Number 67 – One of Lady Badgers favourite records of the last ten years

Queen – Perfume Genius – Chosen by Badger – taken from ‘Too Bright’ LP (2014)

Here’s Mrs Badger again, filling in where her idle hubby fears to tread in case he damages something.

Hello again, when I agreed to fill in for Tim, I didn’t really know what to expect. I’m nowhere the music geek that the other two are. I mean, I’m a fairly simple kind of girl, if it’s good I’ll tell you it’s good, if it’s bad, I’ll say that as well because thats pretty much all you need to know – right? So as we are on the subject, I think this record is beautiful, easily one of the best things to be released in the last ten years. I’d also recommend their previous album (I have no idea if it’s their first, second or twenty eighth) ‘Put Your Back In 2 It’.

I don’t listen to much music that has been recorded in the last fifteen years, I am under the impression that around October 1999 the government of the time unleashed some sort of fierce sonic wave that destroyed the talent gene in the majority of human beings.

Since then we’ve had bland singer after bland singer (Will Young excepted, solely for ‘Leave Right Now’), faceless boy bands, faceless girl bands (Girls Aloud are excepted because of Nicola but almost included because of Cheryl), untalented stage school indie bands (That will be you The Kooks), talented but ultimately bland rubbish non stage school indie bands (way too many to list), copy cat bands who are trying really hard to be another band that are more successful than them, soulless dance music that could have been recorded any time in the last twenty years, James Blake, Adele and we’ve handed far far far too much power to Simon Cowell.

So it is refreshing that every now and again though a band or an act appears to have avoided the sonic wave, and for me Perfume Genius are one of these acts. It is unusual for me to hand Tim a CD and for him to sit there and listen to it all open mouthed at it. This happened when I played him this song, since then it has become a firm favourite in the Badger household. I discovered it by chance when working from home, I got bored of the debate on Radio 4 about pensions and switched channels to BBC 6 Music and Lauren Laverne played it.

Oh if you need a Tim update, he is still in a bit of pain but has managed to get downstairs (it took him 45 minutes) and he spends a lot of time on the sofa ‘recovering’ whilst watching Sons of Anarchy.  He also needs a shave (in case he is reading).

SWC adds – I didn’t plan this – ‘Queen’ genuinely is number 67 in the list, its just so happens to be a coincidence that it also happens to be one of Mrs B’s favourites.  I’ve added a couple of other tracks from the ‘Too Bright’ album.  Seriously wonderful stuff though.

No Good

Too Bright

Number 68 – Come On Guys It only Takes five Seconds

Revolution – Spacemen 3 – Chosen by SWC – Taken from Single of the Same Name (1988)

Once again we invoke what is now known as the Jamie XX rule because folks, somewhere else in this list one or both of Jason ‘Spaceman’ Pierce and Pete ‘Sonic Boom’ Kember will feature. This is because put simply Spacemen 3, Spiritualized, The Darkside, Spectrum, E.A.R and any of the other countless Spacemen3 spin off bands are all wonderful (lets forget that Lupine Howl happened for a brief moment) and they should be revered as a bunch of geniuses and worshipped until at least the year 2173.

I came to Spacemen 3 too late to see them live, I remember buying ‘Recurring’ when it came out back in 1991, I have an odd feeling that Our Price Girl served me as well, but I might just want that to be correct. I remember playing the cassette to death, I remember being swept away by the craftsmanship of the music, the beauty of the soundscapes all colliding together, the joyous feeling I got when I laid on my bed, slightly sleepy and listening to ‘Big City’ just kind of floating over me and out of the room (Ok I was massively stoned).

It was only when I explored their earlier music that I realised it wasn’t just about the drugs, man (although it was mainly about the drugs, man). ‘Revolution’ is a startlingly angry record, the guitar don’t just sound loud, they sound pissed off. They sound like they are being playing in the middle of a riot by a man holding a Molotov and wearing a makeshift facemask. The lyrics aren’t sung, they are kind of read to you, half spoken, half lectured to you. It’s a warning, then it’s a call to arms, then it’s a full on ‘COME ON lets storm parliament and burn the fucking place to ground’.

Seriously if they played this outside Downing Street Gates when the Anti War Protest were in town or the Students were rampaged it would have happened.   Probably.

This would have been posted on the 11^th of the month had the events of last week not ‘overtaken us’ so here as a special treat are some of my favourite Spacemen 3 tracks (the ones that are under 30 minutes long that is)

Walking With Jesus

Feelin Just Fine

Hypnotised

Just To See You Smile (Orchestral Mix)

And here is the best Spacemen 3 spin off track that doesn’t feature Kember or Pierce

Waiting for the Angels – Darkside

Don’t say that we don’t spoil you.

Number 69 – A real game changer

Losing My Religion – REM – Chosen by Badger – Taken from ‘Out Of Time’ LP (1991)

We’d like to take a moment to introduce Charity Chic, whose own blog, is one of the big influences on our decision to start our own blog. You can access it here, but to be honest if you are not already reading it on a daily basis then you need to put down whatever it is that stopping you and rectify the situation immediately.

Number 70 – A joyous explosion of shrieking energy

No Epiphany – Fucked Up – Chosen by SWC – Taken by ‘Chemistry of Common Life’ LP (2008)

Led by the irrepressible lead singer Damon ‘Pink Eyes’ Abraham, Fucked Up make music as ferocious, uncompromising and independent as their name suggests. Its frantic, fast paced, high energised punk rock and it is nearly always brilliant. The kind of music that really wakes you up in the morning, a proper aural assault. It is at times an uncompromising and relentless hardcore onslaught (18 minute singles about Chinese Zodiac signs for instance). Ferociously heavy guitars, pounding drums, and then its all wrapped up with Pink Eyes delicate little growl. I say delicate, I mean something else entirely,  a word that has not yet been invented. It is of course marvellous.

But.

Once or twice an album you get tracks in which the ferociousness stops and you get a track of majestic beauty, a track in which a tune wraps itself around the gruff singing instead of the other way around. A track which is as close to indie pop perfection as Fucked Up are ever going to give you. Tracks which are catchy, tracks which feature gorgeous female vocals, tracks which have choruses that you sing along to. Tracks which if a radio station ever dared to play them, would propel Fucked Up into the superstars that they deserve to be. Those tracks are beyond marvellous.

It was a difficult choice as to which Fucked Up track to include because as much as I love ‘No Epiphany’ I cannot ignore the fact that a few years ago Fucked Up released possibly one of the greatest pop records of the last ten years, in ‘The Other Shoe’. That folks is a perfect record, every note, every beat, every raspy shout from Pink Eyes, every single second of the ‘Dying On The Inside’ bit that fills the hook laden chorus is just stunning, so stunning that you can ignore the fact that is features on a concept album. So I sat there and played them back to back about ten times to try and decide.

I went with ‘No Epiphany’ for three reasons – 1) that bit at the start, unashamedly bulky and arm swinging brilliance right there, a riff that scruffy indie urchins would gladly shoot their grannies for. 2) The gorgeous female lead ‘Aaah Oooh’ bit that interrupts the intro, and ultimately leads us to the best bit, the growl that is unleashed from Pink Eyes down the microphone and into your head.

That’s the thing with Fucked Up, yes they might have their roots in hardcore and be massively influenced by the likes of the Replacements and the Middlemen but they are easily at their best when they produce stunning records like these two.

Here’s The Other Shoe and

Here’s Crooked Head another unashamedly catchy slab of punk pop perfection and it’s just a shame it’s not Christmas because I could have posted This.

Shame.

Oh and once Fucked Up joined the bands Fuck and Holy Fuck to take part in the ‘Festival of Fuck’ which was held in the small Austrian village of ‘Fucking’.  That folks is your SWC true fact of the day.

Tomorrow we have another guest reviewer

Number 71 – Definitely not a metaphor

Little Fluffy Clouds (Dance Mk II) – The Orb – Chosen by Badger – Taken from Single of the Same Name

I’d like to start with a word from our sponsor…..

Hi everyone, this is Tim’s wife, Lorna. I just wanted to take a moment to thank everyone for their kind and good wishes over the past week, it’s been a testing, emotional, scary and worrying time. It’s strange to think that there is a small part of the internet that features people that we have never met that care so much, it’s strange but also touching. It’s also slightly weird to be known in that world as Mrs Badger, as its not actually my surname (you guessed that right?), Tim got that nickname following a job at work in which he saved a badger from a river and ended up being made Honourary President of the local Badger Preservation Society (SWC note, this is actually true, I’ll tell that story one day, or rather Tim will). I mean seriously, do you think I’d ever marry someone whose name is Badger…then again my maiden name was Crumb so it’s an improvement.

Tim had surgery on Monday to have a lump removed from a ‘delicate area’, or as his brother helpfully put it ‘an enemy missile in Camp Ball Sack’. The lump it turns was nothing spectacularly serious, but it shouldn’t have been there, so it is no longer there. Guys, you can uncross your legs now.

At this stage, Tim is still very sore and obviously in a great deal of pain (worse than childbirth so he says), he has managed to hobble across the bedroom, moan with pain, and then hobble back again. He is also starting to moan about in order, Wayne Rooney, Daytime Television, the price of super noodles at Waitrose, and the bad parking of the Kwik Fit Van across the road, so he is well on the road to recovery. It will be at least a month though before he is able to go back to work and leave me in piece. To be honest, if he continues to moan about the lack of hot tea available to him, he will be going straight back to the hospital to have a kettle shaped lump removed from the other side of Camp Ball Sack.

Seriously though, for a while, he was a bit scared, and a bit fragile, and I know that he won’t mind me telling you all that he found the well wishing overwhelming, in a good way. He is well on the way to being Tim again. Thanks again everyone.  It has meant a lot.

I’ll echo what Mrs B has just said, apart from the hot tea thing, he was genuinely touched, and baffled by the fuss people were making – especially JC who stayed up to like 4 in the morning doing a mixtape – which he loved by the way – none of it will be forgotten. I only hope that the rest of this rundown is worthy of the fuss.

So let’s just pick up where we left off, here’s the Orb, a song which Tim selected for this list and one which he told me last week always reminds him of a holiday he had in St Lucia a few years back a holiday in which he went on a jet ski for the first and only time in his life.  He’s going to relay that story the next time he’s on here.

‘Little Fluffy Clouds’ is stunning as well, beautifully simple, but irresistible and for now, according to this list, the Greatest Remix Ever (Until another one comes along at least). Oh, and Mrs Badger has reluctantly agreed to write Tim’s next two submission to this blog (Number 67 and 64 if you are interested).

Meanwhile here are two other mixes of ‘Little Fluffy Clouds’

Little Fluffy Clouds (7″ Edit)

Little Fluffy Clouds (Coldcut Heavyweight Dub Mix)

Number 72 – The greatest advert for narcotics ever recorded and right now I could do with at least three of the things on this list.

Feel Good Hit of the Summer – Queens of the Stone Age – Chosen by SWC – Taken from ‘Rated R’ LP (2000)

Now, I need to tell you all something.  This blog is taking a weeks holiday.  Don’t worry we will be back.  But I’m moving house today and I won’t have Wifi in the new place for at least a week and Badger…

Well, Badger is not very well at the moment, he won’t mind me telling you that much, but he’ll be here when he can for the next few months or so.

Normal service will be resumed around the 13th or 14th October.  Please remember to comeback we only write this bollocks because some of you seem to enjoy it.  When we return we continue with this run down with Number 71.

Thanks all.

The Lost Art of Keeping a Secret

Number 73 – A homage to the much missed Saturday TV Programme of the same name (ok, not really, its Ride)

Vapour Trail – Ride – Eventually chosen by both of us, taken from ‘Nowhere’ LP (1990)

Here’s JC with the fourth (?) of his randomly selected picks.  One that made me chortle so much I choked on my toast and needed a slap on the back.

So there I was, quite happily getting on with my life, organising myself for a much needed few days away from work and thinking of nothing more stressful than what to pack in my case for a week-long trip away to see some friends when this e-mail drops in.

TB’

It’s not that I’d forgotten I’d committed myself to doing a series of pieces for this, what is quite frankly, the best running series out there in blogland right now, but hadn’t quite realised it was getting close to the time for another contribution.

In reply, I ask Tim:-

‘not a problem

what song have I to talk pish about?

JC’

‘It was Vapour Trail – we had to discount Four other Ride songs to get to that one.  So its the fifth best Ride song.  If you can draw reference to the Trespassers William cover version of it as well you get bonus points.’

And that, dear friends, is where my problems began………

I know next to fuck all about Ride.  Indeed, thanks to spending time in a car being chauffeur driven back and forth to football matches by an 18-year old girl who is also in charge of the music, I know far more about Jason Derulo, Sigala and Jess Glynne than I do about Ride.  Such are the perils of volunteering for random numbers in a countdown.

The other thing I’m completely unnerving by is the fact that SWC and Tim have been producing stonking pieces of writing to accompany their selections, always revealing some snippets and memories of their lives and how certain songs have impacted on them or are linked to a significant happening or event.  My contribution on Ride, whatever form it ends up taking, inevitably, would see a dip in quality.  I’m bloody terrified.

I begin by finding a copy of ‘Vapour Trail’ on the internet to give it a listen. That’s where I get really confused.  I think I’m hearing The Stone Roses……………and I think The Stone Roses are, for the most part, one of the most overrated bands there’s ever been.

So right away I’m thinking that I don’t really like ‘Vapour Trail’ , so how the hell do I say something meaningful???  At this point I’m really thinking that I should do that ‘call a friend’ thing they have on game shows and get Aldo to write this piece for me.  Only thing, he’s in Croatia right now and I won’t see him for another 10 days by which time the deadline will be missed.

Baws.

I was 27 years of age when Ride’s debut LP came out.  It’s an age when a little bit of cynicism and world-weariness sets in for most folk.  You look around at those who are say 5-10 years younger and you feel a tad jealous of their care-free attitudes, enthusiam, energy. You also get to laugh though at their insane confidence that everything they are seeing, saying or doing has never been seen, said or done before in the history of mankind.  This extends to music which, to their ears, is the most exciting era there’s ever been, but you know different for it was the sounds of your own youth, when you were 17-22 years old, that truly was unlike any other…..

It is very easy to understand why Ride and the whole shoegazing thing, and indeed Madchester before it,  mean so much to so many people of a certain age – folk who tend to be in their late 30s and early 40s for the most part – and why they get excited and nostalgic for it.   It’s how I feel about new wave/post punk and the later emergence of the great UK guitar bands of the early 80s and it’s why my own blog tends to be dominated by that era.

It’s the same way, that in maybe 30 years or so, the teenage girl who travels to football with me is likely to be reflecting back and fondly remembering the songs that she moved her hips to so often and arguing that ‘Want You To Want Me’, ‘Sweet Lovin’ and ‘Hold My Hand’ are among the greatest 200 songs of all time.  It’s a personal thing.

And do you know what……those putting the lists together are always right.    Vapour Trails might not be a song I’ll return to ever again but having now played it back-to-back five or six times as I type these words, I can appreciate why it is so highly regarded and loved by many.  It will make you smile and recall some very incredible times from days of old.

Now who in gawd’s name are Trespassers William?  At least I’ve heard of Ride……………………………..

SWC adds – thanks again JC, he’ll be back in around twenty days time when we will for the first time in the history of WYCRA go back to back JC. If that makes sense.

This is the Trespassers William version if you are interested.  I’d be interested to know which you think is better.

Number 74 – Turns out I’d been waiting all my life this.

Life – Summer Camp – Chosen by SWC – Taken from ‘Always’ EP (2012)

As I’ve said before the old iPod often has a habit of coming up with the right song for the occasion, and this is nearly a perfect example – but its not quite perfect, as you will see.   Everything you read below is completely true and exactly as I tell it.

It is about ten past one in the morning in October about four years ago. I am asleep, when I hear a voice, I think this is in my sleep, because this is the voice of a chap from work that I am having an argument with in a blissed out dream. The voice says to me “You better get up”. I wake and rub my eyes and then I hear my wifes voice coming from downstairs. I wander downstairs and find her on the bathroom floor on all fours, in agony, there is some blood. I should really at this point mention that she is 9 months pregnant and our baby is 11 days overdue. I stand there and the first thing I say is ‘Jesus’. The next thing I do is rush for the phone and the little yellow post it note with the emergency midwifes number on it.

Earlier that evening (about 9pm), thinking she was is Labour we had driven to the hospital only to be sent home, by an angry nurse saying ‘She is not in Labour’. I look at her and say “look, I’m no midwife, but I’m telling you right now, “SHE IS IN FUCKING LABOUR”. We then stroll out and drive home fuming and my wife is moaning that again she has go over the speed bumps that appear to have multiplied by about ten thousand on the way home.

Anyway, I phone the emergency midwife who demands to speak to my wife, and then she speaks to me again and says “warm water, towels, as many as you can find, head strokes, TENS machine, I’ll be half hour”.

She arrives and folks, she is marvellous, a saint, and someone who if we hadn’t already decided on a name for our child, we would have gladly named our daughter after. She looks at my wife and says “you have two options, 1 – we phone an ambulance and you have baby in the car park or 2- We have the baby in the bathroom, because sweety you have about twenty minutes before she makes an appearance” (Told you stroppy nurse at the hospital)

Cutting a long and gory story short, baby makes an appearance at around 3am. My wife has no drugs, no air, no nothing, she took two paracetamol around midnight, the big Jessie.

It is a beautiful moment as anyone who has been there will agree, tears fill our eyes, about half way through an ambulance turns up (just in case) and they make some tea – and then admit after the event that neither of them had even seen a birth before, they are not needed but their very presence makes me feel calm.  My wife is fine, Baby is fine and everyone is in tears. Then the midwife says that she needs to take my wife upstairs to ‘do some stitching’ – we’re not going there don’t worry, and I am left alone with this newborn, my newborn, my beautiful, healthy newborn. I sit there and cradle her. Then I do the stand up and walk around with her in my eyes bit, showing her the world “This is a lamp, this is a sofa”.  Four hours later we are all sitting around in the lounge drinking hot chocolate like we just popped out for shopping.

Family arrive, the morning goes in a blur.  Lunchtime arrives and we are alone for the first time in like 10 hours, my wife and baby are sleeping upstairs, so I catch a few minutes I switch on the ipod and stretch out.

The third song is this from Summer Camp, a track called ‘Life’ and it is gorgeous and it starts thus ‘My bloody hands reach only for you’.  I listen to it and a smile breaks out across my face – again.  I walk upstairs and whisper to my wife ‘Thanks’ and I look again at my daughter, barely half a day old, and I can’t quite believe it.  But, I know its sounds naff, but, I whisper ‘Welcome to the world’ to her.

Here is the rest of the simply adorable ‘Always EP’

Always

City

hunt

Outside

Number 75 – Spacious breathless dreamy excellence

Human Behaviour – Bjork – Chosen by Badger, Taken from ‘Debut’ LP (1993)

Here’s our guest The Robster

You couldn’t make it up really. When I got involved in the boys’ shenanigans involving their fave songs ever, the planets just sort of aligned. They sent me a song by the Manic Street Preachers, not only one of my fave bands, but practically local to my current place of residence. My long-running Welsh Wednesday series over at my place was still going, and Wales were taking Euro 2016 by storm. So I offered to do another one for them, and what happens? Badger only goes and send me a Björk track. I love Björk. No, I don’t actually. I fucking ADORE her. I was also planning to do a series on the Icelandic music scene, and Iceland had also taken Euro 2016 by storm. Coincidence?

I remember when Human Behaviour came out (June 1993). I had been a massive fan of the Sugarcubes and Björk was, for me, the quirkiest pop star on the planet. I was gutted when they split as I had never managed to see them live, and let’s face it, three albums was simply not enough. You can imagine my excitement when I heard Björk was going solo and that within a year of the ‘Cubes break-up, her first single would be out.

I don’t know why, but I was expecting something very different to Human Behaviour, something – I dunno – more indie? The final Sugarcubes release was a brilliant album of remixes featuring some of the top producers of the time (Justin Robertson, Todd Terry, Marius deVries, etc) so I should have been prepared for something a little more electronic I suppose. But no, I heard Human Behaviour and my heart sunk.

There was a girl who worked in the indie record shop I spent far too much time and money in who, for some reason, had a massive crush on me. I found her a little scary, mainly because she was a few years older than me, and I’d never had anyone take such an interest in me like that before. One afternoon, she dropped by my work and gave me a bag that clearly had a record in it. “I got you a present,” she said. “I thought of you when it came in.” It was the 12″ of Human Behaviour. Ever since, I’ve always associated this song with her.

I’ve come to like Human Behaviour quite a bit in the intervening years. Those timpani drums that echo throughout in time (and tune) with the bass make it sound all brooding and ominous. There’s a lot of cool stuff going on in it, and it’s not all that electronic-sounding really. Some nice growling guitars, an understated rustling snare drum and, of course, Björk’s voice at the centre of it all. It’s masterfully put together, a great production by Nellee Hooper. In fact, it’s not unlike Massive Attack in places, probably for that reason.

The album – craftily-titled ‘Debut’, even though it was actually Björk’s second solo effort, following some 16 years after this [https://www.discogs.com/Bj%C3%B6rk-Gu%C3%B0mundsd%C3%B3ttir-Bj%C3%B6rk/master/1870] – sounds rather dated to these ears nowadays. Human Behaviour still stands up, probably because it is the least electronic track on it. I also still love Crying. But the trouble with electronic music is that it rarely stands the test of time, the sounds get left behind as the technology changes. A lot of ‘Debut’ suffers from that, I reckon.

I have grown into Björk’s solo career over the years. ‘Biophilia’ is one of my favourite records of the decade – Crystalline floors me every time – and she remains one of pop’s most interesting characters at a time when people making pop records have become so incredibly dull and boring. Maybe one day she’ll run out of ideas and call it a day, but I doubt it’ll be any time soon. 

Oh, in case you were wondering about the girl from the record shop and I – it didn’t really develop. She was a nice girl and all, but really not my type. I suppose I could have strung her along in the hope of getting more free records, but I’m not that kind of guy. Not exactly SWC and Our Price Girl, I’m afraid…

Badger adds: – well nothing really, I can’t add a thing.  Outstandin as ever from the Robster.  More guest stuff in two days time.

Venus As a Boy

Big Time Sensuality

Number 76 – Happy Birthday Mrs SWC

The Private Psychedelic Reel – The Chemical Brothers – Chosen by Badger – taken from ‘Dig Your Own Hole’ LP (1997)

We are all a bit busy right now so we are trying to keep these as short as possible.  I mean you don’t come here for polite conversation do you?  So where to start with this one…

In a year which saw an outstanding set of releases such as ‘Ok Computer’ and perhaps even better ‘Ladies and Gentleman, we are floating in Space’, it would be easy to overlook ‘Dig Your Own Hole’ by The Chemical Brothers.  However, if you did you would miss a classic, a mix of psychedelia, acid house, hip hop, funk and massive massive beats.  This album followed an album which saw number one singles, but it was this record that propelled the Chemical Brothers into the stadiums.  And whilst they were in the stadiums, they gave us live shows of legend.

‘The Private Psychedelic Reel’ is a wonder of a track, a kaleidoscopic rush that burrows into your ears, consisting of rushes, whoops, bleeps and a lovely melody courtesy of Mercury Rev (still Mercury Revs finest moment according to SWC).  It is quite simply perfect, and it is the perfect end to a brilliant album as well.

Here are a couple more Chemical Brothers tracks

Leave Home

Setting Sun

And tomorrow a returning guest….