pop culture - TL:DR (That's Long, DID Read)

For Whom The Cowbell Tolls…

Thanks for this article are owed to Jamie Cowey (for the title) and the anonymous person whose enlightening comments on my original version of this have been incorporated into the section on Honky Tonk Woman…

AND SO…

The cowbell has presumably been part of the percussionist’s arsenal since early in the Jazz period, but it really came into its own in the 60s and 70s; but that’s not what this is really about.

‘Cowbell rock’ is, as well as being a hugely irritating electro classic by Pyramyth, almost a genre of its own, and this is a brief (mostly unresearched, therefore probably mostly wrong) glance through it.The obvious disclaimer here is that rock comes from blues and R&B music and therefore the true history of the cowbell in popular music should feature many more black musicians than are included here. But this isn’t a true history of anything really.

There are notable uses of the cowbell in mid-late 60s pop and rock, notably The Beatles’ Drive My Car (1966), which perhaps surprisingly prefigures the genre with its funky soul influence. The Spencer Davis Group’s equally soulful Gimme Some Lovin’ (1966) also features possible cowbell* although to my ears it sounds more like a tambourine. *see note on Honky Tonk Woman below

Iron Butterfly’s psychedelic rock monster In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida is often cited too (including by me elsewhere), though a proper listen to the song reveals that although there may be cowbell there (and it is certainly implied by the beat etc) it mostly sounds like straightforward snare/toms.

So to me (and I am happy to be put right on this), the art of true cowbell rock begins…

The Rolling Stones – Honky Tonk Women (1969) – before anything else, the intro is purely cowbell and from then on the song establishes cowbell rock; a rocking, yet laidback beat that holds everything else together. It was to prove hugely influential on the rock of the 70s and every revival thereof up until the present day. Interestingly (this is the part alluded to in the introductory note; thanks anonymous person), it is most likely erstwhile Spencer Davis Group producer Jimmy Miller, rather than the undoubtedly brilliant Charlie Watts, who plays the cowbell.

The 70s was the cowbell era and the classics are many and (to a degree) varied:

Free – All Right Now (1970) – picks up where Honky Tonk Women left off, with even bigger gaps in the riff; more room for cowbell. Most of Free’s early work should really be in the ‘implied cowbell’ list below

Velvet Underground – Sweet Jane (1970) – an honorable mention really; the cowbell (if there is any) is not very audible but this should be a cowbell classic based on the riff alone (more such nonsense below).

Slade – The Bangin’ Man (1974) – a tongue in cheek, slightly sad song, seemingly alluding to the memory problems the great Don Powell suffered when recovering from a horrendous car crash; but his drum/cowbell playing here is peerless.

David Bowie – Diamond Dogs (1974) – the sleazy death throes of Ziggy provide the

perfect backdrop for some classic cowbell courtesy (I presume) of the great Aynsley Dunbar. Interestingly, Bowie’s flirtation with cowbell rock outlasted his glam period; check out the Young Americans-era outtake I’m Divine for some classic cowbell with more of a funk flavour.

Nazareth – Hair of the Dog (1975) – basically a compendium of everything cheesy-but-good about mid-70s hard rock; and they came from Dunfermline!

Kiss – Calling Dr Love, Ladies Room, Take Me etc (1976) – Presumably Peter Criss got a new cowbell in 1975/6 because it’s all over the classic Rock & Roll Over album (released November 1976), giving it a looser, warmer feel than the also great but clinically orchestrated Destroyer (released March 1976, shockingly; When they were good, they were productive!)

Blue Oyster Cult – Don’t Fear The Reaper (1976) – the tempo is slightly too frantic to be classic cowbell rock (though the cowbell is very audible!), but this has to be mentioned thanks to the excellent Saturday Night Live sketch with Will Ferrell.

Aerosmith – Last Child (1976) Many early Aerosmith classics have implied cowbell (see footnote), but this slow & dirty-sounding masterpiece has the real thing.

War – Low Rider (1975) – somewhat out of genre being funk, but this song belongs in any discussion of the cowbell in popular music. I’m sure Funkadelic must have used it too, but nothing comes to mind so I’ll leave that for now…

Beyond the 70s there’s still plenty of cowbell action but on the whole not in the classic mould, but a few nice examples are:

Motley Crue – Wild Side (1987) Tommy Lee is not as good a drummer as he or his fans think he is but although he doesn’t use the cowbell properly here, he uses it well.

AC/DC – half of their songs (you would think, examples are rarer than one would hope), they kind of built a career on it.

Pixies – U-Mass (1991) Who’d have thought? But they do it well.

Nowadays there’s probably more cowbell rock than ever, but as far as I’ve heard it’s mostly a purely retro/pastiche/tribute thing so worthy of consideration, but not here…

POSTSCRIPT: IMPLIED COWBELL

The list of songs that are, to all intents and purposes ‘cowbell rock’ but have little or no actual cowbell is distressingly long; someone should add some posthumous cowbell to these at the very least:

Edgar Winter’s White Trash – Give It Everything You Got (1971) Dirty, nasty, gritty, funky rock, oddly the intro is kind of Stooges-like, but anyway; no cowbell.

Black Oak Arkansas – Hot And Nasty (1971) – The title says it all. Would have been hotter and nastier with cowbell though

Alice Cooper – Be My Lover (1971) – Great anyway, but how much greater would it have been a tiny bit slower and with

cowbell?

ZZ Top – Waitin’ For The Bus (1973) It nearly has cowbell on it. Let’s just pretend it does.

Foghat – Slow Ride (1975) – come on, this blues rock classic has everything except the icing on the cake; where’s the cowbell Roger?

Ted Nugent – Cat Scratch Fever (1977) – same principle as above, maybe Ted is too much of a guitar guy to care about getting the percussion right? Ditto Stranglehold, but that said, I haven’t heard a huge amount of early Ted, isn’t there bound to be at least one cowbell anthem in that oeuvre?

Whitesnake – Come An’ Get It (1982) – Whitesnake’s work is a bridge between 70s rock and the harder, more modern 80s version; this would have been a tiny bit better with cowbell though, no?

Judas Priest – You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’ (1982) – The beat is right, Rob Halford gives the perfectly assured performance the song needs, but Dave Holland does everything right except play the cowbell; possibly they wanted to distance themselves from the 70s at this point

Manowar – Metal Daze and Shell Shock (1984) Great, great testosterone fuelled nonsense/genius, the former song may have to be featured in a ‘best notes ever hit by a vocalist’ article at some point. But should have got out the cowbell guys; not metal enough I expect.

The Rolling Stones – Start Me Up (1981) and The Cult – Love Removal Machine (1987) The same song, more or less. Both bands forgot the cowbell though.

In fact, The Cult’s transformation from moody goths to leather-clad rock gods was generally lacking in cowbell, despite the potential of songs like the awesome-anyway Wild Flower. That does however have some tambourine or something similar on the choruses to give that faux cowbell flavour.

Overall though, it is the 1970s that is the true era of the cowbell, and this is all just the tip of the iceberg. One of the great things about 70s rock is how much of it there is – and surely there must be many cowbell classics lurking out there, just waiting to be rediscovered by modern ears…

Copy? Compliment? Coincidence? Incestuous album covers!

Firstly; if you’re looking at this because of the word ‘incestuous’, shame on you! Anyway, for a variety of reasons, lots of album covers seem to pay tribute to/copy/look like lots of other ones, which is what this is all about.

In the early days of shellac and then vinyl records the sleeve was mainly used to advertise either the record label or sometimes the retailer of the disc within.

But this isn’t a history of picture sleeves, interesting though that would be. Once there were music stars who people recognised the faces of, the sleeve became a promotional tool in a far more specific way than before. The main reason initially for ‘lookalike’ sleeves was presumably that artists and/or record labels hoped (and still do) that something that worked for someone else will work for them, artistically and financially and possibly creates a link between the artists in the buyer’s mind. Then there are those who sincerely wish to pay tribute to one of their influences, those who are just unconsciously doing so, and those artists who share a background in a genre/culture etc, and…. well; lots of reasons. Some examples…

1. Blondie – Blondie (Private Stock, 1976) & Kim Wilde – Kim Wilde (RAK, 1981)

By 1981, Blondie were no longer a cult, punky act, but international superstars. What better inspiration for a kind of pop pastiche of the new wave sound? In comparison with Blondie, Wilde’s first album is pretty pretty weak, though it does have some great songs on it; if you think Kids In America is great.

2. Kiss – Destroyer (Casablanca, 1976) & Manowar – Fighting the World (Atco, 1987)

Kiss were tongue-in-cheek cartoonish macho hard rock. Manowar were cartoonish macho metal that was either so completely tongue-in-cheek that they refused to acknowledge the humour of their whole image or else were deadly serious, which is kinda scary; but either way pretty ace. Consciously or not, surely a manly tribute to ‘the old gods’

3. Elvis Presley – Loving You (RCA Victor, 1957) & many, many others including Fabian – The Fabulous Fabian (Chancellor, 1959) and Bryan Ferry – These Foolish Things (Virgin, 1973)

Right from the start, Elvis’ album covers were to create the iconography of pop/rock music, imitated for commercial reasons by his imitators & later paid homage to by artists who grew up with Elvis as the face of rock ‘n’ roll (see also Elvis’ debut album & The Clash’s London Calling)

4. Joni Mitchell – Blue (Reprise, 1971) & Marianne Faithful – Broken English (Island, 1979)

Probably coincidental, but both albums are the definitive releases of iconic female singers & were to an extent departures from their previous work, both are good and both pictures are blue innit. Also, although they are both self-consciously posing for a picture, neither artist was concerned with trading on their looks in the way that record labels have traditionally done with both female and male artists (see Elvis etc) from the 1950s onwards.

5. Carpathian Forest – Through Chasm, Caves & Titan Woods (Avantgarde Music, 1995) & Wongraven – Fjelltronen (Moonfog, 1995)

Not exactly a coincidence; both bands used the same picture by Norwegian folkloric artist Theodor Kittelsen (1857-1914), iconic in the black metal scene ever since his drawing Fattigmannen was adopted by Varg Vikernes for Burzum’s Hvis Lyset Tar Oss in 1994

6. Jan & Dean and Friends- The Heart & Soul of Jan & Dean & Friends (Design Records, 1964) & Mel Torme – I’ve Got The World On A String (Allegro, 1964?)

A strange one, presumably these were both budget releases & the labels sourced the attractive but irrelevant artwork from an image library.

7. The Beatles – Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (Parlophone, 1967) & The Rolling Stones – Their Satanic Majesties Request (Decca, 1967)

A notorious pairing, the Stones, famously at a bit of a dead end, tried to emulate the feel & popularity of Sgt Pepper with the extremely lavish holographic (etc) artwork of Satanic Majesties, but it didn’t really work. A much better album than it’s reputed to be however.

8. David Bowie – Aladdin Sane (RCA, 1973) & Jobriath – Creatures of the Street (Elektra, 1974)

It’s fair to say that Jobriath was influenced by Bowie in pretty much every aspect of his early recording career, but although Creatures… (mentioned elsewhere in this blog) is an interesting but not great LP, the front cover is, alas, just a little bit ridiculous by comparison with Bowie at his iconic peak.

9. The Byrds – Mr Tambourine Man (Columbia, 1965) & The Jimi Hendrix Experience – Are You Experienced (Track Records, 1967)

This comparison really traces the advance of psychedelia from a mild distortion of perception to a neon-coloured hallucination over the two years 1965-67

10. The Smiths – The Smiths (Rough Trade, 1984) & UK indie music in general (here; The Wedding Present – George Best (Reception Records, 1987) & Belle & Sebastian – The Boy With The Arab Strap (Jeepster, 1998)

The Smiths (mainly, one presumes, Morrissey) cared about the appearance of their records in a way that few artists have, and the relatively brief period of their recording career (83-87) means that their oeuvre has a unified completeness which is both rare and pleasing; presumably if they had gone on forever they would have tried something new at some point. The look (as well as the sound) of The Smiths had an immediate and lasting impact on the UK indie scene; although The Wedding Present (often characterised as the Smiths fans’ second favourite band)’s classic George Best doesn’t look especially like a Smiths album, the whole aesthetic seems to come from a similar (if slightly less glamorous) source. Stuart Murdoch of Belle & Sebastian seems to have, like Morrissey, a complete vision for the way his band should be and to date the B&S discography has a distinctive (and slightly Smiths-like) appearance. A good proportion of UK indie sleeves still have a very post-Smiths appearance (as does the output of the great My Little Airport from Hong Kong)

11.. Iron Maiden – Number of the Beast (EMI, 1982) & Megadeth – Peace Sells… But Who’s Buying (Capitol, 1986)

Iron Maiden’s Eddie has influenced the covers of thousands of heavy metal LPs throughout the 80s (and to the present day) but Megadeth’s Vic Rattlehead is probably the most blatant homage & Peace Sells… is probably their best album cover of the era.

12. Bob Dylan – Bob Dylan (Columbia, 1962) & Donovan – What’s Bin Did and What’s Bin Hid (Pye, 1965)

Despite their essentially very different styles, Pye Records was determined to use the surface similarities between the two young folksters to promote Donovan as the British Bob Dylan and to that end, What’s Bin Did… features an informal Dylanesque photo as its cover image.

13. Poison – Look What The Cat Dragged In (Capitol, 1986) & Dogs D’Amour – In The Dynamite Jet Saloon (China Records, 1988)

Although the rougher, more rock ‘n’ roll-glam oriented Dogs D’Amour were less influenced by Poison than bands like Tigertailz were, the layout of their least all-over-the-place album is, by accident or design, a scuzzy-glam echo of Poison’s more Hollywood-looking debut.

14. Randy Newman – Randy Newman (Reprise, 1968) & Elton John – Elton John (DJM, 1970)

It may be no coincidence that Elton John, with one not-massively-successful album behind him and a few years away from his outrageous glam-era costumes etc should seemingly model the cover of this, his breakthrough album, on Randy Newman; dour, unflamboyant , thus far critically and commercially neglected, but already an artist’s artist. It worked better for Elton.

15. Carnivore – Retaliation (Roadrunner, 1987) & Sodom – Persecution Mania (Steamhammer, 1987)

Presumably a coincidence, both of these albums are speed metal classics, although Carnivore are less well remembered than Sodom (who, to be fair are still going). The passing resemblance of these covers probably says as much about the atmosphere of the Cold War era as it does about metal.

16. The Beatles – With The Beatles (Parlophone, 1963) & The Nazz – Nazz (SGC, 1968)

As with the aforementioned Elvis sleeves, every picture of The Beatles in their early years was influential, and none more so than the cool, simple sleeve for With The Beatles. Even so, it’s somewhat surprising to see its influence lingering as late as the psychedelic era, when Todd Rundgren’s Nazz released their debut (which arguably is modelled on the early covers of The Rolling Stones as much as The Beatles. But then the early Stones albums wouldn’t have looked as they do without The Beatles either.

17. The Rolling Stones – Sticky Fingers (Rolling Stones, 1971) and Mötley Crüe – Too Fast For Love (Leathür Records, 1981)

Although only a passing similarity, Motley Crue inherited much of their spirit and attitude from the Stones and the cover of their debut is appropriately a more in-your-face updating of the classic Stones artwork.

18. David Bowie – “Heroes” (RCA, 1977) & Iggy Pop – The Idiot (RCA, 1977)

Not a coincidence, Bowie & Iggy Pop worked closely in their Berlin period & both were influenced by German Expressionism, here in particular by Erich Heckel’s painting Roquairol. Iggy’s album is a bit better than Bowie’s though; if only he had worked with Eno!

19. Kate Bush – Never For Ever (EMI, 1980) & Toyah – Anthem (Safari, 1981)

Anthem was probably Toyah’s best album; a nice mix of post-punk and new wave/synth pop influences, but despite her strong image she was never as individual or idiosyncratic as Kate Bush, although the fairytale-ish album cover suggests some similarity.

20. Charles Lloyd – Geeta (A&M, 1973) & Weather Report – Black Market (Columbia, 1976)

Charles Lloyd started out as a pretty standard post-Coltrane bop-saxophone player, specialising in ‘chamber jazz’, but by the early 70s he, like jazz in general, had become interested in fusion and elements of world music, reflected in the artwork for Geeta. That was pretty much where Weather Report came in, and although mostly Miles Davis influenced, Black Market has, coincidentally or not, a certain Charles Lloyd-ish quality.

21. Witchfynde – Give ‘Em Hell (Rondelet, 1980) & Venom – Black Metal (Neat, 1981)

More a case of shared influences than anything else, both Witchfynde and Venom came from the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal and had an interest in the occult and biker rock. Cheap, effective visuals were pretty much an essential part of the NWOBHM, with even early Iron Maiden artwork having a somewhat rough & ready charm.

22. Tigertailz – Young & Crazy (Music For Nations, 1987) & Britny Fox – Britny Fox (Columbia, 1988)

>It’s slightly unlikely that foppish Rococo glamsters Britny Fox would be influenced by Wales’ super-glam Tigertailz, but both bands, despite their idiosyncracies, were drawing from a pool of shared glamorous male influences, going back in pop music to the 70s, but historically back to 16th (and in the case of Britny fox, specifically the 17th/18th) century.

23. The Rolling Stones – Rolling Stones No. 2 (Decca, 1965) & The Dead Boys – We Have Come For Your Children (Sire, 1978)

Arguably the Stones cover here has its roots in With The Beatles, but the Stones brought their own surly charisma to the style and it was this that The Dead Boys channelled for their version of (in this case punk) rock, and the cover for their second album seems to pay homage to the Rolling Stones’ second.

24. Mayhem – Live In Leipzig (Obscure Plasma, 1993) & Darkthrone – Transilvanian Hunger (Peaceville, 1994)

Strictly this should be a comparison of Live in Leipzig with Darkthrone’s A Blaze in the Northern Sky (1992), but although A Blaze... pre-dated the release of the Mayhem album (recorded in 1990), the cover picture of Per Yngve “Dead” Ohlin used for the release of Live in Leipzig was well known in the Norwegian black metal underground and indeed, photographs of early Mayhem were, despite King Diamond, Sarcofago etc, pretty much the basis for the 90s Norwegian black metal aesthetic.

25. Jobriath – Jobriath (Elektra, 1973) & David Bowie – Diamond Dogs (RCA, 1974)

Although it seems unlikely (to say the least) that Bowie would be influenced by Jobriath, there is a slight passing resemblance between the excellent, slightly creepy gatefold artwork of Jobriath’s much hyped but unsuccessful debut and Bowie’s superlative dark glam masterpiece; possibly more to do with a shared influence of traditions of depicting the male nude than anything else.

26. David Bowie – Ziggy Stardust era appearance (1972-4) & Leslie R McKeown – All Washed Up (Ego Trip, 1978)

Although not based on any single image of Bowie, ex-Bay City Rollers frontman Les McKeown’s first solo album & singles showcased an image clearly based on the glam-era Bowie of a few years earlier.

27. Venom – Welcome To Hell (Neat, 1981) & Dødheimsgard – Monumental Possession (Malicious, 1995)

Hardly a coincidence; a large part of black metal’s satanic iconography was brought to the genre by its inventors, and the cover of Venom’s debut has been paid homage to by metal in general more times than almost any other image apart from Iron Maiden’s Eddie

28. David Bowie (again) – Space Oddity (RCA, 1972 reissue) & Marc Bolan & T-Rex – Zinc Alloy and the Hidden Riders of Tomorrow (EMI, 1974)

It’s no surprise to see as visual an artist as Bowie featuring repeatedly in this list, but here he seems to have influenced his glam predeccesor and friendly rival Marc Bolan; Whereas earlier T-Rex albums had pioneered Bolan’s fey/fairytale glam image, by ’74 his music had become tired and limited (and ego-centric; T-Rex was now appended to the artist’s name rather than being an entity in its own right) in comparison with that of his old friend Bowie, and Zinc Alloy ( yep :/ ) was all-too-transparently influenced by Ziggy Stardust. The cover, however, seems more influenced by Bowie’s covers for Aladdin Sane and the glam-era reissue of his 1969 album, retitled Space Oddity. Given the slight deterioration of Bolan’s pixie-like charm, Zinc Alloy is unfortunately a less than bewitching or otherworldly sleeve.

29. Steeler – Strike Back (SPV, 1986), Helter Skelter – Welcome to the World of Helter Skelter (Metronome, 1988) & Pretty Boy Floyd – Leather Boyz With Electric Toyz (MCA 1989)

Presumably coincidence based on the common language of 80’s metal (but ultimately traceable back to Kiss in the mid-70s), both Helter Skelter and Pretty Boy Floyd’s late 80s glam-pop masterpieces have ludicrous paintings of the artists on them, very similar in style to German metallists Steeler’s 1986 opus Strike Back. Strangely, the Helter Skelter painting is by Games Workshop legend John Blanche, better known for the kind of dark fantasy images used in Warhammer etc (but also showcased on the cover of Sabbat’s classic UK thrash album History of a Time to Come.) The sleeve for Strike Back seems to be the first updating of this kind of thing since the classic Ken Kelly Kiss covers(!) from the 70s (see above).

30. Eric Carmen – Eric Carmen (Arista, 1975) & John Travolta – Can’t let You Go (Midland, 1977)

Ex-Raspberries frontman Eric Carmen’s debut solo album is best remembered for ‘All By Myself‘, but it was a strong album that revealed an excellent songwriter and performer with an eclectic range, from the Brian Wilson-esque ‘Sunrise‘ to the near-classical arrangement of that famous hit. John Travolta’s Can’t let You Go was released just as the young actor became a star with Saturday Night Fever and is, not surprisingly wet, bland, funky disco-lite with some soppy ballads thrown in. The covers of both albums showcase the sensitive (and in Travolta’s case, nakedly vulnerable) side of the young stars.

31. Cheap Trick – In Color…and in Black & White (Epic, 1977) & M

ötley Crüe – Girls, Girls, Girls (Elektra, 1987)

Ten years on from Cheap Trick’s In Color… one of the great hard/pop-rock albums of all time, came one of Mötley Crüe’s best, at the time notable for a (slight) toning down of the band’s glam image. The Crüe cover lacks the humour of Cheap Trick’s (admittedly not really evident in the front image only; the back cover has the band’s two quirkier-looking members on non-motor cycles), but is iconic in its own decadent, 80s way….

32. Pink Floyd – Animals (EMI/Harvest, 1977) & The Orb – The Orb’s Adventures Beyond the Ultraworld (Big Life, 1991)

An explicit homage, Dr Alex Patterson’s original vision for The Orb was inseparable from the psychedelic explorations of Pink Floyd. Admittedly, by 1977, the spirit of the prog legends’ optimistic experimentation had mostly evaporated, but the Animals sleeve, with its giant inflatable pig drifting over Battersea Power Station remains an iconic, dreamlike and good-natured image which, by 1991 seemed ripe for an update.

33. Genesis – A Trick of the Tail (Charisma, 1976) & FFWD – FFWD (Inter-Modo, 1994)

As with The Orb’s music above, FFWD (Robert Fripp, Thomas Fehlmann, Kris Weston, and Dr. Alex Paterson)’s 1994 ambient/prog/experimental album bears a resemblance (only slight in this case) to an album which was fundamentally different from the prog that inspired it. Indeed, the FFWD album seems to be influenced more by the ambient works of Eno than by a progressive band like Genesis (or Fripp’s King Crimson for that matter), but there is at times an atmosphere of pastoral whimsy that recollects the Peter Gabriel-era Genesis of Nursery Cryme or Foxtrot, far removed from the glossy, accessible rock of the Phil Collins-led Trick of the Tail. But that album’s cover has an archetypical prog feel, even if the album doesn’t, and so does the sleeve of FFWD.

FIN

Soft As Snow (But Warm Inside) – “shoegaze” 1988 – 1993

First a note: this is not an exhaustive exploration of the (for want of a better term) shoegaze genre. It’s extremely subjective, being based on my own memories and tastes c.1990-2 and therefore has some glaring omissions (unaccountably I had never really heard much of the Cocteau Twins’s music at the time. More accountably, I didn’t like Catherine Wheel very much) and takes no account whatsoever of neo-shoegaze or the careers of the bands mentioned below after the period covered.

small but perfectly formed…

Nowadays, when even the format of the album is under threat from streaming services, social media and the ability to download single songs, the EP (always a lesser format) seems ephemeral or even pointless. It was not always so, however; although posterity has made Just For A Day and maybe even Whirlpool and Ferment into ‘classic albums’, many of those who were around, reading the music weeklies (an important point) at the time will remember that virtually every shoegaze album from 1990 onwards was initially regarded as a disappointment upon release. And all of them were then completely eclipsed by My Bloody Valentine’s genre defining/destroying Loveless when it finally emerged from its long gestation (or what seemed at the time a long gestation; compared with m b v – finally released in 2013 – Loveless seems almost hastily thrown together).

That the genre is ideally suited to the format of the EP partly has to do with its style. Although no two shoegaze bands sounded quite as alike as their contemporary detractors claimed, it’s true to say that effects-laden guitars, wistful vocals and hazy, dreamy atmospheres predominated – and these things are on the whole more effective in small doses. Likewise, the subject matter of the majority of these bands was enigmatic and allusive rather than forthright or obvious. Understanding lyrics (or even singing along to them) is by no means a prerequisite for good music, but it does give an album a focal point aside from the overall sound; but in the majority of shoegaze records the vocals are an integral part of that sound and the lyrics are barely discernible.

EPs, singles and even mini-albums were therefore the ideal way to experience what during the period became (sneeringly) called shoegaze:
and, at least in my opinion, all of the key (and minor) bands in the scene produced their best work over series’ of three or four-song 12″ records, right from the dawn of the style.

The architects of shoegaze

Through the early/mid 80s, The Cocteau Twins were undeniably key in establishing a guitar based, semi-ambient sound and, simultaneously The Jesus and Mary Chain made feedback and sheer noise a part of the overground rock/pop scene. Some aspects of the sound that became shoegaze can be traced back further, to the post-punk scene (notably The Cure, still very much a vital part of the music scene in the late 80s/early 90s), but it is really the Cocteau Twins and JAMC that should be considered the real architects of shoegaze. In their wake came the 80s indie scene in general, with bands like The House of Love and The Smiths, who would influence pretty much all of UK indie one way or the other from around 1984 onwards.

Baby Talk…

‘Shoegaze’ proper really kicked off in August 1988, with My Bloody Valentine’s You Made Me Realise EP.

Although MBV had been releasing records since ’85, until You Made Me Realise, the band’s sound was far more traditional, with a jangly 60s, post-Smiths, C86/twee quality very different from their aggressive, feedback and effects-laden mature sound. Their 1987 single Strawberry Wine is a case in point; essentially it’s very similar to a song like Thorn from the You Made Me Realise EP; both songs are fast-paced indie pop, characterised by Kevin Shields and Bilinda Butcher’s vocal harmonies, Colm Ó Cíosóig’s dynamic, aggressive percussion and layers of guitars. But on Strawberry Wine, the guitar sound is the chiming, jangly, Byrds-influenced one then popular in the UK indie scene. On Thorn, the underlying track is not that different, but on top of the base layer of strummed guitars, the melody is formed, not by a 12-string Rickenbacker-ish sound, but by the highly peculiar vacuum cleaner-like mechanised howl of Kevin Shields’ heavily distorted guitar. Even if Thorn wasn’t a better song than Strawberry Wine (but it is), the guitar adds not only a unique sound to the song, but it also intensifies its stormy, melancholy atmosphere. This was a key feature of shoegaze that all of the best bands brought to their music; not only was the voice another instrument, the guitar was another voice.

MBV followed up You Made Me Realise uncharacteristically quickly with their debut full-length album Isn’t Anything. Iconic though it is, it demonstrates exactly why the EP is the format of shoegaze: even a relatively short 40-ish minutes of disorientating, backwards-sounding, intense and mysterious hazy intensity is a bit much without the voice of a singer like Elizabeth Fraser to bring it all together. Anyway, the impact of You Made Me Realise was pretty immediate; by October ’89, one of the first new young bands made its debut: Lush, with their Scar mini-album.

Lush

With Scar, Lush not only established a distinct musical identity based around the opposing forces of Cocteau Twins-esque fragility (enhanced by the – typically – ‘ethereal’ vocal harmonies of Miki Berenyi and Emma Anderson) and prickly, punky bitterness, they also created an instantly recognisable aesthetic. 4AD – always the most coffee-table-book-friendly indie label – should have been a natural home for the shoegaze scene, but in fact Lush and Pale Saints were (I think) the only shoegaze bands aside from The Cocteau Twins (always somewhat aloof from the ‘scene’) to benefit from the label’s invariably evocative artwork and in the end Creation became the shoegaze label. The six songs on Scar were uniformly excellent, but the production (by John Fryer, with the band) was serviceable but lacked sparkle, something rectified on the band’s next (and best) release:

Mad Love EP (1990)

This EP exemplifies the best of the shoegaze scene; four excellent songs, no fillers (and it is surprising how many bands couldn’t record an EP without at least one lesser song), each song catchy and atmospheric but no two very alike.
This time round the production was in the hands of the Cocteau Twins’ Robin Guthrie, indie royalty, and of course the main architect of the kind of pretty noise (and it is worth remembering that, despite their ‘niceness’ most shoegaze records included the kind of abstract noise that was definitely not a normal part of chart music) that Lush were working with. Alongside three new songs (all better than anything on Scar) there is a sparkling rerecording of Thoughtforms, the somewhat leaden sound of the Scar version replaced by something more scintillating.
Later that year, the band released Sweetness and Light, their most commercial, hook-laden record, the poppy a-side backed with two even more lighter-than-air songs, both pretty good. At the same time, it was becoming clear from interviews and TV appearances that the band were not quite the fey, angelic characters they mostly sounded like on record. By ’91 the shoegaze scene was, if not in decline, then at least on a plateau, and Lush’s singles Black Spring and For Love were far patchier than their previous work. There were still great songs, but what had been ethereal had started to become watery and unmemorable and the band’s tougher songs jettisoned the shoegaze idiom for something more proto-Britpop/mainstream indie-rock-ish. Which is not what I am writing about.

Luckily, 4AD seemed to notice this watershed and released an album bringing together all the band’s work up to Sweetness and Light. Gala, especially in its lavishly packaged LP form, is all you need to know about Lush the shoegaze band, and is one of the great monuments of the genre.

Ride

The month before Lush’s Mad Love went on sale, a young band from Oxford released their self-titled debut EP. Ride is not as perfect as Mad Love but it established a sound that was more pop-oriented than My Bloody Valentine, but with a heavier, noisier guitar sound than Lush. Ride balanced the unabashedly indie-pop sound of Chelsea Girl with three contrasting songs. These were the surprisingly heavy Drive Blind (with its psychedelic, flickering guitar part strangely reminiscent of the intro to Status Quo’s ludicrous 1967 psych-pop classic Pictures of Matchstick Men) and the more reflective All I Can See and the noisy Close My Eyes. The band’s sound was defined by the gentle harmony vocals of Mark Gardener and Andy Bell, whose voices bore a passing resemblance to that of MBV’s Kevin Shields, but where his voice often stayed buried, semi-coherently in the mix, Ride put their vocal harmonies in centre stage.

In the summer of 1990, Ride released the eminently summery Play EP. Again, the band showcased a heavier indie rock sound, softened by the mellow Englishness of the vocals, but Ride’s music was never as wispy and insubstantial as the scene’s detractors sometimes claimed.
The Fall EP was released in September and was another strong release, but although I remember a Melody Maker journalist claiming slightly later that the shoegaze (the then-derogatory term was coined around this time) bands were sapping their strength by releasing streams of EPs instead of saving their strength for an album, Ride were one of the few whose debut full-length (Nowhere, released a month after Fall) was actually stronger than the EPs which preceded it.
By the time Nowhere was released, ‘shoegaze’ was at its height, with critical reactions from the music press (in those days far more influential than now, especially on the UK indie scene) outweighed by support, especially from Melody Maker.
Ride were also wise in that they (more or less) jettisoned their shoegaze sound at the right time, the more 60s-pop/prog influenced Going Blank Again proving to be their biggest selling album. But before they moved on, the band released their most perfectly realised work, the Today Forever EP, four contrasting but still definitely ‘shoegaze’ oriented songs.

Slowdive

If Ride were more strident and rock than Lush, then Slowdive were everything shoegaze’s critics hated about the scene: mellow, melancholy, dreamy, slow (of course), fragile. But that’s not all they were: their self-titled debut, released at the end of the autumn in 1990, was a seriously noisy release, for all its snails-pace tempos. The beautiful foghorn guitar of the title track was closer to the sound of My Bloody Valentine’s (as yet unreleased) magnum opus Loveless than any of their peers, and the way the delicate female/male vocals of Rachel Goswell and Neil Halstead drift through the massive soundscapes of guitar noise was distinctly different from the other bands of the genre. 1991’s Morningrise EP was another near-perfect EP but Holding Our Breath, released not long before debut album Just For A Day suggested, despite the presence of one of their most popular songs, Catch the Breeze, that the band had painted themselves into a corner; the distorted noise and feedback of the first EP had been smoothed into something altogether cleaner and more melodic, but without the stormy atmospherics, the sound of Just for a Day sometimes veered uncomfortably towards a kind of ‘Shoegaze Moods’ new age muzak.

Unlike Ride and Lush though, Slowdive’s second LP Souvlaki, released in 1993 after the death of shoegaze, was probably their strongest work.

Other bands
Shoegaze was not a vast scene, but at its height, EPs more-or-less in its style(s) proliferated almost weekly. The following are a few bands who excelled on EPs:

Curve – Blindfold (1991), Frozen (1991), Cherry (1991)

Curve appeared fully formed in 1991, with the slick and accomplished Blindfold EP. Despite very positive reviews, there was a certain amount of suspicion of the band in the indie press because the duo – Toni Halliday, (probably the shoegaze pinup, though not my personal one) and Dean Garcia – had links to various mainstream pop artists, having worked with Eurythmics and had an attempted a mainstream pop career as State of Play in the 80s. Curve were important, though, in that they brought (admittedly after My Bloody Valentine had already released remixes of their work) electronic elements and dance beats to the shoegaze genre, not to mention the only (to my knowledge) appearance of a rapper on a shoegaze song, namely JC-001, who appears – surprisingly successfully – on Ten Little Girls. Curve’s first three EPs were consistently strong, but their debut full-length Doppelganger (1992) was the archetypical disappointing shoegaze album, partly, as with Slowdive, because more than four or five songs in the band’s style becomes something of an endurance test.

Chapterhouse – Freefall (1990)

Chapterhouse bore the brunt of the music press’ disaffection with shoegaze, and indeed their discography is on the whole one of the weaker ones of the scene. Freefall is probably the best of their EPs, although lead track Falling Down (a Curve-like funky dance/shoegaze crossover) has not aged as well as one would like. For the best of Chapterhouse see the list at the bottom of this article.

The Boo Radleys – Adrenalin EP (1992)

It’s hard not to hate The Boo Radleys for Wake Up Boo etc, but all of their early EPs (and their debut album Ichabod & I) are all worthy of investigation. Adrenalin features Lazy Day, one of the finest shoegaze-pop songs of the period, the perfect marriage of pop hooks and blurry noise, and satisfyingly short too.

Moose – Cool Breeze (1991)

Moose, like Chapterhouse, seemed to come along just as the music press was growing weary of the shoegaze genre, but the three EPs they released in 1991 form a body of work with a very distinct personality and charm. Cool Breeze is the best of these, four perfect, sparse and autumnal pop songs, simple but inventive. Somewhat surprisingly, the band’s debut album XYZ was good too, despite an unexpected segue into mellow Americana.

Drop Nineteens – Winona (1992)

Labelmates of Moose (on Hut Records), Boston’s Drop Nineteens were (I think) the only US band to fully embrace the shoegaze sound, and their single Winona is a melancholy, droning-but-catchy classic.

CODA
Some songs of the period that would make an excellent shoegaze compilation (with the disclaimer than not all are technically shoegaze songs):

* My Bloody Valentine – Thorn

* Ride – Vapour Trail

* Lush – De-Luxe

* Slowdive – Slowdive

* Cocteau Twins – Heaven or Las Vegas

* Chapterhouse – Breather

* Curve – Ten Little Girls

* Boo Radleys – Lazy Day

* The House of Love – Christine

* Pale Saints – Half-Life

* Drop Nineteens – Winona

* The Wendys – Pulling My Fingers Off

* Moose – Suzanne

* Cranes – Thursday

* My Bloody Valentine – When You Sleep

* Slowdive – Souvlaki Space Station

* Ride – Today

* Lush – Thoughtforms

* The House of Love – Destroy the Heart

* Curve – The Coast is Clear

* Pale Saints – Throwing Back the Apple

* Codeine – D

* Moose – Untitled Love Song

* My Bloody Valentine – Slow

Inevitably, the releases of the year 2015 (part two)

Secrets of the Moon – SUN (Lupus Lounge)

There is not a lot of emotionally complex black metal music out there; a shame, because the expressive possibilities of the form are arguably greater and more powerful than any other metal genre. Also a shame, because, as with any genre of music, the best black metal transcends its idiom and is simply great music; and such is SUN, the sixth album by the always-dependable Secrets of the Moon. ‘Dependable’ is rarely used as a huge compliment for a band, but although the last few Secrets.. albums have been powerful and mature, none of them really suggested an album as immense as SUN. Inspired to a large extent by the suicide of ex-bass player LSK, it’s a work full of strange, desolate yet apparently hopeful imagery. Mysterious, elusive, it’s an album whose emotional punch is as unexpected as it is tangible.

Ken Camden – Dream Memory (Kranky Records)

Experimental guitarist Ken Camden’s Dream Memory is as ethereal and dislocating as the title suggests. Blurring the lines between guitar, synthesiser and the human voice, it has at times a Steve Reich-like hypnotic quality, giving the impression of moving forwards while standing still; beautiful, in a peculiar way.

Various Artists – Spazzin to the Oldies – a Tribute to Spazz (Mind Ripper Collective)

I haven’t spent a lot of time listening to powerviolence pioneers Spazz, but having listened to them now, I prefer this; the sheer enthusiasm and variety of bands here makes this short, sharp album a great way to blow away the cobwebs.

Absentia Lunae – Vorwarts (ATMF)

Black metal again; one of the most underrated bands around, the key to Absentia Lunae’s power is suggested by the title of this album. Rather than wallowing in the clichés of 90s black metal – or, more credibly, paying tribute to them – Absentia Lunae use the genre’s powerful forms to move constantly forwards with one eye on the ruins of the past; it’s a powerful, poignant sound. I am aware that this album was actually released late in 2014; but because it was late in the year it ‘bled into’ 2015. I’ll try not to do this again but can’t promise not to…

Valet – Nature (Kranky Records)

It was a good year for Kranky, among the many great releases, the latest album by alt-rock/shoegaze group led by Honey Owens is as fragile but hard-edged as glass; haunting in several senses, it’s a record to wallow in but one that it’s never quite possible to absorb.

OLD ALBUM OF THE YEAR: contender #2

Orange Juice – Coals To Newcastle (Domino)

This beautifully designed little box/book set collects everything recorded by one of the greatest indie pop groups ever. Apart from anything else, it’s one of the widest-ranging bodies of work by any band of the era; from romantic and funny proto-Smiths ‘indie rock’ to sophisticated and soulful funk-inflected dance-pop, Edwyn Collins and co made a unique mark on popular music.

Inevitably, the releases of the year 2015 (part four)

The penultimate selection of the year’s best releases, I’m thinking there will have to be some ‘honourable mentions’ at the end of the final part!
Enslaved – In Times (Nuclear Blast Records)
It’s been a long time since Enslaved could be classified as viking metal, but the spirit of their ancient Norse ancestors lives on in In Times, along with the spirit of King Crimson and 70s prog in general, metal and black metal in particular and so much more. In Times is arguably their greatest album to date, and its greatness is defined by the way the band takes so many apparently disparate and complex elements and makes them not only harmonious but accessible and memorable. A masterpiece.

Jenny Hval – Apocalypse, Girl (Sacred Bones Records)

A highly peculiar yet very accessible album, the music and song structures on Apocalypse, Girl are dreamlike and unpredictable, but made into a satisfying whole by the remarkable voice, words and personality of Jenny Hval herself.

Grift – Syner (Nordvis Produktion)

Some people are justifiably critical of the more pleasant end of the black metal genre these days, but wallowing in melancholy has its own appeal and Erik Gärdefors makes masterfully mournful music. As beautiful as it is sad.

Jess & The Ancient Ones – Second Psychedelic Coming: The Aquarius Tapes (Svart Records)

Less doomy than their previous work, the latest album by Finland’s foremost psychedelic rock band is certainly not less atmospheric and manages to be exhilarating even when at its most wandering & jazzy. Great songs, great production & the superbly charismatic Jess herself; brilliant.

Sigh – Graveward (Candlelight Records)

Even by the standards of the mighty Sigh, Graveward is a highly peculiar album. Frank Zappa-meets-prog-meets-Yngwie Malmsteen-meets-power metal-meets-movie soundtracks-meets-black metal; it’s difficult to pigeonhole but easy to enjoy.

OLD ALBUM OF THE YEAR: contender# 3

Pilot – A’s, B’s & Rarities (EMI)

Seriously underrated 70s post-glam power pop from Scotland. Pilot had a few chart hits (more than you’d think in fact) but their lesser known work is just as interesting, if not as immediate. Lest the fact that Pilot was a great band not be enough to convince people even more snooty about music than me, half of the band played on the majority of Kate Bush’s most iconic work.

La Flamme et le Lys: Métal Noir Québécois

Firstly, the black metal of Québec (at least the black metal I am talking about) has little or nothing to do with Canada. Nothing against Canada (or Canadian metal for that matter), but what makes this scene so distinctive is the backdrop of the history of Québec/Nouvelle-France as a nation (lots of fascinating info here), not to mention the French language, especially romantic perhaps, to people like myself who don’t understand it.

Two ironies recur endlessly in black metal: firstly, despite the avowed individualism of almost every BM band, the genre has come to be defined in part by national scenes, with various identifying features. The most obvious (because most famous and because it put many of the genre trademarks in place) is the Norwegian scene of the early 90s, but for me, the Québec scene has arguably been the most distinctive and consistent over the last decade or so.

Secondly, despite the rhetoric of superiority common in certain areas of the genre, much of the best black metal (especially the nationalistic/heritage-leaning kind) takes a large part of its melancholy atmosphere from a history of defeat and hardship rather than one of victory and supremacy; the image of snow covered ruins or desolation that grace the cover art of a large proportion of black metal releases may represent the defeat of black metal’s enemies, be they the Christian church, or modern urban civilisation, but the fact is that nowhere in the world is there or has there been a black metal elite ruling over a subjugated population of cowering slaves.

In fact, more commonly than not, ‘heritage BM’ (absolutely horrible term, can’t think of a less insulting one) has at its heart the supplanting of native cultures and traditions by Christianity, but with Québec the focal point historically is the destruction of the colony of New France and the (to a degree ongoing) marginalisation of its culture and traditions within the later UK/US-influenced construct of Canada.
This kind of history of hardship, neglect and respect for nature and tradition is the exact mixture of musical/historical/ideological inspiration that can make nationalistic (a sinister word, but it doesn’t necessarily have the fascist connotations of National Socialist Black Metal, of which see here) BM such a potent-sounding music.

It should be pointed out though, that the settlers of Québec were not the first people there, and the history of the native peoples of Canada is even more marginalised and bleak than that of the first European settlers.
Sadly I have yet to hear any native American black metal, if there is such a thing (I would like to hear it if there is). Possibly the essentially European (and, taking into account the influence of the blues, even African) nature of heavy metal makes it unlikely to be embraced by heritage-minded individuals of native American backgrounds.
Still, the fascinating history of New France and Québec is more than troubled enough to account for the emotion that exudes from the best black metal of the nation.

There is no doubt that in the New France the settlers’ lives were difficult; even aside from the daily hardship that was (and in many places still is) inherent in the lives of people living from the land, the extreme climate and landscape of Québec – especially in the winter – made peoples’ existence precarious at best.
The paintings and drawings of Dutch emigrant Cornelius Krieghoff (seen here) – in some ways a parallel figure, in BM at least, to Theodor Kittelsen in Norway – vividly depict these struggles while also representing something of a nostalgic ideal through their picturesque depiction of an isolated and self-sufficient community. It should be noted though, that the history of New France dates back to the 1500s, so by the time of Krieghoff’s travels in Québec in the mid-19th century, the people’s connection with France was already a near-mythical one.

Perhaps because of the vast differences – not just in terrain and climate, but also government and society – between France and its colony, New France quickly gained an independent identity of its own. Though the language and many of the traditions would remain French, the connection between Québec and its mother country would quickly become minimal, despite various rebellions against the English-speaking oppressors throughout the 19th century.
All of these factors have helped shape the character of Métal Noir Québécois. Although not one homogenous sound, most of the bands have some common ground. Much of the imagery of the genre is that common to black metal in general; the iconography of forests, frost, snow, autumn and winter landscapes – it is particularly appropriate for Québecois black metal. There is a strong vein of nature mysticism in the music, often lurking as a subtext, but occasionally, as in Neige et Noirceur’s masterful Hymnes de la Montagne Noire, taking centre stage.

Likewise, the use of folk elements is hardly new to black metal, but the distinctive folk music of the area uses instrumentation unusual to BM (such as accordions as well as fiddles) and has a unique, archaic flavour which is extremely evocative when used well. Neige et Noirceur again provide a good example with their strangely sea-shantyish Ancien Folklore Québécois.

It’s not all ‘New France’ though; although primarily French-speaking, other influences helped shape Quebec, as the presence of Dutchman Cornelius Kreghoff in the colony suggests. In fact the excellent-but-mysterious one-man project Ziel Bevrijd has a Dutch name, suggesting (maybe?) an alternative heritage, although Viingrid writes lyrics mainly in French.

Musically speaking, the strongest influence on the Québec bands is probably Burzum, specifically the albums Hvis Lyset Tar Oss and Filosefem, the primitive mix of fuzzy guitar and fairly basic synth being surprisingly adept at conjouring epic wintry landscapes as well as desolate misery.

Recommended Listening:
I can’t stress strongly enough that I am not in any way an authority on the black metal of Québec and there is every chance that I have missed out major artists as well as minor ones. A good rule of thumb is that if is from Québec and released by Sepulchral Productions or Les Productions Hérétiques it’s probably worth a listen. These are all good:

Sorcier Des Glaces

This band has been around since the late 90s and if not the most distinctive – or the first – of Québec’s BM bands, they have never made a bad record. Atmospheric but more upbeat (as well as faster and less French) than many bands in the scene, albums like the definitive Snowland and 2011’s The Puressence of Primitive Forests are highly recommended to fans of expansive post-Burzum BM.

1837
A pretty marginal band, but with a name derived from the year of the Québec patriotic uprising and a (to my knowledge) sole EP, Prologue (2010) to their name, 1837 seem in some ways to be just what obscure local BM is all about. The EP is strong, but pretty harsh, very similar to Celtic Winter-era Graveland.

Forteresse
Perhaps the greatest of all Québec BM bands, their manifesto-like Métal Noir Québécois defined the genre, bringing together Burzum-esque epic-but-melancholy BM with traditional Québec folk music and imagery. Les Hivers de Notre Epoque is if anything even better, less ferocious but even more atmospheric.

Sombres Forêts

In a similar vein to Forteresse, but slightly more ambient and snow-shrouded and less folk-influenced, Sombres Forêts are one of the more melancholy bands in the scene. To my ears their best album to date is 2008’s Royaume de Glace, a despairing masterpiece with some of the best vocals of any Québec BM album, especially when Annatar shrieks hoarsely over relatively clean guitars on songs like the great The Forest.

Neige et Noirceur
Another one-man band whose style veers close to Forteresse (and indeed Burzum) at times, NeN have a discography which encompasses folk, ambient and of course atmospheric BM elements, all albums are good, but Crépuscule Hivernal sans fin sur les Terres de la Guerre from 2009 has a particularly intense and obscure atmosphere.

Neige Éternelle
Pretty much a definitive Sepulchral signing, the best songs on Neige Éternelle’s 2013 self-titled debut bring a strongly Darkthrone-like flavour to the Quebec sound (check out L’appel de la Mort for a perfect synthesis of Burzum, Darkthrone and Métal Noir Québécois)

Brume d’Automne
A somewhat schizophrenic band, Brume d’Automne veer between some of the most folk-influenced music in the genre (for example La mort d’un patriote from their debut album Fiers et Victorieux) to a strongly punk-influenced sound on songs like Quand Les Corbeaux Crient Leur Haine.

Monarque
Far more typical, being essentially a very prolific one-man project (sort of – Monarque is sometimes joined by a live drummer) in the epic/atmospheric BM vein. Another artist with no bad releases (that I’ve heard) but the 2013 opus Lys Noir is particularly strong.

Gris
Another great band signed to Sepulchral, Gris play extremely poignant-sounding, at times lush BM, very sophisticated and with at times a Shining-like quality. It’s hard to choose between their two excellent albums, the first, Il Etait Une Forêt somehow has a magical, almost hushed quality even at its most raw, heavy and tormented, while their latest A L’Âme Enflammée, L’Âme Constellée… has a vast epic grandeur.

Chasse-Galerie
A strongly folklore-inspired band where Québec BM meets Falkenbach, Chasse-Galerie specialise in high-velocity melodic BM with at times a heroic flavour and lots of good tunes.

Ziel Bevrijd
Mentioned above, this strangely-named act is far from prolific (and sometimes scorned for the lo-fi qualities of its output), Ziel Bevrijd’s self-titled album and split with Csejthe (a very good band who don’t quite fit what I am writing about) should definitely be checked out by anyone into bands like Marblebog or (of course) Burzum.

Nordmen
Pretty standard orthodox BM with a strong atmosphere, NS by reputation (hard for me to say based on song titles in French) and pretty good despite a slightly thin sound.

Ciel Nordique
To date, Ciel Nordique have released one demo, in 2005, but it’s a very accomplished one, balancing aggression and melancholy perfectly.

Délétère
Still relatively new on the scene, Délétère so far have one excellent full length album, Les Heures de la Peste to their to their name. Better still, because more raw and concentrated, are the demos collected on De Ritbus Morbiferis; a set of songs that utterly embody the raw melancholy and stormy, snow-covered landscapes that define Métal Noir Québécois.

And that’s probably enough for now….

The Lucky Ones Were The First To Die! The 1980s post-Mad Max Apocalypse

However successful George Miller’s 2015 Mad Max movie was, for a variety of reasons it is unlikely to have the impact of the second (and by extension, the far superior first) one did; the release of 1981’s Mad Max 2 (known internationally as The Road Warrior) coincided with the boom in home video (specifically home video rental; those were the days when to actually buy a movie on VHS cost outlandishly vast sums) and the fact that it was set in a barren landscape with details (cars, clothes, technology) that were recognisably contemporary, but generally beaten-up, rather than gleamingly futuristic meant that its look and feel was easy to imitate on an extremely low budget. The storyline, too, was simple and dynamic in the style of a spaghetti western; requiring only a few key locations, a small cast and some action, it was apparently eminently imitable. Except of course, that George Miller is a masterful director and the pre-Hollywood Mel Gibson was an immensely charismatic and capable actor.

There was also the atmosphere of the early 80s; people may now, on the whole, be more scared than they were then, but the threats of the 21st century are rarely as monolithic and inescapable as the fear of nuclear war once was. The cold war, pre-Gorbachev, created a paranoia that pervaded not only obvious movies like Wargames (US) and When the Wind Blows (UK), but also silly flag-waving nonsense like Rocky IV. Not surprisingly, this is a feature of life in the 80s rarely acknowledged by the nostalgia industry.

Aside from Mad Max 2, the other cinematic progenitor of the 80s post-apocalypse straight-to-video movie was John Carpenter’s 1981 masterpiece(ish) Escape From New York. In fact, so influential are these movies that many of those that follow could (and will) justifiably be referred to as ‘Escape from Mad Max 2’ movies. Most of the classic derivative B movies can be easily identified by the presence of a post-Mad Max/Snake Plissken hero – lone, brooding, grizzled, leather clad, often with unacceptable hair.

Due presumably to it’s powerful final scene, the 1968 classic Planet of the Apes is evoked every now and then, albeit on a less epic scale; even less obvious, but arguably still there, is the distant influence of HG Wells’ The Time Machine, with its vision of a small ‘civilised’ ruling elite (Eloi) living in comfort and bestial devolved humanoids (Morlocks) roaming the wilds. A debased version of this idea; a small group of nice, civilised people terrorised by a group of not-nice, non-local people, helped by a nice, non-local person or people is so widespread in cinema (westerns, samurai movies, Night of the Living Dead etc etc) that it’s hard to say where exactly it originated (actually, probably somewhere quite obvious/well known, but I will look that up after it’s too late for this article).

Since the 1920s, most Hollywood movies have historically tried to sell themselves with a snappy tagline; as you will see, these movies have some of the best ever coined. So here is a selection of worthwhile post-apocalyptic movies that gives an idea of how varied even such a narrow subgenre can be…

Countdown to Apocalypse…

Technically pre-dating the 80s straight-to-video post-apocalyptic cycle (and influencing it?) but definitely worth a mention is

Damnation Alley (1977)
Tagline: You Have Seen Great Adventures – You Are About To Live One

Basically a bunch of TV and B-movie actors driving around the desert in ridiculous Robot-Wars-looking modified vehicles. Many of the factors that would become clichés are firmly in place here; a shattered, post-apocalyptic world (cheap desert locations), a ramshackle group of survivors (though less fashionably ramshackle than in Mad Max 2 and its imitators), a pretty basic ‘quest’ style theme (in this case a search for fellow survivors).
In terms of general filmmaking competence and originality this, though not great, is far above the standard of the general 80s movie of this type.

Another early entry that sets the tone for what was to follow is…

Ravagers (1979)
tagline: 1991: Civilisation is Dead

It really IS dead; in this yawn-apocalypse, Richard Harris tries to find a way to safety through a decaying post-civilisation landscape populated by warring gangs. It is far less exciting than one would think possible.

Post-Apocalyptic Raids

Not surprisingly, the true Escape from Mad Max 2 subgenre was defined by the work of Italian B-movie/exploitation directors. One of the true genre-setting movies, and pretty ubiquitous in video shops back in the 80s is Enzo G Castellari (director of Jaws ripoffs, horror movies and The Inglorious Bastards (1978))’s opus:

1990; The Bronx Warriors (1982)
tagline; The lucky ones were the first to die!

The disclaimer here is that there is no apocalypse as such; but the movie is 100% in the post-Escape From New York genre, with the Bronx declared a warzone and sealed off from the rest of the world, left to the feuding gangs that inhabit its decaying tenements and warehouses.

In fact, the movie is kind of an amalgam of several sources, most notably Walter Hill’s all-time great The Warriors (1979) and it owes as much to Romeo & Juliet and to spaghetti westerns as it does to the usual subgenre films. It is fun, more or less, but it has serious pacing problems (not to mention dubbing issues) that put it firmly in the z-list. The characters too are confusing – storyline-wise Mark Gregory’s ‘Trash’ should logically be the hero or the villain but isn’t really either. On the plus side, though, there is a character called ‘Toblerone’! This movie was part of a seam of post-apocalyptic movies with ‘Bronx’ in the title, possibly influenced by the depiction of the Bronx as violent no-man’s-land in Paul Newman vehicle Fort Apache The Bronx (1981)? Bronx Warriors itself is followed by the very similar but not-at-all-better Bronx Warriors 2 (Escape from the Bronx). Everything you need to know about that one is on this better-than-the-movie poster:

Another, but better Escape from Mad Max 2 movie is Fred Olen Ray associate Steve Barkett’s

The Aftermath (1982)
tagline; Hell in the Aftermath; who will survive?

Mad Max‘s bizarre mutant biker-gang leader was (strangely yet memorably) called Toecutter. The Aftermath has a gang of mutant weirdo bikers led by B-movie god Sid Haig’s ‘Cutter’. Despite the utter lack of originality, the story (slightly influenced by Planet of the Apes: astronauts return to Earth to find it a post-apocalyptic wasteland inhabited by gangs of violent criminals et cetera) and direction actually make this a very watchable B-movie.

Sadly, the same cannot be said for:

She (1982)
Tagline; Sandahl Bergman tempted Conan and now she is ready to take on the World

Even the truly great Sandahl Bergman (of Conan the Barbarian etc) can’t save this plodding post-apocalyptic updating of H Rider Haggard’s classic adventure novel She. There are lots of excellent and bizarre elements; werewolves, gladiators, mad scientists and so on – but (a key genre fault, this) the pacing is bad and the atmosphere flatter than a dust-swept wasteland. A sad waste of talent, especially since it was directed by non-schlock Israeli director Avi Nesher.

Similarly unambitious but more fun is giallo maestro Joe (Papaya: Love Goddess of the Cannibals) D’Amato’s…

Endgame (1983)
tagline; For An “Endgame” Champion In The Year 2025, There’s Only One Way To Live. Dangerously

‘Escape from Mad Max 2’ again; this film shares many parallels with the later The Blood of Heroes (see below) and looks forward to The Running Man, but is much more fun than either. Telepathic mutants, violent game shows, warriors, what’s not to like?

Similar but SO much better; perhaps the ‘Escape from Mad Max 2’ movie of all time also arrived in ’83, in the shape of Italian exploitation master Sergio (La Montagna Del Dio Cannibale) Martino’s opus…

2019: After The Fall of New York (1983)
tagline; Mankind will prevail if it can survive the year 2019…

After a nuclear war, naturally, (this film, like John Carpenter’s, actually names the – now alarmingly close – year, rather than giving the usual vague-but-infinitely-more-sensible date of ‘the near future’) society has broken down, technology has failed and gangs of radiation-infected mutants roam the ravaged wasteland blah-de-blah.
In this case, what’s left of society is being led by the evil and repressive “Euraks”, while a rebel Federation fights for the survival of the old ways of life (presumably those same ways of life which led to the apocalypse, but that’s people for you).

In a blatant ripoff of Escape from New York, the Federation hires a mercenary (though not a nothing-to-lose criminal like Snake Plissken) called, somewhat loftily, ‘Parsifal’, who, naturally owes allegiance only to himself and his own survival and *snoooooore* but nevertheless accepts the mission to travel into the heart of New York(!) to retrieve the only fertile female left on earth.
The key to this film’s enjoyability is its utter trashiness, and to be fair, the survival of the human race does seem like more of a ‘prize’ than the life of the President or fuel. Fun, nasty and definitely unboring, like B movies should be.

Speaking of ‘Escape from Mad Max 2’ …

Stryker (1983)
tagline; After the holocaust, nothing matters but survival also, perhaps better; The Odds are a million-to-one. And Stryker is the one.

Uninspired taglines for an uninspired movie; Filipino exploitation master Cirio H. Santiago (TNT Jackson, Nam Angels) directs this opus in which, after the inevitable apocalypse, the world is running out of water (of course), and a group of Amazons guard the last known freshwater spring but are attacked by a gang of blah blah blah, until moody, monosyllabic tough guy “Stryker” turns up to help them out. You know the rest.

more of the same in….

2020 – Freedom Fighters (1984)
tagline; When earth becomes an arena… murder becomes a way of life.

Joe D’Amato again, but on much weaker form, this super cheap plodathon tells the story of a band of grizzled warriors fighting against fascism in post-holocaust Texas.

Business as usual in Bobby (The One-Armed Executioner) Suarez’

Warriors of the Apocalypse (1985)
tagline: They turned paradise into hell!

Although firmly in the Escape from Mad Max 2 mould, there is a welcome flavour of heroic fantasy in this movie. After civilization has inevitably been wiped out by nuclear war, a ridiculous leather-clad adventurer leads a group of wanderers on a search for the fabled Mountain of Life, on the way encountering mutants, pygmies, ladies in fur bikinis etc. FUN.

A very welcome if sadly very bad addition to the genre is…

Robot Holocaust (1986)
tagline; It’s machine versus man in the ultimate battle for the future!

Finally, someone (in fact Tim Kincaid, director of Bad Girls Dormitory and gay porn) realised that there might be robots after the apocalypse! In this timeless masterpiece (as much heroic fantasy as anything else) a ‘drifter’ called ‘Neo’ and his rusty robot sidekick battle evil authorities who are using slave labour to run their power station, with extremely low budget results.

More typical (but less fun, and shockingly an even weaker premise) is…

Steel Dawn (1987)
tagline; there are several, none great. Best is probably In this frightening time, one man makes a difference

In a post-apocalyptic wasteland, an evil gang are menacing a peaceful group of survivors because they want to steal their water. *YAAAWN*, and then a ludicrously bearded warrior in the shape of the late, great Patrick Swayze(!) arrives to sort everything out. Yep, it’s ‘Escape from Mad Max 2’ again, only more good-natured and much less fun.

But what happens when you cross ‘Escape from Mad Max 2’ with the superior 70s sci-fi movie Rollerball, I hear you ask..?

The Blood of Heroes (ridiculously aka The Salute of the Jugger) (1989)
tagline; The Time Will Come When Winning Is Everything

The second half of the 80s produces especially threadbare variations on the post-apocalyptic straight-to-video movie and this is one of the worst; in this future, the ragged survivors of nuclear war aren’t looking for fuel, Presidents, ladies or even water; they are playing a nasty yet somehow extraordinarily dull version of football. ‘The Time Will Come When Winning Is Everything’ – hopefully not for a while yet though.

Fred Olen Ray got a brief mention earlier, and it would be strange if one of the ultimate Z-movie directors of the era hadn’t dabbled in a (presumably lucrative) straight-to-video genre: of course he did!

Warlords (1988)
tagline: He came out of nowhere. A stranger, a soldier… and maybe a saviour

Seriously cheap (though less so than Olen Ray’s Lovecraftian yawnathon, Phantom Empire) this endlessly boring Escape from Mad Max 2 movie has a cast of maybe 10 people, several of whom play handily-masked mutants that hero David Carradine despatches every 10 minutes or so. The ‘plot’; Warlord (Sid ‘the Cutter’ Haig) kidnaps a girl and takes her into the mutant-ridden wastelands. David Carradine rescues her. Even the fairly formidable quantities of gratuitous nudity that 80s B-movie directors revelled in fail to make this watchable to post-adolescent people.

Almost too late, but just about worth a mention is

World Gone Wild (1988)
tagline; 50 years after the end of the world the only ones left are nuked-out, zoned-out burnouts. The wildest adventure of all is about to begin.

Actually it really isn’t. A small role for Adam Ant as a bad guy is perhaps the most memorable thing about this ‘ragtag bunch of survivors protecting dwindling water supplies’ movie, but it is more-or-less watchable and fun.

AFTERMATH…
‘More-or-less watchable and fun’ may be a modest achievement, but it is but an unattainable dream for the most recent additions to the genre. There are (leaving aside ‘big’ movies like The Road and The Book of Eli which, whatever their faults, are not B-movies in the usually accepted sense) comparatively few these days, but those that there are (that I have seen) are on the whole not even as enjoyable as the lamer entries here, and in some cases (Doomsday (2008)) fall into all of the old ‘Escape From Mad Max 2‘ cliches, without even the excuse of cashing in on a recent, fashion-changing blockbuster. And then there is the new Mad Max. But if Charlize Theron, Tom Hardy and actually being released in cinemas just seems too commercial, there is enough of the 80s apocalypse out there (if not available on DVD, let alone Bluray) to keep even the most hardened leather-clad mercenary busy for some time...

Independence as a State of Mind: the Bosque Records story (1988-2001)

Romantic intro…

Records (even really bad ones) are mostly just what the word suggests: a unique record of a specific performance, made on a particular day or days, by people in a particular room or rooms, who were in whatever mood they happened to be in at the time.

Record labels are, at their best, a time capsule of an era (or, if they go on long enough, time capsules of eras; see for example the lavish Rise and Fall of Paramount Records box sets), bringing together and preserving these voices and sounds and making them accessible for as long as the technology exists to play them.

Naturally, the more focussed or niche (or just small) a label is, the stronger the time capsule quality is; which brings us to Bosque Records. Although the big names of the 90s Scottish indie scene (Primal Scream, Belle & Sebastian, Teenage Fanclub, Travis, Shamen etc etc etc etc) are well remembered by posterity (or else are actually still around), they were simply the most visible/commercial/successful elements of an extremely vibrant and wide-ranging scene, which had its roots in the punk era and evolved throughout the subsequent decades in a variety of unpredictable and sometimes whimsical ways.

At the less commercial end of the spectrum was Tom Worthington’s Bosque Records, initially based in Edinburgh (rarely noted for its music scene) and then Glasgow (always noted for its music scene). In the period 1988-2001 Bosque released a handful (twenty-something) of distinctive, often powerful releases by artists as diverse and idiosyncratic as Dominic Waxing Lyrical, Gilded Lil, Starstruck and Trout. A small output perhaps; but it fulfils the ideal that (presumably) all labels start out with; you can pick up a Bosque release, be it punky, experimental, bluesy, dancey, with the confidence that you will hear something different, something interesting, something unique. And that is a real achievement.

In some ways, Bosque was documenting the end of an era; changes in the music industry, along with (and partially caused by) the birth/growth of the internet and the (temporary, as it turned out) death of vinyl records meant that the indie scene of the early 21st century would be less local and often less experimental, thanks to the appearance in the mid-90s of ‘indie’ as a term denoting a specific style/genre of (mainly guitar-based) music.

The original meaning of indie was in fact exemplified by small labels like Bosque; truly independent, devoted to whatever music their owners wanted to release, regardless of style and fashion or commercial potential. Indie releases from the 80s and 90s have their own special charm; like the music itself, the hand-drawn logos, the artwork and design have a resolutely non-corporate appeal, an expression of freedom and the non-elitist sense that art isn’t something precious or pompous, and that it has everything to do with your life.

Tom was good enough to share his reminiscences (and pictures; please see his Flickr albums for proper photo credits) with us;

When and why did you decide to start a label?

“I was in a band in Edinburgh, named Hee Haw and we had recordings that we wanted to release. In 1988 we first put out an 8 track cassette ‘Splash your head’ that sold quite a few (200?) so logically we thought that we would next do a vinyl record which was the 5 track 12” ‘WrigglEP’ in 1989 (bosc 006). Of course we should have done a 7” or 2 x 7”s but we had ‘label support’ from Fast Forward who persuaded us that the 7” was wrong for us and the ‘market’. And we were impressionable so that is what we did. It was alright, Peel played it and we sold a few, gigging as much as we could.”

Where did the name Bosque come from?

“Bosque (my spelling) is/was a word in common parlance in Forres, Moray, the town where I grew up. It means, roughly, excellent or sound, as in mighty. There was a Bosque cassette compilation in 1994 that featured The Manxish Boys, Pink Kross, Starstruck, Gila Monster, Policecat etc. This was called ‘Humpy Bosque’ (bosc008c) which suggests that it is an incredibly wonderful thing – which it kind of was. The name was of course awkward and annoying, always requiring to be spelled out to people, B O S Q U E.”

What were your biggest influences when you started the label?

“Punk rock. Vanity self publishing. Desire to document. Validation. Independence.”

What is your favourite record label, if you have such a thing?

“I shall plump for Shimmy Disc. But also early Flying Nun. Ankst Records too – I so admired their thing and was always actively seeking a decent band that communicated in Gaelic. But to my knowledge no such band has ever existed.”

Was there a specific guiding principle/vision behind Bosque records?

“Initially no, not really, it was a collective necessity and a shared responsibility. But after the Hee Haw releases it became me and Mark Gibbons, and that’s where it got freaky, and free. We were so in love with music, our own and that being made all around us. We were passionately involved, music and art and poetry was all that mattered. We knew that we had to take complete control and somehow, that is what we did. After Mark & I moved through to Glasgow in 1995 he started to have more fun. He joined and recorded several other bands and became less and less involved in Bosque. It was mostly me then, in a cheap white suit, a bit stoned.”

You were involved in the Bosque Burlesque events as well as the records, was there a spirit of camaraderie between the label/bands/fans?

“Well yes there was. I mean not always, because we were purposely juxtaposing things and deliberately trying to integrate many strands of the cultures that we were interested in. The Bosque Burlesque shows were a good example of this approach. Bosque was always about widening things out, finding connections and introducing jarring elements that tickled our fancy. We were trying to be free. And straddle the medias. There was such a great scene in Glasgow in the mid 90’s. We hardly cared about the rest of the world, we had all the excitement and all the tunes right here in our city. It was, essentially, a very wonderful time. The grotty basements and the parks and the cheap bars were full of individuals experimenting with their lives, throwing all that they had against the wall to see what would stick (a Will Prentice observation).

< Minx Grill

Seemed like everyone made music, wrote zines, put on gigs, we were just very, very present. Really I was too involved to ever be successful at the label game. I was a little bit older than most of us and I found myself in some kind of welfare/surrogate uncle role for lots of lovely, amazing, needy people. But at the same time I was trying to be a responsible safe bet to London promo/label types, fuck that wasn’t very comfy for me. But someone had to do it…

But aye, looking at the photos I took of the Bosque Burlesque shows, just about everyone in the audience was in bands themselves – and lots of them still are! A lot of fun, so many stories…”

What are your favourite Bosque releases and why?

“I suppose that the Sativa Drummers / Rockaragnarok split 10” (bosc024) summed up the ethos pretty well – and it is a great record. Sativa Drummers were a collective of drilled, politically motivated ravers with drums who would turn up from over the horizon at every demo or radical event in the east of Scotland. Mark Deas recorded this record and marshalled a massing barrage of drums, with minimal tape loops that conjured up an Albini-esque finale. Rockaragnarok on the other side were associated with and even shared members and lives with the Sativa Drummers but played an entirely different, timeless plas-rock psyche that amazes me still. But I am proud of all that we released. I just wish there had been more.”

Are there any Bosque artists you feel deserved wider exposure?

“Pretty much all of them. Seriously. I honestly believe that when they were on form, Gilded Lil were one of the greatest rock & roll bands of all time – and Trout were punk rock incarnate. Starstruck were pretty incredible at times and I am extremely proud of it, even if I say so myself. And what to say of Dominic Waxing Lyrical? I hardly know where to start, but the good thing is that he has not stopped and that is perhaps in some small way, due to our documenting and validating his music and stance on life back then.”

<Gilded Lil live c.1998

Were there any bands around then you wish you had signed but didn’t?

“Lots, I had so many ideas, so much enthusiasm, but so little money. There were so many good ideas for records, it’s a wee bit painful to think about them. I was useless with the business and admin but was convinced all through doing the label that someone, some big label or distro or individual would support and bankroll me through a load of releases. I had the bands ready, and the ideas and energy. It didn’t happen though.

I very nearly got to make a record with Mr. McFall’s Chamber (trumped by Robert Fripp).

I would have loved to have made a record with the Country Teasers.

There was to be a Starstruck picture disc 7” on the subject of red hair that just never happened dammit.”

It felt like the UK indie scene really changed around the time of Oasis, when suddenly commercial appeal/mainstream success started to be a goal, rather than something to be suspicious of, was that how it felt from the inside?

“I don’t think I cared that much. That stuff was all so crass and bland to me. Starstruck actually had a run in with Creation records around this time. Dave from Fire/Paperhouse Recs wanted to re-release the 1991 Starstruck cassette album ‘It’s fun, it’s easy. It’s you’ (bosc005) on CD on his Seminal Twang label – which was a fantastic idea, we were thrilled. And he was keen, he got us to do some recordings for various compilations, flattered us, gave me beer money, put us on the guestlists and generally held out the prospect of looking after the band, he was just really enthusiastic. But then he got head hunted to Creation where it all went wonky. Although we went with him there (without having signed anything, duh) his priorities suddenly seemed to change to immediacy and cashing in on what had become indie as a style not independence as a state of mind. We were palmed off, were bottom of the pile and basically forgotten about, which was deeply frustrating and resulted in Saskia and I going into the Creation offices at Creation and removing the Starstruck artwork and tapes. Disappointing, extremely. But we never were going to fit into that scene. Maybe we never were going to fit into any scene… Thus the subtitle to the Starstruck ‘Moi et Beatrice Dalle’ cassingle (bosc009) in 1993 was ‘No Creation Now!’. It also includes our classy version of the Beach Boys ‘Surfers rule’ which we had recorded for a Seminal Twang compilation with Murdo from The Cateran and Margarita from The Fizzbombs/Rote Kapelle.”

How far (if at all) do you think the label was shaped by being based in Glasgow? It definitely felt like Glasgow had a scene in a way that Edinburgh didn’t…

“Well Bosque moved from Edinburgh to Glasgow in 1995. Couldn’t be bothered with Edinburgh any more. Glasgow was absolutely the place to be. I was coming through twice a week anyway. Mark & I had both split up with girlfriends in the east and besides we had added a rhythm section to the Starstruck sound and they lived in Glasgow. So we loaded a van and hit the M8.

Mid 90’s Glasgow was grotty but kind of perfect. Bands would form, flicker and break-up in a day. 15 people would huddle in a bedsit to watch a VHS of a Cassavetes film. Folks would meet at the photocopy shop, start a new zine. We all forgot to eat. The 13th Note and Sleazy’s could be so perfect of an evening and sincerely we did not give a fig for the rest of the world, we had our own. We made friends for life. Very interesting when Richard Hell or Kim Fowley or The Make Up came to town – Glasgow gave more than it got. Amazing.

Of course I remained closely involved with my pals in bands in Edinburgh and felt obliged to introduce and promote their thing, first to Glasgow and then anywhere else that would have them…. This Edinburgh connection seemed like a trump card for Bosque, it felt important. But when I’m in Edinburgh I always want to get back to Glasgow to see what’s going on.

So yes, Bosque was shaped by Glasgow, but perhaps in hindsight it would have benefitted from a slight remove. But that’s not the story.”

Was running the label a financial struggle? Was it ever a full-time occupation?

“Well yes it was a struggle, eventually a bit of a disaster. It was so hard to even make ends meet and I never made any money to speak of, it all went back into the bands, their records, tours etc. But for a very long time I was so motivated and convinced of a beautiful outcome. The satisfaction was from being with fantastic, hilarious, talented people and making music and records. And between me and all the other labels, we did document an important and exciting time in Scottish culture. We did.

But yes I had to work through it all to pay my own way. And I sold furniture, records, all kinds of stuff, just to complete recordings and make the records that I believed in and was committed too. My enthusiasm knew no bounds.”

Was distribution ever a problem?

“Distribution was always a problem. We existed in a window of time where provincial rock & roll had little currency outside of our scene and the internet was but a baby. Post Fast Forward (1990 or so) there was no Scottish distro network to speak of so we were trying to deal with the London distributors and certainly for Bosque that was generally a highly dysfunctional & unsatisfactory relationship. These firms always seemed to be at it with us, but I freely admit that I was pretty dim about it all and not good at the language of bullshit or of playing hard-ball, both of which seemed to be required skills in manouvering within the London music industry. So probably most of our sales were at gigs, direct to shops and through the mail. But can I say that Paul Kearney is a lovely man!

As far as the web went we were actually really on it and did even attempt to live-stream a gig in 1995 as Mark & I and Saskia & Clare from Sally Skull were involved in Scotland’s first internet café then – but it all went tits up, which was another reason for escaping Edinburgh. We subsequently had a website and tried to work that but in the absence of streaming/downloads/secure server it was never a realistic way of running the label.

Sally Skull live, c.mid 1990s

My complaints about distro should not obscure the wonders of the myriad bedroom distros & the international pop underground which supplied the Bosque P.O. Box with cute letters containing fivers and ten dollar notes and IRCs and cheques in return for our vinyl – which meant that there was always a wee bit of money around for the essentials of life.”

Why/when did Bosque close?

“It all got very messy in late 1998/1999. Drugs and depression, death and despair. I had promised certain things basically the Gilded Lil album (bosc028), and I just had to hold on until that was released, which wasn’t until 2001. But I so very badly wanted/needed to get out, quit, take a back seat and get some rigour and honesty back in my life. It was a sad end to an extraordinary time. So very much energy had been put into the venture and there was not so very much coming back at me.”

What do you think of the Scottish/UK indie scene nowadays, do you still follow it?

“A bit. I go out and see bands in Glasgow sometimes. Lots, maybe even most of my friends make music, some of them have never stopped, I guess that they cannot and indeed why should they. There is still a lot of fantastic music being made in this country, particularly of course here in Glasgow. Great bands, labels, venues – loads of crossover into visual art, film and the written word. Exactly as it should be and, I am glad to say, it just don’t stop.”

Looking back at Bosque, do you have any regrets? Would you do it all again and if so what would you do differently?

“No regrets, fuck that. Never again. Onwards.”

Heartfelt thanks to Tom for taking the time to answer my questions! See many more great photos from his archives here

See the Bosque discography here

“Cheap Turd”: the mysterious charm of Valet Girls (1987)

Valet Girls (1987)
Dir. Rafal Zielinski
Starring. April Stewart, Meri D. Marshall, Mary Kohnert
Valet Girls is a poorly made, badly paced, atrociously acted, flatly filmed, desperately unfunny, trashy near-exploitation movie; it has almost no redeeming features; so why is it so great?

Mostly, this must be due to ‘period charm’ – they probably do make crappy movies like this nowadays, but somehow the tone of the modern post-Farrelly brothers, bottom-of-the-barrel comedy is incredibly charmless even by the standards of the z-grade sub-Police Academy humour that plagued straight-to-video films 30 years ago.

What’s funny (peculiar) about Valet Girls is that it doesn’t even have the courage of what convictions it has – the movie poster and publicity suggests a raunchy (indeed, near-pornographic) teen movie, but it is in fact, significantly less titillating than Porky’s, Revenge of the Nerds or even the aforementioned Police Academy itself.

The perfunctory storyline can be summarised extremely briefly; three girls (April Stewart, Meri D Marshall and Mary Kohnert – only the latter was to make further appearances on film) start working as valet parking girls in LA in order to make it in show business. Ironically, the film seems to have been in part an unsuccessful attempt to launch the music career of the appealing but not overly star-powered Meri Marshall; as far as I can tell she had some success in Germany. To that end, she sings a handful of forgettably likeable synth-pop songs, somewhere between Tiffany and Debbie Gibson stylistically.

So what is the appeal of the film? Partly the utter woodenness of the three leads – their intense anti-charisma becomes, to the sympathetic viewer, a kind of endearing charisma. The same can’t be said for the irritating young men who are outwitted by the girls throughout the film and whose names I can’t be bothered to look up. Probably the biggest names associated with the film are John Terlesky (best known to sci-fi/fantasy fans as the title character in the below-par comedy sequel Deathstalker II) and Ron Jeremy, in one of those roles that demonstrates why his career never took off when wearing clothes. Naturally, being the kind of film this is, it wants to have its cake and eat it; we are supposed to see the girls as go-getting young business women, aiming for the stars, but doing it all for themselves; all well and good; and in fact they are both smarter and tougher than the males in the film. As luck would have it for the people trying to sell Valet Girls to a youth audience, though, the girls’ business venture requires them to be sexy (at least I presume they are supposed to be sexy) and to dress (relatively) sexily throughout.

Mainly though, it is that ‘period charm’ – modern movies set in the 80s may carefully research and study the hairstyles, the fashion and music of the time to give an authentic 80s appearance for those too young to remember, but Valet Girls is a compendium of the kind of attempts at fashion that were unsuccessful then and have never been revived, but which were nevertheless a pervasive part of the 80s pop culture universe; witness for example the majesty of the jerky new wave-ish cover of Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Purple Haze’ played by ‘The New Psychotics’; an 80s movie producer’s idea of what the kids might (but didn’t) think was cool. All eras have these kind of things, but the time preserved here has, like the 1920s seen through John O’Hara’s Appointment in Samarra, a poignancy even in its silliest details; for those of the right age, this was their youth and is an era which shall never return.

Valet Girls may be the longest 90 minutes or so you will ever watch – and in terms of plotting, acting, comedy and direction it makes Weekend At Bernie’s 2 look like Weekend at Bernie’s, but on the other hand, if you are old enough to remember the 80s (or wish you had been alive then) and wallowing in amateurish anti-nostalgia appeals to you then you could possibly do worse.

Footnote: the title of this article isn’t just me being mean, it comes from a ‘hilarious’ moment of Police Academy style humour where one of the girls insults one of the many irritating men who populate the film:

Rosalind (April Stewart): “Cheap turd!”

Archie Lee Samples (John Terlesky): “what!??”

Rosalind: “I heard”

For similar experiences see also:
Biggles; Adventures in Time (1986) (80s nostalgia)
Mesa of Lost Women (1953) (50s B-movie nostalgia)
Her Reputation (1933) (30s B-movie nostalgia)
Grange Hill (1978-1990-ish) (an authentic British 80s childhood experience, only without the swearing)

LIVE DEAD: Mayhem 1990

Suicide and murder will get a band noticed, but more than enough has been written about all that elsewhere (best short version; Ian Christe’s Sound of the Beast, best longer version; Michael Moynihan & Didrik Søderlind’s classic Lords of Chaos), so…

Looking at the history of the notorious/famous/classic/tragic 1988-91 lineup of Norway’s black metal legends Mayhem (Dead [vocals] – Euronymous [guitar] – Necrobutcher [bass] – Hellhammer [drums]), the surprising thing about the band isn’t that that they did not manage to finish recording the album they were working on (De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas, eventually released in 1994 after the deaths of both Dead and Euronymous) but that they managed to achieve anything at all.

Famously broke, hungry and with little audience existing at that date for the kind of music they were making, the band nevertheless made a huge impact that lasts to this day. They professionally recorded only a few songs (notably Freezing Moon and Carnage, recorded in 1989, but not released as a single until years later when, again, literally half of the lineup on the record were dead) but their influence on their contemporaries was huge and they even managed the impressive feat of touring outside of Norway, albeit in a severely haphazard and underfunded way.

L-R Euronymous, Dead, Hellhammer, Necrobutcher

The band only played a handful of concerts, mostly around 1989-90, and luckily (and surprisingly) most of those were captured on tape for posterity, with varying degrees of technical skill.
The surviving concert recordings appropriately take place mostly in the cold of winter, (February and November, 1990) and give a picture of the band’s evolution from the rudimentary (if extreme) gore-obsessed black metal of their 80s demos, to the intense and atmospheric black metal that was to kick-start the musical style of the whole genre as it is now known.

The setlist for Mayhem’s shows throughout 1990 seems to have stayed more or less the same, although early favourite (and title track of their 1986 demo debut) Pure Fucking Armageddon was superceded by the vastly superior and more thoughtful new song Pagan Fears in the later shows. It is well-documented that Dead self-harmed during several, perhaps all of these shows, but (maybe luckily) the results are never audible, although there is at times a palpably intense and uncomfortable atmosphere.

The Great War: Live in Jessheim, February 3rd 1990

The first surviving concert recording (I think; I haven’t researched this as thoroughly as I intended to) seems to be a show in Jessheim, Norway from February of 1990, just over a year before this version of the band imploded with the suicide of Dead in April 1991. The recording is, to be charitable about it, not great; harsh, tinny and noisy. It does capture the enthusiasm the band still had at this point, although they were to become noticeably tighter by the end of the year.

1. Deathcrush
Despite a fair amount of surface hiss this is a very strong, gritty and listenable version of the old classic from the 1987 mini album of the same name. Dead roars a few times, but seemingly the only part of the lyric he knew this night was “Deathcrush!!” Pretty good nonetheless.

2. Necrolust
Lots of crowd noise and hiss make this a less satisfying listen as the music is a bit muffled and distant. Still, a pretty good version, as far as the bass and guitar (the most audible parts) are concerned and Euronymous’ solo is less tuneless than sometimes. Again, it seems like Dead only sings some of the lyric, but possibly it’s just that his vocals are lost in the surface noise. One of the more enthusiastic crowd reactions of this period though.

3. Funeral Fog
The crowd (or at least a couple of people) actually chants ‘Mayhem! Mayhem!’ before Hellhammer plays the blastbeat intro to Funeral Fog. A noisy, bad recording can’t hide the fact that the band are playing an excellent version of the song; Dead’s vocal is noticeably more engaged than on the earlier songs, and his delivery, deeper than usual, comes across surprisingly clearly. Euronymous’ guitar playing is excellent, intense and precise and the atmosphere of the classic ‘True Norwegian Black Metal’ comes across perfectly. The song ends in an eruption of feedback but the crowd reacts with enthusiasm.

4. Freezing Moon
Dead gives his usual intro (“When it’s cold and when it’s dark the freezing moon can obsess you” over whines of feedback before the band launches into a messy (at least poorly-recorded and hissy) but still powerful version of one of the all-time classic anthems of black metal. The band (especially Euronymous) plays a little less certainly than in later recordings and Dead’s vocals in the slower part are swamped by the guitars, but the atmosphere of the song still comes across effectively and the crowd reacts vocally.

5. Carnage
The crowd continues to chant and the band launches into an abortive version of Carnage that collapses just after Dead has shouted the opening line. There seems to be an issue with the guitar and Euronymous plays a few random chords before the band launches back into the song, playing an intense but messy version, made challenging to the listener by the poor quality of the recording.

6. Buried by Time and Dust
Dead’s usual semi-comprehensible intro leads into a false start where the band plays a bar or so before the song cuts off, then starts again. The recording makes it all a bit buzzing and monotonous but it’s still an undoubted advance on Carnage.

7. Chainsaw Gutsfuck
Dead barks the title and the band lurches into life, playing that simple yet ominous riff hard and heavy. As with the rest of this show, the volume of the guitars and level of hiss makes it a less than pleasant listening experience, but it was never supposed to be nice.

8. Pure Fucking Armageddon
More feedback and some tuning sounds take up the first few minutes of this highly chaotic version of the title track from the band’s first demo. The small audience chants and cheers, Dead finally announces the song and, after another false start and more chanting the band finally plays, extremely fast and loud but also tunelessly. Unless you like pure noise, this is pretty unpleasant, and the end is cut off, making it an unsatisfying version of one of their less impressive songs.

Dawn of the Black Hearts: Live in Sarpsborg, February 28th, 1990

Probably the most famous of Mayhem bootlegs, Dawn of the Black Hearts has always enjoyed a kind of semi-official quality, since it features a photograph of the scene of Dead’s suicide taken by Euronymous and intended by him (you would think, somewhat unrealistically) as an album cover.
The photograph was presumably sent to Colombia by Euronymous himself, and in 1995, following the murder of the guitarist, the also late Mauricio “Bull Metal” Montoya used it as the cover of the original edition of the album on his Warmaster label, which also features some live tracks recorded by the previous Mayhem lineup in Ski in 1986. Incidentally, the title comes from lyrics written by Darkthrone’s Fenriz which includes an excellent reference to Satan’s “hooven clooves”.

1. Deathcrush
The slightly tinny quality makes this particularly feral version of the perennial Deathcrush a bit hard on the ears, but Dead’s shriek manages to equal Maniac’s unhinged performance on the original 1986 mini-album, no mean feat.

2. Necrolust
After a very short pause for whooping from the crowd, the band launches into a churning version of another venerable classic. The slow, stomping intro riff is more effective than the blasting passages, and Dead’s voice is a little lost in the noise (although he delivers his lines with an occasional hint of Celtic Frost-ish swagger). Star of the show is Hellhammer, who basically pummels the song to oblivion. The crowd sounds a little taken aback but approving, chattering and shouting good-humouredly through Euronymous’ guitar tuning before Hellhammer’s curt intro leads into…

3. Funeral Fog
The first song of the set to be penned by the lineup actually playing is noticeably superior to its predecessors, the blasting passages being both fast and relatively complex/melodic. Dead is audibly more enthusiastic and Eurnonymous’ guitar playing loses its sloppiness, playing the song’s intense interlocking riffs with speed and precision. The tremolo-picked riff following the verses is aggressive, atmospheric and completely definitive of the ‘second wave’ of black metal that the band was bringing into being. The reaction of the (presumably quite small) crowd is suitably enthusiastic.

4. Freezing Moon
After Dead’s usual introduction the band is led into a slightly clumsy version of their signature tune by three cymbal crashes. Once the song gets going everything falls into place, but there seem to be some minor timing issues during the intro. Dead’s especially hoarse vocal is extremely effective during the slower passage, although the performance is derailed a little by Euronymous’ solo, which is basically the same as usual but seems to be in the wrong key.

5. Carnage
Back to the earliest years of the band for this messy, noisy blastfest. The band is fast and powerful but also more ordinary than in the preceding songs; Dead rasps, Euronymous plays a speedy would-be technical solo but it’s only in the thrash-toned lull before the last section that the song has much character.

6. Buried By Time and Dust
Another Dead-era classic, and the man himself delivers a highly theatrical monologue leading into the song, possibly his best delivered intro, although the band unfortunately doesn’t quite start when they should. When they do though, they play this, one of Mayhem’s most dramatic tunes, with intensity and precision. Only the trebly quality of the recording mars what is still an excellent performance, especially if the bass is boosted. The relatively poor sound quality does highlight how great Euronymous’ skeletal riffs are though. It also gets one of the more vocal responses from the crowd.

7. Chainsaw Gutsfuck
The monolithic intro to this sounds as good as always, but Dead’s vocals are buried in the noise, making the whole somewhat monotonous.

8. Pure Fucking Armageddon
Dead intones ‘Only death is real!’ a few times before the band storms into one of their earliest, but not best songs. Still, a rousing end to an intense show.

The album ends with the aforementioned live tracks from Ski (or Lillehammer, depending which sources are correct) from 1986, but the recording has comical speed issues typical of old concert tapes; – think Donald Duck on vocals.

Live in Gleisdorf (?) (date??) 1990

There is little information available (at least I haven’t been able to find much) concerning this concert, credited as taking place in Gleisdorf, Austria, but just as likely to be somewhere nearer to the band’s home. That said, the fact that the band seemingly ends the set with Pagan Fears suggests that it could have been part of the ‘mini-tour’ that visited various locations in the former East Germany in the later part of 1990.

A bootleg with the tracklisting below seems to be available, but I don’t have it, so I have only written about the bit I could find online. The nice thing is that it doesn’t seem to be one of the other recordings re-packaged in the usual bootleg manner, so whether or not it’s really from Gleisdorf, it does seem to be a different concert from the usual 2 or 3 that turn up.

1. Deathcrush
The recording is very poor indeed but reveals that the band plays the opening at a more relaxed pace than usual. It is played are noticeably more tightly than on the earlier recordings and Dead’s vocals sound more coherent, so despite the very poor quality of the recording it’s a surprisingly enjoyable version of this venerable tune.
2. Necrolust
3. Funeral Fog
4. Freezing Moon
5. Carnage
6. Buried by Time and Dust
7. Chainsaw Gutsfuck
8. Pagan Fears

War and Sodomy: Live in Zeitz, November 24th, 1990

Also known simply as ‘Live in Zeitz -1990’, War and Sodomy is a better quality recording than the more famous Dawn of the Black Hearts, with the band tighter and more muscular sounding than before and with a more gritty substantial sound, although the vocals are occasionally lost in the (lack of) mix.
The recording was made during the band’s troubled mini-tour mentioned above, which took them to the former East Germany, although concerts further afield were also planned. The setlist had now become equally split between older material and the newly-written songs, giving it more of the ‘true Norwegian black metal’ sound.

1. Deathcrush
The murky sound of this concert begins with some semi-incoherent growling from Dead, but once the music starts the sound is reasonably clear and less harsh than sometimes. The band sounds powerful and better-rehearsed than on earlier concert recordings but unfortunately Dead’s vocals are a little quiet and echoey.

2. Necrolust
The deeper sound gives the intro a particularly ominous quality but once the blastbeats begin it’s all a bit of a blur. Not the worst version, but Dead’s vocals are mainly an incomprehensible croaking noise.

3. Funeral Fog
One of the highlights of the show, even with the dulled top end the atmosphere and power of the song comes across brilliantly, Euronymous’ haunting melody cutting through the swimming-pool acoustics. Dead is still (appropriately) a little lost in the wall of sound, but his despairing croak surfaces from time to time.

4. Freezing Moon
A very slightly different intro from the usual (Dead rasps ‘when it’s cold & when it’s dark’ rather than the other way round) leads into a towering version of the classic Freezing Moon, second only to that on Live in Leipzig. Euronymous’ solo is almost the same as there but not quite as good. Otherwise this is pretty much perfect, Dead’s voice is harsher and deeper than usual but clear and comprehensible.

5. Carnage
A good version of the song, but like much of the earlier material, Carnage was starting to sound a little tired compared with the newer material. Euronymous livens it up with some rather screechy soloing but although full of energy and aggression it isn’t a highlight.

6. Buried by Time and Dust
Dead’s somewhat garbled introductory statement seems shorter than usual but the band plays the song with authority and intensity. Again, the vocals are a little lost in the sound (especially towards the end when there is some very squealing feedback) but overall a strong version.

7. Chainsaw Gutsfuck
Again sounding a little pedestrian compared to their more recent material, this is a pretty good version of the Deathcrush classic, with the vocals clearer than on most of the songs here and some nice playing by Euronymous.

8. Pagan Fears
At the beginning of the year the band had still been ending their shows with the venerable Pure Fucking Armageddon, but it was replaced in later shows by the mighty Pagan Fears, one of the best tracks written by this lineup of the band. The band is tight and focussed and Euronymous plays the intense riffs perfectly. The recording is somewhat detached from the rest of the album, the intro and applause are cut off, robbing the show of some of its atmosphere, but it’s worth remembering that these recordings were never intended for the CD format so it’s possibly just to do with the mundane reality of turning the tape over to continue recording.

Live in Leipzig: November 26th, 1990 (Eiskeller Club)

The only official live album featuring Dead and the best of these by far, Live In Leipzig, despite many rough edges, captures the band at its best, delivering definitive versions of many of their songs. Interestingly, the setlist here combines all of the songs they had been playing throughout the year (it may just be that this is the only complete show), making it the perfect live document of the era.

1. Deathcrush
As on the ‘Gleisdorf’ version, the band leads into this version of Deathcrush slower than usual before reaching the usual blasting tempo. After all the previous bootlegs it is extremely refreshing to hear Dead loud and in the foreground and with all instruments audible behind him and little surface noise.

2. Necrolust
A solid, brutal version of Necrolust gets a slightly muted response from the crowd, to Necrobutcher’s audible exasperation. His shouted ‘Come on Leipzig! is a rare occurrence for a band who – at this period – tended to stick to minimal, scripted* interaction with the audience.

* possibly not actually scripted, but Dead does seem to have worked out three or four standard monologues for live performances

3. Funeral Fog
As if to shake the audience out of it’s torpor, the band launches into perhaps the best ever version of Funeral Fog. The band’s (and especially Euronymous’) playing is precise and aggressive and Dead delivers his peculiar but seemingly heartfelt lyric about a deadly mist in the Carpathian mountains with throat-ripping intensity. Euronymous’ tremolo-picked melody is one of the highlights of early 90s black metal. The crowd finally reacts with some excitement and Dead delivers his introductory monologue to…

4. The Freezing Moon
The band plays the classic intro at a deliberate, powerful pace before leading into perhaps the definitive version of their most famous tune. Euronymous’ solo is as peculiar as ever, but more inspired and less off-key. Arguably superior to the drum-heavy studio version this lineup also recorded (see above), this is one of the milestones of the band’s career. The audience sounds relatively enthusiastic, but not enough for Dead, who chides them before the band leads into a pummelling version of…

5. Carnage
A fast, precise version of this older song (presumably one the band were still particularly fond of, it is one of only two songs that Dead recorded in the studio.) It’s a strong performance but not their best song, despite Euronymous adding some more modern black metal touches to his guitar parts.

6. Buried by Time and Dust
Feedback somewhat spoils Dead’s introductory speech and the band launches into a good, extremely fast version of this classic with very precise guitar playing but a slightly rattling drum sound compared to most of the album.

7. Pagan Fears
Without doubt one of the best black metal songs of the era, this version of Pagan Fears falters slightly after the intro as Euronymous seems to get slightly lost in the timing of the brief slow section. As soon as the song launches into the first verse though, it picks up, becoming one of the highlights of the set. Dead’s rasping delivery makes the most of one of his best, most enigmatic lyrics.

8. Chainsaw Gutsfuck
Anticlimactic after Pagan Fears, the intro to Chainsaw Gutsfuck is nevertheless as powerful as ever, but the song just sounds a little too primitive compared to its predecessor. A good version though, prowling and sinister, but although Dead delivers the lyrics as well as anyone could, their crudely ‘shocking’ quality seems hopelessly ineffective after the mysterious atmospheric allusiveness of Pagan Fears. After much subdued but good-humoured crowd noise, during which Dead (or Necrobutcher?) exhorts the crowd to join them, the band finally plays…

9. Pure Fucking Armageddon
Probably the best, most intense version of the song, this is heavier and more riff-oriented than usual, although Euronymous does play a seemingly improvised and very messy solo. Disappointingly, the song fades out just as it ends, with no real sense of the crowd’s reaction, a slightly bathetic end to an iconic release.

As far as Mayhem’s recorded legacy in concerned, Live at Leipzig marks the end of an era. Within six months of the concert, Dead had committed suicide, after which Necrobutcher quit the band and this version of Mayhem came to an end. Although it almost certainly didn’t feel like it at the time, they had actually achieved quite a lot for a bunch of weird kids from what was then not a country known for its heavy music.

Within a couple of years, Euronymous too was dead, and the classic Mayhem was no more. Subsequent lineups have made important contributions to the black metal genre and the band endures to this day, but the mystique that draws people to the band still belongs to those early years which, it shouldn’t be forgotten were about music as much as anything else.

Dead (Pelle Ohlin) & Euronymous (Øystein Aarseth) RIP