the rest of this record i can take or (more often) leave
― amateur!!!st (amateurist), Monday, 27 September 2004 06:49 (nineteen years ago) link
― gaz (gaz), Monday, 27 September 2004 06:56 (nineteen years ago) link
― Bimble (bimble), Monday, 27 September 2004 07:47 (nineteen years ago) link
― the surface noise (slight return) (electricsound), Monday, 27 September 2004 07:59 (nineteen years ago) link
― Bimble (bimble), Monday, 27 September 2004 08:03 (nineteen years ago) link
― koogs (koogs), Monday, 27 September 2004 08:06 (nineteen years ago) link
― Bimble (bimble), Monday, 27 September 2004 08:29 (nineteen years ago) link
― john lewis (johnnylewis), Monday, 27 September 2004 10:34 (nineteen years ago) link
― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Monday, 27 September 2004 11:54 (nineteen years ago) link
Let's just say that, much like the equally-badly-chosen YES NEW YORK compilation that I'm listening to right now, it's nowhere near as good as it could have been.
― Mr. Snrub, Monday, 27 September 2004 12:02 (nineteen years ago) link
We Have A Fuzzbox And We're Gonna Use It = Best C86 band name EVAH
― Michael F Gill (Michael F Gill), Monday, 27 September 2004 12:31 (nineteen years ago) link
yeah, could've sworn it was available on cd but cddb has no mention of it... um... i could be wrong.
― koogs (koogs), Monday, 27 September 2004 12:58 (nineteen years ago) link
― Lord Custos Epsilon (Lord Custos Epsilon), Monday, 27 September 2004 15:51 (nineteen years ago) link
― zappi (joni), Monday, 27 September 2004 15:53 (nineteen years ago) link
NME C86 is an album its virtually impossible to like all the tunes on (its actually very varied) but a lot are still great. hence my email.
When people talk about "c86" they mean indie-pop deriv from 85-87 and most of that is better summed up by the 1986 compilation "Indie top 20 vol 1"...
― gerardo francisco, Monday, 27 September 2004 19:51 (nineteen years ago) link
― Spencer Chow (spencermfi), Monday, 27 September 2004 19:54 (nineteen years ago) link
my second tape copy (bought in a shop about a year after nme offer) has RT catno on the spine (Rough C100) and no NME. and is missing the .022 from the front. have also found images of the LP sleeve but no mention of CD anywhere on the web.
'Doing It For The Kids' is also worth having.
― koogs (koogs), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 08:14 (nineteen years ago) link
― JimD (JimD), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 08:29 (nineteen years ago) link
― Mr. Snrub, Tuesday, 28 September 2004 09:04 (nineteen years ago) link
― koogs (koogs), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 09:36 (nineteen years ago) link
― koogs (koogs), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 09:37 (nineteen years ago) link
― Jedermann sein eigener Fussball (Dada), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 09:45 (nineteen years ago) link
― jess (dubplatestyle), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 09:47 (nineteen years ago) link
The Ammonites were great, Zappi!
― flowersdie (flowersdie), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 09:55 (nineteen years ago) link
okay, back to indie-pop. Loved the Shop Assistants by the way. Or at least I loved the album when it came out. Same with Fuzzbox.
also, a big influence on us anglophiliac yank kidz with the funny hair were those debut ten inches/magazines. oh boy were they! now if i could just remember the name of that group who had that duet that went "from make up to break up...I beat myself up inside". I loved that one. It was mighty twee.
― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 10:40 (nineteen years ago) link
only great when compared to, say, Screaming Custard or Cellophane or Thee George Squares (ha).
― zappi (joni), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 10:48 (nineteen years ago) link
― cw (cww), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 10:58 (nineteen years ago) link
― zappi (joni), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 11:02 (nineteen years ago) link
― Pashmina (Pashmina), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 11:05 (nineteen years ago) link
Marvellous stuff! (Zappi, I'll do you a tape if you want, to thankyou for those Deerhoof beauties you sent me the other week).
― flowersdie (flowersdie), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 11:10 (nineteen years ago) link
― zappi (joni), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 11:11 (nineteen years ago) link
― zappi (joni), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 11:15 (nineteen years ago) link
the rest is pretty much what i enjoyed prior to my wake up call @ end of 86 when i discovered Run DMC.
prior to that though i loved mighty lemon drops and shop assistants for several hours.
― mark e (mark e), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 11:18 (nineteen years ago) link
http://66.40.206.13/wolfhounds/ICA-press.gif
― NickB (NickB), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 11:50 (nineteen years ago) link
bad sound.
not to mention that the band had 'issues' with the soundboard that day which messed up the gig somewhat - according to well established sources.
but fun stuff nonetheless, includes power cut !
.. and i dont mean the Noel Watson (the bands DJ later on)
― mark e (mark e), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 12:05 (nineteen years ago) link
― NickB (NickB), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 12:14 (nineteen years ago) link
― Jedermann sein eigener Fussball (Dada), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 12:15 (nineteen years ago) link
Peter Hurst New Brighton Through The Binoculars Of The People One Last Fight Catch Candy Ryan Like Men Possessed Two's A Crowd Goodnight Angel Crikey It's The Cromptons Food For Feet Gone To Earth No Work Today Innocents Abroad Time Was Fairground In Fear Of You Jacktars Tadpole The Decemberists Gift Horse Magic Carpets Trick Of Fate Da Vincis The Book Peter Hurst/Brian N. Smithers The End
― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 12:16 (nineteen years ago) link
― NickB (NickB), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 12:23 (nineteen years ago) link
― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 12:25 (nineteen years ago) link
― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 12:29 (nineteen years ago) link
― NickB (NickB), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 12:37 (nineteen years ago) link
9 Steps to Ugly - Eddie Lopez lives in SloughVery cool, proto-Sundays. Makes me wonder if that is actually Harriet Wheeler singing.
Ammonites - All We HadSlightly better than average Britpopesque Garage Rock with a singer doing a mediocre Morrissey/Mick Hucknall impersonation.
Apple Moths - KymriGag-inducingly cheesy knockoff of...I dunno...General Public or sumthin. The opening 3 seconds sounds like a jingle for Minty Kleen ass-freshener.
Baby Lemonade - Jiffy Neckwear CreationVery, very, very badly encoded. The song sounds like an inept Fall cover band doing a version of a bad Wire b-side. And the mp3 sounds like a Victrola at the bottom of a well. (Yes, I know that this is a "The food is so terrible, and whats worse the portions are so small" kind of argument, but it is the truth.)
Baby Lemonade - Real WorldAhhhh. This is much better. Its like what would happen if Stereolab and Lush had a baby.
Balloon Farm - A Question of TemperatureWeird ass retro shit. Like a 60s garage band basing their 80s comeback on a mix of Fretblanket and TMBG's "Twisting"; though the faux soul chorus is so cheesy as to be unintentionally cool.
Jamie Wednesday - I Think I'll Throw a Party for Myself.Yick. No wonder nobody shows up for your shindigs, you John Wesley Harding wannabe.
Jazz Butcher - Shirley MacLaineCoulda been cool, like an upbeat version of...I dunno...Nick Cave fronting the Hoodoo Gurus. Shame the mp3 sounds like crap being squirted through a very thin tube.
Look Blue Go Purple - HiawathaThe only thing cooler than the weird retro organ is the thickly accented brit girl pretending to be both Kim Gordon and Kristin Hersh.
Love Parade - WoundedWhiny maudlin drivel. Starts out with yet another lame Morrissey impersonation. (and another track with tinny...no, scratch that... 'styrofoamy' sound. a 160 bitrate and it sounds like your listening to it through a door.)
Primitives - Crash (Demo)I always loved this song. The vibe is much rawer, but the singers vocal sounds unrehearsed and slightly bored.
Wild Flowers - A Kind of KingdomDerivative, yet...catchy. I can't explain it, but the music sounds...aussie. The vocal tries to hard to be Bono Vox, though.
― Lord Custos Epsilon (Lord Custos Epsilon), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 17:51 (nineteen years ago) link
― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 19:30 (nineteen years ago) link
Jamie Wednesday were a previous incarnation Carter USM weren't they?
― ailsa (ailsa), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 20:58 (nineteen years ago) link
"All we had" was the Ammonites song i remembered as ok.
I liked what I heard of 9 Steps to Ugly. (And the Sainsburys were on a similar tape I once had - they were good)
Most of the rest mentioned in Custos' post a bit rubbish. (But NOT baby lemonade!)
"Doing it for the kids" is way more floppy fringed and whiney than C86. When you think of C86 you must never forget it housed bands as brilliant as A Witness and Big Flame.
Oh and the Jactars were pretty good of all those scouse bands upthread. Hellfire sermons were the best liverpool band of all though (well, second best behind HMHB)
― gerardo francisco, Tuesday, 28 September 2004 21:06 (nineteen years ago) link
― NickB (NickB), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 21:11 (nineteen years ago) link
― scott seward (scott seward), Tuesday, 28 September 2004 21:16 (nineteen years ago) link
― gerardo francisco, Tuesday, 28 September 2004 21:20 (nineteen years ago) link
yeah, Carter formed when the other three blokes quit but they still had a gig booked; Jim and Les did the show with a drum machine and thought "well this was easy and we don't have to split the money so much" sorta thing. "let's name this one after you instead of me."
― kit brash (kit brash), Wednesday, 29 September 2004 02:07 (nineteen years ago) link
oh look i did find this:
http://graphicnothing.blogspot.co.uk/2011/05/underground-magazine-by-rod-clark-1987.html
― i'm surprised to see your screwface at the door (NickB), Friday, 6 April 2018 15:47 (six years ago) link
Tim - why, what happened?
Pinefox - I love that sound as well; I am all-in with The Bodines, Shop Assistants, Close Lobsters, Fuzzbox, McCarthy and The Wedding Present. Later I came to love Stump, A Witness, and bits of Big Flame (who get too cacophonous for even me). You'd do well to check out the C87 and C88 comps. As mentioned, they focus on the poppier side and have very few duds.
Further down the indiepop compilation road is also the "Scared To Get Happy" box.
― Gerald McBoing-Boing, Friday, 6 April 2018 15:48 (six years ago) link
Close Lobsters (to a degree) and (more so) Fuzzbox and Wedding Present are not really jangly or sweet enough for me.
But I take the general point and I do sense that the 87 and 88 compilations might be closer to what I like.
― the pinefox, Friday, 6 April 2018 15:50 (six years ago) link
It's apples and oranges innit. C86 was a compilation of brand-new artists while the others are retrospective genre compilations.
The connection is the use of "C86" for marketing purposes.
― everything, Friday, 6 April 2018 18:03 (six years ago) link
twas called "shambling bands" not "jangling bands" at the time iirc; a jaggedness that might be clumsy and/or willed was one of the hallmarks at least as much as velvets/shangrilas indiepop template, or something.
Stump were magnificent.
― anatol_merklich, Friday, 6 April 2018 20:46 (six years ago) link
"It's apples and oranges innit. C86 was a compilation of brand-new artists while the others are retrospective genre compilations."
Well the Cherry Red C86 box is both. But the songs it includes that were not on the tape include (esp CD2) stuff that's like what's on the tape. It's not that everything not on the original tape is a different aesthetic.
"The connection is the use of "C86" for marketing purposes."
But ... given that the original C86 was a particular thing (some pop, some noise, some Fall, etc), why did it become potent for marketing something else? That's the puzzle maybe.
For me the whole thing is to some extent a case study of how culture is reimagined, re-streamlined, etc, retrospectively for the needs of a later time. Though it's not entirely that, as some of what came to be casually thought of as C86 is present in the original.
― the pinefox, Saturday, 7 April 2018 14:04 (six years ago) link
There's a great Stump thread on here
― Mark G, Saturday, 7 April 2018 14:12 (six years ago) link
... and why did the later time have those needs?
And what time was it?
I'm inclined to pin it on the www-driven indiepop revival of c.2008-. I feel like it was around that time and subsequent years that I especially heard a lot of 'C86' as a category for indie discos, influences, etc, not particularly meaning the actual 'C86'. I feel like that was the time that the reinvention / relabelling process really took place. A clear-cut example is the idea (c.2008-) that The Pains of Being Pure at Heart drew on C86, though it would be harder really to point to a Pains record that sounds like what's on C86.
But maybe it was earlier too. Maybe all this was around by eg: the early days of Camera Obscura.
And maybe, even, by say the end of the 1980s, once some kind of idea of indie pop had been more streamlined and solidified (cf. the 87 and 88 compilations which draw on this), it was already tempting to look back and think of this in terms of C86? I can remember reviews of The Primitives in maybe 1989 putting them in this sort of context (ie: saying they were successors to Shop Assistants & Talulah Gosh, who at the time were exotic mysterious bands I had never heard).
― the pinefox, Saturday, 7 April 2018 14:37 (six years ago) link
I'm sure I don't need to remind you all that the first BMX Bandits album, released in '89 or '90(?), was called 'C86'! This seemed kind of hilarious at the time because C86 was like the uncoolest thing imaginable by 1989. I don't know why the BMX Bandits called the album that but it seemed to me they were saying, "Yeah yeah, we know you think it's crap but we still like it".
― Buff Jeckley (Tom D.), Saturday, 7 April 2018 14:55 (six years ago) link
... they might have just thought it was funny though.
― Buff Jeckley (Tom D.), Saturday, 7 April 2018 14:56 (six years ago) link
Yes, I did need you to remind me of that.
BMX Bandits are on CD2 of the Cherry Red version with a song from 1986 itself.
I agree that releasing a record called C86 in 1990 is odd.
I don't think I have ever really heard a song by that band that I liked, but I might not have heard enough.
― the pinefox, Saturday, 7 April 2018 15:00 (six years ago) link
I bought the C86 tape in a second hand shop in 1997, and I was surprised by all the Fall-influenced bands because I was expecting it all to be jangly indiepop, because that's what C86 meant at the time.
― Colonel Poo, Saturday, 7 April 2018 15:02 (six years ago) link
C86 became a millstone for bands included on the album and also for some bands that weren't. BMX Bandits' C86 album is because they were one of the bands cast as and archetypal C86 band yet having nothing to do with it. And possibly because it had taken them almost 5 years to get an album out and some of the songs were from the C86 period. The cover has their skeleton mascot rising from the dead with associated iconography - just like Iron Maiden's Live After Death.
― everything, Saturday, 7 April 2018 17:38 (six years ago) link
But maybe Duglas will show up on this thread to sort it out.
― everything, Saturday, 7 April 2018 17:46 (six years ago) link
Stevie T pointed out to me that MIAOW was CATH CARROLL so I listened to this with new ears.
Previously I had heard or misheard it as some kind of Scritti Politti pastiche.
I also keep playing THE SERVANTS.
Despite my doubts, there is something about this compilation that responds to a lot of listening.
― the pinefox, Monday, 16 April 2018 10:19 (six years ago) link
The Servants is Luke Haines's original band iirc?
― you're my luger not my rifle (Noodle Vague), Monday, 16 April 2018 10:33 (six years ago) link
It was but he hadn’t joined by the time of C86.
― Tim, Monday, 16 April 2018 10:41 (six years ago) link
Check out the Miaow compilation When It All Comes Down that LTM put out; great stuff!
― early rejecter, Monday, 16 April 2018 14:25 (six years ago) link
Yes, that sounds like a good idea.
I have just started on the Cherry Red C87 compilation. It's very good! Better than C86!
― the pinefox, Friday, 29 June 2018 15:13 (five years ago) link
CD2 of C87 is even better than CD1.
One song on it that I never really knew is LAUGH's 'Paul McCartney'. I find this tune quite compelling. Does anyone else remember and like this band?
― the pinefox, Tuesday, 24 July 2018 09:11 (five years ago) link
They are on the Video comp "Gimme Shelter" put out by the NME.
― Mark G, Tuesday, 24 July 2018 09:18 (five years ago) link
I know and like Laugh - our friend Dan Pantry was a big fan, PF. My favourite of their material is when they went a little dancier on SubAqua ("Good To Feel Good" off their only LP is tremendous, though I think a little less up your street.
They evolved into Intastella, who you may also remember?
― Tim, Tuesday, 24 July 2018 09:35 (five years ago) link
Thanks TH! Somehow I associated you with Laugh but could not find any specific evidence of this.
I do remember the name Intastella but not, just now, the music.
The song 'Paul McCartney' - apart from its perhaps appealing title - has a kind of rhetorical and emotional urgency that I find fits well with its melody and music.
― the pinefox, Tuesday, 24 July 2018 10:18 (five years ago) link
Bad news update: CD3 seems to be where the bad, gurning, wacky, tuneless sub-Fall would-be-avant-garde bands have been stowed in this compilation. I had hoped that it might be almost free of them. It's quite a disappointment after the heights of CD2.
― the pinefox, Tuesday, 24 July 2018 15:31 (five years ago) link
I'd keep going, the first 8 or so bands might be along those lines but I'd be surprised if you view e.g. Jesse Garon & The Desperadoes or the Siddeleys as tuneless sub-Fall (of course I like all the supposedly bad bands at the beginning of disc 3, especially the Dog Faced Hermans and A Witness)
― Colonel Poo, Tuesday, 24 July 2018 15:44 (five years ago) link
Yes, A Witness in particular has some great moments.
The next box, "C89", is coming out in a couple of weeks!
― Gerald McBoing-Boing, Tuesday, 24 July 2018 16:53 (five years ago) link
I agree, Jesse Garon and (even more) Siddeleys are definitely not in that bad genre. (Though there is a Jesse Garon track somewhere that seems to have some kind of Mark E. Smith pastiche on it?) So yes I will keep going, thanks.
As a friend says, it's good that they put all that stuff together and maybe I can skip past it in future.
I like the idea of C89 but I will need to get to C88 first.
― the pinefox, Tuesday, 24 July 2018 17:44 (five years ago) link
So C89 came out and it was solid if starting to drift into territory that I never liked, and I just listened to C90 and I'm definitely out - never was a fan of the baggy sound and there's way too many weak indie rock bands with poor singers. I was chatting with a mate about it and he said, "The action in the US was much better than the UK at the time." Which made me wonder if there's any US equivalent compilations of the 86-90 period. You'd have to have Guided By Voices, Yo La Tengo, Superchunk, Camper Van Beethoven, Sebadoh, Throwing Muses... who else?
― Gerald McBoing-Boing, Monday, 2 March 2020 02:01 (four years ago) link
There were scene-specific comps like NY Eye & Ear Control, and random things like Magic Ribbons (Sebadoh, Unrest, others) — but nothing else I can think of, that early, which would have brought together a bunch of disparate bands like those you mention.
― Murdered-Out Highlander XLE (morrisp), Monday, 2 March 2020 02:33 (four years ago) link
feels like there were a lot of major label samplers with a real mixed bag that weren't memorable as compilations (I remember a Capitol sampler cassette that had the Cocteau Twins and Motorhead on it)
― avellano medio inglés (f. hazel), Monday, 2 March 2020 02:37 (four years ago) link
This Shimmy Disc comp is another (very) rough analogue.
― Murdered-Out Highlander XLE (morrisp), Monday, 2 March 2020 03:00 (four years ago) link
It was all very scene/city/label–specific.
― Murdered-Out Highlander XLE (morrisp), Monday, 2 March 2020 03:07 (four years ago) link
Yes, in the United States compilations are going to be mostly label-specific in this era. Sub Pop 200 and The Wailing Ultimate capture a good segment of it.
― Julius Caesar Memento Hoodie (bendy), Monday, 2 March 2020 03:08 (four years ago) link
So why not a slight backtrack?
https://www.cherryred.co.uk/product/c85-3cd-clamshell-box-set/
― Ned Raggett, Monday, 8 August 2022 15:09 (one year ago) link
They should give the C86-era stuff a rest and do C81
― you can see me from westbury white horse, Monday, 8 August 2022 15:34 (one year ago) link
Not that I'm not grateful, mind, I'll buy this eventually. I think I've gone off box sets for a while because I've found going through Grapefruit's psych/prog-pop boxes exhausting and I just want things to arrive in smaller chunks :(
― you can see me from westbury white horse, Monday, 8 August 2022 15:36 (one year ago) link
They definitely have a model they follow it's true.
― Ned Raggett, Monday, 8 August 2022 15:37 (one year ago) link
I put on C96 the other day, some good stuff on there, also some not so good stuff.
― link.exposing.politically (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Monday, 8 August 2022 15:53 (one year ago) link
Thought the revive would be about this new book by some bloke who's tracked down all the members of the C86 bands and what they're doing now:
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/aug/08/reel-lives-how-i-tracked-down-the-class-of-nmes-c86-album
― lord of the rongs (anagram), Monday, 8 August 2022 17:42 (one year ago) link
There appear to be two current C86 threads. Unlikely as that must seem.
― Buckfast At Tiffany's (Tom D.), Monday, 8 August 2022 18:21 (one year ago) link
Giving C85 a spin, a LOT of this got airplay at my college radio station at the time. As with all of these comps, some I still rate, some I've moved on from, and hopefully some I passed over grab me now. I'll settle for one revelation, really.
― Gerald McBoing-Boing, Friday, 4 November 2022 20:00 (one year ago) link
I've been listening to C87 (3CD), CD3, a lot. The first 8 tracks on the disc are experimental / noisy garbage that I have to skip. But then there's a quite strong run of tracks including Jesse Garon & the Desperadoes, the always good Siddeleys, and others.
The thought that strikes me and I wish to relay is: we all know of an association between 'C86' and 'twee', implying things like androgyny that have been talked to death already. What I hear in most of these bands, especially the ones with male singers, is something else. Defiance. A shaky swagger. A precarious pomp. There's a note of almost macho, certainly male, confidence, but one that's also undercut by the smallness of the whole enterprise.
― the pinefox, Friday, 20 January 2023 09:14 (one year ago) link
> The first 8 tracks on the disc are experimental / noisy garbage
1. DOG FACED HERMANS – Catbrain Walk2. STUMP – Tupperware Stripper3. GAYE BYKERS ON ACID – Everything’s Groovy4. BOG-SHED – Tried And Tested Public Speaker5. A WITNESS – Red Snake6. MACKENZIES – New Breed7. THE SHRUBS – Edith8. STITCHED-BACK FOOT AIRMAN – Tears In The Gutter
there's a great compilation that focuses on this kind of stuff (and a book) - Death to Trad Rock (although oddly it also includes the wedding present).
i'd also like the ron jonson stuff to be more wildly availably (maybe it is, but last time i looked there was one compilation, lp only, not re-pressed)
― koogs, Friday, 20 January 2023 10:51 (one year ago) link
It does seem like a neglected area of music but then I suppose it wasn't exactly popular!
― A Drunk Man Looks At Partick Thistle (Tom D.), Friday, 20 January 2023 11:04 (one year ago) link