Del Amitri grew out of Justin Currie's Jordanhill College School band, which was formed in Glasgow in 1980, and consisted of Currie (bass and vocals), James Scobbie (guitars), Donald Bentley (guitars) and Paul Tyagi (drums). The newly christened Del Amitri (chosen deliberately because it didn't mean anything but sounded a bit like someone's name) rehearsed in Currie's parents house, before securing official rehearsal space at the Art Centre in a proper room, with Postcard Records signing and future megastars Aztec Camera rehearsing in the room next door. The band's first recorded track was 'What She Calls It', which was the B-side of a flexi-disc given away free with 'Stand And Deliver' fanzine, with the A-side given over to another future Glasgow megaband The Bluebells. Scobbie and Bentley left the band in 1982 to study at university, and a new line-up came together after Currie placed an advertisement in the window of a music store, with Scobbie and Bentley being replaced by Iain Harvie on guitar and Bryan Tolland on second guitar. The band signed to Chrysalis and released their self-titled debut album in 1985 to mixed reviews, and as recording started for what would become their second album, the line-up changed, with Currie and Harvie inviting keyboard player Andy Alston to join the band, and then firing both Tolland and Tyagi, with Tolland being replaced in the studio by Mick Slaven, and Tyagi by The Commotions' Stephen Irvine. However, Slaven and Irvine chose not to join the band full-time and so they were later replaced by David Cummings and Brian McDermott, respectively.
The gestation for their sophomore release gradually got longer and longer, and 'Waking Hours' finally appeared in 1989 on a new label, A&M Records. It was only when unheard songs leaking onto the internet that it was realised that the band had in fact recorded their second album some years earlier, but had decided not to release it, possibly due to being dropped by Chrysalis and therefore having no home for it. The ten tracks were scrapped and a completely new set of songs was written for 'Waking Hours', which went on to reach No. 6 on the UK Albums Chart, and it gave the band their most successful UK single, 'Nothing Ever Happens', which peaked at No. 11. They also gained some mainstream exposure abroad for the first time, as 'Waking Hours' was a success in several territories, and the single 'Kiss This Thing Goodbye' flirted with the lower reaches of the US Billboard Hot 100's Top 40. I guess we'll never know if they would have achieved that success if they'd released the first set of songs as the follow-up to their debut, but I'm sure fans will still be interested to hear them, and so here is what could have been Del Amitri's second album from 1986, named after the track 'Tall People' just so that I could make this cover! There are three tracks which were intended for the track-listing which have so far refused to appear, so I've replaced 'The Way I Live Now', 'Unfinished', and 'Seven Days' with three other contemporary recordings, and I will warn you that the sound quality is not the best, with a fair bit of background hum.
Track listing
01 Tears And Trickery
02 Tall People
03 Keep The Kettle Boiling
04 I Am Here
05 The Wind In The Wheels
06 Love Gone Too Far
07 Life Going Backwards
08 Nothing Goes According To Plan
09 She Showed Me The World
10 Out In The Wind
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