The NME: Do the critics have personality?

He's in Australia and married and happy. Or was at the turn of the year.

Stevie Chick has a birthday-barbeque-fetish.

I think the reason I liked your writing was because you once gave a good review to Scarfo and I thought, "Hmmm. A man of intelligence."

Stevie: I remember you once ideologically trouncing me on a letter I wrote, and I fully deserved it, because looking back it was *incredibly* badly-argued and ill-thought-out, from a terribly awkward mid-late-teen totally removed from the rituals and social life of my contemporaries. The ideas were there, but they needed to be evolved and refined drastically. Places like this did that ... anyway, thanks for the compliments, these (only!) three long years gone by.

(speaks someone who thought the "Why can't he just write about football like the rest of us?" quote was genuine)

In the meantime, there's also Simon Reynolds to add to the list.

As for hacks with recognisable personality in their writing: Swells, definitely, always Good Value for inserting phrases like TEENAGE- DEATH-HYPHEN-SHAG-FEST-NAZI-EXCLAMATION-MARK into, well, pretty much every band he covers.

What does troubles me more is not Hacks Without Writing Personality, it's Hacks Becoming TV and Radio Personalities.

Stuart Maconie, take a thinly-spread bow.

Worse still are the thinly-read: Hacks Not Getting Their Facts Right. Maconie recently appeared on a Radio 4 comedy debate-style panel show. He attributed "nature, red in tooth and claw" as a Shelley quote. It's Tennyson, as any bad schoolgirl knows. He was corrected on the show by Steve Punt of "comedy" duo Punt & Dennis. Which, to be fair, was pretty harsh punishment for even him.

Another favourite Hack Howler of mine is an occasion where Steve Lamacq, ex of NME, commenting on his Radio 1 show on the release of Sugar's "F.U.E.L." and Echobelly's "E.G.O.":

"It's been a good week for anachronisms in album titles..."

PR: "So you've been nominated for a NME Award."
Edith Bowman: "I know, it's brilliant, I'm really suprised."
PR: "Me too."

Apropos of nothing, here's a picture of Simon Price

http://i92.photobucket.com/albums/l27/staybeautifulclub/5%20Stay%20Beautiful%20at%20Purple%20Turtle%20Oct%2004-present/Purple%20Turtle%20-%20Us%20Lot/SimonandJennaWCS1.jpg

Lookin' good!

I don't think the wig really suits him.

I didn't know anyone other than pro-wrestlers doing "EVIL BUSINESSMAN" gimmicks wore shirts with the sleeves cut off.

purple elephant handbag!

TBF I'd hit it.

Good to see me and Big Perp have vets in the game we follow in the footsteps of.

In answer to original question: not allowed anymore (no first person singulars permitted in brave new non-socialist IPC world).

A lot of people seem to have a problem with Stevie Chick, I'm never quite sure why.

i belatedly applaud bill's wisdom.

RIP Dele Fadele

@Mr_Dave_Haslam
Very sad to just find out that Dele Fadele has passed away.
Great, insightful, and much-loved NME writer and founder member of the band Welfare Heroine.

It emerged that Dele had died in 2018 and the sad news has only just got to everyone here.

a belated rip?

oh fuck, if true that sucks so much

i heard a rumour abt this last year and tried to chase it down but got nowhere -- i ran into him now and then but i'd lost regular contact long ago and so had everyone i knew who knew him

rip dele if it's true (and fuck the nme for the way it treated you)

i liked his reviews and him explaining the concept of his own single Starve The Eagle (which I never heard) and he seemed like a very good person :(

RIP I meant to add

Oh no, RIP, I was reading an interview he did with the Shamen yesterday, and just thinking he was such a brilliant and intellectually curious writer, who got such a good, pithy and interesting interview out of such a mercurial bunch of people who liked to play silly games with the press.

He was also in a band with (albeit not at the same time) someone I was in a band with for a very long time, who always spoke very well of him, both as a highly creative musician (apparently no one could ever play Neubauten style Blue Bins as well as he could!) and a general good egg.

RIP. He was a great writer, even as someone who only encountered the NME from the mid-90s his writing stood out, much more understated than his colleagues at the time but also less egocentric, more insightful and able to quickly get to the heart of something. And I guess he was already sidelined or losing interest by then.

Can only echo that, head and shoulders one of the best writers at the NME when I read it. RIP

I've never encountered this Twitter account before but appears to be archiving the early 90s NME review by review?

Anyway there he is reviewing a surprise Sun Ra gig (and if you scroll up, also a very early incarnation of Spiritualized).

...Dele was also lucky enough to see the legendary Sun Ra and his Arkestra at ULU@SunRaUniverse pic.twitter.com/qO1TklTJTE

— Martin Wilson (@martin_j_wilson) June 20, 2020

...also in the live reviews Dele Fadele went to see Spiritualized at King Tut's pic.twitter.com/PN0xbTd7rX

— Martin Wilson (@martin_j_wilson) June 20, 2020

Ach, I'm so sorry to hear this news, however late. I would see Dele at The Ship on Wardour St which was my old work's local, always with his poly bag, we had some mutual friends and chatted a few times, he was always charming.

Often saw his byline on great pieces in the NME when I was devoted to reading it - I remember seeing his name and thinking wow, they are an uber cool mix of cultures and expertise there. Presumably I was way off base if he was treated like shit.

I remember seeing a copy on the way down to Glastonbury in 2004 (I think) and he was still writing for them then, but in a very fringe way.

i mean nme as an institution treated everyone pretty badly, even when individual staffers were kind. and if you'd been there a long time (and he wrote for them for more than 20 years) then the end-stage was often extremely shabby. what he told me of his finally leaving makes me angry.

but lots abt this makes me angry tbh -- i feel we his former friends and colleagues failed him. i certainly feel i did.

I remember an amusing piece he wrote about when he was very green and trying a bit too hard and submitted some dense wordy pretentious nonsense for some live review of captain indie & the indies type thing, and someone advised him: lighten up a bit, only about 108 people actually bother reading the live reviews anyway!

Every one that did formed a bad band tho

As if I hadn't already gone down enough of an early 90s rabbit hole as it was, that Twitter account has got me wondering about the New Fast Automatic Daffodils and whether they are worth listening to (immediate assumption = god no).

Pretty sure no, there used to be a chain of decorating shops up north called Fads that always brought them to mind tho

I listened to a Sweet Jesus song for the first time yesterday, the singer looked like David Gedge but with a ridiculous Alan Vega hairdo and that always put me off at the time, and yeah, not good.

I like the New FADS despite the indie ghetto name. As Tom E said in connection with them recently on Twitter, they were kind of both ahead of and behind the times in mining that scratchy post-punk aesthetic when they did.

We had Fads the decorating shops down in London too (in Peckham, at least). Thank you for that little blast of memory.

One of those childhood things where I knew things in the wrong order: it was a paint shop for me long before I was aware that the word had a broader meaning.

I'm not really sure they thought that piece of branding through (subtext - "everything we sell is shit and you will want to redecorate in two years' time").

If there was a thread of 'bands where you only know and like one of their songs thanks to an old compilation album' they'd be one of my picks.

"apparently no one could ever play Neubauten style Blue Bins as well as he could!"

Dele developed the concept of his single Starve The Eagle from a long conversation he had with with Blixa Bargeld iirc. I don't why I remember this detail because it must have been 20 odd years since I read it.

Remembering weird details from 20 years ago in the NME is a not insignificant part of my mental life.

Actually, who am I kidding, I guess I mean 30 years ago.

that would be more like it. lol ... when you catch yourself out pretending you are still as *young* as knocking on 40!

I like the New FADS despite the indie ghetto name. As Tom E said in connection with them recently on Twitter, they were kind of both ahead of and behind the times in mining that scratchy post-punk aesthetic when they did.

I'll cosign this -- and the one time I saw them live at the Whiskey in LA in 1991 they pulled off something I've never seen before or since at that venue, much less many shows I've been to over the moons -- nonstop dancing from start to finish from the entire place. THAT is rare, and in 1991 was so unusual that's how I've remembered it to the present.

Rock's Back Pages have an extensive collection of Fadele's work if you have a subscription:

https://www.rocksbackpages.com/Library/Writer/dele-fadele

Meanwhile, more on Dele -- so it turns out, much to my intrigued surprise and delight, that he had spent time in the US in the early 80s going to school in Syracuse. I've pulled together a few posts and comments I've seen and here's a summary I wrote up for an email:

--

One thing that I’ve learned to my admitted delight over the past twenty hour hours in the rush of posts has been that he went to university here in the US in the early 1980s and, like me, was a college radio DJ, as well as a record store employee and musician. This was at Syracuse University, kinda smack dab in the middle of New York well away from both NYC and most anywhere else, a self-contained American college city in many ways. (I was living in upstate New York at the time, but not in the same area, being near Skidmore College instead, another noted school well away from NYC.) It’s a bunch of scattered memories so for those who knew him I thought I’d draw what I’ve seen together:

Gary Lucas, aka the Captain Beefheart and Jeff Buckley collaborator, said this in a Facebook comment: "He was also a terrific radio DJ. I first became aware of Dele while driving around Syracuse during trips home from college in the early 80's , and loved catching his sepulchral "This . Is. Dele. Fadele" ID coming over Syracuse University's WAER- FM radio station where he hosted a serious British postpunk show (AER is the same station where Lou Reed once had a show when he was a student there in the 60's titled "Excursions on a Wobbly Rail' after a Cecil Taylor piece). Don't know if Dele's show had a colorful name, but it was damn good. The guy knew his stuff.”

Alec Cumming said on his own page: "I was blessed to know him and work with him in Katsapi, our briefly-lived "industrial" band, which was silly and fun and brilliant and unlistenable all at the same time. (I was one of two bassists; the 1984 Syracuse punks loved us.) He was such a brilliant character, and so inspirational and on-point with what he wanted his music to be, and how it should evolve. He was really one of the coolest people I've ever known, and I'm so grateful I had a chance to make adventurous music with him.”

This band, BTW, was called Katsapi — there’s apparently photos floating around and if I see one I will share it, but I did discover a short review of them in Maximum RocknRoll, from issue 18, October 1984: ""KATSAPI are an experimental /industrial type band, complete with a rhythm section of trash cans, assorted metal cannisters, a drummer, and sometimes 2 bass players. Interesting "collective", they change everything from personnel to musicians every gig or so. Only band of its kind in Upstate N.Y.””

Another fellow from that scene, Scott Munroe, posted this on Alec’s page (it’s vaguely possible that this is an alternate name for Katsapi but it could also be its own thing): "Dele and I were friends during our last two years at Syracuse University. We were both class of 1984 - him in engineering and I in broadcast journalism. During our senior year, we formed this bizarre industrial band with some other friends called The Labour Party which was meant to mirror bands like Test Dept. and Einsturzende Neubauten. I’m sure there are photos and audio out there of us.

"I still remember Dele and myself somehow getting into an Echo and the Bunnymen concert in Rochester (or was it Buffalo?), New York thanks to guitarist Will Seargent, making a six minute din with The Labour Party during our “set” between bands at the Jabberwocky club on the SU campus, his rejection over his request to do a segment during black history month in February 1984 for campus radio station WAER-FM because “he wasn’t black enough” (i.e. because he wasn’t a black American, he was from Africa...my brain still comes to a screeching halt even now thinking about it) and our talks about about music, bands etc."

A further comment from Alec Cumming just now in partial response: "Dele's show on WAER was fantastic!!! Especially when he'd do the late-night shift. All post-punk, early industrial, with a dollop of the Art of Noise (which he loved). He was the GREATEST GUY to hang out with, he was EXTREMELY opinionated, and I made fun of him for his NME obsession, but I just remember laughing a lot with him and being so impressed at his relentless drive, intelligence and creativity. My friends all thought I was insane playing music with him - he'd bang on trashcans and bumpers and such - but I loved the racket. I think I was in Kastsapi V.1, but the band soldiered on after I left town (August 1984). We were looked at in awe by Syracuse's punk scene, because there was nobody doing anything remotely close to what we were doing. (PS - Syracuse has always had a great local music scene.) I was thrilled he ended up at the NME, but also worried the year-in and year-out of music journalism would probably end up wearing him down, because he insisted music had to have ideals and be challenging and ethical and weird, constantly."

his rejection over his request to do a segment during black history month in February 1984 for campus radio station WAER-FM because “he wasn’t black enough” (i.e. because he wasn’t a black American, he was from Africa...my brain still comes to a screeching halt even now thinking about it) and our talks about about music, bands etc.

you couldn't ask for better prep for working at NME in the era he did, or probably at any time tbf!

'00s NME writer James Jam's memories of Dele: https://medium.com/@jamesmcmahon_29072/some-thoughts-about-dele-fadele-6c7a18e533ba

i forget now if he told me this himself or someone else told me, but according to legend he one time seized the WAER- FM studio to solo-broadcast ALL of the TG live albs back-to-back

(this is abt 40 albs i think so the "ALL" seems in retrospect unlikely but there was def talk of a 24-hr blitz of the stuff lol)

(he was studying engineering, which somehow also seems pertinent)

What is TG?

Throbbing Gristle.

There was a James Brown at the NME? Wonder if I met him.

erstwhile manager of hitmakers Fabulous and publisher of softcore ironic misogyny mag Loaded

i've met him, he were alright

you forgot to add *celebrity* fan of vile revenant of the north L666s Utd

oh aye i forgot

ok i only met his briefly, we have to count Leeds in the debit pile

I bought his fanzine (Attack On Bzag) off him, on the street after a http://i.imgur.com/QbYzHTH.jpg gig. From that to Loaded was... quite a stretch.

Haha, WHAT? I said R e d s k i n s gig and it gave me a cat?

Hatcat were never the same after the original bassist left tbf

(longstanding ilx autoreplace for a racial slur / sports team name)

Keep it that way. Hatcat is the best.

so glad that http://i.imgur.com/QbYzHTH.jpg is back

nice spike jonze obit for dele, complete with some actual journalistic legwork: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2020/sep/14/dele-fadele-remembered-nme

i'm glad it actually brings up the issue of why this news took so long to come out (and at least hints at the institutional crappiness of the music press in its treatment of freelancers)

and tbh i lolled at the cheeky way the entirely just and fair headline ("He was a groundbreaker and a visionary”) completes itself further down the copy: “He was a groundbreaker and a visionary. He was a black man writing about indie music!”

that's a really good piece, glad to see it

Does Tim get called Spike a lot?

it's the price he pays for his rare and unlikely surname

Well- written and sad piece