Just Because

. . . I've come home from the pub and I want to hear this.


John Martyn - Small Hours

it's Friday . . . Let's Dance

By the end of 1987/ the start of 1988, producers and acts over here in the UK got in on the act and started making House music, a lot of the early tracks were innovative in the use of samples, with the likes of Bomb The Bass, M/A/R/R/S and S'Express making truly memorable tracks.

One of my favourite of these early house tracks was House Arrest by Krush. The group were Mark Gamble, Cassius Campbell and vocalist Ruth Joy with producers Mark Brydon and Robert Gordon. Brydon would go on to form Moloko (Fun For Me) with Roisin Murphy and Gordon would go on to be involved with Warp records. Ruth Joy left to pursue a pretty unsuccessful solo career.

House arrest was released on the FON (Fuck Off Nazis) label which they shared with the Age Of Chance. The sleeve of the single was designed, like those of their label mate by the Designer's Republic who would go on to design the Warp artwork as well.

Krush were basically a one hit wonder, with House Arrest eventually reaching number 3 in the UK at the end of 1987. The record, doesn't sound half as dated as I expected it to and conjures memories of Red Stripe and spliffs in the dark, dank basements of hotels, those were the days.

Krush - House Arrest (The Beat Is Law)

Out

Don't know a hell of a lot about Sodastream, apart from they are a duo from Australia, Melbourne I think, they broke up in 2007 and are named after a ginger making machine that my brother was rather partial to, myself, I preferred real Irn Bru from large glass bottles.

This track is rather lovely, it reminds me of Belle and Sebastian a bit. Wonder why I didn't buy anything else by them?

Sodastream - Out

My Love Grows Deeper

Clydie King is probably best known as a session singer for the likes of Bob Dylan, The Rolling Stones and Joe Cocker. Or for her brilliant duet with Jimmy Holliday, Ready, Willing and Able which was released on Minit in 1967.

She did release a string of solo singles during the 60's on Speciality, Philips and Imperial. The track posted was the b side of Missin' My Baby, released on Imperial in 1965 and I think is a far superior track to the plug side, with vocals which sound as if they were recorded half way down a mine shaft which seems to add to the sheer sexiness of the track.

I'm in the middle of reading Wall of Pain, The Life of Phil Spector and am amazed of the amount of artists who recorded for that deeply troubled man. Clydie King was one of those artists who had a brief brush with the Wall Of Sound, as was Gloria Jones.

Clydie King - My Love Grows Deeper

I'm Stunned and Saddened

I often wondered where Ctel would go once he finished his trawl through the ABC of dance music but I never for one moment thought that he would rap it. So I'm stunned today. I suppose it is better to go out on a high. I don't however, think for a minute that the acid ted has exhausted his spare room full of great and sometimes not so good dance tunes (see last Friday's post). I suspect that there is something else that is preoccupying his time.

Acid Ted was one of the first places that I visited when I first got interested in music blogs and very quickly found myself visiting on a daily basis, due to the quality of not just the tracks but also the commentary as well and then there were the obscure Weatherall mixes. Along with The Vinyl Villain and the Ghost of Electricity, Acid Ted became one of my regular distractions from work and also an inspiration for me to give blogging a go myself. So he has the dubious pleasure of being partly responsible for the pish posted here.

I'm not sure that there are many people who visit here that have not also scoured the posts on AcidTed, but if you haven't, you should and if you find some tracks that you like you could do worse than make a small donation to the charity mentioned on the right hand side, a cause  which is close to CTEL's heart and has also become something that many of us who have visited the site have become aware of and supported.

I was going to post a Weatherall mix in honour, however between CTEL, STX from another great, sadly missed blog Audio.Out, Moggieboy, Swiss Adam and myself, I don't think that there are many that have not been posted somewhere. If this has, I apologise but I've only posted the one mix from it before.

All the best CTEL and thanks for all the tunes. To paraphrase Liam Maher, CTel, whatever you do just make sure what you do makes you happy

One Dove - Transient Truth (Paradise mix)

Happy Valentine's Day

 

I couldn't decide which version to post, they are both beautiful. Happy Valentines Day L.

Bonnie Prince Billy - After I Made Love To You

B.M.X. Bandits - After I Made Love To You

Yet More Uplifting, Joyous House Music.

I was going to keep this track for a Friday sometime in the future but had the urge to play it this morning and decided to just go ahead and post it. If you can't have a little bit of house on a Saturday there is something wrong.

(Who?) Keeps Changing Your Mind was first released on Strictly Rhythm records in 1993 and I think that I may have cried the first time I heard it. It has been subsequently re released a few times with new mixes, none of which are a patch on the 2 mixes on the original twelve, the mix posted is the Night mix.

I once played this with the Fire Island's mix of Regret and Pete Heller's Big Love  and by the end the dance floor was full of people with huge grins on their faces having a ball, due to the quality of the music not my mixing skills I hasten to add.

With a big bag of pills and music like this blaring out of a PA, we could probably end all wars.

South Street Player - (Who?) Keeps Changing Your Mind

Just Because . . .

. . .  I've had one too many gins and I've just been at Swiss Adam's place. He will no doubt feature the original of this some Friday in the future.

The Cramps - Can't Hardly Stand It

It's Friday . . . Let's Lose Ourselves In Some Rather Uplifting Early House Music

Last week I stated that there would not be any repetition of the early house tracks which had previously been posted on this site.

Bugger that, these tracks deserve to be heard rather more frequently than they are in this house at least. Two of the most uplifting house tracks which has been my good fortune to hear over the years.

I'm just back from Hamsterdam and the trip and meeting was about 100 times better than I thought it was going to be, which was nice. I also came very close to having a spliff but am  proud of the fact that I resisted as it would have meant 6 years of abstinence would have went down the toilet. Did, however have an extremely funny evening, with a couple of Swedes, a few Germans, a Finn or two and an Indian,  now there is a combination for you.

When is a smoking ban not a smoking ban? When it's the Netherlands, some bars we went into the smokers could light up and others they had to go outside. It all seemed completely arbitrary

Joe Smooth feat. Anthony Thomas - Promised Land

Sterling Void & Paris Brightledge - It's Alright

Sweet Baby

I know nothing about this track apart from the fact that it was released in the states on the Sepia label and I'm guessing here, but it wasn't exactly yesterday. I know nothing about the artist Al Gardner either apart from another track he recorded called Watch Yourself.

It is, however an absolutely cracking piece of soul.

I'm off to Amsterdam with work  for 2 days of coma inducing Power Point presentations,  so no post until Friday which may be late unless I do it tonight

Al Gardner - Sweet Baby

Copyright Infringement, Again!

If you're looking for the Weatherall mix of Compulsion, don't bother it appears that Heavenly, or Doves or somebody objects to me posting it.

Now I can understand if I'm posting something which is readily available that  may stop people going out and buying the physical product but a single sided promo which by it's very definition, I shouldn't have been paying a tenner for, is another matter. I just don't understand the reasoning here.

Perhaps some one would care to enlighten me. Answers to the usual places.

Any way here is another Weatherall mix for your delectation.

Airstream - Follow Through (Nine O'Clock Drop mix)

No Stranger To Love

After this weekend's Fallfest, final tally, the first 14 albums, it is time for something a little bit soulful and there isn't a hell of a lot more soulful than Charlie and Inez Foxx.

Charlie & Inez Foxx - No Stranger To Love

Bail Out

10 albums in and I had to bail out, the mutterings in the house were not good and having to take to my bed with a bad case of d&v, not brought on by the listening to The Fall, I hasten to add, meant that my mind was not completely on the project.  I think that I may try to do the other 17,  a couple of albums a day and then a few on Wednesday while traveling to Amsterdam.

Here is something slightly different from the Dirty Edits Volume 1 cd, a Pilooski edit of a track I had never heard before from and artist I was oblivious to, Michael Bundt.

A quick search of the interweb and I found out that Herr Bundt is a German musician, who was in a duo called Siruis in the early 70s before going solo and releasing 3 what could be termed "krautrock" albums. Today he is a composer and producer living in Mannheim.

Michael Bundt - The Brain Of Oskar Panizza (|Pilooski edit)

The Great Fall Album Listening Party.

This weekend, I will be mostly listening to the Fall.

The Fall Forum decided that this weekend would be the inaugural International Fall Album Listening Party. The idea is simple, listen to all 27 studio albums in order of release over the space of a weekend. 6 tonight, 10 tomorrow and 11 on Sunday. At the point of posting I'm half way through Dragnet, the second lp and not terribly good. I have been surprised at how good Live At The Witch Trials sounded, an album which I'm not overly keen on either. Tonight for me will be the most difficult listen as these albums with the exception of Grotesque After The Gramme and Hex Enduction Hour are the ones I listen to least.

By the end of the weekend I will probably be a blithering wreck, or L will have divorced me due to mental cruelty.

I will not inflict more Fall on you but be prepared for a gem or two that I have forgtten about but will hear over the coming couple of days, next week. You have been warned.

Instead here is the latest installment in the Touched By The Hand Of God series. Here is Weatherall's remix of the D---s Compulsion which I got from Discogs this week.

Track deleted due to DMCA take down order, although the manager of the band was unaware of the complaint.

It's Friday . . . Let's Dance

It was during 1987 that I started to notice House music in a big way. Most of my mates couldn't be bothered with it at all and a few people I knew were really hostile towards the music.

As I've said before, trying to get your hands on the stuff was an expensive and time consuming business as the 12" singles were all imports and there weren't any real specialist record shops at this time, well not in Glasgow that I knew of anyway.  I used to have to be quite discerning as to which records I bought because at the time I was labouring on a building site in order to save to go to Uni that September.

During this time I started to notice compilation albums Such as the Jack Trax and House Sound of Chicago series appearing which kind of eased the pressure on my budget and also meant that those elusive rare imports could now be found on 1 double album, what's more it was the full 12" version that would appear on these albums not edits half the length of the original which became the norm a few years later.

I have already posted a good few of these early tracks such as Move Your Body, Promised Land etc and really don't want to be accused of repetition although they are all that good that they deserve to be heard on a weekly if not daily basis.

Today's track, You Used to Hold Me by Ralphi Rosario and sung by Xaviera Gold was originally released on Hot Mix 5 records in the US. I had it on a compilation until those nice guys at Track Records re-released it in 1989.

Ralphi Rosario - You Used To Hold Me

Just Because

I think that this is the best thing the Charlatans did, well apart from Indian Rope and the single also had one of my favourite covers.  Christine Keeler was quite lovely.

The single was released in 1997 and got to number 16 in the UK charts.

The Charlatans - Tellin' Stories

No Apologies

I make absolutely no apologies for posting this, in my defence, however I will cite Gary Mulholland in his forward to his excellent Fear Of Music, the follow up to This Is Uncool.

"Music is a social thing, based almost entirely around dancing, copping-off, drugs that make you love each other, romance and the belief that if you just shake uncontrollably to this beautiful noise in a room full of beautiful people right now, then your lousy job/debtproblems/marriage/friendships/life will simply cease to be. Until the next beautiful noise begins, or the dream ends. This is what pop does for us."

The Sugababes - Push The Button.

Thinking of the Sugababes always reminds me of that episode of Only Fools And Horses where Trigger is talking about having the same brush for years although it had, had 3 new heads and 2 new shafts or something.

Think yourselves lucky I nearly posted Las Ketchup, which I know at least one friend would have approved of.

ps I have no idea if that picture is of the current line up or not. I suspect not. It is easier to keep track of members of the Fall.

It's Not So Grim Up North

I absolutely loved this record until some twat named Dario G decided to sample it in a third rate sub rave piece of pish and totally ruined it for me.

That was until yesterday when it popped up on the iPod and I felt that sort of warm, fuzzy feeling that I used to feel when I heard it. Never got into anything else by the band.

Can't for the life of me recall anything else the band ever did, apart from a pretty pointlesss instrumental version of Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want This Time which was used in Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

The Dream Academy - Life In A Northern Town

New Release From 17 Seconds Records

Ed over at 17 Seconds has got the year off to a flying start with his 17 Seconds records off shoot The latest release from which is a 5 track ep from The  Factory Kids and a cracking bit of indie/shoegazing it is too. The ep is available to download from all the usual suspects and it is really worth it. My only gripe being that there is no physical product but that's down to me being an old git.

The Factory Kids - They Used To Call Me Baby

My Love Gets Stronger

A little bit of Northern to brighten up the start of the week.

Tommy Ridgley was a well known R&B singer from New Orleans, who started off recording for Imperial records in 1949 and also recorded for Decca, Atlantic and in the 60's for local New Orleans label Ric. He kept performing right up until his death from lung cancer in 1999.

My Love Gets Stronger, is a classic mid tempo shuffler, released on the International City label. If you were looking to buy the track on 7" you would need to have more than 500 quid spare, as it is extremely rare and sought after by collectors.

Tommy Ridgley - My Love Gets Stronger