The exercise I’m about to propose may assume that you agree with my premise, that the accumulated wisdom expressed in the songs of some long-running, beloved artists boils down to one Key Message. Of course, as I roll out this idea, you are most welcome to disagree with my premise or any of the particular examples that I pose. First let me make sure you understand what I’m getting at.
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An appealing sense of revenge and antisocial impulses run through the music of Clinic, the surgical masked quartet from Liverpool that’s been making pretty much the same passively sinister album since their first long-player in 1999. On Do It! the band does it again, and why not? Every psychological horror movie is worth a sequel or four. Do fans of The Omen series bother complaining that the third installment was not as good as the first one? I think not. Such films work within a narrow frame and provide a balance of tingles and giggles. As children of children of the damned, Clinic work their mystic garage magic within the pentangle.
Do It! introduces the Satanic skiffle of “Tomorrow”, which sounds like Donovan fronting Psychic TV. Singer Ade Blackburn‘s acidic tone recalls Malcolm McDowell‘s Alex character from A Clockwork Orange. Alex and his droog buddies would have gotten off on new Clinic songs like “High Coin” and “The Witch (Made to Measure)”, the latter with it rumbling beat, spring-reverbed guitar riff, droning melodies, muted cries from the attic supplied by organ and backing vocals. If you’ve got a chip on your shoulder but are not the type to outright kick some ass in the traditional rockin’ dude sense, Clinic’s music provides a soundtrack for your stunted idea of “acting out.” Trust me.
For all my rock snob life I’ve been hearing how great The Fall is. I’ve never bought it. “Shopping Bag” is how The Fall would sound if they lived up to the conventional wisdom of record store geeks. I listen to Do It! and wonder how much misery deceased Joy Division producer Martin Hannett might have had with this band. What’s cool about Clinic, however, is how they manage to keep things light and garagey on the surface while cooking up whatever strange brew they’ve got under the lid. Where Echo and the Bunnymen would have hammered and yelped a song like “Winged Wheel” into submission, Clinic’s measured approach is a sly grin that threatens to wreak more psychic havoc than anything The Cutter might inflict.
MAD PROPS TO MR. MODERATOR FOR PRACTICALLY NAILING IT.
Jah Wobble (bass: early PIL), and Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebezeit (both from Can, bass & drums respectively) released the LP Full Circle in 1982.
The Mystery Date was a track called How Much Are They which was a European club hit at the time.
Another track after the fold.
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In the tradition of The Beach Boys‘ Party! record, Sloan released their own faux-live party album, Recorded Live at a Sloan Party!, as a bonus CD that came with the initial gatefold-sleeve release of One Chord to Another. In honor of our Last Man Standing: Songs in Which a Deliberate “Party” Vibe Plays as Prominent a Role in the Song as Almost Anything Else, we’re posting Sloan’s Party! album. This is a rare release I bought at the right time that makes me feel slightly cooler than usual. Pretty cool, eh? Enjoy.
Let’s Get the Party Started
I Can Feel It
Dignified and Old
Glitter and Gold
Over You
I Am the Cancer
I Can’t Let Go
Stood Up
On the Road Again/Transona Five
I Wouldn’t Want to Lose Your Love
By the way, as with The Beach Boys’ “live” party album, the “party” at which Sloan is playing “live” is also fake. Someone nerdier than myself, although possibly not as cool (because remember, I bought this special edition CD when it came out), will likely correct me, if need be.
Surely you know of The Beach Boys‘ Party album, a studio release that was presented as an impromptu live performance during an intimate party. Fact of the matter is, it wasn’t a live recording in the middle of an intimate party, but it’s a pretty fun album and a great concept for sounding that way. “Barbara Ann” is the best-known track from this album. Those of you who know it well can probably anticipate certain “party” sounds as well as you can any vocal or instrumental lick in the song. Pretty cool – and not the only example of its kind. So as the title of this post suggests, we’re seeking songs in which a deliberate “party” vibe plays as prominent a role in the song as almost anything else. Go for it!
Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been listening to John Entwistle‘s Smash Your Head Against the Wall, an album I hadn’t heard since high school or college days and thought I should own. So a few weeks ago I rectified that situation. The purchase verified why I didn’t spend my precious extra cash on that album all those years ago, but now I’m a hard-working adult with the extra cash to occasionally risk $7.99 on what would have been a good, scratchy, $1-used bin pickup circa 1980. This is one of those albums that could only have been made by a bassist in a hugely successful band in the early ’70s. It’s no Who’s Next, but it’s got enough of what’s cool about early ’70s Who to make the album better than something I might pick up by, I don’t know, Head East, or some other cutout bin orphan from that period. But all this is not why I write of this album and include the following tracks for those of you who’ve never heard it.
John Entwistle, “Heaven and Hell”
John Entwistle, “Ted End”
John Entwistle, “You’re Mine”
The real reason I bring up this album is because the following bonus track, a cover of Neil Young‘s “Cinnamon Girl”…
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The challenge is to brave the waters and give us your thoughts. You know, on the tunes maaaaan. If you know who it is, don’t be the bad apple that spoils it for the rest of us.
