Forty Minutes Of AR Kane

AR Kane formed after Rudy Tambala and Alex Ayuli saw Cocteau Twins on TV in 1985. Their albums 69 (1988) and i (1989) were much beloved by the late 80s music press, the blend of guitar pedal noise, dub and electronic dance pop hitting the mark with writers and fans as the late 80s music scene found common ground between guitar bands and dance music. The otherworldly nature of the Cocteau Twins music, the swirl of FX is evident in their music, the pair playing guitars and singing, with drums provided by tape and machines. Initially they were lumped in with the feedback indie of The Jesus And Mary Chain. Rudy commented that they'd never heard The Mary Chain and were more inspired by Joni Mitchell, Miles Davis, Arthur Russell and Lee Scratch Perry along with the Cocteaus (whose record label, 4AD, they were released their first record on). 

The AR Kane albums have been re- issued recently, a box set on Rocket Girl called ARKive containing 69, i and the EP Up Home as well as badges, art prints and a t- shirt. Rudy and Alex played in London in the summer. Their music is hugely influential if less widely heard than some of their contemporaries. Their feedback drenched, FX pedal guitar noise played a huge part in forming the early 90s shoegaze sound and their electronic dance- pop songs had a big impact on many including Andrew Weatherall (who covered A Love From Outer Space and named a long running mobile club night after the song). When they were put into a studio with Colourbox by 4AD boss Ivo Watts- Russell they created Pump Up The Volume, the M|A|R|R|S single that topped the charts and brought sampling to the masses and while the A-side was mainly Colourbox the B-side Anitina (The First Time I See She Dance) was mainly AR Kane. On 69 they created a sonic blueprint, blending dub, noise, jazz and pop. With Up Home! they'd brought electronic music and acid house into the sound. Just a year later 69 came out, a double album containing a headspinning rush of songs and sounds, some of them not much more than dream sketches, some of them woozy, off kilter pop, with bursts of jazz, drones and dub, bongos, percussion and cello, lullabies over ocean sized soundscapes. 

AR Kane described their music as dream pop, a phrase which has become a shorthand for 21st century guitar music, heavily reverbed chords strummed very slowly with breathy vocals. For Rudy Tambala dream pop was more about the 'dream mythology...and lucid dreaming. We both used to practice it... go into a semi- hypnotic trance just before falling asleep.... being awake inside a dream... What would happen was that we’d hear music in our dreams and wake ourselves up to write down melodies, lyrics or even just the atmosphere that we wanted to capture. Our music was literally dream pop'. 

The mix here switches between the different elements of AR Kane's sound, the wall of guitar FX and feedback, sweetly sung and murmured vocals, dub basslines and breakbeats and synths. 

Forty Minutes Of AR Kane

• Snow Joke
• Baby Milk Snatcher
• Sugarwings
• A Love From Outer Space 
• Miles Apart
• Up
• Crack Up (Space Mix)
• Spermwhale Trip Over
• Anitina (The First Time See She Dance)

Snow Joke, Miles Apart and Sugarwings are all from i, their 1989 album which came out on One Little Indian. A Love From Outer Space, delirious electronic pop, comes from the album too. 

Baby Milk Snatcher was a 1988 single for Rough Trade and then the lead song on the Up Home! EP, a longer version. Up was on the same EP, one of their finest moments. 

Crack Up was a 1990 single on Rough Trade. The Space Mix came out on a Rem'i'xes EP, remixed by Cocteau Robin Guthrie. 

Spermwhale Trip Over is from 69, a song which seemed to give birth to much of the shoegaze band's sound- My Bloody Valentine must have had a copy close by when they recorded Slow. Rudy has described 69 as 'a gem. We wanted to go as far out as we could, and in doing so we discovered the point where it stops being music'. The re- release of the albums in the ARKive box and recent return to live gigs is something to be welcomed. I hope they might make a trip up north at some point soon. 

Anitina (The First Time See She Dance) is the b-side to Pump Up The Volume by M|A|R|R|S, the AR Kane and Cooirbox collaboration. The two groups found out quickly that they weren't going to work together well, their outlook and working methods wildly different. Pump Up The Volume is largely Colourbox with some AR Kane guitar parts added in and the scratch mix DJ skills of CJ Mackintosh and Dave Dorrell. Anitina is predominantly AR Kane with some Colourbox drum machine programming and FX. Post- single disagreements meant that M|AR|R|S was a one off. 

Saturday Theme Seventeen

The World Cup should be on now, in normal circumstances. Covid massively affected international sports tournaments of recent years- the 2020 Euros were played in 2021 for example. But the 2022 World Cup not being played now, in June and July, is not a Covid decision or a sporting one, it's a financial/ corruption one. FIFA in their wisdom decided that Qatar should host the 2022 World Cup. It's much too hot to play in Qatar in the summer so it's not being held until November and December. Qatar has no footballing history or heritage to speak of and while taking the game to corners of the world where football is a noble idea, there's little doubt that the money pouring into FIFA from the oil rich Middle Eastern theocracy made the move easier for the FIFA committee to make. Then there's the number of deaths from slave labour used to build the stadia to think about (Qatar claims thirty seven migrant workers died constructing the stadia. The Guardian puts the figure closer to 6, 500). Homosexuality is illegal in Qatar. Human rights abuses are widely documented. There are stories of state sponsored terrorism. It's probably best avoided by all concerned- but it won't be.  

In 1986 Colourbox released their Official World Cup Theme, to time with the tournament in Mexico. Colourbox are one of the 80s unsung heroes, signed to 4AD and sounding nothing like their labelmates combing reggae and soul influences, beat boxes, sampling, synths, pop and dub- and on their World Cup Theme making something that could be described as jaunty. 

The Official Colourbox World Cup Theme

Isolation Mix Fifteen: Songs Lord Sabre Taught Us Part Two

Two weeks ago I posted my fourteenth Isolation Mix, Songs The Lord Sabre Taught Us, an hour of music from Andrew Weatherall's record box, as featured on his radio shows, playlists, interviews and mixes, mixed together seamlessly (vaguely). Today's mix is a second edition, fifteen songs he played, raved about or sampled, most of them first heard via him (I was listening to Stockholm Monsters before I was a fan of Mr Weatherall, a long lost Factory band who made a bunch of good singles and a fine album called Alma Matter and also the best band to come out of Burnage). It's a tribute to the man and his record collection that there are so many great records from his back pages to sift through and then sequence into some kind of pleasing order. Rockabilly, dub, Factory, post- punk, krautrock legends, Weller spinning out through the Kosmos...



Cowboys International: The ‘No’ Tune
Sparkle Moore: Skull And Crossbones

The Pistoleers: Bank Robber

The Johnny Burnette Trio: Honey Hush

Jean ‘Binta’ Breeze: Dubwise

Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry: Disco Devil

African Head Charge: Dervish Chant

Big Youth: Hotter Fire

Colourbox: Looks Like We’re Shy One Horse

Stockholm Monsters: All At Once

Holger Czukay, Jah Wobble and Jaki Liebezeit: How Much Are They?

White Williams: Route To Palm

Paul Weller: Kosmos (Lynch Mob Bonus Beats)

A R Kane: A Love From Outer Space

Chris And Cosey: October (Love Song) ‘86

Vaughan Oliver

Vaughan Oliver died yesterday aged 62. He was the man responsible for the creating the artwork that graced the sleeves of a slew of bands in the 1980s and 90s and the entire visual identity of 4AD. The selection above shows how distinctive, eye catching and beautiful his work was but also how varied. It helps that the music contained within the 12" by 12" squares above was always of the highest calibre- Lush, Pixies, This Mortal Coil, Cocteau Twins, Ultra Vivid Scene, MARRS, Colourbox, Pale Saints (and also Throwing Muses, The Breeders, AR Kane, Belly... the list goes on). From the days when buying records based on the label they were issued on was commonplace and when the artwork mattered as much as the music.

Here in 1991 are Lush performing their single Sweetness and Light at The Dome, shoegaze pop with a Manchester swing to the rhythm. Vaughan Oliver RIP.

Monday's Long Song

At only six minutes forty-three seconds this isn't an especially long song but it came up on shuffle over the weekend and sounded immense. Released back in 1983 this is Colourbox's magnificent take on Baby I Love You So, an Augustus Pablo song from 1974 recorded by Jacob Miller, but updated by Martyn and Stephen Young making the most of early 80s technology- it doesn't sound dated all these years later either, that bassline alone is worth the price of admission. The guitar part is ace, not your standard reggae guitar part, the cymbals splash away and Lorita Grahame's vocal glides over the top.

Baby I Love You So (12" Version)

Twenty Eight Years Later

Whatever happens tonight in Moscow- England are playing Croatia in the World Cup semi-final in case you've been asleep for the last two weeks- the team have done themselves proud and exceeded any expectations many of us had of them. Since the late 1990s England have failed so often and so abjectly it became difficult to believe that any major tournament could be a success. Having shed themselves of the so-called 'Golden Generation', some really poor managerial appointments and the millstone of the superstars that hung around without really ever doing anything, Gareth Southgate has done something extraordinary- he's built a squad of young men that play for each other and for the team, egos and factions apparently a thing of the past, with the confidence that being young and talented brings and also actually preparing for things like penalty shoot outs. The idea that England could be contesting a place in a World Cup final still seems a bit unreal to me. Last time around, in Brazil, they were the first team home, defeated twice in a matter of days, left playing a third and final group game that meant nothing.

The last time England were in a World Cup semi-final was 1990, a night in Turin against West Germany that ended with penalties and defeat. 1990 was a different world- Germany was not even re-united in summer 1990. Nelson Mandela had only been released in February 1990. John Major was not yet Prime Minister, Thatcher still in power and with no reason to think she wouldn't be by the end of year (Major ended up leading a Tory cabinet and party massively split over Europe, so plus ca change maybe).

In July 1990 I was twenty years old and a group of us had been to Glastonbury at the end of June, arriving home to our shared student house part way through the England- Cameroon quarter final match to see England win 3-2. Glastonbury had been headlined by Happy Mondays and The Cure (both still playing big shows all these years later). We'd seen Sinead O'Connor, De La Soul, James, Jesus Jones and then Archaos closing the Pyramid Stage by tightrope walking across the top of it. There's a review here which describes it as all mud, flares and the Mekong Delta. New Order had hit number one with World In Motion. Adamski had been number one with Seal and Killer before that. Spike Island was only 6 weeks previously, a promise of something that never happened. With the university term and year over I watched the semi-final back at my parent's house and as Chris Waddle put his penalty over the bar someone at our house, an older person who had dropped in, said 'never mind, they'll be in another one soon'. Not that soon it turns out. Whatever happens tonight, it's been a long time coming. Good luck England.

Killer

The Official Colourbox World Cup Theme

Sugarwings

Jumping forward slightly from the last three day's posts to 1989 with a pair of dreads from East London, Alex Ayuli and Rudy Tambala. As AR Kane they made some bewildering and beautiful music, combining guitars with synths and breakbeats and what would become shoegaze. The pair used the term dream pop to describe their music, and the ambient, dubby swirl give many of their songs a dreamlike state. They released two albums- in 1986 their debut 69 followed in 1988 by 'i', both on Rough Trade. In 1990 they put out an e.p. of remixes from 'i' called rem'i'xes, with Cocteau Twin Robin Guthrie providing three new versions and AR Kane themselves three more. This one is lilting and sweet but off kilter and experimental too.

Sugarwings (AR Kane Remix)

With Colourbox (as MARRS) they they would make Pump Up The Volume, an experience neither band enjoyed and wasn't repeated, but which resulted in an international hit for MARRS and 4AD. The A-side, a number one single, is an amazing record, a groundbreaking piece of UK house music, laden with samples and a propulsive rhythm. There were so any problems with sample clearence that different versions were released in different countries. Pump Up The Volume was mainly the work of Colourbox and DJs Dave Dorrell and CJ Mackintosh. AR Kane's contribution was pretty much solely a guitar line. The B-side was largely an AR Kane song but with drum programming from Colourbox's Martyn Young and while not sounding much at all like Pump Up The Volume is a great track in its own right.

Anitina (The First Time I See She Dance)

Long Was The Morning

I may have posted this song before, or at least one of its versions (there are a few), but it was a few years back and it bears repeating. Arena II is a song by mid 80s samples, electronics plus instruments band Colourbox. They made a lot of reggae influenced stuff and some BAD style sample-driven instrumentals but this song is a piano ballad. It has factory settings drum machine, some clicky percussion, great big piano chords and a superb vocal. It is a bit proto-house music. It is about love lost. The bottom line- it is a piano ballad.

Arena 2

As I was listening to this song (while trying to type this post) Mrs Swiss came in and said 'what 80s nonsense is this? It is 80s isn't it?' '1985' I replied. I was about to type the words 'I don't think this song sounds thirty years old', but maybe I'd be wrong.

Just Give 'Em Whiskey

I dug out a Colourbox album the other day while tackling a mound of ironing that Hercules would have balked at. I managed to burn myself only twice as well (left forearm and right thumb), which for a cack-handed, left-hander isn't bad. The album was the two disc vinyl version with the second mixed disc of offcuts and versions, including the monumental Arena II which I've put up here before. Some of their stuff sounds a little dated but there's a load of goodness in it. There's a boxed set out (released back in May also called Colourbox like the albums were, just to make it all a little confusing). This song is a killer, driving bass and guitars and BAD style samples littered throughout. Tip top, ahead of the curve stuff. They went on to make Pump Up The Volume and you can hear why in this song.

Just Give 'Em Whiskey

We are off to a campsite near Tewkesbury for two nights, being time rich/cash poor in August, camping with Mrs Swiss's best friend P and her family. Weather forecast looks reasonable. Back on Wednesday.

We're Gonna Shake Up Your Sleepy Mind

Having already posted three Colourbox songs recently I wasn't going to do anymore but the mp3 player keeps chucking this up, as if it's urging me to share it, and who am I to ignore the God of the portable music device?

Arena 2 is a brilliant mid-80s, proto-house torch song- huge piano, skittering and rudimentary drum track and massive soulful vocal. It makes the hairs on the back of the neck stand up. Stunning.

Arena 2

MARRS Attacks

Pump Up The Volume by MARRS is surely one of the greatest singles ever made and a number one single to boot. From 1987 it was a one-off collaboration between members of AR Kane and Colourbox, both Bagging Area favourites, with extra input from djs Dave Dorrell and CJ Mackintosh. Does it sound twenty four years old? I've lost track of how things should sound after that amount of time. Made up mainly of samples it still shakes dancefloors- well, the floor in my front room anyway. I don't know if anyone would play it in a proper club anymore. This is the B-side Anitina (The First Time I See She Dance), made up of an AR Kane track with Colourbox programming the drum machine.

Anitina (The First Time I See She Dance).mp3

Baby I Love You So

I couldn't let Colourbox go by without posting this, the A-side to the 12" single with Tuesday's postee Looks Like We're Shy One Horse on the flip. Baby I Love You So is a cover of an Augustus Pablo track. This is electronic dub at it's best- big, swirly sound with swathes of colourful synths, a massive bassline, reverby guitars, samples and vocals from Lorita Grahame. Seven minutes or so of wonder. Play it back to back with Looks Like... for full effect.

02 Baby I Love You So 12_.mp3

Breakdown

And back again...

Here's some more Colourbox, this time their debut single Breakdown from 1982, with guest vocals from Debian Curry. There's much less dub and none of the Western samples on Breakdown, just some very 80s leftfield electronic pop but I believe this kind of thing is all the rage with young folk today. Funny how bands then could go from pop to weird, a journey bands tend to do in reverse, if at all. The fact they had a variety of influences and used them all to make their own music that changed and developed over five years, is something to be applauded.

Breakdown.mp3

Looks Like We're Shy One Horse

One of the records Weatherall played when warming up for the Screamadelica live show on Sunday night was this- Looks Like We're Shy One Horse by Colourbox, a magnificent piece of electronic dub with an extended and very dubby outro. Sounded even better booming through Primal Scream's PA system. Looks Like... was released as the B-side to Colourbox's 1986 single Baby I Love You So. On the same day they released their Offical Colourbox World Cup Theme single. Colourbox went on to collaborate with A.R. Kane as MARRS and hit the number one spot with the mighty Pump Up The Volume. This is subtler and spacier but no less good.

No-one- that's no-one, not one single soul- has downloaded yesterday's live version of Come Together. This is a Bagging Area first, a completely unwanted track.

12 Looks Like We\'re Shy One Horse.wma