Volume Six - Wedding Present, Snapdragons, Rose of Avalanche, Wolfhounds, Inspiral Carpets, Suicide, Loop

Format: Double LP/ Cassette/ CD
Year of Release: 1989

If Volume 5 was a strange and occasionally rather drab buffet of art-rock and indiepop, you can hear the stirrings of something different emerging in Volume 6 if you strain your ears...

It's not that this LP deviates much from the course we've been on so far, but there are mavericks pulling ever so slightly at the steering wheel - The Shamen emerge almost completely transformed as an indie-pop-House hybrid, The Inspiral Carpets stick their heads over the wall for the first time, and A Guy Called Gerald drops by to entertain us with a seriously huge crossover track.

All these things were indicative of what indieland would become, whereas many of the other artists on this LP represent the last puff of smoke of the old guard. While The Wedding Present would be too good to be deathless and would move on to greater success on RCA, a lot of the other acts from their particular C86 era would cease to be relevant in the mainstream media very shortly.

That does make Volume 6 one of the more compelling and varied listens, though, as all kinds of sounds emerge out of the chaos, from clattering industrial noises to indiefied synth-pop, to 60s garage throwbacks... there's a clear sense here that nobody truly understood which way the wind was blowing yet. Or at least, Chet and Bee didn't.

Once again, I've included the liner notes for reference.

1. Le Cadeau De Mariage/ The Wedding Present - Pourquoi Es Tu Devenue Si Raisonable? (Reception)

"The ferret goes from strength to strength" - David Gedge, March '89

"Why Are You Being So Reasonable Now?" was the Wedding Present's last single on Reception records before they signed to RCA records and became regular Top of the Pops fixtures.

Driven by an almost folk-rock rhythm - those dabblings with Ukrainian folk music make more sense when you think of their earlier records in that context - "Reasonable" is a solid record, but lacks the aggressive drive and the emotional impact of their earliest singles. Moreover, the need for a French language version of the track (sang by Gedge in rather questionable French with definite Yorkshire vowels) has never been fully explained - were the group going nova across the Channel, I wonder, or was it just an experiment?

The more popular English language version reveals that this is a song about a lover's tiff, and while the lyrical snapshots of the argument are well observed ("No-one can change that much in three days!" "It's not yours to take back!") it's a bitter, biting sulk of a track, and as such feels like neither one thing nor the other. There's a certain lack of drama here, and it's probably because Gedge is, for once, the person wearing the boot. The lyrics are clearly informing us that he's refusing to get back together with the lady, rather than vice versa - and as such, it's hard to get too emotionally involved with the sentiments expressed. They wrote better choruses than this one as well.

Still, none of this stopped the record from climbing as high as Number 42. RCA would take over and push them over the line and into the world of early evening television. This felt like an odd victory at the time, even if each TOTP appearance probably did little to convert any New Kids On The Block fans who might have been watching.



2. The Snapdragons - The Things You Want (Native)

"...against abuse to women, anti-anti-feminism. James' pouting/ plaintive vocals seduce your ears with tastefully thrashed and plucked guitar and an imaginative and grooving rhythm".

With a stomp and a twang, Leeds' The Snapdragons arrive on Indie Top 20 and then completely disappear again. Relative latecomers to the indiepop party, they were rather big news for five minutes in late 1988 before the tide very obviously turned.

"The Things You Want" is actually a confident and punchy single with plenty to offer, and got regular bedroom spins from me at the time. It packs a lot into two-and-a-half minutes, from the thudding and driving hook, to the Blue Aeroplanes-esque trumpet lines at the tail end. Truthfully, though, it does feel as if it could have been released three years before, and it's impossible not to wonder what the group could have achieved if they hadn't been so late to the party.

Interesting indie fact - the drummer Pel Riccardi went on to join Utah Saints.



3. The Rose of Avalanche - The World Is Ours (Avalantic) 

"If you like Bros - you'll love these lads!"

The Rose Of Avalanche emerge on the series for the second and last time, and actually manage to get to the point this time around. Unlike "Velveteen", which yearned and yawned and sprawled itself across twelve inches like a woebegone actress having a bad night's rest, "The World Is Ours" is a surprisingly concise and moody strut of a record. The guitars twang, the chorus is subtle and grows in stature with subsequent listens, and while it was never going to lead them on to greatness, "The World Is Ours" did prove that they weren't simply a "goth rock" band.

The group would continue on their own Avalantic record label until 1990, never quite scaling their mid-eighties peaks again, but certainly managing to please a loyal fanbase.



4. The Wolfhounds - Rent Act (Midnight Music)

"There are thousands of homeless people in this country, particularly in and around the Capital. This government persistently passes laws to keep it that way".

Plus ca change. The UK has never really managed to grasp the issue of homelessness since the eighties, and rising rent and property prices are only making the issue worse - so The Wolfhounds howl of protest here was really only indicative of what would become a much bigger problem (and we would have struggled to believe it could get worse at the time).

"Rent Act" is an incredibly good single as well, starting with some psychedelic atmospherics (possibly a studio tape being rewound and put through an echo effect) and gradually building and building into a righteous piece of fury. While many bands of their ilk contented themselves with thrashing out a general message of protest, The Wolfhounds were actually capable of considered songcrafting beneath the noise - "Rent Act" has so many pleasing elements, from the chugging verses, to the soaring guitar beneath the chorus and the panoramic middle eight. All ensure that the song starts off as a pissy protest and grows into something quite majestic and emotive. There's nothing slick or smooth about "Rent Act", but it's also about as far from Crass as you can get.



5. Inspiral Carpets - Butterfly (Cow)

"A Peel favourite, their latest single, taken from the Trainsurfing EP, available on Cow Records".

Hello Madchester. Except perhaps, not really. While The Inspiral Carpets played fellow horsemen of the baggyocalypse along with the Roses, Mondays and Charlatans, at this stage nobody really had them pegged as being part of any dominant movement as such (though to be fair, most journalists were taking The Stone Roses even less seriously at this point). While Manchester bands were beginning to attract stronger press attention, the Inspirals were still being talked about in terms of being a garage rock revival act. To my ears, they also sounded faintly like early Barry Andrews era XTC at this point.

"Butterfly" confirms that. There's nothing funky or dancey here. It's really all faintly quirky mid-sixties melodies, a squeaky organ and rude, distorted guitar lines. They also don't have Tom Hingley on lead vocals at this point, instead utilising the vocal powers of Stephen Holt, who would very shortly depart to form The Rainkings (one wonders whether he regrets that decision now...)

Still, it isn't that much of a leap from this to the material on their debut "Life" album, and only the rough edges give the game away. "Butterfly" also shows that they could pen a powerful chorus along with the best of their travelling companions... even if nobody expected them to become an act who would go on to shift hundreds of thousands of records. I mean, come on, they were hardly The House of Love or The Darling Buds, were they?



6. Suicide - Rain of Ruin (Chapter 22)

"Back after what seems like an eternity but is actually only ten years. Suicide prove that absence makes the heart grow fonder, whilst at the same time showing numerous young pretenders how to do it!"

What young pretenders could they have been referring to, I wonder? And is one of them coming up shortly?

Suicide were a group who barely need any introduction, but whose harsh minimalism alienated swathes of the public in their heyday. Talked about almost as the seventies equivalent to The Velvet Underground, Alan Vega and Martin Rev arguably invented the idea of the electronic music duo, and possibly planted the seeds of some of the ideas later to be found in industrial rock and goth rock to boot, not to mention proving to be an influence on acts as diverse as The Jesus and Mary Chain and MIA. Absolutely critically slated in their day, Suicide's popularity rose enough for them to reform in the late eighties and be given a hero's welcome, and their stature has only grown since (this is an over-simplification of the facts, of course, as Suicide did gain some critical and commercial ground in the early eighties - The Quietus' tribute to Alan Vega following his death helps to fill in some of the blanks).

"Rain of Ruin" isn't much talked about now, but felt like a significant event of a single at the time, being given even more press inches and raves than Wire's comeback received a couple of years previously. It also showed that Suicide weren't really interested in going anywhere especially new. "Rain of Ruin" is much more sparse, bare and hypnotic than any of their influences managed to be, holding your attention through the sheer drone of persistence and Vega's hiccuping sub-Elvis vocals. Whatever ideas they may have given other musicians, in the end there were very few other groups out there who sounded exactly like Suicide - they were entirely their own deal.



7. Loop - Black Sun (Chapter 22)

"From the LP 'Fade Out', Loop take the blow torch and petrol cans to music and deliver their most powerful single yet".

It would be tempting to compare "Black Sun" to Suicide's output, but honestly, you can hear the difference. Loop don't really sit still, and while the foundations for "Black Sun" are a near-perfect doomy bassline, the band constantly pile new ideas on top of it across five minutes - a shimmering psychedelic guitar effect here, a wailing solo there, a rattling drumbeat elsewhere... so this feels more like a slowed down, doped up take on krautrock than an out-and-out Vega tribute.

It's also their finest single to my ears, feeling delightfully hazy and foggy and incredibly addictive. As soon as those riffs and drones slowly disappear into a tunnel at the track's end, you feel instantly compelled to return the stylus to the start of the track again. Five minutes of this never feels like quite enough, and while it might seem like an unlikely Indie chart number one now, this made serious sense at the time.

Indie Top 20 Volume 4 Part 1 Side Two - Wedding Present, Flatmates, Primitives, The Shamen, World Domination Enterprises, Pop Will Eat Itself

1. The Wedding Present - Nobody's Twisting Your Arm (Reception)

Well, this is it. This is the sound of a band with a style which was largely uncommercial at the time rising right up from the underground, and with an unbelievably good single. The yearning, lovelorn buzz and jangle of The Wedding Present's previous 7" efforts had been good, but nothing before really hinted at this - "Nobody's Twisting Your Arm" is just brilliant Pop. Pop with an abrasive edge, and pop that wasn't going to get played on Steve Wright In The Afternoon, obviously, but nonetheless, David Gedge was obviously on unbelievable form at this point.

Always known for taking common everyday sayings or phrases and trying to create hooks out of them, "Nobody's Twisting Your Arm" ups the commercial ante further by adding arrangement flourishes too, like that chiming piano, the female backing vocals, and not to mention one of the best choruses of their career. The opening lines "And when I called your house/ And your sister thought that I was somebody else" could have been given to a sulking, moping Jason Donovan for his latest hit if it weren't for the wobbly scansion in the second line. Try imagining "Nobody's Twisting Your Arm" performed in a synth-pop style. It isn't hard to do, as John Lennon never sang.

The track only just missed out on a proper national Top 40 place as a result, settling at the final position of number 46. It wasn't an Indie chart Number one either, resting somewhat unfortunately behind Kylie Minogue's "I Should Be So Lucky" on PWL, but perhaps that's only appropriate.

Things would change hugely for the band after this point. We'll meet them one more time before they sign to RCA, but there might be those who argue that this was actually their career pinnacle. I'm not too sure where I stand on that myself.



2. The Flatmates - Shimmer (Subway)

And this is probably my favourite Flatmates single as well, as the band suddenly throw feedback and jagged, harsher guitar sounds into the mix.  The lyrics are extra spiteful and biting as well, with spat out lines like "God knows what you've put me through" displaying a different facet to the band which just wasn't apparent on "Happy All The Time".

Sadly, it was also the beginning of the end for the group. One Janice Long Session EP would follow, and a final "proper" single in "Heaven Knows" in October 1988, before the game was up. They would reform in 2013 and release one more single, but are one of those frustrating indiepop acts never to have treated the world to a proper LP. Across seven inches, though, they were always a marvellous proposition.



3. The Primitives - Stop Killing Me (Lazy)

The Primitives are, you could argue, everything The Flatmates could have ended up becoming, and perhaps that's what they were trying to avoid. "Stop Killing Me" was released only a year before their RCA single "Crash", a top five smash which became the staple of school discos, with lots of caffeine-buzzing teens screeching "Shut! Shut your mo-outh!" in time with Tracy Tracy. Often regarded as one-hit wonders, they in fact managed a couple of years of moderate hit singles afterwards - no mean feat for a group of their ilk.

"Stop Killing Me" is an admirable and gutsy blast of three minute sixties pop with teeth, but in retrospect it's not worth getting overly exercised about. What's on display here could easily be found in countless other places being performed with a bit more of an edge and bigger hooks, but obviously it isn't their finest or most representative moment.



4. The Shamen - Knature of a Girl (Moksha)

"Christopher Mayhew Says" on Volume 3 was a fantastic psychedelic cacophony, but by the point of "Knature of a Girl" things had calmed down a little. The sledgehammer beatbox rhythms are still in place, and the shimmering effects (this time with added sitar styled noises) add a kaleidoscopic feel, but poppiness is beginning to rear it's head.

"Knature of a Girl" is still a long, long way from "Ebeneezer Goode" - so far it's almost mind-boggling, in fact - but the chorus here sounds close to the soon-to-be-born Jesus Jones, and you're left with the impression that the emerging wave of faintly rebellious but nonetheless commercial alt-pop groups probably owed The Shamen a debt. A debt, obviously, that neither side was keen to acknowledge by the time The Shamen were Boss Drummed up to the hilt.



5. World Domination Enterprises - I Can't Live Without My Radio (Product Inc)

Don't worry, readers, this one was an absurd release even at the time; a cover of LL Cool J's single with discordant, squawking guitar noises taking the place of any scratch mixing or indeed grooves. Apart from the fact that this version propels along with a bit more urgency, it's hard to understand why you'd need to own it instead of the original... nonetheless, it climbed to Number 8 in the indie chart, acting as World Domination Enterprises' biggest single ever.

The group were probably much more respected at the time for their cult single "Asbestos Lead Asbestos" which loaned its title to a later slice of Carter USM lyricism, and indeed had a cult following which ensured they were big news on the national gig circuit for awhile. "I Can't Live Without My Radio" is a baffling misfire, though, which only seemed radical at the time for the novelty of being a Hip-Hop track being retooled and reappropriated by English noiseniks. We were easily pleased by such things in those days.



6. Pop Will Eat Itself - There Is No Love Between Us Anymore (Chapter 22)

"There Is No Love Between Us Anymore" really is largely an instrumental track propelled along with scratch noises, interjecting samples and the occasional anguished cry of the title from Clint Mansell. That should have made it an utterly inappropriate single and something best left to the closing moments of the "Box Frenzy" LP, but in fact it showed that there was slightly more to the Brummie boys than leery, beery rapping and loud guitars. There's a neat patchwork quilt of ideas going on here, and a distinct dark mood, which showed that a creative and modern songwriting approach was apparent in their ranks - a point that probably needed to be made after two cover versions in a row.

Oddly, this does creatively sit somewhere between Public Image Limited and Big Audio Dynamite, the follow-up projects of two crucial punk figures, and the moody black and white video of two knackered parents loans it a sympathetic and considered edge the larks of the "Beaver Patrol" promo definitely didn't. ("It's restricted from playback on certain sites", say Sony. How dare I attempt to plug a bit of their adopted back catalogue on my blog, eh?)

Whatever the influences or the purpose behind the release of this, it did their prospects no harm and acted as their first ever official UK Top 75 chart entry, climbing to number 66. Far bigger success would also follow.

Indie Top 20 Volume 3 Side 4 - Sugarcubes, Throwing Muses, My Bloody Valentine, Wedding Present, Joy Division

1. The Sugarcubes - Birthday (Icelandic Version) (One Little Indian)

When this was released in 1987, the initial response could only be described as enthusiastic bewilderment. It wasn't that anyone in the position to promote it (music journalists or late night DJs) disliked it, more that they didn't understand how to describe it or put it neatly into context with anything else that was happening at the time.

Partly for that reason, I suspect, The Sugarcubes ended up becoming a band-come-tourism-campaign-for-Iceland, with almost every announcement, review, interview and Chart Show fact box referring to the fact that they came from a remote, frozen island with the same "population as Camden Town". A place hardly anyone visited, where music made strange ethereal noises and television only broadcast for three hours every day. The only way to describe "Birthday" in a way that might have made it saleable or caused it to make any sense to the time-pressed observer was to make it sound like an exotic cultural phenomenon occurring in some strange, faraway place.

Trouble is, as anyone who has become acquainted with Iceland or its music scene since fully understands, "Birthday" isn't really typical of anything happening there, or indeed anywhere else. Sure, music journalists compared the band to the Cocteau Twins at this point, and there's no question that there's an influence at play, but even so... those whining, weeping guitars, chiming bells, ponderous percussive elements, and Bjork's echoing, sky-reaching howling combine to create something actually really very creepy. The word "beautiful" has been occasionally used to describe the single, but it's not a well sounding record to my ears; it reaches, it surges, it staggers, it collapses like a yearning ballad being played from a vinyl record on a boat at choppy seas.

The video, screened on "The Chart Show" more times than I can sensibly count, adds to the sense of unease. The background picture is Bjork dancing and singing in an empty room with a darkened window. The foreground shot zooms in and out of Bjork's face, and as it zooms in she becomes pixellated like a Crimewatch video of a witness talking about a heinous murder. It's cheap and basic, but it again gives the impression of something slightly more sinister.

Bjork later referred to this as a "tasteless pop song", clarifying: "It’s a story about a love affair between a five year old girl, a secret and a man who lives next door. The song’s called Birthday because it’s his fiftieth birthday... I was always changing my mind about what the lyrics should be about. I had the atmosphere right from the start but not the facts. It finally ended up concentrating on this experience I remembered having as a little girl, among many other little girls’ experiences. It’s like huge men, about fifty or so, affect little girls very erotically but nothing happens . . . nothing is done, just this very strong feeling. I picked on this subject to show that anything can affect you erotically; material, a tree, anything.”

Which doesn't really clarify anything concretely, except to say that from the foundations up (the premise, the overall sound, the delivery) "Birthday" is consciously awkward, naive and confused, reaching for past emotions it can't get to or explain, and seems to want to unnerve the listener with its ideas.

I have my own particular memories of being five years old which relate tangentially to this record: My parents used to have an old 1960s stacking record player in the corner of our front room which was as big as a cupboard and contained a large number of old singles in its compartments. I used to regularly plough through the singles and stack them on the central spindle, spinning Fats Domino, The Beatles, The Animals, Ray Charles and other classic records of that era. On occasion, the stacking process wouldn't work, and a record would drop and as it span, would slip and slide against the label of the one beneath it, causing the melody to create a slightly discordant, wobbly noise. I hated this. It caused me to run from the room crying out to get help, I found it so unsettling.

To this day, I still have a stronger gag reflex than most around music which feels unsettled and faintly discordant (and not, crucially, heavily discordant) in a similar way (so it's lucky we won't have to discuss My Bloody Valentine much). It causes me to admire the way "Birthday" was put together rather than actually outright enjoy it.

But whatever I think, or reflexively feel - this single launched Bjork outside of Iceland and created a fascinating and unique pop star who remains an inspiration to many, and you could argue it was even the first pivotal step towards putting Iceland on the tourist map, giving the country more glossy magazine and newspaper coverage in Britain and beyond than it had enjoyed since the Cod Wars. If The Sugarcubes caused you to pull the Atlas from your parent's bookshelf and look further north than usual, you weren't alone. Maybe it was the start of the nation being patronised as being weird, quirky and out-there, when in reality it's no weirder or quirkier than any island nation - but that's the price everyone paid.

"Birthday" itself was never a conventional hit, but hung around the bottom of the National Top 100 across the whole of Autumn 1987, and ended up selling 50,000 copies - more than many "proper" chart hits.



2. Throwing Muses - Cry Baby Cry (4AD)

"Cry Baby Cry", on the other hand, isn't much more settled than "Birthday", sounding like an agonised country record performed in sheer panic by some musicians held at gunpoint. "He moved me and the chains changed!" yelps Kirsten Hirsch in a way that's one part joy, the other part total fear, while the band chug along rapidly behind her.

It's a deranged sounding single which has a rawness later Throwing Muses releases wouldn't necessarily possess. As the years rolled on, they discovered ways to decant their angular sound into more poppy structures, whereas "Cry Baby Cry" is almost all sharp edges. As an introduction to the band, it's interesting but not particularly accessible.

As a teenager, I actually thought this was probably what a band would have sounded like if Sylvia Plath had been a lead musician rather than a poet. Full marks for being a pretentious boy, then, but I'm going to put that comment here anyway because there's still a slight ring of truth about it for me. It has the same driving energy combined with disquieting ideas.

"You're wrong, Dave, and you're a pseud. Comparing bands to Sylvia Plath, honestly, you're not 14 anymore".
You're probably right, but I can't help it.



3. My Bloody Valentine - Strawberry Wine (Lazy)

And after all that, we get My Bloody Valentine at probably their most "normal". In their earliest days, MBV were usually regarded as being a sideshow in Indiepop quarters, a fey, merry group with some syrupy sixties ideas in their veins. That's an undeservingly simplistic view, as you can actually hear some of what would eventually make them significant here - the mix is much more interesting than anything, for example, The Pastels would be bothered to create. Feeling set on one constant droning mid-point, with the coo-ing backing vocals dominating and faintly buried lead vocals, it sounds faintly blurry, out of focus and claustrophobic. Something was already starting to happen, even if the details hadn't been fully fleshed out yet.

"Strawberry Wine" also sounds like a psychedelic folk song booted into the laps of an indie group, having a faintly otherworldly quality as a result. This is bit parts Indiepop, Shoegaze and early Incredible String Band at the same time.

Of course, if anyone had been played "Birthday" and "Strawberry Wine" back to back at the time and been asked which group would go on to make widely critically acclaimed and groundbreaking albums with their recording studio experiments, I still doubt the answer "My Bloody Valentine" would have cropped up much. Hindsight is a funny thing.



4. The Wedding Present - Anyone Can Make A Mistake (Reception)

This starts with high-powered guitar jangling, then revs its engine and speeds off, leading one critic of the time to comment: "The Ben Johnsons of indie take off around the track so fast they go straight past any tune".

That's a bit unfair, actually. "Anyone Can Make A Mistake" has become slightly sidelined in the Wedding Present's catalogue, but it's actually a brilliant little single, combining some superbly melodic, growling guitar riffs with an unstoppable energy. Even at this point before they signed to RCA, you can hear that their future would include "Kennedy" - "Anyone..." contains very similar elements in its sound.

Bigger and better things were to come in terms of exposure for the group, however, and this single acted as their last to sit outside the official UK Top 100. (Until they went "down the dumper" again, anyway).



5. Joy Division - Love Will Tear Us Apart (Peel Session) (Strange Fruit)

And here we are again, discussing a classic track everyone knows, dating from well before 1987, purely because it was on a Peel Session EP and entered the indie chart as a result.

This time, though, at least the track is more than marginally different from the finally released single version, and in my view actually better. Some might see this as sacrilege, but the Peel Session version adds more beef to Peter Hook's clattering basslines and the driving percussion, giving the track a sense of drama it didn't eventually have. Of course, other people believe that this destroys the sense of atmosphere the song later had - it's entirely a matter of taste.

The Peel Session EP climbed to number three on the indie chart, and number 98 on the Offical Top 100.

Indie Top 20 Volume One - Tracks 6-10 (Guana Batz, PWEI, Wedding Present, Blue Aeroplanes, Joy Division)

6. Guana Batz - Loan Shark (I.D.)

Anyone enjoying the "Top of the Pops" re-runs on BBC4 will be aware that the one aspect everyone tends to forget about the early eighties was the fifties rock n roll revival. Shakin Stevens and Matchbox were less credible and saccharine attempts to get back to quiffy basics, whereas the likes of The Straycats updated the sound with a modernised, hardened edge which still sounds compelling.

By the mid-eighties, the psychobilly movement was in full swing, and Guana Batz were the prime movers on the club scene, pulling in cramped sweaty crowds. Their crossover appeal was such that their albums regularly graced the top five of the indie charts, although a full-scale assault into the adult, mainstream charts never really occurred. The group remain active on the live circuit to this day.

I wish I could offer a reasonable perspective on "Loan Shark", but sadly this really isn't my bag. It's the last time any track of this nature would appear on the "Indie Top 20" series as well - rather like ACR on track one, it feels like one of the last representations of a movement which was slowly slipping back underground again.



7. Pop Will Eat Itself - Oh Grebo I Think I Love You (Chapter 22)

Way before they discovered The Beastie Boys, Hip Hop, samplers and dance music, Pop Will Eat Itself just created the kind of buzzsaw beery racket as heard above. Their punkish approach was actually surprisingly short-lived, with two releases slipping out which had a primitive, treble-heavy sound before their third, a cover of Sigue Sigue Sputnik's "Love Missile F1-11" (more on that soon) began to play with a much broader palette.

"Oh Grebo I Think I Love You" is likeably trashy but inessential, and it's hard to imagine that the group would have been remembered if they'd kept this sound up for much longer. It doesn't help that the idea of Grebo being a youth movement was over before it really properly began, so the daft novelty aspect of this track now seems lost to the mists of time.



8. The Wedding Present - You Should Always Keep In Touch With Your Friends (Reception)

There was a point in the eighties after The Smiths split when music journalists began forlornly hunting high and low for a group who could replace them as commercial British indie figureheads. During that slightly hysterical process, some incredibly unlikely names emerged - The House of Love, for example, who sounded so completely unlike The Smiths as to be irrelevant to all enquiries - but when The Wedding Present were name-dropped, it felt like a distinct possibility. Gedge's angst-ridden, lovelorn outsider lyrics, heavy use of common northern slang and phrases in his songs, the band's way with a jangly pop hook... well, why not? I suppose... if we must... erm...

Like some people sincerely believe that Jeremy Corbyn is a God-like, charismatic leader, there really was a point where people wanted to believe that David Gedge was the next Morrissey, because there were no other obvious options on the horizon. Sometimes, when a vacuum exists, you really have to cling on to any hope there is, however unlikely it seems.

At this point in their careers, they were a long way off being feted to such a degree, but the ingredients for what made them a briefly fantastic group are all present and correct in "You Should Always Keep In Touch With Your Friends", from the unwieldy title to the angst-ridden lyrics and simultaneously biting and jangling guitar riffs. Whereas later Wedding Present singles would show a pop sensibility the band have never really been given enough credit for, "Friends" meanders and mopes around indie-land with a scowl, and never quite reaches out in that way. But it's still a fine part of their back catalogue, and deserves a certain amount of respect.



9. Blue Aeroplanes - Lover and Confidante (Fire)

Bristol's Blue Aeroplanes, on the other hand, were almost destined to be a cult band from the off. Spoken word, poetic lyrics collided with angular guitar riffs, and they had a Russian interpretative dancer on stage with them throwing shapes to their music. Such arthouse behaviour was barely befitting a band who eventually ended up on a major label. Indeed, it's interesting to consider the fact that their Fire Records label-mates Pulp were considered oddballs at this point, when Pulp were actually already creating a few dark pop moments which were marginally more straightforward and less eccentric.

Still, "Lover and Confidante", while not being The Blue Aeroplanes at their best - that cheapo sounding recording flatters them not - does have a sharp guitar riff running through its core, and a fantastic central catchphrase in the chorus ("I can't talk to her so I'd like to talk about her") which sums up disturbing, obsessive love or lust more simply and effectively than most tracks of that era... but far better singles would follow.

10. Joy Division - Transmission (Peel Session Version) (Strange Fruit)

Now here's where we stumble across a strange anomaly. "Transmission" comes from entirely the wrong era to be on "Indie Top 20" at all, but Joy Division had recently put out a Peel Sessions EP on Strange Fruit records, of which this was a key track. It slipped safely inside the indie charts, and therefore qualified it for awkward inclusion here. The fact that Clive Selwood owned Strange Fruit records and presumably could cheaply and easily slip a big name band on to "Indie Top 20" through that outlet without much fuss was obviously also a huge incentive.

We don't really need to talk about "Transmission", of course. It's a bona-fide classic of its era, and while the Peel Session version lacks the depth and attention to detail of the studio release, the ideas still shine through. However, the placing of Joy Division straight after a run of scratchy, scrappy indie bands feels jarring and perplexing, and doesn't work as well as you'd suppose it might. There's nothing on this LP it sounds in good and easy company with, except perhaps the next track... and more on that later.