The Monochrome Set - no thread???

Awww, Woodentops are GREAT! Monochrome Set is much greater, however.

Just saw The Monochrome Set performing at Primavera Sound festival in Barcelona. It was really great, though there were a bit too much 90s stuff for me, but still, seeing Bid, Lester & Co was fantastic.

Touring the States! Or a chunk therein:

27/05/13 - Bowery Electric, NYC, USA
28/05/13 - The Saint, Asbury Park, NJ, USA
29/05/13 - Maxwell's, Hoboken, NJ, USA
30/05/13 - PhilaMOCA, Philadelphia, PA, USA
31/05/13 - NYC Popfest @ Knitting Factory, NYC, USA
01/06/13 - The Record Collector, Bordentown, NJ, USA

Pretty much the only reason I'd support the secession of Texas is so when somebody said a band I loved was touring my country there'd be a better than 1 in a 100 chance they're playing within 1000 miles of me.

Eligible Bachelors is great! I dunno why it's not up there in the canon of stuff like Smiths, Go-Betweens, Aztec Camera etc?

I bet Clientele is huge fans

"Volume, Contrast, Brilliance Vol. 2" just came out:
01 Something About You (1985)
02 I Wanna Be Your Man (1978)
03 Cilla Black (1983)
04 The Greatest Performance Artist In The World (1983)
05 Reach For Your Gun (1985)
06 Fly Me To The Moon (1978)
07 Love (1985)
08 Whoops! What A Palaver (1985)
09 I Want Your Skin (1989)
10 Stories From The Book Of Love (1986)
11 White Lightning (1987)
12 Wisteria (1987)
13 Bella Morte (1989)
14 Swing (1986)
15 Black Are The Flowers (1991)
16 Jack (1991)

Wow, two new studio albums since Platinum Coils too... Super Plastic City and Spaces Everywhere! I love Bid so much.

https://www.strandedrecords.com/collections/tapete/products/the-monochrome-set-1979-1985-complete-recordings-6xlp-6cd?mc_cid=407acf8d96&mc_eid=2e56297982

I want, but so pricey!

No tracklisting?

Who wants to split the cost with me, I'd go for the CD set at half that price in a heartbeat, you can have the LPs.

Actually, I take it back. Here's the details:

https://shop.tapeterecords.com/the-monochrome-set-1979-1985-complete-recordings-boxset-preorder.html

That doesn't seem complete to me...?

What's it missing? I don't have a record player.

Missing:
Jacob's Ladder (single version)
Andiamo (alt version)
Get Style & Twitch
Cilla Black (both from the Brazillian release of "The Lost Weekend", these were demos and not officially released at the time)

All the BBC session and solo stuff from "Volume, Contrast, Brilliance Vol. 1" (but I guess that's outside the scope)

So fairly minor, I suppose though I do love those one-off singles from Bid and Lester Square.

Cherry Red released a 3CD expanded "Eligible Bachelors" with the "Fin" live album as well as a bunch of non-lp cuts and radio sessions. I'm most curious about the stuff listed as "Rarities", are those just demos for the next album that never happened?

Don't know and don't own it but looks like it's previously released singles-only trax, b-sides, etc. Typical Cherry Red shoddy marketing etc blah blah blah.

So I’m trying to make sense of the MS discography but on Spotify at least it’s basically like 15 compilations.

The “tomorrow will be too long” comp is basically the first two albums, but... are they actually the first two albums? Are they re-recordings? The production value seems different from a lot of other MS material from the same era.

They are actually the first two albums. Can you explain what you mean by different?

Well for instance this is “Martians Go Home” from one of the other comps: https://open.spotify.com/track/4iTIQsuKRV5kkADH1mSQac?si=39VVFJ8jSuGPWmeiS0AFog

And this is from “Tomorrow”: https://open.spotify.com/track/4jO2nzsT58E23CCTVu8jc9?si=-_tvtbimS66cd17CWIxWEw

This is “Love Zombies” from the Volume comp: https://open.spotify.com/track/19Rt3NwlD3eMlJ7Yz7bp1Q?si=SMn80_6JQEmloqY1XL4kEg

And this is from “Tomorrow”: https://open.spotify.com/track/13azUQ8XftGPu7ZnpO60nV?si=G4lxcfeKRXOOfh3JhxSZWw

Maybe the other comps are pulling versions from old 45s rather than the album cuts? It’s just hard to tell since everything pre-Eligible Bachelors is scattered in collections.

"Love Zombies" from the Volume comp is a BBC session version.

Monochrome Set's catalog is poorly documented, with live, session, demo and single versions (which were often quite distinct to the LP) popping up all over the place.

Volume Contrast and Brilliance is mostly Peel sessions and singles.

Okay, that all makes sense. Pitfalls of the streaming era - no liner notes to help make sense of what you’re hearing. I’m just glad to know I do in fact have the first two albums to listen to!

Can't wait for the show tomorrow night, no lie.

back to the Peter Murphy thread with you

Joke's on you -- I'm seeing both of them tomorrow! (Early show for Peter M, then over to the Rickshaw.)

unfair!

aw well, got to see Mazzy Star last week anyway

Had no idea they were touring — and they’re in LA in a matter of days!

Their FB group had a post by a very excited #teen who's going to see them soon, bless.

RFI New Wave/Post Punk song featuring lyrics about "Les Enfants du Paradis"

Thx to this thread for getting me to check VCB Vol 2. Damn it good

I still prefer the Raj Quartet version of " Whoops! What A Palaver" (which is really just Simon Fisher Turner backed by the Monochrome Set?) to the demo version on that compilation. Bid gives it his best, but his accent just isn't aristocratic enough to carry the joke

does anyone rate their post-reunion material highly? they've put out six albums since 2012 but I haven't heard a single one

Ha I just came back to say that I’m listening to Fabula Mendax, it’s sorta...amazing? And interesting, at one listen. Bid’s narrative persona is so very good, and the songs are beautifully constructed and arranged to my ear, both individually, and as a collection.

Like ay, busting out massive awesome slide action on Sliding Icicle, right to the abrupt close with “that’sit” was a surprise based on my limited TMS background.

And then the next song has a beautiful beautiful chamberpop construction. Strings oboe all dashit. It’s. Lovely.

Don’t know how long my enthusiasm will last but I’m obv pretty enthralled.

I still wish for more Scarlet's Well, but the albums since 2012 have all had good stuff on them... I don't have Fabula Mendax yet though!

i'm looking forward to checking Scarlet's Well.

Being temporarily obsessed with an artist is pretty "Hunt3r-y." Still, a Kinks superfan buddy advised me a couple of days ago that "I Feel Fine (Really)" is the most Ray Davies song Davies hasn't done, and so I am checking Maisieworld. It fucking rules. It's super melodic, and muscularly so, everywhere. Davies is sorta haunting a lot of the album to me, from a standpoint of a lot of the constructions and even lyrical tropes. The transition to chorus in Cyber Boy is a highpop Kinks style that I adore.

Another signpost in here for comparison is Robyn Hitchcock, and I love the hell out of him too. To some extent each is mining different patches of the past. This album stylistically and energy-wise feels a little like Goodnight Oslo. To me this is better at every checkpoint. Bid's vocals are so strong and expressive, and the band is ripping everything, and the Set is not afraid to dump in some horns, or go big on the organ, or the guitar lick.

I cannot believe how nice this feels to me, might be my age. And I love when an artist kinda sneaks up on me, despite my history of general awareness of it. Damn I hope I get to see them someday.

this life is nowhere near as nice/
as suggested in the paintings of paradise/
so i would like refund from a monk or priest/
or an amalgamated beast

wrote like robyn and played and sung like ray. win. (from song "maisieworld")

oh shit the spirit of bimble is in me here but still more, a video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJsuahBgWyk&feature=emb_logo

https://youtu.be/sJsuahBgWyk

https://youtu.be/W5K996oPoQU

this song from 86 sounds to me like drunk hitchcock doing a lounge song, but imitating bob dylan. it’s something.

i've listened to a bit of Scarlets Well now. It ranges from Spongebob style mock sea chanteys to sophistipop mock sea chanteys to bid-in-hard-irony sea chanteys. on their faces, all the songs are credibly fine, but i seriously do not get what is happening with that smothering motif.

a month later i'm still listening to a lot of intermittent Maisieworld and Fabula Mendax.

I listened to Platinum Coils after my string of posts above. As a person who lived more than a couple months in a hospital for brain injury, it is my absolute favorite artistic commentary on brain injury recovery. ever. bid will be a hero of mine forever, just for going that hard on the experience. i still can't hardly write about it.

Post 2010:
Maisieworld>Fabula>>Spaces Everywhere>>>>Cosmonaut

i've not listened to Super Plastic City, except to the first song as I type this line. It's very in character but good, and now sea-chanteying. Will now investigate.

"no sea-chanteying"

hahaha, Scarlet's Well are probably my favorite band of all time the motif is essential!

(I think the best approach is to proceed as if there is no mocking nor irony in Scarlet's Well)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oji50pnUH_o

is that the drummer who quit them and so got a song that shaded him? ha i love this band but man that is pretty austere.