Sketch For Summer

Sketch For Summer is the opening song on 1980's The Return Of the Durutti Column album, a three minute introduction to the work of Vini Reilly, a song combining simplicity and beautiful, languid guitar playing.

Sketch For Summer

In 1980 Durutti Column suddenly became a solo project when the rest of the band dissolved overnight, about to record an album. They had appeared from the remnants of a local punk band called Fast Breeder and contributed two songs to Factory's first release, A Factory Sample. When Tony Wilson and Alan Erasmus arranged for their debut album to be produced by Martin Hannett, three members walked out leaving guitarist Vini on his own. Not believing that a one man group would be allowed to record nevermind  release an album Vini had to be coaxed by Hannett into getting out of bed but over a few days Vini played guitar and Hannett played echo unit, delay and drum machine. Vini told Hannett that he didn't want the 'distorted, horrible guitar sound' and Martin went on to get sounds out of Vini that no one else was doing. Hannett then pulled three days worth of guitar playing into shape and a nine track lp was created that Vini didn't beleive would appear even when Wilson gave him a white label copy of it.

This being Factory in 1980 and Wilson being Vini's manager the entire early Durutti Column is covered in Situationist jokes and references. The group's name was a reference to an anarchist unit that fought in the Spanish Civil War. The album's title, The Return Of The Durutti Column, was taken from a 1967 Situationist poster. The initial run of the album came in a sleeve covered in sandpaper, another Situationist joke, borrowed from Guy Debord, an album that would over time destroy the rest of your record collection. All of this is very Factory, very knowing and part of the legend but listening to Sketch For Summer is the whole deal in itself, a song that fades in with Hannett's birdsong, created on one of his delay boxes, and then a drum machine smothered in echo and tape hiss before Vini's guitar playing arrives. Melodies played through some chorus and echo FX pedals, and little runs of notes, lyrical without words, the repeated refrain around two minutes thirty and then the run out with the drum machine and the birds is just perfect.

Now So Much Waste How We'll Be Teased

It is the 50th anniversary of the events of May 1968 where students and workers in Paris staged a series of strikes and demonstrations that very nearly brought the government down, tapping into and inspiring a year of revolution and turmoil. Back in May 1988 it was the 20th anniversary and I remember watching an excellent Channel 4 documentary about it and reading various articles and features while I was supposed to be revising for my A Levels. 

A year later, May 1989, The Stone Roses released their debut album which was peppered with references to May 68 (along with a regicide fantasy) which made The Roses seem like a political band, revolutionaries maybe, a view of them that has been lost over the years. On Bye Bye Badman Ian Brown sings about the smoke and choke of tear gas and the neutralising effect citrus fruit has on  CS gas (something an old man told them in a pub according to interviews). The lemons on the album cover and T-shirts repeat this. 'I'm throwing stones at you' Ian croons, to the policeman in the picture above, the cobblestones of the streets of Paris underneath which would be found the beach. Ian would return to May 68 on solo songs (Corpses In Their Mouths was a Situationist slogan of the time). 

Bye Bye Badman

The song on that sparkling debut album that precedes Bye Bye Badman is the one I can keep coming back to, that hasn't become over familiar. Don't Stop is Waterfall backwards. It's an easy studio trick, reverse the tape and see what happens- trippy whooshing sounds, stoned, Satanic vocals and a 60s vibe. But Don't Stop is much better than merely a lazy studio mucking about session. John Squire's backwards guitar riff is a joy, sucking the distortion and lead lines into new shapes and Reni's new rhythm track puts it in touch with another revolution, the one of 1988-90 that was taking place in nightclubs, warehouses and fields. For the words John listened to the backwards Waterfall vocal and then wrote down what the lines suggested, resulting in something close to poetry.

'Don't stop, isn't it funny how you shine?
Here the sea spray give
I was with her
We're under the ship so get me over
Now that was me, listen
Now she fishes now, listen
There was no one out there we used
There is the news for me useless
Now so much waste
How we'll be teased
Don't stop, isn't it funny how you shine?
Don't stop, isn't it funny how you shine?
Oh won't you just ask me you're an imbecile
What's the matter for everyone I feel
Pain, blues singer
He's playing just a guitar from the top
I wake I still look I feel loose
We're all here now who's the first ease into my heart
He must be one of us'

Don't Stop

No Forbidding Allowed

Mentioning the Situationists earlier reminded me of them- not that I know a great deal about them- and how they've been a part of 'music' since the 60s, with those riots in Paris in 1968 and the whole 60s subculture, Malcolm McLaren, Sex Pistols, punk's sloganeering generally, The Stone Roses and elsewhere. Greil Marcus does this sort of thing better than me and at far greater length. The slogans and graffiti have been evident over the last few years with the various protests, not least the Occupy Movement and also with silly old Banksy. Still, Situationist slogans can be pretty good even if they read more like something you'd buy on a T-shirt in Top Shop now than an actual call for change.

Be realistic- demand the impossible
Underneath the paving stones, the beach
No freedom for the enemies of freedom
Only the truth is revolutionary
Speechmaking is counter-revolutionary
Millionaires of the world unite- the wind is turning
The golden age was when gold didn't reign
Are you a consumer or a participant?
Going through the motions kills emotions
We demand games with great seriousness
When examined, answer with questions
Unbutton your mind as often as you unbutton your fly
Those who lack imagination cannot imagine what is lacking
Abolish copyright; sound structures belong to everyone
This concerns everyone
When the last sociologist is hung with the guts of the last bureaucrat, will we still have 'problems'?
You may only be 25 but your Trade Union dates from the last century
The boss needs you, you don't need the boss
Let's not change bosses, let's change life
Run, the old world is behind you
No replastering, the structure is rotten
Boredom is counter-revolutionary


Yeah, well, like, whatevs.