Mouldy old dough by Earl Brutus.

damn.
like louis, i'm speechless

OK, right, I wasn't going to talk about this until it was officially announced but it seems to have leaked out. Nick died on Sunday night. He was drummer with Clock DVA, Gun Club, World of Twist, Jesus and Mary Chain, Freeheat (not a bad CV) and, of course, singer and frontman with Earl Brutus. More importantly, he was a wonderful man, a total one-off and a real mensch. So long Nick, hope to see you next time around.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3001/2572785667_30ffd59be8.jpg?v=0

Oh man I used to know him when he was in Freeheat, seemed like a lovely guy, very friendly and open. RIP

Universal Plan - Earl Brutus

"I get up.
Go to work.
Eat my lunch.
Come home.
Cure cancer.
That's it.
It's a beautiful world"

fucking brilliant band, if only he had kept to his own plan.

Good appreciation on Quietus:
http://www.thequietus.com/2008/06/nick-sanderson-an-obituary-an-appreciation/

I had no idea really who this guy was until I read his obit here in the Independent. Didn't realise there was a connection between EB and Clock DVA - what a great band they were. Tom, I'm sorry to hear you lost a pal.

This is a delightful story that LJ will like:

Sanderson's interests were broad, including ornithology, Manchester United and British history. I remember him describing a birdwatching trip to see some hawfinches in Norfolk. He didn't find the birds, instead ending up drunk in the dark and falling down some coastal bluffs. His clothes torn, his face scratched, he knocked on the door of some remote cottage. Surprisingly perhaps, the stranger who answered let Sanderson in. The pair then spent the rest of the night in high-spirited revelry.

Hope he got to see the hawfinches in the end, God knows I've tried and those are some bad bitches to nail down.

(dude gets bonus points from me for being a red BTW)

:(

i mean a birdwatching football fan who wrote awesome fucking music

Cheers for posting that Quietus thing, Nick, that was a good piece

Eh, no worries, but that was actually Neil that posted that.

Oh man, so it was, sorry Neil!

Nae bother, glad it was enjoyed.

Blimey, World of Twist are a cursed band - first Tony Ogden, now Nick Sanderson.

Bloody cancer :-((((

good write up by bob stanley in this months mojo re Tonight .. as a lost classic, along with a nice obit by ian harrison (who also sorted out the excellent piece over on quietus).
interesting point about an artist using Earl Brutus as the foundation of a new exhibition.

Yeah, it seems to have been written before, which is a shame.

Never really got used to that second Earl Brutus album; it was too much of a Lexicon to the first's Beauty Stab.

fucking, fucking hell. and there was i hoping the thread revive might have been a reunion or something :(

RIP, nick. you rocked my fucking world in all manner of ways.

there are many days i think earl brutus might just have been the greatest band of all time. unsurprisingly, this is going to be one of them.

and tom, yes, my sympathies: it's obviously something else entirely to lose a guy you knew.

i just spent an hour or so wandering about glasgow in the rain listening to "your majesty". what a blindingly fucking good band. i'm incredibly saddened by this news (i didn't realise the initial thread revive was so long ago; the first i'd heard of any of this was this morning).

yeah.
i listened to both albums for a few days solidly after i heard, and cant deny i was a very depressing experience given that i had always hoped that they would reform and i'd be in the front row with a great big mutha'fuggin' grin.
but sadly this will never be the case now.
a blindingly fucking good band indeed.

They have always begged the question: Why don't more bands dress like sailors in the Royal Navy?

They looked fucking fantastic.

One of the most refreshing live bands I've ever seen. Did I howl? I always had the biggest shit eating grin. Genuinely fucking crazy on stage were the Brutus - 'old enough to know better' made them more rewarding

Bar 'Navyhead' which was usually blasted only when well oiled, I didn't really play them at home that often.

After hearing the horrible news, it dawned on me that I must have seen Earl Brutus as much as any other band.In one or two venues but in their hey day (fuck yeah) they just sort of arrived at Festivals - usually first or second on on , on the third stage. Still pissed from the night before.

Having given both a lot of listens, I'd say the two albums are very close but Tonight is the, erm, special one. Would be interested to read the obits/write-ups. As I said above, Nick seemed like one of the genuine heroes and even a wasteful young'un like myself will miss him. ;-)

Train driver in eyeliner

A tribute concert for Nick Sanderson featuring Jesus & Mary Chain, Black Box Recorder, British Sea Power & Earl Brutus DJs.

The Jesus & Mary Chain are set to headline a one-off show in commemoration of musician & railwayman Nick Sanderson who sadly passed away on June 8th of this year.

The show, to take place at The Forum in London on October 27th 2008, will also feature sets from Black Box Recorder, British Sea Power and a DJ set from Jim Fry & Gordon King of Sanderson’s final group, Earl Brutus.

Tickets for the show are priced at £20 and are available via www.kentishtownforum.com. All proceeds from the show will go to Nick’s immediate family.

Born Sheffield, South Yorkshire 22nd April 1961, Nick was a talented musician with an infectious passion for everything from Manchester United, the British rail system, British history to ornithology.

Nick started out as drummer with Sheffield post-punk group Clock DVA in the early Eighties before a stint with The Gun Club. A founding member of Manchester’s World of Twist, Nick also went on to regularly drum for Jesus & Mary Chain, for whom he played on their 1998 album Munki.

Yet it was to be Earl Brutus, the band he formed with Gordon King of World Of Twist and Jim Fry, who he knew from his Clock DVA days, which gave a voice to Nick’s acute sense of the minutiae of British culture.

The name was meant to conjure up "a pub that's quite a rough sort of place, but with a nice carvery on Sunday lunchtimes" and they marvelously continued to be at odds with all prevailing trends courtesy of a musical blend that fell somewhere between Kraftwerk and the terrace-stomp of classic glam-rock and a keen lyrical absurdity that often championed the un-celebrated while deriding the vacuous.

Having originally come from a railway family, Nick was to finally become a train driver on the London to Brighton line following the demise of Earl Brutus.

For further information contact:

Steve Phillips Coalition PR 0208 987 0123
St✧✧✧@coalitiongr✧✧✧.c✧.u✧

jim reid talks about nick and about the gig; also some amusing mary chain interview footage from back in the day.

3 and a half years since I started this thread and I STILL haven't heard this.

Did it ever surface?

if it did, i've not heard it either :)

Still sounds like the best thing ever...(when i play it in my head)

Another Quietus article on the Brutus and Nick Sanderson, this time with their manager's thoughts. Wish I'd bought tickets to the gig now.

Jim Fry giving a talk on music photography at The Apple Store, Buchanan Street, Glasgow, Thursday 12th March 2009 at 6.30pm.

Then afterwards DJing at McSorley’s, Jamaica Street.

Be there and be square.

and ASK HIM about MOD!

He's got a book coming out, don't think it's out yet

Aargh, shit: I can't make that. Might be able to get along to McSorley's later.

what a glorious result : today i found a live version of come taste my mind in the archives that i had no idea about.

There was a great live version of that on an NME free CD once. That's got to be one of my favorite singles of the 90's.

There's not many bands I love as much as Earl Brutus.

the video for come taste my mind might be my favourite video in the entire history of the music video

ha.
thats where i found it.
i had no idea it was on the cd as the rest is pretty arse.

ps. posted it on blog if interested.

It's one of the few NME CD's I still have, just for that song. The NME were behind them for a while, I remember the second album got album of the month.

The video is indeed a classic I remember seeing it on the ITV chart show. Those were the days!

to be honest, i probably got the nme just for that track as well, but it was '98 so cant recall, hence the '!!!!' when i came across it.
its that david bowie 'lodger' era guitar line that does it for me.

There's something really moving about the bit where he starts ranting "Who are you, you're nothing you are" the music is ridiculously good in that bit. They were dismissed as a bit of a novelty act but the tunes were always really tight. I miss them a little bit everyday.

Just played 'On Me, Not In Me' on a jukebox in a pub in Colne.

That bit where he sings 'Take me to your harvester' and then the whole thing goes Henry the 8th crazy with the lutes and stuff...then the huge Glam riff, possibly the biggest, most monstrous, dirtiest glam riff ever, kicks in...everyone in the pub just stopped talking and listened. Admittedly there were only about 8 people there but I have NEVER seen that happen ever before

I don't even need to hear them nowadays, just the fact that their music EXISTS, makes my life better.

Just might be the best band of all time

There should be a national holiday called Nick Sanderson Day where we can spend the whole day swigging lager and smoking fags in appreciation

hahaha you're damn right, both about the riff which I just stuck on again, and the need for Nick Sanderson Day

Yeah that was the song that really made me fall in love with them. It's one I always have ready for mix CD's.

I was so gutted when he died I never got to see them live and always thought they'd one day get together and make one more album. I remember reading they had an album planned called 20 Brutus Greats that never got finished. I always thought that just sounded like it was going to be the best album ever made.

I still play both the albums a lot. They would both easily fit into my top 100 of all time.

IMO Tonight...is a little better than Your Majesty...

I mean, they're both great (and, fuck, Tonight has Navyhead, Life's Too Long and Black Speedway on it as well as OMNIM) but Tonight is just greatness from start to finish, in my 90's top 10 and maybe all-time top 30. Staggering piece of work. At least they gave us the Larky single before sputtering out.

There should be a national holiday called Nick Sanderson Day where we can spend the whole day swigging lager and smoking fags in appreciation

oh yes. liking this idea.

er obviously I mean "Your Majesty has Navyhead..."

IMO Tonight...is a little better than Your Majesty...

I mean, they're both great (and, fuck, Tonight has Navyhead, Life's Too Long and Black Speedway on it as well as OMNIM) but Tonight is just greatness from start to finish, in my 90's top 10 and maybe all-time top 30. Staggering piece of work. At least they gave us the Larky single before sputtering out.

― Do the english boil pizza? (acoleuthic), Thursday, January 14, 2010 11:11 PM (2 minutes ago)

I agree with just about everything you said there. Tonight took me longer to get into but it sounds better as a whole album. I just started playing songs from it and found myself amazed all over again at the moment in Second Class War when that organ intro turns into that huge dirty riff. Universal Plan might be my favorite track of there's.

I'd add Don't Leave Me Behind Mate as another great track off your Majesty, the way he sings " Please Don't be impossible, Steve it's only alcohol" it's kind of beautiful.

They are one of those bands that when I listen to them I just think there's no-one better.

Plus, Tonight has more or less the greatest album-cover/inlay artwork evahhh

I really can't get over that album-cover, it's haunting and kinda beautiful