Forty Minutes Of Arthur Russell

Firstly I should probably admit to being in no way an expert on Arthur Russell. I've got various tracks and a handful of albums but don't feel like I've done much more than scratched the surface of his music and on top of that I always feel with Russell's music there's something unknowable about it, something just out of reach. Sometimes it feels like his songs drift by like they've been caught by the breeze. I often feel like I'm slightly out of step when listening to them- but when they hit though, when the penny drops, they have a deep impact. 

Arthur was a cellist, producer, singer and songwriter from Iowa who moved to New York in the mid- 70s and became very much a part of the Manhattan avant garde scene and then New York's disco world. He recorded dance music as Dinosaur L and moved in circles with Peter Gordon, Talking Heads, Allen Ginsburg and Nicky Siano. He released only two albums during his lifetime- 1983's Tower Of Meaning (an orchestral piece) and 1986's weird and wonderful World Of Echo (cello and voice, dub disco and acres of space and echo) plus an album as Dinosaur L 24- 24. Arthur died in 1992 from AIDS related illnesses. In the years since his death a series of albums have been released, putting more and more previously unheard Arthur Russell songs out into the world and his reputation and influence have grown and grown. 2004's Calling Out Of Context is as good a place to start with the posthumous releases along with The World Of Arthur Russell from the same year. 

This mix is based on my incomplete knowledge of Arthur's music and isn't much more than some of my favourites thrown together in an order that seemed pleasing. 

Forty Minutes Of Arthur Russell

• A Little Lost
• In The Light Of A Miracle
• Time Away
• Calling Out Of Context
• See Through Love
• In The Corn Belt (Larry Levan Mix)
• I Like You!
• That's Us- Wild Combination
• Let's Go Swimming

A Little Lost jumps in with Arthur singing 'I'm a little lost/ Without You/ That could be an understatement...' accompanied by his cello and warm, wobbly echo. It came out on the posthumous album Another Thought, the first recordings released after his death in 1993 and is a good scene setter for Arthur's music- all those weird, non- obvious qualities that make his songs so unique. See Through Love is from the same album, a song that bubbles and echoes, as if recorded underwater. 

In The Light Of A Miracle was another unreleased during his lifetime track, one that came out on Philip Glass's insistence on Another Thought. It was a Loft classic (David Mancuso's NY invite only underground dance party/ space) and has been remixed various times to transcendent effect. The version here is the original mix, a shapeshifting, otherworldly piece of music, impossible to pin down, floating in some space between avant garde, disco dub and house- while sounding like none of those. 

Time Away is from Love Is Overtaking Me, a record that is an outlier in the Russell catalogue- no jazz inflected disco or avant garde cello and space experiments but more traditional songs, just voice and acoustic guitar. Time Alone is minimal and naive, a song about tidying up his room, Modern Lovers indebted perhaps. 'I'm taking time away/ To dream'.

Calling Out Of Context is a collection of songs Arthur recored between 1985 and 1990, released in 2004 and containing some of his most brilliant work- the title track blends voice, percussion, guitar and keys and boundless experimentation to create something really special. That's Us- Wild Combination is from the same record, a joyous anthem with Jennifer Warnes sharing vocals. It seems to me that one of the main presences on these tracks, the main sounds, is New York, the spaces and rooms and spirit of the world he lived in. I Like You! is also from Calling Out Of Context, a strange and murky stew, electronics, cello, percussion and voice. 

In The Corn Belt was one of Arthur's Dinosaur L tracks, NY dance music remixed by Larry Levan, the man who DJed for a decade at Paradise Garage, splicing dub and disco, hugely influential and pioneering post- disco/ pre- house scene, playing records on turntables with live synths and drum machines. 

Let's Go Swimming is the final song on World Of Echo, a short and simple meditation and a totally unconventional marriage of cello, folk/ disco, tape delay and voice-

'To the north part of it
The country I was made to
Cause were you been I go
That's where you'll always go
I'm banging on your door
Up in the big blue sky
When you let the water in'

Half An Hour Of The Clash Edited, Sampled And Remixed

The Clash, remixed, edited and sampled for a thirty three minute blast of Strummer/ Jones energy and invention for your Sunday morning delectation. Best played loud. 

Half An Hour Of The Clash Edited, Sampled And Remixed 

• Return To Brixton (SW2 Dub)
• Dancing (Not Fighting)
• Rock The Spectre (Peza Edit)
• Magnificent Dub (Leo Zero Edit)
• I'm Not Down (Hold Your Head Up)
• Davis Road Blues (Don Letts Culture Clash Radio Version)

In 1990 The Clash had a number one single eight years after they split up (for the purposes of this we'll take Mick being sacked from the band as the actual moment they split up even though the five man Clash rumbled on for two years with a largely unloved album and a busking tour that those involved seemed to enjoy). Should I Stay Or Should I Go went to number one and saw a surge in Clash related activity, one of which was the record company CBS reissuing Paul's 1979 song Guns Of Brixton in remixed form as Return To Brixton. The remixes of Return To Brixton, three of them on the 12", were done by DJ Jeremy Healy.

Edit: it occurs to me now that the re- issue/ remixes of Guns Of Brixton were in response to the bassline being sampled for Norman Cook's chart topping single Dub Be Good To Me as Beats International, number one in January 1990. 

Dancing Not Fighting came out last year, a thumping, beat driven, high octane Jezebell release that  samples Mick Jones screaming at bouncers in the film Rude Boy, trying to get them to stop beating up Clash fans. The band disowned the film by the time it came out but the live footage of the band is among the finest committed to tape by anyone, anywhere. Here they are in July 1978 doing (White Man) In Hammersmith Palais at the Glasgow Apollo. 

This seven minute clip has them powering through Complete Control, Safe European Home and What's My Name at the Music Machine in Camden a few weeks later. 

Rock The Spectre is a Peza edit, what happens when the Strummer and Jones vocals from Rock The Casbah are played over Mystic Thug's Brocken Spectre (Mystic Thug is Tici Taci's Duncan Gray). What happens is you get the song completely recast in a new light, reborn, Mick and Joe's voices over a throbbing piece of slinky 2023 chug. Joe's vocal particularly shows he gave absolutely everything in the studio. 

Magnificent Dub is a Leo Zero edit, the Magnificent Dance (a B-side to the Magnificent 7 single, released in 1981, inspired by the band's time in New York and Mick especially being taken with the brand new hip hop culture). Some of the vocals Leo throws into this edit are from the band playing live at Bonds, Times Square and various people having a go at the bassline ((played originally by Norman Watt- Roy when Simonon was out of town filming The Fabulous Stains). Leo also inserts some sections from the unreleased, unofficial Larry Levan version of Mag 7. 

In 2005 when mash up culture was the big new thing a whole host of artists/ bedroom bootleggers threw everything they had at a completely remixed, re- edited and mashed up version of the album London Calling. The Clash found themselves (unofficially) rubbing shoulders with The Streets, Peaches, Vanilla Ice, Chuck D, Outkast and host of others sampled artists. It was massive fun. E-jitz took Mick's 1979 album track I'm Not Down and spliced it with the vocal from Boris Dlugosch's speed house track from 1997, Hold Your Head Up (vocal courtesy of Inaya Davis).

Davis Road Blues is a dub track by Prince Blanco with Mick's guitar from B.A.D.'s The Bottom Line and Joe's voice from a radio interview describing his first meeting with Mick and Paul that led to the formation of The Clash, a meeting that took place at 22 Davis Road, Shepherd's Bush (in a squat Paul shared with Sid Vicious and Viv Albertine).

Edit: the squat at 22 Davis Road has appreciated in value since the 1970s, as you'd expect. According to Rightmove 23 Davis Road was sold in 2018 for £480, 000 (that was just half the property, a ground floor two bedroom flat). Full houses on Davis Road, number 43 for example, go for around £840, 000 (2022 price). The 2020s version of Paul, Viv and Sidney must be living elsewhere.  

Stand On The Word

Well it took a while but it's finally Friday. The first Friday of September, the first Friday of the new school term and new school year- so getting there at the end of a week that has felt like it's been nine days long is worth celebrating. This song, a piece of New York gospel that got picked up and played in several legendary New York clubs in the mid 80s, is a celebration and a half. One of those who picked up on it and played it as the sun came up after all nighters at the Paradise Garage was dj Larry Levan. For a long time this song had brackets after the title which would read (Larry Levan Remix) but it's a mistake, a myth that has been fairly widely debunked. Levan played the record but didn't remix it. It doesn't really matter. Hold your hands up and sing.

Stand On The Word