Will I ever fall in love with Record Fairs ever again?

Over the last two weekends I have visited two record fairs in the vain hope of not relying solely on the internet to find the stuff that I want. There is a certain pleasure in rummaging through loads of boxes of interesting music. The elation when finding something you've been looking for for a long time is there for the picking, in good nick and priced reasonably is hard to put into words. It's mostly hard to put into words because I can hardly remember the feeling.

The vast majority of record shops have little in the way of anything different or away from the norm. I always know how poor a shop is going to be in the first five minutes of entering one. If the shop has no Cocteau Twins or Pixies, stuff that's can be easy to come by on the internet, there's practically no chance of finding any Dead Can Dance, Throwing Muses, Birthday Party or Clan of Xymox.

I don't just limit my searches when out looking to 4AD stuff. There seems to be an English vacuum in second hand goth, industrial or anything more alternative to Wonderstuff. It would be great to find a section with Front Line Assembly, Diamanda Galas, 1919, Ausgang, Sopor Aeternus and on and on. That would be a dream. But when a simple list as that is just a pipe dream what chance do I have to find any Cold In Berlin, Soviet Soviet or some of the other remarkable music that's around lately. Go online I guess

But I keep trying out shops and record fairs and the last two weeks have been fine examples of disappointment. The first fair was in Derby a couple of weeks ago. I had been to the fair once before and there was a guy with a stall that had mostly punk and new wave stuff, so I was eager to see if he had any new stock on. After over three hours in a record fair with about 7 or 8 traders with stalls, I didn't find a single item on my want list of nearly 900 items. I did pick up a few interesting little other items though including a Gary Numan LP, 2 Crime And The City Solution singles and a Shellyann Orphan single

At least I walked away with something. It is disappointing to still have the same amount on my wantlist, to find nothing at all for my 4AD collection is extremely disheartening when a record fair supposed to be the best place to find these items.

So I decided to travel a bit further affield a go to a record fair that was billed as "the biggest outside of London". Surely that would be what I was looking for. Advertised as 100 tables with traders from all over the country, attended by buyers from all over the world it sounded too good to miss. One of the things I always find funny about these fairs, is how late the traders turn up to the event. 2 minutes before doors open and traders are still wheeling boxes of stock into the venue, leaving you thinking "this is your trade, wake up earlier in a morning".

There may have been 100 tables (I didn't count), but there were only about 15 to 20 traders, three of which had been at the other fair in Derby just a week before. On asking they had no new stock since the week before. Then as usual there were the bargain basement traders. These have hundreds of CD's, usually mass bought stock that no-one can sell. I know even without spending hours looking that there's gonna be nothing in there. After about three minutes of walking two loops around the tables, I knew only one of them had any chance of anything remotely like what I was looking for. Still I persisted and stretched my patience as much as I could tolerate, knowing I would be writing this blog, and searched though as many of the traders stock as my willingness allowed. But my initial hunch was right, as aways. Only one trader had anything worth buying, the one I had picked out in the first three minutes and none of his stock hit any of the hundreds of items I was looking for, except one.

The NME Peel sessions compilation was the only find out of thousands of records. I did pick up Cocteau Twins and Birthday Party bootlegs as well as an Xmal Deutschland peel Session release, but none from my list. The bootlegs were quite recent and the Peel session was some years later after Xmal Deutschland had moved on from 4AD.

It is dis-heartening at times. I would have thought after this long that I would have picked up some specialised trader, eager to find the stuff I want. Instead I generally get "good luck with that" in a semi-sarcastic voice based on the experience of how rarely 4AD stuff is picked up and how quickly it's bought up. As much as buying online is nowhere near as satisfying as browsing through physical boxes looking for that special gem, it's the form I have to keep relying on.

As a finishing note and as mentioned before, I'm accruing quite a stock of duplicates again just wanting a good home. So watch this space as there are plenty more 4AD items to give away. Here's a sneak preview and you won't believe some of the items I have that just maybe you could own soon. Tell me if you recognise any...

...and as a last note Andy and I are back in the studio again putting together another song. After months of just not feeling it, Andy has managed to kick me into shape and we're composing again.

Until next time....guess the releases

Get the wish list below 900 by the new year (Check back Regularly)

28th November 2014

One package today and at last, a release actually on the existing wantlist. It was the German vinyl release of the Modern English album After The Snow. That leaves only another 13 versions of that album left to get my hands on.

That's the wantlist down to 930. My goodness that seems like a huge ask now to get down to 900 by the year's end. The goal post most certainly keeps moving and Betty's useless, she hasn't bought a single release for me yet!! Oh well, the search goes on....

27th November 2014

At the beginning of the day, the postman came and went and I was left empty handed. But then a courier turned up later in the day with quite a large box from the US with my name on it. Inside were two CD longboxes of the Pixies albums of Doolittle and Bossanova. Longboxes have an interesting history. They were introduced to help customers moved from the large packaging of vinyl to the smaller and more expensive CD. It also helped to display CDs in vinyl display areas and because of their bigger size helped to reduce shoplifting. Here is our dog Betty demonstrating the size of the 12" longbox

Here is a wiki on the longbox.

It seems, although most CDs were sold in longboxes, most customers saw them as throw away packaging like a plastic bag and threw them in the dustbin. Now they are quite sort after.

At last some items delivered. Problem is, these two release weren't on my wantlist as I wasn't sure if they existed. So the wantlist is still stuck at 931. This is not looking promising at all!

26th November 2014

I got really excited when a small parcel landed on my desk this morning, at last maybe the count can actually go down. It was not to be. I had forgotten the DVD called Sanctuary that I had bought a few days back. It's a documentary about Lisa Gerrard, which I am excited to get, but was hoping to hammer down the wantlist even in a small capacity. The wantlist stays at 931. I'm still struggling to find anything on ebay, but have found a couple of decently priced items on Discogs.

I did listen to The Sisters Of Mercy's album Floodland last night. It is funny how time changes one's perception of music. In the late eighties I really loved that album, but got sick of the worship it got a few years later, like it was some sort of goth must have. It was good, but not that good. On this listen I noticed how an EP's worth of ideas can be over stretched out to an albums length. The first two tracks Dominion and Mother Russia are one song without even a chord change, the album title track is used twice, the main single This Corrosion is mixed out about twice as long as it should have been and 1959 looks like a bolted on afterthought because there was 5 minutes left to make a full labum's worth. The album is ok and it did inspire a lot bands to go into territory they had not gone before, but nearly 30 years later it made little impact on me again. Not a patch on Clan of Xymox's Medusa.

25th November 2014

Nothing was delivered yesterday and nothing came today either. I'm running out of stuff that I can find on ebay again, it's as though I was just lucky the last couple of weeks and now the luck has dried out. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of items from my wantlist that are on ebay, they're just not reasonably priced especially when adding the postage on top.

I then noticed this morning that the album Sleeps With The Fishes by Pieter Nooten and Michael Brook has a Spanish vinyl version, a Japanese CD version and another UK version not previously listed. Therefore my wantlist has gone up, while my achievements have flatlined. Time is running out!

Wantlist = 931

22nd November 2014

Visited a small record fair this morning about ten miles from home. I was there to meet a vendor I had met at another record fair a month ago and said he may have some 4ad stock for me and would bring it with him. I emailed him my wantlist a couple of weeks ago and went to the fair with a smattering of hope. No luck once again though, he had been busy at work through the week (he's only a weekend music trader) and didn't have time before going to the fair to go through the huge build up of stock that he struggles to find his way through. Still, there's some hope that he still actually might have some interesting stock at some point for me in the future.

There were only about five vendors there, of which only one other had anything remotely alternative. I would have come away empty handed after two hours if it hadn't have been for finding a specially remastered version of The Sisters Of Mercy's Floodland album that shouted at me to take home. I think that album will be making the album listening night this coming Tuesday.

At least the wantlist count has stayed at 928 for a day, seeing as I haven't found anything as yet to add to it, thankfully.

21st November 2014

Two parcels have been delivered today. The first one is a magazine called Debut from 1984 in which each edition came with a a compilation LP included. The magazine is 12" x 12" and looks like a gatefold album with a thick booklet in the middle. The reason this magazine is the collecting list is because of the inclusion of a Colourbox track called Fast Dump (very likely a song about an emergency poo).

The second package was a US pressing of the Modern English album Ricochet Days also from 1984. That has moved my wantlist count down to....928. That would have been 2 down, except that the German compilation called Formel Eins Space Hits I found out today, has a cassette version not currently in the list. 2 down and then 1 up, I'm still yo-yo-ing. Oh well, there's a local record fair on tomorrow, let's see what that brings

20th November 2014

A couple of days ago I discovered a copy of Ultra Vivid Scene's 12" single of Mercy Seat on ebay. There's a  version with a green sleeve with a circular hole cut from the centre of the sleeve and another sleeve of the same release that has no hole cut but in grey. I have both of these, but the photo on ebay looked like a version that should not have existed, a green sleeve with no hole cut. I asked the vendor what colour the sleeve was, just in case the camera shot was not colour accurate (which can happen) and the answer came back a resounding GREEN. I had little to lose, it was only selling for a couple of pounds, so the risk was worth taking....

It wasn't green, it was grey, of course. Even my photo of it (above) comes out green. Oh well.
So you would think that my want list would be at the same number, but no, it's gone up by one. Today's count is 929 because of a fellow collector called berndhugo who has recently acquired Birthday Party's Junkyard album on a UK cassette, which many believed didn't exist. Berndhugo was good enough to send me some pictures and I added it to discogs, hence the extra release.

Let us see what tomorrow brings....humph!

19th November 2014

Dragged myself into work this morning, still feeling a little spaced out, that's man flu for you, nastiest disease in the world. I actually dropped three from my wish list today, as one release on discogs was added incorrectly and so was deleted, WooHoo

Waiting for at work was the Birthday Party album Junkyard, this time the New Zealand vinyl version and also a test pressing of Wolfgang Press' single King Of Soul.

Count is now down to 928. Some more beauties to get to me yet, but the purchases are starting to dry up. I need to find some more releases and pretty quick


17th November 2014

In typical fashion, when everything I purchase I have delivered to work, I haven't been into work today because I'm chocked up to the eyeballs with a cold. So no work, no pick up of deliveries and nothing to add to this blog as promised. Fate has a funny sense of humour doesn't it? Chances are, there are deliveries on my desk at work that I can't tell you about yet. Between the running nose, sneezes, coughs headache and sore throat, is a desperation to get back to work. There are some lovely purchases making it's way to me, let's just hope I can shake the sweats and get back to work....watch this space....a bit longer


14th November 2014

As promised, I'm here again. Today has been a typical day. I started of with a want list of 928 and although I have had a delivery today...the count now is....931. Today's post revealed a Birthday Party CD of the album Prayers On Fire.

All looked good. It looked like the UK release with the catalogue number CAD 104 CD, bought from ebay. The only give away that it wasn't the original 1988 release, was the matrix number near the centre of the CD itself that has GAD104CD on it. The GAD code was used by 4AD to re-release lots of albums in the 90's with. So any release with a GAD code is not an original. Buyers beware. Darn it! This morning I also found another three items not on my list and I had to reluctantly add them. It almost feels painful to find yet another release that I don't have listed in my wish list. Oh well, lets see what Monday brings

Tour De France, Tour De York, Tour De Record Shops

Last weekend I had the great privilege to stay in the city of York to watch the Tour De France stage start from there. I always love seeing the Tour De France, having watched it on the television since 1985. But this was also a great opportunity to go and pay a visit to all the record shops in York. On the Friday I had made a trip to a local record shop at home first. It's an interesting shop, thousands upon thousands of records, cd's and cassette tapes.

As an experienced record shop visitor, I can usually tell quite quickly if a record shop is going to be of any use to a 4AD collector. Cocteau Twins and Pixies have to be the easiest and most prolific releases to find. If a shop doesn't have any releases of these two artists, there's a very good chance that there is practically no chance of anything more obscure such as Dead Can Dance or Clan of Xymox. It's not a hard and fast rule, but is an easy indicator. I was determined that weekend to put aside my previous judgement of UK record shops and thoroughly search through them to see if my prejudice was justified or not.

The local record shop did actually have some Cocteau Twins and Pixies, so things were looking up. But the first hurdle was the lack of discipline in organising the records into their sections. I found 4AD stuff under Goth, Indie labels, rock and 80's pop. It would take days to go through every section on display, so some sort of common sense was needed. There were about seven or eight Cocteau Twins releases, of which The Spangle Maker was three of those, all the same (except for one which was an original embossed - at the same price as the other two). All of the release were English pressings of which I had all of them. Except for Cocteau Twins and Pixies, there wasn't anything else and certainly nothing outside of the typical English releases.

Knowing that there was a real mix up in the discipline of releases between the sections, it meant that it was likely worth going through some of the unlikely sections to try and find a hidden gem. But I always find that kind of search soul destroying. Looking through masses of 80's pop, with tons and tons of cheap chart topping drivel, selling at 50 pence a time (which is still overpriced), with practically no surprises and having done this so many times before, getting sick of seeing the same faces, the same graphics as hundreds of previous searches over decades of record collecting, the will is sapped.

After a couple of hours searching, I leave empty handed, not even close to finding anything of interest. Bearing in mind that I have over 930 items in my want list and the fact that I'm also interested in picking up anything else of interest that I may find. The word disappointed doesn't even come close.

At least I had the weekend in York to look forward to and a list of five record shops to go and interrogate.

With my phone and a list of handwritten post codes I set off for the first shop in the centre of the city. There were two close by on the list and while looking for the first, actually found the second instead. It didn't look promising. In the shop window was a selection of classical and jazz releases and I feared that it would be a more specialised shop than I was looking for. Inside, there was jazz music playing and first couple of sections were listed as Jazz and Classical. The main reception was all CD's and along the back wall was a section of Rock, Indie and Pop. The rack had a few hundred CD's and was very helpfully split into lots of artists and an alphabetical catch all of every thing else. In about a half hour I had looked through them all and found one compilation CD of The Birthday Party, Mutiny / The Bad Seed EP. I couldn't remember if I had this already, so bought it anyway. At the back of the shop was a small collection of vinyl of which there was nothing of interest at all.

Across the road was another of the listed record shops. Entering it though, it looked more like a brick a brack shop, than a record shop. There was about four boxes of vinyl, three of which was all new and sealed stuff. The fourth box just had charity shop quality stuff, easy listening and pop albums. No luck there then.

Another shop was right in the very centre of the city. My lovely long suffering wife had brought a book with her and it came in handy as the shop actually had a little bench outside in the sunshine, just perfect for the record shopper widow. I always thought that shops miss out on a treat here. Record shops should have a widow waiting area with tea, biscuits and usual shopping magazines. Clothes shops should have a bloke waiting area, with a games console or a tv with Rambo or some such crap on, that way the other half can spend more time shopping guilt free.

This third shop had a couple of thousand pieces of vinyl, with no sections at all, except for a couple of boxes of dance 12"s. I started at A and worked my way through. I could tell from the start that the shop wasn't going to have much. By the finish of C and no Cocteau Twins, my expectations had fallen completely. The whole shop had nothing at all.

The third shop on the list was on a small lane, again right in the centre of the city, but was up the attic of another shop and supposedly easy to miss. I couldn't find it though. The lane only had three shops on it and none of them had anything going up into an attic room. Another record shop bites the dust.

The last one was about two miles out of town. It was a lovely red hot and sunny day, so we walked to it. I hoped for a good record shop. Being out of town probably meant better rent and therefore a bigger shop and a better chance at some luck.

After a grueling hot walk in the sunshine, we finally got to the record shop in a little York suburb. Once again, the sections were poorly disciplined. There was a punk / new wave section that had no Cocteau Twins at all, which was a bad sign from the off. I asked the owner where I would likely find the stuff I was looking for and he pointed me at a bunch of boxes on the floor marked as 80's. The shop didn't have any surprises in it at all and was typical rock albums mostly. The owner moaned about his work experience youngsters he had in recently just to put the vinyl into order and selections and I envisaged a couple of spotty teenagers without a clue of what they were sorting through as the owner sat around doing nothing at all while all his stock was a mess.

I left once again with absolutely nothing!

5 Record shops over a weekend and one CD bought. When I got home, I realised I had The Birthday Party CD, only I had the original and the purchased version bought in York was actually the re-release from around 2007, which looked almost identical except for the matrix on the disc itself. The telltale sign was a GAD number on the matrix against the CAD number on the sleeve. GAD was the number given to whole lot of 4AD re-releases.

I used to love going to record shops a couple of decades ago, but the experience is just not the same anymore, and I don't think the difference is from me. The record shops just don't have the stock or organisation to compete against the online competition even though online you also have to pay for postage as well. Maybe I'll give one of the large fairs a go?

Dead Can Dance Resurrected

Well done to Slow Pulse Girl at  Nightmares On Wax  for winning the Clan of Xymox Blind Hearts 12" promo. Hopefully another competition will come up again soon, as collection duplication is a constant and ongoing issue.

The piece I did on the Bauhaus singles of Dark Entries was kind of the way I wanted to go with this blog. I wanted it to become a good source to find definitive listings of a release. Yet even at the stage I am at, I am struggling to complete a release with all of it's variations. I suppose it comes back to the question again, how far do you go? The Dark Entries collection of 7 versions that I listed does not include any test pressings, if any test pressings exist at all anymore.

I starting to think that maybe I should just bite the bullet and stick my neck out with a few releases and say "this is every version that exists". I'm just wary of making out I'm an arse that thinks he knows it all, when in fact we are all on a journey that constantly changes and cheats (sometimes).

Maybe I will start and add more now that the collection is starting to take a decent form. I'm currently at 596 items collected that doesn't include posters, postcards and oddities. I still have roughly 900 items left to collect that I know of (again not including non music formats). So I still have one hell of a way to go.

To add to this, I'm not exactly shutting myself off to other music in the process. Dead Can Dance have their new album out called Anastasis, which I just couldn't help but buy, and of course not just in one format either. The album came as:

"Exclusive Limited Edition Box Set (Edition of 2000); boxed in custom made deluxe hardbound book, embossed with band logo and album title, and featuring 8 specially designed pages of album art and lyric sheets. Autographed 6" x 8" lithograph artwork print; USB drive contains the full album in high fidelity 24bit digital audio and album artwork." 

I'm a sucker for it. I had to have it and, of course, I couldn't let the chance of having the double clear vinyl version pass me by either. So I spent £55 on both of them and then had to fork out over £18 extra to get them delivered. The price for a second hand copy of the limited edition CD has rocketed from its new price. This always happens generally when a limited stock runs out. Some of the stock gets bought by traders who bet on making a quick from the flurry of interest the new album has created. Demand is up but supply has dried out, perfect for a quick price hike. I suppose you can't blame a trader wanting to make a living and a trader's prices only reflect (mostly) the price the customer is prepared to pay. 

The Dead Can Dance Anastasis limited edition has already sold twice on discogs for over £130 and  there are 5 for sale at the moment for between £120 and £220. It's very likely that the price will fall as initial excitement wanes. 

The album itself is wonderful. It seems as though Brendan Perry and Lisa Gerrard are collaborating more as they did in the eighties. In later albums of Dead Can Dance the music was more separated by the two artists and less collaborated. But now they do seem to be working together more as the style of the album is of both artists. I also think that it is probably the most accessible of all the Dead Can Dance albums, an album that would be a good introduction to Dead Can Dance if you have never listened to them before.

It has whetted my appetite to see them live in October. The only issue I could have with this album is that the mastering seems rushed. I waited to give the album a listen until the vinyl was delivered. The sound quality of Vinyl far surpasses the sound quality of CD's or downloads, so I wanted to listen to it at its best. Unfortunately the sound was a little flat. At first I thought it was the vinyl mastering, as these days vinyl records are made from a digital recording, which is actually defeating the object of having it on vinyl. But the CD version is also a little flat, but perhaps not as obvious. It's such a pity as the music is just awesome. 

You never know, if the unmixed tracks have been kept a better mastering may be done in future. But don't let it put you off, to the average ear the mastering quality probably won't even be noticed. What's more important is that the music on Anastasis is incredible, give it a listen

http://www.deadcandance.com/main/

Win a Clan Of Xymox Promo and Feel Loved

Clan of Xymox are a difficult band to figure out. They started with real genius, pushed their luck a bit too far following trends instead of exploring and experimenting with what they were doing, flopped in a huge way, then tried to pick up where their invention was last dropped but finding some of the talent was gone. Of Course Clan of Xymox themselves would never agree this is correct, except most fans would agree that this is the simple but accurate depiction.

Don’t get me wrong, the re-invented Clan of Xymox aren’t rubbish, but they do lack a certain flair that set them apart from their counterparts. The biggest issue is the fact that there seems to be way too much ego in the way to have any accurate or factual history simply laid out about the band.

The first album Subsequent Pleasures was a self released album that has a shroud of mystery over it from the beginning. As mentioned in earlier blogs, it is rumoured that Ronny Moorings, the singer of Clan of Xymox, didn’t like the quality so threw away most of the 500 copies made. Whether this has any truth is difficult to prove, but these rumours have helped the original version become very collectable, fetching a handsome price.

Once signed to 4AD their first Official album that was released called Clan of Xymox. Again some interesting confusion is raised because the band were calling themselves just Xymox, a Tag, I suppose you could call it, that Ronny Moorings had given himself (a bit like Jonny Halfhead...although someone gave me that, I didn’t invent it). The first album title was supposed to be Clan of Xymox by the band Xymox. But in the understandable confusion the Clan Of.. stuck.

The debut album is very much in the vein of New Order. Quite dark, quite dancey and electronic, with hints of industrial, or what was to become industrial music. Detail was its greater hallmark. Interesting shifts and lots of little samples and noises keep you interested and adds an atmosphere and realism to the music. This was something for me which defined a difference between Tangerine Dream and Jean-Michel Jarre’s music. Tangerine Dream were session electronic musicians. They could bang out an album every six months. Their music had a handful of layers and was clever in its simplicity. But Jean-Michel Jarre’s albums took time in the production process of adding a very rich texture using many, many layers and tweaks which gave his music more depth and realism. Clan of Xymox has this depth and multi layers.

The next album took the same ideas from the first album and galvanised them. Medusa is a perfect album. The production is spot on and the mix balanced just right. The songs have interesting and unexpected twists. The lyrics are simple, but have an air of honesty that allows the user to relate and feel the mood without being patronised. The whole album feels shared and equal between the musicians, but it would seem that tensions were building, there were too many talents wrapped tightly into too small a space.

The next single was to be their last with 4AD before the band changed their name to what it was going to be originally “Xymox”. The single was Blind Hearts, which was released on 4AD and then also released on the label the band moved to, Wing Records. This song was to feature on the next album Twist Of Shadows. Twist Of Shadows is the Medusa album made more accessible. It’s a lot lighter and more pop orientated, which is where the inner band tensions were. The band had a good balance of experimentalism and a desire to be popular with Medusa, with Twist of Shadows the urge to be popular was starting to win out at the detriment of experimentation.

Twist of Shadows is probably the most accessible as an introduction to Clan Of Xymox. Because of its desire for popularity, it is a little dated with a typical ‘80’s sound.

 

The band went on towards the pull of dance music in the early nineties like bands were trying to do at the time, latching onto an emerging house and techno scenes. But this drive for success and trend contributed to their downfall and by the mid nineties, the talents within Clan Of Xymox (or Xymox as they were now called) where pulling so hard in several directions that the whole band split apart.

Eventually the singer, Ronny Moorings, was left alone in the band. He decided to start from scratch and return to the dark moody, industrial sound that had originally defined Clan Of Xymox. Although this has been a partial return to original form, you can tell a lot of the talent is no longer with Clan Of Xymox. I have only heard the first album of the resurrected Clan Of Xymox called Hidden Faces and then a couple of later singles and I wasn’t too impressed. But then my musical period of experimentation from the early nineties was swamped with wannabe Sisters Of Mercy bands that got so repetitive and predictable, so when I hear another band doing the repetitive and predictable and also sound like they are trying to mimic the Sisters of Mercy, I automatically switch off.

Maybe the more recent Clan Of Xymox offers more hope, I don’t know, maybe one day I’ll give them yet another go.

There is another interesting psychological twist to my tale and Clan Of Xymox that works against myself picking the band up again. In the early nineties, I loved the first three Clan Of Xymox albums. When going to alternative and goth nights several times a week I would proclaim how great they were with the DJ’s and event organisers constantly and even lend copies for them to listen to. But as always, it fell on deaf ears because they weren’t in vogue, and everyone wanted to listen and dance to the same predictable stuff. Now they have become the goth underground darlings, with everyone proclaiming how they loved this stuff years ago. Bollocks! So I can’t help but be annoyed and want to steer clear of this fickle trend and current opinion shite. That doesn’t help trying to keep and unbiased opinion either

So to commemorate this great band, and of course because of the fact that I am a dimwit and yet again I have in my possession two versions of this release...I am once again giving away a 4AD release. Well that’s not strictly true as this version isn’t on 4AD, but you can forgive me for that. The winner this time round will receive a copy of Xymox’s 12” single of Blind Hearts. This is the US Promo version on Wing Records that was the bridge between Clan Of Xymox and Xymox. An interesting piece of history.
I will even post it for free. Feel the love.....

Please don’t enter just to sell it...that’s not the point.

 

For a chance to win this lovely article, just friend me on Facebook and send me a message telling me you want it, because you just want it OK! One lucky winner will be chosen at random by picking the entrant that shouts the loudest

I’m Jonny Halfhead and you have been a wonderful audience

It's all Greek to me...

A number of things this last couple of weeks. I found a guy on ebay selling a load of 4ad stuff. Not just a handful, but a boat load of stuff. I was curious, so asked him why he was selling what was obviously a collection. It turns out he had bought the whole lot as a collection from someone else to fill just one or two gaps in his own collection, then was selling the rest on. This has been a nightmare. A whole collection being sold off one release at a time, with at times, only 4 minutes between each item finishing on ebay. I wish a had a couple of thousand pounds spare, but I don’t. So I have had to watch many fantastic items disappear from view without even a close sniff at getting them.

Bidding has to be tempered I think. It’s too easy to get caught up in the frenzy and pay out a ridiculous price for something because at the time you feel desperate not to lose out. But it is surprising how many things come around again. From this lot of auctions a Colourbox release went for over £100. It’s hard to quantify paying anything over £20 for a colourbox release, they come up so often and so cheaply.

In the last couple of weeks this humble blog passed 10,000 views since its inception. Well.... what can I say? Ah, ah, bloody ‘ell, no way, I can’t believe it....or comments along those lines. I’m lost for words for you wonderful readers, thank you so much for your company. I hope I can keep you entertained for a few years to come.

There has been an interesting new addition to the collection. Staying with the Bauhaus theme, it’s the album “Burning from the Inside”. After the first album with 4AD and a couple of singles, Bauhaus moved to the parent label, Beggars Banquet. This is what 4AD was kind of set up for, find talent, sign it, promote it and if it takes off, pass to the parent label. This only happened with Bauhaus, why other 4AD artist didn’t follow the original plan I don’t know.

So the next handful of albums were under Beggars Banquet. But a few strange anomalies appeared from Greece. Rumour has it that the distributors in Greece didn’t have any Beggars Banquet labels but did have 4AD ones, so used them. But the labels are quite unique for 4AD, so I’m not sure of this explanation. Whatever the reason, the record label on the Greek album has 4AD labels.

It would seem the Greek Mask album also has 4AD labels, but I haven’t acquired that one yet. The Greek Ziggy Stardust single also has 4AD labels

These make for lovely little collection pieces.

Moving on... after the last blog entry about the seven versions of the Bauhaus’ Dark Entries I had managed to piece together, and of course after all the praise I generally give Discogs, this week the seven entries I had carefully tried to list in Discogs have been hacked down to six entries. This is in accordance with the Discogs rules that states that only separately defined releases are to be listed and that this does not include matrix variations. This has become very annoying, as it becomes difficult to track matrix variations within Discogs. The only way to get this changed is to argue a lot in a forum about it...humph

Well if anyone has a Discogs account, have a read of my argument and enter into the discussion if you wish
http://www.discogs.com/help/forums/topic/344093
I shall be back soon. I’ve fluffed up yet again and bought a duplicate item, triple Doh..., so I may be giving away a Xymox promo 12”.
If you wish, have a look for me on Facebook and Twitter
Jonny Halfhead

Jonny Halfhead Requires Charitable Donations

I am very excited. I have been wanting to let tell you all what I have managed to acquire this week, but didn’t want to chance my luck until the item finally arrived safely and in one piece.

There are many releases that are exciting to acquire when collecting 4AD. Some are quite rare and yet fetch surprisingly low prices. Some are ridiculously priced, not only because they are rare, but also because they are very much sought after.

I remember a 4AD collector being asked what his most prized collection piece was. His answer was the My Captains single “History”. He had been struggling to find this single over a number of years and have never seen it once, not on ebay or at record fairs, nowhere. And yet I never had this problem and found a copy quite easily.

 

Probably the most expensive piece of 4AD to try and acquire is the “Lonely Is An Eyesore” compilation. This was a 4AD release from 1987. It came in a standard release of either LP, CD, cassette or video. This version of the LP was fantastic enough, with a strange fold out inner sleeve with all the 4AD releases listed so far in 1987, many already deleted. 4AD released a more limited edition of this LP. The limited version had a thick book inside with lots of great artwork and a second sleeve that folded out  like a tryptych. But then 4AD also created 100 copies of a wooden box, which had inside the LP, CD, cassette and video, with individual pieces of artwork created for the box inside. The plan was to give all the contributing artists a copy each, but some of the artists didn’t want their copy. Of the 100 made only about half were taken by individuals in 4AD. The rest then got sold to the general public.

 

A few years ago I saw one of these go up for sale on ebay for about £400. I didn’t have the money then, and I also found it difficult to justify spending that kind of cash on one music item. A couple of years later another sold for just over £1000, again on ebay. I didn’t even see this one until it had gone. Now if you see one for sale it’s generally going for around the £2000 mark. I have seen one for sale at this price and it becomes hard to try and justify spending that kind of money.

Unfortunately, this is not the item I have acquired as yet.

This is what I have just got my hands on.

 





This is the debut release from Clan of Xymox. Released in 1983 and self financed, it has quite a story behind it. Getting behind the story though seems full of controversy and ego. Don’t take my word for it, see this great biography on the story of Clan of Xymox here

www.unruhr.de/

The reason why Subsequent Pleasures has become so sought after, is because “The Band” decided to destroy most of the 500 copies. Why is the ultimate question! Nevertheless, the few copies that remain fetch a good price and are generally difficult to get hold of for less than £200.

Ouch, I’ve think I’ve just had a wallet attack!

To sweeten the pain, when the item arrived in the post, I was delighted to find inside a set list from a Clan of Xymox gig, with a backstage pass stuck to it and signed by the band members. Finishes it off nicely I think!
 

Well at least this is one of the more expensive items on the collection grabbed. I see myself fortunate I didn’t decide to collect Led Zeppelin or something similar, otherwise I would need another mortgage.....

An Interview With Pieter Nooten

I don’t really get excited about celebrity, people are only human after all. Most celebrities are famous nowadays for having no talent whatsoever. I do have a great respect for some people who are talented though and show signs of being more than the average human. I then add greater respect for those talented humans that also have some semblance of realism and modesty. So that is probably why I don’t admire that many people as you can probably imagine. I find most people with talent have an equally sized ego to go along with it.

Don’t get me wrong, I know from personal experience, that in order to be able to perform in front of peers, you need to have some sense of ego to be able to pull it off successfully. There is nothing worse than watching an artist that has no faith in their self or their art. Then, of course, there is the matter of living in a world full of people with talentless ego’s who have an insane jealousy of those with real talent.

The saying goes that history is written by the victors. In the modern world is seems to be written by those with the biggest mouth and the biggest ego. Thankfully, in the modern age, there are also other folk with a passion for truth and an eye that can see past the egos and feather displays.

Were am I going with this, you may ask? Well, one musician I greatly admire is Pieter Nooten. Pieter was one third of Clan of Xymox in the eighties. The Clan of Xymox album Medusa made my all time top ten albums (see previous blog entry). Pieter Nooten was the man who edged Clan of Xymox away from being just another goth band, or just from being New Order mark II. I am very fortunate to have been able to put a few questions to Pieter just this last week :

Before meeting Anke and Ronny (who formed Clan of Xymox), what kind of bands were you playing with?

When I was around 16 I used to play drums and later the bass guitar; always involved with local indie bands. Later I bought one of the first tascam 4track cassette recorders and got into composing.

Was there a clear direction in music style when you joined Anke and Ronny (Clan of Xymox), or did your sound develop?

I met them in Nijmegen in 1980 when they were a duo and we got on together immediately, being influenced by the same bands and sounds of the time. We desperately wanted to merge the new developments in music (affordable synths, drum machines, triggering etc.) with the new guitar music of that era.

Was Subsequent Pleasures self released? Why were most of the original copies of Subsequent pleasures destroyed?

I was not involved with the making (or destruction) of SP.

We met Dead Can Dance when they toured The Netherlands for the very first time and Brendan introduced us to Ivo Watts.

How did you personally feel about the way the band was represented by 4AD’s artwork?

They came up with the basic design. We were great fans of 23 Envelope.

Brendan and I became quite good friends for a while; he was –just like me- a big admirer of medieval and baroque music as well as more contemporary minimalist composers like Arvo Part. Brendan and I should have worked together but it never happened.

What was it like to work for 4AD? Did you have any good relationships still going today?

Oh yes. Friends for life I would say, even though I may not speak to them on a daily basis. I still keep in touch with Brendan, Vaughan and Ivo.

On the Medusa album there are some wonderful, even progressive, changes and styles, which is unlike most of the similar genres typical output of the time. Where did this influence come from, and were these non-traditional methods of non verse - chorus structures universally enjoyed within the band, or did it cause tensions?

At that time I was massively impressed and influenced by contemporary classical music as well as the more experimental pop acts (Tuxedo Moon, Peter Gabriel, Kate Bush, This Heat etc…). I definitely wanted Xymox to develop an influential and ground breaking sound. But Ronny wanted to become famous and produce more commercial sounding material.

Did you have any influence in producing the Medusa album?

Absolutely. I wrote a lot of the material for that album (AND the first). At the time we were all involved with the mixing and production of the albums. john fryer was the main producer and we listened to him but also came up with our own suggestions. Sometimes we would all be hanging over the mixing desk, one changing e.q's and someone else adding velocity etc

How did the work for This Mortal Coil work come about, what are your memories of that experience?

Ivo had a tape of demos of me and simply asked me to deliver that particular song for TMC. John Fryer, Ivo and me recorded it in London.

Have you found a greater appreciation recently for your work done with Clan of Xymox, now that the more recent incarnation of the band shows a distinct lack of your flare?

What can I say… I do get mails now and then. I am proud of what I was capable of at such young age and happy that this inspiration has never left me. On the contrary, it has evolved. My music becomes more and more mature and drifts slowly further and further away from pop music.

How much did you contribute to Anka’s album? What was it like to work with her again? Are there any plans to work with with her again in the future?

We both worked on Cocoon Time when we both lived in London and everything seemed to work out, before the record company that signed us sort of collapsed, as a prequel to what was going to happen to most of them later on…Anka and I have always worked together pretty nicely; we did most of the technical stuff with Xymox.

Absolutely. Mind you, I lost interest in most pop music at a young age already and my influences have always been kind of different. I do NOT have anyone in pop music to look up to so I am not trying to sound like anybody or anything. The music I write now, comes freshly from or should I say to, an open mind.

I have seen references that say you are the father of Dark wave, do you see any truth in that? Do you have any pride in your contribution?

I have never said such! Dark wave? What is that to begin with? Ha-ha.

It’s more cutthroat and backstabbing now than it was back then. But also, there is more opportunities then ever before. There is no money to be made from albums, and maybe that’s a good thing. Artists need to get out of their comfy zone to get noticed.

What are you working on now and what is inspiring you?

I have almost finished my next album. Nothing inspires me more then wonderful music but I am afraid it’s mainly music written centuries ago. This said, it doesn’t mean I am closed of from the present. I keep a close ear to any new music that’s out there.


To find out more about Pieter Nooten :

http://www.pieternooten.com/home.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pieter_Nooten

http://www.4ad.com/artists/pieternootenandmichaelbrook

http://www.4ad.com/artists/clanofxymox

The music industry has never been kind to it’s artists, do you think the music industry is any worse today?

Is a more ambient direction a subconscious path or a consequence of age?

What are your memories of Dead Can Dance from those early encounters? Have you ever thought of working with Brendan Perry or Lisa Gerrard?

Do you recall how Clan of Xymox became involved with 4AD?

4AD Top Ten Albums

So after I gave you my all time top ten albums, you lucky people, I thought I would share the pick of my top ten 4AD albums. In rough order of release, these are the albums that have led me to want to collect 4AD. They show a great diversity of style for release from the same label.

So here goes -

Bauhaus - In the Flat Field

One of the enjoyments I get from music, is finding something different, something new that is totally different to anything I have heard before. Most of these albums did that for me. I discovered Bauhaus in the late eighties, by which time they had completely gone as a band and split into their separate projects. The first Bauhaus album I discovered was Mask. Mask was led by David J’s bass, a sound at the time I was obsessed with. Bauhaus did it differently to everyone else though. In time I appreciated this debut album more than Mask. It has an eccentrically English feel to it, unhinged and steeped in a old world of perversion behind closed doors. Steampunk?

The Birthday Party - Junkyard

Junkyard hurt your ears. It was loud, unapologetic, raw, and wonderfully disjointed. The birthday party were a rip off of The Pop Group, but took the idea further. In a similar way to Siouxsie Sioux’s vocals, all the instruments sounded out of tune and yet together somehow worked. It sounded ,on first passing, as though a bunch of 5 year olds were playing punk, until you notice interesting time signatures, mad silences, and complicated runs. The more you listen, the more you enjoy and love hating it at the same time.

Clan of Xymox - Medusa

Le Mystère Des Voix Bulgares - Le Mystère Des Voix Bulgares (Volume 1)

I started listening to this only recently as I continued to pick up more pieces to the collection. Two things seem amazing about this album. On the first few plays, you can hear some of the sounds that must have influenced Lisa Gerrard as she heard the folk music of many cultures as she grew up. The second surprise is the picture that forms in your head of the quite young choral singers that must be making up this choir, the voices sound so youthful and alive. I got quite a shock to see the photo’s of the general choir member, generally middle aged and showing faces of wisdom and experience. Hardly the angelic innocence that washes over you as a listener. You can only be impressed that this sound is the countries folk music. It’s a reflection of the geographic place Bulgaria finds itself, stuck between East and West mixed with Baltic influences with a disregard for the 12 note western standard.

Various - Lonely is an Eyesore

This album is a 4AD legend. It nicely wrapped up 4AD at a point just before the introduction of a new direction for 4AD with the signing of The Pixies. The whole album flows like a concept piece, which is remarkable to say each artist is different in their own way and yet the album feels as though it keeps a constant theme running through it. It changes mood from a sampled covered opening track from Colourbox which wakes you up and pulls you straight in into This Mortal Coil’s mellow Acid, Bitter and Sad. Yet the transition seems seamless. The Colourbox track may be brash, but it still retains enough calm within it to allow This Mortal Coil to follow. This sums up the whole album, nothing is out of place. This also came in several formats, the original LP had a wallet like sleeve, with all the 4AD releases so far, listed on the inside with a key as to whether still available or deleted. There was also a limited edition release, which had a 4 sleeve foldout inner and 12” colour book all in a card box sleeve. Then there was the ultimate 4AD release, some would say, a wooden box version of the album. Limited to 100 copies, 70 of which were given to 4AD band members, staff and the like and only 30 sold to the general public. This was a wooden box containing the LP, cassette, CD and video of the album, along with individual pieces of artwork unique to every box.

Lush - Scar

This was only a mini-album, but still an eye-opener for me. At the time, Indie music was taking off in a big way in the UK and hidden within this surge was a style called shoegazing. I personally never liked the shoegazing scene. For me it had too much of a fixation with the beat generation of the sixties, which never did anything for me, yes, even the Beatles. Although Lush were kind of lumped in with the rest of the shoegazing crowd, I heard something strangely new. This was the first time I had heard loud fast guitar music mellowed with a soft slow and sensual female vocal floating along the top of the white noise. There was also a track called Etherial, and to me this title summed up the music completely. Now the term Ethereal is used to describe even Dead Can Dance, which I still class as world music. Ethereal still conjures up for me what Lush introduced me to, the musical battle of noise and angelic harmony. They never did this again and got sidetracked into Britpop

Pixies - Doolittle

In 1990 in the UK, everyone was going Pixies mad. This was their fourth album, but this one got them a lot of attention in the UK. I had never heard anything like this before, it was completely new, had a sexual depravity akin to Bauhaus and was also mentally unhinged. Doolittle was a revolution in music for me like punk was more than a decade before, yet it took nearly two decades for everyone to slowly realise it. When you heard Nirvana a couple of years after this, Nirvana sounded like very poor, quick fix imitators to me. I never rated Nirvana either. In the UK, this had a special release at independent record shops which had the LP with a 12” book, a set of 12 postcards all in a Pixies Doolittle plastic bag. Very nice

Dead Can Dance - Aion

This Mortal Coil - Blood

I listened to this constantly in 1992. This album can keep you gripped musically, but it’s also fascinating as a project. There’s so much to find out about This Mortal Coil. The session musicians are from all over 4AD and beyond on this album and many of the songs are cover versions. The track that always leaves me close to tears is the cover of the Byrds “I Come and Stand at Every Door”. An individuals musical history of discovery is always interesting. I heard this version years before I heard the Byrds original version. This Mortal Coil’s interpretation of this song is incredibly moving and powerful. The original version is very good, but very much of its time in a sort of hippy, preachy way. So I prefer This Mortal Coil’s version. But is that because I heard that one first??


Lisa Gerrard - The Mirror Pool

Lisa Gerrard works on a level unlike no-one else. A true independent and individual artist. She has a way of expressing music that is deeply spiritual and beautiful without having to use any traditional language. To see Lisa perform live is a opportunity not to miss. This was Lisa’s first solo album after a career as one half of Dead Can Dance. Originally released on CD, it was later possible to get the album on vinyl, which is a real treat. The Mirror Pool is possibly less accessible to a pop fed audience, even less so than Dead Can Dance possibly are. But as with all great music, time devoted to it is paid back in multitudes. I always wonder when I hear music like this, how can anyone that says they love music, not be swept away with an album like this?

Most of these albums are from the first decade. Although many believe the nineties were 4AD’s best decade, I feel the nineties were the turnaround in music, where the number of artists shot through the roof, but the diversity fell dramatically. This was typified even in 4AD.

I would recommend any of these albums, the Lonely Is An Eyesore compilation would be fine introduction though.

Until the next post, thanks for taking the time to read through a man’s dribbling fondness.