Felt -- Classic or dud??

I love it to death, though. It inspires me greatly

It's grown on me a lot over the years but I'd still say it's one of my least favourite Felt records. It is much more enjoyable than Train Above the City.

For me, the melodies and arrangements really evokes a really heavy/'fragrant' wood-y/manicured forest atmosphere, kind of similar to the clientele (although the clientele are more straight up 'forest-y', imo). one of those 'album hits you at an intensely vulnerable part of your life' thing probably

The slower, bluesier stuff I've heard from Train is good (one for the out of context thread). There's definitely a zillion jazz solo piano albums that run circles around it, obviously

I'm going to have to go back to it now you've compared it to The Clientele.

They're a really hard band to rank. Right now I think I'd put their albums in this order. The top two are set in stone and Train will always be my least favourite but I'm always changing my mind about the others.

1. The Strange Idol Patterns
2. Forever Breathes the Lonely Word
3. Poem of the River
4. The Splendour of Fear
5. Me & a Monkey on the Moon
6. Ignite the Seven Cannons
7. The Pictorial Jackson Review
8. Crumbling the Antiseptic Beauty
9. Let the Snakes Crinkle
10. Train Above the City

the first two albums are my favorite. That grey twofer "changed my life" or whatever back in high school

it was like "oh wow, a band decided to make albums based on that penultimate track on joy division's closer. And they added beautiful heart-stopping guitar playing, and the singing is by a fey Tom Verlaine, I am So down, These are my guys!"

ya know i thought seven cannons was my favorite album until i realized just now that the album i was listening to on spotify was a twofer and that all my favorites were actually on strange idols

Anyone know the back story behind Liz and Robin backing Lawrence on "Primitive Painters"?

umm because guthrie produced the album?

wtf happened to those reissues? surely Lawrence needs some more heroin. he should be reissuing everything.

The Cocteau Twins were fans of Felt and invited us to tour with them in 1984. We became friends and Robin Guthrie said he'd like to produce us.

this interview is pretty exhaustive on how Guthrie came to produce Ignite, and the recording of Primitive Painters:

http://www.uncut.co.uk/blog/the-view-from-here/an-interview-with-lawrence-primitive-painters-was-this-great-big-statement-felt-were-going-to-be-massive-69839

Over the years I’ve collected some of the master tapes and on the reissues that are coming out, I’ve tried to extract the Cocteau Twins from my record

hmmm...

i emailed cherry red about the reissues 6 months ago and they said it was looking like sometime in 2017, then i tweeted at them the other week and they said they had no news

Just checked earlier in the thread and it was last July when they first posted those tweets suggesting the reissues were on their way. I'm sure they even put up pictures of Lawrence signing them.

When the last Go-Kart album came out, my first order of the vinyl seemed to get lost in the post. When I contacted Cherry Red about it they said Lawrence would happily send out a replacement copy but "it might be a while to get it signed as Lawrence has disappeared on us again". I'm guessing that he's behind the delays.

Thanks for that Uncut link, exactly what I was looking for!

There are some days "Primitive Painters" is the most perfect song ever.

https://www.mixcloud.com/WEEKEND_Festival/weekend-mixtape5-lawrence/

Many of the songs in this podcast, which Lawrence recorded exclusively for Week-End, will only be known to aficionados, yet they lay bare the foundations on which indie and Britpop was built. An unusual history lesson by an indie icon who rarely talks, but who turns out to be a very eloquent speaker.

Listened to Felt all day today. Perfect for a rainy winter day.

just browsing France Castle's Instagram (love Clay Pipe & her artwork), and check out this post.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BNR-vtbhaw8/

https://mobile.twitter.com/wrongsreversed/status/802558977020198916

Another view of that incident, this one from a camera behind the goal.

christ Lawrence Of Belgravia is really boring and awful-looking and depressing as all hell. if they showed it in schools to young musicians they'd all go off and do accountancy or something.

Totally agree. I thought it was a massive letdown after the long wait to see it. It really didn't seem as interesting as it could have been.

"Felt reissues, sweet!"
Oh... $40 LPs and $45 CD+7" boxes... no extra tracks... ok so downloads it is.

Felt's entire discography in one place.

no singles *thumbs down*

Yeah, weird

nah, just lazy

Why did they change the name of Crinkle, I wonder?

Lawrence hated the name

I can think of at least a dozen other Laurence-related songs/band names that are more worthy of "hate"

Let the Snakes Eat Crinkle-Cut Fries

there's a bit that really stuck with me in the David Cavanagh book about Creation records where Lawrence talks about Bobby Gillespie asking him if the forthcoming Felt album had a title yet, Lawrence replying that it was going to be called 'Let the Snakes Crinkle Their Heads to Death' and Gillespie responding with incredulity - "Crinkle? What sort of word's that?"

that's a bit rich coming from a Scottish dude

https://assets.fontsinuse.com/static/use-media-items/91/90112/full-1080x1350/5d48314c/60455432_2492647757656739_3307904735600062668_n.jpeg?resolution=0

Never forget
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/63/Primal_Scream_-_Chaosmosis.png

.

he changed the name and before that he cropped the cover art. was he embarrassed at his headwear?

maybe just realized it was totally un-felt like to have an actual band photo for a cover

or ended hating one of the former members

RIP Martin Duffy

Aww man RIP teenage genius.

Awww, creator of some of the most beautiful music. Waaaaay too young.

Incredibly sad. Martin's playing sparkled over Felt's best records and added a lustre to every musical situation he was involved in. a true keyboard wizard.

Totally agree with that. The Felt albums he played on are the best. He was also one of the people responsible for bringing back keyboards as a "rock" instrument. There hadn't really been any fresh & distinctive keyboard players outside of synth-pop since maybe Una Baines.

I mean, come on!
Here's the link to the song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulTQW6oFoTs

Whoops wrong ling. I mean this... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-9bv1FO72A

Ling link whatevs. Ok I'm going to bed. RIP Mr. Duffy. A great keyboard player!

How rare was it for that generation of musicians to use organ rather than synth in the mid-80s? I can only think of Talk Talk as an example.

It wasn’t super-common but also by no means unheard-of, most often involving acts who were more or less 60s / beat inspired - off the top of my head you can expect to hear organ on records by the likes of the Prisoners, Makin’ Time, TVPs, Jasmine Minks, bit later on the Sea Urchins, Inspiral Carpets.

Interesting, though if Duffy was using a Hammond, that's a lot more trouble to take on the road than a more compact "garage-rock" style organ.