february 25th extract-status quo

Status Quo-Down Down

The Hindustan Ambassador is a car manufactured in India by Hindustan Motors. It has been in production since 1958 with very few modifications or changes and is based on the Morris Oxford III which itself was made in the U.K. between 1955 and 1959. The only major change since production started in 1958 was been the design of the front grille. You can see where this is going.

Status Quo. Status Quo? How on earth did this end up on the iPod? I don’t ever remember downloading this or ever buying any Status Quo track. Even if I had, would I admit it?

Status Quo (hereafter referred to in the correct parlance, as “the Quo”) seem to be a particularly British phenomenon. Whist they have that obviously reductive blues/60’s r & b sound i.e.  American I cannot think of any group from the U.S. that is analogous to the Quo. Possibly ZZ Top come sort of close but they are a bit more arch and knowing. Status Quo, sorry ,the Quo, just do what they do-no more and no less.

Looking on the internet, they’ve had 60 hits on the U.K. charts and over 22 in the Top Ten. They also seem to have done well in Northern Europe as well-Scandanavia, Germany, Belgium etc. New Zealand and Australia love them equally. In the U.S. their only ever chart hit was “Pictures of Matchstick Men”-their first ever single from 1968. In America they must be some sort of one hit wonder/novelty act. That’s the Americans loss and our gain.

The Quo seem to occupy a strange position- both rock music with a capital R and classic rock with a capital C but they are not classic “Classic Rock”. But they are so popular as well. So pop music then. But not really “pop”. Let’s just say classic rock pop. Or popular rock. Or classic pop rock. That’s the best description. Classic Pop Rock- or CPR if you prefer acronyms.

I don’t think that the Quo would ever inhabit a landscape where they could be considered “cool”. They may have, at some time in their past, but not now. Whereas there are some bands that sometimes are out of fashion who can surprisingly become rehabilitated, feted by the cognoscenti gaining a hip kitsch appeal before fading away again, I cannot perceive the Quo going down that route. They are too well grounded in that middle ground. I wouldn’t wish that on them and I don’t think that they’d look for it either.

What is staggering is that they have been around for so long and have remained doing the same sort of thing, year in, year out ,for decades. You know exactly what you are going to get with the Quo.  Denim, ponytails and shuffley rock and roll. Nothing will come as a surprise. But they are so enduringly popular-tour after tour sells out and although the hits are sort of drying up a bit, I wouldn’t ever discount them getting yet another top ten in the future. They’re always good for a tv appearance as well-usually some Saturday night show  on ITV at 8.30 -not too late night, lets keep it popular-when they come on to promote their latest single. Mustn’t forget their appearance as Les Battersby’s favourite band in Coronation Street-this wasn’t a fleeting visit either; they stuck around for a bit of a storyline and gamely played the game .That’s what they do.

I don’t know of anyone who dislikes the Quo. You may not actively love them but it’s impossible to to dislike them. On those multiple choice surveys where you are asked to rank things in preference, on a scale of 1 being “very positive feelings” to 3 being “no strong feelings” to 5 being “actively strongly cannot see anything redeeming” (or something like that) ,the Quo would only have boxes 1 to 3 .There’d be no point in wasting the ink to print boxes 4 and 5 because nobody would ever tick them.              

Totally Shuffled-Bill Drummond

extracted from "Totally Shuffled- A Year of Listening to Music on A Broken iPod" 

February 18th

I met Bill Drummond once.

He made me a cup of tea.

I was trying to get all of the records released on his then label, Zoo, and I had got nearly all of them, but had fallen short with the first release, Big in Japan’s “From Y-Z and Never Again” e.p. So, at 17 years old and knowing that Zoo’s office was in the middle of town and incredibly listed in the Yellow Pages under Record Labels, I plucked up the nerve one weekday afternoon to knock on an anonymous metal door on the first floor of a building in Whitechapel, Liverpool.

What possessed me to do this, I’m not really sure. I must have thought that they had boxes of records for sale.

Anyway, the door was opened by Bill Drummond himself and I stuttered what I was after. He very kindly explained that all the Big In Japan records had been sold out, but there were some sleeves left and did I want one of those?

Not only that, but did I want a cup of tea whilst I was here?

I expected to be ushered into some sophisticated thriving hive of activity, a plush suite of offices, but it was a merely a bare room. There was a big empty desk with a phone on it, a fridge, kettle and an old sofa. That was it.

I also expected that it would be full of musicians and instruments-maybe Julian Cope would be hanging around. But no, that’s all there was.

A fridge and a sofa.

Battered old carpet on the floor and Dave Balfe, co-owner of Zoo (and later to manage Blur) on the phone.

I can’t remember what exactly I talked about with Bill Drummond, but I certainly stayed long enough to have a cup of tea.  I recall that he talked about Zoo making a film and somewhere along the line Dave Balfe passed him the phone for some business deal to be discussed.

Bill Drummond apologised to me for interrupting our conversation following this and asked what were we talking about before spending another 15 minutes or so resuming our conversation. I have racked my brain but have no recall to this day what it was all about.

What I do have a memory of is that he was a very affable, friendly chap. He could have quite easily sent me away with a flea in my ear when I had had the temerity to knock on the door of his company unannounced, or just thrust the sleeve of the e.p. in my hand and told me to bugger off.

The fact that we took the time to make me (a 17 year old fan) a cup of tea and find time to chat has positively coloured my perception of the man ever since. It was clearly a small thing for him but for me, goes to show that not everyone in the music business is an arsehole.

 Bet he’s one of a select few though.  

Get "Totally Shuffled" here:

Kindle:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Totally-Shuffled-Listening-Broken-ebook/dp/B00CJYZ3CA   

Paperback :

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Totally-Shuffled-Listening-Broken-iPod-/dp/149495687X 

......and this is what "Totally Shuffled" is all about:

One track per day for 366 days on a broken iPod. 366 tracks out of a possible 9553. From the obvious (The Rolling Stones), to the obscure (Karen Cooper Complex). From the sublime (The Flaming Lips) to the risible (Muse).  From field recordings of Haitian Voodoo music to The Monkees. From Heavy Metal to Rap by way of 1930’s blues, jazz, classical, punk, and every possible genre of music in between. This is what I listened to and wrote about for a whole year, to the point of never wanting to hear any more music again. Some songs I listened to I loved, and some I hated. Some artists ended up getting praised to the skies and others received a bit of critical kicking. There’s memories of spending too many hours in record shops, prevaricating over the next big thing and surprising myself over tracks that I’d completely forgotten about. But with 40 years of listening to music, I realised that I’ll never get sick of it.  I may have fallen out of love with some of the songs in this book, but I’ll never fall out of love with music.     

 

bob dylan-don't start me talkin

whoever said that dylan was washed up in the 80's-I'd love to hear more stuff he recorded with The Plugz.Is there a great lost album out there somewhere?

update 13 feb-not me taking this off line but sony taking it off youtube-apologies

Totally Shuffled extract-Sisters of Mercy

extracted from "Totally Shuffled-A Year of Listening to Music on a Broken iPod"


Sisters of Mercy-

Sometimes music evolves in different, unexpected directions.


Jazz to blues to rock and roll.

Country music from blues and Scottish folk music from the 19^th century.

House music from German electronic etc.

Sometimes it’s a picture of constantly shifting sands. But sometimes it just stops dead. A cultural cul-de-sac, a dead end. A mere appendix.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Goth, and specifically, The Sisters of Mercy.

This is a surprise; I’d forgotten that I’d put it on the iPod. It must have been a grim day when I’d downloaded it-music to fit in with the weather I suppose. Sisters of Mercy are one of those bands that the idea is so much better than the execution of the idea. The image that I have of them; and one that had been actively perpetuated by the band is that of heavy, dark, grinding music. A pure behemoth of sound, an unstoppable force. They should be the sound of a glacier moving inexorably through isolated Northern European mountain ranges.

Someone once told me that if the Sisters of Mercy were a car, then they should be a big American muscle car from the 70’s,battered but rumbling noisily along the Highway (with a capital H) at 85 mph. An orange Dodge Charger or a Camero specced up with a firebird logo on the bonnet (sorry, hood) and a huge chromed air intake poking out, sidepipes and tinted windows. Listening to this track-for the first time really- as well as the rest of the album, the Sisters of Mercy sound exactly like a first generation Fiat Panda, but one of those made on an East European production line.

The staggering thing is that despite their doomy, heavy, dark and yes, Gothy image, the Sisters of Mercy sounded so flimsy, so tinny. I did think that it was possibly due to the speakers I was playing them through so I switched to the main hi-fi system, but it didn’t add any depth. Even boosting the bass to the maximum and reducing the treble accordingly they still had the sound of the Fiat. Rattle. It sounded as if the doors were going to fall off at any minute. I could give them the benefit of the doubt I suppose and blame it on the fact that they were attempting to make the sort of music that just wasn’t possible with the technology at the time.

On the other hand, Swans and Young Gods were around, I think, at about the same time and they didn’t sound as if they were backed up by the drum effects from a Casiotone keyboard.

All this is before I moved onto Andrew “Eldritch”. I can just about understand how, as a young impressionable man, he decided to adopt another surname, instead of Taylor, to give some mystery and add to a stage presence. But as a 52 year-old, Andy, maybe it’s time to give it up. He also gave the drum machine a name, “Doktor Avalanche”. Not only is it like having an imaginary friend, but it’s having one with the name spelled purposefully wrong.

I have an enduring imagine of Andrew Eldritch stomping moodily through the rain-lashed streets of Leeds, in his long leather coat, big boots, cowboy hat and all dressed in black. He is passed by an old bloke with archetypal flat cap and mac, smoking a Woodbine. He looks across at Mr Eldritch and shakes his head. I know how he feels.

"Totally Shuffled" here;  

Kindle http://www.amazon.co.uk/Totally-Shuffled-Listening-Music-Broken-ebook/dp/B00CJYZ3CA

Paperback http://www.amazon.co.uk/Totally-Shuffled-Listening-Broken-iPod-The/dp/149495687X

and this is what it's all about....

One track per day for 366 days on a broken iPod. 366 tracks out of a possible 9553. From the obvious (The Rolling Stones), to the obscure (Karen Cooper Complex). From the sublime (The Flaming Lips) to the risible (Muse).  From field recordings of Haitian Voodoo music to The Monkees. From Heavy Metal to Rap by way of 1930’s blues, jazz, classical, punk, and every possible genre of music in between. This is what I listened to and wrote about for a whole year, to the point of never wanting to hear any more music again. Some songs I listened to I loved, and some I hated. Some artists ended up getting praised to the skies and others received a bit of critical kicking. There’s memories of spending too many hours in record shops, prevaricating over the next big thing and surprising myself over tracks that I’d completely forgotten about. But with 40 years of listening to music, I realised that I’ll never get sick of it.  I may have fallen out of love with some of the songs in this book, but I’ll never fall out of love with music.