In a list of things happening that when you’re young only happened to old people celebrating your silver wedding anniversary would feature near the top end. One day you’re in your mid- twenties, gadding about, the next you’re in your fifties and it’s twenty five years to the day since you got married. I’m never too sure you should read a huge amount into Ian McCulloch’s lyrics, they seem to be full of imagery that could be there just to sound good or to dress something up in poetic language, but Silver seems to be a song full of romance, joy and facing the world square on so it seems relevant in some ways today…
‘The sky is blue/ My hands untied
A world that’s true/ Through our clean eyes
Just look at you/ With burning lips
You’re living proof/ At my fingertips
Walked on a tidal wave
Laughed in the face of a brand new day
Food for survival thought
Mapped out the place where I planned to stay’
I’m not sure that the title of these mixes holds true any more but onward we go. This week’s hour of music is coming from the punk and post- punk world and the long tail that snakes from the plugging of a guitar into an amplifier and someone with something to say stepping up to the microphone. Some Spaghetti Western as an intro, some friendship, some politics, some anger, some exhilaration, some questions, some disillusionment, some psychedelic exploration and some optimism to end with.
In History Lesson Part 2 D. Boon explains his friendship with Mike Watt, the importance of punk in changing their lives, the singers and players in the bands that inspired him and, in the first line, the essence of punk as he experienced it.
‘Our band could be your life
Real names’d be proof
Me and Mike Watt played for years
Punk rock changed our lives
We learned punk rock in Hollywood
Drove up from Pedro
We were fucking corn dogs
We’d go drink and pogo
Mr. Narrator
This is Bob Dylan to me
My story could be his songs
I’m his soldier child
Our band is scientist rock
But I was E. Bloom and Richard Hell
Joe Strummer and John Doe
Me and Mike Watt, playing guitar’
Echo And the Bunnymen’s 1981 album Heaven Up Here- a record that kept me company during a cold winter in rented accommodation many years ago- is possibly the group’s masterpiece, the sound of a band firing on all cylinders, writing new songs that were a step up from their first flush, adding a weird tom-tom groove to their post- punk rock while constructing a visual world and a look, a style. In the years between 1980’s Crocodiles and 1984’s Ocean Rain the Bunnymen were unstoppable. Then it all stalled and fell apart- Bill Drummond excused himself from the manager’s chair which played a part as did Pete de Frietas’ erratic behaviour in 1984-5 and a growing gap between Mac on one side and Will and Les on another. But before that they were something else.
Heaven Up Here opens with three of the best album tracks any album can offer- the post- punk grandeur of Show Of Strength, the urgency of With A Hip and then the dark, bleak, brilliant Over The Wall. In some ways it’s easy to want to stop the record there and go back to the beginning and overlook the rest of the album but the closing few songs shouldn’t be passed over, almost matching the opening trio for drama and intensity. Final song All I Want is a gem, led by Pete’s percussion and drums, Will’s spindly guitar lines being fired off and one of Les’ brilliant basslines. On top of this Ian gives a grandiose vocal performance, on an album bejewelled with them. The closing seconds after the final climax has the band continuing the song, recorded very quietly and then fading out, as if they were in a room still playing and someone just closed the door while they carried on, unable to bring it to an end. All I Want lets some light in to Heaven Up Here’s icy gloom, like dawn breaking, especially when listened to with the song preceding it, the sail away dramatics of Turquoise Days.
Back in 1983 Echo And The Bunnymen were stung by some of the reviews of their third album Porcupine. In response they started writing again and used a Peel Session to try out some new songs, broadcasting Nocturnal Me, Ocean Rain, My Kingdom and Watch Out Below. Not a bad night’s work I think.
Watch Out Below shimmers and glowers, acoustic guitars to the fore. Over time it would gain new words and a new title- The Yo Yo Man. This version with the refrain Watch Out Below fits in with the maritime theme Ocean Rain was developing and the line Mac wails from the title track of ‘The Greatest Album Ever Made’, ‘screaming from beneath the waves’.
Porcupine, for what it’s worth, is a funny album and the criticism of it is partly justified. Out of the first four ‘classic’ lps they made, it comes fourth for me. Despite opening with two of their very best songs (and singles) The Back Of Love and The Cutter it fades after that, too similar in tone, too dour, not enough drama and variation. It’s not a bad album but the one before it (Heaven Up Here) and the one after it (Ocean Rain) are better.
Echo And The Bunnymen sounded like a band with something to prove at The Ritz on Thursday night. The set focused mainly on their early years and Ocean Rain, not once failing to do those songs justice. The opening section of songs like Going Up and All That Jazz is loud and punchy with just the right amount of punky aggression, Will Sergeant riffing at the forefront. A few songs in there is a one-two-three of Angels And Devils, Do It Clean and My Kingdom which if that had all I’d seen, I would have gone home happy. In their pomp the Bunnymen created a marriage of post punk and psychedelic rock and that’s what we get tonight, Will peeling off solos and riffs, one of the key post punk guitarists. During some of the instrumental breaks Ian McCulloch stands back gesturing towards his bandmate, fully appreciative of his playing. Mac’s voice has survived the years, a little deeper at times and there are some of the higher notes he steps back from, leaving the crowd to fill in, but he is still largely the singer he was thirty years ago, wrapping his tonsils around his Scouse poetry. There’s nothing run of the mill about this band tonight, They play like they mean it. The songs are done properly, a little raggedness adding to them and keeping them alive. They’re still doing that old Bunnymen trick of breaking into medleys- Do It Clean goes into Sex Machine, later on we get Roadhouse Blues, Walk On The Wild Side and Jean Genie- and then snapping straight back into the original tune. Villiers Terrace is immense, a scabrous tale of trippiness in post punk Liverpool (did I ever tell you I once spent an afternoon trying to find Villiers Terrace? It doesn’t exist). The poppier songs are joyous- Lips Like Sugar sounds as good as anything they ever did, Seven Seas shimmers and sways and Bring On The Dancing Horses is a big echo laden treat. Nothing Lasts Forever provides the terrace singalong moment. The Cutter is alive and kicking. Bedbugs And Ballyhoo is all beefed up, hair slicked back and all that jazz. The knack the Bunnymen mastered in the mid 80s was writing songs that were full of romance and drama, reaching a peak on The Killing Moon, introduced to us by Ian as ‘the greatest song ever written’. They then go on to do a good job of proving it. The last song of the encore is Ocean Rain, a masterpiece of quiet/loud dynamics, a transporting moment, Mac singing as if he depends on it, needs it. It’s 2016, a long time since their heyday. It’s true that this isn’t the original line up, they can’t match what they did with Bill Drummond at the helm, playing strange gigs in Buxton, the Crystal Days, St George’s Hall and so on- they were different times. But this is as vital and revitalised a Bunnymen as there has been for some time. If they’re playing anywhere near you in the near future, I’d go and see them if I were you.
Well, that’s that then. It’s September, summer is over, the school year starts again for me today. Back to it. On the plus side my brother got me a ticket to see Echo And The Bunnymen at The Ritz tonight (yes, it’s a school night but there you go, life is short, carpe diem etc).
Mac the Mouth said that Ocean Rain was the greatest album ever made. I don’t think that’s true but there are times when I think it’s the greatest Bunnymen album. This different version of the title track, which I have posted before I’m sure, lacks the strings of the final version but is just as good in its own way.
‘Is that the only thing you care about?
Splitting up the money and share it out’
Written about Thatcher in 1983 and sadly just as pertinent today in 2016. The 12″ makes use of those extra inches with those great strings and heads for the dancefloor. As Mac said, ‘Lay down thy raincoat and groove’.
‘We’ve been waiting with our best suits on, hair slicked back and all that jazz’.
Echo And The Bunnymen benefitted massively from Bill Drummond’s management, his leftfield plans and sense of theatre. In between the first and second albums (Crocodiles and Heaven Up Here) they released a four track live e.p., Shine So Hard, a document of a gig at the Pavillion in Buxton deep in the Pennines, in January 1981. The palm house, the army surplus clothing, the bright white lights, Pete’s shaven head and the other three’s fringes and quiff- it’s never all about the music with a band, the visuals are such an important part and the Bunnymen and Drummond knew this. Echo And The Bunnymen, especially early on, had a really democratic sound, the drums, bass, guitar and vocals all seem to carry equal weight and have the same space, no one instrument dominating. All That Jazz is an early highlight, a stomping bassline, shards of guitar, military drums and Mac’s urgent singing.
On July 19th 1986 New Order headlined a show at GMEX (formerly Manchester’s Central railway station, for much of the 70s and early 80s a derelict carpark. We used to park there when shopping in town and my Mum and Dad got all of us kids back in the car on one occasion and drove off, leaving one of my brothers standing forlornly where the car had been, aged only three or four. Don’t worry- they realised before leaving the carpark). The show was the highlight of the Festival of the Tenth Summer,a Factory organised event celebrating ten years since punk and the show at the Lesser Free Trade Hall where the Sex Pistols set into motion everything that has happened to Manchester since. The Lesser Free Trade Hall, also the venue where Bob Dylan was accused of being Judas, is now a swish hotel. The Festival of the Tenth Summer had its own Factory catalogue number (FAC 151) and had nine other events including a fashion show, a book, a Peter Saville installation, an exhibition of Kevin Cummins photographs and so on. Very Factory. Support for New Order at the gig included The Smiths (billed as co-headliners), The Fall, A Certain Ratio, Cabaret Voltaire, OMD, John Cale, John Cooper Clarke and Buzzcocks. Not a bad line up really.
During their set New Order were joined on stage by Ian McCulloch who sang Ceremony with them. This clip shows that meeting, the only drawback being it’s less than a minute long.
There’s an audio only version of the whole song here. Ian sings in a register closer to Ian Curtis’ and certainly gives it his best shot. The bit where Hooky joins Mac at the mic is great.
Ceremony was Ian Curtis’ last song, intended for Joy Division but recorded and released as the first New Order record. The first two New Order records actually- it was released in March 1981 by the three piece New Order and produced by Martin Hannett. It was then re-released in September 1981 in a newer, slightly longer version with Gillian Gilbert on board and with a different Saville sleeve. If you want to get really trainspottery about it, the run out groove on the first version says ‘watching love grow forever’, while on the second version it has ‘this is why events unnerve me’.
New Order and Echo And The Bunnymen toured the USA together along with Public Image Ltd throughout 1987, billed as The Monsters Of Alternative Rock. The Melody Maker reported from it as the picture up top shows. According to Lydon’s autobiography ‘Bernard Sumner was having problems emotionally and looked a bit the worse for wear’ and describes him being tied to a trolley to sing at one gig as he was unable to stand. ‘Nice fella’ though says Lydon. Bernard’s favourite tipple was ‘a pint of headache’ (Pernod and blackcurrant).
I was skipping through Bill Drummond’s excellent book 45 the other night, due to turning 45. He was Echo And The Bunnymen’s manager all the way through their best years and writes very eloquently and passioantely about them. Then I went and found this- the Bunnymen live at Rockpalast in 1981 with an hour and half set spanning the first three albums, showing what a formidable back catalogue they were building up. But the most striking thing is how different their set up looks with them playing in a line across the front of the stage, not with the drum riser behind the singer- changes the whole look of a band playing live. Almost revolutionary. Actually, on second thoughts, the most striking thing is Ian doing sexy in his ripped t-shirt.
Bagging Area 