Volume 20 Tracks 6-10 - Gene, Inspiral Carpets, Mark E Smith, The Charlatans, Boo Radleys, Transglobal Underground

6. Gene - Be My Guide, Be My Light (Deceptive)

Gene last featured on volume ten of "Indie Top 20", peculiarly enough, albeit in their Martin Rossiter-less guise of Sp!n. If that group had an edge to them, Rossiter brought along the melodrama, and while Gene were often compared to The Smiths or Morrissey, the force of their instrumental delivery was occasionally more akin to sixties mod groups or even 70s pub rock bands.

"Be My Guide, Be My Light" doesn't particularly highlight that diversity in their sound, with Rossiter's hollering, woebegone vocals taking centre stage and the band trailing along behind, but it was the first single of theirs to chart within the UK Top 75, and became something of a favoured anthem at gigs from that point forward.

While the group were quickly lumped in with Britpop, there was a clear lyrical sensitivity to their work which certainly didn't bear comparisons with Oasis or Northern Uproar. "Be My Guide, Be My Light" appears to be about an evening's worth of drunken shenanigans, though, which doesn't do a great deal to back up my claim - but there's plenty of alternative evidence available.



7. Inspiral Carpets featuring Mark E Smith - I Want You (Mute)

If absolutely nothing else, "I Want You" is the song responsible for putting Mark E Smith on "Top of the Pops". His somewhat wayward performance resulted in Tom Hingley desperately trying to get him back on track lyrically, side-eyeing him in increasing desperation while Smith ambled around the stage plucking lyrical phrases from the track at random. "Right, OK... thank you boys", said a perplexed and typically dry Simon Mayo at the end, and the paths of Smith and BBC TV prime-time would never cross again. Frankly, it was somewhat miraculous that they ever did.

"I Want You" is also an absolutely rip-roaring track, sounding for all the world like The Fall at their most frantic featuring Tom Hingley of the Inspiral Carpets on guest vocals. It somewhat proves Smith's point that "if it's me and your granny on bongos, it's The Fall". It starts as it means to carry on with an enormous ramshackle juggernaut riff, then rallies along, incorporating some quality Smith-isms on the way. "The Dutch East India Company in the USA of A think they can fool/ with their sincere usury" seems to be about the American independent distribution company who he had clearly experienced difficulties with at some point, though God knows who "lost two stone in weight".

The song sticks doggedly to its chosen path, never really developing or choosing new roads. It's akin to a full-force naive sixties garage track in its approach, in total love with its own noise and poking a finger in the eye at the Inspiral Carpets usual considered tunefulness at this point in their careers. It went on to top the 1994 John Peel Festive Fifty, and no wonder. It also went on to reach number 18 in the UK charts, which was somewhat less expected under the circumstances. In all, it's one of the better tracks either party has been involved with, and it makes you wish they'd actually done a few more things together.

Sadly, this is the last time we'll be discussing The Inspiral Carpets or Mark E Smith on here. The former split up after being dropped by Mute Records, and the latter continued ploughing his way through numerous record labels and dozens of singles and LPs, but was just never featured on the series again.



8. The Charlatans - Jesus Hairdo (Beggars Banquet)

The Charlatans take a musical journey into the bluesy swamps of the American South. Though to be honest, elements of "Jesus Hairdo" sound similar to the theme to the long-forgotten Dave Lee Travis and Craig Charles starring action/quiz show "Go Getters", so perhaps they were actually taking a musical journey to Cheltenham to take a ride on a hot air balloon. Who knows?

"Jesus Hairdo" managed to join Primal Scream at the voodoo punch bowl at around the same time, and while it couldn't have sounded less like The Charlatans at their moody baggy peak, it did do a lot to show that the group were more than just a bunch of floppy-fringed blokes who belonged to another point of the nineties.

For my personal taste, "Jesus Hairdo" is one of the least pleasing Charlatans 45s, though. It's all bluesy jam and no bread, and a slightly odd choice for a single. That it failed to reach the Top 40 wasn't actually hugely surprising.



9. The Boo Radleys - Lazarus (Creation)

"Lazarus" appears on Volume 20 of "Indie Top 20" by dint of its reissue in 1994. This upsets the lineage of our discussions about the Boos somewhat, but it probably makes sense to start at the beginning - when "Lazarus" first emerged in 1992, it felt completely unexpected. While the group had developed their sound in leaps and strides prior to its release, there were elements to the track which had never really achieved such prominence before.

It begins with throbbing, echoing dub reggae noises before they collide into a mounful, surrendering trumpet clarion call, which would repeat itself throughout the track at regular intervals and act as the chorus. "I... I must be losing my mind" sings Sice through a crackly, treble-heavy treated vocal, "I keep on trying to find a way out/ there's no need you don't lock the door anymore". Eventually, the other group members join him, "ba ba baing" their way through his vocals like a Beach Boys tribute band drunk and walking in the wrong direction on the way home from the pub. Psychedelic elements twitter and stir their way in their background, and "Lazarus" becomes an incredibly afraid, lonely, lost  sounding record, but wonderful for it. Like The Factory playing "Path Through The Forest" meeting King Tubby meeting Guy Chadwick meeting The Beach Boys in some kind of ludicrous supergroup who could only exist on the continent known as the imagination, this is not what anyone expected. Oh, and Toni Halliday appeared in the video for reasons which were never completely explained.

That Alan McGee opted to give the single a second chance once their LP "Giant Steps" had become acclaimed isn't that surprising. If he expected a proper hit, though, he'll have been disappointed. "Lazarus" was far too unorthodox and mournful to wow daytime radio listeners, and it was left up to the latecomers and stragglers to support the reissue, along with the Radleys fans who wanted to pick up the remixes on the B-side (the Saint Etienne one is particularly ambient and worthy of investigation).



10. Transglobal Underground - Protean (Nation)

Since the whole "Indie Top 20: House" debacle, the series hadn't really gone out of its way to showcase independent dance music much, obvious exceptions such as A Guy Called Gerald aside. The appearance of Transglobal Underground here is something of a surprise, then, though their fusion of world music styles with dance music did make them a bit more of an IPC journalist's dream than a lot of the club music around in 1994.

"Protean" showcases why Transglobal Underground were so respected by so many different audiences. The different elements of their sound aren't lazily bashed together in the form of tossed-off ethnic samples, but fully incorporated into the work. "Protean" therefore sounds both unique and hypnotic, showcasing the fact that the euphoria surrounding communal, danceable music is a global phenomenon rather than a niche youth consideration. "Protean" twitters and shimmers along, sounding joyous and tranquil at the same time. It's hard to hear quite how it fits in with the rest of this LP, but it's nice to have it here.

Volume 17 Side 4 - The Fall, Cornershop, Madder Rose, Mint 400, Miranda Sex Garden

1. The Fall - Why Are People Grudgeful? (Permanent)

It feels odd that we've ploughed through 17 Indie Top 20 compilations now and not once managed to discuss The Fall. Odd, but technically correct, that is. While The Fall were arguably one of the earliest groups to achieve cult success without going anywhere the ink of a major label contract, by the mid-eighties they were on the Warner Brothers-affiliated Beggars Banquet, then jumped from there to Phonogram. By the time the "Indie Top 20" series started, then, they were about as "indie" (in the true sense of the word) as Big Country.

The early nineties weren't a kind period to cult bands, though, and like That Petrol Emotion on Side 3, they found themselves booted away from the financial certainties of a major label and on to the smaller Permanent Records - who were still distributed by BMG, but we'll let that pass (Beechwood obviously did).

This is also one of the only periods of The Fall's career where it's possible to get a sense of concessions being made to record labels, or at least some bait being dangled to put the group in a more sure-footed position. Their "Infotainment Scan" LP was demo'd while the band were without a deal and seems to have been partly developed almost as a sweetener to interested labels. It's a fantastic album and possibly my favourite Fall LP, just because it contains all the awkward hard edges, scattershot lyrics and wry observations you'd expect, but it also pulses and shines. Moments like their cover of "Lost In Music" and "A Past Gone Mad" throb with dance-friendly rhythms, making the group almost sound like a replacement for the by now completely washed up Happy Mondays (who, of course, used The Fall as a starting template for their sound).

Their cover of the reggae track "People Grudgeful" by Sir Gibbs - actually a bit of a dis in the direction of Lee "Scratch" Perry - takes the weary and frustrated skank of the original and beefs it out beyond belief, adding distinctly African sounding guitar work, punching bass drum sounds, and unashamedly commercial, Essex-friendly techno noises. It's rare to use a phrase such as "It's a banger!" in relation to a record by The Fall, but it really is, and while it may not have seen the same chart action as their other slight hits "Victoria" and "There's A Ghost In My House", it's far better, bigger and shinier than either of them. There's also little doubt that it helped nudge the group into the Top Ten album charts for the first and last time in their careers. These were the finest times of our lives...



2. Cornershop - Trip Easy (Wiiija)

Initially, it was far easier to fall in love with the idea of Cornershop and what they represented than their earliest records, which were faintly confused sounding and very lo-fi. While it seems to have been largely forgotten since, people from Asian backgrounds were deeply unrepresented in British popular culture before the early nineties (though Sheila Chandra briefly broke through as a musician and personality - see my other blog here) to the extent of being almost invisible. Cornershop were spurred into existence by some of the misguided drivel Morrissey had begun uttering at this point, and felt like a positive reaction against both his little Englander rhetoric and the under-acknowledged lack of diversity within the music industry, as well as the sickening inroads the BNP were making into politics at this point.

Their early singles, while shot through with irritation, sarcasm and knowing references and in-jokes, weren't really particularly distinguished from numerous other low budget agitprop groups of the period. Their psychedelic use of sitar droning did set them apart slightly, but many of the records sounded like what they were - the punkish noise of a very new group who hadn't fully formulated all their ideas yet.

Of all their singles and EPs from this period, "England's Dreaming" is the only track where the noisy chaos actually sounds thrilling and ever so slightly dangerous. Somewhat bafflingly, Beechwood bypassed that one for this compilation and skipped on to the next track off the "Lock Stock & Double-Barrel EP", "Trip Easy". As the title suggests, it's one of their dronier, more psychedelic outings, shimmering naively in a distinctly low budget way, never quite setting out what it achieves to do during its very brief run time. Like The Jesus and Mary Chain attempting an equivalent of "Their Satanic Majesty's Request", it's a nice idea on paper but not something that quite works on your turntable. You could argue that the tracks of theirs which utilise the sitar are effectively reclaiming it back from the middle class hippies who had cynically used the instrument in their work, but there are no significant leaps forward here.

In time, Cornershop would produce some brilliant and fully realised singles and albums. Their lo-fi years definitely hinted towards that possibility, but nobody was ever fully sure if they would still be an active concern after 1993 was over, never mind a group who would eventually reach number one in the "proper" charts.



3. Madder Rose - Beautiful John (Seed)

New York's Madder Rose were immense John Peel favourites in 1993 (and beyond) and actually produced some of the era's most intricate, yearning and beautiful singles. "Car Song" and "Panic On" from their major label years in 1994 saw dirty, exhausted country rock meet the youthful angst of indie, sounding all the better for it.

"Beautiful John" kicked up the dust a lot more, however, and seemed to be celebrating the rugged masculinity of John Wayne and other similar figures (and not Peel himself, as some listeners may have suspected). It's a lazy, hazy, light hearted stroll through American Western mythology which was wildly appreciated by critics and listeners alike in 1993, but seems rather slight now, particularly in comparison with some of the group's later material.

The group signed to Atlantic Records and continued on their journey until 1999, when dwindling interest caused them to unplug their guitars and move on.



4. Mint 400 - Natterjack Joe (Incoherent)

Oh. Yes, this lot... Mint 400 were (apparently) a very loud and seering live band, and when grunge was at its peak, were briefly deemed one of Britain's great hopes. A succession of critically slated releases greeted with general public indifference soon saw them swept to one side within a matter of months, though, and they have been largely forgotten since (they don't even have their own Wikipedia page, for shame).

"Natterjack Joe" has teeth and a very doomy air, and snaps away for six minutes about nothing in particular. It makes precisely the right noises, but also sounds fairly indistinguishable from the numerous unsigned UK alternative rock groups who shouted a lot with Home Counties accents and cluttered up the local gig circuit at this point. While more successful groups of this ilk managed to kick you in the gut or shove you sideways by their force of personality, Mint 400 occasionally sound as if they're play-acting, and the production here is hollow and unflattering.

To this day their output is not without its fans online, but I genuinely can't see a broader reassessment of their work occurring any time soon.



5. Miranda Sex Garden - Sunshine (Abrasion Mix) (Mute)

We last met Miranda Sex Garden on Volume 12, and now they're back with what can only be described as some madrigal singing combined with primitive drum patterns and frantic indie guitar chords. It hadn't been attempted often before, and it's possibly reasonably safe to assume it won't happen again.

The ensuing racket genuinely works uncannily well, though. While the mix-and-match approach may seem like a contrived attempt to get the moody indie kids on board with some youth-unfriendly Radio Three styled ideas, I caught the group live during this period and they appeared in their element. Dressed like posh, moody goths, they grinned from ear to ear at the noise they were creating - at least, when they weren't glowering intensely - and generally put on a brilliant show, giving the appearance of being much more than an unusual and rather marginal band.

As stated previously, the core elements of the band would have considerably more success later on in The Mediæval Bæbes, where a return to the more traditional elements of their sound would be marketed to an older audience of Sunday glossy supplement readers.

Was this scrapyard video an inspiration for the numerous bits of Chart Show indie chart visual filler during the later years of that show's life, I wonder?