Six Of The Best – Page 2

Ballroom Blitzed

October 18, 2015October 18, 2015 Craig McAllister

(c) Stuart Westwood

There was a defining moment last Thursday night when Johnny Marr was up in space somewhere, out among the stars and playing his melodies gifted from the Gods, showering the faithful at his feet with little arpeggiated notes of joy. It all happened midway through his celebratory, revelatory gig in Kilmarnock’s Grand Hall, and midway through a pulsing take on Electronic‘s evergreen Getting Away With It. Recast as an electro throb (“This is a disco song from Manchester“) with jagged, edgy guitars, it was accompanied by a pair of stark blue flashing strobes, marching in time to the guttural punch of the bass. As the song reached its peak, somewhere a flick of the switch turned the venue from rave central into a spangled, sparkled music box. The light changed from stark blue to glitter ball white as the music shifted from electro pulse to pure Marr; the chiming, echoing notes cannoning off the turn of the century walls and out into the ether. Surrounded by a swirl of mirrored light careering from a pair of over-sized disco balls and out on the edge of the 6 ft high stage, lost in his own music, it did indeed look like Johnny Marr was on the edge of the universe.

(c) Stuart Westwood

My day with Johnny was a day like no other. I’d interviewed him 2 weeks previously, giving me something of an ‘in’ when it came the time to meet him. I should backtrack slightly here. I’m part of the team who promoted the gig, so I was involved in the set-up of it. This meant me and my giddy head would be around the venue for the day leading up to the show itself. At the end of our interview, Johnny had promised to sign my guitar, and I’d carefully left it by the mixing desk, within eyesight at all times.

He was due to soundcheck at 4pm, and by half 2 I was starving. He wasn’t in the venue as he’d gone off for a jog around the provincial town of Kilmarnock, but I didn’t want to chance nipping out to a shop for a quick sandwich in case my moment would arrive. After the show, I reasoned, it would be pandemonium with people clamouring for his attention – before the show was my best bet at face-to-face conversation. I was having a conversation with his tour manager (about aeroplanes, of all things), when I was first aware of his presence. Some folk will tell you that the room changes when a famous person enters. In typical Johnny fashion, he made his announcement via his guitar. With my back to the stage, a quick blast of distorted blues gave way to the recognisable riff of The Headmaster Ritual. I tried to act non-plussed in front of the tour manager, but my eyes gave it away. He stopped our conversation and wandered off, leaving Johnny playing to an empty Grand Hall, save myself and a disinterested sound engineer by the mixing desk.

(c) this author

Stone me! It’s Johnny Marr! With cool hair. In a none-more-punk mohair sweater and a pair of jeans my 14 year old daughter might struggle to get into. He’s tiny! Put-him-in-your-pocket tiny! Like a little Lego version of the real thing, he bent down by his pedal board and made a few adjustments, now and again clanging a chord for good measure. Calling his technical team over he explained what he wanted. “When I play with this pedal (Clang! Tchk Tchk Tchk Tchk Tchk… ) I want those little blue lasers. When I use the reverb (Clang! Dun-dun-dun-dun-dun…) I want the subtle wash.” The whole show, it struck me there and then, is as choreographed as a Legs ‘n Co dance routine. Albeit a post-punk riot of Marr originals and Smiths’ classics, but a scripted, well-rehearsed version of spontaneity nonetheless.

Once happy with the instructions given to his lighting guys he bounces off the stage, keenly aware of my presence. “Johnny!” I call out, and he comes over. “We spoke on the phone a couple of weeks ago.”

“Craig?!? Great article, brother! How’s your little lad? Still playing his guitar? Did you bring yours then?” and before I’m fully aware of the situation I’m actually in, he’s leading me across to the mixing desk where he’s spied my guitar case. “Go on then! Let’s see it!” and he takes it out of the case, ignoring the Smiths vinyl I’ve stashed there for signing. “I like it….a ’78 you said? Californian? Great – a proper punk guitar!” He turns it over in his hands, casting his eye over the details. “No binding on the neck. I like that. See that knot in the wood there? Love it. Not too heavy….d’you know the green one I played on the Meat Is Murder LP? (of course I know it!) It weighed a ton. This is a nice guitar. You’ve got a good one there.” And then he puts it on. I’m about to pee my pants in excitement.

(c) this author

“What’s your favourite Smiths tracks?” He plays a few Marr-esque open chord runs up and down the neck. This! Can’t! Be! Happening! Then he notices my Queen Is Dead LP, lying expectantly for the caress of a Sharpie. “Have you worked out Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others yet?” And he plays it. Effortlessly and perfectly. He lets me video him playing it too. This is all too much. Of course, I only go and spoil it.

“So,” I say confidently. “Do you use your 3rd finger or your pinky for this part…” and, as he hands me my own guitar, the one I’ve played constantly for 25 or so years, I proceed to tie my fat fingers in knots whilst playing not only the wrong notes but the wrong fucking strings. Some Girls.. is a tune I play regularly, and while I’m not super fluid with it, I’ve never once played it as badly as I do at this very moment. Put it down to big match nerves, but I’ve really let myself down here.

(c) this author

Anyway, our conversation continues for a while. We get pictures, he signs my guitar, he signs my Smiths vinyl, we hug, he says thanks again for writing a great article, (brother) and then he’s off to join his band for the soundcheck proper, where I watch from the balcony as they play their version of Depeche Mode’s I Feel You a couple of times and run through a ramshackle version of The Sweet’s Ballroom Blitz.

“Ever since we announced the Kilmarnock gig, people keep telling me it’s the place where the Ballroom Blitz happened.” (The man at the back said ‘everyone attack‘ was apparently shouted as a fight broke out during a Sweet gig in the Grand Hall in the early 70’s, something that has now passed into local legend.) “It’s not on the set-list, but if it turns out OK in the soundcheck, we might do it in the encore.” As it turns out, they don’t, though Johnny does ad-lib a few lines towards the end of Boys Get Straight.

The gig itself? It’s super great, of course. A heady mixture of Messenger and Playland tracks, interspersed with choice selections from The Smiths’ superlative back catalogue. Second song in is is Panic and the room goes berserk. Johnny is a whippet thin rod of electricity, darting from one side of the stage to the other. Pogoing here. Windmilling there. In profile. In sillhouette. In denim jacket. In spotty shirt. Take your eyes off him at your peril. The Headmaster Ritual gets another outing. There’s a fantastic breakneck galloping Bigmouth Strikes Again. There Is A Light is mass communion. You Just Haven’t Earned It Yet, Baby, surely the best Smiths track to never be a single, kicks off the encore, where he’s joined by his son Nile (from support band Man Made – they’re worth a-watchin’) on a surprisingly good take on The Primitives’ Crash.

(c) this author

By the last song of the night, Johnny has us in the palms of his teeny tiny talented hands. How Soon Is Now? is a wobbling, juddering juggernaut, Marr wringing sustained notes of feedback from his famous green Jag. I decide to throw caution to the wind and, relying solely on the AAA pass I’m proudly wearing (remember Wayne’s World?) I’m off into the photographers’ pit, empty by law of the management since the 4th song and hoping for a decent snap of the occasion. As Johnny starts his de-tuning freak-out, I rush in. “Johnneeeey!” I scream, and he looks my way – purely coincidental, but still – and stands right above me, posing for me, as my phone fires as many photos as it can handle. He looks down from the top of the mountain at one point and gives me a wink (!) and then he’s off back to the mike, my photos in the bag. It’s all quite thrilling.

(c) this author

There’s more conversation (“neat capo trick, by the way, I tried it out. I’m gonna use that on something!“) and pictures after the show, a show he genuinely loved doing. It’s after midnight by the time we pack up and I head home carrying a signed guitar, a couple of signed Smiths records, Johnny’s set list, his road tested and slightly chipped signature-bearing plectrum….and the red and white roses that dangled from his belt loop for the entirety of the gig. Quite what I’ll do with them, I don’t know. They’re sitting in front of me as I type, a faded and falling apart memento of a day that will never fade from my memory. It’ll be quite a while before they’ve scraped me down from the ceiling, believe me.

(c) this author

Live!, Six Of The Best

Six Of The Best – Johnny Marr

October 7, 2015October 7, 2015 Craig McAllister

Six Of The Best is a semi-regular feature that pokes, prods and persuades your favourite bands, bards and barometers of hip opinion to tell us six of the best tracks they’ve ever heard. The tracks could be mainstream million-sellers or they could be obfuscatingly obscure, it doesn’t matter. The only criteria set is that, aye, they must be Six of the Best. Think of it like a mini, groovier version of Desert Island Discs…

Number 22 in a series:

Johnny Marr is the wunderkid guitar player who, one day in 1982 knocked on the door of 384 King’s Road in the Stretford area of Manchester and encourgaged the bequiffed answerer to be the wordsmith that would sing atop his unique tunes. Together, they formed a partnership that would over a few short years become the most unique British guitar group of all time. To many of a certain age they were our Beatles, our Pistols, our band. There was no-one like them before and there’s been no-one like them since. From the first time I heard them (unusual for such a seismic event, I can’t actually remember when this was), The Smiths became my favourite band and, as a ham-fisted, fat-fingered guitar player with lofty ambitions, Johnny Marr became my instant hero.

With a guitar in his hands, Johnny is a magician. In The Smiths, brightly ringing, sparkling arpeggios fell from his fingers as regularly and as rhythmically as the Mancunian rain. Over the course of one memorable weekend the barely 21 year-old Johnny wrote three of the tunes that would define not only his band but an entire era; William, It Was Really Nothing, How Soon Is Now? and Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want were all committed to tape in order to have something new to present to producer Stephen Street come the Monday morning. Three time-tested classics. One weekend. 21 years of age. Unbelievable.

As a Smith, Johnny wrote an obscene number of brilliant, inventive tunes. Lazy writers would go on about his ‘chiming‘, ‘jangly’ guitar sound, but there was far more to his arsenal than that. There was always, even in the Smiths’ most tender moments, a bite to his guitar. He could fingerpick. He could play inventive chord patterns. He could fingerpick and play an inventive chord pattern underneath it at the same time, with 10 fingers sounding like 25. ‘Like Lieber and Stoller piano lines playing alongside the guitar‘, to misquote him from those early days. Then there were the open tunings, the Nashville tunings, the hitting of the strings with knives to get the desired effect. He reinvented the wheel.

Johnny agreed to an interview ahead of his forthcoming October tour, a tour that takes in the west coast forgotten backwater of Kilmarnock (a show I’m involved in putting on) and telephoned me from his car, “somewhere on the outskirts of Manchester, just out of rehearsals. It’s good to get the band back together and blow the dust off the songs. I’m energised and enthused and I can’t wait for the tour to start.“

I explain to Johnny that our interview will be in two parts. The first part will focus on his recent work, his upcoming tour and his in-the-pipeline autobiography. The second part will focus on his Six Of The Best, albeit a 6otB with a difference. But more of that later.

Tell me about the last couple of years, then. It seems to me that it’s been quite full-on and intensive – two albums (The Messenger and Playland) written, recorded and released in two years and toured around the world and back again. This is the sort of behaviour I’d expect from a band with it all to prove, not from someone who’s made his mark in the world and who, by now, should be sitting back admiring his body of work from the comfort of an easy chair.

I’ll take that as a compliment. I really enjoy my work. It’s what I do and I’m good at it. It’s actually been 10 years of non-stop action! I joined Modest Mouse in 2005, just in time to record the ‘We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank’ album. That album really took off in the US and we toured there for a few years. It was pretty great, playing in a band again. Then, as fate would have it, Modest Mouse decided to take a break from touring and at the same time, The Cribs asked me to join as a guitar player. Without so much as a pause, it was back to being full-on and intense all over again. But I like that. I’m not into taking a year off.

Over my time in The Cribs I collected lots of ideas for songs. My travels informed what I was writing about, and as I wrote I had a specific sound in my head for a group that could play them. It was important to me that the band I put together should operate like the best bands; we should live in the same city and we should all be friends. I’m lucky that my best mates also happen to be the bass player, the guitar player and the drummer in my band.

The Messenger was released in 2013 and was really well-received. This gave me the encouragement to keep going, and I got on a bit of a roll. The songs that ended up on Playland the following year were very much a narrative for city life. I’ve always seen the two albums as a pair. Playland was my ‘difficult second album’, but I think I pulled it off. It sounds vital and NOW!

I point out that, from The Smiths via Electronic and The The to Modest Mouse and The Cribs, Johnny Marr has had a lot of ‘difficult second albums’.

Ha! Yeah! That’s true. ‘Meat Is Murder’ was a pretty good 2nd album, wasn’t it? I’ve always been a fan of them – I loved Talking Heads and The Only Ones second LPs. You don’t always have the luxury of having a long time to write your follow-up album. Usually, they’re written on the hop. Both Talking Heads and The Only Ones were made under the conditions conducive to getting the job done.

And now, following the wham-bam knockout of the two LPs, you have a tour that will see the Messenger/Playland era come to a close and immortalised for posterity in your first live album, the aptly-named Adrenalin Baby (recorded earlier this year in Manchester and due November.)

Yeah. The live album. I’m really proud of it. It’s a really good document of the time. I’ve kept it to one CD (although it’ll be a double LP) as it’s short ‘n sweet and doesn’t outstay its welcome. It’s a good representation of the live set. Hopefully, people who come to the shows will enjoy it as a reminder of what the shows were like, and those who never made the shows will get an idea of what the live set is all about. I wanted it to sit alongside my favourite live LPs, albums like Bowie’s ‘Stage’ and Iggy’s ‘TV Eye’.

I remark that my favourite live album is The Ramones’ ‘It’s Alive’. Oh yeah! The energy on that is amazing. D’you know, I stole my copy! I wasn’t sure I was going to like it, so I ‘borrowed’ it from the local newsagent and never gave it back. It’s a brilliant album, isn’t it? Like all the best live albums it has volume and energy. Hopefully, people will get that from Adrenalin Baby.

Adrenalin Baby is a good potted history of Johnny’s best bits – half a dozen or so tracks from The Messenger/Playland eras, a cherry picking of the Smiths tracks he plays live, Electronic’s perennially melancholic Getting Away With It and a garage band ramalama run through of I Fought The Law. It’s Alive indeed.

Looking at the tracklisting of the album and scrutinising the playlists from the recent tours, it’s clear that Johnny holds his back catalogue dear to his heart. This is where my idea for this Six Of The Best came from – if Johnny were to put 6 of his own tracks into a time capsule to be dug up in 100 years time, which tracks would he choose? What are the tracks that Johnny Marr is defined by?

You want me to pick my own tracks? Cool! I’ve never been asked that before. Usually, everyone wants to talk to me about The Stooges. You want me to pick my own records? Alright then. Let me think about that.

And think about that he does. Johnny then very methodically gives me a chronological list of what he deems to be his best bits. An impossible task, most folk would agree (and a final choice that many would also disagree on), but, for the record, here are the tracks that Johnny Marr is most proud of having been involved in.

The Smiths – How Soon Is Now?

Y’know? The Smiths really blew me away. I’m defined by them and I can quite happily live with that. The combination of guitar sounds on How Soon Is Now? is amazing. The layering. The patience required to put it all together….it hadn’t been done before and it hasn’t been done since. I’m very proud of How Soon Is Now?

Electronic – Get The Message

The band was borne out of The Smiths and New Order, but sounded like neither. We were very unique. Bernard and myself had a real spark. Get The Message is a great example of what we do best. Those early days in Electronic were great fun. I remember the first tour, drinking pints of champagne after an insane Barrowlands show.

The The – Slow Emotion Replay

I can only play harmonica one way (!), and it’s all there on Slow Emotion Replay. The guitar part – it’s what people think I sound like. You and I know differently, of course.

Modest Mouse – Dashboard

This is the track that kind of kicked off the 1st phase of my ‘new’ career. When we wrote the album, all my guitar parts were worked out in advance. I spent ages with my effects pedals making mad Captain Beefheart sounds until I discovered what I was looking for. I’m extremely proud of the guitar sound on the whole record. Everything you can hear in the left-hand speaker is me, doing my best Beefheart impression.

The Cribs – We Share The Same Skies

I’ve chosen this for the same reasons as Slow Emotion Replay. The guitar playing – classic me, isn’t it?!?

Johnny Marr – The Messenger

This song is a good representation of how I like to sing. I was never known as a singer, but I’m comfortable doing it. The Messenger is kinda post-punk in feel, jagged and spiky but the vocals are warm and textured. I like that juxtaposition.

Never one to look back, Johnny is always looking forward to the next thing. After “10, 15 years of offers”, now is the right time for him to commit his memories to print in the form of an autobiography.

“There’s a genuine interest in my life from enough people to warrant this. I was always unsure about doing this, but then I saw the satisfaction – no pun intended! – that Andrew Oldham got from penning his two memoirs. And Nile (Rodgers) writing his – well, that’s me been given the seal of approval to do my own.”

We have a wee chat about music autobiographies in general and enthuse about Keith Richard’s book, specifically the section where he talks about discovering open G tuning and how that opened up a whole new world of guitar playing.

We also chat about our kids, how it must be great, I say, to look out and see your son (Nile’s band Man Made are the support on the October tour) on stage, following in your footsteps. And then, the gent that he is, Johnny passes on some advice for my own son (he’s only 8) who’s beginning his first tentative steps on the six string. Getting guitar tips from Johnny Marr – does it get any better than that? I even have the cheek to pass on a capo trick I’ve discovered for myself – not quite the whole new world that Keith Richards discovered in open G, but enough of a trick for Johnny to prick his ears and say, “Right, run that past me again! Ah! Got it! I’m gonna try that next time I play ‘There Is A Light..’”

Whether he will or not remains to be seen, but what a great way to finish an interview!

Johnny Marr is on tour this month. Check all the usual places for ticket details.

West of Scotland fans might like to get themselves to Kilmarnock for his only date in the area on Thursday 15th October. See you down the front.

Six Of The Best

Six Of The Best – Grahame Skinner

April 22, 2015April 23, 2015 Craig McAllister

Six Of The Best is a semi-regular feature that pokes, prods and persuades your favourite bands, bards and barometers of hip opinion to tell us six of the best tracks they’ve ever heard. The tracks could be mainstream million-sellers or they could be obfuscatingly obscure, it doesn’t matter. The only criteria set is that, aye, they must be Six of the Best. Think of it like a mini, groovier version of Desert Island Discs…

Number 21 in a series:

Grahame Skinner is best known for being the provider of the deep, rich baritone vocal atop Hipsway‘s mid-late 80s pop/soul output. I loved them. Most folk of a certain age in the West of Scotland did. Just too young to appreciate Orange Juice, they were the next best thing. The teenyboppers had Haircut 100. We had Hipsway. That’s how it went.

At the time, The Smiths were just about my most favourite thing in the world, and most folk assumed that I had modelled my towering quiff on that of Morrissey’s. Not at all! I was always way more into Marr than Morrissey. My quiff, my pride and joy, was a hybrid quiff – an amalgamation of the best of Love & Money’s James Grant and Skin from Hipsway. It was lush, it was thick and it was Brylcreem’d to within an inch of save-the-whale oil slickness. In fact, Black Mama’s Chip Shop at Irvine Cross used to phone me now and again when they’d hit a busy spell and ran out of stuff to fry their chips in.

In 1986/87 you couldn’t escape the music of Hipsway. It was theee trendiest thing to be seen carrying into the common room at school. Forget your Bunnymen and Smiths and Housemartins and Lloyd and his Commotions – Hipsway was where it was at. The eponymously titled LP blasted out of bars and bedrooms everywhere, and even Alex Aitken’s car. He had somehow passed his test when we were still at school and drove everywhere. We threw away his goth pretensions along with his All About Eve cassettes in one fell swoop when he wasn’t looking and replaced them with Hipsway. “Are you broke? Are you broke?! By the broken years!” we’d sing, annoying the hell out of him.

If you didn’t actually own the LP (although at least half the population must’ve done) you couldn’t escape the music. The Broken Years and Long White Car were played to death on Radio Clyde. They were both misses rather than hits, expensively polished in the top studios by the top producers, but they paved the way. Ask the Lord was the hit that should’ve been, all call-and-response vocals behind a mid-tempo, bass-driven groove.

The Honeythief was the one that hit the target though, it’s economic riff adding just enough Chic to propel it to Number 17 on the actual charts, providing the band with a Top Of The Pops appearance in the process.

If you never listened to Radios Clyde or 1, or watched Top of the Pops, you’d probably still have heard Tinder via an era-defining McEwan’s lager advert that was on constant rotation seemingly for ever. I think it still pops up between the breaks on that STV Glasgow channel that started up recently. Hipsway. You just couldn’t escape them.

Skin is also the teller of the tallest of tales, as a near 30-year wild goose chase at my expense has only just come to an end. I happened to remark that when Hipsway played Ayr Pavilion – the 15th April 1987 (I have the ticket sitting in front of me), he introduced their encore, a cover of the Bee Gee’s Jive Talking, as “the new single,” due for release “any day now”. The next day I hotfooted it to Walker’s at Irvine Cross, only to be told they didn’t have it. They didn’t have it the next day either. Or the day after that. Or the day after that. Or 3 weeks later. Or 6 months later. Or never at all. Since then, with the advent of the internet, I’ve looked in the deepest darkest places in the hope I’ll somehow turn up a copy of Hipsway doing Jive Talking.

“It’s never existed,” Skin tells me. “It never did!”

Pffft. And that’s the enda that.

Grahame was more than happy to chat to Plain Or Pan and give us Six of the Best. He starts with the usual disclaimer of “this isn’t by any means a definitive list, and is in no particular order,” so read ahead knowing that, as with the other 20 previous entries, obvious choices will have been missed. Call it a snap-shot of Grahame’s musical tastes, the music that shaped the music he’s known for making himself.

Johnathan Richman & The Modern Lovers– Roadrunner

“I remember when it came out and how strange it sounded. It evokes the whole idea of driving down a dark road. It has an amazing rhythm that goes on and on for ages. Johnathan Richman really is a terrific songwriter.”

Jim Ford – I’m Gonna Make Her Love Me Till The Cows Come Home

“Jim Ford was best pals with Sly Stone. Sly called him ‘the baddest white man alive’. In my humble opinion, this record is easily one of the best records ever made. It’s amazing. Funky. Soulful. It’s on an album called ‘Country Funk’, which kinda sums it up.”

David Bowie – Life On Mars

“I could’ve picked any of 20 or so David Bowie tracks. I have absolutely no hesitation in calling David Bowie a genius. It’s an over-used phrase, but in Bowie’s case it applies. I can remember hearing this song on the radio from before I was a Bowie fan. It resonates. Something about it stuck with the young me. The first Bowie LP I bought was Ziggy Stardust, and I quickly worked backwards from there. Bowie is the touchstone.”

The Rolling Stones – Jumpin’ Jack Flash

“I love everything the Stones have ever done. I won’t ever get tired of this record. Whenever it comes on I break out the old dad/uncle dancing routine. Who disnae?!?“

Led Zeppelin – Black Dog

“I was 16/17 years old. That really impressionable age when bands matter more than anything. My pal used to tape the John Peel show and we’d listen to it the next day. We were all into punk and new wave, The Stranglers and stuff like that. Led Zeppelin? They were simply NOT ACCEPTABLE! Then I heard Black Dog and it changed the game forever. What. A. Record.“

Orange Juice – Falling & Laughing

“Orange Juice and the Fire Engines were like heroes to us. Local bands that could put out singles. If they could do it, anyone could. We could! I love this record. the music is terrific – a driving bassline, interesting chord changes. it’s adventurous, brilliant songwriting.“

That’s a great selection – very Plain Or Pan, I’m sure you’d agree.

These days, Grahame still writes and records. He puts out records under his own name as well as that of Cowboy Mouth and Witness. You should probably pop over to his website, where he has music for sale.

Away from the brief glare of the spotlight, he also dips his toe into the live arena. In just a couple of weeks he plays the HAC in Irvine, a terrific little theatre that’s recently seen the likes of Glenn Tilbrook, Nik Kershaw and Model Aeroplanes pack the place out. You can buy a ticket here.

Football, Gone but not forgotten, Six Of The Best

Six Of The Best – Stuart Cosgrove

February 9, 2015 Craig McAllister

Number 20 in a series:

Stuart Cosgrove is, to most folk in Scotland, the owner of that distinctive voice with the Tayside twang barking and cackling its way out of the tranny each Saturday afternoon between 12 and 2. “Ah yes indeed Tam!” could almost be his catchphrase. As co-presenter of BBC Radio Scotland’s Off The Ball, he’s a bringer of much needed humour and mirth to suffering Scottish football fans up and down the land.

‘The most petty and ill-informed football show on the radio‘ is a must-listen to in my house – it’s the central part of my pre-match warm up before I head off to Rugby Park to watch my team lie down to whoever they’re up against that week. Although primarily a football show, there’s a fair smattering of music references. Sometimes, one of the guests will be of that ilk, other times Tam and Stuart will discuss their musical preferences, with Stuart the black music obsessed yin to Tam Cowan’s cabaret ‘n crooners yang. And there’s always a record to play out with, a thematically-linked song that encapsulates the mood of that week’s big (or petty) talking point. It’s my favourite show on the wireless by some distance.

In the 70s, Stuart was a buttoned-down and baggy-panted Northern Soul fan, a collector of rare 7″s who was fond of hopping on the overnight Perth to London train and disembarking at Wigan just in time for the Casino to open. In the 80s, Stuart indulged his musical passions further by writing for the fanzines before graduating to the NME and The Face. He was an early champion of electronic dance music and his job gained him access to all sorts of musical royalty, from Stevie Wonder and Jimmy Ruffin to Prince and the hallowed halls of Paisley Park. He’s long-since moved onwards and upwards (would you still want to be writing for NME nowadays? What/who could you muster up any enthusiasm to write about?) and is now a high heid yin at Channel 4. Somehow, inbetween the radio work each Saturday, working in London through the week and going to as many St Johnstone games as he can fit in, he’s found the time to write a book.

Here’s the blurb;

Detroit 67, The Year That Changed Soul is the story of the city of Detroit in the most dramatic and creative year in its history. It is the story of Motown, the breakup of The Supremes and the implosion of the most successful African-American record label ever, set against a backdrop of urban riots, escalating war in Vietnam and police corruption. The book weaves through the year as counterculture arrives in Detroit and the city’s other famous group, the proto-punk band MC5 go to war with mainstream America. The year ends in intense legal warfare as the threads that bind Detroit together unravel and leave a chaos that scars the city for decades to come.

It’ll be right up my street, and no doubt many of yours too.

Ahead of its publication at the end of March, Stuart somehow found the time to contribute to Plain Or Pan. Keeping with the Detroit theme, Stuart tells us his six favourite Detroit musicians. In what must surely be a serendipitous moment, most of them have graced this blog countless times already.

Marvin Gaye

The original black crooner who wanted to be the black Sinatra but ended up fronting the greatest album of all time ‘What’s Going On.’

Marvin Gaye – Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)

David Ruffin

The bespectacled lead singer of The Temptations was the most complicated character at Motown and at war with himself. He eventually died of a drug overdose.

The Temptations – Message From A Black Man

Aretha Franklin

The Queen of Soul came from a famous Detroit family whose father was the city’s most flamboyant preacher.

Aretha Franklin – Save Me

Mary Wilson

Often seen as ‘the other Supreme’ caught in a bitter war between Diana Ross and Florence Ballard, but her voice effortlessly floated from jazz, to soul and even opera.

The Supremes – Automatically Sunshine

Ronnie McNeir

An outsider who often won local talent contests in the Motor City but was in his sixties before he joined The Four Tops as a stand in for the legendary Levi Stubbs.

Ronnie McNeir – Lucky Number

Jonnie Mae Matthews

The godmother of Detroit soul and a pioneer who had a voice rougher than sandpaper and smoother than silk.

Jonnie Mae Matthews – The Headshrinker

Stuart Cosgrove is the author of Detroit 67. You can read more about the book and its author on the Detroit 67 Facebook page. Afterwards, you’d best get on the good foot and pre-order your copy from here (or your usual online book retailer.) I’ll see you at the front of the virtual queue.

Alternative Version, Cover Versions, demo, Double Nugget, Dylanish, Get This!, Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find, Live!, Most downloaded tracks, Six Of The Best, studio outtakes

P.O.P. B.O. ’14

December 31, 2014 Craig McAllister

Somehow, this is the end of the 8th year of this blog. 8 years! I never for a minute thought I’d be down this road for so long, but here I am, slowing down slightly, but still writing whenever the muse takes me. In the past, I used to write loads over the Christmas period and store it all up like a squirrel hiding nuts in trees, so that when I was busy with my real work I could drip-feed my wee articles online at regular intervals when time was of the essence. These days, holidays mean holidays. For the past week or so I’ve done sweet F.A. apart from sit around in my underwear eating cheese until 3 in the afternoon. Occasionally I’ve tidied up a bit, but that’s only after the Applewood smoked or Wensleydale and cranberry has run out.

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It’ll be good to get back to the old routine in January and, along with work, get back to writing about music on a (hopefully) more regular basis. Until then, here’s the annual end of December post.

Around this time of year I employ a team of stat monkeys to sift through everything published on Plain Or Pan over the last 12 months. Numbers are fed into a specially-constructed silver machine, crunched and spat back out. Amongst the stainless steel saliva lie the 25 most listened to and/or downloaded tracks of the year.

Below is that list, a CD-length collection of covers, curios and hard-to-find classics. Download the rar file, sequence as you please and burn away.

Baby Huey – Listen To Me

The Lovin’ Spoonful – Do You Believe In Magic?

French Fries – Danse a la Musique

Oscar Brown – The Snake

Al Brown – Here I Am Baby

Radiohead – These Are My Twisted Words

Bob Dylan – Boots Of Spanish Leather

Ian Dury & the Blockheads – Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick

Michael Marra – Hamish

Paul Weller – Flame-Out

Bo Diddley – She’s Fine, She’s Mine

Barbara & the Browns – You Don’t Love Me

Tommy James & the Shondells – Crimson & Clover

Lightships – Do Your Thing

The Beatles – It’s All Too Much (Much Too Much bootleg version)

Les Negresses Vertes – Zobi la Mouche

Trash Can Sinatras – Ghosts Of American Astronauts (Live at Fez, NYC 2004)

Eddie Floyd – I’ve Never Found A Girl

The Smiths – There Is A Light That Never Goes Out (demo)

Curtis Liggins Indications – What It Is

Them – I Can Only Give You Everything

Kim Fowley – Bubblegum

A Camp – Boys Keep Swinging

The Slits – I Heard It Through The Grapevine (demo)

Madness – Un Paso Adelante

And here’s to health, wealth and happiness to you all for 2015. All the best!

Six Of The Best

Six Of The Best – Model Aeroplanes

August 6, 2014 Craig McAllister

Number 19 in a series:

Those four fresh faced youngsters above are Model Aeroplanes and with nary a hipster beard nor a tattoo in sight are just about the hottest, hippest most happening name to drop right now. Crowd pleasers at this year’s Liverpool Sound City and both the T In The Park and Wickerman festivals, not to mention the up-coming Belladrum festival, there’s a huge, expectant buzz around the Dundonian four piece.

If I was 18 and sick fed up of Arctic Monkeys’ gradual drift away from their early sound, Model Aeroplanes would be my new favourite band. Featuring the classic bass, drums and two guitars set-up, they play well-crafted, infectious songs that rattle and roll in equal parts.

Younger readers might also hear them as an updated version of a less reliant on effects pedals Foals or Vampire Weekend, with the twin guitar attack firing off chiming African-influenced chattering riffs.

Cynical old gits like me who’ve been around the block more than once (and bought the original t-shirt, not the updated Primark version) are harder to impress. You could play spot-the-influence all day if you like, but there’s no denying Model Aeroplanes are a bright ‘n breezy breath of fresh air.

You know those folk that put half a dozen Mentos into a bottle of Coke then film it for You Tube’s sake? That’s the sound of Model Aeroplanes. Put some elements of the less-precious end of post-punk in the bottle. Add equal parts Talking Heads when they discovered Africa with the expansive skittering widescreen sound of Franz Ferdinand. Dilute the mixture with the pop nous of Haircut 100, who took the Orange Juice blueprint and, with a spit and a polish, galloped with it into the charts. Shake the whole thing up and let it explode. Voila! Model Aeroplanes!

If you’ve pressed ‘play’ above, you’ll know that their whole sound, whilst rooted in the DNA of ‘proper’ indie is as polished as the shine on their smiling wee faces. Underneath the two guitars is a terrific rhythm section, all counter rhythms with tons of cowbell and pitter-pattering percussives.

They’re far too young to remember that old “there’s always been a dance element to our music” cliche, but Model Aeroplanes could say that honestly and proudly with hand on heart.

By the time they get around to releasing an album they’ll be gunning for the charts. They have proper hit-making potential and Radio 1, in particular Edith Bowman and Vic Galloway love them.

The band have built up a rabid fan base who travel to the gigs the way football supporters follow their team the length and breadth of the country and they’ve helped recent release Electricity clock up over 30,000 hits on You Tube.

Plain Or Pan asked Ben and Rory from Model Aeroplanes to lay their influences bare. I have to admit to never having heard 2 or 3 of these tracks before now, but after having MA’s tracks on repeat for the past few days, they make perfect sense. There’s a multitude of polyrhythms and bucketfuls of delay-drenched guitar interplay on almost every track. These are the tunes that make Model Aeroplanes tick;

Lightspeed – Twin Atlantic

We became massive Twin Atlantic fans around the time of Vivarium and are to this day. This just reminds us of being 14 and drinking White Storm Cider at our local park.

You Can Call Me Al – Paul Simon

This is one of the most well known songs in existence but even if you didn’t know who it was when you were young, if you recognised it, I’ll bet you went mental at the bass solo.

F.C.P.R.E.M.I.X – The Fall of Troy

Most people, if they listen to our music, would be shocked at bands that have influenced our playing in the past. The Fall of Troy were among bands like The Mars Volta, Meet Me In St. Louis, Biffy and Twin who’s songs we’d learn then mosh out to at practice back in 2010. Anything with a weird time signature was acceptable but ‘F.C.P.R.E.M.I.X’ is in 4/4 and still rocks. We still give it a bash at most practices now so I suppose it’s a sign that playing pop music hasn’t completely taken us over.

Munich – Editors

Last August we were given an amazing opportunity to support Editors at the HMV Picture House in Edinburgh. At the time it was the most people we’d ever played to at once, around 1,000 when we went on, but we’ll always remember how nervous we were walking on stage. I could have spewed, we hadn’t really felt nerves like that before and haven’t since to be honest. It’s good to remember. This song is an anthem.

Cassius – Foals

One of our older friends showed us this song in 2009, we were blown away. Kieran learned how to play dance-beats and the rest is history.

Black and Blue – Miike Snow

(Rory) – I saw Miike Snow on Later with Jools Holland in about 2009-2010 and, for the most part, have listened to them every day since. No joke.

Model Aeroplanes are often out and about on the road. In the Autumn they had out as support to Fatherson. Before that, on September 12th they make a *flying visit to Irvine to play the intimate environs of the town’s Harbour Arts Centre. A great place to see them before they make their inevitable climb up the ladder and into the larger venues, tickets are only a fiver. You can get them direct from the HAC 01294 274059 with no booking fee, or via http://www.ticketweb.com, with a small booking fee added. I’ll be there. You should do your best to get alongl too.

*I couldn’t go the whole article and not make some sort of aviation-based pun.

Cover Versions, Six Of The Best

Six Of The Best – Paul Donoghue (Glasvegas)

March 31, 2014March 31, 2014 Craig McAllister

Six Of The Best is a semi-regular feature that pokes, prods and persuades your favourite bands, bards and barometers of hip opinion to tell us six of the best tracks they’ve ever heard. The tracks could be mainstream million-sellers or they could be obfuscatingly obscure, it doesn’t matter. The only criteria set is that, aye, they must be Six of the Best. Think of it like a mini, groovier version of Desert Island Discs…

Number 18 in a series:

Paul Donoghue is the Clash-obsessed bass player with Glasvegas. No stranger to a large tub of Brylcreem and seemingly always dressed from slicked-back bequiffed head to pointy-booted toe in none-more-black, he looks like a big drip of a Simonon-silhouetted oil slick, all monochrome mood and menace. Don’t be deceived by the image though. Get talking to him and you’ll quickly discover an eloquent speaker, one who loves music just as much as you or I.

I’ve liked Glasvegas since the first LP. The raybans, the hair, the pillaging of rock ‘n roll sound and vision. ‘My name is Geraldine and I’m your social worker’, ‘Your da’, he’s gone’, ‘No sweeping exits, no Hollywood endings’. It’s modern folk music for retro-looking music fans.

Of course, Glasvegas kinda divide many people. “Derivative,” they say. “Nothing original“. It’s easy to play ‘name that tune’ with some of their records, their influences are wide and fairly obvious, but I think that familiarity is what makes them an enjoyable listen. The many people who like them might never have consciously listened to a Ronettes track or any random album from Creation Records back catalogue. Equally, the many people who like them could just as well own every album on the Creation label and the Phil Spector Back To Mono box set. There’s nothing wrong with familiarity in music. Throbbing Gristle are unlistenable. With Glasvegas, the listener doesn’t have to try too hard. You know when the solo is going to come in on early rock ‘n roll records. You know when that third chord is going to appear on a Ramones track. You know when Iggy will grunt ‘n growl between Stooges lines. Likewise, you know exactly when James Allan will ad lib ‘yea-ah, yeah!’ between Glasvegas lines. You know that their records will sound like a big bucket of Phil Spector has been flung over them. It’s familiar and it’s good. And who can argue with three albums and umpteen pan-global tours sharing stages with some of the biggest bands on the planet?

A tremendous raconteur, Paul has a wealth of totally unpublishable tales featuring Noel ‘n Liam ‘n Ian McCulloch. You’d like him. Just back from a successful tour of America’s far-flung places and looking ahead to the summer festivals, Paul took time out to tell Plain Or Pan six of his favourite tracks. They might not be obvious influences, but all make sense if you are familiar with the music Paul plays. The first track, for instance, has a bass line that Paul could have written. Maybe he nicked it…

Pink Glove by Pulp.

This is probably my favourite song, and has been for a while. I have loved Pulp for a long time. When I first started listening to music it was 1994 and Britpop was in full swing. Oasis were the best band in the world to me, as I’ll mention later, but Pulp were a band I liked, but didn’t listen to a lot. Looking back now, I think that Pulp have by far the best songs of that time. They tell stories of a side of Britain that not a lot of people talk about. A seedier, almost macabre side that lies beneath the stiff upper lip and suburban doors. This song is a great example of this, the lyrics telling a story of dressing up and the pitfalls that brings. At least, that’s what it says to me. Maybe that’s more a vision into my psyche than a view of the song!

Supersonic by Oasis.

This was the first song I ever learned to play on the bass. It’s a very simple bass line, but when I learned it, it made me realise that I could be a musician, that it wasn’t out of reach and for people who were maestros. I think Oasis did this for a lot of people who joined bands or picked up a guitar. When they first came out, they forced their way into almost everyone’s attention. I have friends who don’t listen to much music just now, but will always listen to Definitely Maybe and What’s The Story. This is a great testament to what this band meant to people.

Chelsea Hotel #2 by Leonard Cohen.

I never listened to Leonard Cohen until about a year ago, but since then he has become one of my favourite artists. The poetry in his lyrics is amazing, and the variation of the different styles he has made songs in is astounding. Listening to songs like “Hallelujah” and “First, We Take Manhattan” are like listening to two different artists. This is one of the very few songs that have almost made me cry. Especially the line “we are ugly but we have the music”. Another great love song.

I’m Going Slightly Mad by Queen.

Another band that I love. I remember watching live at Wembley and being blown away by how much energy they put into their live show. For the first twenty minutes they didn’t stop, and worked the audience up into a frenzied state. This song is a departure from that. The lyrics are perfect for the song too, they are out there enough to make you believe this is madness. I love the line “the kettle is boiling over ; I think I’m a banana tree”. Genius.

Perfect Day by Lou Reed.

This is a song that makes me very emotional every time I listen to it. Even before the great man died, every time I listened to it, it made me feel sad and happy at the same time. I also really connected to the lyric, “I thought I was someone else, someone good”, for reasons I won’t go into here. I think most people can relate that to their own life at some point. It’s such a simple song too, but to do that it takes true genius, like Lou Reed had in abundance.

Absolute Beginners by David Bowie.

When my wife and I decided to get married, one of the easiest things to organise was our first dance. We chose this song because it is one of the greatest love songs ever written. Bowie always impresses me with his lyrics, both the abstract and the objective. It tells you that if you love someone, then it makes the hard times that much easier.

BONUS TRACKS!

Here‘s Glasvegas (or rather, just James, an end-of-the-prom twangy guitar and minimal keyboard washes) doing Queen’s I’m Going Slightly Mad, from a 2011 session on Minnesota Public Radio.

Just an observation, but the vocal ad libs at the end recall Lee Mavers’ ad libs as The La’s Looking Glass collapses in on itself and swirls frantically down the plughole.

No mention of Glasvegas is possible without referring to their best track, I’ve written about The Prettiest Girl On Saltcoats Beach before. Here’s a snippet:

It begins with gentle waves crashing on the shore. Clearly a sample from some long-forgotten sound effects album, cos if you’ve ever been on Saltcoats beach you’ll know that the waves don’t break gently on the sand.

There are 2 kinds of waves in Saltcoats: 1. The big ones you get when it’s the middle of winter, blowing a gale, snowing and freezing and the TV cameras are there. And 2. The splashback from the Arran ferry as it comes into dock in Ardrossan, just up the beach.

So, sound effect waves.

The band provide the drama as the track unfolds in melancholy fashion, all vibraphone, reverb, shimmer and twang. It reminds me a lot of those early Trashcan Sinatras b-sides (like ‘Skindiving‘ – go seek it out). It ebbs and flows like the tide on the Firth of Clyde, crashing to a fade once again with those lapping waves on the Saltcoats shore. ‘The Prettiest Girl On Saltcoats Beach’ is truly bathed in melodrama and pathos.

It makes Saltcoats sound like the most (cough) romantic place on Earth.

Clearly it isn’t.

If you’ve ever been to Saltcoats during the Glasgow Fair Fortnight you’ll know what I’m talking about. Dressed head to toe in Rangers or Celtic regalia, they come down to our bit of the world armed with crappy-ringtoned mobiles and plastic footballs, to eat our ice cream and litter the beach with empty bottles of Buckfast. And that’s just the women. To be called the prettiest girl on Saltcoats beach is a bit of hollow praise. But Glasvegas must’ve been down on a good day.

‘The Prettiest Girl On Saltcoats Beach’ does for Glasvegas what ‘The Boys Of Summer’ does for Don Henley. It’s a Scottish love song of the highest order. Burns would’ve been proud. In fact, I’d say it’s right up there on a par with Morrissey’s best work. He’d do a great version of it. And that would be something, wouldn’t it?

And after that build up…if you’ve never heard it, here it is…

Gone but not forgotten, Six Of The Best

Six Of The Best – JJ Gimour

March 4, 2014 Craig McAllister

Number 17 in a series:

JJ Gilmour is the silver haired, silver tongued ex-Silencer from Lanarkshire*.

In a career that spans 25+ years in the business of music, he’s had his fair share of highs and lows.

But mainly highs.

With The Silencers, he was a regular concert attraction all over Europe. He’s topped the bill at some of the best-known music festivals. He’s worked with some of the top producers of the time (yer actual John Leckies and Michael Brauers for starters). He’s been managed by Miles Copeland. He’s written songs for Kenny Rogers;

I was challenged by my manager to write a song about a cowboy who fell in love with a belly dancer. So I did it! It’s called The Cowboy’s Lament and it’s the happiest I’ve ever felt after finishing a song. Kenny’s sat on it for two years. I don’t know if he’ll ever release it.

He’s sold half a million albums in numerous ‘territories’ (record company speak for ‘absolutely everywhere’). In fact, if he cared to do so, JJ would be able to fashion the walls of his house with gold discs the way a teenager might be inclined to paper their bedroom with popstar posters.

Being part of a successful band, JJ found it difficult trying to get all his ideas across. So in the 90s he took the brave step of going solo. Since then, fads and fashions have come and gone. Today’s bright young things have become tomorrow’s laughed-at losers. Entire ‘careers’ have burned briefly before being consigned to the dustbins of pop. And JJ continually ploughs his own furrow.

Five albums later and Jinky’s never sounded better. He’s a terrific live act – equal parts raconteur and wreck on tour, his milk bottle-thick glasses belying his talent. Less Buddy Holly and more bloody helly, the gaps between his songs are filled with the sort of occasionally sweary banter that wouldn’t sound out of place at the Stand Comedy Club. He’s a very funny man, but more importantly, JJ can sing like the best of them. His songs are stories and beg to be heard in the confines of a small environment. He’s all about intimate gigs and plays live regularly. If you ever get the chance, you should go and see him.

And guess what…

If you’re in Ayrshire, you should get yourself down to the Harbour Arts Centre in Irvine, as JJ Gilmour will play the HAC this Friday (7th March). There’s nothing more intimate than a gig at the HAC, and this has all the makings of an absolute cracker.

Like a tip-top athlete who’s fitness has peaked at the right time, JJ’s coming to Irvine in the best possible form. Just a week after his annual Portpatrick show(s) – acoustic one night, plugged in the next, electric both nights, he’s guaranteed to be at his very best.

JJ took time out from rehearsals at his home in Belfast to give Plain Or Pan the low-down on what records inspire him.

Take it away Jinky…..

I suppose we should start at the beginning. The first record I ever heard that made me want to spend my own money on music was Ian Dury and The Blockheads‘ ‘Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick‘.

It was full of funny words and references to strange, far-off places. The deserts of Sudan. Japan. Milan. Yucatan. What did it all mean? It took you on a geographical journey. Eskimo. Arapaho. Two fat persons click, click, click. Fan-tastic words! Then of course you got the bonus of There Ain’t Half Been Some Clever Bastards on the b-side. The Blockheads were a terrific band. Great, great players. They could play anything. I was fortunate enough to meet them a couple of times.

Ian Dury was a true original. That whole punk scene, when Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood were forming the whole image, they took it from seeing Ian around town, his ears full of safety pins. No-one else was doing it at the time. What a leg end. (JJ pronounces this as two words).

After punk, I began listening to what you could call ‘intelligent musicians’, classically-trained folk who weren’t afraid of showing off their talents in the face of 3 chords. I loved the huge sound that ELO made.

‘Wild West Hero’ epitomises that for me. The strings. The story. It‘s a terrific sound. Jeff Lynne is someone I want to work with at some point.

My next choice is by someone who, personally takes himself far too seriously….but what a songwriter! Sting has the knack of writing really clever pop songs. The Police‘s ‘Message In A Bottle’ has it all – great rhythm, a brilliant guitar riff from Andy….

When I first heard it I thought, ‘This guy’s some writer!‘ Of course, later on he’d totally rip off Stand By Me for Every Breath You Take, but Message In A Bottle is a classic.

It has never been more finely used than when it soundtracked Jim Royle pissing into a bottle in an episode of the Royle Family;

Around this time I discovered The Beatles. Everyone goes through a Beatles phase and I’m no different. I came to them when I realised where everyone else was stealing their ideas from.

I’m more of a Lennon man than a McCartney man but I could pick any Beatles tune really, even the George Harrison ones that the other two tried to suppress. I huvnae much time for Ringo, but y’know, without him they weren’t truly The Beatles. If I had to choose just one Beatles track, it would have to be A Day In The Life. It’s big. It’s huge, actually. We used to use it as intro music at gigs. It built the audience up before we came on.

JJ’s last 2 choices are personal favourites of mine. I was delighted that he chose them…

I feel I must tip my hat to Scotland’s finest song writer, lyricist and poet – Michael Marra. Michael wrote brilliant songs, but my favourite of his is ‘Hamish‘, written about the Dundee United goalie Hamish McAlpine and the time when Grace Kelly came to watch Monaco take on Dundee United at a European game at Tannadice.

(Now, I could wax lyrical about Michael Marra, someone who in another time and place might’ve been considered a Scottish Tom Waits. He once turned up at Irvine Folk Club with a battered old ironing board under his arm, the sort of ironing board you might find at Irvine dump if the owner had the gall to be seen throwing such a battered old relic out in public. Michael casually set up the ironing board and used it as his keyboard stand. He’s dead now, and sometimes we don’t appreciate our best writers until they’re not there to be told. Michael was one of the very best. His song Hamish ebbs and flows in melancholy fashion, and the string swell at the end is pure Hollywood. Anyway, that’s this writer’s tuppence-worth).

Have a read at the lyrics:

Up at Tannadice,

Framed in woodwork, cool as ice,

Keeping out the wolves in his particular way,

With a smile and a wave, A miraculous save, they say,

Out runs Hamish and the ball’s in Invergowrie Bay.

Up at Tannadice,

As they gently terrorise,

Called the sentry “Oh Hamish, give us a song”,

Raising the voices as high as the bridge is long,

Nasser said ‘hello’ and did you miss him when his voice was gone?

I remember that time it was an evening game,

A European tie in the howling rain,

Gus Foy pointed at the side of the goal,

And said, there’s Grace Kelly by Taylor Brothers Coal, …at Tannadice.

Up at Tannadice,

Watching as the fortunes rise,

Smiling when he hears, ‘ah it’s only a game’, Win, lose or draw you’ll get home to your bed just the same,

But Hamish stokes young mens’ dreams into a burning flame,

Hamish stokes young mens’ dreams into a burning flame.

I’ll leave the final word on Hamish to JJ

– You should check out the Leo Sayer version on You Tube. He’s not kidding.

My final choice is absolutely The Best Pop Song Ever Written Since The Beatles. Has there ever been a song about mainlining heroin quite so beautiful as The La’s ‘There She Goes’? No, there’s not!

We’ve heard it so many times. It never sounds tired or jaded. It always sounds fresh. There’s not a chorus in sight, just spot-on verses and a perfect guitar riff with a wee breath-catching breakdown in the middle. Absolutely perfect.

I love what wee John (Power) is doing with Cast – Walkaway and all that, but nothing he does is as close to perfection as There She Goes. Lee really should try and get himself back together again.

(I’ll not bore you with my La’s stories. You can ask me the next time you see me.)

JJ Gilmour plays the HAC this Friday, 7th March. At Jinky’s request, support comes from terrific up-and-comers The Sean Kennedy Band. You can buy tickets here. A limited number will be available on the door, on a first-come, first-served basis.

Don’t you dare miss him now!

* And don’t ask Chris Eubank to say that.

Alternative Version, Cover Versions, demo, Dylanish, Get This!, Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find, Kraut-y, Most downloaded tracks, Six Of The Best, studio outtakes

Lucky Seven

January 2, 2014 Craig McAllister

Plain Or Pan began back in January 2007. December 2013 saw the 7th full year of the blog. The end of the year makes me come across all misty eyed and giddy at the thought of this blog being not only still in existence but in rather rude health. At some point recently, the one-and-a-half millionth visitor crossed the threshold to read all about James Brown or Lou Reed or some forgotten Teenage Fanclub b-side. Facebook followers are in abundance, Twitter sends its fair share of readers in this direction and if you read that wee panel on the right, you’ll notice visitors from as far afield as Buenos Aires, Berlin and Ayr. Thank you one and all!

What better way to celebrate 7 years of typos, titbits and factual inaccuracies than with the annual Plain Or Pan Best of the Year CD*.

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*I’ll provide the tunes. You make the CD.

Our team of stat monkeys works double shifts over the festive period before presenting me with documented proof of the most listened to and downloaded tracks from Plain Or Pan throughout the year and I compile them into a handy CD-length album, complete with artwork, that can be added straight to your iTunes or wherever and onto your iPod to listen to during that new-fangled jogging craze you’ll ditch by February. Alternatively, it could be burnt off to listen to, old-skool style, on a couple of shiny discs in the car.

Tracks included:

Pixies – River Euphrates (Gigantic ep version)

Victoria Wood – 14 Again

The Smiths – Rusholme Ruffians (demo)

James Brown – (Hot) I Need To Be Loved

Supergrass – Caught By The Fuzz (acoustic)

The Cramps – I Wanna Get In Your Pants

The House of Love – Destroy The Heart (demo)

Neil Young – Birds (Mono single version)

Elizabeth Archer & the Equators – Feel Like Makin’ Dub

Beak> – Mono

Dave Edmunds – Born To Be With You

The Clique – Superman

Ike Turner – Bold Soul Sister

Can – I’m So Green

Wilco – Impossible Germany

The Mamas and Papas – Somebody Groovy

Santo & Johnny –Sleepwalk

Dee Clark – Baby What You Want Me To Do

The Specials – Too Much Too Young (LP version)

Barry Adamson – Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Pelvis

Neu – Hallogallo

Mogwai – The Sun Smells Too Loud

Trash Can Sinatras – Little Things That Keep Us Together

Roxy Music – Virginia Plain (Peel Session)

*** a cracker! ***

Get it here.

Normal service resumed next week. Lookin’ forward to it!

Alternative Version, Get This!, Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find, Six Of The Best

Rockin’ Bob’s Rockin’ Revue

November 17, 2013 Craig McAllister

Elvis.

You can never have too much Elvis…

The story goes that Elvis’ domineering manager Colonel Tom Parker was a Dutch illegal immigrant to the States and that, once/if the authorities ever found out, he’d be extradited straight back to where he’d come from (“you can leave that phony made-up ‘Colonel’ title at the door, thank you very much, and you better get used to folk calling you Andreas Cornelis van Kuijk once again”). Consequently, poor Elvis never got to tour the world as a recording artist, the paranoid Colonel convinced that somewhere along the way his illegal alien status would be uncovered and the land of the brave and the home of the free wouldn’t let him back in. The only time Elvis saw anywhere other than the States was during his time in the US army based in Germany. But you knew that already.

Here in Ayrshire, any mention of Elvis is met with a slightly smug response. Prestwick Airport, just up the road from where I’m typing, is the *only British soil ever graced by the feet of The King, as he dropped past for a quick wave to his fans while his plane stopped to refuel between Germany and the US, and the folks of Ayrshire have quite rightly been dining out on this pop nugget ever since. For a long time, the airport was a tacky shrine to all things of a Presley persuasion, with his face/image/signature filling up much of the available wall space with all the faded glamour of a 1980’s Butlin’s burger bar. Disgraceland might’ve been a more apt name for it had they not de-Presley’d it slightly during a re-branding programme a few years ago.

*only British soil? Tommy Steele claims to have spent a day with Elvis in 1958, showing him the sights and sounds of the city of London. But, unlike the picture above, there’s no photographic proof that this ever occured, so here in Ayrshire we tend to gloss over the possibility. It ruins a perfect story. And it would be another costly re-branding exercise for our pokey wee airport.

Last weekend you may have caught the show on the telly featuring the nation’s favourite Elvis tracks. No surprises by any stretch of the imagination, but this got me thinking about those Elvis tracks that never get their time in the spotlight. For such a prolific recording artist, Elvis seems to have had his discography squashed and squeezed into an assortment of handy 20 track all-you-need compilations. Well, no. He’s never recorded the classic album, much of his output in the 60s was flowery soundtrack fodder and filler and his 70s material is almost considered a white jump-suited parody, but there’s more to Elvis’ music than you might think.

Who better to ask than pop scholar, member of St Etienne and author of Yeah Yeah Yeah (The Story of Modern Pop), Bob Stanley. I suppose this makes this feature a Six Of The Best of sorts….with Tupelo trainspotter Bob picking 10 rare-ish Elvis tracks and giving each one the briefest of moments in the spotlight. It’s by no means a definitive guide to the backwaters of Elvis (I’d have included Pocketful Of Rainbows and Stranger In This Town. You probably have others of your own,) but it’s a good springboard if you fancy diving into the murky depths of the Presley canon.

1. Blue Moon

Released in 1956, standard ballad Blue Moon was one of Elvis’ first recordings after leaving Sam Phillips and Sun Records for RCA.

Neither rock nor roll, country nor western, its eerie, distant, ghostly vocal and hillbilly clip-clopping rhythm sounds like some extra-terrestrial broadcast from a by-gone era. The fragile yin to Heartbreak Hotel‘s ferocious yang, Blue Moon is Elvis at his most unselfconscious and tender.

2. Crawfish

Elvis and his movies have always been a bit of a standing joke amongst ‘serious’ music fans who never really recovered from seeing their idol misdirected for a good decade or more through Colonel Tom’s none-too-subtle capitalistic urges in the chase for cold hard cash.

A shame, as there are some stone cold Elvis classics waiting to be discovered amongst the dusty grooves;

1958’s hit ‘n miss King Creole soundtrack included Crawfish, a southern gumbo of a duet between Elvis and Kitty White. Elvis and Kitty might sound like a pair of light opera singers high on hooch ‘n moonshine, but the sparse backing music is not a million miles away from anything Lux Interior would’ve been proud to add his name to. Crawfish also happens to be one of Joe Strummer’s favourite Elvis tracks.

3. Doin’ The Best I Can

Another from a movie, 1960’s GI Blues, Doin’ The Best I Can is perfect Elvis – the waltzing lilt, Scotty Moore’s subtle guitar picking, the brushed drums and The Jordanaires ethereal gospel doo-wop all coating the track in magic dust. The last track on GI Blues, it deserves a wider audience. Play it, love it as you will and pass it on.

4. Animal Instinct

Elvis released three (!) films each and every year in the 60s and Harum Scarum was one of 1965’s offering. Consider the pop landscape for a second – The Beatles were ingesting marjuana for breakfast and on the verge of becoming studio auteurs. Motown was in full four-to-the-floor swing. Elvis was out of touch releasing hokey films accompanied by what many consider to be his poorest musical output.

Harum Scarum (along with the previous year’s Roustabout) suffered the indignity of being ‘promoted’ without the release of an accompanying single. Animal Instinct was recorded for Harum Scarum and although it featured on the soundtrack LP, wasn’t actually used in the film instead. The track itself is a loungecore/exotica/rhumba hybrid, with a moody, kohl-eyed Elvis laying bare his sexual desires in none-too-dressed-up animalistic metaphors.
5. Please Don’t Stop Loving Me

From 1966’s Frankie And Johnny soundtrack.

Look out! Here come The Jordanaires and their measured pitch-perfect harmonies once again. The best sound in music, would you agree?

There’s a tinkling piano in the background and a ‘My Way‘ feel to the guitar riff (I think by Scotty Moore again) as Elvis gets down to full-on ballad mode and gives birth to a gazillion impersonators in the process. You were born… just to be…. in my arms…. in my arms…..your lips were made…just to be… kissed by me….kissed by me. Not a dry seat in the house, I’d wager.
6. Edge of Reality

From the soundtrack to 68’s Live A Little, Love A Little, Edge Of Reality was recorded at the same sessions as A Little Less Conversation. Whereas the latter’s throwaway lounge funk was designed solely for the displaying of the Elvis pelvis, Edge Of Reality showcases an Elvis vocal that verges on the edge of parody, all softly rolled ‘rs’ and a rich baritone croon that channels his inner Scott Walker. Edge Of Reality eventually found its way onto the b-side of If I Can Dream, although the loose-limbed Hal Blaine drum track and orchestral brass section wouldn’t sound out of place on an Isaac Hayes LP. Ain’t nothin’ like Hound Dog, that’s for sure.

7. I’m Leavin’

I’m Leavin’ is a little-known track from 1971. Released as a stand-alone single, you won’t find it on many of the more bog-standard compilations. As such, it’s something of an Elvis obscurity, not helped by it reaching the lowly chart position of 36 on its release. I’m Leavin’ is a masterful Elvis performance. No hysterics, no histrionics, for once he actually sings almost behind the musicians, showcasing his crack band of Nashville sessioneers for what they are. As the title implies, this is Elvis singing about love gone wrong, something he was experiencing in his own life at the time. Indeed, many of the tracks recorded around this era were as autobiographical as Elvis could get, considering he didn’t actually write them……
8. Patch It Up

Patch It Up is terrific – a staple of his early 70s Vegas shows (see That’s The Way It Is and it’s essential accompanying soundtrack), it’s a riot of fuzz bass, stinging James Burton guitar licks and warm Stax brass. This is larynx-loosening guttural grunt Elvis in full-on remorse mode. He’s wandered, he’s strayed and now he’s back telling the object of his affections that he loves her. Somewhat mirroring his home life with Priscilla at the time, this wouldn’t be the only time Elvis laid his soul bare for all to see, doing it to more dramatic effect on Suspicious Minds. Although, if you watched the telly at the weekend, you’ll know that already.

Trivial fact – One of those roof-raisin’ female voices in the background of Patch It Up is Darlene Love, who’d previously found success recording with Phil Spector.
9. True Love Travels On A Gravel Road

Recorded in Memphis at the duck-tail end of the 60s, True Love Travels On A Gravel Road was also a staple of the Elvis Vegas set. An RnB/country/southern soul hybrid, with a healthy sprinkling of female gospel singers, it’s one of the last great Elvis tracks. The record benefits from a terrific production and Elvis is restrained, soulful and passionate, the complete opposite to the bloated, huffing and puffing performer he could sometimes be at the time. Spare your ears, but I seem to recall a Shakin’ Stevens version doing the rounds sometime in the 80s.
10. Good Time Charlie’s Got The Blues

In 1973, Elvis found himself recording at the world-famous Stax Records studio. Known as the home of southern soul, Stax gave birth to many great artists and tunes – Booker T, Otis Redding, Rufus & Carla Thomas, The Staple Singers….many of the artists that pop up regularly on this blog…..I could go on, but you’ll know them all yourself. A good few duds were recorded in his time at Stax, but Good Time Charlie.. isn’t one of them. An easy listening croon atop a backing that’s fluid and meandering and nothing at all like the Elvis of old, it was perhaps not surprising when it was considered flim flam by the record buying public at the time. However, the appreciation for Good Time Charlie has, like the Elvis girth of the day, grown to generous proportions.

An impressive list. Track them down and you’ve got yourself a good wee alternative Elvis compilation. Add the afore-mentioned Stranger In This Town and Pocketful Of Rainbows and you’ll have a cracker. And if you can add the full-on gospel rockin’ and God-fearin’ Milky White Way…..

…..you might just have yourself Now That’s What I Call The Best, Least-Heard Elvis Tracks In The World…Ever. Uh-huh.

Bob Stanley is currently out and about promoting his book. He might be coming to a town near you. You can check all things Bob-related here.

You can buy Yeah Yeah Yeah here, plus at all the other usual places. An ideal addition to your Christmas list.

Bob’s Blog, Croydon Municipal is here.

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