Monday’s Long Song

The latest release on Paisley Dark, Leeds based home of electronic psychedelia, is a five track EP by Ian Vale. It opens with Many Times, six minutes and twenty five seconds of dark acid house, four- four drums, a bouncing bassline and shimmering arpeggios- dark dub disco action.

It’s followed by an Al Mckenzie remix, ten minutes of wobbly, slowly building electronic music, a twisting and turning, rising and falling remix that keeps on giving- it really is where the action is. Get both and three other tracks- a Ben Hunt remix of Many Times, another Ian Vale track  Oh Malone and a Julius remix of that- at Bandcamp. 

Al Mckenzie is one half of D:Ream whose 1993 hit single Things Can Only Get Better has recently made the headlines again, pumped out of a speaker at the public end of Downing Street when Rishi Sunak stood in the pouring rain and tried to make it sound like calling a general election was a good idea for the Tory Party. From there, it climbed the charts again and Al and Peter ended up having to make a statement saying to Labour, ‘please don’t use this song’. They haven’t got over it being used by New Labour in 1997- the decision by Tony Blair to invade Iraq alongside the USA did for the relationship between D:Ream and the Labour government (as it did for any people). Singer Peter Cunnah described the song as ‘a very odd piece of gravity that you just can’t escape’. Al added, ‘There’s no way- our song and politics, never again’. I understand that decision but in a way it’s also a shame- the sight of Sunak, unable to even find an umbrella never mind run an election campaign, piss wet through as the song drowned him out was priceless. Given what Sunak’s done since however, it looks like one of the slicker parts of his election campaign.