The Boo Radleys - Wake Up! LP C/D

"Wake Up Boo" epitomized this (although it was the sensible and obvious choice for the lead single, I can't deny that).

What, even the chopped-up interview about being on Creation?

xxxpost

Don't worry, I do the same thing. In fact, despite the fact that I know I like the single and I know I love the songs I rarely "reach out" for this album cos I expect it to be a horrible overblown happy-clappy affair.

They didn't do it all the time, but I'd recommend The Soup Dragons' This is Our Art, if you haven't heard it. On Overhead Walkways sits perfectly next to It's Lulu & Wake up Boo

xpost to dl

I really should buy more Boo Radleys records. I didn't get around to finally buying "Giant Steps" until just last year.

perfect!

Even "Wake Up! Boo"
is about a depressed spouse
not pulling you down

I don't often play
this record because it's SAD
BEYOND ALL BELIEF

I totally get the whole "feel sorry" thing for this album, I used to have similar thoughts. I got into them just after Giant Steps came out and I loved it very much, but I could not have been more thrilled when they went off in this direction instead. The reviews at the time were very much unanimously of the opinion that this surpassed that record and was their most spectacular masterpiece (most people ended up saying the same things about C'mon Kids, of course; they changed their minds superquickly about that one too). Even taking into account of "Wake Up Boo!", it was still a gloriously unexpected surprise when this got to number 1.

"Wake Up Boo!" is my favourite Boo Radleys track, no contest. I have absolutely no idea which my favourite album is. I don't think it's this, C'mon Kids just edges it on basis of colour! and careeringness! I do think this album massively outclasses Giant Steps though; "Twinside" blazes, "Stuck On Amber" is my life, sadly. Not filtering everything through space-dub-fuzz = Rage And Fury are more strikingly apparent, which is nice to hear from them. And the whole thing of circumstances-forcing-you-to-live-somewhere-really-shite-that-you-want-to-escape-from is something I can relate to quite a lot, I love the fact that someone wrote a whole record around it.

In a strange way I believe that the whole thing was a bit of an experiment in itself. I read an interview with Martin Carr where he'd told a journalist he was going to write a straight-up 12-song pop album. So he did. But the thing is, it's not exactly that poppy, nor straight up, it's pretty wonky, it has backwards samples about shagging dogs and football hooligans, it's mad and it's all based around that sleepy, dreamy feeling when you hear music in the morning and it makes no sense but it sounds great!

Haikunym OTM - the whole affair is very bittersweet "You'll never touch the magic if you don't reach out far enough" etc... For real happy clappy Boos you want C'Mon Kids.

I like this interpretation.

He probably said that in a lot of interviews at the time. That was also the height of Martin's obsession with namedropping the Beatles. He quite obviously wanted to write a faux-Motown album and needed to get it out of his system before moving on to something else.

I do to but there isn’t one. It is so hard for me to talk about my very favorite band of all time. I think deep down it really is the Cure who are my all time favorite band but I have grown out of that phase of life.

It’s funny because Martin and I are basically the same age. So every time an album came out in the 90’s it felt like it was written for me because I was going through the very same phase in my life. For the record it is Kingsize that is my favorite album of theirs and in my top five for best album of all time but most people don’t see the brilliance of that album. I am finding out, however, that some hard-core Boo fans agree with this.

Wake Up! came out in 1995 and in that year I moved to San Francisco. So even though SF was not a shitty place to live, it did take me about a year to fully adjust to it, meanwhile I had this album to comfort me about being in a new and strange place. Now I wish I never left San Francisco but that is history.

Sure it is Martin’s Beatles album, but there is something about this album that makes it right. This is a phase that needed to happen to this group and even though it has been cast aside, for the most part, it truly is one great album. Just another one of the great albums that the Boos made for music fans in the 1990’s.

I miss this band ever-single day and I can’t say that about any other band.

great to hear Martin, Doom! stereolab remix again though.

We shouldn't underestimate the input that the other guys had to the music. The one time I spoke to Martin it was clear he had mucho respect for Tim Brown and all he did, not just the bass playing.

Somehow I have never been to Preston, I think secretly this album is why.

So what exactly was the story behind this? And the blue room in Archway?

"I was a Teenage Death Squad"
"Go With Yourself";
"Don't Take your Gun to Town" (?)
"Third Unattended Bag on the Right"
"Stronger";
"Betsy's Beads"
"Little Giant"

BTW, it use to be Brave Captain but now he wants to go by bravecaptain, for some reason, and it’s suppose to be all small with it being one word.

brave captain is horrible, i think gorwel owen must make jokes about him when he's working with sfa and gorky's. 'he's got this hat...'

i'd buy a second eggman album. is sice off somewhere selling books?

The Fingertip Saint Sessions Vol. 1 (2000) – 1) Raining Stones 4) Third Unattended Bag On the Right 5) The Tragic Story [?]

Go With Yourself (2000) – 2) Assembly Of the Unrepresented 4) Where Is My Head? 5) Ein Hoff Le 6) Hermit Versus the World 8) Reuben 9) Go With Yourself

Better Living Thought Reckless Experimentation EP (2001) – 3) Me and You Glue 4) Stronger

Advertisment For Myself (2002) – 3) Stand Up and Fight 5) Rod’s Got One 6) I Was A Teenage Death Squad [?] 9) This Weight That You Have Found 11) Betsi’s Beads 14) Mobitise

All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving Grace (2004) – 1) AWOBMOLG 2) Into Thin Air 3) Every Word You Sound 6) Good Life [feat. Sice on lead vocal] 10) Weaponized

I still have a couple of newer EP’s and random songs to go over but, like I said, still have about a month to get it all together.

Sice has shown up on that bravecaptain song (Good Life) and on two other songs from December of 2004. The group is called Meister and has people like Mark Gardner, Idha and Howard Jones also on his album called I Met The Music. The two best songs are the ones that Sice sings however and they are called "Be Love" and "Jealousy" and have this on slsk if you want to hear it.

I LOVED that Eggman album but it never came close to anything he did with the Boo Radleys.

I think Wilder is an amazing song - never understood the hate for it. Eggman is really really good.

Rather than start a new thread, can we talk about C'Mon Kids now? It was hailed as a welcome return to the crazier stuff at the time but maybe it's aged just a bit? I never really liked the title track or What's In The Box but Ride the Tiger and Everything is Sorrow are great songs; Four Saints is sonic bliss as is Bullfrog Green; but there is quite a lot of filler on it. Still very good. I'd say if Wake Up! is Carr's Pet Sounds then C'Mon Kids is Smiley Smile.

(I should say that the self-title debut album by the Works, a Dungen spinoff band, *really* reminds me of the Boos in shoegaze/Beatles mode, more in feel than in specific sonic reference. It's more self consciously a late sixties/early seventies sound but it's done extremely well, search it out if you can.)

Meanwhile, demi-inspired by this, I am listening to my CDR burn of Ichabod and I from many years back. Mmm.

Just wish I had a vinyl player...

I was never sure what to make of Kingsize - a lot of it was good and a lot of it sounded a bit bandwagony and old-before-it's-time and a lot of it sounded like a Christian rock band.

Boy was I right.

I already owned this album and Kingsize without particularly liking either, but hearing Giant Steps triggered some serious reassessment. Epic, EPIC shit. I was having a spot of difficulty with Wake Up! at first, preferring that more 'crunching' sound they did, but now I love it. Whatever you think of *that* song, I like to think of it as Martin Carr's 'Good Vibrations'. You know, a bit of a 'pocket symphony'. Thinking on, someone really should write a symphony about pockets.

Kingsize, I'm still struggling with. There's the spine of an absolute classic there: the first four tracks (even *gulp* Free Huey) are superb and seem to be taking the album on this kind of grand, serpentine adventure but it seems to hit a bit of a buffer after that. The title track is one of the best songs I've ever heard, The Future Is Now is a cool, breezy way to end the album, but other tracks just seem too much to have 'required assembly'...which can be a good thing...but with stuff like Clo-Clo, the main trunk of the song doesn't really fit the coda (those extended wig-outs they did so well). Also, said 'trunks' aren't very good, which is bound to be a problem. It does sound at times, as Martin Carr said, like he'd almost given up by this point.

Maybe it will click eventually. In any case, I haven't indulged in one band so much since I went out and bought SFA's entire (then) catalogue 5 years ago after digging Radiator and Outspaced out of my collection and giving them long overdue listening time. A not dissimilar story, but one for a different thread altogether I suppose.

Pretty fucked off I'll never get to see the Boos live, actually.

C'mon Kids thrills on a way more visceral level than Wake Up! but it does seem to stall and wobble a bit more than I remembered. I still think I like it better, but only just. Kingsize needs to lose "The Future Is Now" (and maybe "Monuments For A Dead Century") before I will consider it best-Boos-evah!-contender, but I do like how much tighter and less jangly it is than Wake Up!. I always loved "Free Huey", I thought it was like they were trying to be Republica.

"Belvidere" pretty much wipes the floor with everything else, on reflection. But a whole album of this would have been a bit drab.

BeeOK and I'm usually hang around in the I Love Music room as well.

I will be back in a bit to write my thoughts on Kingsize.

Thanks for the Ned!'

I am really starting to love ILM!

hmmm...i thought it was safe to assume that this was one of the best songs on Kingsize.

I don't much like Boos lyrics, i think this is why I prefer 'C'mon Kids' because he does oddness a better turn than earnestness. Shelter isn't filler, it's a solid album track.

I saw the Boos open for Better than ezra, a miserable experience as all the dopes there kept talking while they played their 8 song set, ugh. saw them on their own a few years before and they were horrible then, one big ball of black noise, hard to get anything out of it.

That just about tells it all. I could write out a three-page review of why I love Kingsize but will cut it down and try not to get too personal.

I had just about giving up on trying to find someone, anyone on this earth who thought this is by far the best thing the boos have ever done. Than because of the anthology album Find Your Way Out that is coming out (July 4) the question came up on bravecaptain board, what is the best album? To my shock and amazement this beat ever other album easily when I thought it would be Giant Steps that would win.

First my criticism of this album is that 'Free Huey' does not work. In fact I always thought I hated this song but it’s not bad on its own. So I am so use to skipping this song every time I play the album it doesn’t even feel to me like it’s part of it.

I have always been drawn to powerful music that seems to draw me in and speak to my inter soul. When you can relate to ever single song on an album than you know you have something special. With age comes wisdom and everything just seem to come together perfectly for this album. Martin Carr has never written better lyrics before or after this period in his life. So I can understand this album not speaking for a lot of people but for the few it has it seems to have really made a certain connection.

It made me laugh that someone said that he felt like this was a Christian rock album. Martin is not a religious man but did write songs that might seem that way but really they are about drugs and friendship. "Now we’ve high as monkeys Now we’ve come so far You and I are simple friends no more Now we’re high as monkeys Opened a few doors Let the sunshine crash into our souls …Thinking fast and feeling free And there’s no one who can touch me Higher than the universe itself Thanks I don’t need no help."

'Kingsize' is the Boo Radleys best song and is a powerful statement when they have a song called 'Lazarus' but is true. I always felt that song would be the song I dedicate to my wife someday…

Their best ever single is on this album as well but was never released as such or on the UK version of this album. 'Put Your Arms Around Me And Tell Me Everything’s Going To Be OK' is pure pop genius, IMO.

'The Future Is Now' is also a peek into what he would be doing next with bravecaptain stuff. 'Song From The Blue Room' is a much better or perfect ending for this album however.

So I do understand many, many people not getting or liking this album. I also feel it doesn’t reveal itself for a bit and could be a bit off putting a first. The rewards are so much greater in the end but could be just me.

Deon

Username: Put Your Arms Around Me And Tell Me Everything's Going To Be(e) OK

Maybe it's because I knew the end was nigh for the Boos when it came out that I couldn't bring myself to love Kingsize. I rushed into the shops on that October day expecting some kind of display with THE NEW BOO RADLEYS! written on it. But no, I had to ask a shop assistant who directed me to a forlorn bit of the shop. I could only be disappointed by the packaging which, on the outside looked like a Wonderstuff poster on a student's wall, and on the inside could have been knocked up by an invalid with a vague grasp of MS Paint.

Still it's the music that counts. I remember being delighted by the drill'n'bass intro, being a massive Aphex Twin fan at the time, but even then still recognising it as tokenism.
Still the first two songs were fantastic. The Old Newsstand especially working as the perfect partner to Belvedere. Free Huey I'd heard already. Never liked this - it sounded dated even at the time and saying things like "Republica" doesn't help it at all. What are the lyrics about?
Monuments For A Dead Century on first listens sounded like a horrible attempt at cashing in on millennium fever, but is redeemable as the only song on Kingsize to have a proper wigout.
I agree with whoever said the middle section of the album needed breaking up. Eurostar and Adieu Clo Clo are both great songs but far too similar to be stuck together. Jimmy Webb Is God, a fantastic track in itself with a sublime coda just gets lost. I don't often make it to the end of this album because of this.
I always skipped Comb Your Hair because it sounded almost exactly the same as a Pulp song that came out about the same time. She Is Everywhere is a welcome return to Wake Up lyricism and almost partners tracks like 4am Conversation.
Altogether, Kingsize is by no means a bad album, it's just a little halfbaked and unfocussed compared to the Boos in their prime.

Gotta go, or I'll be late.

When I check back, the finished album tracks were almost the same as the ones I was having a hard time with – simple things like good sequencing brought the album to life a bit. Free Huey and Kingsize were grafted on as late additions (ironically the worst and best tracks). The early demo of Kingsize was drone-pop, and sounded like early Spiritualized, who Martin used to adore.

It was heartbreaking that they split on the back of such a great album. But if no-one is buying your records, what can you do?

Not to keep bumping this thread but needed to acknowledge Ian on his great post. The thing that continues to blow my mind is that for the really hard-core boo fans it is Kingsize that really touches them most. You ran a Boo Radleys site, so you must really like them as well. It just great to meet, hear, or talk to anyone who feels the same way. The great lost album from the 1990s.

It was heartbreaking that they split on the back of such a great album.

Ian or anyone for that matter, that is my real e-mail address and I’m on slsk as BeeOK as well, lets chat sometime!

And then, one gig at the Virgin Megastore (which I didn't get to), and then they packed it it.

That's my feeling about Kingsize exactly. It's a fine album but you can tell it's the end really. I still maintain that Giant Steps is their best, closely followed by Wake Up.

I see early Boos as a completely different beast really, but I still love the early stuff. I don't think there are any bad songs on Everything's Alright Forever and it could fit very well in the recent wave of psychedelia we've been seeing with Dungen and stuff like that. I really enjoy listening to Spaniard, Song For The Morning To Sing, Does This Hurt, Room At The Top, Tortoiseshell, Foster's Van (sublime!), Buffallo Bill and countless others. I think the reason I like Giant Steps so much though is because it's such a big leap from the early stuff yet it retains the original ethic (tracks like Spun Around and Take The Time Around are still as noisy and shoegazey as fuck).
It's about time I made myself a best of Boos CD-R as my favourite tracks keep changing. Right now I'd say this would sum them up for me:

Foster's Van
Buffalo Bill
Spaniard
Song For the Morning To Sing
Room At The Top
Butterfly McQueen/Rodney King
Best Lose The Fear
Lazarus
Joel
Crow Eye
Zoom
Charles Bukowski Is Dead
Reaching Out From Here
Blues For George Michael
Wallpaper
Almost Nearly There
Bullfrog Green
French Canadian Bean Soup
Everything Is Sorrow
Four Saints
Ride The Tiger
The Old Newsstand At Hamilton Square
Jimmy Webb Is God
In A Galaxy Far Far Away

Honorable mentions:
Tortoiseshell
Oh Brother
I Will Always Ask You Where You've Been Even Though I Know The Answer
Vote You

Bodenheim Jr
Kaleidoscope (Ichabod & I version)
Naomi
Everybird
Sometime Soon She Said
Foster's Van
Spaniard
Skyscraper
Room At The Top
Smile Fades Fast
I Hang Suspended
Butterfly McQueen / Rodney King (I think of this as one song)
If You Want It, Take It
Take The Time Around
C'Mon Kids
Four Saints
New Brighton Promenade

November 13, 1992 at the Hollywood Palladium when they were the opening band for Sugar. (Everything’s Alright Forever tour)

November 18, 1993 on the Sunset Strip at the Roxy Theatre and was the only time I got to see them when they were the headliner band. This show went really well for the Boos as a lot of people were talking about how great they were live after the show. (Giants Steps tour)

September 5, 1994 for Lollapalooza 1994 on the second stage. (Giant Steps tour)

In my opinion, "Every Heaven" is the best they ever did. So powerful and loud, and yet so meek and melodic. Four perfect beautiful songs. I like a lot of the early stuff, but not all. All my CDs got burgled, and I only have the early stuff on vinyl now, and rarely get round to listening to vinyl. I've got most of it I think.

I loved Wake Up Boo the song but couldn't get on with the album to be honest. Same with C'mon Kids. Then I forgot about them until a web search last year found me a review of Kingsize. I went straight out and bought it, and think it's fantastic. Just as good, although very different from "Every Heaven".

I only saw the Boos once, at Manchester students union in about 1994. The same mate came up from Cardiff (where he'd seen them a week previous and they were rubbish). In Manchester they were superb. Loved every minute and still remember most of it.

When I found they had split I was pretty upset. Listening to Kingsize now is quite a melancholy experience knowing they've gone.

So I went to Hollywood this last weekend to buy Find Your Way Out, UK release date July 4, 2005. Aron’s and Amoeba were sold out and I’m still without it. I couldn’t be a bigger fan and I still don’t have it in the first week of release.

How do the Remastered songs sound?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/music/4134418.stm

I just pulled out Kingsize today — my first Boos, it always was my sentimental favorite. Anyone who comes to this record first seems to think differently of it than longtime Boos fans.

The title track is outstanding — very "Oasis With a Brain." "Monuments..." is brilliant, the last section in particular. But "Eurostar" may be my favorite — epic synthpop, a side of Martin Carr I wish her pursued more in Bravecaptain, to be honest.

Wake Up! has always struck me as the breakthrough and high point, not Giant Steps which has always seemed overly shoegazy and somewhat dated to me, despite good overall songwriting. Almost every song on Wake Up! is brilliant, with some seriously sticky hooks ("Stuck On Amber"), great experimentation ("Marin, Doom!...") and a hugely confident production.

Meanwhile, C'mon Kids was an enormous disappointment to me -- after having heard all the buzz about it being "their Revolver," it sounds in retrospect like a very Nineties Guitar Rock record, "Bullfrog Green" and "Everything Is Sorrow" notwithstanding.

But tonight I will revisit and perhaps report back...

I saw them there around that time. They weren't playing in Scotland, so me and a friend came down to Manchester for the night. Support was by someone shit (was it 18 Wheeler?). The Boos were absolutely amazing. I was right down the front, and I can't remember a single thing they played apart from Lazy Day, but I know I really enjoyed it.

Anyway, yes, probably my second favourite album after Giant Steps. But it's a close-run thing.

Oh yeah Kingsize is brilliant and is still their best, IMO. On a whole all of their stuff is pretty terrific and still sounds great today.

Ok, this is weird. I'm listening to "Swansong" from Learning to Walk and I'm oddly, brilliantly affected. I know they became better - and more pop - but are there other shoegaze tracks that are as good as this?

Learning To Walk is actually a really formidable LP. Foster's Van is a personal fave.

Never got into it.

I did get into "Everything's alright forever"

Thought I'd post this while I'm here, adapted from a Facebook note I wrote the other day.

I was asked by a mate who runs one of those free local magazines to review a retro album for their miniscule music section. I chose 'Giant Steps', it's an album that's very close to my heart and has been since 1996 when I bought a used copy on cassette from David's Music. Blew my f*cking mind to be honest with you. But rather than going out and raving about it, playing it to my friends, making copies and compilations with it on, I kept it kind of to myself. Maybe it was cos the Boos had been demonised by their later success with "Wake Up Boo!", or maybe it was just because I always felt it was "my" album written "for me" and encapsulates everything I like about music - playfulness, heartfeltness, genre-hopping, great melodies, noisy bits, quiet bits - that I didn't want to let anyone in on the secret, or have it ruined by the remarks of others.

Anyway, for whatever reason the cat's out the bag now. Forgive me if it's not Lester Bangs or anything, it's written for non-music fans and I'm an amateur, but these are my thoughts 14 years after the fact.

The Boo Radleys
Giant Steps
Creation Records

1993 saw the Boo Radleys as a band in transition. Before Blur vs Oasis, Cool Britannia, “Disco 2000”, girl power, and a certain breakfast radio staple that ordered us to “Wake up, it’s a beautiful morning” came ‘Giant Steps’ - possibly the single most underrated British record of the nineties. The Boos never really recovered from 1995’s ubiquitous “Wake Up Boo” - a huge chart-hit whose upbeat chorus and catchy horn section jetplaned over the heads of Britain’s morning commuters, who unfairly dismissed the song’s belying lyrical subject matter (living with a depressed loved-one) as “far too chirpy”.

But this isn’t about “Wake Up Boo” – this is about what came before; an album that encompassed everything from Beatlesque harmonies to fat dubby basslines, ambient vamps to clattering space-rock dirges. At only 23-years old, Martin Carr was already a gifted songwriter who had already penned an indie classic with 1992’s ‘Everything’s Alright Forever’. But while that LP worked as a worthy addition to the then-popular shoegaze canon of My Bloody Valentine, Chapterhouse and Slowdive, his follow up proved to be an altogether different beast.

In only a couple of years, the assimilation of sixties music by the Britpop brigade would be all encompassing, with Noel Gallagher and Damon Albarn regularly borrowing great chunks from the works of John Lennon and Ray Davies respectively to fuel their own hit singles. But rather than ripping off the sounds of his parents’ records wholesale, Carr’s tribute to the sixties lay in combining extreme sonic experimentation with a jeweller’s eye for pure pop music. More “Revolution No.9” than “Hard Days Night”, none of the 17 tracks on ‘Giant Steps’ are left untreated by Carr’s gleeful studio trickery. Even the relatively straightforward acoustics of “Wish I Was Skinny” descend into this incredible coda of chaotic fairground organ and Galaxian arcade gurgles. The chaos is revisited on side two’s opener, “Spun Around”, whose gentle arabesque flutes give way to an almighty voiding of the soul, a literary account of clinging onto the bowl while praying to the unknown for redemption. But there are also a lot of sweet moments on this record. The Moody Blues-y psychedelia of “Butterfly McQueen” and the cathartic happy/sad closer “The White Noise (Revisited)” are just a couple. But by far the most ambitious moment is the epic single “Lazarus”, a sprawling psych-rock call to arms with a wordless horn-laden chorus and a minute-long trip-hop introduction.

Carr’s lyrics have always alluded to his own hopes and fears, ‘Giant Steps’ being no exception. He diarises his experiences of being in his early twenties as poetry - of wishing for more while fearing the future, of his experiments with drink and drugs whilst battling past religious demons, of wanting to move faster but seeking something tangible among the uncertainty. But it never feels overbearing or angsty, and like “Wake Up Boo”, the introspective lyrics are offset by Carr’s childlike approach to the studio-as-playground.

‘Giant Steps’ was the mid-point between the experimental indie rock of the Boo Radleys’ past and their all-too-fleeting affair with the charts. So forget about Britpop’s cash’n’carry mooching off the past, forget Chris Evans’ cloying breakfast shows, and give this record the hearing it deserves.

Check out some other thoughts here:

http://www.booradleys.co.uk/giant_steps/fans.htm

(might recognise some names...)

hehe, yeah i love the fact that site exists!

... still!

Ok, this is weird. I'm listening to "Swansong" from Learning to Walk and I'm oddly, brilliantly affected. I know they became better - and more pop - but are there other shoegaze tracks that are as good as this?

― paulhw, Tuesday, March 31, 2009 7:54 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Learning To Walk is actually a really formidable LP. Foster's Van is a personal fave.

― the next grozart

otm

can't approve upon what grozart said with "Foster's Van" also being my favorite. Learning To Walk is the third best shoegaze album released.

Where are you going
With your suit of armour on
And your back turned to the sun
And your lips tightly sealed?

What is this poison
That you carry like a curse
I'm your lover not your nurse
But I will wash it away

Don't stay here for me...

(Wake up it's a beautiful morning it ain't).

I've really been regretting lately that I didn't pick up all the Boos stuff back in the early/mid 90's (when you could find it in every store) because I'm realizing now how great it is, and a lot of it is great--including Wake Up! (although I, also, rarely pick it up, since I have it in my head that the other albums are so much better).

http://www.cherryred.co.uk/cherryred/artists/booradleys.php

Re-Released on 17/05/10 on Cherry Red Records.

Released in 1995 on Creation Wake Up! is the fourth album by the Boo Radleys Although the band had received critical acclaim with their previous album, Giant Steps, Wake Up! was their first true commercial success, reaching number one in the UK album charts. This was due in large part to two factors: the emergence of Britpop as a driving force in mid-1990s British music, and a catchy Top 10 single, "Wake Up Boo!"

This deluxe edition brings together on 3 discs the original album as well as all the B-Sides from the time, with newly written notes and a booklet featuring original sleeves.

CD1: Original album track listing:

1. "Wake Up Boo!" - 3:37
2. "Fairfax Scene" - 2:14
3. "It's Lulu" - 3:04
4. "Joel" - 6:10
5. "Find the Answer Within" - 4:34
6. "Reaching Out From Here" - 3:02
7. "Martin, Doom! It's 7 O'Clock" - 6:21
8. "Stuck on Amber" - 5:24
9. "Charles Bukowski is Dead" - 2:39
10. "4am Conversation" - 2:43
11. "Twinside" - 4:45
12. "Wilder" - 6:56

CD2 : Bonus CD 1

'Wake Up! B-Sides:

Janus
Blues For George Michael
Friendship Song
Wake Up Boo! Music For Astronauts
And Tomorrow The World
The History Of Creation [Parts 17 & 36]

Find the Answer Within B-Sides:

Find The Answer Within (High Llamas Mix)
The Only Word I Can Find
Very Together
Don't Take Your Gun To Town
Wallpaper

CD3 : Bonus CD 2

It's Lulu B-Sides:

This Is Not About Me
Reaching Out From Here - High Llamas Mix
Martin, Doom! It's Seven O'clock - Stereolab Mix
Joel - Justin Warfield Mix
Tambo
Donkey

From The Bench At Belvedere B-Sides:

From The Bench At Belvedere
Hi Falutin'
Crushed
Almost Nearly There

there is going to be also this, thanks for pointing this out F'n'B.

Re- Released on 17/05/10 on Cherry Red Records.

Giant Steps is the third album by the Boo Radleys, released in 1993. NME and Select named it as album of the year. It reached the UK Top 20, but did not spawn a Top 40 single. The title is inspired by John Coltrane’s album of the same name. The Boo Radleys were never comfortable fitting into any of the easily defined categories that Pigeon-holed so many British bands in the early 1990s. Arriving on the scene as shoe-gazing My Bloody Valentine wannabes, they signed to Alan McGee's hip-to-the-times Creation Records.

They surprised everyone by releasing Giant Steps in early '93. Living up to its title, the album is indeed a step above and away both from what their peers were doing and what was expected of the band themselves. The album is a cornucopia of varying influences from the Smiths-y "Wish I Was Skinny" to the lovely brass arrangement in "Lazarus". Giant Steps is a mouthful, containing 17 songs, but it's also their definitive album. This re-issue brings together all the b-sides and singles from around the time into one great triple CD.

CD1: Original album track listing:

1. "I Hang Suspended" - 3:57
2. "Upon Ninth and Fairchild" - 4:50
3. "Wish I Was Skinny" - 3:37
4. "Leaves and Sand" - 4:25
5. "Butterfly McQueen" - 3:28
6. "Rodney King (Song for Lenny Bruce)" - 2:45
7. "Thinking of Ways" - 3:48
8. "Barney (...and Me)" - 4:42
9. "Spun Around" - 2:31
10. "If You Want It, Take It" - 2:47
11. "Best Lose the Fear" - 4:12
12. "Take the Time Around" - 4:07
13. "Lazarus" - 4:38
14. "One Is For" - 1:36
15. "Run My Way Runaway" - 2:20
16. "I've Lost the Reason" - 5:17
17. "The White Noise Revisited" - 5:02

CD2 : Bonus CD 1

Adrenalin EP:
Lazy Day
Vegas
Feels Like Tomorrow
Whiplashed

Boo! Forever EP:

Does This Hurt?
Boo! Forever
Buffalo Bill
Sunfly Ii: Walking With The Kings

I Hang Suspended B-Sides:

Rodney King - St Etienne Remix
As Bound As Tomorrow
I Will Always Ask You Where You've Been Even Though I Know The Answer

Wish I Was Skinny' B-Side:

Peachy Keen Acoustic Version
Furthur
Crow Eye

CD3 : Bonus CD 2

Barney (…and me) B-Sides:

Tortoiseshell
Zoom
Cracked Lips, Homesick

Lazarus B-Side:

At The Sound Of Speed
Let Me Be Your Faith
Petroleum

Lazarus (Remixes) Part 1 and 2:

Lazarus - 7" Version
Lazarus - Acoustic
(I Wanna Be) Touchdown Jesus
Lazarus - St Etienne Remix
Lazarus - Secret Knowledge Remix
Lazarus - Ultramarine Remix
Lazarus - Augustus Pablo Remix
Lazarus - 12" Version

No C'mon kids..... No credibility ( but that's just me)

i have all those already...

giant steps bonus cds = those classic eps we were talking about in that other thread.

I have a bunch of Lazarus eps, all cd 'singles', 2 from the UK, and about 3 (I think) from the USA, Columbia promos, etc.

I reckon they missed a Lazarus off.

that's all the ones i have (but that's only the english releases)

pop_music/boo_radleys/find_the_way_out/112_lazarus.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/giant_steps/13_lazarus.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus/01_lazarus.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus/02_at_the_sound_of_speed.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus/03_let_me_be_your_faith.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus/04_petroleum.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus_remixes/101_lazarus_7_version.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus_remixes/102_lazarus_acoustic_version.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus_remixes/103_i_wanna_be_touchdown_jesus.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus_remixes/104_lazarus_st_etienne_mix.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus_remixes/201_lazarus_secret_knowledge_mix.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus_remixes/202_lazarus_ultramarine_mix.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus_remixes/203_lazarus_augustus_pablo_mix.flac
pop_music/boo_radleys/lazarus_remixes/204_lazarus_12_version.flac
pop_music/various/international_guardians_of_rock_and_roll/107_lazarus.flac

discogs has this on a french ep

3 Lazarus (Kris Needs Mix) 8:53

but i think that is this:

2-1 Lazarus (Secret Knowledge Mix) 8:50
Remix - Secret Knowledge
Remix [Credited To] - Kris Needs

columbia has

1 Lazarus (Edit) 3:38 (compared to album version at 4:37)

and then there's the columbia promo

6 Lazarus (The Flood Remix)

"Giant Steps" = Olivia Tremor Control
"Wake Up!" = Apples (In Stereo)
"C'm On Kids" = Neutral Milk Hotel
"Kingsize" = All of them

.. and "Everything's alright forever" and "Learning to Walk" (and "Ichabod" ?)

This is great great news! !

I already have all the tracks appearing here (obv) but this is still great news.

.. and "Everything's alright forever" and "Learning to Walk" (and "Ichabod" ?)

I am not very familiar with the debut, but I have the feeling it's more of a shoegazing effort and doesn't really fit into the Elephant 6 analogy.

haha i was thinking the same thing.

Yeah, Everything's Alright Forever was pretty freekin harsh. Much closer to My Bloody Valentine & Jesus and Mary Chain than Slowdive or anything from the Elephant 6 camp.

not sure if i'm going to buy this as i already have everything but these collections are ace. the Boo Radleys made some amazing b-sides and i'm happy that they collected a bunch of them here. Cherry Red Records did a much better job on these than they did on the Slowdive one.

listen to all the singles from the Giant Steps era, drunk and in real time:

I’m glad they put "Lazy Day" first; "Come stab it faster" it would have been to slow otherwise. "Whiplashed" indeed, during this time in my life I was a bit lost but was having the time of my life. "Give My Love to My Friends" indeed. B+

I remember the day I was in the record store, pick up this single and read the title, Boo! Forever and thinking this might be the start of a very special relationship. "Buffalo Bill" is the best b-side from the Everything's Alright Forever era. I can understand Cherry Red adding these singles to this collection as Everythin's Alright Forever wasn't going to given the same treatment at this time.. A-

This is when I knew what they were talking about when they decided to call this album Giant Steps. For the sake of this experiment I'm playing these singles in the order of release. Possible their best moment, this 12" version blew my mind like so few songs ever have. This EP starts around the second half of "At the Sound of Speed" then it just clicks. The flowers just seemed to grow brighter with the beauty. Though that might have to do with other reasons as well. "0Why don’t you tell me that it wrong, you're the reason I go on." A+

Not really a remix fan, has a good down low vibe. "As Bound As Tomorrow" starts about half way through, after all this ambient stuff, sensing a trend. These are songs are truly out there. B-

Though it says "Peachy Keen" acoustic, it is not. Now they have come back to songs that went quite good enough for the album but kick ass. Just made me scream out because really there wasn't stuff this good on the radio. Listening to the last half of "Furthur" and thinking experimental b-sides at their best. A+

This is going to close out the Giant Steps era. "Barney..." is excellent now, probably better than when it came out. "Tortoiseshell" is the acoustic song, not "Peachy Kenn." The original shoegaze song is so much better (from Learning to Walk) but this is pretty. "Zoom, just one look and my heart went boom" nice, remembering and getting those chills all over again. "Smack, just one kiss and I was out of wack. All at once there was no turning back, was so far above the brightest star." They really caught lighting in a bottle and will never filch when I say they are my favorite. A-

Most appropriate that this collection ends with the 12" version of "Lazarus." The three minutes plus intro make this song build to a great climax, something that is actually lost in the single version.

reviving, simply because I got steaming drunk and suddenly "From The Bench At Belvedere" came on the tannoy, and I was suddenly transported. Transported back to a time when I'd like to say things were simpler - but not - rather they were different. The first proper gig I went to was when they were promoting this EP. I was maybe 15, 16. Good god I haven't heard that song in so long. Maybe secretly the quintessential Britpop song? It made me feel real again, and I had to share it with likeminded ilxors because no-one else around me would have understood...

"From The Bench at Belvedere" is a very obvious extra track if Cherry Red do ever reissue "Wake Up!"
And, yes, it is a great single, even though personally I like "Wake Up Boo!" and "Find The Answer Within" even better.

"Find the Answer Within" remains one of my favorite songs of theirs.

"From The Bench at Belvedere"

I remember this coming out just ahead of the Beatles' "Free as a bird", and thinking that if *that* was actually the Beatles single, there'd be rejoicing and the press and media saying "These guys still have it yeah!", but I just knew the Actual reunion single would prove to be an anticlimax etc.

And so it proved. And the media at large never got to listen to Belvedere...

not sure if i'm going to buy this as i already have everything but these collections are ace. the Boo Radleys made some amazing b-sides and i'm happy that they collected a bunch of them here. Cherry Red Records did a much better job on these than they did on the Slowdive one.

― Bee OK, Saturday, May 8, 2010 1:02 AM (1 week ago) Bookmark

It's the same for me I have most of their singles but I know if I see the new reissue I'll be so tempted to get it. It's not like I really want to get it and then get rid of all the singles as they all look so great. Some of their best songs were B-sides especially Boo! Forever.

I love From the Bench at Belvedere it's such a simple and beautiful melody. I probably like it more than anything on Wake Up apart from maybe Twinside.

I played C'mon Kids for the first time in years today and I loved every second of it. Bullfrog Green and One Last Hurrah really stood out. I think I had forgotten just how much I loved this band. Really glad the reissues are coming out.

I take it "Kingsize" isn't going to get an expanded edition either?

I think they got rid of the bench, y'know...

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Wallasey,+United+Kingdom&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=49.176833,79.013672&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Wallasey,+Merseyside,+United+Kingdom&ll=53.424226,-3.05436&spn=0.004552,0.009645&z=17&layer=c&cbll=53.424304,-3.05442&panoid=x8bLbokHbAZPxdEcSSD6Fw&cbp=12,185.85,,0,5

No "I Want A Rainbow Nation" (never released on CD before)? No "The Queen Is Dead"? These will be fantastic releases for anyone discovering the Boos for the first time, but there isn't a single curiosity for people who loved them enough at the time to actually buy their records to get excited about.

http://www.cherryred.co.uk/cherryred/artists/booradleys.php

Kingsize
cdmred467

PREORDER NOW! Released on 20/09/ 2010. The Boo Radleys are - for reasons that are hard to understand - a greatly underrated band. Formed in 1988 in Merseyside and their own way through the changeable music scene of the 90 s leaving many classic albums and singles and a couple of massive hits. Kingsize was the bands sixth and final album they split on its release not helping its sales. It is a great album and well worth discovering twelve years on. It is presented here with bonus tracks and an exclusive booklet.

1. Blue Room In Archway
2. The Old News Stand In Hamilton Square
3. Free Huey
4. Monuments For A Dead Century
5. Heaven’s At The Bottom Of This Glass
6. Kingsize
7. High As Monkeys
8. Eurostar
9. Adieu Clo Clo
10. Jimmy Webb Is God
11. She Is Everywhere
12. Comb Your Hair
13. Song From The Blueroom
14. The Future Is Now
Bonus
15. Spanish Lizards
16. Everything Falls Away
17. In A Galaxy Far, Far Away

shit, moving this to the right thread: The Boo Radleys, Classic or Dud?

Are there any other concept albums about hangovers?

Man, "Wake Up Boo" is such a fucking dark song. "For what could be the very last time" - what are you saying here, Martin?

Why the heck is “Put Your Arms Around Me And Tell Me Everything’s Going To Be Fine” missing from that Kingsize reissue?

I know it was a US only track but it’s really excellent

Agreed and one of their best songs.

It's actually called "Put Your Arms Around Me and Tell Me Everything's Going to Be OK" and yes, where I got my username.

I'm going to admit it here. I have listened to the new album a lot this year. It's pure AOR crap but with Sice singing it works for me.

Not on the reissue IMO because Cherry Red has a tendency to lift from retail UK CD singles. It's possible whoever compiled didn't know it existed. C'Mon Kids bonus 7" tracks and Kingsize single promo tracks also get overlooked. I have a quite a few of their reissues and this appears to be a common theme

Man, "Wake Up Boo" is such a fucking dark song. "For what could be the very last time" - what are you saying here, Martin?

Marcello on WUB (and the glorious Wake Up! in general): http://nobilliards.blogspot.com/2021/05/the-boo-radleys-wake-up.html

I thought this album was pretty shit at the time, after liking the previous 2 and the EPs. Sold it years ago. Still think It's Lulu was a terrible song for a single. Maybe it's worth another listen

It's Lulu is embarrassing trash imo, but the rest of the album is lovely Beatlesy melancho/psychedelia

Quite annoying the B sides from this era are missing from Spotify, and I'd love a deluxe reissue with those on, but here's an alternative tracklisting for Wake Up I made (It's Lulu swapped out for Bench at Belvedere)

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0nH15duwTKTYLvM23hC0aB?si=zwnly104QHifai02d_WOow&utm_source=copy-link

Love that Marcello write up. Interesting he mentions High & Dry at the end. One of my first property concerts as a teenager was the Boos on their Belvedere tour at Cambridge Corn Exchange, and I remember the venue piping High & Dry through the foyer on the way in and thinking momentarily that the Boos had already started playing

Heeeeeyyy what's that noise?? Do you rememberrrrr?? Do you remember??

*proper

I did buy the new Boo Radleys' album to help it make a mark in the album chart (failed..).

Played about half of it, it's nice but..

I feel bad about this, but I just don't want to hear it.

I'm ignoring it completely.

Would love to have Sice as therapist <3

It's like a beef chili without any chili in it.

a couple of months ago i found both cd singles for 'wake up boo!' in a charity shop bin.
the second cd has a rather mad 9 minute track :
'music for astronauts'
kicks off with the standard track and then morphs into a full on excess of timestamped baggy beats enhanced with acid squiggles and samples.
i.e. it's rather wonderful, and something i did not expect.
however, the final track on the ep, 'the history of creation parts 17 & 36' will never get listened to again.

I still have never heard “blues for George Michael”, it’s supposed to be a super mental bside yeah?

does your ilx email work ?

Blues For George Michael is my favourite song by them

It's super mental

ta, mark!

"Blues for George Michael" didn't make my ballot when we did the Boo Radleys polls but a bunch of B-sides did make my ballot.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHCVEtWKPTw