva l on July 24 wa s a long shot tha t ca me off “A very sma ll number of Newport sta ff a nd a rtists knew it wa s a possibility she wa s coming for ma ny months,” sa ys Ja y Sweet, executive producer of the festiva l “But we a lso knew tha t it wa s only Joni who could decide to step on tha t sta ge. There wa s never full certa inty it would ha ppen until it did ”
Centra l to the plot wa s Ca rlile The singer songwriter beca me friends with Mitchell in 2018 a nd since then ha s spea rhea ded ga therings of musicia ns a t Mitchell’s home in Los Angeles to sing, pla y a nd socia lise a mong them Wolfe, La essig, Ta ylor Goldsmith, Ma rcus Mumford, Bonnie Ra itt a nd Elton John
OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 101 N N A W E S T E R V E L T
“Tha t was nuts!” laughs Wolfe “It’s astounding how much character and rhythmic prowess she has. She is fully Joni; her rhythm and tone are just as brilliant It’s different, obviously. She’s more of an alto now than asoprano, but it’s so good.”
Afterwards, says Sweet, Mitchell was “radiant and beaming A miracle personified ” “I don’t think she wanted to go to sleep,” says Wolfe. “She was so pumped! It was great, we all went out and celebrated We had oysters and lobsters, as you do in Newport ”
“It’s clea r tha t musica l is magica l and has the ability to really heal. We’re honoured to have been awitness to it, let alone play apart in it It was one of the most specia l moments of our lives.”
GRAEME THOMSON
song and tha t Joni might sing along here and there,” says Laessig “Tha t wasn’t wha t happened! She started singing entire songs by herself and standing up and shredding on guitar! It was really amazing for all of us Our minds were all blown ” Looking radiant in apurple beret, sunglasses and beads, sitting on a golden chair in aforma t intended to recreate the laidback feel of the ‘Joni Jams’, Mitchell performed a13 song set with Carlile, Wolfe, Laessig, Mumford, Goldsmith, Wynonna Judd, Blake Mills, Allison Russell, Shooter Jennings, Celisse Henderson, SistaStrings, Josh Neumann, Matt Chamberlain, Rick Whitfield, Ben Lesser, Jay Carlile and Phil and Tim Hanseroth Among the highlights was a beautifully bluesy “Summertime”,
an impossibly poignant rendition of “Both Sides Now”, and Mitchell’s mean extended electric guita r jam on “Just Like A Train”
“SHE STARTED SINGING ENTIRE SONGS BY HERSELF” HOLLY LAESSIG
Joni“ fullof joy energy BrandiCarlile at the Newport Folk Festival2022
As to whether we will see more of Mitchell on stage: “It wouldn’t surprise me,” she says “I hope so She seems gung ho We’ve been talking about tha t in our exchanges about the weekend and her recovery in genera l
, with
and
Charlton Park, Wiltshire, July 28-31 W
F
Pauline Black of The Selecter
and woodland campsites And that silver goateed fellow shufing around in sandals and a foppy hat, dutifully scooping rubbish into the zero landfll recycling bin? Yes, that really is WOM AD co founder Peter Gabriel, who rescued the debut festival from fnancial ruin four decades ago Like a proud dad, Gabriel has popped back this year to witness his baby reach midlife maturity
to perform this year, albeit feetingly, but there is a welcome appearance by A Certain Ratio, who frst played WOM AD in 1985. With recent recruit Ellen Beth Abdi standing in for injured frontman Jez Nelson, ACR’s taut punk funk rhythms still pack a sharp modernist thwack Meanwhile, The Selecter are making their WOM AD debut. “It took us 40 years to get here,” deadpans an eerily ageless Pauline Black, her lightly frost y tone entirely justifed by her band’s irrepressibly joyous ska pop bounce
Glamorous West African divas are in abundance this year, starting with Mali’s Fatoumata Diawara, who headlines on Thursday with her agreeably crunchy funk jams, desert blues grooves and brightly hued bling The following night, Benin born superstar Angélique Kidjo plays a set leaning heavily on her 2018 remake of the Talking Heads classic Remain In Light, an inspired piece of musical symmetry reclaiming a post punk landmark that was itself heavily infuenced by African rhythms Kidjo begins a little too sedately but builds to a feverish crescendo, putting a melodious highlife spin on “Once In A Lifetime” before coaxing Gabriel onstage to share vocals and dance awkwardly to “Mama Africa”
Te Lips, Gilberto Gil and a litter picking Peter Gabriel celebrate 40 years of uplif ting international sounds
Yazz Ahmed, beneath Luke Jerram s Museum Of The Moon
WOM AD has had a bumpy ride in recent years, with new post Brexit restrictions adding to perennial headaches over travel visas and late cancellations, all made worse by a lengthy Covid sabbatical But the festival is back for the frst time since 2019, just in time to celebrate its 40th anniversar y. Lightly reconfgured to bring the main stages closer together, the Charlton Park site feels unusually busy this time, with 40,000 people packing its marquees, fairgrounds
American Head liners: Flaming Lips
Gabriel is the only artist from the original 1982 festival lineup
Fantastic Negrito
Peter Gabrielwith Angélique Kidjo
The most magical of WOM AD’s alternative stages is a woodland glade nestled beneath Luke Jerram’s dazzling Museum Of The Moon, a seven metre wide lunar sphere illuminated from within. In this hushed secret garden, trumpeter and composer Yazz Ahmed weaves alluringly hypnotic electro jazz soundscapes, while experimental duo Amaya (Duncan Chapman and Supriya Nagarajan) conjure up a spellbinding sonic tapestry of ambitronic drones and octave vaulting Carnatic vocals
There are gestures of solidarity with Ukraine scattered across the festival, from the blue and yellow lighting motifs on the main stages to the free tickets ofered to refugees feeing the war Representing the country on stage, the lightly experimental Folknery play a juicy selection of rootsy ballads, hollering impassioned microtonal yodels over kinetic clatter, electronic squelch and organic twang And one of the weekend’s stand out
A reliably rich source of melting
R IDAY afernoon in leaf y Wiltshire and already this sleepy corner of England is exploding like a frenzied late night rave in Soweto A late addition to the long running global music festival, “Afropsychedelic” collective BCUC Bantu Continua Uhuru Consciousness are intent on making a big impact with their thunderous blend of township rhythms, fzzing electronics, gospel infused vocals and staccato raps A high voltage showman, frontman Jovi Nkosi climbs the lighting rig, perches on the bass speakers and commands the crowd to mosh “Woop woop!” he booms “That's the sound of the police ”
WOMAD FESTIVAL O M A D R Y L E Y M O R T O N G E T T Y M A G E S
Flaming
new discoveries is South Korean avant folk group Ak Dan Gwang Chil (also known as ADG7), who pay their own of beat tribute to Ukraine by playing “Hey Hey Rise Up”, the Ukrainian resistance anthem recently re worked by Pink Floyd and Andriy Khly vnyuk Fronted by three colourfully dressed female singers, this hugely charming young band are a total blast, putting an irreverent K pop spin on antique shamanic songs
Another is Kae Tempest, who booms emotionally raw confessionals over pounding techno beats, cinematic electronica and famenco guitar furries. “Bless all my trans, queer, non binary folk,” Tempest declaims, “bless you forever!”
His jaunty Portuguese language cover of “Get Back” is a pleasing reminder that this former political exile turned government minister is
not only the same age as McCartney, but appears to drink from the same fountain of eternal youth Gil wears his legend status lightly, but this is an old master at work, a sublime demonstration of music as a sweetly melodious, humane, inclusive, uplifing, intoxicating, healing force for good STEPHEN DALTON
pot sounds, the crosstown trafc between France and North Africa proves especially busy this year, from the electrif ying gnawa rock of Bab L’Bluz to the frst ever UK show by Parisian psych blues band Al Qasar Led by guitarist Thomas Attar Bellier, this multicultural collective play a muscular mash up of fuzzed out guitar, Middle Eastern instruments and Arabic lyrics.
The weekend’s most deliriously un WOM AD performance comes from The Flaming Lips, whose
Saturday headline show is a psychedelic banquet of rousing ELO sized anthems, acid fried humour and eye popping Las Vegas visuals. Wayne Coyne spends much of this set cocooned in his signature transparent bubble, Neil Young's voice trapped inside Barr y Gibb's body, charming the crowd with his incongruously old school Midwestern manners. “It’s such an honour to be chosen to play with this amazing assortment of freaks from around the world,” he gushes They may shade into zany schtick at times, but nothing beats the Lips for crowd pleasing spectacle and Sesame Street surrealism.
Sunday fnally brings scorching sunshine to Charlton Park, perfect weather for the mood lifing massed percussion of bhangra big band The Dhol Foundation. And rounding of the festival in life afrming st yle is Gilberto Gil, who turned 80 this year Thronged by 14 members of his extended family, including his fve year old great great grandson, Gil foats
While a certain scented candle tastefulness may prevail on the big stages, there are noteworthy exceptions One is Fantastic Negrito, who sets Saturday afernoon ablaze with his blasting mix of testifying soul, storytelling wit and supercharged showmanship
through a perfumed haze of jazzy Tropicá lia, disco and funk, samba and bossa nova, throwing in a featherlight reggae version of “The Girl From Ipanema” for good measure.
I LE V G A R R Y J O N E S OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 1 0 3
An old master at work:Gilberto Gil
On the slow sludge rock waltz of the opener “Cooksmania”, Dawson implores the headbanging crowd to join in on the “ya hoe, ya hoe, ya hoe” refrain and gets them to wave hands in unison; on the diabolic Black Sabbath churn of “Iv y”, his high pitched wordless “ah hah”s inspire a singalong before he leaps into a Jef Buckley style falsetto; and on “Silene”
While it would be interesting to hear some of Dawson’s older songs get the thrash metal treatment, it’s clear that this collaboration is being kept distinct from his solo canon The closer is a distended, 10 minute version of Circle’s own “Terminal”, a Motörhead style boogie that ends with the band forming a human pyramid around Dawson, waggling their tongues and pointing their guitars upwards in formation When they return for an encore, it’s with a rowdy version of Martha And The Mufns’ whimsical new wave hit “Echo Beach”, a song released a year before Dawson was born “This is the happiest night of my life!” he says, gleefully England’s most literary songwriter is playing it dumb and it’s an absolute joy to watch.
Dressed identically in black sweaters and green neckerchiefs, Dawson and the band look like members of an austere religious order, and there is something slightly cult like in their performance
Keyboard player Mika Rättö ofen sings an octave below Dawson, as if intoning some grave medieval plainsong Bassist Jussi Lehtisalo sings operatically, like a castrato leading a prayer session. The three guitarists (four if you include Dawson) ofen drop to their knees during solos, as if in feverish worship; when they line up close to each other, playing precise metal rifs in tight harmony with their guitar
RICHARD DAWSON & CIRCLE Scala,London, July 6 Geordie folk poet indulges inner rock pig to thrilling effect Priests of prog metal:Richard Dawson (centre) with Circle K L A R A W E S S They look like members of an austere religious order S E T L IS T 1 Cooksmania 2 Methuselah 3 Silphium 4 Ivy 5 Silene 6 Lily 7 Terminal E NCORE 8 Echo Beach 104 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
necks parallel, they look less like Thin Lizzy and more like priests waving incense from thuribles.
A
he holds up his guitar neck afer each rif and gets a huge cheer “Lily” is a rather grim retelling of Dawson’s mother’s experiences as a nurse in Newcastle’s Royal Victoria Infrmary, but all we hear are Dawson’s shrieking falsetto vocals inciting the moshpit to pogo
moshpit, choreographing the crowd mayhem And he’s really rather good at it
So this is quite a change in gear for Dawson Tonight the fngerpicking introvert has transformed himself into an extrovert rock monster, playing a hot, sweaty, full to bursting stand up rock venue, accompanied, as on last year’s Henki, by the Finnish prog metal sextet Circle The lyrics are as poetic and afecting as ever episodic tales of botanists, geographers and missionaries but you can’t really hear them over the heav y metal thunder. Instead it brings out another side of Dawson’s performance: that of the ringleader, conducting the
JOHN LEWIS
NYONE going to see Richard Dawson in concert will probably expect a certain degree of quiet reverence. He tends to play sit down venues and his accompaniment is usually acoustic and spartan, leaving plenty of sonic space to enhance his wonderfully bathetic, absurdist poetry lyrics about dead dogs in alleyways, about peasants in ffh century Northumbria, about furious dads watching their sons play football, about a man losing fngers to a Stafordshire bull terrier because he had a stick of Pepperami in his rucksack His last gig in London was a socially distanced show at the Barbican in late 2020, where he performed solo and ofen a cappella.
A returns;and eyes on moviemaking and
satirists’
The setting is a stretch of remote California farmland where Otis Hay wood Jr (aka OJ, geddit?), played by Daniel Kaluuya, is trying to maintain his family business, training horses for Holly wood. While OJ reunites with his irrepressibly no bullshit sister (Keke Palmer, charismatically pushing the boat out), neighbour Jupe (Steven Yeun), a former child TV star turned theme park owner, is having his own close encounters with whatever’s hovering in those cloud dotted skies.
BOTH SIDES OF THE BLADE
surreal not quite UFO flick;Cronenberg
The flm might have been more cutting (as it were) if Cronenberg had made it, as originally planned, 20 years ago, when body modifying artists like the notorious Orlan were a hot topic. Crimes… is still stranger and more idiosyncratic than most other flms you’ll see this year, but you can’t help thinking that the New Flesh is looking a touch wrinkly
CRIMES OF THE FUTURE It’s been a while since David Cronenberg was in the business of making what you’d think of as David Cronenberg flms visions
OPE With 2017’s Get Out, Jordan Peele made an almighty mark as a genre innovator, mixing horror with contemporary race satire, while his follow up US pushed further into wayward visionary realms His third flm, Nope, still manages to be idiosyncratic, as well as pretty watchable in a traditional menace from above sci f vein yet it’s nowhere near as provocative nor as fully conceived as his frst two
THE FORGIVEN
of
Directed Cronenberg
Brits abroad © F O C U S F E A T U R E S
Now Cronenberg Sr has returned with a flm very much in his former mode Crimes Of The Future is set at a time when “surgery is the new sex” Viggo Mortensen and Léa Seydoux play Saul and Caprice, a duo specialising in bizarre art performances: he grows new mutant organs in his body, she removes them (that said, their act is not nearly as odd as another artist’s, who gives the phrase ‘all ears’ a whole new meaning)
by David
What turns out to be up there is what you’d legitimately call a UFO, but not strictly of the usual variety but once we discover what it is, and how it’s to be tackled, the flm has largely squandered the suspense built up during a series of stop start ominous incidents Meanwhile, a surreal, unsettling strand involving a chimpanzee going ape on a bygone TV show is tacked on like a noncommittal sidebar Peele’s customary pithy commentary on America and race takes something of a back seat, beyond the foregrounding of black and Korean American cowboy characters and the reference to the frst black man seen in a moving image This is a strange, intermittently involving, but generally frustrating flm not an outright Nope, closer to a Hmmm, Maybe…
Foreign
Directed by Claire Denis Starring Juliette Binoche, Vincent Lindon Opens Sept 9 Cert To be confirmed 8 /1 0
N
affair:Ralph Fiennes and Matt Smith in The Forgiven NOPE Directed by Jordan Peele Starring Daniel Kaluuya, Keke Palmer Opens August 12 Cert 15 6 /1 0
BOTH SIDES OF THE BLADE France’s Claire Denis is one of today’s most unpredictable auteurs: while you can detect her signature in a flm, you never quite know what topic she’ll choose, or what oblique angle she’ll approach it from The follow up to her delirious science fction exploration High Life, Parisian love triangle drama Both Sides Of The Blade might ostensibly seem a little conventional Seeing Juliette Binoche and Vincent Lindon frolic amorously in a sun kissed Mediterranean at the start, you almost expect to hear that deathless ‘sha ba da ba da’ theme from A Man And A Woman.
Directed by John Michael McDonough Starring Ralph Fiennes, Jessica Chastain Opens Sept 2 Cert To be confirmed 8 /1 0 1 0 6 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
CRIMES OF THE FUTURE
The black Cronenbergian humour has returned, while this stately flm pushes the claustrophobic mood of Dead Ringers that bit further, hitting a tone of brooding
OFFICIAL COMPETITION
physical and psychic mutation, exploring the porous borders between the human, the technological and the ickily material. For a while he moved on to relatively decorous non genre dramas (A Dangerous Method, Cosmopolis) while passing the keys to his efects vault to son Brandon, whose flms Antiviral and Possessor carried on a dynastic tradition to startling efect.
Directed by Mariano Cohn, Gastón Duprat Starring Penélope Cruz, Antonio Banderas Opens Aug 26 Cert To be confirmed 8 /1 0
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austerity that makes it feel somewhat like a modern opera, without the music. The result is imposing and at times genuinely unsettling, yet somehow a little passé.
A slender narrative involves the pair’s encounter with representatives of the National Organ Registry (Kristen Stewart, Don McKellar, both nervily droll) and an outsider cult who eat purple candy bars
Starring Viggo Mortensen, Léa Seydoux Opens Sept 9 Cert To be confirmed 7 /1 0
Johnny Flynn, Will Poulter and Naomie Ackie star in Malachi Smyth’s heist thriller with a difference set on Britain’s back roads, to a soundtrack of Flynn’s original songs.
Pam Grier in Jackie Brown
OFFICIAL COMPETITION Films about flm making can be alittle alienating especially if spiked with in jokes about the Spanish and Argentinian movie worlds And yet Ofcial Competition is authentically ahoot This brisk, stylish comedy by duo Mariano Cohn and Gastón Dupra t is essentially achamber piece, albeit one mounted with luxurious style.
With such ahigh caustic comedy of misunderstanding, it takes adirector like McDonough to make the socia l satire so pitiless and acast this strong to eke out the nuances from materia l tha t a t times seems (albeit knowingly) on the nose. Fiennes musters acontemptuous dryness tha t gradually breaks down a s David approaches an eventua l moment of truth, while a cast including Said Taghmaoui and Christopher Abbott rarely put afoot wrong (although Caleb Landry Jones, characteristically, could aford to take it down severa l notches). And cinematographer Larry Smith gives the Moroccan setting aburnished lushness tha t brings out the ironic charge of aflm tha t might a t frst appea r touristic, but tha t soon veers challengingly of the beaten mora l track. JONATHAN ROMNEY
Quentin Tarantino’s 1997 Elmore Leonard adaptation returns, with ’70s action queen Pam Grier in the title role, along with Robert De Niro, Bridget Fonda, Michael Keaton and the indispensable Samuel L Jackson Still QT’s most arguably only grown up movie
Rerelease for the 1972 classic by Surrealist pioneer Luis Buñuel, in which a well-heeled group of friends repeatedly fai l to have dinner, for the strangest of reasons
JACKIE BROWN OPENS SEPTEMBER 16
But this being aDenis flm, things get considerably stranger. It’s partly because of how little she chooses to tell us. Lindon, way more understated than in the recent deranged Titane, is Jean, aformer rugby professiona l with ajail record but it takes awhile before we understand why It’s partly to do with his old associate François (Grégoire Colin), an ex of his wife Sara(Binoche), and still able to set her trembling with one of his (sometimes absurdly malign) sideways looks. Denis who explored simila r emotiona l territory with Binoche in the rather slighter Let The Sunshine In typically tends to veer away from the main narrative track to focus on topics tha t seem to drif incidentally into the picture: notably, discussions of Lebanon and the problem of ‘white thinking’, discussed on Sara’s radio show Occupying a narrative sideba r of their own are Jean’s young mixed race son (IssaPerica ) and his devoted grandmother, played by French New Wave veteran Bulle Ogier. It’s aflm tha t asks the viewer to piece it together, although it’s clearly not tha t bothered if you don’t; but the quizzica l minor key indirectness is unmistakeably Denis, down to the customary broodingly insistent score by Tindersticks
ALSO O UT. . .
Idris Elba plays a djinn to Tilda Swinton’s academic in a wry modern fairytale from Babe/Mad Max maestro George Miller.
THE DISCREET CHARM OF THE BOURGEOISIE OPENS SEPTEMBER 9
THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF LONGING OPENS SEPTEMBER 2
The Discreet Charm Of The Bourgeoisie
The Forgiven goes challengingly of f the beaten moral track
THE FORGIVEN Westerners abroad culture clash drama s can make you uneasy for all the wrong reasons and that’s something tha t writer director John Michael McDonough (The Guard, Calvary) is surely playing with in The Forgiven. Set in Morocco, and based on Laurence Osborne’s novel, the flm is, typically for McDonough, rich in pithy did they really say that? dialogue, in this case including sexist, racist and homophobic one liners in English, Arabic and the Berber language of Tamazight.
A canny satirist, McDonough knows wha t he’s doing with both language and stereotypes, making for ataut, discomfting experience Ralph Fiennes plays David, aLondon doctor with drink problems driving through the Sahara with his wife Jo (JessicaChastain) to aparty held by awealthy friend (an imperiously debonair Matt Smith) En route, they run over ayoung Berber but once they arrive a t their luxurious destination, they, their host and fellow guests seem ready to write this tragic incident of a s merely an unfortunate foreign afair. Then the boy’s father arrives a t the door.
HER WAY OPENS AUGUST 26
DRY GROUND BURNING OPENS SEPTEMBER 2
Brazilian drama takes a swipe at the Bolsonaro regime, with the story of a female favela gang hijacking an oi l pipeline.
S C R E E N P R O D / P H O T O N O N S T O P / A L A M Y S T O C K P H O T O ; R O N A L D S E M O N E T / S Y G M A / S Y G M A V I A G E T T Y I M A G E S
Laure Calamy nervy Noémie in TV’s Call My Agent! stars as a single mother and sex worker in a politically charged debut from director Cécile Ducrocq.
THE SCORE OPENS SEPTEMBER 9
neurotic, up themselves trio imaginable Lola the director (Penelope Cruz with electrically crazy hair) is aPalme d’Or winning visionary with aconfrontationa l approach to rehearsals, while the lead actors are singularly ill matched: transatlantic big screen playboy Felix (Antonio Banderas) and self important stage grandee Ivan (Osca r Martinez) Lolais counting on her stars’ enmity igniting the screen in her flm about rivalrous brothers, while her oddball directing methods turn the tension stratospheric.
Ofcial Competition is a t once elegant, urbane and deliciously silly: it hits the odd obvious note, but does so with majestic cheek It’s also a visua l pleasure, the glossy setting of acavernous modernist arts centre providing agorgeous frame for some priceless gags, both visua l and (in a scene involving multiple microphones and avery prolonged snog) resoundingly sonic.
A pompous industrialist decides to try his hand a s aflm producer, and hires only the very best director and the very best actors to adapt the most prestigious novel, hoping the result will be amonument to his glory Needless to say, the talent he enlists is about the most
“WHO is David Bowie?” wonders one of amillion anonymous narrators, cut up and cast adrif into the digital vortex of Moonage Daydream. “Where did he come from? Is he acreature of a foreign power? Is he acreep? Is he dangerous? Is he smart? Is he dumb? Nice to his parents? Real? Put on? Crazy? Sane? Man? Woman? Robot? What is this?”
If you come to Brett Morgen’s new, ofcially sanctioned Bowie biopic expecting defnitive answers to any of these questions you may be disappointed The director’s pitch to the estate back in 2016 was for an “experiential IMAX movie, no interviews, no talking heads, no biography” The frst audience he showed his fnal cut to consisted of Sean Penn, Bono, Eddie Vedder and The Edge And true to his word, for the frst half an hour at least, Moonage
As the pace slows it’s easier to take issue with what’s missing: the scufing mid ’60s aborted launches; the near absence of any voice from his collaborators (notably the mighty Davis Alomar Murray triumvirate); the Tin Machine years?
But chiefy, from the lack of any critical perspective. This is of course acondition of working with the ofcial estate: you’re given free access to aTechnicolor Xanadu of sound and vision, but you can’t attempt to interpret or explicate And so Morgen has to rely on clips of TV interviewers over the years Russell Harty calling out forlornly into the satellite void, “Are you there, Mr David Bowie?” in the style of Clem Fandango, Dick Cavett getting visibly freaked out by ademonically coked out Thin White Duke, Mavis Nicholson delivering some motherly tough love Afer all we’ve seen through his mismatched eyes over the course of two exhausting hours, the flm even concludes with some Hollywood homilies, the kind of thing Blackstar Bowie went to awesome lengths to escape.
Daydream is awork of heroic bombast, aglitter cannon bombshell, with the fragments of Bowie’s career Morgen apparently had access to fve million mediaassets from the estate archive fred at the screen at high velocity, maximum volume and intense sensory derangement
But despite his flm’s more portentous moments, Morgen never promised us profundity There will be more thoughtful, more enlightening and more suggestive flms about Bowie. But for high energy, comic book, neon cocktail thrill power, Moonage Daydream will be hard to beat Watch at maximum volume
quotes from Bowie interviews over the years, it has something of Bowie’s mid ’90s rage for chaos manifesto cutting compulsively from Metropolis to Mars, Berlin to Brixton, Danny Kaye to William Burroughs It’s relentless, demented and while he can keep all the plates spinning utterly thrilling. Blink and you might miss something never seen before: the Spiders teetering onto some early provincial stage; Jef Beck rifng along at the farewell Zigg y show, seguing from “The Jean Genie” into “Love Me Do”; hysterical footage of teenage fans on the stack heel rampage through London; Carlos Alomar conducting the band through aghostly Berlin instrumental; Bowie playing gamelan in some early ’80s Indonesian temple.
But inevitably Morgen can’t maintain the pace Moonage Daydream settles into afamiliar, if fragmentary and hyper accelerated, narrative: the occult paranoiaof Los Angeles prompting the move to the austere charm of Berlin; from the fringes of of Broadway theatre to the stadium wilderness of mid ’80s celebrity; from aesthetic isolation to uxorious splendour.
MOONAGE DAYDREAM
N EON
Characteristically, Morgen uses “Hello Spaceboy” the single from 1 Outside, Bowie’s vertiginously high concept album/non linear Gothic dramahyper cycle to soundtrack his opening barrage With selective
8/10 Wham, bam, thank you glam! Brett Morgen’s glitter cannon take on the Bowie biopic.By Stephen Troussé Bowie:plenty of spectacular sound and vision, but a paucity of analysis 108 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022 Blink and you’ll miss something never seen before
Briefy fêted by wha t Morrison ca lled “the mink coa t people” of the New York a rt set, the Velvets were a ccording to Julià rega rded a s “a bunch of sa distic homosexua ls” by Ea st Coa st hippies, though the truth wa s ra ther less exciting Reed wa s under susta ined fa mily pressure to follow his fa ther into a ccounta ncy during his time with the ba nd, while drummer Tucker wa s a regula r a t Sunda y ma ss throughout their four a lbum ca reer Julià’s interviews give plenty of ba ckground, but a lso a sense of how the members struggled to live up to their lega cy. Over the course of Linger On, Ca le a nd Reed morph from confused, uptight thirtysomethings (“Would you like to see my cock?” a coked up Ca le a sks Julià in their 1981 meeting) into something like functioning a dults, proud tha t the Velvets never rea lly a ge.
With impecca ble technique, the north Londoner rema ined a t a dista nce from the Stones’ excesses for most of his ca reer (ba rring a n unsettling midlife crisis drug problem in the 1980s) Origina l guita rist Bria n Jones ca lled him “proba bly the most deta ched a nd well a djusted person on this whole pop scene”, but Charlie’ s Good Tonight digs behind the impa ssive fa ca de to fnd something more unusua l. Ba ndma tes a nd close a ssocia tes celebra te Wa tts’ interests in ja zz, a ntiques a nd US Civil Wa r memora bilia , his a mbiva lence a bout the Stones’ music (“It’s wha t I do,” he sa id with typica l deta chment) a nd his extreme fa stidiousness. “To wa tch Cha rlie pa ck wa s like wa tching a Buddhist ceremony,” sa ys Keith Richa rds of the drummer’s ha bit of ordering his socks in strict colour order, while Wa tts’ da ughter Sera phina notes he put a lmost a s much time into wa shing up a s he did into sourcing ha ndma de shoes: “He liked things put a wa y a certa in wa y, a nd he ma de the most incredible cup of tea ” Inconsequentia l deta ils ma ybe, but given Wa tts’ disda in for the limelight, sweetly revea ling.
CHAR LIE WAT TS’ formida ble wife Shirley wa s somewha t a fronted when her husba nd returned from a la te ’60s tour in a n unusua lly bumptious mood, writing to a friend: “Cha rlie ca me home a t the weekend, full of conceit a bout being a member of The Rolling Stones So I ma de him clea n the oven.”
JIM WIRTH
Dicey digs: Tom Waits at the Tropicana Motelin LA, 1978
Waits embraced what his bassist called “self imposed poverty”
Ha ving quietly done the dirty work a s the Stones’ drummer since 1963, Wa tts died in October 2021, a ged 80. But if the ba nd ha ve forged on without him, Charlie’s Good Tonight, by group insider Pa ul Sexton, shows how no one could ever entirely fll his drumstool
OM WAITS a nd his disciple Chuck E Weiss were in their fa vourite Los Angeles cofee shop, Duke’s, one night in Ma y 1977, when the police ca me in to hustle one of the regula rs. Incensed, the duo ma de a n ill fa ted decision to intervene. As Wa its’ ma na ger Herb Cohen reca lled: “[The cops] pulled their guns, threw Tom a nd Chuck to the ground a nd ha ndcufed them They told Chuck they were a rresting them for homosexua l soliciting a nd being drunk a nd disorderly.”
If there wa s a point when Wa its’ musica l love a fa ir with the sea mier side of Los Angeles fna lly went cold, tha t might ha ve been it Alex Ha rvey’s Song Noir: Tom Waits And The Spirit Of Los Angeles tra cks Wa its’ a dventures in bohemia from his 1973 debut Closing Time to 1983’s Beefea rt frenzy Swordfshtrombones, by which time the fa mously louche Wa its ha d turned 30, got ma rried, quit smoking a nd wa s looking for somewhere more sensible to live.
B R A D E L T E R M A N / F I L M M A G I C OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 1 0 9
Song Noir shows how Wa its embra ced wha t his ba ssist Jim Hugha rt ca lled “self imposed poverty”, living in squa lor a t the dicey Tropica na Motel where he roma nced Bette Midler a nd Rickie Lee Jones before increa singly dera nged pimps, cra zies a nd Wa its superfa ns forced him out. However, if it wa s no longer sa fe to wa lk on the wild side, Ha rvey suggests the records he ma de a fer his whirlwind roma nce with Ka thleen Brenna n were much more da ngerous, with contentment a nd a move out of LA clea rly the ma king of him. “If it wa sn’t for her, I’d be pla ying a stea khouse somewhere,” Wa its sa id of the woma n he ma rried in 1980 “No, I’d proba bly be clea ning the stea khouse ”
R EVI EWE D TH I S M O NTH
SONG NOIR: TOM WAITS AND THE SPIRIT OF LOS ANGELES ALEX HARVEY REAKTION £11 8 /1 0 CHARLIE’S GOOD TONIGHT PAUL SEXTON HARPERCOLLINS £25 8 /1 0 LINGER ON: THE VELVET UNDERGROUND IGNACIO JULIÀ ECSTATIC PEACE £50 7 /1 0
T
Discovered a t a Trouba dour open mic night, Wa its’ ha rd boiled style ha d been glea ned from jotting down conversa tions he hea rd while ma king pizza s a t Na poleone’s in Sa n Diego “When I put them together, I found some sort of music hiding in there,” he sa id. He disda ined the la idba ck country rockers then in vogue “They don’t ha ve horse shit on their boots, just dogshit from La urel Ca nyon” but his Ra ymond Cha ndler ish ta kes on the da rk side of the city were rega rded a s hokey by others. Trouba dour ma na ger Robert Ma rchese wrote him of a s “a middle cla ss Sa n Diego mom a nd pop schooltea cher kid” whose work wa s merely “his impression of how funky poor folk rea lly a re”.
M AINTAINING The Velvet Underground’s forbidding mystique wa s, for Sterling Morrison, one of their grea test fea ts. As the guita rist told true believer Igna cio Julià , “We never did a ny prea ching, which is wonderful ” A cofee ta ble book cum fa nzine, Linger On brings together the Ba rcelona ba sed writer’s encounters with Lou Reed, John Ca le, Nico, Mo Tucker a nd Morrison from the ’70s onwa rd, showing how the sna rky a esthetes’ disda in for crowd plea sing endea red them to Andy Wa rhol’s inner circle
for Guns N’ Roses’ debut, Appetite For Destruction, prior to Mike Clink’s involvement.
MO OSTIN Warners honcho
SIDNEY KIRK
Not Fade FAway
Isaac Hayes’ bandleader
1927 2022
I
If the Monda ys embodied the a nything goes a pproa ch of the la te ’80s a nd ea rly ’90s, it wa s Ryder younger brother of frontma n Sha un who a nchored it to a solid groove, his punk funk rhythms a ccentua ted by guita rist Ma rk Da y. The self ta ught Ryder’s ea rly inspira tions were Motown a nd Funka delic, superseded by the emergent sounds of Chica go house in the mid ’80s Refecting on Pa ul Oa kenfold’s a nthemic 1989 remix of “Wrote For Luck”, a crossover moment tha t helped defne a cid house a s a cultura l phenomenon, Ryder commented: “It wa s the sound we’d been looking for a ll a long. When I frst hea rd it, I couldn’t believe it.”
Horn pla yer Vincent DeRosa ’s dizzying CV included sessions with Ella Fitzgera ld, Da vid Axelrod, Fra nk Za ppa , Ha rry Nilsson, Alice Coltra ne a nd Henry Ma ncini, though he wa s best known for his a ssocia tion with Fra nk Sina tra , fea turing on timeless
the group splitting soon a fer He returned for 1999’s initia l reunion, but quit two yea rs la ter due to a fra ctious rela tionship with his brother Ryder then bega n writing for TV, re emerging with his own outft, Big Arm, in 2007. The ba nd issued a sole a lbum, Radiator.
A true pioneer: PaulRyder with the Mondays at Portsmouth Pyramids, November 2017
1951 2022
Miles Davis bassist
1920 2022
Bond theme creator
ondly remembered this month…
Sinatra sideman
NTERVIEWED for John Wa rburton’s Hallelujah!, which chronicled the ca reer of Ha ppy Monda ys, Fa ctory boss Tony Wilson cla imed tha t ba ssist Pa ul Ryder wa s la rgely responsible for cha nging the complexion of British da nce music “It wa s [drummer] Ga ry Whela n a nd Pa ul Ryder who a da pted the rhythms of America n house music to English rock,” sa id Wilson. “To punk, in fa ct.”
H A R R Y H E R D / R E D F E R N S M C H A E L O C H S A R C H V E S / G E T T Y M A G E S
he wa s commissioned to write the score for Dr No, including the iconic “Ja mes Bond Theme”.
1928 2022 Ea st Ender Monty Norma n enjoyed a ca reer a s a big ba nd singer prior to composing for successful ’50s musica ls, a mong them Expresso Bongo a nd Irma La Douce But he a chieved immorta lity in 1962 when
The Ryder brothers eventua lly pa tched up their diferences when the origina l Ha ppy Monda ys lineup reunited for a rena shows a nd festiva ls in 2012 a nd beyond. The ba nd issued a limited edition cha rity single, “Ta rt Ta rt”, in Pa ul’s memory, la uding him a s “a true pioneer”.
Lea d guita rist a nd co founder Ma nny Cha rlton wa s the powerhouse behind Scottish ha rd rockers Na za reth between 1968 a nd 1990 As producer, he oversa w 1975’s pla tinum selling Hair Of The Dog, fea turing their biggest hit, “Love Hurts” In 1986, Cha rlton a lso produced 25 demos
Happy Mondays groovewrangler 1964 2022
Jazz sax explorer 1944 2022 Cla ssica lly tra ined free ja zz musicia n Ba rba ra Thompson pla yed sa xophone for a va riety of ensembles, beginning with Neil Ardley’s New Ja zz Orchestra a nd Colosseum (a longside husba nd Jon Hisema n) in the la te ’60s. She went on to co found United Ja zz + Rock Ensemble a nd lea d the groups Jubia ba a nd Pa ra pherna lia
more He a lso issued a series of solo ja zz funk a lbums.
PAUL RYDER
1941 2022
Important imprint: Mo Ostin 110 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
Nazareth mainstay
Verve executive Mo Ostin wa s poa ched by Fra nk Sina tra to run his new Reprise imprint in 1960. The compa ny’s subsequent merger with Wa rner Bros sa w Ostin guide the la bel through a n intense cultura l shif, signing Jimi Hendrix, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young a nd other signifca nt a rtists. He beca me Wa rners president in 1970, a post he held for 24 yea rs.
1943 2022 Memphis pia nist Sidney Kirk sta rted out a longside schoolma te Isa a c Ha yes in loca l R& B groups in the la te ’50s. When Ha yes emba rked on a solo ca reer a deca de la ter, Kirk beca me a crucia l pa rt of his Movement, a ppea ring on ea rly ’70s la ndma rks like Shaf, Black Moses a nd the a ll sta r soundtra ck, Wattstax.
On frst hea ring Micha el Henderson pla ying with Stevie Wonder a t New York’s Copa ca ba na in 1970, Miles Da vis informed Wonder: “I’m ta king your fucking ba ssist.” Henderson thus beca me a crucia l fgure in Da vis’s fusion era , fea turing on Live Evil, On The Corner, Agharta a nd
BARBARA THOMPSON
VINCENT DeROSA
MANNY CHARLTON
Ryder’s tenure with the ba nd he co founded in 1980 mirrored the Monda ys’ own rise a nd fa ll He rode the a rtistic a nd commercia l pea ks of Bummed a nd Pills ‘n’Thrills And Bellyaches, before sinking into heroin a buse a mid the cha otic recording of 1992’s ca la mitous Yes Please!, with
MICHAEL HENDERSON
MONTY NORMAN
SANDY ROBERTON
WILLIAM HART
BOB HEATHCOATE SuicidalTendencies bassist
D O N P A U L S E N / M C H A E L O C H S A R C H V E S / G E T T Y I M A G E S C B S V A G E T T Y I M A G E S OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 111
1928 2022
Bob Heathcote joined Suicidal Tendencies just prior to their 1988 Epic debut How Will I Laugh Tomorrow W hen I Can’t Even Smile Today, which marked their full transition from hardcore punk to crossover thrash He quit to focus on family life soon afer, replaced by Robert Trujillo (later of Metallica).
Underworld” and “The Legend of Xanadu” by Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich
Afer recording sides in London for Joe Meek as The Charles Kingsley Creation, brothers Charles and Kingsley Ward co founded Rockfeld Studios on their family farm in
RAY RAPOSA
Star turn: Nichelle Nichols in 1967
Led by teenage frontman Jim Sohns, Chicago’s Shadows Of Knight sought to add alittle Midwestern authenticity to the British Invasion sound they adored They hit big immediately with acover of Them’s “Gloria”, which made the Billboard Top 10 in early 1966, though the initial lineup disbanded afer three albums.
1964 2022
‘Poogie’ Hart was one of the less celebrated pioneers of
1942 2022
Archie Roach launched his musical career with 1990’s devastating “Took The Children Away”, based on his experience of being forcibly removed from his parents aged two. He subsequently became a leading voice of Australia’s stolen generations, releasing a series of albums and sharing stages with Bob Dylan, Patti Smith and Billy Bragg
1935 2022
CHARLES WARD Rockfield Studios co founder
ALAN BLAIKLEY Prolific UK songwriter
JIM SOHNS Shadows Of Knight singer
Ex BBC Radio narrator and producer Alan Blaikley began co writing with old schoolfriend Ken Howard in the ’60s Among their biggest successes were The Honeycombs’ “Have I The Right?”, Elvis Presley’s “I’ve Lost You”, The Herd’s “From The
1932 2022
1981 2022
ADAM WADE
ARCHIE ROACH Aboriginalsinger songwriter and activist
Previously half of ’60s duo Rick & Sandy, Edinburgh born Sandy Roberton later fared better as a producer, overseeing albums by Steeleye Span (including 1970’s Hark! The Village Wait), Shirley Collins (No Roses), Ian Matthews, Liverpool Scene and more He also formed Rockburgh Records and ran the Worlds End Producer Management Company.
Much loved TV and flm actor Bernard Cribbins frst appeared on record with the West End cast of Little Mar y Sunshine in 1962 He became a Top 10 chart star later that year with novelty singles “The Hole In The Ground” and “Right Said Fred”, both produced by George Martin. Cribbins later endeared himself to a younger generation by narrating The Wombles
Prior to becoming American TV’s frst black game show host, Adam Wade was an R&B star in the early ’60s His major successes included “Take Good Care Of Her” (later covered by Elvis), “The Writing On The Wall” and “As If I Didn’t Know”.
JAYDAYOUNGAN
Poogie man:William Hart behind the Apollo Theatre, NYC, Oct 15, 1968
W
Folk rock producer
ILLI A M
DOB UNKNOWN 2022
1946 2022
Castanets captain
1991’s similarly Trek indebted Out Of This World.
Philly soul He was lead singer and chief song writer with The Delfonics, whose smooth, mellifuous R& B lent itself to the orchestral arrangements of Thom Bell, the producer who would later work with The Stylistics, The Spinners and Deniece Williams Hart and Bell co wrote The Delfonics’ breakthrough hit, 1968’s “La La (Means I Love You)”, a pristine soul ballad given wings by Hart’s emotive falsetto. It was the beginning of a concerted run of successes through to the early ’70s, from “Break Your Promise” and “Ready Or Not Here I Come” to “You Got Yours And I’ll Get Mine” and The Delfonics’ other signature
Louisiana rapper 1998 2022
Javorius Scott, better known as JayDaYoungan, issued a steady stream of mixtapes prior to 2020’s Baby23, his full length studio debut His big lif of moment was “Elimination” (2018), followed a year later by the platinum selling “23 Island”. ROB HUGHES
1945 2022
1940 2022
works such as In The Wee Small Hours, Songs For Swingin’Lovers! and Strangers In The Night
Hart and his brother Wilbert had founded The Delfonics (originally known as The Orphonics) as a vocal group in 1965 They released a handful of Bell produced singles on local imprints Moon Shot and Cameo Parkway, but didn’t gain wider attention until hooking up with Philly Groove two years later Afer the band’s hit making prime, the Hart siblings fell out, with each fronting their own iteration of The Delfonics over the ensuing decades William also kept up a solo career that included a 2007 collaboration with ex members of The Stylistics and Blue Magic, The Three Tenors Of Soul.
Avuncular actor
Monmouthshire in 1963 It grew into a pioneering residential facility, used by Queen, Black Sabbath, Robert Plant, Iggy Pop, Oasis and hundreds more.
1956 2022
NICHELLE NICHOLS
Nichelle Nichols imprinted herself onto the popular psyche as Lieutenant Uhurain Star Trek, becoming one of the frst black women to appear regularly on American TV during the ’60s She also recorded acouple of jazz soul albums: 1967’s Down To Earth and
BERNARD CRIBBINS
1960s R&B hitmaker
Star Trekker
Delfonics mainman
Ray Raposa frst caught Sufan Stevens’ attention with 2002’s W hat Kind Of Cure. Stevens promptly signed him to Asthmatic Kitty, where Raposa heading up a revolving cast of players issued Cathedral, the frst of seven freak folk albums as Castanets He and Stevens also scored two soundtracks for flmmaker Kaleo La Belle.
moment, “Didn’t I (Blow Your Mind This Time),” with its easy groove and layered strings The latter earned Hart and Bell a Grammy in 1970, inspiring covers by Aretha Franklin, Eddie Floyd, Millie Jackson and more.
I tha nk you for the obitua ry for Ca tha l Coughla n [Aug ust issue], one of my fa vourite songwriters a nd L L A N M A Y E S
A
Emailletters@uncut.co.uk. Or tweet us at twitter.com/uncutmagazine
Uncut is not rea dily a va ila ble on the ma ga zine sta nds in Texa s, so a friend sent me a copy, a nd wha t a n edition it is! In the la te ’60s I wa s in the Tra ffic fa nclub, Fa mily were my fa vourite UK ba nd a nd Buffa lo Springfield my fa vourite US ba nd I a lso ha d a grea t fondness for Peter Green a nd Chicken Sha ck during the blues boom of 1968. I couldn’t hope to be in better compa ny in a ma ga zine with fea tures on Neil Young and R ichie Fura y, Roger Cha pma n, Chris Bla ckwell a nd Christine Perfect You a lso ma na ged to dra g up some obscure a nd new ba ckground info on the ea rly da ys of The Bea tles. If there’d been a couple of pa ges on Mick Fa rren a nd The Devia nts, it would a lmost a ppea r tha t I’d edited the perfect issue myself I should proba bly be emba rra ssed to a dmit tha t I’ve never hea rd of Osees or Sessa , but I suspect they’ve never hea rd of me either
Paul Higham, via email
Allan Mayes with Elvis Costello, his partner in folk duo Rusty, in 2015
…Ama zing CD. I love how you've turned the disposa ble ma ga zine cover CD into a genuine a rt form. Even the ordina ry ‘best of the month’s new music’ discs a re a lwa ys well thought out a nd sequenced, with bea utifully designed covers. Phil Tate, Twitter
RUSTY NEVER SLEEPS
Greetings from Austin, Texa s. Tha nk you so much for the two pa ge fea ture on our Resurrection Of Rust CD [Instant Karma, Aug ust issue] After 50 yea rs of trying, I signed my first record contra ct la st yea r a nd now a two pa ge fea ture in Uncut! Where will it end, I wonder? I knew a ll I ha d to do wa s be pa tient a nd it would a ll eventua lly ha ppen for me
Mark Gresty, via email Glad to help, Mark Here’s Johnny Echols himself with the answer for you: “The single version of ‘She Comes... in Colors’and the album version were mixed differently. The f lute and harpsichord were more prominent on the album because it was a stereo mix The single was mono, so the vocal, as well as the g uitars, were more for ward, and the ancillar y instruments were further back in the mix. Thank you for your keen obser vation ”
CATHAL COUGHLAN RIP
MANC-Y FEAT
At la st! It’s only ta ken you 304 issues but tha nk you for fina lly putting Wilco on the cover of Uncut [September issue]. I’ve been a rea der since da y one a nd I ca n think of few other ba nds who fit so snugly into wha t you do It wa s grea t timing, too
ha lf wa y between Cruel Countr y a nd the Yankee Hotel Foxtrot a nniversa ry edition a nd Nick Ha sted’s piece rea lly got to the hea rt of the ba nd a nd their lega cy The CD, mea nwhile, wa s one for the a ges. It wa s grea t to hea r those different versions of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot ’s songs a nd, a long with their Wilcovered for you from 2020, Crosseyed Strangers now ha s pride of pla ce on my CD shelves Am I the only person, by the wa y, who owns both pressings of Wilcovered on vinyl? Surely not… Susie Jeckman, Cardiff
Any wa y, tha nks once a ga in for the a rticle a nd continued support of Elvis Costello a nd his ma ny va ried musica l a dventures. Best rega rds, Allan Mayes, Austin, Texas
Ca n you clea r up something which ha s been na gging a t me a ll these yea rs. A friend of mine bought the single a nd I remember the keyboa rd a nd f lute being very different from the a lbum version Ca n you tell me if there wa s more tha n one a rra ngement of this song with different f lute a nd keys?
Tha nks for the a rticle on Love’s “She Comes In Colors” [September issue] It wa s good to hea r the ba ckstory.
Tha nks for the review of the expa nded reissue of Little Fea t’s Waiting For Columbus [September issue], which ca ptures the oddity of the live ba nd a t this time I sa w one the Ra inbow shows, a nd it wa s a bit of a cura te’s egg.
There is one error in the review though, which I think is down to Rhino Little Fea t never pla yed Ma nchester City Ha ll, a s the venue did not exist; they pla yed the Free Tra de Ha ll. They did pla y a City Ha ll,
MILES HIGH CLUB
KEYS TO LOVE
WILCOVERED…
Plea sed to report tha t the a lterna tive version of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, the @Wilco compiled CD tha t comes with the new issue of @uncutma ga zine, is very good indeed David Belbin, Twitter
The show wa s weird, with Miles a lterna ting between trumpet a nd keyboa rds Even though I still understa nd the record no better tha n in those da ys, I still a dore it just the sa me. And l listen to it on SACD, the only wa y tha t comes close to live music I a m ha ppy to ha ve most of Miles’ grea test work in tha t forma t Including Big Fun, which like Neil Hussey wrote, is a very underra ted record. And “Go Ahea d John” is so from a nother universe tha t it is ha rd to believe the trumpet a nd the guita r a re pla yed by two different persons Check it out Love your ra g when you kick a ss!
but tha t wa s in Newca stle on (I think) the nights preceding their a ppea ra nce in Ma nchester.
I a m a bit la te in rea cting to the terrific a rticle on Miles Da vis [ June issue] a nd his revolutiona ry On The Corner I wa s 17 when it ca me out a nd I ga ve it a s a birthda y present to my girlfriend who wa s four da ys younger. I stole it ba ck a nd to a pologise I took her to see Miles in Den Ha a g, some 40 clicks south from Amsterda m where we lived
Peter Daniel Blom, Bloemendaal
26 Former members of Mott The Hoople and Medicine Head joined forces in 1977 to form British (5)
E D ITO R AT LARG E Alla n Jones
12+15A Did Booker T & The MG’s wind the clock up too much? (4 2 5)
PU B LI S H I N G PRO D U CTI O N MANAG E R Craig Broadbridge
CO NTR I B UTO RS Jason Anderson, Laura Ba rton, Ma rk Bentley, Greg Cochra ne, Leonie Cooper, Jon Da le, Stephen Da lton, Stephen Deusner, Lisa Ma rie Ferla, Michael Ha nn, Nick Hasted, Rob Hughes, Trevor Hungerford, John Lewis, April Long, Da mien Love, Alasta ir McKay, Piers Ma rtin, Rob Mitchum, Paul Moody, Andrew Mueller, Sha ron O’Connell, Michael Odell, Erin Osmon, Pete Paphides, Louis Pattison, Jonatha n Romney, Bud Scoppa, Johnny Sha rp, Dave Simpson, Neil Spencer, Terr y Staunton, Graeme Thomson, Luke Torn, Stephen Troussé, Jaa n Uhelszki, Wyndha m Wa llace, Peter Watts, Richa rd Willia ms, Nigel Williamson, Tyler Wilcox, Jim Wirth, Da mon Wise, Rob Young
18 Goth seen remixing Nick Cave’s last album (8)
S E N I O R S U B E D ITO R Mike Johnson
PI CTU R E E D ITO R Phil King
D I STR I B UTE D BY Ma rketforce (UK) Ltd, 5 Churchill Place, Cana r y Wharf, London E14 E NT SE RVICES M E N
“Love And Theft” a nd Time Out Of Mind sta nd next to Dyla n’s ’60s gia nts m b v is actua lly on a pa r with Loveless. Portishead’s Third has been completely underrated by myself, a nd unfortunately, despite approaching with the most open ea rs, I ca nnot listen to The Hold Steady a nd those voca ls ouch!!
23 The NME once declared, “1977 is the year of The ” (5)
8+2D No amount of questioning will reveal this song from Richard Ashcroft (3 3 7)
I have just finished this, and what a rewarding journey it was Albums that had become too familiar were heard in new ways with certain albums I hadn’t played for years.
R EVI EWS E D ITO R Tom Pinnock
MacColl, 21+16D Run DMC, 26 DW, 31+23A Paolo Nutini, 32+7D Ryan
13 Idles’ music restricted to one channel only (5 4)
1 In Search Of Space, 9 Santa Fe, 10 Embrace, 11 Lees, 14 On Hold, 16 Delgados, 19 Ewan
The letters in the shaded squares form an anagram of a song by Joni Mitchell. When you’ve worked out what it is, email your answer to: competitions@uncut co uk The first correct entry picked at random will win a prize Closing date: Wednesday, September 14, 2022
Certa in highlights or insights?
Your promotion of quality artists has completely enriched, educated and informed my own musical journey over the years I decided to play every album I had on the list from 300 to the No 1 spot. Rules were simple in order and the full album no skipping
28 Serving no purpose, like a Depeche Mode single (7)
11 Johnny , godfather of rhythm’n’blues or his son Shuggie (4)
performers of the past 40 years Desperately sad to lose Catha l, especia lly as he seemed to have entered a nother fruitful phase with last yea r’s excellent solo a lbum Song Of Co Aklan a nd this yea r’s brillia nt a lbum a nd videos from Telefis. I a m pig sick at never having seen Catha l play live.
14 His albums include Sacred Love and The Bridge (5)
THAN KS TO :Johnny Sharp
3 (See 24 across)
13 Unorthodox start to a single by Muse (3)
2 (See 8 down)
7 Krautrockers making an appearance during a tune up (3)
4 Razorlight’s No 1 hit single (7)
E D ITO R Michael Bonner
ETWORKS C H I E F E XE C UTIVE O F F I C E R Meng Ru Kuok C H I E F O PE R ATI N G & CO M M E RC IAL O F F I C E R Holly Bishop MANAG I N G E D ITO R Jeremy Abbott ART D I R E CTO R Simon Freeborough PRO D U CTI O N E D ITO R Eusta nce Hua ng R E G I O NAL E D ITO R ( APAC) Karen Gwee H EAD O F MAR KETI N G Benedict Ra nsley S E N I O R MANAG E R O PE R ATI O N S & E M PLOYE E E N GAG E M E NT Amy Fletcher CO NTE NT PRO D U CTI O N AS SO C IATE Billy Chua NME Networks Media Limited, Griff in House 135 High Street, Crawley West Sussex, RH10 1DQ A Caldecott Music Group Company OCTOBE R 2022 • U NCUT • 113 All content copyright NME Networks Media Limited 2022, a ll rights reser ved While we ma ke ever y effort to ensure that the factua l content of UNCUT Magazine is correct, we ca nnot ta ke a ny responsibility nor be held accountable for a ny factua l errors printed No pa rt of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieva l system or resold without the prior consent of NME Networks Media Limited UNCUT Magazine recognises a ll copyrights conta ined within this issue Where possible, we acknowledge the copyright NME Networks is a pa rt of Ca ldecott Music Group
OCTOBER 2022
THE 300
H I DDE N ANSWE R “Wild Honey Pie”
S E N I O R D E S I G N E R Michael Chapma n
Working my way through @ uncutmagazine’s 300 Greatest Albums of its lifetime, one per day. Not everything is for me, but overall great stuff so far Today it’s No 249, the Handsome Family’s In The Air @neil fettes, via Twitter
…I was inspired by your 300th issue with its list of 300 of the best albums released during Uncut ’s lifespa n I have 287 of your list, la rgely due to Uncut ’s inf luence a nd introduction to a rtists such as Weyes Blood, Sufja n Stevens a nd Low over the yea rs.
5 A classy lady associated with both Genesis and The Stranglers (7) 6 (See 22 down)
17 Mark Knopf ler provided the music to this 1983 Bill Forsyth film (5 4)
15 (See 12 across)
25 Levon , drummer and vocalist for The Band (4)
Adams, 34+28A Muddy Waters, 35 Old Kit DOWN
20 Owl, 22 Newport, 25 ELP, 27+3D Look Away, 29 Tom, 32 Ry, 33 No
So, tha nks aga in for the introductions a nd the continuing qua lity musica l taste a nd for giving my wife the perfect vehicle in which to, yet aga in, laugh at my tendency to OCD Alexander George, Glasgow
ANSWERS:TAKE 303 ACROSS
” , opening track to Elton John’s album Goodbye Yellow Brick Road (8)
20 Strange duet in a difficult age from Steeleye Span (7)
22+6D Their singles include “Glittering Prize” and “Up On The Catwalk” (6 5)
10 “Nothing he’s got he really needs, 21st schizoid man” , King Crimson (7)
1+24D+24 A It’s All Over Now Baby Blue, 2 Sense, 4+30D Cherry Red, 5 One Love, 6 Sobbing, 8 Eyeless, 13+12A Flamin’ Groovies, 15 Heart, 17 Lol, 18 Dark,
24+3D “I know it ain’t much but it’s the best I can do” , 1971 (4 4)
29 “And I guess this just goes to show, the dream of the casino soul” , The Fall (3)
HOW TO ENTER
31 “Funeral For A Friend/Love Lies
9 Franz Ferdinand performance in the afternoon (7)
CLUES DOWN
E D ITO R (O N E S H OTS) John Robinson
CLUES ACROSS
ART E D ITO R Ma rc Jones
1+6A That relationship between Barâ t and Doherty? This time it’s personal (4 5 2 3)
CO NTR I B UTI N G E D ITO R Sa m Richa rds
TE X T AN D COVE RS PR I NTE D BY Gibbons UK Ltd
PRODUCTION & OPE RATIONS
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CROSSWORD
One vinylcopy of Dr John’s Things Happen That Way
This competition is only open to European residents.
30 “Is it getting better or do you feel the same?” , 1992 (3)
32 The Rolling Stones’ debut single, a cover of Chuck Berry (4 2)
COVE R PH OTO G R APH :Henr y Diltz
5HU CLI
27 Metal fusion on a Neil Young album (4)
And you would have to be na iled to the f loor not to da nce like a madman if you play “Bra in Blister” by Fatima Ma nsions, I reckon I da re not play that one when driving in the ca r! Keith Rhodes, via email
21 Keyboard player with The Nice before joining a supergroup (7)
I would encourage all to explore his magnificent music CV, starting with Microdisney in the ’80s, followed by often brilliant, and never boring, Fatima Mansions in the ’90s and then a series of fine solo albums in the last 20 years.
PRO D U CTI O N E D ITO R Mick Meikleha m
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32
16+19A That single connection between David Bowie and The Jam (8 9)
1 “The child is grown, the dream is gone/ I have become ” , 1979 (11 4)
Altered Images’ new album Mascara Streakz is out on August 2 6 via Cooking Vinyl
It’s a n obvious one, but I couldn’t lea ve it out. This wa s proba bly one of my first purcha ses a s a n a lbum, going to Woolworths with my own money And it seems every bit a s good toda y a s it did then There’s nothing like Parallel Lines to get you rea dy for a big night out Tra ck a fter tra ck… it’s like a Grea test Hits a lbum. The genius of tha t a lbum is why Altered Ima ges rea lly wa nted to work with Mike Cha pma n; one of my cla ims to fa me is tha t when we recorded Bite out in Los Angeles with Mike Cha pma n, I got to use the sa me microphone a s Debbie Ha rry She’s a lwa ys been one of my biggest inf luences
The Thorns AWARE, 2003
SELF ESTEEM
I’m loving the recognition this a lbum is getting It comes from such a persona l pla ce a nd I think tha t people sometimes underestima te how difficult it is to expose yourself on tha t level in your writing When I first sta rted listening to this a lbum, one of my first thoughts wa s, ‘I’d rea lly like my da ughter to hea r this’, beca use it dea ls with so ma ny things tha t young people ha ve to come up a ga inst. But I love the optimism a nd the joy a nd the cheekiness of it. I might a dd tha t the ba cking voca ls a re extra ordina ry. I’m a big fa n of ha rmonies a nd these voca ls a rra ngements a re stunning I think music should be loud a nd proud, a nd this is
I’ve a lwa ys loved Gra ce Jones, how ca refree she is. There rea lly a ren’t ma ny people who could get a wa y with na ked hula hooping, a nd yet she ma kes it seem like the most na tura l thing in the world Nightclubbing is a work of genius, just a bsolutely glorious There’s so ma ny sta ndout tra cks, including “Pull Up To The Bumper” which of course I wa s completely oblivious to the rea l mea ning of when I wa s young. I love the moment when it suddenly da wns on you wha t she’s a ctua lly ta lking a bout. I’m gigging a lot a t the moment a nd we a lwa ys ha ve a big Gra ce Jones moment in the dressing room before we go on sta ge
Clare Grogan
THE THORNS
DAVID ESSEX
She’s a singer from Ca pe Verde who wa s known a s the Ba refoot Diva beca use she never wore shoes Miss Perfumado kinda tra nsla tes a s ‘Miss Sweet’ a nd yet she sings these a bsolutely hea rtbrea king songs. It ta kes me ba ck to when I moved into the house tha t I live in now. We were getting a lot of work done a nd we were pretty much living in one room, indoor ca mping for a yea r; a t night we’d light ca ndles a nd listen to this a lbum Her voice is just so extra ordina ry to me I feel tha t you’ve got to be overwhelmed by music, it’s got to push you right over And this voice a nd this a lbum pushes me over.
Miss Perfumado LUSAFRICA, 1992
Rock On CBS, 1973
Prioritise Pleasure UNIVERSAL 2021
GRACE JONES Nightclubbing ISLAND 1981
DAVID BOWIE Station To Station RCA, 1976
BLONDIE ParallelLines CHRYSALIS, 1978
Te Altered Images frontwoman on the records that could make her happy: “You’ve got to be overwhelmed by music”
I’m a ma ssive Da vid Bowie fa n During lockdown, I wa s going running rea lly ea rly in the morning; the streets were so quiet, I could run a round North London bellowing songs a t the top of my voice. I sta rted going through the whole Bowie ca ta logue while I wa s running a nd I kept coming ba ck to Station To Station. I a lwa ys remember wa tching the Cracked Actor documenta ry a nd thinking, ‘This ma n is the most gorgeous, cool person on the pla net ’ And he looked rea lly different to the Bowie I knew from Zigg y Stardust a nd Aladdin Sane His a bility to reinvent himself, his desire to keep moving… tha t’s wha t being a rock sta r’s a bout rea lly, isn’t it?
I think a lot of people got to know a bout The Thorns from Ricky Gerva is’s After Life, where he uses one of their tra cks. An a coustic rock ba nd is not something I would norma lly lea n towa rds, but the ha rmonies of Ma tthew Sweet, Peter Droge a nd Sha wn Mullins a re incredible It reminds me of spending lots of time in Los Angeles when the a lbum first ca me out I wa s in this a ma zingly exciting pla ce tha t wa s quite a lien a s well, a nd the comfort of this music wa s so importa nt I don’t understa nd a n enormous a mount a bout the technica lities of ma king records I get people to help me with tha t! but the songcra ft here is rea lly glorious.
SALT ’N PEPA Hot CoolVicious NEXT PLATEAU, 1986
I got a sked to do a pla y in Edinburgh a bout a cra zy celebrity a erobics tea cher I decided to tra in in a erobics so tha t I could be more convincing in this role, a nd a ll my routines were to tra cks from this a lbum. “Push It” is a rea lly brillia nt song to do a bdomina l crunches to The first time I went to New York [in the early ’80s], my big memory of tha t trip wa s seeing hip hop everywhere a nd a bsolutely loving it It wa s litera lly those scenes of New York when it wa s rea lly rough a nd grimy, a nd people with ma ssive ghettobla sters in the streets. Finding music like tha t in its a uthentic sta te is a bsolutely incredible. And then I turned it into a n a erobics cla ss!
114 • U NCUT • OCTOBE R 2022
I grew up in a household of three genera tions who a ll loved music, which wa s a n a bsolute gift But they a ll ha d their own ta stes, they a ll ha d their own record collection, a nd we only ha d one record pla yer so music wa s a lwa ys a bit of a fight! When I wa s given Rock On for my birthda y, I wa s thrilled. The title tra ck completely blows my mind, it’s just the most extra ordina ry song. And the production is a ma zing I think it’s Jeff Wa yne Even a t tha t ea rly point in my life, there wa s something a bout the production of the record tha t rea lly spoke to me I a lwa ys like music tha t ma kes me feel overwhelmed a nd this wa s the sta rt of tha t feeling
N T E R V E W S A M R C H A R D S
CESÁRIA ÉVORA
SUPER DELUXE COLLECTOR’S EDITION THE FIRST EVER AUTHORIZED BLONDIE ARCHIVAL PROJECT IN THE BAND’S HISTORY CREATED WITH THE INVOLVEMENT OF ALL SEVEN ORIGINAL MEMBERS AL SO ON 8CD, 4LP, 3CD AND DIGITAL OUT AUGUS T 26TH
