Forty Six Minutes Of Twenty Three

Two months ago this weekend, the day before we were taking Eliza back to Liverpool for her final year in university, the three of us were sitting in a cafe in Didsbury village, one of our afternoon walk and a brew haunts. Eliza said, out of nowhere, 'I think we should all go and get a number 23 tattoo for Isaac'. Lou and I looked at each other and both said, 'yeah. ok'. It was very spontaneous, none of us ever really thought abut getting a tattoo before. Me and Eliza had joked about but very much in a 'we won't ever do this' kind of way. But at that moment it suddenly seemed like a good thing to do. Unfortunately the tattoo parlour in Sale couldn't fit us in on the day so we booked in for a month later- it felt like something the three of us should do together and Eliza didn't want to come back from Liverpool for a while. It also gave us some time to think about fonts and parts of the body.

The number 23 has become associated with Isaac. I've written about it before this year. He was 23 when he died and his birthday is the 23rd November (just a couple of weeks away now with the 2nd anniversary of his death a week later). In the last year the number 23 has kept appearing in front of me- on street signs, graffiti, electricity boxes, random tv countdown shows suddenly channel surfed onto, the only available table in a pub. I don't think it necessarily means anything- it's just something I've started noticing and when I see a 23 now it makes me think of him and smile. Getting a 23 tattoo might trigger the same reaction (and a month later, I'm happy to say it does). We got the tattoos done a month ago. Mine is pictured above, a type writer font on my forearm. Lou got a smaller 23 on her side and Eliza got an even smaller, fine line 23 on her upper arm. 

The number 23 has a rich history. I've written before as well about it's part in KLF mythology, with their interest in Discordianism and numerology. When Isaac died I was reading John Higgs' book about The KLF. A few weeks after he died I picked the book back up and the first chapter I read was about the significance of 23. I finished the chapter and put the book down, totally freaked about. I read it again the next day and it had a similar effect. When I was looking at fonts for my tattoo I thought about a KLF block 23 but it would very inky and take some time to do. I fancied a type writer font. On the morning we were due to go I suddenly wondered what 23 would look like in a factory/ Peter Saville font and started going through my various Factory art books. What, I asked myself, was Fac 23? A quick search later and I realised Fac 23 was the 7" release of Love Will Tear Us Apart by Joy Division. Which caused me to stop in my tracks for a moment. In the end I didn't quite go full Peter Saville Fac font but it played a part in my thinking. We're all really glad we got them done. At the moment, all autumn chilliness and long sleeves, its often covered up, but when I see it, it makes me smile. The upcoming anniversaries are weighing quite heavily and I'll be glad to get November over with- but the tattoos feel like a positive and I'm not sure a year ago I'd thought that would be possible. 

This mix is 46 minutes of songs connected to the number 23. I was going to bring it in at 23 minutes but that felt too short so went for double 23. Two of the songs below were also released in full 23 minute versions which felt too long for a Sunday mix but they're here in shorter versions to represent their 23 minute long brothers. 

46 Minutes Of 23

• Chris Rotter And The Bad Meat Club: 86'd
• 10:40: Sleepwalker
• Local Psycho And The Hurdy Gurdy Orchestra: The Hurdy Gurdy Song (Mothers Of The New Stone Age Remix)
• 23 Skidoo: Coup
• Jah Division: Jah Will Tear Us Apart
• The Vendetta Suite: Eye In The Triangle
• Two Lone Swordsmen: 23rd Street
• Mogwai: U235
• Gorillaz: Aries
• Psychic TV: Godstar
• The KLF: 3am Eternal

Chris Rotter was the guitarist in the live band incarnation of Two Lone Swordsmen and played on and co- wrote songs on Andrew Weatherall's solo album A Pox On The Pioneers. I became friends with Chris online and then in real life. When Isaac died he wanted to record a song for Isaac. I asked him to do 86'd, a song I heard Andrew play on a radio show, a glorious chiming krauty instrumental. Chris went and re- recorded 86'd in new form, 23 minutes long. For reasons of space I've included the shorter one here. The full length 86'd (For Isaac) is here. 

Last December Jesse represented the entire 10:40 back catalogue as an advent calendar. This was the track for the 23rd December, the sleek psych and somewhat krauty Sleepwalker with Ben Lewis on guitar.

The KLF and the number 23 I've mentioned above. Read John Higgs' Chaos, Magic And The Band Who Burned A Million Pounds for more detail. Local Psycho And The Hurdy Gurdy Orchestra are ex- KLF Jimmy Cauty and ex- Pogue Jem Finer. Their hurdy gurdy, neolithic celebration drone came out on 12" came out earlier this year complete with a 23 minute mix. I've included the shorter remix here but the 23 minute version is the one really. 

23 Skidoo are here for obvious reasons. Coup is a block rocking post- punk/ punk funk track from 1984. In a further Andrew Weatherall connection, it was one of the songs on his 9 O' Clock Drop compilation from 2000. 

Joy Division's Love Will Tear Us Apart, as I said above, was Fac 23. Factory's numbering system was central to their ethos. All Joy Division and New Order singles ended in 3. Rather than include the original I decided to put Jah Division's dub cover in- it fitted better. Jah Division released an EP of four dub covers of Joy Division songs  in 2004. If you ever see a vinyl copy, please give me a ring. 

The Vendetta Suite are from Northern Ireland, the work of Gary Irwin. In 2017 Gary released an EP titled Solar Lodge 23 from which this piece of cosmic dubbiness is taken. 

Two Lone Swordsmen- yes, them again- released their first record in 1996, a 12" that contained four tracks- Big Man On The Landing, Azzolini, The Branch Brothers and the one here, 23rd Street, a few minutes of abstract Swordsmen sounds. 

Mogwai's move into soundtrack work has paid off. This is from the soundtrack to Atomic, a bit of a cheat maybe numerically but 23's in there and the track fits.

Gorillaz have played with the number 23 frequently in their imagery and artwork. This song Aries was a single in 2020 and has the unmistakeable and melancholic/ uplifting sound of Peter Hook's bass at its heart.  

Psychic TV, Genesis P Orridge's experimental psychedelic/ acid house band had some interest in 23. In 1986 they began a series of gigs to be recorded and released, 23 in total, each played on the 23rd of a month for 23 consecutive months. Godstar is a single from 1985, a tribute to Rolling Stone Brian Jones.

The KLF's 3am Eternal was the second of their stadium house trilogy, released in 1991 (after a previous version in 1989 and a subsequent one in 1992). The version here, the 1991 single and chart topper, took this mix to 46 minutes. 

Weatherall Remix Friday Four

In 1992 Andrew Weatherall made the move from being the solo remixer and DJ, ably assisted by Hugo Nicolson on many of his genre- busting, name- making early remixes to becoming part of a group. In part this was a desire to head away from the light, away from the Balearic and indie- dance scenes and mine something darker and deeper and less obvious. Rumours in the NME (often placed there by his friend Sherman who edited the dance music page) suggested Weatherall was forming a new band- Sabres Of Paradise- with a record label of the same name and the similarly named Sabresonic club night under a railway arch at Crucifix Lane, London. Hugo had become a part of Primal Scream's onstage set up and Andrew had begun working with Gary Burns and Jagz Kooner. The trio would become Sabres Of Paradise, putting out several key singles- Smokebelch, Theme, Wilmot- and two albums- Sabresonic and Haunted Dancehall before Andrew shifted things around again and formed Two Lone Swordsmen with Keith Tenniswood. 

Somewhat overlooked in the Weatherall/ Sabres back catalogue of releases and remixes is the debut release on Andrew's Sabres Of Paradise label, the 12" known as listed as PT001 in the Sabres catalogue numbering system. Discogs has this listed as a 1993 release but several people online recently have said it came out in autumn '92 (at least in white label version). The first run of twelves was on red vinyl (rare) with a black vinyl run following (less rare). It seems that PT001 came out before both Secret Knowledge's Ooh Baby and Pleasure by SYT (I appreciate this is probably unimportant to most people, unless you are compiling a comprehensive, definitive discography of Andrew Weatherall releases- hi Martin).

PT001 is a remix, or total reconstruction, of Throbbing Gristle's United (a 7" single, 1978). There are two versions, the A-side eleven minutes of 1992 Weatherall, the perfect marriage of the newest sounds and styles spliced with his influences, in this case the music of Throbbing Gristle and Psychic TV. Repetitive bleeps, tribal drums, samples screeching, metallic cymbal crashes and then a crunching, thumping four- four kick.  Three and a half minutes in the TG synth riff surfaces, loops round and then the tribal thumping returns. A piano run appears at five minutes thirty, giving that hands- in- the- air moment and then a proto- Sabres bassline joins in. Everything begins to pile back in again for the run in, building in layers and intensity, tempos and noises colliding. Thirty years old and still capable of causing strobe light flashbacks and goose bumps.

United Mix 1

United Mix 2 is shorter, only brief five minutes and forty seven seconds, starting with the tsk tsk tsk of a hi- hat and then the drums, all about percussion and rhythm, harder and tougher. Eventually sirens arrive, wailing away on top, a techno alarm call from the early 90s.

United Mix 2

Genesis P. Orridge

Genesis P. Orridge died on Saturday aged seventy sending further ripples through social media,tributes to another important figure from the fringes of popular culture gone. Genesis leaves a complex legacy. The work left behind is important, it changed the way many people saw the world and inspired them to do things themselves. Genesis as the founder of COUM Transmissions in Hull in the early 1970s making radical, confrontational and subversive art. Throbbing Gristle's back catalogue and their influence on post- punk, industrial, acid house and beyond is widely acknowledged. They were castigated as 'wreckers of civilisation'. The four-piece group- Genesis, Cosey, Sleazy and Chris Carter- made pioneering music, using synths, homemade devices, FX, noise, samples, found sounds, spoken word, all aspects that became commonplace. Psychic TV were an group who wanted to unite music and video art, leftfield pop and psychedelia and in Godstar, Genesis' tribute to Brian Jones, made one of those records that was always floating round the ether in the second half of the 80s.

Godstar

Genesis played a key role alongside Richard Norris in making Jack The Tab, an album that is often seen as the first British acid house record. Andrew Weatherall said that the arrival of house and techno didn't surprise him at all because he'd already heard Throbbing Gristle, he knew from their records what the future sounded like.

This track is a live performance from San Francisco in 1981, their final show before their initial break up and released on an album called Mission Of Dead Souls.

Persuasion U.S.A.

This one, a just over a minute of distortion and noise, was from their debut album in 1977, The Second Annual Report.

Industrial Introduction

In her autobiography Cosey Fanni Tutti makes several accusations about Genesis's abusive behaviour, accusations he denied. She says he threw a concrete block off a balcony at her while she was sunbathing, again something he denied. At the very least he doesn't come across as a very nice person, moody, controlling and manipulative. Cosey and others have questioned his business practices, which often left them out of pocket to his benefited. Maybe this isn't the time to go through all of this. The deaths of people who are flawed and complex can be difficult to get a handle on. RIP Genesis.

Psychic Sunset

Sunset in Whitby last Sunday captured on my phone. Lovely.

Musically I'm picking up right where I left off before going on holiday with a tune that has been playing repeatedly in the caravan we stayed in just outside Scarborough. In 1995 Andrew Weatherall remixed Throbbing Gristle's United no fewer than four times. All four mixes (retitled Re-United) came out on a Psychic TV cd single called Sirens along, with three other songs, and were credited to both Psychic TV and Weatherall. The four mixes taken together form a wonderful thirty minute suite. The pick of them is Mix 3, eleven minutes of mid-90s housiness. The second half where piano and bass play off against each other is especially good.

Re-United Mix 3