Subway Sect - Ambition 7" (1978)

In 1978, Vic Godard was considered by many, and in particular the musical press, as one of the punks who would become a star, or at least, would do a long and fruitfull career. We were all wrong and it is a great waste. I don't really know what happened in Vic's brain in 1979 and 1980, but he decided to dramatically changed his mind about his musical direction, and if his first album was quite an achievement (but not as much as a Subway Sect album building a sound on this single would have been), his later lounge style did please me at the time but retrospectively, seems a commercial suicide. But maybe it could have worked, I don't know. When it was released, I remember thinking he was trying to become commercial and not that he was trying to kill himself artistically. However, he failed. But back in 1978. With "Ambition", he signed one of the greatest songs of the punk wave. Somewhere between Buzzcocks and the Only Ones, with echoes of Television and Marc Bolan, it is all punk needed to become. Using strange little organ sounds and not the usual punk drumming, avoiding any "new wave" tendency such as XTC or Wire were driving what was first a brutal and simplistic music, Vic Godard and his Subway Sect was really doing something important for the future of the movement. Spectacularily, this song did not lose any of its emotional potential and has travelled through the years quite well. If you are one of those thinking that punk was a bad flash in a loosy pan, give it a try here. "Different Story", the B-side (with the text on the cover) is also excellent.

Here's the lyrics of "Ambition"

You can take it or leave it as far as we're concerned. Because we're not concerned with you. What you want is buried in the present tense. Blind alleyways allay the jewels". I am a dried-up seed can't be restored. I hope no-one notices the sleep on me. I've been walking along down this shallow slope. Looking for nothing particularly. Am I guided or is this life for free. Because nothing ever seems to happen to me. And I won't be tempted by vile evils. Because vile evils are vile evils...

Alex Harvey Band - (Big Tree) Small Axe 7" (1980)

Alex Harvey is with Alain Kan the main reason I created this blog. Some of their songs seemed irreparably lost and nobody seemed to care. If most know Alex had a career before the 4 years that lasted the Sensational Alex Harvey Band, few were and still are interested by his musical life during the 5 years between the SAHB end and the tragic and irreparable Alex's death on 4 february 1982, one day before his 47th birthday. Sad since he released a great album with his new band (The Mafia Stole My Guitar, on which the wonderfull "The Whalers" was chosen as B-side for this single) and 2 singles, the one here being the last one he saw released when still alive. Released in may 1980, it means that Alex had no record out for almost 2 years before he died. It's quite incredible when one knows how he never gave up and wanted to play and record again and again. But so where these times, sometimes cruel for artists such as Kevin Coyne and Alex Harvey who had contributed more than anybody to the punk movement and who were cited by punks (at least John Lydon) as true influences. The A-side was an attempt to recreate a Bob Marley song, surely because it seemed a good idea for the charts. It was not and we must admit that the cover is not convincing. Of course, it's not bad, but honestly it's far from the greatest achievements of the past. The B-side is so fantastic that it makes this single a great one. Once again, it is a self-made cover since there was originally none. The picture of Alex is of course a reference to the text of "The Whalers". I'm quite happy with my choice on both sides and, maybe I'm wrong, but I think that he would have liked it. So enjoy it here. In a few days, I'll post another post-SAHB single, never included on various compilations, and published the year before this one.

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I think it is pleasant to listen with the text on the screen, so I put the "Small Axe" one (from Bob Marley) but also the deeply moving one of "The Whalers"

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(big Tree) Small Axe. Why boasteth thyself. Oh, evil men playing smart and not being clever? I said, you're working iniquity to achieve vanity (if a-so a-so). But the goodness of jah, jah. I-dureth for-i-ver. So if you are the big tree, we are the small axe, ready to cut you down (well sharp), to cut you down. These are the words of my master, keep on tellin me no weak heartshall prosper, and whosoever diggeth a pit shall fall in it, fall in it. And whosoever diggeth a pit, shall fall in it (... fall in it). If you are the big tree, let me tell you that we are the small axe, sharp and ready, ready to cut you down (well sharp), to cut you down(to cut you down)(to cut you down). These are the words of my master, tellin me that no weak heart shall prosper. And whosoever diggeth a pit, shall fall in it, uh, bury in it. And whosoever diggeth a pit shall bury in it, uh (... bury in it). If you are the big, big tree, we are the small axe, ready to cut you down (well sharp), to cut you down. If you are the big, big tree, let me tell you that we are the small axe, ready to cut you down (well sharp), to cut you down, sharpened ...

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The Whalers (Thar She Blows). Gimme the spear. Gimme it quick. And I'll kill the son, of Moby Dick. I'll throw the carcass on the boil. Sell my soul for bloody oil. Murder in the silver foam. Grab the gold and sail back home. Slaughter cubs and mummy too. Here's a perfume just for you. Thar she blows, thar she blows. There she blows. See the spout. Money is what it's all about. In leopard skins and tiger shoes. We all sing the dog food blues. Sling it on the rusty deck. Rip the sinew from its neck. You can't complain, it's fair enough. We kill it and you buy the stuff. Thar she blows. Thar she blows. I'm a whaler man, a buccaneer, the butcher boy. Born a hero dyin' slow. You're only blubber what did I say here today. Will you be here tomorrow? Will you be here tomorrow?

Alain Z Kan - Parfums de nuit (1986)

This is the last album from Alain Kan. Four years later, he would disappear, really disappear, and nobody knows, even today, 23 years later, whether he's dead or alive. Maybe he's somewhere inbetween, with some strange creatures, probably night creatures, floating in the stinky air of Pigalle, looking with a sad smile tourists fucking with prostitutes in the darkness of bars with carpets red as blood and faces white as sperm. Pressed and distributed by the New Rose label, this incredible LP has never been edited in CD. It's a shame, a real shame. To really take the measure of the genius of Alain Kan, one must listen to this album. Not because it's better than the previous one, Whatever happened to..., a classic masterpiece, since it's actually very different. No, but because here only calling Alain Kan an Antonin Artaud or a Egon Schiele of the music scene takes all its sense. Always flirting with "la folie" (strange, it is the name of the club in Annecy where he played at the times of this album), this is what rock should be more often. Crucial, visceral, seminal (from semen). This is what only some singular personalities such as Peter Hammill, Kevin Coyne, Simon Finn or Alex Harvey, could offer to humankind. An illustration of our internal devils, our vices, our disgusts, and the sickness that contemplating the filth of the world generates in our minds. Actually, this is one of these rare moments when we think that the French language possess (in its demoniac acception) something that English cannot carry. A quality of evocation in the writing and the singing that only Brel, Ferre, Barbara and Piaf were able to share with the listener. But here, for the first time, it is in the context of rock music, a style not perfectly appropriate to the French language for reasons that would need a long analysis by linguists, but I'm not the right man to do it. The last song of this LP, "Schwartz Market" is the most extreme vision of Hell's Dante that has been proposed in music. Compared to it, all the Grindcore scene seems little kids playing with their excrements to feel like rebels. If I decided to create this blog, it was for 2 reasons/names: Alex Harvey and Alain Kan. I could have built a fan club blog but I'm too old to be a fan and I'm not a fan of fan blogs (or sites). I did not think that I would post albums but I'm not sure this one will be posted anywhere soon so I give to who wants it. Impossible to say enjoy it of course, but if you want a very special trip, try it here.
The song I put to listen to is "Rezo Perroquet Vert", it was hard to select one, but I think it shows how the album sounds. Since I got no picture of Alain Kan from this period, I prefer not to illustrate this album with older photos. It seems Alain had quite changed physically at the end of his public presence on earth.

Mandy Morton and the Spriguns - Magic Lady (1978)

Until recently, the only women that could inspire to me intense emotions were Billie Holiday and Melanie Safka. But this was before I discovered Mandy Morton, specially this album, and found that another woman voice could make me shiver. Mandy Morton has a very quiet voice but with something severe and a resignation in it that produces a feeling of fatal fate that I would call doom. She really is the perfect vehicle to carry a quality of despair more often represented in the funeral doom movement than in the classic folk one. It is true that traditional songs are often full of morbid visions and tragic destinies, but here Mandy Morton never seems to mimic these old times and makes these words as relevant today than they were in their times. It must be specified that all the songs are originals and none old ones arranged. The miracle is that the music perfectly suits her vocal approach, whereas in the english folk planet of the seventies, virtuosity and demonstration often ruined any emotional quality. Not here. The album is her first released under the name of Mandy Morton and the Spriguns. The previous ones were released only as the Spriguns. Honestly, no one of these previous works can rivalize with this masterpiece. They all have too much "exercices de style" on them to convince and Mandy has only a secondary role. Here, the band is at her service and she deserves it. All the songs are gems. It has been really difficult to chose one for a streaming listening. This post is the first of a long series from S'Heaven Tease, articles published in the music mag Xroads and in which I comment some obscure treasures of the seventies. These LPs are often impossible or very hard to find in CD, and most of the time quite expensive. So, to propose them here in reduced quality format such as the MP3 is, will help to know if you think they are worth the financial sacrifice. Mandy has published 2 other albums after this one, no more under the name of the Spriguns, certainly because of her separation from her companion, one of the founders of the band. They are not as fantastics as this one but still very good. She works for now several years in a radio in which she has a cultural show and I hope she doesn't miss the music since the music does miss her. Enjoy this magic lady here (the magic lady is Sandy Denny, dead the previous year and to whom the eponymus song is dedicated)

Here the text from "Witchfinder", that you can hear below

"They’re going to hang a witch". Shall we build the scaffold high to stretch their necks until they die? Shall we build the fire up to send them straight to hell? Oh it doesn’t matter how they go as long as we can make a show. Down through the mist comes the rider. The death bell tolls a warning to his prey. He’ll see us all in hell the witchfinder by torturing our life and souls away. And what kind of man is this the witchfinder, who calls himself a holy man of the cloth? His wretched form a constant reminder of all the night black hags that he’s turned off. He’ll seek out all our covens and destroy them, and cruelly send our sisters to their deaths, and rid our lands of powers that defy him until our dark lord has no servants left. And when he sees the marks of his destruction, he’ll think that he rests easy in his bed. But we’ll come in the night to instruct him. In the rules of the land of the living dead.

JFG - The dk's Choice (2004-2009)

Imagine you receive a CD-R from someone who liked what you wrote in a music mag (always Xroads since I do not write anywhere else) and, after only a few minutes listening, you know that you have here one of the best singer and songwriter living on this planet, someone that will take place next to John Lennon psychedelic-era, Syd Barrett Pink Floyd-era, Lou Reed Velvet and Transformer-eras, Jonathan Richman and Robyn Hytchcock (all eras) and some other ones, but in no way smelling like plagiarism. And what is the most incredible (and scandalous) is that this young man has no label, no record released although he's still composing fantastic songs and have a real charisma on stage. From this time, I write on him as often as I can (always in the same mag, maybe not the most appropriate to stimulate curiosity) and I got the privilege to be one to those he regurarily writes emails. I asked him some days ago the authorization to establish my own Best of among the 39 original songs he sent me in the last months. He answered yes and seems curious of my choice. Honestly, I could include almost all of them if the criteria was to like them or not since I don't think possible to completely dislike one of his songs (the same with Peter Perrett for example). But here are the 11 eleven ones (hell heaven?) that I listen to again and again and again. Some of them are in my top 100 of the best songs ever composed (such as the great "Love song" you can listen to at the end of this post, but also "Sleep", a delicious recent one that should be known by everybody including you). The Lennon's influence is much more marked in his later songs and the musical arrangements are always chosen with a rare intelligence. JFG lives in France (like Elliott Murphy and I sometimes wonder why they stay in this cul-de-sac country where rock has not any chance to feed his man) and I hope that an English or American reader will be as enthousiastic as I am and send these songs to some label that would have the great idea to release them on CD. Here I imagined a vinyl release with 20 min or so on each side (self-made cover again of course, using pictures of him on stage). I made the choice of the order of the songs taking into account their recording dates (although JFG did not specify them clearly I must say) and the sequence I would have liked to find on a record. Enjoy enjoy and enjoy it again here.

Janitor Joe - The Singles (1992-93)

Joachim Breuer (on right on the above picture) is an underrated genius. He was the leader of the Bastards at the onset of the 90's, whose noise was somewhere between Drunk with Guns and Unsane. Then, he formed Janitor Joe with Matt Enstminger on drums and Kristen Pfaff on bass. The music was less sludgy and more Stoogy I'll say, but nearly as good as the Bastards. The trio released 1 single on OXO and 2 on Amphetamine Reptile, and a superb album entitled Big Metal Birds. Unfortunately, Kristen was called by Courtney Love to join Hole and she went to live in Seatt-Hole, leaving Joachim to modify the line-up (see her doomed fate at the end of this post). With a new (male) member, the band released the fantastic Lucky album, maybe more direct, but a high standard on my personal scale (I don't know whether the expression is correct or not but I try it). After this LP, Joachim Breuer disbanded Janitor Joe to form Gnomes of Zürich, a rather deceiving band who released one album and faced complete indifference. He then left the music world to become a PhD. I wrote to him 10 years ago and he was kind enough to answer. I don't know what he's doing now. In the Janitor Joe singles, most songs did not feature on albums (acually, only "Boyfriend" and "Pest" could be found on Big Metal Birds and Lucky respectively). It was a shame not to have the 8 other gems available, this is why I did this Singles compilation. It is to note that the Review Stalker Blog proposed one here (just one thing: I hate when blogs welcome you with unexpected music, turn it off please) but a song called "Void" from a compilation 7" called Up on Helter Skelter Records (and featuring Atomic 61, Sinatra and Superconductors) was missing, so I added it here with the 2 album songs. The only single song missing in action in both my and the RS blog is "Under the Knife" on an OXO 7" that I've never found. Either you got the LPs but not the singles, or not even know the name of this great band... enjoy here.

Some months after leaving Janitor Joe, Kristen Pfaff, was a heroin junkie and apparently unhappy of her experience in Hole. She decided to come back to Minneapolis and, according to some sources, was waited by Joachim and Matt to rejoin Janitor Joe. She did not have the time since she was found dead of drug overdose in her bathroom in june 1994, the day before she'd planned to get back home. This was only 2 months after Kurt Cobain's suicide. Maybe I'm unfair, but I think great musicians should avoid any friend or loveship with someone called Love. Brian Wilson had his Mike to destroy him, Karen and Kurt had their Courtney. So sad, her bass playing was really great (listen to it in "Stinker") and she probably had achieved some great things with Joachim the following years.

Melanie - Ballroom Streets / The 4 CD-forgotten songs (1978)

Melanie has been someone very important in my life, either in musical or in personal terms, but it's not the place here to talk about it. I've tried my best, in particular via the Crossroads/Xroads mag, to contribute to the public reevaluation of this incredible singer songwriter, maybe the most European of all US singers (to be Ukrainian may have helped). Here, we found her in 1978, and in a very singular phase of her career. After a long 5 years period during which her success faded away due to the release of rather uneven albums, Melanie seeming more interested to care about her children than her records, she missed a great comeback in 1976 with the Photograph LP, that surprisingly flopped. With Ballroom Streets, it seems that the project was to make of Melanie a sort of rock singer leading a gang of male musicians. It is to note that she's rather lean, and it will be, to my knowledge, one of the only times in her life. Honestly, this apparent commercial bet is a complete success. She reveals herself a great band singer, and shows a swinging genius that even her fans were surprised to hear. Behind her, the band is competent but could have been better. In brief, this double vinyl LP recorded in Live condition in front of a small assemblee, had a lot of qualities to convince the press and the public that the Photograph LP was not a one-shot. Unfortunately it failed to reach this objective and Melanie would then drown deeper and deeper in obscurity. The reason of the present post is that all the CD versions of this double LP have sacrified 4 from the 18 songs, and among them, I think that 3 should have found their way in the reeditions. First, "Groundhog Day", from Photograph, a gorgeous song with such a so delicate smiling despair colour in Melanie's voice. Then, "Friends & Company", also from Photograph, with its long and very good instrumental final, that closed the LP. There was also the classic "Any Guy" from the Affectionately album (her second), strangely omitted of the CD versions. And last, a rather weak song, "Holdin' Out" from the Madrugada album. You'll find them here on this virtual EP with a self-made cover. Sorry for the low quality of the vinyl rip, but my original one is not in quite good and my technical skills to produce MP3 from analogic sources could still improve. I hope however that you'll find some pleasure. Enjoy here.

Here the lyrics of "Groundhog Day"

"I've grown fat I've grown a beard I've grown alone Seems no one comes to stay in my loneliness Sometimes love and sometimes none I'm out of luck but I'm not done Today is Groundhog Day Take me to a party take me to a room Where there ain't no corner For me to run into I think I'm gonna have to touch everyone in the place A game of hearts playing face to face How long a line to a space Where I look at mine You know I'm gonna have to touch everyone in their place Feel every part tasting every taste How much more running in place will it take to find It's Groundhog Day I've grown fat I've grown a beard I've grown alone It must be a year Today it's Groundhog Day, Groundhog Day Oh take me to a party Take me to a party I think I hear the music playing, ooh Take me out of my room I gotta get to a party Take me, take me to a party Take me out I think I gotta get out of my place I hear the music playing"

Television Personalities - A Sense Of Belonging 7" (1983)

During the 80's, Dan Treacy, the mainman from Television Personalities, progressively became a sort of Ray Davies of our times. The Painted World album is one of his most political, sociological and dark project, and one of his best in musical terms (and he did a lot of marvellous ones). From this LP was released the “A Sense of Belonging” single, with a provocative picture of a battered child, although the lyrics of the song doesn’t talk about abused children, but about the sarcasms of some on those who manifest against the war. I always cherished Television Personalities, from their first single in january 1978 (“14th Floor”) until their last magnificent LP, My Dark Places, in February 2006 (the last one released in 2007, Are We Nearly There Yet?, was recorded before, and is rather weak). Since the only persistent member of the band and main composer is Dan Treacy, it’s a way to say I’m a Dan Treacy fan. This single is very heartbreaking for me because, from the cover to the text via the song (and the Dan’s voice), everything is in agreement here with my conception of what is a great depressive sociological song. The B side, “Paradise State”, is still more Ray Davies-like in its lyrics but more Wyatt-like in music, with a description of the sad everyday life of poor people. Honestly, in 1983, Ray Davies was no more able to write such exceptional texts on the simple men and women suffering under the terrible Thatcherian economical dictature. Difficult to finish as usual with enjoy here, but at least, take a trip in desperate Dan's land here.

The cover of the Painted World LP is this one.

Under, I publish the lyrics of both songs.

"A Sense of Belonging". Once there was confidence but now there is fear. Once there was laughter but now only tears. Once there were reasons for our optimism. But I hope and I pray in my own naive way that one day we can reach some sort of understanding. Try a little more sharing. Try a little more giving. Might find a sense of belonging. Might find a sense of belonging. And I know you think I'm young and naive because I go on CND marches, well that's my decision. I think that you're the one who's naive and like a fool you accept it. And like a fool you ignore it. Why don't you try and stop it? To try and find a sense of belonging? I know you watch "World In Action" and "Panorama". And to you it's just another soap opera drama, it can't happen here. Have a nice cup of tea and we'll all stay calm. And we'll come to no harm in our nice warm underground shelters. There'll be helter skelter. There'll be babies dying, you'll hear their mothers crying. I've seen the devil smiling, I've seen the devil smiling. Try to find a sense of belonging. A sense of belonging. And you laugh and make jokes about what you will do when the button is pressed and we hear the four minute warning. And if you think it's funny now wait 'till the bomb goes off . You'll all be in fucking hysterics. You'll see babies dying, you'll hear mothers crying. I'm only asking for one thing. Just want a sense of belonging. No more weapons and no more wars. No more violence. What's it all for anyway?

"Paradise Estate". Mrs. Brown wakes up every morning. She takes the milk from her doorstep, puts on a pair of faded carpet slippers, and walks a painful mile to the launderette. Her husband Jack is slowly dying, asbestos poisoning had riddled his insides. He got his pension six years early. When they took away his job, they took away his pride. Mrs. Wilson sets her clock for seven to see the children off to school. She can't afford to give them breakfast. Well not as a rule. Her husband Jack has run away. Gone with the barmaid from the Roses' Crown. Picks up her prescription every Friday. She's heading for her second nervous breakdown. Jennifer Lee is only seventeen. She had a baby when she was still at school. Her parents have disowned her and the social service barely calls. The father was a boy she met at a party. Her sister Debbie's twenty-first. She can't remember his face or his name very well. Anyway he probably doesn't remember her. And every day's the same on paradise estate. Because paradise came one day too late. We all live in little boxes. Boxes made of bricks, boxes for unmarried mothers. Elderly and sick Graffiti on the walls. Tells it all "Gary loves July", National Front slogans, "Jesus is coming", "Kilroy was here". But paradise came one day too late on paradise estate.

Cockney Rebel - Singles As & Bs (1973-74)

Psychomodo from Cockney Rebel is among my 5 fave albums of all the times, and this, since it was first released. I wrote it here, I wrote it in the Xroads music mag and after death, I will still write it in heaven or in hell, if there is a paper and a pen (I think it will be in Hell's Mag with my blood). Human Menagerie, their first album, was also a beloved one. With this formation (featuring the great Stuart Elliott on drums, who will stay with Steve Harley and then play with Kate Bush), the band only lived 2 years before Steve Harley, for a reason I ignore but regret, disbanded it. In parallel, they released 4 singles, two of them being hits: "Judy Teen" in March 74 (n°5 in the UK charts) and the legendary "Mr Soft" 4 months later (n° 8). Five songs from these singles were not included in the 2 LP's. It is true they are now bonus tracks on their CD remastered versions, but I think it is better to listen to them separately. A single song has some flavour that is sometimes quite different from an album song. And if "Sebastian" and "Bed In The Corner", released on singles, were album songs, the 6 other ones are for me, the perfect example of single songs. If you wonder why I have such a passion for Cockney Rebel, I can only recommend that you listen to this small compilation to dl here, or at least listen to "Mr Soft" here under. If after listening, you still wonder why such an enthousiasm, just imagine I have "mauvais goût" (bad taste) as we say in France. In a next future I will post the singles from Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, the second incarnation of this band, who played between 1975 and 1977. Some great things too but quite different from their glam period.

Schlong - Stroker 7" (1991)

Between 1989 and 1994, I had a kind of compulsion for buying noise, sludge and doom US singles. All these bands were quite unknown at that time, and there was no difference for us between a new Unsane and a Schmortlurtz (or Schlong) single, since both were obscure bands from nowhere (remember it was a time without any web for the poor French spiders we were to gather some any information). Among them, some became famous (eg. Unsane) and sometimes more than famous (eg. Nirvana), and some remained in their eternal obscurity. Honestly, it was sometimes possible to predict their future and I can't say I'm surprised thant Schlong never made it. But I would not have bet a cent (a Euro one but in these times, it was still Francs) that Unsane would become so referential. All this to hide that I don't know a thing about this band from Florida... except that they are from Florida (and still, I'm not sure). I read that "schlong" and more specifically "schlong stroker" is the term for anybody practicing masturbation, the same way than a "branleur" in French "se masturbe" (you won't say that this blog doesn't contribute to help you learning foreign languages). Contrary to what you may think, I did not made the cover by myself as the Rikki Nadir one yesterday. This is the real one. If I post this 2 songs single, it is primary for the elegantly titled "Proctology disaster" (and I know what it is about, I've been operated myself of this sensitive area of our intimacy some years ago), an extraordinay piece, not of meat but of sludgy noise with some Drunk with Guns elements. The instrumental part of the second half of the song is gorgeous. The best now is to leave you enjoy this proctology disaster here, the other side being titled, quite similarly, "George Bush". I hope a French sludge band will take the idea and call one of his shit "Nicolas Sarkozy". He deserves it.

Rikki Nadir - The Polaroid 7" - 1979

This is not what I call a great song but this is sure a rare one. And a strange one. Released in November 1979, some weeks after its pH7 album, under the name of Rikki Nadir (an alter ego created by Peter Hammill in 1975 for the fantastic LP Nadir's Big Chance), the motivation of Peter Hammill to release this song under this 4 years old name is a mystery for me. I am not sure he is quite fond of this song since he did not put it on the recent remastered and bonus-added version he did of his pH7 album. Surprinsingly, it was on the original US one. All this is not easy to understand but here it is. It is a reminiscence of the punky folk side of Peter Hammill and maybe where he may have gone if the new wave had caught him. That was not the case. Since the single had no cover, I did the one above myself today with a photograph (but not a polaroid) of Peter Hammill that same year (at least it seems). I think it is not too bad.

A more personal fact now. The cover I did when I bought the single in 1979 was a Leslie Krims photograph. I publish it because for me this song is for eternity (mine at least) associated with this picture.

And for bonus, a photograph of Peter Hammill in concert this same year (here I'm sure). Here is the source.

And a last bonus, the lyrics. I don't know it it's a true story he experienced but it is quite funny.

Me holidays on the Southern Sands,trying to get some fun by way of one night stands...I clocked this girl, thought l'd give her the chat -one of them Swedish blonde types and l've always fancied that. I showed her me Polaroid. She said "I like it, will you please take my picture?"I say "Right then", thinking this is gonna be me lucky day. She whips off her bikini top and I think "OK!" I say "It only takes a minute for this thing to develop."She says "I'd better push off now or me feller'll be jealous."Just then I felt a hand on me collar, and it was a Boy in Blue. He says "You can't take nude photographs on this beach,"and "I'm arresting you."I protested me innocence, but it was no use, the picture was forming;he gave me the official warning that day. He'd seen me Polaroid, so what could I say? I looked around, but she'd disappeared, I say "You don't understand, this was all her idea"but the copper says "Don't worry son, I get the picture OK." He took me Polaroid and I got ten days.

Fu Manchu - Slap A Ham EP (1990)

My fave music style is doom. Among various doom substyles, my fave one is sludge. Every sludger has his (her?) own definition of what is sludge and I won't give mine here in poor English. I wrote my own sludge story (in my native language on a collective magazweb and you can find the text about this EP here). For me sludge was born around 1989 and 4 bands seem at the source of this muddy sound. Here's one of them: Fu Manchu. This 3 titles EP released on the Slap A Ham label (6th one) represents the step from the Melvino-Sabbath style to what will become some months later the true sludge sound. The band will change direction as soon as the next single and will later cultivate a much more punky stoner approach (and less palatable to my ears). The vinyl rip (not mine) is not first class but with sludge it's not quite a problem. Consider that as an historical sonor document (but these are 3 fucking great songs too). Enjoy there.

Alain Kan - Radio flic / Killer Man (1977)

Here's the second single from Alain Kan's Gazoline band. Very different from the previous one. A real punk gem. For me, the only example of a successfull French punk single. The lyrics are in the file because it's not very easy, even for French speaking listeners, to understand exactly what the hell is singing Alain Kan. Honestly, I knew that this would not last. Alain Kan had a much more varied musical world than the one featuring in this single. That said, an LP would have been great and would have remained the only real punk album in this country. Here is a link about Alain Kan (in French). Enjoy (it is really short, don't miss the beginning).

Here's a picture (taken at the Olympia's punk night) showing that Fred Chichin (soon to form the Rita Mitsouko) actually collaborated with Alain Kan. They are both somewhere now, but where?