Category: Hard-to-find

Prince has gone and done it again. Hot on the heels of giving away his new album with the Mail on Sunday, he’s only gone and let this Sunday’s Observer give away the brilliant 1987 concert movie of ‘Sign O’ The Times’. I for one will be rushing out to buy one of the only 2 or 3 copies of the Observer from the local Spar.

I’ve been going through a wee Prince phase recently, as about a month or so ago I downloaded a 4CD bootleg of the Sign O The Times Tour Rehearsals from Dimeadozen. Some of it is absolutely fantastic and some of it is jazz shit/shit jazz. Here are some of the best bits.

Sign O The Times. Extended intro. Instructions to the band. Guitar wah-wah’d to death. As the man himself says, Oh Yeah!

1999. Stay with the drums. Make it tight and funky. Boom Boom! Sounds a bit like James Brown. Also sounds like a rehearsal. It would’ve been alright on the night, no doubt.

Kiss. Uh! Gimme the horns ‘gain. This veers close to jazz shit/shit jazz. Not a patch on the single version, but kicks the arse out of Tom Jones’ version. Of course.

U Got The Look. 2, 3, huh! No Sheena Easton on this one. I assume it’s Sheila E who sings her part here.

Starfish & Coffee. My favourite track from the original album. Complete with bum note at the start (“Nice goin’! – Sorry ’bout that!”) Great vocal on this one. And great backwards-sounding drums.

Let’s Go Crazy. Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to get through this thing called…shows. Listen out for the blank bits. Those ‘spontaneous’ audience participation bits are actually well-rehearsed. Who’d’ve thought it?! Listen too for Prince’s guitar. Bloody brilliant. Distorted and rocked out. His Boss Digital delay pedal must’ve gone through an awful lot of batteries. Great ending.

* Next week’s Observer on Sunday is giving away Talking Heads ‘Stop Making sense’ concert movie. Holy moly!

As requested, here’s the Vanilla Fudge Coke commercial. It’s a wah wah ‘n’ Hammond B3-heavy psychedelic freak out. Reminds me a bit of Deep Purple’s ‘Hush’. I’m not too familiar with Vanilla Fudge, so I’m not sure if this track is a pastiche of one of their other tracks. “20,000 eyes diggin’ Vanilla Fudge onstage with Coke!” Here you go.

Following on from a previous post a while back, here’s more Coke commercials from the 60’s. All soul tracks, all fantastic. 

Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell were well know for their duets (It Takes Two, The Onion Song, You’re All I Need To Get By etc etc). Less well known perhaps is the fact that Tammi rarely ever sang on any of these tracks. A hopeless alcoholic, she was usually replaced by any number of mimicking Motown session singers and no-one knew any better. So I have no idea if it really is her duetting here with Marvin, but this track swings like all those other tracks just mentioned.

“For the first time, Ray Charles and Aretha Franklin the King and Queen of Soul, for Coca Cola.” This track sounds like they’re singing their hearts out in celebration of their love for one another – “You bring on the good times darlin’ you know that is so” and then you remember they’re singing about a fizzy drink! Sounds great though! Things go better with Coke indeed.

Otis Redding died way too young. He set the Monterey pop festival on fire. OK, Hendrix may have had yer actual flames on his strat, but it was Otis who had the whole hippy audience eating out the palm of his hand thanks to the inter-racial group (the MGs and the Mar Keys horns) and the sheer dynamism and soulfulness of his performance. You can get the Monterey video from any number of decent online DVD sellers. Do yourself a favour etc etc, and while you’re waiting for it to arrive, hear Otis put his heart and soul into a paen for the sweet taste of Coke here.

“Joe Tex talks to his baby!” And it’s a bottle of Coke! Pistol crack snare, tight horn section, tickling piano, a conservative bass line and that great Joe Tex vocal on top. Come on baby, let’s go! Here you are Quinny.

Got loads more of this stuff, so let me know what you want to hear next. The Bee Gees? Vanilla Fudge? More Aretha or Marvin? Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Titch? Who needs gimmicky Coke and iTunes promotions when Plain Or Pan is open for requests…..

*Added 5.12.07 More Coke tracks here!

The Primitives were from Coventry and formed in 1985. They filled the gap post-Smiths and pre-Stone Roses and I bloody loved them. Their first single was ‘Thru The Flowers’ which was released in May of 1986. I’ve got it on super sexy seven inch and I am open to offers. It’s not the same version that appeared on their debut album ‘Lovely’. Initially, they were very primitive and all the songs were noisy and sloppy because that is how they played. The obvious focal point was Tracy Tracy who was cute as cute and looked a bit like Ruth Ellis (the last woman to be hanged in Britain). The others dressed head to toe in black, wore skinny jeans and pointy boots and had Ringo Starr circa 1965 haircuts. Paul the guitarist was clearly in love with Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground and had a great collection of guitars. The band went through more line-up changes than Spinal Tap. The original drummer Pete Tweedie wasn’t very good, so most of their early stuff was actually done with a drum machine (something most people don’t realize) and Pete would play the ride or hi hat. They released six singles with the sixth being a re-recorded version of ‘Thru The Flowers’ before they eventually signed to RCA in 1987.

In 1988 the album ‘Lovely’ was released and it is brilliant. It was a night and day change from their early singles. All of a sudden they knew how to play their instruments. The first change they made was getting rid of Pete the drummer. The other key to their sound was producer Paul Sampson who went back through all their old demos and found ‘Crash’ a song they had scraped. This was their only big hit and became a bit of an albatross for them. You’ve probably heard it. That guy from Busted has got a version out just now. It’s in the new Mr Bean movie. Honestly! Anyway, sales inevitably diminished, and the band continued to release great singles that only myself bought. ‘You Are The Way’ being a fine example. Co-written by Ian Broudie it shoulda been a massive hit. But wasn’t. The hidden jewel in their crown for me though is a track that originally appeared on the b-side of ‘Way Behind Me’ and was re-recorded with the guitarist singing. ‘All The Way Down’ is a brilliant piece of pseudo-Nuggets hammond ‘n’ bongos psychedelia and YOU NEED IT!

Of course, the band eventually petered out. Tracy added her vocals to some generic Ministry Of Sound pish dance track, and Paul is now a graphic designer. Download the 3 tracks above and remember them this way. And get over to Amazon or Play or wherever and pick up their Best Of for about £4.

tracy tracy                       ruth ellis

A couple of years ago, my mate Quinny casually mentioned that he had once been inside a giant squid costume on stage at a Super Furry Animals Barrowlands show. He used to give out fliers and stuff outside gigs and happened to be in the right place at the right time when the band’s management came along looking for 5 willing participants to wear the suits. They were instructed to walk on at the start of the gig and hold their fist aloft in front of the crowd who would be going bonkers at the sight of what they thought were the band in funny costumes. Quinny said he had to do all he could to stop himself from stage diving. As I said, he mentioned all this to me quite casually one day a couple of years ago, when we were talking about music and he said that he didn’t even like the band! A Jim’ll Fix It moment wasted on a non-believer. I told him they were magic and played him these 2 tracks to try and convert him.

Tradewinds and The Roman Road were both released as b-sides on the singles around the release of the ‘Rings Around The World’ album and were then included as the Tradewinds ep as part of ltd edition versions of the album. They are folky, electronic, a wee bit country, a wee bit sweary (Roman Road is anyway) a wee bit prog and a whole big bit magic. In short, a potted version of what’s great about the Super Furry’s. You’ll like them. Even if Quinny still thinks they’re rubbish.