cluster and eno

In the summer of 1976 Brian Eno hooked up with Harmonia (Michael Rother, plus the Cluster duo of Dieter Moebius and Hans-Joachim Roedelius) and recorded some music that wasn't issued for over 20 years. Eventually issued as Tracks And Traces in 1997, the pieces show the musicians creating some beautiful soundscapes, but the end result is a little aimless at times.  

The following year Eno joined Moebius and Roedelius at Conny Plank's studio in Koln. The results this time were more focused and two superb albums emerged.  

The first - Cluster & Eno - was released just a few months after the June sessions, the second - After The Heat - followed in early 1978. 

Musically these two albums are very like a sort of slightly more intense, slightly more warped, slightly more weird version of Eno's contemporaneous Music For Films. Some of the tracks, like "Old Land" or the angelically pretty "Fur Luise" could easily have fitted onto MFF or Before And After Science - in fact "Old Land" is actually pretty similar to Eno's "Dover Beach" in with its lovely synth washes. But the more rhythmic tracks, like "Oil" or "Die Bunge" have a much more definitely Germanic air about them. They are also pretty odd. More so than any Eno solo pieces from this time. The more traditional musical training of Roedelius shines through too - "Mit Simaen" is classically beautiful. 

Then, at the end of After The Heat, we have the three songs. These are very Enoid, as we would expect, with "The Belldog" being one of the loveliest songs Eno has ever created. I love the spacey-ness of it all, the twinkling synths, the burbling rhythms. Eno's vocal is excellent too. Restrained and perfectly pitched. The other two songs are perhaps not quite as wonderful but both are impressive - "Broken Head" is graced with a superbly deep soundscape, full of relentless swirls and swoops, and I love Eno's deadpan delivery. And "Tzima N'Arki" is just loopy. A brilliantly jumpy backing track, with Holgar Czukay guesting on bass, and the backwards vocals all making for a fantastically disorientating song (and the fact that some of the vocals are the chorus of "King's Lead Hat" but run backwards somehow makes it even better). Yet, listening to it today I was surprised that despite the sheer weirdness of the track I was happily so familiar with it that it felt reassuring and friendly too.

I get that with songs by people like Laurie Anderson or Scott Walker too. A track like "Tzima N'Arki" or Scott's "The Cockfighter" might pop up on shuffle and I love it like an old friend, but objectively I know that it's genuinely weird beyond belief. Sometimes if a track like this crops up in the car and Charley is with me and hearing it for the first time, to her it's mad, bonkers and freaky. To me it's perfectly normal! 

toyah - it's a mystery

This cropped up on the iPod shuffling just now....Toyah's 1980 single "It's A Mystery". 

What a thoroughly enjoyable song it is. The chorus, despite being lively and pretty epic is also oddly downbeat and has a welcome melancholy edge to it. But what really struck was that fact this song would never be made today. Or at least it wouldn't sound anything like this. 

Toyah's vocals are a little ragged and clearly untrained, with lots of squeaks and pitching which is just about on the right note, but it's perfect for this song, giving it an energy and charm that is unique. And if this song was to be made today, Toyah's slight lisp would probably be erased, the rest of the vocals autotuned to hell and any interest and quirkiness would be sucked right out of it.

Also on shuffle earlier, from around the same time as "It's A Mystery", the Passions' brilliant "I'm In Love With A German Film Star". Wonderfully languid and disinterested sounding vocals in the classic New Romantic style. The Passions supported Roxy Music on some dates around 1981 - that would have been a good bill, an appropriately fashionable and classy looking band supporting Bryan and the boys. They never did anything else to rival "German Film Star" though. A quick look at Wikipedia reveals that the band pretty much broke up soon after this hit with their main songwriter leaving due to "serious political differences" - makes a change from musical differences!  

television - queen elizabeth hall, london, 21 june 2005

More from the written years ago but never used pile...

Although it said 7.45 on the ticket I think everyone was surprised when the last call bell rang at 7.45 and Television actually ambled onto the stage. Nothing in the way of Good Evening London, or even any acknowledgement that they were even on stage. Richard Lloyd looked really scruffy! Horrible red shirt and terrible sweatpants rolled up at the ankles. At least Fred Smith and Tom Verlaine wore regulation black jeans...

A surprisingly brief bit of noodling / tooning and we were off into the first of a whole bunch of new songs. Really new ones, not even the ones that they have been performing over the last few years. These were brand new. And good too - quite rocky in places. The opening new piece, apparently called "Flower Spasm" at the moment led into a spirited "Venus" and the always welcome "1880 Or So", the long jam at the end lifting the song into the stratosphere. 

Then four new ones in a row! The new songs were, on the whole, rather tasty. No idea what they were about as the words were sung in Tom's usual strangled goat voice (Richard Lloyd's description!) and he often didn't bother to get too close to the microphone. Even when he did, his voice was mixed too low for most of the first half of the show anyway and was therefore overpowered by (mainly) Richard's guitar. Of these tracks, "The Sea" is a mighty impressive slice of moody, swirly rock and one of the best tracks Television have ever done in my opinion. Since 2002 they've played about 8 or 9 new songs - so when's the album coming out? (**)

In between the songs Tom consulted with his music stand containing his "note... book" as he called it. He speaks with loooonnng pauses in the oddest places. He also muttered something about "we like to come and play in European theatres. It's like rehearsing on stage. That means we'll be really good when we get back to our practice room..."

Tom actually seemed quite cheery though, in his usual distracted manner. According to TV, Richard plays the "Strat - o - cast - or..." and Fred plays the "bass" but he pronounced it like the fish... it seemed to amuse him though! 

Lots of protracted tuning while Fred stood and watched. Billy Ficca used these times to tap everything he could find with his drumsticks and occasionally he managed, in this way, to lead these seemingly random tunings into actual songs. Richard seemed quite chirpy too but still looks like he's gonna murder someone when he takes a solo, and he holds his guitar as if it's really pissed him off somehow, so he's gonna strangle that mother soooo hard... But what magnificent playing! It's fascinating to see them up close and watch the constant swapping of lead lines. "Marquee Moon" is a good example - Tom plays the choppy riff at the start of the song as Richard does the fiddly bits, but somehow they seamlessly swap over for the long solo in the middle. As usual there's very little interaction between the band members - they barely look at each other. 

Old favourites - "Venus", "See No Evil", "Prove It", "Call Mr. Lee", "1880", and of course "Marquee Moon" were all dispatched with a freshness that pleased me. "Mr. Lee" was especially good, a really chunky sound from Lloyd. 

Then after a great encore of "Little Johnny Jewel" another, shorter mic stand appeared on stage and when they all wandered back again they were accompanied by Patti Smith in battered leather boots and a sort of tweed jacket over a lurid orange t-shirt. With her glasses and her greying frizzy hair she looked like a scary granny. She launched into a semi-improvised song / poem - about Ophelia it appeared - backed by a top new tune from Television. It was a really great, powerful piece - Patti reading most of the words from her notebook and Tom grinning occasionally at her. Must have been written / made up on the night as it referred to the summer solstice. Very cool anyway.  

Then they all wandered off again and the lights came up. It all seemed over rather abruptly but they'd played for nearly two hours, so we can't complain.

Set list...

Flower Spasm

Venus

1880 Or So

Kinks' Song

Balloon

The Sea 

Shirley's Song (Frustration)

Prove It

Persia

Call Mr. Lee

See No Evil

Marquee Moon

Little Johnny Jewel

Ophelia (?), featuring Patti Smith...

...case closed!

** - 12 years on and there's still no sign of the album, nor do we have any idea what's happened to all the new tracks, as Television have stopped playing them! 

suede - a new morning

I seem to be one of the only people in the world who likes the final Suede album before they split for a while in 2003 - A New Morning. It pretty much bombed when it was released, barely scraping the Top 20 (all their previous albums made number 1), the accompanying singles didn't bother charts much (though "Positivity" was one of their biggest sellers in most European countries - especially Denmark) and despite generally favourable reviews from the press it was the fans, crucially, who had always defended Suede against every criticism, who seemed to turn against the album. Quite why is a mystery. Suede's concerts from 2002 and 2003 were some of the best, and best received gigs of their career. Critically acclaimed shows, sold out everywhere, yet the album they were promoting sold next to nothing. 

To add insult to injury 2003's Singles collection didn't even reach the top 30 despite containing all 21 of their singles, most of which had been top 10. It seems that by 2003 Suede had become utterly irrelevant to the general public. A strange and very sudden turn of fate - in 1999 all the singles from Head Music had charted well, and that album was their biggest seller.

Anyway, A New Morning, whilst not being the strongest Suede album is by no means the disaster that everyone seems to think it is. The opening track and lead off single "Positivity" is delightful - summery, up beat and very catchy, backed with a lovely string arrangement. I'm at a loss to explain why this song attracted so much disdain. Maybe it wasn't murky and grimy enough for the old Suede fans. The next track "Obsessions" is a real return to basics - a classic Suede rocker with Brett on top form vocally. His singing voice had lowered slightly from the whine of the first album to a more gravely rasp vaguely reminiscent of Richard Butler of the Psychedelic Furs. Many of the following tracks adhere to the band's initial desire to record a sort of electric folk album. Gentle guitars, piano, mellotron and strings mix with some glorious backing vocals and genuinely uplifting and laid back melodies - "Lost In TV" is a wonderful example of this, with it's catchy chorus it could have been a great summer hit. 

Interestingly the whole album was recorded at least once before being scrapped and redone. The original versions, recorded with Beck producer Tony Hoffer, circulate and it's hard to hear why they were dropped. Not only do they sound excellent, with some intriguing electronic flourishes, but the eventually released versions recorded mostly by Stephen Street, really don't sound that different and none of the released versions are appreciably better. It's as if Suede had a weird crisis of confidence that was never satisfactorily resolved.  

There are still some harder songs - "You Belong To Me" is up there with the best ever Suede riffs, though on this one I find Brett's vocals strongly reminiscent of Scott Walker (and why was it relegated to bonus track status??). The song is fast and pounding with a great circular guitar signature but somehow the vocals are cool and relaxed and remarkably similar to Scott's laconic drawl on some the Walker's more up beat numbers. "One Hit To The Body" is classic Suede, but arguably the most impressive songs are the quieter ones - "Astrogirl" has a delightfully woozy mellotron sound, and the hidden track "Oceans" is gorgeous. 

It's a feel good album, full of nifty tunes and melodic invention. Should have been a much bigger hit, and really deserving of rediscovery.