Crispy Ambulance - The Plateau Phase

With so much stuff sloshing around in our culture these days it has been remarkably easy to find new avenues for exploration.  It must have been so different for earlier generations, without TV, without cinema, without the enormous printed media, without the Internet.  Sometimes finding stuff so easily does seem like cheating in a way, there is the small thrill of the initial discovery and then it becomes just another bit of stuff along with all the rest.  I try to gravitate towards those albums which have a story behind them, a story that I have often concocted to 'tell' the way in which they were found.  As it is with Crispy Ambulance (a name which seems revealing somehow even though it is nonsense) who first came to my attention whilst watching the film Control about the life of Ian Curtis (I ended up not learning much more really than what the NME has told me).  The singer of Crispy Ambulance, Alan Hempsall, stood in for Ian Curtis once when the latter was unable to perform.  I thought then, what a bizarre name for a band.  I remembered it though, which is how I came to listen to their one and only 'proper' album, The Plateau Phase.  At the time of release in 1982 (I am coming to the conclusion that 1982 was one of the greatest years for music) Crispy Ambulance seem to have been unduly affected by the music media's continuing obsession with Joy Division and were condemned for 'slavishly' copying said band.  I have always thought the praise for Joy Division was somewhat fanatical; Joy Division, to me, on record come across as distant and aloof, rather bleak (live it seems they were far more aggressive), Crispy Ambulance on the other hand feel so much more alive, even if their subjects are as melancholy, and the album throbs at times with a primal power.  Take Are you Ready? which builds slowly and slowly into a mantra, developing the suspense... then unfortunately things falls flat with the dirge-y Travel Time but never mind, they tried.  We are back on track with The Force and the Wisdom, Hempsall howling over minimal keyboards, the bass echoing eerily in and out, conjuring visions of dark forests and night-time.  Although inspired by Sex Pistols and Magazine like most bands at that time, Crispy Ambulance also seem to be closet hippies, I am not sure exactly why I think this but there is something far looser in their sound than the jerky rhythms of the post-punk leaders; that they take their inspiration from nature as well as from the Modern.  Hempsall's voice, whilst flat at times, is unaffected and 'real.'  The repetitive, driving rhythms echo hypnotic 'tribal' rituals (but might also be where the charge of being 'turgid' came from depending upon whether you like that kind of thing).  Take The Wind Season which, close to the end, breaks down into chants of 'oo ah oo', and We move through the Plateau with its refrain 'Nature attacks you and Nature heals you.'  Whilst Death from Above sounds like they were trying to capture the feel of the Arctic, something which Joy Division also excelled at, however Crispy Ambulance's effort comes across as slightly wistful, suggesting there is some optimism beneath the froideur.  

So much music, so little time...

It's been ages since I posted here and so many albums I have neglected to even compose the beginnings of a review... in order to catch up I am going to cheat and keep everything to a sentence, hoping to capture the essence somehow.

PS Except for The Cure all of these albums are from the 1980s

The Crackdown - Cabaret Voltaire
Grimy and forbidding, the sound of steel shutting down, nihilistic shopping centres and underground car parks, not to mention wildly innovative.

Head on The Door / The Top / Disintegration / The Cure / Faith / Japanese Whispers / Pornography / Wish / Seventeen Seconds / 4:13 Dream / Mixed Up - The Cure
In the search for the perfect emotional rush - be it happiness, heaven, gloom, despair, optimism, hope, fear, boredom, tension - The Cure just about nails every one you could ever imagine; they are more than essential, they are vital.

Voice:The best of Eyeless in Gaza - Eyeless in Gaza
Two men, a synthesiser and effortless amounts of quiet creativity


Immigrant / Promise / Voodoo Dollies: The Best of Gene Loves Jezebel - Gene Loves Jezebel
Perfect before they decided to go all Bon Jovi, the Welsh coalfields meets melancholy meets two oddly-coiffed brothers makes dark, wild fairy stories


Life in the Gladhouse: The Best of Modern English - Modern English
Bizarrely labelled as 'Goth' more agitated popsters producing some interesting tunes (some which appear to have inspired LCD Soundsystem), unfortunately remembered only for their soppiest offering 'Melt with You'

Swimming / Spectators of Life - The Names
Finally a group to dispel notions that the Belgians can only produce good beer and chocolate, lovely dreamy, wobbly pop to fall in love with - 'Life by the Sea' going onto my list of the most beautiful songs ever

For all and none / Pindrop - The Passage
Britain seems to be good at producing dramatic, if obscure, intelligent pop, The Passage are no exception even if sometimes they come across like a typical English day, wet and murky

If I Die, I Die - The Virgin Prunes
There is no justice in the world that the flamboyant, sarcastic, entertaining, over-the-top 'Prunes should not be as famous as their childhood friends, U2

Garlands - The Cocteau Twins
Before they started cooing of elle megablast burls and itchy glowbos, the Cocteau Twins exercised a darker imagination, captured here in all its stark beauty

Here Comes Everyone - The Wake
Etheral vocals, woozy sounds, lovelorn lyrics and dainty guitar, The Wake represent the template for many an 80s / 90s twee Indie band; there are many moments of sublimity e.g. 'All I asked you to do' which sets a high standard for tugging at your heartstrings

In the Flat Field - Bauhaus
Help! this is scary stuff, the desperate sound of a band struggling to get out of the East Midlands (I know how that feels...)

Double standards who me? LOL

Hmm  remember a time not so long ago when the 1980s were universally reviled for their incredible lack of palatable music and general hilarity in that anyone would ever be seen dead in legwarmers and a ra-ra skirt.  Yet how soon we are to forget... or maybe it was all a media confection anyway, as is much of the so-called popular imagination of the 80s.  So I have to admit that I was surprised to find that some of my now favourite bands existed in the 80s and produced surely some of the most compelling music ever committed to vinyl and cassette, now CD and iPod (perhaps even mini-disc if that cute format had not been relegated to the Betamax pages of technology history).  It seems that others have been thinking along the same lines and now the lies have been swept away.  Saxophone solos are not necessarily the work of Satan as we are discovering - although not strictly from the 80s, Hiroshima Mon Armour by Ultravox! showed that saxophones can be tasteful, it was only over-use by Trevor Horn and others that destroyed its credibility (perhaps).  Over-indulgence in the studio (drugs as well as music) would not necessarily result in a cringing unlistenable mess as long as the creative impulse was not completely shot to pieces - step forward Sulk by Associates which is near as dammit the most perfect album ever and it comes out of the 80s ha ha!  And so a new generation of young persons are reclaiming the good elements of the 80s that have so long been subsumed beneath the dross loved by the media - so instead of Japan we have Duran Duran, instead of Propaganda we have Frankie Goes to Hollywood, instead of Associates we have Wham and instead of Ultravox! we have Ultravox (okay this is where it gets confusing so post-Foxx Ultravox to be more precise).  Why can't we have them all?  I say we should fight for an alternative history of music!  And fall in love with those falling in love with the true spirit of the 80s... Ladyhawke, Late of the Pier, Ladytron, These New Puritans, Wild Beasts.  That should be enough to get the Recession party started... 

Club tropicanca birds are free

Some perverse syncronocity is at work, so lets explore the links between three works that perhaps bear no relation to each other yet seem to clump together in my consciousness. Well it's not that they don't share anything... all written in the musical ferment of the early 80s, the wonky new pop influence evident -Club Country (1982) bringing up latent memories of Club Tropicana (1983); picture the scene as the cod flamenco guitars of Alan Rankine strike up, the studios dissolve in a blue haze and past sails George Michael on his lilo, cocktail in hand smiling charmingly at Billy MacKenzie's untamed exotic vocal stylings whilst beside the pool friend Robert Smith dances blissfully, the seeds of Birdmad Girl (1984) being planted inside, he only turning arch cynicism into sweetness. Lets go so far as to suggest that the next link in the chain be La Isla Bonita (1987) only now the sweetness has become cloying, the early stabs at hedonism (even if to sneer) replaced with faux nostalgia for a popstar's dreams...

So my ipod has discovered it's favourite bands to be The Cure and Joy Division. Okay so there is no proof of a conspiracy but sitting here this morning already there have been 5 tracks by the Cure and its not as if they are the most represented band on here... Associates and Japan might enter into fisticuffs to gain THAT title! Not that I'm complaining mind, I have this strange Philip K Dick-inspired idea that the ipod is somehow designed to tap into the feelings emanating from your brain waves so that it tailors the music (when on shuffle) to suit your mood - hence last night when I was feeling a bit down it responsed quite brilliantly with Fight (The Cure) amongst others with it's inspiring lyrics to fight against the gloom that engulfs you in its bitter embrace. Apart from Pornography though - which remains a difficult album for me to digest even in the happiest of moods - I find the Cure strangely uplifting, as with Joy Division, perhaps even with the strange howling of Bauhaus in the flat fields, the recognition that these despondent feelings are not yours alone.

Last of the Pier - fantasy Black channel

Wow this band... every time I put this album on I just want to spin around the room in mental way singing my head off (although some of the songs don't have words just create fantastic pictures...)  I guess if I had to describe the sound it would be a mash of voice and plastic, muzak and laughter, pathos and inebriation, the headlong crash of youth discovering it has no boundaries 'cept itself.  All the usual cliches LOL.  I found it after the fire at Weston pier which kind of made sense to the name.... 'Space and the Woods' -  favourite things condensed into sound with (trying to be profound) lyrics (got to love the pretentiousness of youth) 'I know they don't owe me anything not after what I've done'... but what crime is that except to make a superb album?  'Heartbeat' another stunner despite the lack of actual lyrics.  getting work up a treat 'a heartbeat a flicker a line' but does it mean except on a machine (it's just a line after all)?  I feel them crawl into the cables... saving the best till last a magnificent stomp along this 'bathroom gurgle' ... it could mean so many things... the gurgle of water, the gurgle as blood is drawn... hey come on they put these thoughts in my head!  "we have all been wasting our time" don't worry guys it's just false modesty...

limbo, panto - wild beasts

Imagine a bastard child of the Associates and Orange Juice, throw in a dictionary and tales of furtive goings on and you are close to imagining the sound of Wild Beasts.  The song titles are a delight in themselves, the imaginatively entitled 'Brave Bulging Buoyant Clairvoyants' with its catchy (if a mouthful) refrain and the evocative 'She purred while I grrred ' tells you all you need to know... finally a band with an acute sense of the absurd arrives to brighten a turgid offering from over-hyped indie miseries and 80s copyists.  Because for all their subtle similarities there is something new and exciting afoot.... so the Associates link is not lazily made to referencing singer Hayden's operatic yearnings but as a context for the oblique lyrics and obscure sense of humour that is demonstrated (of course there has been bands since but I fail to remember any at the present moment), such beauties as 'take these chips with cheese / as an offering of peace' and perhaps the most arresting as it floats across a crowded field, sung in all seriousness.  Lilting guitars and the deeper richness of bassist Tom's voice combine to create a sublimity rightly championed by Steve Lamacq amongst others, for, above all, how could a band not be loved for such lines as 'I swear by my own cock and balls'?  It is unfathomable.

A secret wish - Propaganda

If pop was always this obscene and this beautiful, a discovery that only you've made crawling into the myriad sounds conjured up by the machines, selling your soul to the statuesque alabaster carved of English and German uniting in the hands of megalomania of sound...  power force motion drive propels its forward on wings of fairlight constructions, is it a sense of humour or wilful perversity that drops a jazz solo for goodness sake into this teutonic wilderness, lives and loves are lost in the blink of an eye, you murdered love 'I was the witness but now I'm the judge... I am the judge!  And I judge this to be more than a guilty pleasure, dripping in the decadence of the 80s mania for pop - dance away the shoulder pads and celebrate the melancholy redolent under mascara tinged skies.  Sorry for laughing but how can you turn a hyper-mania indie dirge legend to a synth drenched industrial pop dirge only a genius would even have the lunacy to attempt it but to pull it off... there is magic here in spades, the most unlikely spaces thrill with glitter; Jewel the sound of cheese graters if they could sing, its counterpart Duel so ludicrously conventional you have to wonder... 'Frozen faces can always melt' so throw away those assumptions now!  Its sooooo 80s but can you forgive just a teeny bit for the marvellous pomposity of it all, feel the drama as everything AND the kitchen sink is flung in (somewhere even synth pop supremo David Sylvian lurks before he turned his back on artifice and reclaimed his soul).  Selling my soul, selling my soul, never look back (goodbye the modern age with your dreary copyists)... it has the super shiny sheen of gloss Trevor Horn's sticky fingers by association even if he was too taken by the sleaze of Frankie and the hyperbole of Morley taints it still but a synth pop treat best consumed vociferously.

'There you stand making my life possible' - The music of David Sylvian

If you told me a few months ago that I would be listening to music which seems to be inspired by those who live in the endless deserts grassy savannahs and tangled forests away from the superficiality of the western world, the silence in-between the puzzle of existence, isolated communities, ambient jazz noodlings and mystical spiritualism then I probably would have laughed for a long and hysterical moment.  Needless to say my changed has been changed from contact with the long and interesting career of David Sylvian.  Prior to recent David Sylvian had existed for me in that periphery in the mind rarely explored, a name with such connotations attached as world music, difficult, obscure, a pretentious and aloof chap (also mixed up with David Byrne) but with little actual meaning.  So when the name becomes something real it is hard to resist the category being dragged up, assumptions and all, to be re-fashioned into something new and exciting.  So the category David Sylvian now means a rich complexity of sound, the only singer I can give time to for ambient jazz (yes really) David Sylvian I have to hand it to him.  He has kept me going in the times when I felt down, the rich melancholic timbre of his voice at once soothing and troubling, the gentle hush of twilight in an over-stimulated world.  Like Billy Mackenzie he underwent something of a dramatic change from a very mannered, (if not as hysterical as Billy M), approach to singing, finding and settling in with his voice over a number of years, along with the relentless desire to experiment with music and seeming to push himself into new territory with each new release.  The one thing holding it all together is his voice, familiar, easing gently into more adventurous soundscapes.

Perversely I started with the album which is considered to be the most difficult to listen to - Blemish - written during the break-up of Sylvian's marriage and completed in a relatively short time.  Although the accompanying instrumentals were stark (at times the scratching of a guitar is the only embellishment) and the songs at times could be accused of being rambling, I was surprised how quickly I took to the album.  Particularly compelling were the sentiments explored - 'How little we need to be happy' and 'The heart knows better' really struck a chord and filled me with confidence that experimental music does not have to be a chore or a pose but can be enjoyed.  

Going back in time Brilliant Trees was Sylvian's first solo album after the split with Japan, interesting in that it sounds almost nothing like his previous work (see the Dolphin Brothers Catch the Fall for a more obvious take on what Japan might have sounded like had they not imploded) but explores different musical textures including jazz (shudder) and acoustic.  It could be a mess but musically its coherent and held together by its themes of understanding your place in the world (inspired by reading Sartre's Nausea which accentuates the desire of intellectual pretensions so missing in some music).  'Pulling punches' opens the collection in an exhilarating way, perhaps the most upbeat number, followed by 'Red Guitar' which is my absolute favourite even despite the obvious jazz influenced piano, regarded rather disgustingly by a friend of mine, which only endeared it to me more.  More introspective are 'Nostalgia' and 'Brilliant Trees' and no less wonderful for it.

Everything and nothing (with its plaintive cover) is a quick way to come up to speed with the work of Sylvian, an anthology of his work whilst with Virgin records, including the albums Dead Bees on a cake and Secrets of the beehive as well as various rarities and singles that have not made it onto previous albums.  It also includes the glorious 'Pop Song' which Sylvian apparently wrote in response to being asked to do something more commercial... as you can imagine it is anything but, merging discordant chords with grumbling lyrics and for the possessor of such an emotion-filled voice it emerges that it is possible for Sylvian to sound utterly blank.  A superb two fingers to the charts (needless to say it didn't get anywhere but are we surprised?)  'Bamboo Houses' continues the Eastern influences so explicit in Japan's music and it is the diversity of the styles covered that so intrigues; Sylvian has the intelligence to surround himself with excellent musicians that are as eager to deconstruct sound as he is.

Despite the power of his voice, the largely instrumental albums that Sylvian has released are not disappointing in that they lack which is so appealing.  Gone to Earth contains some of the most evocative music I have ever heard, conjuring up hidden idylls in their titles as well as the soundscapes created; 'A Bird of Prey vanishes into a bright blue cloudless sky' and 'Sunlight seen through towering trees' leave no mystery as to the atmospheres they wish to create in the imagination.  This is the second half of the album, the first half is concerned with songs that are just as beautiful, even the lengthy 'Wave' (over nine minutes) does not outstay its welcome and (excuse the terrible analogy) ebbs and flows with Sylvian's emotional lyrics, very compelling.  'Taking the veil' is much gentler yet throbs with the same power.  It is purely an emotional engagement, I find myself at a loss exactly how to articulate the impact... the same too with Alchemy: An Index of possibilities which brings together other instrumentals, the short 'Words with the Shaman, Pt 2: Incantation' (featuring lively percussion from Steve Jansen) is gripping, impossible to guess exactly where all the sounds come from (real or taped) but of this earth.  It is grounded, evocative of the difference to be discovered when conventional approaches are abandoned.  It is a constant; Japan were playing with difference, even if it seems submerged under style, and Sylvian to me represents the ceaseless roaming of an unsettled soul, seeking for constancy, perhaps not finding (or wishing) to find it...