Category: Hard-to-find

demo, Hard-to-find, Studio master tapes

Spread ’em!

Craig McAllister

I’ve been meaning to mention that Stone Roses reissue from a few weeks back. Whatever you think of them, I have to tell you that the remastered album sounds absolutely magic. It’s night and day compared to the weak, tinny excuse of a CD that didn’t even come out when the album was initially released. The new version sounds like a jet plane taking off in your living room. I can only guess what it must sound like through a decent pair of Senheissers after a jazz cigarette. If I had the money I’d have sprung for the complete nuts ‘n bolts b-sides ‘n all release in the John Squire artwork adorned canvas 12″ box. If everything sounds as good as the mastering on the album it’ll be well worth it, and the rest. Until I have the money, bittorrent will be my best friend…

stone roses bw

I’ve written about Love Spreads before (here – you’ll find the demo and the guitar tab) but I feel compelled to write about it again given that mp3s of yer actual studio mastertapes fell into my exciteable wee hands only a couple of hours ago. Aye, that’s right! The studio mastertapes for Love Spreads! Sort of…

Lead guitar

Mani Bassline

Reni drum track

vocals + guitar + piano

I’m sure they’re taken from one of those Guitar Hero-type video games (maybe Rock Band?) but I have 3 seperate tracks and one amalgamated track featuring vocals, guitar and piano (with a bit of bass bleeding through now and again). They sound fantastic. The bassline alone is crying out for some bedroom nerd to remix it into oblivion. In fact, if you had the time to combine the bass parts with the drum track, you’d have yourself the perfect backing track if you fancy a spot of bedroom hip hop.

Squire’s isolated guitar part sounds fairly easy to play, although the ‘track’ I have sounds like 2 guitar tracks added together – one fat sounding dropped D Les Paul doing all the slide parts and a thinner sounding guitar playing all the clipped chords and those top-of-the-scale notes. Find my tab from the other post and jam along. That’s what I’ve been doing this morning instead of the ironing! 

stone roses love spreads vid

Remember to get Audacity for the full Phil Spector four track bedroom production effect! And try not to make a mess in yer Calvins, McMark.

Bonus Track!!!

The long-forgotten live-in-the-studio version of Love Spreads that made it’s only appearance on the original 1995 Help album. No one ever mentions it but this version is immense. Features a nice piano ‘n drums break down not on the single version. Get it!

Cover Versions, Double Nugget, Hard-to-find

Sounds like Bowie? Oh Yeah!

Craig McAllister

The Shadows Of Knight were a genre-straddling garage punk band from mid 60s Chicago. Taking their cue from The Yardbirds, The Who, The Stones, The etcs etcs blah blah blah, they are as well known on the northern soul scene for ‘Shake‘ as they are on the garage circuit for their feedback soaked version of Them’s ‘Gloria‘. Lenny Kaye’s Nuggets album included this, their version of Bo Diddley’s ‘Oh Yeah’.

shadows-of-knight

A garage stomper of a track, guitars drop in and out of the mix. The rhythm section takes it down. The singer whispers. The rhythm section section takes it up again. The singer screams. The guitars scream. The girls in the audience probably screamed as well. David Bowie was clealry taking notes. The similarity between Oh Yeah and Jean Genie is bordering on the criminal. But you knew that already.

“Has anybody seen Kosher Pickle Harry?” ask The Premiers at the start of Farmer John, their 1964 universally accepted garage classic. Welding the rhyhtms of Louie Louie and Wild Thing (of course) onto a standard 1950s croon-fest proved a success, given that this track reached the giddy heights of number 19 on the charts before the group disappeared from view forever.

the premiers

Farmer John is seemingly recorded live at some Animal House type frat house party. Girls whoop and cheer, everyone sings the backing vocals and a rocking good time is seemingly had by all. In fact, the track was recorded to 3 tracks in the studio before the band invited their pals in to hear the record for the first time. The engineer at the desk used the 4th track to record the sounds of the studio party and mixed it across the top.

Neil Young liked this track so much he took to covering it live in concert at the start of the 90s. He turned it into a bucketful of grunge and sucked the life out of it, but, hey hey my my, if he hadn’t covered it, I’d never have gone out of my way to dig out the original. So a backhanded ‘thanks‘ to him for that. And remember folks, as the saying goes, “If you dug it, it’s a nugget!”

Hard-to-find

Just so you know…

Craig McAllister

…a few of my files have been deleted by persons unknown today. If you’re trying to download something and you get a ‘file expired’ message or nothing happens at all, it’s nothing to do with me. Those pesky internet police are on my back again. I’m trying to stay a step ahead by re-uploading what I know is missing, but I thought I’d let you know.

lethal-bizzle-police-on-my-back-240907

You fink they’d have better fings to do wiv their time, like catchin’ real criminals n’ vat. Gawdon Bennet, it makes ya wonder, eh?

Here‘s the first track from that Danger Mouse album that never got released. Featuring Wayne Coyne, it’s called Revenge. Stick it to the man!

Blur Fanclub Singles, demo, Hard-to-find

His Arse Was Just A Blur

Craig McAllister

That’s the punchline to a well-quoted Billy Connolly joke, where he explains the joys of cycling at high speed. You yourself better get on yer bike and download the following tracks ASAP before the internet police remove some or all of them quicker than you can say “Wow! More Blur fanclub singles!” Go! Go! Go!

This is the second volume of the Blur Fanclub Singles. You can find out the background to the singles here, where the first few tracks are still available (after much re-uploading).  

sing_cover_big

2000: Sing (To Me)

Early version of an insignificant album track (Leisure) that gained it’s rightful status as a melancholic piano and vapour guitar-fest when it was included on the soundtrack to Trainspotting. This early version finds Damon mumbling and shouting nonsense a la a Home Counties Mark E Smith over the top of a piano seemingly played by Les Dawson. “So what’s the word?” The word is excellent, Damon. Top notch.

bsidesep_cover_big

2001: Tracks from a Camden Electric Ballroom gig in September 1999

I’m Fine

Bone Bag

No Monsters in Me

Young & Lovely

The gig itself was a one-off b-sides gig where Blur played nothing but, er, b-sides. For the record, the original studio version of I’m Fine can be found as an extra track on the 12″ and CD single of Popscene. These days, it’ll cost you an arm and a leg to buy. In the days of Nirvana, the post-Leisure pre-Modern Life… Popscene single was considered a bit of a flop and quickly forgotten about, much to the band’s chagrin.

Bone Bag backed CD2 of For Tomorrow, the single that introduced the band’s new found kicking-against-the-pricks anglified-and-proud-of-it organic Kinksian Modern Life Is Rubbish sound. Nah. I don’t know what that means either. And I wrote it. But you get the drift.

No Monsters In Me is a late era Blur b-side, making its appearance on the CD single of The Universal, that tune that Britrish Gas hijacked for their TV adverts. Young & Lovely was a track I always thought could’ve been held back for greater things. Instead, it was stuck away on the b-side of Chemical World. In hindsight, that makes Chemical World that rarest of things – a Blur single with good A and B sides. Let’s face it. Some of Blur’s b-sides are a bit ropey, aye?

wont_cover_big

2002: 2 tracks

Come Together (demo)

Won’t Do It (demo)

No, not a cover of yer Beatles Chuck Berry rip-offathon. Paul Weller and assorted showbiz pals got there first with that one. A live version of Come Together graced CD2 of the Chemical World single, but I think I’m right in saying the demo version featured here is the only studio recording to see the light of day. I’m sure Blurophiles will correct me if I’m wrong. I’m also sure they’d agree Come Together wsas perhaps best left in the studio. A noisy mess is how I’d describe it. Oops!!! Come Together is on Leisure. Of course it is. In my defence, I only have a promo copy of Leisure that has no tracklisting with it.

Won’t Do It graced the 12″ of There’s No Other Way. The demo version sounds exactly the same – the sound of a band finding their feet; one foot firmly placed in the experimental/feedback/racket side of the fence, the other foot making tentative steps towards that green faraway place known as ‘melody’. The first foot wins.

Anyway, enough of this tuneless fanclub nonsense. Only one sleep till the real Fanclub – Teenage Fanclub live in the rock n’ roll hotbed of Motherwell. Review and the usual pish about how great they are to follow.

Oh, and one more thing. The eagle-eyed amongst you may have noticed that the first post in this series ended at 1998 and this post begins at 2000. Somehow, I’ve lost the 1999 tracks and artwork. My computer detectives are onto it……

 

Cover Versions, demo, Double Nugget, Hard-to-find

Them was rotten days

Craig McAllister

Going to see a band these days is far too expensive. Yer enormodome megastars like U2, Springsteen, AC/DC etc etc charge a small fortune. Yer second string enormodomers like Coldplay, Oasis, (insert your own choice here) etc etc can get away with charging similar fortunes. Even relatively minor league acts are asking you to stump up anything upwards of £15 to hear their one album’s worth of whining nonsense. And why? Cos in this day and age, when folk (like me) illegally share music, the artist has realised that the only way to make money is on the road. That’s why live music has never been so bouyant.  Even Madonna is out and about playing a football stadium near you. You can’t download the live experience. Aye, you can download a Dylan concert the minute he’s off stage. And you can watch umpteen YouTube shaky camera phone videos of Paul McCartney on stage with Neil Young even before the last bit of feedback has fizzled out. What you can’t do is download the actual in-yer-face gig. And until you can, your favourite artists will continue getting away with charging you the price of feeding a family of four for a week. But you knew that already.

blur ticket

It wasn’t always like this. I saw Blur for £1! (see above). I paid £4 on the door the first time I saw the Stone Roses. Even their famous Alexandra Palace gig was only £8.50. And they were massive by this point. I’ve tons of tickets for concerts I’ve been to where I’ve paid a fiver or less. Sure, that first Stone Roses concert was 20 years ago. Blur was 18. I’m no economist, but surely the price of gig tickets these days outstrips the rate of inflation?

ticket

I saw the Inspiral Carpets loads of times. So named after one band member commented on his fellow band member’s mum’s orange and brown 70s living room carpet, the first time I saw them they were supporting the Wedding Present in the Barrowlands. I thought they sounded like the Teardrop Explodes; swirly organ, 60s references, bowl cuts and all that. Every song sounded like ‘Reward‘. I was hooked. I kept my fingers poised over the pause button of my tape recorder during John Peel shows and I kept my eyes peeled on the gig pages of NME. I went to see them all the time. I paid £3.50 to see them in the bar at Glasgow Tech. A quick visit to their merchandise stall to purchase 2 ‘Cool As Fuck’ badges (lost on the way home) and a demo tape called Dung 4 cost me a further £3.60. Add a couple of student-bar-priced watery pints  and you can see that I had a great night out for a tenner.

Inspiral Carpets - DUNG 4

Keep the Circle Around

Seeds Of Doubt

Joe

Causeway

Inside My Head

Sun Don’t Shine

Theme From Cow

Butterfly

26

Garage Full Of Flowers

96 Tears

A couple of weeks ago I dug out that old demo tape and converted it into mp3 files. It’s very much of it’s time, but still sounds pretty good. If you’re in anyway into Farfisa-led 60s influenced tunes sung by a shouty guy called Steve (these songs are pre Tom Hingley fame era) then it’s for you. Some of the tracks appeared polished and shiny down the line on the Rare As Fuck Plane Crash ep.  Others crept onto 7″ b sides or re-appeared in future Peel Sessions. If you’re a fan of Inspiral Carpets you’ll know most of them. If not, it’s as good a place to start as any. This tape was the one thing that convinced me I had seen the future of rock n roll. And it wasn’t called Bruce Springsteen.  

Inlay

The Inspiral Carpets occasionally gave out a newsletter. By issue 4 it had become known as the moos-letter. Here’s the one I got round about the time I saw them in Glasgow Tech and bought the tape that you’re just about to download.

find out why 1

find out why 2 3

find out why 4

Footnote:

I meant to write in my original post that about a year after the Glasgow Tech gig, I saw the Inspiral Carpets again at Strathclyde University. This was round about the time Noel Gallagher was roadying for them. The band were outside unloading their van and I took the chance to get them to sign the inside of my Levis denim jacket. They all signed it (apart from the singer who was, to quote the roadie (Noel?), “away shaggin'”). Clint Boon drew the cow logo and wrote “Inspirals ’89” underneath it. I think my sister nicked the jacket about a year later. Pre-eBay, I don’t know where it ended up…

Cover Versions, Hard-to-find

Flip Yer Whig

Craig McAllister

Being the totally shallow person that I am, one of the cooler records in my collections is the Afghan Whigs‘ Uptown Avondale 7″ single. On the Sub Pop label. On red vinyl.

Released in 1992, Uptown Avondale was the perfect distilation of the Afghan Whigs’ blend of Sabbath-heavy riffs fighting it out for centre stage with Stax and Motown soul tinges. Was it grunge/soul? Was it soul/grunge? It doesn’t really matter because to these ears it sounded fantastic.

AfghanWhigsUptownAvondale

The 7″ features 2 tracks. On the one side, a feedback-soaked minor key version of Freda Payne’s perennial disco classic Band Of Gold. Where the original is heartbreak sung euphorically, this version is half the tempo, half the euphoria but twice the heartbreak. I dug out my single last night and fired up the old Dansette. The single is one of those jukebox singles that’s missing the centre piece. I used to have one of those bits, but somewhere down the line it’s disappeared. I put it on anyway, thinking that the rubber mat on the turntable would keep it in place. Woah! “Noooowwwww ttttthhhhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaattttt yooooouuuuuu’vvvvveeee gggggaaaaaawwwwwwwnnnnnn aaaaaaallllll ttttttthhhhhhaaaaaaaaaattttt iiiiiiissssss llllllleeeeeeeeffffffftttttt iiiiissss aaaa bbbbbaaaaaannnnnddddd  ooooooffff gggggggoooooollllllldddddd.” I had to take it off. It sounded even more downbeat, depressing and deranged than ever. Thankfully, the mp3 sounds the way the Whigs intended.

afghan whigs

The flip side is even better. Here, they do a version of The Supreme’s Come See About Me. Whereas the original is all finger-clickin’ hip-shakin’ innocent teenage joy, the Whigs’ version sounds totally dangerous. The drums at the start don’t have the pistol crack that you’ll be familiar with, you’ll need to add your own handclaps, guitar riffs replace the rinky-dink piano trills and backing vocals are whispered with an air of menace rather than sung with innocent joy. “Come see about me” they implore. Eh, I’d rather not, thank you very much. It’s still soul music Jim, but not as we know it. It also happens to be in my Top 10 favourite tracks ever.

afghan whigs live

If you bought the 12″, you’d also find 2 extra tracks. This, their excellent though downbeat (of course) version of Al Green’s Beware and this, their faithful reworking of yer actual Elvis’ True Love Travels On A Gravel Road. Spooky keyboards. Descending bassline. Heartfelt vocals. All in a minor key. Again.

And if you bought the CD single, there’s a hidden track right at the end, a remix of the band’s own Milez Is Dead. Renamed Rebirth Of The Cool (see what they did there?) it’s apparent they’ve been listening to no less than Fools Gold. Aye! Funkier than a mosquito’s tweeter, some might say.  With added heroin.

Cover Versions, Hard-to-find, studio outtakes

There’s a riot goin’ on…

Craig McAllister

..and you might not even know it. The most prolific* band in showbiz, legendary Scottish band (C) The Trashcan Sinatras are currently burning up the highways and byways of the United States of America. I know many visitors here are from that big part of the globe and I thought I’d post this to let you know.

us09_tour_flyer_02

Relax girls. Some of them are even married.

Most fans of the Trashcans tend to be of the obsessive kind and will know all about the tour already. They’ll have their tickets, their accomodation sorted out and they’ll already have chosen which tracks from Cake they’re going to heckle for thoroughout the show. But you couldn’t be blamed for drifting off and seeing other bands during the Trashcan’s over-long hiatus. You might not be aware the band are still going strong. If so, this is a public service broadcast aimed at you, dear American reader. If they’re playing near you, get to the show. Go! Go! Go!

Listen out for the new stuff from the In The Music album – Prisons sounds like The Byrds doing Sugar Sugar, lead single I Wish You’d Met Her sounds like The Faces with the Bee Gees on backing vocals and Oranges and Apples is a 9 minute wig out (by Trashcans standards at any rate.) Watch the recent wig-out free acoustic in-store acoustic version here…

Here’s a couple of TCS rarities. First, Snow. Penned by Randy Newman, covered by Harpers Bazaar, this track was only ever released in Japan. At the tail end of the last century.

Next, Hammertime. Recorded for Weightlifting but left off at the sequencing stage, this track saw the light of day on the b-side of the highly collectable All The Dark Horses 10″ single. It was also briefly available as a download.

Lastly, Duty Free. A track so willfully obscure the band never even put their own name to it. Recorded as the Cat Protection League for a college project CD, Duty Free is classic Trashcans – melodic, melancholic and uplifting at the same time. It deserves a wider audience than it reached on the CD. Hence it’s appearance here at Plain Or Pan? Download then go and see the band live. Get to the show! Go! Go! Go!

Remember to check trashcansinatras.com for regular updates and video clips etc

You should really also visit Five Hungry Joes. Clearly a labour of love, it features an excellent array of all things Trashcansesque.

*Prolific. For our American readers, that was, like, irony, dude.

Blur Fanclub Singles, demo, Hard-to-find

Fish, Phish and all sorts of pish. Thank heavens for the internet.

Craig McAllister

It seems as good a time as any to post some of these tracks. Actually, a couple of weeks ago would’ve been better, but then as you know, I’m always just a half-step behind what’s currently in vogue. As I write, Blur have played their final gig. Again. And broken up. Again.

blur early

(snigger)

I’ve written about this before, but for those irregular/new visitors, I’ll go on record again and say that I’m a bit of a Blur fan. I have been since day 1. Bought She’s So High on 12″ and faithfully bought each release on the day of release until Crazy Beat limped out from between the grooves of Think Tank to promote a Coxon-less version of the band that had somewhat spectacularly ran out of steam. To be fair though, I played Think Tank a week or two ago and it’s held up fairly well, even without Coxon’s distinctive wonky guitar scratchings.

blur 97

The only aspect of Blur’s back catalogue I don’t have is the fanclub singles that get sent out every Christmas to those in the band’s fanclub. Subscribers to the fanclub received a quarterly fanzine called ‘Blurb‘. Come 1996 (and issue 4 of ‘Blurb‘) lucky subscribers also received a nice wee CD single at Christmas. In these modern times where bands continually blog, twitter and YouTube every bum note they’ve ever twanged, the notion of a fanclub is fairly quaint. But then, if you’re a fan and you’ve gotta have the lot, joining the fanclub was the only way to ensure your collection remained complete. REM have a similar fanclub that send you all sorts of live/demo/rare material that is the proverbial trainspotter’s wet dream.

coxon

A pissed Graham Coxon has just been knocked down by a car.

It’s all Britpop’s fault.

Thank heavens then for this thing called the internet. A bit of googling and bittorrenting later, and you too can have the entire recorded output of Fish, Phish and all sorts of pish. Look in all the right places and you might even find stuff you like. A couple of clicks yesterday led me to the very items missing from my Blur collection – the fanclub singles. Over the next few weeks I’ll post a couple of tracks until you too are bang up to date with all things Blurish. The fanclub singles were released once a year between 1996 and 2005. Here’s the first three:

death_cover_big

1996: Death of a Party

Acoustic demo version of a track which finally appeared on the Blur’s 1997 eponymously titled elpee. The demo was recorded at Matrix Studios in 1992. Extra points for the Syd Barrett-esque backing vocals. Blur sure set their stall out early…

iloveher_cover_big

1997: I Love Her

Demo recorded in 1991 at the sessions that produced ‘Leisure‘. Came with issue 8 of Blurb. Nice cheesegrater guitar/elastic band bass duel. Extra points for the pseudo Syd Barrett backing vocals. Can you see a pattern emerge?

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1998: Close

Demo recorded at Maison Rouge in 1992. Sounds a bit like the track above. What with all that backwards feedback fading in, it sure starts a bit like Popscene. Also has something approaching those “Ah ah watch you play” backing vocals that you’ll know from There’s No Other Way. Came with issue 12 of Blurb. Extra points for Coxon’s especially wobbly guitar solo.

More to follow in the next couple of weeks. Keep ’em peeled….

demo, Hard-to-find

A plea for Lee and GOLAS3

Craig McAllister

Hoy! Mavers! C’mere til I gie you a smack roon’ the heid. And make it quick, before that Pete Doherty gie’s you a different kinda smack roon’ the heid. In two weeks time, a bastardised version of The La’s will play a free festival in Sheffield. The band will consist of Lee Mavers (of course) along with selected Babyshambles personnel and Pete Doherty hingers oan. Not good. I asked Mavers if I could be in The La’s once. True story, but I’ll save it for another day. He told me I could never be in The La’s because I wasn’t a Scouser. Nowadays, anyone with the right haircut, Cuban heeled boots and fondness for illegal substances can seemingly fit right in. This new version of The La’s promises to be a car crash of even greater proportions than the 2005 version. And that’s really saying something. Bop bop shoobedoowop.

Don’t do it Lee. Stay at home, dig out the back catalogue and reminisce. That’s what most La’s fans have had to do for long enough anyway. It’s what I’ve been doing this week. Someone contacted me from Chile (!) and asked me to write a piece on The La’s for a cultural South American website. It’s being translated into Spanish as I type. I dug out my old La’s bootlegs and session material and buried myself in the stuff. It’s been magic. I have all The La’s small but perfect back catalogue apart from this…

timeless melody ad

The unreleased version of Timeless Melody, GOLAS3 (or GOLAS312 for the 12″). Almost 20 years to the day, 500 copies were pressed up and promoed to the music weeklies very briefly. GOLAS3 subsequently became the most sought after item in The La’s canon. It was withdrawn very quickly after Mavers decided he no longer liked the mix. But you knew that already. After hearing tape after tape of La’s sessions I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t think even Mavers knew what he was really listening for some of the time. GOLAS3 is a fantastic release. I’d imagine you’ll all be familiar with Timeless Melody, but the withdrawn version is something else entirely. It has a full-fat mono-sounding thunk that is obviously missing from the watered down, more well known album version. “Almost an anti production!” raved St Etienne’s Bob Stanley, reviewing the singles in that week’s Melody Maker. The withdrawn version of Timeless Melody is The Beatles in Hamburg’s Reeperbahn, Jeff Beck in The Yardbirds and Bummer In The Summer-era Love rolled into one. ‘Wild’ Billy Childish must’ve cried into his impeccably imperialistic droopy moustache if he was ever fortunate enough to hear it. There’s even more to follow…

GOLAS_312-Melody_Maker-May_27-1989

Skip past the more familiar sounding Clean Prophet and you’ll get to Ride Yer Camel, a 7 minute lo-fi homage to the Delta Blues, recorded late one night in one of The La’s umpteen guitarist’s flats. Beefheart, Bo Diddley and the blues. I’ve written about it before (canny be arsed linking to it to be honest) but have a listen. You won’t believe your sanitised in-ear speaker system 21st century ears.

Timeless Melody

Clean Prophet

Ride Yer Camel

My mp3’s come courtesy of a very kind and decent Irishman. He made my day about 4 years ago. If you happen to have a copy of GOLAS3 or GOLAS312 lying around gathering dust in your collection, drop me a line and I’ll take it off your hands forever. You could make my day today. I’ll even give you some money for it. Everyone’s a winner baby, that’s no lie.

Hard-to-find

Take Me To Your Dealer, Super Furry Animals

Craig McAllister

Ah, hidden tracks. Ever since that tape engineer accidentally left the tape running whilst Abbey Road was being mastered, creating Her Majesty as an unintended hidden track, others have followed where The Beatles (naturally) took the lead. Come to think of it, The Beatles pioneered something similar a couple of years before this when they put that “I never cook it any other way I never cook it any other way I never cook it an….” right into the run out groove at the end of Sgt Pepper. But that’s not really a hidden track, more of an annoyance to the weekend stoner who’d have to get up and physically lift the needle form the record. No, I’m talking about proper hidden tracks. Those wee gems right at the end of a CD about 15 minutes after the last track has stopped playing, or before track 1 has even started (re-re-wind). I can do without the sound of the bass player being sick at the beginning of Ash’s ‘1977‘ album. And I can do without the stoned piano nonsense at the end of  (er, I forget for the moment!) But tracks like Nirvana’s ‘Endless Nameless’ (on later editions of Nevermind), Me White Noise on Blur’s Think Tank and GenChildren on Radiohead’s Kid A are proof that sometimes the band’s best work goes almost unnoticed. Those 3 tracks are all future posts for sure, but for now I want to focus on the real Kings of Pop, those Super Furry Animals.

super furry goggles

I said Google!

The Super Furries would perhaps agree with me when I say that the best work can often go unnoticed. The first track on their Guerilla album is Check It Out. A few weeks after the albums release, they let slip via their fanclub mailing list (no internet in those days) that if you rewound the CD beyond the start of Check It Out you’d get this, a track called Citizen’s Band. And it’s magic. “Tried my hand at the citizen’s band, I’m a breaker that breaks.” A slow burner, it finishes in a flurry of fuzz guitar, handclaps and Keith Moon drum rolls. Nice falsetto backing vocals too. Oh, and a flute. Oh, yeah, and a stolen melody from part of their own ‘Hometown Unicorn’.

Following on from this Super Furry revelation I spent an afternoon going through all my SFA records looking for hidden tracks to no avail. Imagine my surprise then when Outspaced (early singles/b-sides/rarities compilation) was released. Rewinding the first track, I found this. ‘Outspaced‘ (the track) is an instrumental that builds and builds from a few electro bleeps and pleasantly strummed chords into a behemoth of a track that could only be describes as The Beach Boys playing Krautrock. To think I might never have heard it…

SFA-Slow-Life

I can’t find any more hidden gems amongst my SFA collection, but if you know something I don’t, please let me know. Until then, here’s a couple of Super Furry rarities for you. First up, the Street Edit (ie very sweary) of Motherfokker. Sounding like a stoned n’ swaggering Shaun Ryder, it’s quite amusing and very sweary. It features some of Goldie Lookin’ Chain, but don’t let that put you off. Released initially on the Japanese ‘Slow Life’ ep, you can find it on a few other SFA releases. Or you can get it here.

sfa ysbeidiau

Finally, Charge, from the b-side of Welsh language vinyl-only single Ysbeidau Heulog. A heads-down, no-nonsense Stooges assault on the senses. With added random American newsreader and the band shouting ‘Charge!’ every now and again, it’s a belter. Hear it here.

These tracks just go to illustrate what a brilliantly eclectic band the Super Furry Animals are. To do soft-rock harmonies, all out techno assault n’ battery, stoned fuzz and psychedelic acoustic balladry well is no mean feat. Especially when they often do all that and more in one song. Appreciate them while they’re here, folks. Don’t let them become the Velvet Underground for my grand children. Investigate the above tracks then nip over to superfurry.com or Play or Amazon or wherever you shop these days and fill yer trolley to the brim.