Cast - All Our Days (2001)

John Power was previously the bass player, backing vocalist and only constant member along with Lee Mavers in The La's, but he left the band on 13 December 1991 after becoming frustrated with the ever-increasing number of aborted studio sessions, having played essentially the same set of songs since 1986. Having emerged as a songwriter in his own right, he later commented that by that point he was more interested in his own songs than anyone else's, and so set about forming his own band. Having switched from bass to rhythm guitar whilst residing at Brucklay House, he began jamming with friends, and Cast gradually emerged. The first addition to the band was ex-Shack bassist Peter Wilkinson, while embryonic line-ups of the band featured several guitarists, including Ged Malley and ex-La's member Barry Sutton. This line-up started gigging, but Power was never really happy with it, and so he split the band up and extricated himself from his Go! Discs contract in summer 1993. He set about forming a new line-up, keeping Wilkinson and recruiting Keith O'Neill, who had previously played in The Empty Hours, The Windmills and Tommy Scott's pre-Space band The Australians. An old college friend of Wilkinson's was guitarist Liam 'Skin' Tyson, who joined the band in November 1993, and the new line-up played their first gig in Hull in January 1994. Within months they had secured high-profile support slots with Elvis Costello on two UK tours, and Oasis, and it was during the latter tour that Polydor head of A&R Paul Adam approached the band to sign them, with them joining the label on 13 December 1994, three years to the day that Power left The La's. 

The band released their debut single 'Finetime' in July 1995, which went straight in at No. 17 on the UK singles Chart, while the follow-up, 'Alright', an old La's song originally written and performed under the original title 'Fly On', managed to peak four placed higher.  The band's John Leckie-produced debut album, 'All Change', was released in October 1995, and it shot straight in at No. 7 in the UK charts, going on to become the fastest selling debut album in the history of the Polydor label, and both 'Sandstorm' and 'Walkaway' were top ten hit singles. A stand-alone single was released in October 1996 titled 'Flying', giving the group their highest chart position in the UK where it reached number 4. Their second album, 'Mother Nature Calls', was released in April 1997, and was made up of rockier material that was now sounding looser and cockier in a Stonesy or Faces-ish way. It  peaked at No. 3, and staying in the Top 40 for over 6 months, while four singles were released from the record, which were all top twenty hits. The album received largely mixed reviews in the press, but Power later claimed that this was because it was more of a slow burner than the more instant 'All Change', and apparently a number of critics later told him that repeated listens had changed their perceptions of it. By the time the band set to work on their third album, 'Magic Hour', the Britpop movement was faltering, with a number of their contemporaries disbanding or being dropped by their labels, and so they enlisted Gil Norton as their producer, who had previously produced Pixies, and moved towards a heavier riff based sound. 

The first single from 'Magic Hour' was 'Beat Mama', with the band using loops and samples on the record for the first to give the material a more modern feel, but it was to be their last top ten hit, peaking at No. 9 in a chart now awash with teen pop. The album was issued in May 1999 and shot to No. 6 in the UK albums chart, but only one more single was released from it, and that could get no higher than No. 28. Power began writing in early 2000 for the follow-up, 'Beetroot', which was released in July 2001, and although the band were initially set to work with John Leckie again, Power had met producer and programmer Tristin Norwell who he was interested in working with, and the pair worked on the album together for three months before moving to another studio, where other members of the band contributed. The resulting record was very much based on loops, and featured heavy use of horns and flutes, deliberately moving away from the usual guitar sound, as Power claimed that the band wanted to come back with something that felt fresh and enticing. Only one single was released from the album, with 'Desert Drought' stalling at No. 45 in the charts, and the album fared even worse, only crawling in at No. 78. Following the cancellation of a planned UK Autumn tour due to "internal band circumstances", Cast split in August 2001 just one month after the release of 'Beetroot', with this last album being blamed, as it seemed that some of the band didn't like it, and looking back, Power admitted that it should have been a solo album. 

Following the split, Power released an actual solo album entitled 'Happening For Love' in 2003 through Eagle Rock Entertainment, followed by two further albums more in the acoustic folk vein through Tanuki Tanuki, a label set up by former La's A&R man and his then manager Jona Cox. Peter Wilkinson, along with the band's live keyboardist Paul Ellison, joined Echo & The Bunnymen and appeared on the 2005 album 'Siberia', before leaving shortly after to re-join the re-formed Shack. Tyson joined Robert Plant's band Strange Sensation in early 2002, touring Plant's album 'Dreamland' before appearing on and co-writing the follow-up 'Mighty ReArranger'. On 22 June 2010 it was officially announced that Cast were to re-form, with plans to work on new material, and they released their fifth studio album, 'Troubled Times', produced by John Leckie, as a download to pledgers through Pledgemusic on 2 November 2011, followed by a physical release in March 2012. Despite this much-anticipated come-back, I think even their most ardent fans would have to admit that their finest hour was that half-decade between 1995 and 2001, and it was also when they were at their most prolific, adding two or three extra songs to every single that they released, so here they all are in one place, alongside a couple of choice out-takes, to remind us of just what a great band they were.  

Track listing

Disc I - 1995-1997
01 Better Man (b-side of 'Finetime' 1995)
02 Satellites (b-side of 'Finetime' 1995)
03 Follow Me Down (b-side of 'Alright' 1995)
04 Meet Me (b-side of 'Alright' 1995)
05 Hourglass (b-side of 'Sandstorm' 1996)
06 All My Days (out-take 1995)
07 Walkaway (Strings version) (single 1996)
08 Fulfill (b-side of 'Walkaway')
09 Mother (b-side of 'Walkaway')
10 Flying (single 1996)
11 Between The Eyes (b-side of 'Flying')
12 For So Long (b-side of 'Flying')

Disc II - 1997
01 Come On Everybody (b-side of 'Free Me' 1997)
02 Canter (b-side of 'Free Me' 1997)
03 Release My Soul (b-side of 'Free Me' 1997)
04 Dancing On The Flames (b-side of 'Free Me' 1997)
05 Hold On (b-side of 'Live The Dream' 1997)
06 Flow (b-side of 'Live The Dream' 1997)
07 Effectomatic Who (b-side of 'Live The Dream' 1997)
08 Out Of The Blue (b-side of 'Guiding Star' 1997)
09 Keep It Alive (b-side of 'Guiding Star' 1997)
10 Redemption Song (b-side of 'Guiding Star' 1997)

Disc III - 1997-2001
01 The Things You Make Me Do (b-side of 'I'm So Lonely' 1997)
02 Theme From (b-side of 'I'm So Lonely' 1997)
03 Get On You (b-side of 'Beat Mama' 1999)
04 3 Nines Are 28 (b-side of 'Beat Mama' 1999)
05 Hoedown (b-side of 'Beat Mama' 1999)
06 Whiskey Song (b-side of 'Beat Mama' 1999)
07 Gyspy Song (b-side of 'Magic Hour' 1999)
08 I Never Wanna Lose You (b-side of 'Magic Hour' 1999)
09 What You Gonna Do? (b-side of 'Magic Hour' 1999)
10 The Seeker (out-take 1999)
11 Cobwebs (b-side of 'Desert Drought' 2001)

The La's - The Key (1989)

The La's were formed in 1983 by Mike Badger, existing briefly as an arthouse/skiffle-type outfit with a few tracks released on local compilations. Lee Mavers joined in 1984 as rhythm guitarist, eventually gaining songwriting prominence and emerging as the band's enduring figurehead. Bernie Nolan, accomplished musician formerly of The Falcons, The Russian Rockabillys and The Swampmen, was the original bassist, and John Power joined the group in 1986, but not long after that Badger left to form The Onset, and the group carried on as a trio. They attracted the attention of several record labels after a series of performances in their hometown in 1986, and demo tapes copied from a session at the Flying Picket rehearsal studio in Liverpool began circulating. One of these demo tapes found its way to Andy McDonald at Go Discs, and after a short bidding war they chose to sign with Go! Discs. The band's first single 'Way Out' was released in October 1987, and although it broke into the top 100 and was praised by The Smiths' frontman Morrissey in the music magazine Melody Maker, it attracted little notice from the public. The band continued to perform around the UK and gained success as a live act, drawing comparisons to The Beatles due to their origins, their vaguely Merseybeat sound, and Mavers' expressive lyrics. 'There She Goes' was released in 1988 and garnered moderate attention and airplay, but performed poorly in the charts, and a follow-up single 'Timeless Melody' was scrapped after review copies had already been sent out, as Mavers was unhappy with the production. This turned out to be an indicator of things to come, as the band then spent the next two years fruitlessly recording and re-recording their intended debut album, with a constantly changing band line-up, where only the core of Mavers and Power remained the same, and discarding producers at an alarming rate. 

The previously volatile band line-up settled in 1989 with Lee's brother, Neil Mavers on drums, and Peter "Cammy" Cammell as lead guitarist, and the band then entered London's Eden Studios in December 1989 to again record their debut album with Simple Minds and U2 producer Steve Lillywhite, but even using arguably their most stable line-up, Mavers was still not satisfied with the end results. The Eden sessions with Lillywhite would become the band's final attempt at recording the album, as the frustration of not achieving the right sound and mood in their songs, as well as increasing friction with Go! Discs, who had spent a considerable sum of money on recording sessions for the album, led to them simply giving up on the sessions. Lillywhite pieced together the recordings he had made with the group into what became the eventually released album 'The La's', and Mavers has since tried to disown it at every opportunity. However, the public had a different opinion, and when the album was eventually released in 1990 it reached No. 30 in the UK charts and received a Silver certification. It included, among new material, re-recorded versions of all the previous singles, including a remixed version of 'There She Goes', which  was then re-released as a single, and this time it reached number 13 in the UK singles chart, and remains the most visible and enduring of all the band's songs. Despite the trials and tribulations of recording their first album, the band stayed together, and in 1989 Mavers had a bunch of new songs, which he took round to Go! Discs boss Andy MacDonald's home and performed for him in his kitchen. The performance was apparently videoed, with the audio from this appearing online as a CD entitled 'The Kitchen Tapes', and although most of the songs are just Mavers and his guitar, with the occasional addition of some percussion, you can hear that these songs do have something about them, and we can only speculate on what they would have sounded like if Mavers had taken them into the studio with the rest of the band. 

Track listing

01 Robberman
02 Our Time
03 When Will I See You Again? 
04 She Came Down In The Morning  
05 Was It Something I Said?  
06 It's Impossible  
07 Tears In The Rain  
08 Over (BBC radio session 1989)
09 Go Go Daddy  
10 I Am The Key
11 Son Of A Gun (Key 103 Radio session 1989)
12 Way Out
13 I Can't Sleep