Various Artists - Never Mind The Ballads (2010)

The current court case involving John Lydon and his former band-mates Steve Jones and Paul Cook, over whether the band's music can be used in a forthcoming biopic, reminded me just what a unique band The Sex Pistols were when they first appeared in 1976. This is borne out by the fact that I can't recall ever having heard a cover version of one of their songs - and although I know that there are loads out there, it's just that they aren't by any bands that I've ever been that interested in hearing. There are perhaps two exceptions, with Galaxie 500 covering 'Submission' for a John Peel session, and Bananarama attempting 'No Feelings' for the soundtrack to the 1982 film 'Party Party', but the rest have generally passed me by. I though that in the ensuing 40-odd years there must be some intriguing covers out there, so I attempted to put together an album along the lines of my earlier 'A Slow And Quiet Sabbath' post, with covers that almost verged on easy listening. It wasn't easy to find ballad versions of these most raucous punk songs, but mostly I managed it, and to my ears it sounds pretty good. The Bad Shepherds is the band led by former Young Ones star Adrian Edmundson, and adding pipes to 'Anarchy In The UK' was inspired. Hayseed Dixie can always be relied on to provide a yee-ha country twang to any song that they cover, while Nouvelle Vague and Sofia Allard & Carl-Michael Herlofsson really pull off the easy listening vibe. Hotrats were a band formed as a side project by former Supergrass members Danny Goffey and Gaz Coombes, and Twinkle Twinkle Little Rock Star make albums full of lullabye versions of punk classics, and in the end I found a subdued version of every track from the 'Never Mind The Bollocks' album, now retitled as 'Never Mind The Ballads' (and I know they're not all strictly speaking ballads, but the title was too good not to use).      

Track listing

01 Holidays In The Sun (Hayseed Dixie)
02 Bodies (Veruca Salt)
03 No Feelings (Bananarama)
04 Liar (Micro Grande)
05 God Save The Queen (Nouvelle Vague)
06 Problems (Twinkle Twinkle Little Rock Star)
07 Seventeen (Detune)
08 Anarchy In The UK (The Bad Shepherds)
09 Submission (Galaxie 500)
10 Pretty Vacant (Sofia Allard & Carl-Michael Herlofsson)
11 New York (Opium Jukebox)
12 E.M.I. (The Hotrats)

Keane - Wolf At The Door (2004)

Tom Chaplin and Tim Rice-Oxley became friends when they met at Vinehall School in Robertsbridge, East Sussex when they were young. The school was owned by Chaplin's family, and his father was the headmaster there, and when they left and moved on to Tonbridge School in Kent at the age of 13, they met Dominic Scott, and discovered their liking for music. Although Chaplin had learned to play the flute, he never considered music as a proper career at the time, but while Rice-Oxley was studying at University College London in 1995 he formed a rock band with Scott and invited another Tonbridge schoolfriend Richard Hughes to play drums. The band were named The Lotus Eaters, and started as a cover band, playing songs by U2, Oasis, and The Beatles, and rehearsing at home. After listening to Rice-Oxley's piano playing during a weekend in 1997, Chris Martin invited him to join his newly formed band Coldplay, but he declined because he didn't want to leave The Lotus Eaters, and because of Martin's offer, and although Hughes and Scott were originally opposed to it, Chaplin joined the band in 1997, taking Rice-Oxley's place as vocalist and adding himself as the acoustic guitarist. It was at this point that they band opted for a new name, choosing Cherry Keane after a friend of Chaplin's mother, whom Rice-Oxley and Chaplin knew when they were young, and which was later shortened to Keane. Chaplin departed for South Africa in Summer 1997 to work as a volunteer during his gap year, and when he returned in July 1998, he was picked up at the airport by the band, who announced that they had a gig booked in 10 days! Keane made their live debut at the Hope & Anchor pub on 13 July 1998, playing original material, and although Chaplin later went to Edinburgh University to study for a degree in art history, he quit his degree and moved to London to pursue a full-time musical career. In late 1999, and without a record deal, Keane recorded their first promotional single 'Call Me What You Like', which they released on their own Zoomorphic label, selling it at live gigs in early 2000. Only 500 copies were pressed, and so it was re-recorded in February 2001 and added as a b-side to their 'Wolf At The Door' single, but this was even rarer as only 50 CD-R copies were made. 

Because of the limited success Keane had at this time, Scott decided to leave the group a month after the single was released to continue his studies at the LSE, and the band decamped to James Sanger's recording studio at Les Essarts, France, where they taped a number of tracks in late 2001, including 'Bedshaped' and 'This Is the Last Time', and it was during these sessions that the idea of using a piano as lead instrument began to emerge. After they returned to the UK in November, they signed to BMG to publish their music, but still did not have a recording contract, and for most of 2002 all recording or live performances were stopped, with the band starting to agree with the departed Scott that they were going nowhere. In December 2002 they started playing live again, and one gig was attended by Simon Williams of Fierce Panda Records, who offered to release 'Everybody's Changing' as the first commercial single by the band. As a result of the attention garnered by the single, and because of the strong live reputation they had built up, a bidding war for the band ensued among major record labels, with Island Records eventually winning out, but they were allowed to issue 'This Is The Last Time' on Fierce Panda in October 2003 as the final release on that label. In January 2004 Keane was named the band most likely to achieve success in the coming year in the BBC's Sound of 2004 poll, and a month later their first single release on Island reached number three on the UK singles Chart. A re-release of 'Everybody's Changing' followed 'Somewhere Only We Know', featuring a new cover and b-sides, and that reached number four in the UK Singles Chart. Their debut album 'Hopes And Fears' was released on 10 May 2004 in the UK, and debuted at number one in the UK Albums Chart, becoming the second best-selling British album of the year. Despite their disjointed discography in the early days, the eight singles they released on Zoomorphic, Fierce Panda and Island included eleven new songs on the b-sides, and this was to continue for the rest of their career, with the band treating their fans to new songs or choice covers on nearly all of their subsequent singles. In what will be a multiple post from the band, we start with those first two singles, some early demos, and some exclusives b-sides, to hear how the band started out, from their formation in 1997 to their multi-million selling debut album some seven years later.  

Track listing

01 Emily (previously unreleased 1999)
02 More Matey (previously unreleased 1996)
03 New One (previously unreleased 2000)
04 Call Me What You Like (single 2000)
05 Rubbernecking (b-side of 'Call Me What You Like')
06 Closer Now (b-side of 'Call Me What You Like')
07 Wolf At The Door (single 2001)
08 The Way You Want It (b-side of 'Everybody's Changing' 2003)
09 Snowed Under (b-side of 'Somewhere Only We Know' 2004)
10 Allemande (b-side of 'This Is The Last Time' 2004)
11 Walnut Tree (b-side of 'Somewhere Only We Know' 2004)

The B-52's - Mesopotamia (1981)

When The B-52's burst onto the music scene in 1978 with 'Rock Lobster' they epitomized the retro dayglo orange fun of the late seventies. With that single and 'Planet Claire' they had mixed twangy guitar lines, kooky organs and beehive hairdos into a sweet and frothy confection, filling college dance floors and even making inroads onto mainstream radio. As the eighties dawned, they went looking for ways to expand their musical range, and assert their willingness to take artistic risks without abandoning their abiding commitment to the groove that moves. To help them make the transition from New Wave to Post Punk they enlisted the help of David Byrne, hoping he might do for them what Brian Eno had done for The Talking Heads, securing their place as critical darlings while paving the way for further commercial success. By the time that Byrne came to work with the band in 1982, he had fully absorbed Eno's interest in African polyrythms and analogue synthesizers, and was already beginning work on his first solo effort, a score for Twyla Tharp's dance company that he would call 'The Catherine Wheel'. He soon stripped the band's sound down to a dancey, primitive beat, with the kitschy guitar lines making way for sleek synthesized bass lines, brass arrangements, and inventive percussion effects of the kind that were beginning to emerge from the nascent hip hop scene in New York. The resulting sound was considerably darker and more atonal than the band's earlier efforts, full of angular, abstract grooves that stood in stark contrast to the increasingly earthy and distinctly southern sensuality of Kate Pierson's and Cindy Wilson's vocals. It was adventurous, challenging music, but perhaps more reflective of Byrne's private preoccupations of the time than the interests of the band or its record company. 

At some point, the band and the producer fell out with one another and the sessions were abandoned, and to recoup some of the costs, six of the most fully developed tracks were released as the 'Mesopotamia' EP in 1981. In general it has been regarded as a misstep by the band's fans, and when it came for a CD reissue it was completely remixed to remove any sign of Bryne's involvement, and it is this sanitized version which is today most readily available. However, back in 1982 initial copies of the EP were released on the Island Record label in the UK and parts of Europe that included Byrne's longer, dubbier, and altogether more interesting mixes of several tracks, offering a brief glimpse of what The B-52's' third album might well have sounded like had Bryne been allowed to complete the project. Some of the tracks are noticeably longer, with the title track adding an extra three and a half minutes, while 'Cake' gains nearly two minutes more music. By adding in the 'Queen Of Las Vegas' out-take from the sessions we have the full album that Byrne would have made with the B-52's, and whether you're an avid fan of the band or just a casual listener, this is definitely worth hearing to see how the band had initially tried to progress their career to a new level. 

Track listing

01 Loveland 
02 Deep Sleep 
03 Mesopotamia 
04 Cake
05 Throw That Beat In the Garbage Can
06 Nip it In the Bud
07 Queen Of Las Vegas

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The Moody Blues - Look Out (1966)

The Moody Blues formed in 1964 in Erdington, a suburb of Birmingham, and started as a trio called El Riot And The Rebels, consisting of Ray Thomas, a young John Lodge and (occasionally) Mike Pinder. They disbanded when Lodge went to technical college and Pinder joined the army, but after his spell in the forces, Pinder rejoined Thomas to form the Krew Cats, who played the Hamburg circuit, not altogether successfully. Back from this disappointing spell in Hamburg, the pair recruited guitarist/vocalist Denny Laine and band manager-turned-drummer Graeme Edge, with John Lodge being approached to be the bassist, which he declined as he was still in college. They instead recruited bassist Clint Warwick, and this five-piece appeared as The Moody Blues for the first time in Birmingham in 1964. The band soon obtained a London-based management company, 'Ridgepride', formed by Alex Murray (Alex Wharton), who had been in the A&R division of Decca Records, and they signed a recording contract in the spring of 1964 with Ridgepride, which then leased their recordings to Decca. They released 'Steal Your Heart Away' as a single, and appeared on the cult TV programme 'Ready Steady Go!' singing the uptempo b-side 'Lose Your Money (But Don't Lose your Mind)'. It was their second single, however, that launched their career, with 'Go Now' becoming a hit in Britain, where it remains their only No. 1 single, and also in the United States, where it reached No. 10. The band encountered management problems after the chart-topping hit and subsequently signed to Decca Records in the UK (London Records in the US) directly as recording artists, and a four-track EP was released which featured both sides of their first two Decca singles. 

Their debut album 'The Magnificent Moodies', produced by Denny Cordell, was released on Decca in mono only in 1965, and contained the hit single together with one side of classic R&B covers, and a second side that including four Laine-Pinder originals. The band followed the album with a series of relatively unsuccessful singles, although they did enjoy a minor British hit with a cover of 'I Don't Want To Go On Without You' in February 1965, while the Pinder/Laine original 'From the Bottom Of My Heart (I Love You)' was issued as a UK single in May 1965 and did a little better at No. 22. In June 1966, Warwick retired from the group and the music business, and was briefly replaced by Rod Clark, but in early October Denny Laine also left the band, prompting Decca to release 'Boulevard de la Madeleine' a few days later, as The Moody Blues seemed to be disintegrating. In the November 1966 issue of Hit Week, Dutch interviewers Hans van Rij and Emie Havers reported that The Moody Blues had been in the process of recording their second album 'Look Out', and under the direction of their producer Denny Cordell at least ten tracks were completed before the sessions were abandoned and the album was shelved, never to be released. The band's contract with Decca required them to record enough songs for a minimum number of singles and albums, and despite unpredictable changes taking place within the group by the summer of 1966, they were still bound by this contract. 

Obviously hoping to get some return from their investment, Decca issued a few of the Cordell recordings as singles between 1966 and 1967, with others on the flips. Mike Pinder and Denny Laine could be considered the "Lennon and McCartney" of the group by this time with all the original titles composed by them, with a track like 'Sad Song' being a wonderful composition featuring Laine's characteristic mournful lead vocal and tasteful flute playing from Ray Thomas. The band recorded one cover, of Tim Hardin's 'How Can We Hang On To A Dream', making two attempts to get it right, and another great Pinder/Laine recording from the summer 1966 sessions is 'Jago & Jilly', which is based around a waltz tempo - seemingly popular with the group at the time. Lyrically, it's a love song sung by Laine who does a fine job on the vocal as well as supplying intricate guitar work. 'We're Broken' is distinctive for its distorted 'fuzz' guitar sound similar to what The Spencer Davis Group used for 'Keep On Running', and two of the songs recorded at the final recording session became the single 'Lfe's Not Life'/'He Can Win'. Mike Pinder takes the lead on his own composition 'I Really Haven't Got The Time', and the version here is the first known recording, and pre-dates the one most fans will be familiar with. The songs from these sessions have finally been unearthed and added to a recent re-issue of 'The Magnificent Moodies', and so with the addition of the non-album single 'Leave This Man Alone' / 'Love And Beauty', we can finally hear what their actual second album could have sounded like if Decca hadn't shelved it for what they no doubt considered a valid reason at the time.    

Track listing

01 Sad Song
02 This Is My House (But Nobody Calls)
03 How Can We Hang On To A Dream
04 Jago & Jilly
05 We're Broken
06 Send The People Away (People Gotta Go)
07 Life's Not Life
08 He Can Win
09 Boulevard de la Madeleine
10 Red Wine
11 I Really Haven't Got The Time
12 Love And Beauty
13 Leave This Man Alone 

Gordon Lightfoot - Day Before Yesterday (1967)

Gordon Meredith Lightfoot Jr. was born on November 17, 1938 in Orillia, Ontario, and his musical talent was recognised by his mother at an early age, and she schooled him into a successful child performer. His first public performance was 'Too Ra Loo Ra Loo Ral' (an Irish lullaby) in grade four, which was broadcast over his school's public address system on a parents' day event, and as a youth he sang under the direction of choirmaster Ray Williams in the choir of Orillia's St. Paul's United Church, which he had credited with teaching him how to sing with emotion, and to have confidence in his voice. Lightfoot was a boy soprano, and at the age of twelve, after winning a competition for boys whose voices had not yet broken, he made his first appearance at Massey Hall in Toronto. He performed extensively throughout high school, and taught himself to play folk guitar, with a formative influence on his music at this time being 19th-century master American songwriter Stephen Foster. In 1958 he moved to California to study jazz composition and orchestration for two years at Hollywood's Westlake College of Music, which had many Canadian students, and to support himself while there he sang on demonstration records and wrote, arranged, and produced commercial jingles. He returned to Toronto in 1960, as he was missing home, and has lived in Canada ever since, although he has done much work in the United States. After his return to Canada, Lightfoot performed with The Singin’ Swingin' Eight, and with the Gino Silvi Singers, and he soon became known at Toronto folk music oriented coffee houses. In 1962 he released two singles, both recorded at RCA in Nashville and produced by Chet Atkins, that were local hits in Toronto and received some airplay elsewhere in Canada, with '(Remember Me) I'm the One' reaching No. 3 on CHUM radio in Toronto in July 1962. 

In 1963 he traveled around Europe and the United Kingdom, and for one year he hosted BBC TV's Country and Western Show, returning to Canada in 1964, where he began to develop a reputation as a songwriter. Ian and Sylvia Tyson recorded 'Early Mornin' Rain' and 'For Lovin' Me', and a year later both songs were recorded by Peter, Paul and Mary, while other performers who recorded his songs included Elvis Presley, Chad & Jeremy, George Hamilton IV, The Clancy Brothers, Marty Robbins, Judy Collins, and The Kingston Trio. In 1965 Lightfoot signed a management contract with Albert Grossman, who also represented many prominent American folk performers, and after signing to United Artists he released his version of 'I'm Not Sayin'' as a single, and appearances at the Newport Folk Festival and on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson increased his following and bolstered his reputation. His debut album 'Lightfoot!' was released in 1966, bringing him greater exposure as both a singer and a songwriter, and it featured many now-famous songs, including 'For Lovin' Me', 'Early Mornin' Rain', 'Steel Rail Blues', and 'Ribbon of Darkness'. He consistently placed singles in the Canadian top 40, including 'Go-Go Round', 'Spin, Spin', and 'The Way I Feel', but his biggest hit of the era was a rendition of Bob Dylan's 'Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues', which peaked at No. 3 on the Canadian charts in December 1965, and to kick off Canada's Centennial year, the CBC commissioned him to write the 'Canadian Railroad Trilogy' for a special broadcast on January 1, 1967. Between 1966 and 1969 Lightfoot recorded four more albums for United Artists, and established himself as one of the best singer/songwriters of his generation, but this album concentrates on his rise to that success, collecting all his early singles from 1962 to 1966, plus the 'Canadian Railroad Trilogy' EP from 1967. It also includes one previously unreleased song which eventually turned up on the 'Early Lightfoot' album in 1969, and the version of 'Spin, Spin' on here is the original 45 recording and not the later remake which appears on most compilations.  

Track listing

01 (Remember Me) I'm The One (single 1961)
02 Daisy-Doo (b-side of '(Remember Me) I'm The One')
03 Negotiations (single 1962) 
04 It's Too Late, He Wins (b-side of 'Negotiations')
05 Adios Adios (single 1962)
06 Is My Baby Blue Tonight (b-side of 'Adios Adios')
07 Day Before Yesterday (single 1963)
08 Take Care Of Yourself (b-side of 'Day Before Yesterday') 
09 I'm Not Sayin' (single 1965)
10 For Lovin' Me (b-side of 'I'm Not Sayin')
11 Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues (single 1965) 
12 Ribbon Of Darkness (b-side of 'Just Like Tom's Thumbs Blues')
13 Early Morning Rain (single 1966)
14 Spin, Spin (single 1966) 
15 Long Haired Woman (previously unreleased, only available on 'Early Lightfoot' 1969) 
16 Movin' (from the 'CN Freight Film' EP with Jean-Pierre Ferland 1967)
17 Talkin' Freight (from the 'CN Freight Film' EP with Jean-Pierre Ferland 1967)

Peter Gabriel - Before The Flood (1979)

Peter Gabriel had been working on new music with lyricist/poet Martin Hall, whom he’d known since they both contributed to the 'Colin Scott' album back in 1974, even before he left Genesis the following year, and had recorded demos of some of these new songs during 1974 and 1975. The first three tracks on this album were recorded at Send Barns in the summer of 1974, with Anthony Phillips and Phil Collins, and includes Gabriel's demo of 'You Never Know', which was released as a single by the comedian Charlie Drake. More songs were taped in 1975 after he'd left Genesis, and these recordings are a fascinating glimpse at several raw versions of songs which would later become established Gabriel classics, including an early version of 'Excuse Me' without the barbershop harmonies, and a drastically different take of 'Here Comes The Flood'. 'Get The Guns' was recorded by Alan Ross before Gabriel himself disemboweled it for the backbone of 'Down The Dolce Vita', 'No More Mickey' is a wry tribute to Genesis' long standing friend and early sound engineer Richard MacPhail, which was unsuccessfully offered to Charisma as a single in 1975, and 'Funny Man' is an insightful look at the price of being in the public spotlight. None of these latter songs ever made it to Gabriel's studio albums, but that's not due to a lack of quality, as any one of these would have enhanced the record on which it appeared. They were found in a waterlogged tape box in a closet, which says much about the lack of care with which the musicians, and indeed the record company, sometimes treated this material, but it's been cleaned up to remove as much background noise, clunks and clicks as possible, and now sounds pretty good for its age. To make it up to 40 minutes I've added a couple of demos from 1979, with an instrumental version of 'Walk Through Fire', which, with added lyrics, later appeared on the soundtrack of the 1984 film 'Against All Odds', and the otherwise unheard 'We Don't Need No Aggravation'. 

Track listing

01 You Never Know

02 Firebirds
03 You Get What You Want
04 Howling At The Moon
05 Excuse Me
06 Funny Man
07 No More Mickey

08 Here Comes The Flood
09 Get The Guns
10 God Knows
11 Walk Through Fire
12 We Don't Need No Aggravation

Tracks 1 - 3 performed by: Peter Gabriel (vocals/flute), Martin Hall (guitar), Anthony Phillips (piano), Phil Collins (backing vocals) 

The Boo Radleys - Skywalker (1998)

I originally intended to end this series of Boo Radley's rarities at 1995, as they only released one album and one more single after that, with the 'Kingsize' single being cancelled, and so I thought there wouldn't be much esle to add, but a comment by jman prompted me to investigate a bit further, and possibly round things off with an EP from 1998. That EP has now turned into a full-blown album, as despite the fact that a break-up was on the cards, with Sice saying in 1998 "It was such a relief when Martin phoned me and said he didn't want to make any more records. We’d been wanting it to stop for quite a long time, but I couldn't do it – I didn't want to leave. I wanted the band to end and only Martin could have done that", the band were still recording loads of extra songs in the studio, and so from just the singles released from 1996's 'C'mon Kids' and 1998's 'Kingsize' we have one final 20-track album of rare b-sides and freebies from the band.

Track listing

01 Bloke In A Dress (b-side of 'What's In The Box' 1996)
02 Atlantic (b-side of 'What's In The Box' 1996)
03 Absent Boy (b-side of 'What's In The Box' 1996)
04 Annie & Mamie (b-side of 'What's In The Box' 1996)
05 Flakes (b-side of 'What's In The Box' 1996)
06 Skywalker (free 7" single with 'C'Mon Kids' 1996)
07 French Canadian Bean Soup (free 7" single with 'C'Mon Kids' 1996)
08 Spion Kop (b-side of 'C'Mon Kids' 1996)
09 To Beautiful (b-side of 'C'Mon Kids' 1996)
10 Nothing To Do But Scare Myself (b-side of 'C'Mon Kids' 1996)
11 Vote You (b-side of 'Ride The Tiger' 1997)
12 Roadie (b-side of 'Ride The Tiger' 1997)
13 Safe At Home (b-side of 'Ride The Tiger' 1997)
14 A Part I Know So Well (b-side of 'Ride The Tiger' 1997)
15 Last Night I Dreamt Of God (b-side of Everything Is Sorrow' 1997)
16 Everything Falls Away (b-side of 'Free Huey' 1998)
17 In A Galaxy Far, Far Away (b-side of 'Free Huey' 1998)
18 Spanish Lizards (b-side of 'Free Huey' 1998)
19 Superindependent (b-side of cancelled 'Kingsize' 1998)
20 Tomorrow (b-side of cancelled 'Kingsize' 1998)

The cover uses a photo by Elena Jo Melanson

Bryan Ferry - Horoscope (1991)

In 1991 Bryan Ferry started recording songs for his first album of original material for four years, and the sessions yielded enough material for the 'Horoscope' album to be released. However, Ferry did not feel that the songs were good enough, as he'd become self-conscious about bringing out a new album, feeling that he had to write his masterpiece, and as the technology got more sophisticated, his opportunities expanded and the possibilities became endless. Initially he was upbeat about the prospect of releasing it quite quickly after the relative failure of 'Bete Noire', but by 1992 he found himself without either a manager or a producer, and with no one there to call a halt to his increasingly grandiose designs, the recording sessions just went on and on. The situation only stabilized when he hooked up again with his original manager, David Enthoven, who had come out of a ten-year retirement. Listening to the tracks intended for 'Horoscope,' Ferry, Enthoven, and the record company decided that even after all the years of work, they were still not ready, and while some reports claim that Virgin Records simply rejected the album out of hand, this is rigorously denied by Ferry himself, although he does admit that Warner Brothers in America didn’t like it as much. The consensus of opinion was that the main problem was the lack of anything commercial enough to be released as a single, and so the solution was to simply put the album on hold and try something else, releasing a covers album instead, in the form of 1992's 'Taxi'. Two years passed and a new album of original material was once again on the cards, so some of the songs from 'Horoscope' were revisited, with 'N.Y.C.', 'The 39 Steps', 'Gemini Moon', and 'The Only Face' being exhumed and included on 1994's 'Mamouna'. The rest of the songs have remained locked away, and apart from a much shorter version of 'Midnight Train' appearing on 'Avonmore' in 2014, they have not subsequently turned up on later albums, so this is definitely worth hearing as an idea of Ferry's vision in the early 90's. 

Track listing

01 The 39 Steps
02 The Only Face
03 N.Y.C
04 Midnight Train
05 Your Love Has Died
06 Gemini Moon
07 Blinded By The Life I'm Living
08 Mother Of Pearl 

Following a comment by Geof McM I've speed-corrected the album to slow it down by 5% and it does now match the available re-recordings, so I've replaced the original album in the folder. 

The Bread And Beer Band - The Bread And Beer Band (1969)

The Bread And Beer Band was a group of England's best studio musicians, formed by Tony King (a record producer and assistant at Apple Records), and the band included Tony King, Bernie Calvert of the Hollies, Roger Pope and Caleb Quaye of Hookfoot (and Elton John's late 70's band), Jamaican percussionists Lennox Jackson and Rolfo, and Reg Dwight (aka Elton John) on piano and harpsichord. King envisioned them as a studio band along the lines of the great Motown musicians of the past, but rather than a touring, full-time outfit, it was to be a recording group and studio back-up unit that could be revised and shifted to fit the needs of each individual project that was undertaken. This instrumental album was recorded during sessions in 1968 and 1969 and included Chris Thomas as a producer, but only two tracks from the sessions were ever released, with 'Dick Barton Theme (The Devil's Gallop)' / 'Breakdown Blues' appearing as a single in 1969, featuring an original group composition on the b-side. The single received quite positive reviews, and so the band were sufficiently motivated to try to get an album released, which would have comprised reworked arrangements of popular songs of the day, with a few standards tossed in. Among the songs tampered with were Sam The Sham's 'Wooly Bully', Donovan's 'Mellow Yellow', Tim Hardin's 'If I Were A Carpenter' featuring Elton on harpsichord, and even a humorous arrangement of the 'Zorba The Greek' movie theme. As so often happened, the album was shelved, with Tony King eventually giving the master tapes to Elton as a 1976 birthday gift.

Track listing

01 Woolly Bully  
02 Mellow Yellow  
03 If I Were A Carpenter  
04 Zorba The Greek  
05 The Letter  
06 Dick Barton Theme (The Devil's Gallop)
07 Quick Joey Small  
08 Needles And Pins  
09 Billy's Bang
10 Breakdown Blues
11 God Knows (A Bit Of Freedom)  
12 Last Night  

The Band:

Tony King - producer
Bernie Calvert - guitar
Roger Pope - drums
Caleb Quaye - guitar, bass
Lennox Jackson - percussion        
Rolfo - percussion
Reg Dwight (aka Elton John) - keyboards

She Trinity - Have We Sinned? (1970)

I though that I'd completed my series of under-recognised girl singers of the 60's, but an article in the current Record Collector alerted me to a band that I'd overlooked, but who deserve to be included. The original line-up of Lady Greensleeves was Shelly Gillespie, Sue Kirby and Robin Yorke, and they formed a group together in their native Canada in the early 60's. In late 1965 they all emigrated to England, and it was there they they enlisted the services of Pauline Moran as their bassist, and then signed a management deal with Peter Grant, who put them in touch with producer Mickie Most. It was Most who re-christened them She Trinity, and he took them into the studio to record their first single, a re-interpretation of The Bobby Fuller Four's 'I Fought The Law' entitled 'He Fought The Law'. The big difference between She Trinity and the plethora of other girl groups around at the time was that they played their own instruments, which in 1966 was something of a novelty. Their second single was a cover of Lou Christie's 'Have I Sinned', but it was their next one which attracted attention, with the unwieldy title of 'The Man Who Took The Valise Off The Floor Of Grand Central Station At Noon'. Sue Kirby had left the band quite early on, and the remaining members felt that they needed a keyboard-player, so Marion "Rusty" Hill joined them, and she was later replaced in 1967 by Eileen Woodman, who stayed until the very end. Their cover of 'Yellow Submarine' was recorded by the band themselves before Most arrived at the studio, and he played it to Brian Epstein to see if he would let them release it, but Epstein was so annoyed that he rush-released The Beatles version as a single, to squash any success that the band might have had with their version. In 1967 future jazz great Barbara Thompson joined the group on flute and saxophone, and singer Beryl Marsden was also a member for a while, although she didn't record with them. In 1968 the band released a single under the pseudonym of Gilded Cage, with Maxine Silverburg as the vocalist, and this was followed a year later by a reggae version of 'My Bonnie', which the group now say was recorded against their better judgement. One last single was released under the She Trinity name, which was a re-recording of 'Hair' - the b-side to one of their Gilded Cage singles - and on the flip was the outstanding 'Climb The Tree', which was a great piece of UK psyche, although the music was actually by a band called Onyx, with Eileen Woodman singing the lead vocal. The single didn't sell that well, and in 1970 the band quietly split up, with the various members going their own ways, but luckily they have left behind a great collection of UK pop and psyche which we can enjoy today. 

Track listing

01 He Fought The Law (single 1966)
02 The Union Station Blues (b-side of 'He Fought The Law')
03 Have I Sinned (single 1966)
04 Wild Flower (b-side of 'Have I Sinned')
05 The Man Who Took The Valise Off The Floor Of Grand Central Station At Noon (single 1966)
06 Yellow Submarine (single 1966)
07 Promise Me You'll Cry (b-side of 'Yellow Submarine')
08 Across The Street (single 1967)
09 Long Long Road (For The Broken Hearts) (single as Gilded Cage 1968)
10 Baby Grumbling (b-side of 'Long Long Road (For The Broken Hearts)')
11 My Bonnie (single as Gilded Cage 1969)
12 Hair (single 1970)
13 Climb That Tree (b-side of 'Hair')

Various Artists - An Alternative Hendrix (1990)

I was listening to my New Fast Automatic Daffodils 'Peel Sessions' album the other day, and was reminded at just how great their take on 'Purple Haze' was, which in turn prompted memories of another couple of Hendrix covers by new wave/alternative bands that I'd always loved - 'All Along The Watchtower' by XTC and 'Foxy Lady' by The Cure. I wondered if there were any more punky versions of Hendrix's songs out there, and found that although there have been two tribute albums released, with 'Stone Free' in 1993 and 'If Six Was Nine' in 1990, they seemed to concentrate on more mainstream groups to contribute to them, and so I only had to borrow four songs from the latter to flesh out this collection of re-imaginings of Hendrix classics by some of my favourite new wave/alternative bands. 

Track listing

01 Purple Haze - New Fast Automatic Daffodils
02 Can You See Me - Thee Hypnotics
03 Stone Free - Supergrass
04 Are You Experienced - The Mock Turtles
05 Who Knows - Bevis Frond
06 Foxy Lady - The Cure
07 Love Or Confusion - The Screaming Trees
08 Hey Joe - Patti Smith
09 All Along The Watchtower - XTC
10 Voodoo Chile (Slight Return) - The Membranes
11 Crosstown Traffic - Richard Hell & The Voidoids

The Bluetones - The Happy Lobotomy (2006)

The years after the release of 'Luxembourg' were quiet for The Bluetones, but eventually a three-album deal was signed in late 2005 with Cooking Vinyl Records, promptly followed by the limited release of the 'Serenity Now' EP and a full UK tour, and their first eponymous album for the label spawned the single 'My Neighbour's House' in September 2006. It would be four years before the next studio album, with 'A New Athens' appearing on CIA Recordings, but it failed to chart and the writing was on the wall for them, with the band announcing that they'd split after a farewell tour in the autumn of 2011. While they were active they released nearly two dozen singles and EP's, and nearly every one of them had exclusive songs on the b-sides, so this last volume collects the tracks from the final single from the 'Luxemboug' album, plus the flips from their Cooking Vinyl singles, and altogether these four volumes contain 55 non-album tracks released in just an eleven year career.   

Track listing

01 Suffer In Silence (b-side of 'Never Going Nowhere' 2003)
02 Pram Face (b-side of 'Never Going Nowhere' 2003)
03 Choogie Monbassa (b-side of 'Never Going Nowhere' 2003)
04 Serenity Now (single 2005)
05 Autumn Tones (b-side of 'Serenity Now' 2005)
06 Mine In The Morning (b-side of 'Serenity Now' 2005)
07 The Happy Lobotomy (b-side of 'Serenity Now' 2005)
08 Untitled #6 (b-side of 'Head On A Spike' 2006)
09 Surrendered In The Living Room (b-side of 'Head On A Spike' 2006)
10 Your Psychotic Friend (b-side of 'My Neighbour's House' 2006)
11 S. Thoresby (b-side of 'My Neighbour's House' 2006)
12 The Last Song But One (b-side of 'Surrendered' 2006)
13 Wasn't I Right About You (b-side of 'Surrendered' 2006)

Bob Dylan - Talkin' Woody Guthrie Blues (1961)

Woody Guthrie was a folk hero of Bob Dylan's, and five days after arriving in New York from Minnesota in 1961, Dylan tracked him down in East Orange, New Jersey, and meet him for the first time. Guthrie was 48 at the time, and lived at Greystone Park Psychiatric hospital in Morris Plains, New Jersey, but spent his Sundays at the apartment of Robert and Sidsel Gleason, 20 miles away in East Orange. He had been in psychiatric care since September 1954, when he checked himself into Brooklyn State Hospital, as he had trouble controlling his muscles and thought he had a mental disorder. When he checked out of the hospital in May 1956, he went to Morristown, New Jersey, where he wandered the streets, homeless, and was arrested, spending a night in Morris County Jail. At his own request he was then sent to Greystone, where staffers assumed he had paranoid schizophrenia - his claims that he had written thousands of songs and published a book seemed implausible. Months later, he was diagnosed as having Huntington's disease, a hereditary disorder that causes the victim to gradually lose control of his movements. Even though his mind was sound, Guthrie's family kept him at Greystone because it was the best option, and in 1959, when the Gleasons learned Guthrie was at Greystone, they arranged to take him every Sunday, making it much easier for Guthrie's family, who lived in Brooklyn, to visit. The Gleasons let visitors come by when Guthrie was with them, and some folk singers, including Pete Seeger, Ramblin' Jack Elliott and Phil Ochs, often stopped by, and Dylan had found out where Guthrie was when he went to the family home in Brooklyn and talked to Guthrie's 13-year-old son, Arlo. He had read Guthrie's autobiography 'Bound For Glory', which detailed his travels across America, playing his songs for anyone who would listen, and as he was rarely recorded, it was up to Dylan and other folk-singers of his generation to secure his legacy and carry on his tradition. By the time Dylan visited Guthrie, he was in pretty bad shape, barely able to move or speak, let alone sing, but he loved hearing his own songs, and Dylan was happy to play them. After his visit, Dylan wrote 'Song To Woody', which he included on his first album in 1962, incorporating some of Guthrie's songs into the lyric, peppering in bits from '1913 Massacre', 'Joe Hillstrom' and 'Pastures Of Plenty', and he played the song to Guthrie at a later visit. In the Spring of 1961, Guthrie's family transferred him back to Brooklyn State Hospital, so the visits to the Gleasons' apartment ended, and in 1967 he died at age of just 55. In the early years of his career Dylan often played Guthrie's songs in concert, and some were also recorded at the Gleason's home and in his Minnesota hotel room, and through him a new generation discovered the work of the man and learned about his contributions to American  music. This album collects a dozen of these recordings from 1961, when Dylan was taking his first steps to becoming a spokesman for his generation, and was taking the lead from one of his heroes. Considering the age of the recordings they are not bad quality, although I have had to do some patching to 'I Want My Milk' to fix some bad drop-outs and volume fluctuations.  

Track listing

01 1913 Massacre  
02 Gypsy Davy 
03 (As I Go) Ramblin' Round  
04 I Want My Milk  
05 Talking Merchant Marine  
06 VD Blues 
07 Pasture Of Plenty  
08 Car Car  
09 Ain't Got No Home
10 Talking Fish Blues  
11 VD Gunner's Blues  

12 This Land Is Your Land  

All songs composed by Woody Guthrie.