How Not To Run A Record Label Part 4
2015 - July to December
Trying to recall exactly where were at with the label in the middle of 2015 is lost in the mists of memory. What is clear, looking at the back catalogue, is that we were about to expand our reach a lot further, sadly without the success that ought to follow such ambition.
Ian and Neil Moss returned with another single at the beginning of July. A laid back smooth affair with jazzy tinges. Ian said “The novels of Jim Thompson have given me pleasure and inspiration over several decades , I recently informed a psychiatrist that I identified strongly with Lou Ford the central character in ' The Killer Inside Me ' , this is an imagining of inhabiting said characters mindset.” Didn’t sell at all, oddly, I thought it was very good.
The latest instalment in the Ion / Loop series saw the duo dealing with heightened emotions. 'Hog and Bone' is set beautifully by Loop, somewhere between wistful and bitter , whilst Ion takes umbrage at someone hell bent on a destructive spree that eliminates all beauty and wonder,' Go for the throat', is about the anger of a man who has bottled up and repressed his emotions for too long. He gives himself a stern lecture and tells himself it is time to unleash his animalistic self. Dusty Moonan said “This Is f*cking brilliant”. Andy/Moff Quayle said “Gorgeous. They make a perfect duo. Ion is like an old testament prophet, Loop is an orchestra of angry psychics. Album's going to be boogie treat”. A threatened album never emerged but we are left with perfect examples of pop-punk.
They had been promising it for a while and Andy/Moff and Ian/Eon finally got together for a single. They had appeared together with Loop at a gig at The Crescent and a bond had been formed. Lyrics were sent to Moff. Moff returned with some music. I fettled the elements into something and then sent them back to Moff. Moff sprinked them with Eddodi dust after baking them in moist caterpillar juice for several days. We had a cautionary tale of life in the Antipodes, and an internal dialogue about the process of catabasis and entropy. Utterly unique and rather marvellous.
Bob Stow and I began the Auster Boys project back in 1983 over beers at the NALGO rooms in Northampton. Our mutual admiration of New York writer Paul Auster gave us a name and inspired a form of presentation built around psycho-geography. Bob became Auster South and I became Auster North. He would send tapes of spoken word and I would add music. I had hours of tapes which needed digitising and the intention was to release the back catalogue over time and also do some new stuff. All of the recordings were very basic and needed a lot of restoration. Whilst this was underway I collated and remixed a series of instrumental sketches that were originally recorded as part of the "Last Rites Of The Dog Tired Boys" sessions in the mid 90s. Guitar plays a part in this material. I was never a great player but I could coax some atmospheric sounds out of my Yamaha with the help of a Roland Echo Pedal and an Ibanez Tube Screamer. A lot of this was recorded live to tape using a fancy recording set up that cost a lot of money but was only used for around six months before going into storage. Before I acquired Ableton I was using Sony Acid Pro which was not very user friendly but had some interesting elements. Most of this stands the test of time. I called it the Fabulous Auster Boys but essentially it’s a solo release. The Auster Boys would return properly in due course.
Whilst I was doing that Ian got back together with old chum from Hamsters days Jon Rowlinson for a single which features the amazing instrumental prowess of the latter. Ian is both playful and menacing on this one. Great fun and stunning bass work from Jon. The title Strangler Jon reflected his love of the band of the same name.
Ian and myself were still producing single tracks on a regular basis. For some reason I decided to call myself U-Bob for the next release. I also thought it was time to demonstrate I could still write songs and delivered a tuneful pop ditty to Ian who delivered delicious melancholic lyrics with a vocal performance to match. Evening sunset is a reflection on ageing and mortality , echoing Dylan Thomas in "do not go gentle into the night" mode , rather than raging at the dying of the light Mr Morph fixes it with a steely gaze and states, “I'm not ready yet!.” I can’t remember why I decided to do the weird dubby bit at the end.
July concluded with another single. Ian was joined by The Rusty Nails (me again in another guise). Ian said “Clown time and Under Pressure were written and recorded in a 24 hour period spent drinking and thinking , both are approached light-heartedly whilst not shirking more serious underlying subject matter. Clown Time is a message to a friend ' pissing his life away'. The message is ' time to pull up your socks'. Under pressure was inspired by taking my medication to help get me through the day.” The vocals weren’t mastered quite right but the intent was spot on. There’s an arresting glitchy feel to both tracks which either demonstrates ineptitude or a particular understanding of unusual time signatures.
STAGGS were back in August with a masterpiece. Four absolutely stunning tracks brimming with ideas, replete with dark sardonic humour, self deprecating, and relentlessly regional in a North Eastern way. Scott was enjoying himself, you could tell, wrapping the whole parcel in a self referential mythology. Big Jack is one of he best football songs every written! Sunset Over Aldi is a tragi-comic soap opera of high quality which reflects the desolation of austerity.
More song-writing from me next - chords and such - a trio of songs badged as Ion-Morph. A great tribute to Roy Buchanan - Ian has a skill in telling tales of music heroes, perfect little histories summing up careers in a five minute song. You Fool was a song I wrote in the 1970s about a school friend who ruined his life through his inability to control his impulsive behaviour, the chord sequence survived but Ian took the words and improved them. Last Man Standing I can’t remember doing at all but it sounds good and we were back to the less structured stuff. Ian having a rant about the music biz - something he would do on a regular basis.
A single followed from IKMRAO - the initials of our names - again this one is lost in the mists of time but it sounds rather good - moody stuff. This and the surrounding singles would have benefited from being collected as an album, I think the impact would have been better.
I met Dave Hammond in 2012 at a gig at the Kings Arms in Salford. He had travelled up from Haverhill to see the first performances by legendary Manchester band The Distractions in over 30 years. An affable chap from Hull with a love of cricket and music - a kindred spirit and a fellow DJ. We began a dialogue and started sharing music between Salford/Manchester and the wider Cambridge Area. He recommended a number of bands which I began playing on my radio show. He drew my attention to a female fronted rock/pop band called Bouquet of Dead Crows. A bit out of our label comfort zone but it sounded damn good. I ran it by Ian - he concurred. The first of a long partnership between Salford and Cambridge which resulted in a huge number of releases and some gigs.
Monkeys In Love…..cast your mind back to part 1 of this tale where Steve and Laura from the band helped us out with our first release It was time to return the favour. Hitherto the band had released music on VPL - you really must check out their excellent album Live In Stoke Newington (see below) - but they let us have this one. They said “The Superselling Sounds Of The Monkeys In Love is a round-up of some actual jingles that we’ve made for various things and some mock jingles that we’ve made for fun. It’s also a twist on the idea of a “best-of” compilation, in that some of the tracks are re-purposed versions of some of our more popular songs that we’ve either re-recorded or remixed and now sport exciting new lyrics about radio shows and stuff. Most of the EP was recorded by Steve between March and July 2015, but track three comprises of material recorded between June 2012 and July 2015”. We loved Monkeys In Love and we miss them!
Three more singles followed from Ian and me, under various guises. As I said earlier we should have really done an album. We were still in a post Kill Pretty flux I guess and we needed to find an identity - that would come eventually. Pending that three tracks that summed up the state of the nation and a sort of celebration of a political change which would eventually fail. The latter two were both for charity releases focusing on Homelessness and the extant crisis in the Yemen. Somewhat depressing to consider nothing much has changed since then other than everything costs a lot more than it used to.
Poppycock are a collective of musician's and artists from Manchester. They formed in 2012 playing their first gig at The Hippodrome in Hulme followed shortly by an 'Unpeeled' gig promoted by Tuff life Boogie at a great venue called Gullivers on Oldham Street, in the city centre. This was their first release apart from a track on the Salford Streets album. Una Baines (of The Fall of course, as well as Blue Orchids) is the guiding hand. The line-up of the band at this point in their history was blessed with two outstanding vocalists - the previously mentioned Rose Niland and Ann-Marie Crowley who went on to work with The Speed of Sound. Aidan Cross appears in the video.
At this point I had sustained a nasty ankle fracture and was in hospital for a week and then housebound for three months before casts were changed and removed and then I was in rehab/physiotherapy until the end of the year. On an August Bank Holiday weekend when everyone was out having fun what could a poor boy do except to create an album of quirky electronic sounds. The inspiration for the tone/feeling of much of this was the 1975 Miles Davis in Japan live recordings. Much of it was improvised on the fly which I think gives it a freshness. Mr Moss provided some voices for the music.
Another one from Bouquet of Dead Crows followed, a teaser single from an upcoming album. And another video, we were getting slick.
The third IKMRAO offering was another standard pop chord sequence affair bathed in layers of synths with a very dark lyrics from Ian. Anti-pop? Drums could have been mixed better they are rather intrusive but overall a very atmospheric set of tunes.
A week later we released an album from Neil Moss as Nemo. Comparisons with John Fahey and Brian Eno were made. There were 22 minimalist pieces with a few sonic surprises thrown in for good measure. Some great variety across all of the tracks meant repeated listening was required to fully understand what was going on.
Who was Franco Bandini? Well it was Sam Smith - not that one - hence the need for a pseudonym. Stephen Doyle had introduced me to Sam after he had played his music with the band The Parish Church Fire on his Sonic Diary Show. Sam presented this one-off collection to us and we put quite a bit of effort into the marketing. The four songs are a nod to the author John Fante (his novels ‘1933 Was a Bad Year’, ‘Ask the Dust’ and ‘Wait Until Spring, Bandini’ providing obvious inspiration). The artwork depicts John Fante himself, with an added semicolon used a symbol of hope for those suffering with depression, anxiety and thoughts of self-harm, the underlying engine room of the themes presented on this record. Franco made only a few live appearances I think, one was supporting Dave Graney and Poppycock at the Kings Arms in Salford the following year.
We ended October with a milestone - our 100th release - presenting a selection of our artists with old, new and renewed tracks. All proceeds would go towards Mary’s Meals charity. It was sort of a “Greatest Hits” album with a few new things added on and is a good snapshot of what we were about at the time.
November delivered an album from Bouquet of Dead Crows. The line-up at the time was Antoinette Cooper : Vocals, Neil Bruce : Guitars, Ukulele, Graeme Clarke : Bass, Acoustic Guitar and Andrew Coxall : Drums, Percussion & Programming. It’s a great collection which brings emotionally charged melodic passages together with high octane hard rock sections. Neil’s love of Pearl Jam seems to me in hindsight to be influencing, at least in part, this music, but there is something very English about the set as well.
Hamsters had been back in the studio with Ding and this resulted in an EP called "Branches" so named because it was created by the latest line up from the bands family tree , a stable line up too ! In fact the most stable ever Hamsters line up though still only 10 months old at the time. As I have said before the Hamsters tale has been well documented. A band that had been bloody and fractured , punctured by violently differing opinions. Despite that there remained a bond of brotherhood , pride in their work ran deep. This set perhaps is the best recorded output of the legendary band. The Stooges is clear influence but again that regional vibe comes through. Ian managed to get some CDs made as well - were we turning into a proper record label?
Hedgehog/Gobstopper was about emotional responses. Fear and loathing in one hand, anger and violent intent in the other, two visceral reactions to the ever encroaching dark hand of chance. This would be the last release by IKMRAO - things would move elsewhere in 2016 but take a few more years to finally consolidate into a proper vehicle. This recording was dedicated to those who had written us out of history over the last 12 months. We were contemptuous of the mealy mouthed trad. rock critics who seemed to think we were cheating because we weren’t in a band and didn’t play live. What amazes me, and still does to this day, is that I have an idea what Ian is going to do when I send him the music, but what comes back is at complete odds to my preconceived ideas. That’s why it doesn’t fit into some nicely manicured genre slot.
Scribnalls was a live audio-visual Eddodi lantern extravaganza which was first performed on 22nd August 2014 as part of The Queerwolf's Closet held at The Kings Arms, Bloom Street, Salford. I missed that event for some reason. Andy advised "Scribnalls, in terms of art, was an attempt to evoke the vitality and atmosphere of doodles, casual graffiti or simple drawings whose creators never considered them anything more than an aid to some explanation or other. Often just simple line drawings on a plain background or perhaps penknife marks etched into a burnished desktop, these images for me have always had such power that in studying them air starts to move around them and colours suggest themselves. The situations described in the drawings were intended to be elemental." Andy’s continued inventiveness still astounds me to this day.
December was upon us and we had once last new offering from the two of us. We said “Both Ion-Morph and Space Museum will be taking a long deserved rest after a very busy year so this is their last collaboration under those two names. They will re-emerge phoenix like from the ashes of the old year in 2016 with new things and sounds. Until then a last rage against the dying embers of 2015 dealing with ambition, disappointment, people and places we aren't allowed to go to”.
Ian wanted to end the year with a statement. He said “2015 has been a busy year for me. 26 singles or EPs plus three spoken word albums have been released outside of my commitments to the Hamsters, still I had a lot I wanted to get off my chest and with the invaluable help of my collaborators that has been done. I don't pretend that every release has worked as well as I'd have wished , time and financial constraints often hinder that objective , but each release has carried a sense of honesty which I hope has been evident. I appreciate because of the relentless pace of the releases some have slipped through the net so to speak , in light of that I have compiled this selection of what I believe to be some of the high points of my releases this year.” A limited run of CDs were made and completely sold out. It collected tracks Ian had made with Loop-aznavour, Johann Kloos, Passage of Time, Space Museum, Nemo, IKMRAO, Hard The Transition, Modal Roberts, Moff Skellington. A great synopsis of what we had achieved during the year. 95 physical copies were made.
December wasn’t quite over - STAGGS wanted to put out a Christmas single. The result was a piece of anarcho-pop which teetered on the edge of blasphemy. Imagine if Salvador Dali had been advising Abba or Dollar on material. Michael sent the stems and I created a dubby electro remix.
The year ended with four live releases - all recorded at the Crescent in Salford. Ex Levellers 5/ Calvin Party and Peel favourite John Donaldson had re-emerged as JD Meatyard and was curating a series of tours under the umbrella of “The Independents”. Sadly due to the ankle recovery process I missed the October gig. The line-up was excellent - our own Hamsters, the anti-folk genius of New Yorker Cannonball Statman, and JD Meatyard with Tamsin Middleton from AAAK, Mr Heart, Liines and more recently Vice Vera. What we have is a great historical document of a vibrant scene. I urge you to listen to Cannonball’s “Carlos Is On Fire” which coincidentally he has just released a new version of on his latest album.
Dusty Moonan had put together a new West Coast Sick Line band during 2015 which featured Dave Majoros – Drums & Backing Vocals, Nathan Page – Bass & Backing Vocals and Chaimaine Smith – Vocals & Keys. This recording captured the band in fine form at The Crescent in November with a stunning version of the anthemic “Have You Ever Been To The North?”
Our second year concluded with a mad rush of releases - it was definitely time for a short break!
TO BE CONTINUED