2024 In Dub

The list making has started. Some of my blogging compadres have already pressed the Best Of 2024 button. At some point before Christmas I will post an end of year review and list. In the meantime, here's some of 2024's highest quality dubwise sounds wrapped up in an hourlong mix- there's much more that could have fitted into this mix too but in the end I wanted to keep it to under sixty minutes. Repetitive, bass heavy, echo- laden and spacious sounds for Sunday. 

2024 In Dub

• Coyote: Living In Heaven
• BTCOP: Sabre 540 (Rude Audio Remix)
• Five Green Moons: Garbage Van Exhaust
• Uj Pa Gaz: Roxy (Hardway Bros Meets Monkton Uptown)
• David Harrow and Little Annie: End Of Times (Rude Audio's Immutable Remix)
• Hugo Nicolson and David Harrow: Revolvalution (Dan Wainwright and Rude Audio VIP Remix)
• Justin Robertson's Deadstock 33s: In Minus Shadows
• The Woodentops: Dream On (Rolo's Dub)
• Richard Norris: Fever Dub
• Coyote: OMG

In early December Coyote released a dub 12", two huge dub tracks,Living In Heaven and OMG,  that are in their own description 'light as a feather- heavy as lead'. 

Living in Heaven sounds like it be from side six of Sandinista!, a massive compliment in this household- it also has a touch of the Sabres Of Paradise Ysaebud single. Rattling bassline, echo and vocal sample. Coyote add some strings. Lovely deep stuff

Rude Audio's remix of BTCOP's Sabres 540 came out on Tici Taci in February, a remix that Rude Audio's Mark Ratcliff thinks his among his best work. He's right. 

Five Green Moons is Justin Robertson's latest venture, a post- punk/ pagan dub excursion, an eleven track album that continues to reveal new depths with each play. Justin appears later on too, with a track from the EP he released on the excellent Pamela label in April, four tracks all to some extent infused with dub. 

Uj Pa Gaz is from Tirana, Albania, a Tici Taci recording artist, producer and DJ. Roxy came out in late July and appears here in Hardway Bros Meets Monkton Uptown remix , heavy duty dub action from Sean Johnston and Duncan Gray. There is a very beguiling Middle Eastern melody line that plays out from the start, tumbling percussion, rimshots, delay and the deep hit of dub bass.

David Harrow has turned sixty this year and has celebrated with a release every month, a treasure trove of music emanating from his LA studio. His EP with On U legend Little Annie, the New York post- punk/ dub poet, had the original version of End Of Times, an instrumental, an acapella, and six remixes, two by Rude Audio- the Immutable and Protean Remixes. The Immutable is the dubbier of the two, a dubbed out rhythm underpinning Little Annie's poetry, 'this is not a happy hour'.

And Rude Audio turn up again, their third appearance here, now with the assistance of the wonderful Dan Wainwright. They took a track recorded by two former Andrew Weatherall cohorts- David Harrow and Hugo Nicolson and spun out into psychedelic dub complete with a brain melting ukulele solo. There are Sabres Of Paradise sounds scattered throughout it.

The Woodentops released a new album in April this year, Fruits From The Deep, a deep and rewarding trip under the sea. Dream On was one of the highlights, remixed in dub style by main Woodentop Rolo McGinty. Dream On (Rolo's Dub) starts and ends with an airplane taking off. Flying off to somewhere warm seems like a dream right now. 

Richard Norris' Bandcamp subscription service rewards on a monthly basis, a project that started with his Music For Healing ambient project but has blossomed into other areas, not least his Oracle Sound series of albums. Oracle Sound is (currently) three albums of superb, home grown dub. Fever Dub is from 2024's Oracle Sound Volume Three. 

An Hour Of Midsummer Ambience

Today's mix is inspired by the music Martin and I played last Saturday might at Soup with Contours and Marconi Union, sixty minutes of largely ambient music with a tendency towards the cosmic and the odd detour into dub, on this day, the mid point of 2024- how did we get to 30th June so quickly? It seems like only recently it was New Year. The picture is from December last year and an Anglo- Saxon cross in the churchyard of St. Edward's church in Leek, Staffordshire (my Dad's hometown and home to the local delicacy, the Staffordshire oatcake). Anyway, midsummer, late nights, warm days, ambient bliss, dub bass. What more could you ask for?

An Hour Of Midsummer Ambience

• Underworld: Dark And Long (Most 'Ospitable Mix)
• Khartomb: Swahili Lullaby (Synkro's Balearic Dub Mix)
• M- Paths: Emerge
• Sabres Of Paradise: Chapel Street Market 9am
• Zoe: Moonsister (Lunar Dub 1)
• William Orbit: The Story Of Light
• Coyote: Every Forest Tells A Story
• The Woodentops: Dream On (Balearic Ultras Brooking Bass Remix)
• Andy Bell: Smokebelch II
• African Head Charge: Dub For The Spirits
• Sedibus: SETI Part 3

Dark And Long opened Underworld's 1994 album dubnobasswithmyheadman. The single version came with four different mixes, the ambient Most 'Ospitable one being a thing of great beauty. 

Khartomb's 1983 single Swahili Lullaby, post- punk dub,  has recently been re- issued by Jason Boardman's Before I Die label along with this ambient/ Balearic remix courtesy of Stockport producer Synkro. 

M- Paths album Submerge came out on Mighty Force earlier this year, one in a long line of outstanding releases from the reborn Exeter label. Emerge is the final track, piano and synths combining to give the feel of surfacing from underwater to feel the warm hit of sun on your face. 

Chapel Street 9am was on Sabres Of Paradise's 1994 album Haunted Dancehall, Weatherall, Burns and Kooner creating a morning walk through the streets of London after a night at the titular nightclub, electronic seagulls yapping overhead and the gumshoe Maguire heading home. 

Zoe had a huge hit with her song Sunshine On A Rainy Day, a pop- rave classic from summer 1991. The Orb and Youth were involved and The Orb remixed her song Moonsister for the 12".

William Orbit's Strange Cargo 3 is a lost ambient/ global/ dub gem from 1993. The Story Of Light is a blissed out ambient peak.

Coyote released Every Forest tells A Story earlier this year, another spoken word vocal sample layered over laid back ambient/ Balearic music. 

The Woodentops released their album Fruits Of The Deep in April and a single Dream On a few weeks before with this floaty remix by Brighton's Balearic Ultras. 

Andy Bell's cover of Sabres Of Paradise Smokebelch II is from our album Sounds Of The Flightpath Estate Volume 1. In a chain of events that still leaves me scratching my chin, we had almost every track ready for mastering and I emailed Andy (he'd been on tour in the US with Ride) to see if he had anything for us. The following day he sent me Smokebelch, saying I'd inspired him to finish it. He started it the day Andrew died and completed it for our album, inspired by Andrew. Coincidentally, our album made Piccadilly Records mid- year top 25 collections round up a few days ago. 

Dub For The Spirits came out on African Head Charge's Churchical Chant Of The Iyabinghi, an album of previously unreleased tracks and dubs from their 1990 classic Songs Of Praise. Every home should have one.

Sedibus's SETI (The Search For Extra- Terrestrial Intelligence) came out at the start of the year and I'm still going back to it, a lovely mix of synths, samples and 'real' instruments and an endless, questing vision of outer space as a place to find something else/ yourself. 

Fruits Of The Deep

The Woodentops released their latest album in late April, a fourteen track opus called Fruits Of The Deep. Rolo has been working towards this for some time- the first inklings of it came out as the single Ride A Cloud back in 2022 and more recently the slowed down Balearic shuffle of Dream On. The opening five songs of the album, the two already mentioned along with Liquid Thinking, Too Good To Stay and Lately, make as good a run of songs as the band have ever released, matching their late 80s classics from Giant and Wooden Foot Cops On The Highway. The trademark Woodentops acoustic guitars are there, the rattling hubcap percussion and rhythms. Lately rides in on a piano riff and a ringing Simon Mawby lead guitar line, Rolo in fine voice front and centre.  

The album takes a sharp left turn after Lately, the three minutes detour into Hotel a disorienting scrambled piece of music, Prince fed through a load of FX dissolving into an ambient soundscape. After that there's a bluesy shuffle (Don't Stop), some turbo- charged Woodentops Balearic pop that could have come straight from Hypno Beat Live in 1987 (Saturday Soundcheck), an instrumental that sounds like Lalo Schiffrin's Bullitt had it been recorded underwater while a train went past (City Wakes) and then three more ultra- Woodentops songs- Can't Stand Still, I Can Take It and the gorgeous lament Traversing Heartbreak. 

Fruits Of The Deep could have finished there- acoustic guitars, Frank de Freitas' bass, Simon Mawby's guitars, Rolo's vocals, loads of layered backing vox, found sounds, the sound of a band building on their glory days of several decades ago but moving on confidently and with as et of fully realised and fleshed out songs that the world needs to hear. But Rolo has two more cards up his sleeve, a sixteen minute finale, a pair of long songs inspired by the sea. The first is The Fishermen Leave At Dusk, eight minutes of impressionistic seascapes, FX and acoustic guitars submerged into the aqua, diving deep while bubbles surface. The second and the track that closes the album is  Bathyscaphe, an even more distorted dive into the subaqua world, effects, found sounds, and eventually a slo- mo jam, guitars and drums dredging the seabed, dropping out, returning and building to an echo laden ending. 

Buy Fruits From The Deep here. Once enough orders are in Rolo's going to go ahead with CD and vinyl versions. 

Dream On

The Woodentops are preparing for an album release, a record that will be called Fruits Of The Deep. When they toured last month they played some new songs along with songs from their 80s releases and last year they put out the Ride A Cloud single. Last Friday Rolo and the rest of the line up put out a new song, Dream On, with a pair of remixes, all of which are hitting the spot, sounding laid back, sleepy and full of the promise of spring/ summer. Dream On opens with some very Woodentops sounding acoustic guitars, some dub space and an electric guitar riff. It's lovely stuff. 

The remixes come in the form of a Rolo Dub and a Balearic Ultras remix. Dream On (Rolo Dub) extends it out, bassline to the fore, with backing vox and sound effects (a plane taking off, hitting an old leather arm chair for a drum sound, a large metal tray from Morocco, backing vocals recorded in a long concrete corridor), acoustic guitars and what may be a melodica. As I said of the original version, lovely stuff.

The Balearic Ultras Brooking Bass Remix is longer still, ambient intro, kick drum and snare rattle, padding bassline, isolated backing vocal, angelic sounds slowly gathering pace and then Rolo's voice drifts in, 'dreamer, dreamer, dreamer, waiting for the time to come...'- and again, lovely, lovely stuff, and ultra Balearic.  

All three can be bought at Bandcamp. 

V.A. Saturday And The Woodentops Live

Back in 1988 Trevor Fung, Pete Tong and Paul Oakenfold came home from a summer on the White Isle and filled with the spirit of Ibiza, the anything goes approach of the DJs out there and the desire to do it in London. In September of 1988 they complied a Various Artists compilation record, Balearic Beats Vol. 1 (complete with legendary Dave Little sleeve art, multiple acid coloured single eyes and some Terry Farley liner notes). Balearic Beats Vol 1 pulls together what have become ten set texts of late 80s acid house, with Mediterranean house, Stock, Aitken and Waterman pop stars, industrial groups, Belgian New Beat and  EBM rubbing shoulders with proto- indie dance, Code 61 and Thrashing Doves, Nitzer Ebb and The Residents, Mandy Smith and Fini Tribe, Electra and The Woodentops. Play whatever you like as long as people can dance to it. 

Balearic Beats is a classic VA compilation, an attempt to pull together the sound and energy of a time and place onto black vinyl. For those of us in the UK who didn't make it to Amnesia or Pasha and who soaked this sort of thing up second or third hand, here was a primer, a record or tape to play over and over and a raison d'etre. In some ways, the anything goes spirit of this album, is what this blog and what the  compilation tapes, mix CDs and attempts at DJing I've messed about with ever since, are all about.

Incidentally, at Ban Ban Ton Ton Dr. Rob posted an extensive interview with Trevor Fung and a follow up post where Trevor outlined the tracks he submitted to Oakenfold's label FFRR for the album, some of which didn't make the cut. Trevor's Balearic Bonus Beats can be found here. 

Of those songs on Balearic Beats Volume 1 the one I was most familiar when it was released was Why Why Why by The Woodentops, a track that appeared on the album as live recording. The manic energy of The Woodentops, the acoustic guitars not so much being played as scrubbed, the hubcap and wood block percussion hits and Rolo McGinty's chanted lyrics, 'Are you ready now?... why? why? why?', was a step away from the indie world that they seemed to come from in 1986- it was t- shirts and shorts, sunglasses and suntans, a song made for dancing to as well as for listening to in a bedsit/ halls of residence. 

Why Why Why (Live)

The Woodentops are currently part way through a short tour of the UK. They opened it with a gig at Night And Day in Manchester on Wednesday night, a cold and wet night lit up by Rolo and the band who gave their all and looked like they were enjoying themselves. 

The first couple of songs felt a bit like it was the first night of the tour, a little time needed to warm up possibly, but they kicked into gear and kept going, quick fire drums bubbling basslines and Rolo's rapid strumming. In the midst of guitars, drums, keys and cellos and the group's songwriting chops, the sounds of influences such as Can, The Clash and Talking Heads can be heard. Why Why Why gets a cheer mid- set and Love Train rattles by like 1986 was just a few days ago. The recent single Ride A Cloud, surely a chart hit somewhere, is a delight, the chilled guitar lines and breathy feel changing the energy and feel completely, a Rolo spoken word section describing the actions of astronaut Mike Massimo, a man with a lifetime ambition to work on the Hubble Space Telescope and who at the moment of achieving his lifetime ambition, broke the hatch and watched the screw float away into the depths of space. I guess it's still out there somewhere. My memory of exactly what they played on Wednesday night is patchy and I wasn't taking notes but near the end they played Good Thing, a stand out from 1986's Giant album, the African highlife guitars sparkling. This version is from the 1987 live album Live Hypno Beat, an album recorded live in Los Angeles in '86, a live album that can be returned to and played over and over again. 

Good Thing (Live)

My friend Darren and came with me took this photo of Night And Day,, a small venue that is a Manchester institution and that has played host to some amazing gigs over the last three decades, from bands big and small, known and unknown. I've seen Carbon/Silicon (Mick Jones' post- BAD group), Pete Wylie, The Orb and Damo Suzuki play there among others. Doves, Johnny Marr and Manic Street Preachers have all appeared on the small, square stage. It's currently awaiting a legal hearing about it's future due to a complaint from a resident who bought a flat above Night And Day, a bar and live venue, and then complained a bout the noise. I really hope it wins and stays open. 

Saturday Live

Back at the start of March I posted a half hour Sunday mix of The Woodentops and then a little over a month later chief Woodentop, Rolo McGinty, put a brand new song onto Bandcamp. The new song, Ride A Cloud, went onto the wider internet streaming sites a couple of days ago and is a thing of joy, a little bit of space Balearica, with acoustic guitars and wobbly synth sounds and Rolo singing about the dangers of following your dreams and getting what you want- 'If you can ride a cloud like a horse/ You can get there'.

Ride A Cloud concerns the story of Mike Massimo, a man who's ambition was to become an astronaut and work on the Hubble space telescope. He achieved this dream but when working up there, three hundred miles above the earth, he broke it. While unscrewing a bolt it snapped and in order to repair it he had to break a door open. The song is one of 2023's joys to date and I heartily recommend it. 

The band had a fearsome live reputation in the mid- 80s, a band playing upbeat and off kilter indie pop, getting faster and faster as the decade went on. Here they are filmed for Whistle Test in 1985 while playing in Derby, a shirtless Rolo leading the band through two songs- Move Me and It Will Come- 

In this clip three years later, filmed at the Dominion Theatre in London (at David Bowie's request) they romp through their best- known song, a seven minute version of Why Why Why, stand up drumming from Benny Staples, hubcaps being banged, the varnish being scrubbed off the tops of their guitars while Frank de Freitas plays a superbly rubbery bassline. 

This is the full twenty five minute set which the above clip is taken from, Bowie dancing in the wings. 

In 1986 the group had been recorded while playing a gig in Los Angeles, the frenetic Live Hypno Beat Live album (released in 1987). Why crossed over from this album to Ibiza when Alfredo began playing it in his sets and then back again to London's burgeoning clubland (it was a massive favourite at Shoom), the speed of the guitars, Rolo's delivery, all intensity and rush. The gig at The Palace in Hollywood was apparently the first time they were introduced to E.

Why (Hypno Beat Live)

Plenty (Hypno Beat Live)

Half An Hour Of The Woodentops

In the mid 80s The Woodentops arrived, formed in South London by Rolo McGinty, Simon Mawby, Alice Thompson, Frank De Freitas (brother of Bunnyman Pete) and Benny Staples. The early sound married acoustic guitars, marimbas, trumpets, strings and accordion with indie- pop songwriting, hooks aplenty. Around 1987 they shifted gear, speeding up and becoming a frenetic, dance- pop group. Drummer Benny Staples played standing up with a kit that included hub caps giving them a definte rhthmic change other groups at that time just didn't have. Their live album, recorded in decidedly un- indie Los Angeles, Live Hypno Beat is a classic, the band not just playing their guitars but scrubbing them. The arrival of ecstasy may have been a contributory factor. Over in the Balearics Why became a much played song. I bought their second album when it came out Wooden Foot Cops On The Highway in 1988 and it's stuck with me ever since in one way or another (although, strangely looking at it now, the mix below has no songs from that album contained within it). They were a step ahead of their contemporaries, never quite making the crossover to the big success. No matter- they remained unaffected and have a back catalogue without any weak spots- the thirty minutes below could easily feature twenty more songs without any dip in quality. Click play for an upbeat and uptempo half hour to kick start Sunday morning with a spring in your step. 

Half An Hour Of The Woodentops

• Why (Hypnobeat Live)
• Good Thing (12" Mix)
• Travelling Man (12" Mix)
• Give It Time (Adrian Sherwood Remix)
• Plenty
• Love Train (Janice Long Session Version)
• Move It (Hypnobeat Live)

Why and Move It are both from Live Hypno Beat Live, a twelve song live album, recorded in Los Angeles in 1986 for a radio station. Frenetic, hyper- speed, supercharged and upbeat indie- pop. The pile up of guitars, drums and whatever else is being played towards the end of Move It is a manic thrill. In recent years Why has been remixed time and time again, almost always successfully, a song that loses none of its impact.  

Good Thing, a delicious blend of late 80s indie-pop and African highlife guitars, was a 1986 single and was on their debut album, Giant, also out in 1986. Travelling Man was the B-side. Both are essential Woodentops. The 12" mixes are a minute or two longer in both cases, stretched out at breakneck speed.

Give It Time was also on Giant. The Adrian Sherwood mix, one of several he did for the band, is from a three CD compilation of rarities, remixes and remasters that came out in 2013. 

Plenty was the debut single, released on Rough Trade in 1984 which caught the eyes of a certain Mancunian singer who was reviewing the singles in Melody Maker that week. Morrissey's name followed them round for several years. 

Love Train, a rockabilly shuffle played faster than any train could move, was a 1986 single and also on Giant. The Janice Long session was recorded in June 1986. They'd previously recorded a session for Janice in 1985 as well as sessions for Peel and Simon Mayo.

Are You Ready Now?

The Woodentops were a great band, a little out of step with the times perhaps which maybe explains why their music still sounds so good today. Their mixture of rockabilly, fast propulsive rhythms (at least partly due to a stand up drummer with hub caps as part of his kit), acoustic guitars being scrubbed at speed, the sweetly sung vocals of Rolo and a generally bright, sunny outlook set them apart from their peers in the indie world. There's some hints of darker influences in their music, Suicide definitely in there somewhere and Rolo served some time in Liverpool post- punk legends The Wild Swans but their songs were usually upbeat, beat music. Why Why Why was adopted by the Balearic DJs, Alfredo and Leo Mas, out in the Mediterranean and then in the club scene back home, an Adrian Sherwood version of the song and then a live version recorded in Los Angeles in 1986 and released a year later on the Live Hypno Beat Live album. This version was from a session recorded for Janice Long at the BBC in 1986.

Why Why Why (Janice Long Session Version)

Isolation Mix Twelve

I'm not sure that the title of these mixes holds true any more but onward we go. This week's hour of music is coming from the punk and post- punk world and the long tail that snakes from the plugging of a guitar into an amplifier and someone with something to say stepping up to the microphone. Some Spaghetti Western as an intro, some friendship, some politics, some anger, some exhilaration, some questions, some disillusionment, some psychedelic exploration and some optimism to end with.

In History Lesson Part 2 D. Boon explains his friendship with Mike Watt, the importance of punk in changing their lives, the singers and players in the bands that inspired him and, in the first line, the essence of punk as he experienced it.

'Our band could be your life
Real names'd be proof
Me and Mike Watt played for years
Punk rock changed our lives

We learned punk rock in Hollywood
Drove up from Pedro
We were fucking corn dogs
We'd go drink and pogo

Mr. Narrator
This is Bob Dylan to me
My story could be his songs
I'm his soldier child

Our band is scientist rock
But I was E. Bloom and Richard Hell
Joe Strummer and John Doe
Me and Mike Watt, playing guitar'

Ennio Morricone: For A Few Dollars More

Minutemen: History Lesson Part 2

Joe Strummer/Electric Dog House: Generations

X: In This House That I Call Home

The Replacements: Can’t Hardly Wait (Tim Outtake Version)

Husker Du: Keep Hanging On

The Redskins: Kick Over The Statues

The Woodentops: Why (Live)

The Vacant Lots: Bells

The Third Sound: For A While

Spacemen 3: Revolution

Poltergeist: Your Mind Is A Box (Let Us Fill It With Wonder)

Echo And The Bunnymen: Ocean Rain (Alt Version)

Pete Wylie: Sinful

Carbon/Silicon: Big Surprise

Isolation Mix Ten

I started compiling this one in my head when the sun was shining and it was hot enough to sit in the garden at night until it went dark without the need for a coat or sweatshirt. Since I started actually putting it together the sun has vanished and the temperature has halved but I've ploughed on anyway. It's a ten song mix with sunshine and balmy nights in mind from the political/ absurdist post- punk/ dub of Meatraffle, the finger picked acoustic guitar and Mellotron magic of Steve Cobby, some chuggy Scandi- disco/house, 80s heroes The Woodentops, a blissed out re- edit of Brian Eno, Andrew Weatherall spinning Toy into a chilled krautrock groove, some Belgian New Beat from 1989 and Grace Jones backed by Sly and Robbie.

Meatraffle: Meatraffle On The Moon

Steve Cobby: As Good As Gold

The Woodentops: Give It Time (Adrian Sherwood Mix)

Brian Eno: Another Green World (The Blue Realm) Mojo Filter Edit

Fjordfunk: Exile (Hardway Bros Remix)

LAARS: None (Full Pupp)

Paresse: Rosarita

Chayell: Don’t Even Think About It

Toy: Dead And Gone (Andrew Weatherall Remix)

Grace Jones: Walking In The Rain

A Good Friday

Today is Good Friday. Many people will get today off work and Monday is a bank holiday so that means a four day weekend for most. I'm not back in work until Tuesday. I've got a ticket for Weatherall and Johnston's A Love From Outer Space night at The Refuge tonight. All good.

Here are two good songs, one from The Woodentops and their Hypno Beat Live album, recorded in Los Angeles in 1986 and released in 1987, and the other from Dinosaur Jr and their 2016 album Give A Glimpse Of What Yer Not, J Mascis, Lou Barlow and Murph showing that re-unions can work.

Good Thing (Live)

Good To Know

Sherwood

Tuesday brings a pair of Adrian Sherwood mixes for your listening pleasure. The first is his dub mix of Monkey Mafia's after hours classic from 1998, their cover of the Creedence Clearwater Revival song As Long As I Can See The Light. Echo, delay, melodica, the full Sherwood dubbed out business. A lovely way to start the day.

As Long As I Can See The Light (Adrian Sherwood Dub Lighting)

My own personal Woodentops revival continues- the band haven't been far away from my stereo for most of 2018. Sherwood remixed several of Rolo and co's songs. This is my favourite, vocals up front, crunchy guitars dropped in and out and frenetic pace maintained.

Love Affair With Everyday Living (Adrian Sherwood Mix)

Monday's Long Song

Monday's long song this week comes from The Woodentops and an unreleased version of their song Give It Time, a single and album track in 1986 but constructed and mixed by Arthur Baker in '85. Clocking in at 7 minutes 34 it's not actually that long I suppose but most of Rolo's songs were around the 3 minute mark, rapid strumming and double time percussion making everything feel pretty quick. This one takes things more gently, Baker finding the space and a slower tempo. Those acoustic guitars are still there and some extended percussive sections. Lovely stuff from a band with a back catalogue full of the same.

Give It Time (Arthur Baker Mix)

People often lament The Woodentops failure to 'make it'. Rolo said the following at his Facebook page recently in response to a comment that they deserved to have been more successful...

'Back then I could not have been more busy. So many people before my eyes, insane huge crowds and banging indoor venues. More planes than trains and endless miles, the pressure was intense and I lost it many a time. I wasn't always a happiness machine. Usually but not always. I never actually began a band with the intention of being in the charts, I wanted to do something and just hoped some people might enjoy as much as I. All the ambition was directed at trying to get the band tight and convincing like the music I listen too. I wanted to add something to the sound of the town. So when it got to risking your life literally, to get to a tv station on the other side of Europe in continuous heavy rain in the fast lane, I noted that moment. Death by self promotion! Also by not being part of any scene, coming up with totally different ideas for more songs that intentionally didn't sound like ones we already had, we are hard to promote so we never would be a typical chart act. We fell into them for a bit sure. Mainly though it was international alternative charts which I would prefer to be in. I know we have songs out there that have influenced or been included in new musical movements, excerpts in films and tv, mentions in books and all sorts. David Bowie bought all the records we made and loved them and told me so. So I feel success came our way. I'm a happy chappy and alive. So I'm saying it's cool if we didn't or haven't headlined Wembley stadium. We play too fast for there anyway. You wouldn't be able to hear a thing'.

All of which made me smile.

Good Thing

I was playing some records at the weekend, some newly acquired ones and pulling out some older ones. I discovered that my 12" copy of Come Together by Primal Scream, the one with the Andrew Weatherall and Terry Farley mixes, is pretty knackered. The sleeve is worn but the disc is worse- the condition is such that if you found it in a charity shop for a couple of quid you'd think twice about whether it was worth it. I'll have to replace it. I suppose it is 28 years old and has been played a lot, often at parties and similar, when maybe I'm not best minded to be as careful as I should be.

On the other hand I pulled out a pair of 7" singles by The Woodentops from 1986 that looked like they were made and bought yesterday. The first was the 7" Good Thing single, backed with Travelling Man, a perfect pair of songs, in beautiful and pristine condition.

Good Thing

The other was the double 7" pack, two discs in a gatefold sleeve, with different sides playing at either 33 rpm or 45, just to confuse me. Disc 1 is Everyday Living and Why and Disc 2 Move Me and Well Well Well. Here are Rolo and co playing Everyday Living at Roskilde in 1987, demonstrating well why they struck a chord with both indie and dance. They had something a little different and flirted with success. I don't know if they deserved to be huge, they were probably a bit to idiosyncratic to be massive but they were a cracking band.



And until last night I hadn't ever seen this video, a promo for Give It Time, off 1986's Giant album.

Why Why Why

Back to it this morning- early start, work clothes, motorway etc etc. It's all a bit of a shock after two weeks off.

This Leo Mas and Fabrice version of The Woodentops' Why Why Why is one way to ease the pain and lessen the blow. Eight minutes of sun dappled groove.

Why Why Why (Balearic Militant Dub)

Why

Adrian Sherwood did a superb remix of Why Why Why by The Woodentops, dancefloor and dub friendly. It was on The Woodentops Imaginary Compilation Album series over at The Vinyl Villain at the start of April. Rolo McGinty's group usually get referred to as indie-dance pioneers and that seems to be true enough, although their indie-dance sound doesn't really sound anything like what the phrase 'indie dance' summons up. They crossed over to the Balearic scene in the mid-to-late 80s, the fast acoustic guitars and experimental nature of Why Why Why moving feet and minds. This Tony Johns and Dave Boreham version sounds really fresh.

Why Why Why (Balearic Re-edit)

Woodentop

Why Why Why by The Woodentops took frenetic, acoustic guitar led indie rock into the acid house scene in the mid-to-late 80s, epitomising the anything goes attitude coming out of the clubs. This was generally a good thing, although as Mr Weatherall pointed out in the Primal Scream documentary a couple of weeks ago ' I went from dancing to Throbbing Gristle to dancing to Chris Rea'. This is a live version taken from the Balearic Beats compilation and is well worth several minutes of your time.

Why Why Why (Live)