BEATS OF LOVE 

4. Wishing Star by Leo Almunia

IT'S NOT every day that the artists who created one of your favourite albums (Pulsar) fly into town to play a show, but that's what Leonardo Ceccanti did with his ever smiling Almunia partner Gianluca Salvadori in 2013 for SFH. We put lots of love in the air that Wednesday evening and it gave me the insurmountable task of eclipsing it, which, in truth, I haven't been able to do.

Other than some bits and pieces, they've sunk off the radar in the UK, so I was happy to hear the ever discerning Claremont 56 was releasing a solo LP, Minor Circle, by Leo. The best British label in the world. Happier still when I heard the sound-clips, and now truly ecstatic to finally get this sun-drenched goodness on the stereo. The same personnel as said album; Paul Murphy mixing, Mark Warrington's superb artwork, and Leo overseeing almost everything else, sadly minus Gianluca, produces another veritable masterpiece. An eight-year hiatus is a long-time, even by Howard Hughes standards, but this is well worth any wait.

Those sorely missed guitar strings of every persuasion are so damned hot and still stretch out for miles and miles. Even veritable masterpieces have their highlights; Abbey Road's Here Comes the Sun, Back in Denim's The Osmonds, or Mystery to Me's Hypnotized, and Leo's LP is no exception as this song attests.   

Somewhat swampier than the duo's past classics, but still crystalline enough to shine plenty of light and depth into the listening experience. Equal parts, dubby, atmospheric, and spacey, with top marks production from start to finish, make this another epic musical journey, the highlight of which is most reminiscent of glories past.

Less swampy, with the guitars as light as a souffle omelette, it breezes along majestically and in passages even soars into the sky. Tomorrow, I could easily write similar words about the closer, but today that sounds more condensed and slightly less moving, and epic. Moving, and epic, or a sublime psychedelic sunshine minstrel tune, I'm as confused as the next man. Call it anything but nu-fucking-disco, I guess. All I know is this album is truly great, and this song is greater still. The high place is revisited.  

Welcome back Leo, and I hope some promoter has both the sense and promotional nous to put on some top UK shows. I'll be there for sure, plucking my imaginary guitar strings, tunelessly, to your wondrous music. 

LISTEN : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuWfv7Umbxg

 BEATS OF LOVE

3. Phobia (Paranoid  Mix) by Flowered Up

ONE OF the nuttiest gigs I ever attended was Flowered Up at Royton's Assembly Hall. It was a Sunday evening and about midway through Soul Family Sensation's subdued support set, and, after smoking lots of pot, my good mate Stu lost consciousness and just collapsed on the floor. So much for his school night.  

The FYC (Oldham's very own footy firm) were out in force and by the end of Flowered Up's lively set were invading the stage and going bananas. My good mate Stu was still comatose. Finally, as the wonderful Weatherall mix of Higher than the Sun boomed out of the speakers, ending the night, he arose then began cheerily dancing before successfully chatting up a sixth former, who he quickly led to the taxi-rank at breakneck speed. 

In my naivety, I thought that every Sunday was going to be full of similar shenanigans. Not long after, they instead became scrabble nights with my kid sister. I caught up with the FYC years later in the same place where they shouted 'no surrender' throughout an evening with Howard Marks. (For a far better band anecdote buy Believe in Magic.) 

With a band you love whose records aren't great, and whose talent is limited, you need remixes and luckily they had them in spades. The overplayed Weatherall Weekender mixes are arguably the best, but my favourite is this earlier one from 1990. Producer Marc Angelo is glamour model Linda Lusardi's brother and a dub specialist. I was more impressed by the former fact.

It plays like a crossover between Lee Perry and Candy Flip's worst studio efforts, and is all the better for it. The loopy piano-line is given a starring role and sounds much more at home on this mix than the A-side. What was annoying about Oakenfold was his bad marriage of baggy songs and loopy piano-lines, which were ripped off by all and sundry. They only ever worked for him with U2 coz they could carry any tune along, I guess. Stripping away the naff baggy song then, with just the loopy piano-line and dubby effects, works a treat. Many producers with far bigger budgets than Heavenly and far better musicians to work with fail the remix test miserably. 

If you're only going to rescue one record from the bargain crate, make it this one.  

   

 BEATS OF LOVE 

2. Smile by Microworld

FOR MY money, Andras Fox is one of the most important producer/ DJ's out there right now, so when he included Philip McGarva's first output in 6 years under the Microworld moniker in his 2016 mix, I was curious. Grey Melody is awash with warm synths but also frenetic enough to make you move and smile. 

When I heard Andras DJ, I expected to hear similar trance inducing rhythms like this, but the tempo of the records disappointed me in his set. Fast was great at first as it contrasted with Jim's tunes in a very non-linear way, but then it became ceaseless and I was bloody relieved when it finally stopped. 

I recall the only time Weatherall and Tenniswood were disappointing by being equally annoying on their lap-tops at Tim's shindig when they played way too fast and killed the vibe completely. Big name acts who feel the need to experiment on small-time promoter's nights are another bug-bear of mine. Yes, another. Subsequently, my relationship with Andras has been on/off ever since because of these experiments with tempo, but my relationship with Microworld, thanks to him, has been going very steady.   

The Transmat debut is a record Moonboots would've given me to listen to had I still been going to E-Bloc twice a week in 1999, but, as I wasn't, he didn't. Finally bought 17 years after its release, I was expecting to listen with a forgiving ear. However, it still sounds fresh. Larry Heard nuts know that the B-side is the place to head despite the-side being way more popular.  

More dream-house than techno, more Devonport than Detroit, and, floaty, not lightweight, it really hits its spot relentlessly. The pads gather pace but never sound abrasive, warmly charging the tune tremendously, burning up any dancefloor or bungalow. 

Basically, it's a blissfully emotive piece of late 20th century electronic music and every home should have a copy. 

 BEATS OF LOVE

 

1.  The Montana Freight Train Mix by Carl A. Finlow, Ralph Lawson & Domenic Capello

I'VE ONLY once met Antony Daly twice on the same weekend. Firstly, as a swivel-headed, happy loon, unable to speak during Nado's 20th celebrations, and then, the night after, as something unable to find its own mouth to even say 'Hi.' I'm guessing he had the sense to put his head down between time as he was still chatty. I always make an appalling first impression. Anyway, he owns and runs the ever more impressive 586 Records and occasionally sells me fantastic records like this.  

I only met Ralph Lawson once too, sociably speaking,  and found him wholly affable, which, back in the mid-nineties, wasn't all that impressive. I found his rhythmic, no-nonsense music wholly affable too, which back in the mid-nineties wasn't all that impressive either. Once again I'm wrong as I now find myself accidently buying his output more and more. 

I recently wrote a long-winded blog piece about clubbing in Sankeys Soap, recalling that, for me at least, Domenic Capello marked the nadir. Someone, I thought, synonymous with bland and formulaic, but, because I'm so often wrong about everything, I decided to google him and came across this slow burning masterpiece. Everything but bland and formulaic, predictably. 

It sounds good here, but on a proper deck with the volume on it really takes you to the special place, and just gets better and better. Not a second is wasted. For me, it's all about this epic A side which naturally locks into an insistent groove before heading off into the deep ... 

... warm pads then wobble about deliciously with aquatic washes that really do sound magical and thankfully last an age. It really ends on a high too. Rather than just reverting back to the main groove, it saves the best till last with teasing stabs that put a silly great grin on your face, not unlike the one on mine when I first met Antony. Very clever, yet seemingly simple devices stand this out from the crowd. It's genius is in holding back, which gives it more space and natural energy. They've learned lessons from their livelier first collaboration and delivered an absolute peach second the time around. 

I was burnt out by 1996 and was playing back too many conversations in my head to know a banging tune; I guess. Buy this bomb on sight if you don't already own it whist it's affordable.    

SONGS THEY NEVER PLAY ON THE RADIO 

10. THE FINE LINE BETWEEN ART AND FUCKING THINGS UP COMPLETELY

PART 1

AS I unceremoniously removed myself from my dream site in West Didsbury and into Jeff's back bedroom in a pre-riot unravaged Clarksfield, I still had an inflated ego and a pretty decent contact book but I just wanted to lie low and save up for a house deposit. However, just prior to moving in, I had my last 3 day bender, and I woke up utterly mind shot by a cassette given to me by Pete, inscribed simply with the words Casino Records, and Doves. That's what happened to me. I woke up next to records and cassettes but seldom women. It must've been played a couple of hundred times before I finally decided to get up for work at the tail end of the following week.

I was still naïve enough to think music could change society, or at least my own circumstances, and pushed this cassette onto people like a man possessed. My late brother-in-law loved it, which was encouraging. Jeff had his own blinding obsessions, of which Gabrielle's Wish were the most enduring, Chameleons, excepted. It became known to us that they were in the same studio, and Pete, the common denominator, was someone we could approach to put on a show. 

Other than the fact I was saving for a deposit, I was also given an ultimatum; either I stopped the amphetamines that made me so unpredictable in work, or going into business with Jeff and our venture, The Job Club, was off. So began a blurry 8 months of mixing lager with prescription drugs. 

Soon his house was full of drapery and lighting equipment and we had a meeting with Jon-Da-Silva and their manager, the maverick Rob Gretton at the Witchwood. Incomprehensibly, prior to the meeting, after just buying a Standells LP, from Echo records, I went into The Abbey to steady the nerves where I met Taff and for the one and only time since school Cozzy, the top-boy in my year. He no doubt thought I was still a fantasist when I said I was off to meet Rob Gretton. 

Pretty soon after 5 pints of strong lager had found their way down my neck, I was half-cut and on a bus to Ashton talking up our new record-label with Hip-Hop and Street Soul at its core, and dismissing New Order completely. Jeff was fighting a losing battle and should have gone alone but despite me being there fucking things up, we were still given a Gab's Wish gig to test our muscle and prove ourselves.    

Jeff was great with the practicalities, having managed an actual band, Lincoln, and I was good for odd ideas, like having a strobe facing the audience to make it hard for them to see. We worked a DJ set together that actually played well, and we both stayed in prior to the show. Jeff no doubt baby-sitting. Needless to say, the night was a fucking triumph with Gretton even patting me on the back, and with me and Jeff dancing uncontrollably in a way we had years earlier in private when the Rockingbirds were blaring out of his stereo.

Unfathomably, I had handed his mad ex a flyer and predictably she found her way to the show and then his house. Predictably, I gave away a strip of Prozac to oversee a party that went on for another 10 hours without both the host or his missus. Predictably, the writing was on the wall. 

 

PART 2

I HAD ceased venturing to Mancunia to see established bands and was instead just milling around what quickly turned into a revolving door of the same local acts and sixth formers. They were duly bored to death of hearing about the Doves by the end of April. A month before their secret show, that was finally granted us after a hundred or so calls to Dave Rofe. My record box hadn't been tempered by any divisions, so sounded somewhat disjointed as I tried to stay loyal to both the sixties underground garage scene and to dubby-techno pioneers. 

The energy and enthusiasm with my new work-spar was now strained and instead of baby-sitting me and corroborating on our ideas, I was instead given a free rein with disastrous consequences. 

However, not before seeing glossy professional posters advertising the Sea EP with our name emblazoned on it, which was a proper buzz. Hearing the local radio announce the show made it suddenly, frighteningly, real. 

Then, on the eve of the show, Gretton died suddenly. A crisis meeting was held in a Tib Street cafe when it was unfortunately decided the bloody show would go on. We spent the daytime erecting a wooden stage, the transportation of which nearly killed a pedestrian, and then we lined up a relaxing mellow night of guest DJing, only I turned up with moody-techno records.  

I still recall hammering out a Huggy favourite of mine full-blast, Hoth, to a busy bar for the second time, coz no one was in earlier, and dancing manically to it, so I must have by then been pissed. Later I retired with some friends from Royton for a lively lock-in, and then later still road tested a massage parlour that was across the road from the venue. 

I wasn't too happy dismantling our stage with a bear-head at the Doves' request the next afternoon. I wasn't too happy either at not being able to practice my DJing coz the FA cup final was on and was less happy still when by tea-time I was pissed again. Rather than go home for a lie down, which Jeff's missus was begging me to do, I instead sent her to get my Librium (my ill-fated Prozac replacement) and carried on drinking pints of Stella. 

Needless to say, the show was a fucking triumph, despite me being there, going through various dark psychotic changes that left me scared of my own records, scared of my friends, and, the final indignation, being unable to control my own bladder. I don't recall what actually went into my system that night or anything sequential, but I do recall hiding under a table at one point. 

Quite how I connected with Andy Votel and Jane Weaver because of this show will forever remain a mystery. I even changed my trousers and took my share of what little money we made off to the massage parlour, where I hugged a bewildered-looking lady in her 40s. Who later cried buckets with me after I regaled my sorry tale. 

Life would never quite hold the same possibilities again, and I understandably became reclusive. 

 SONGS THEY NEVER PLAY ON THE RADIO 

9. SANKEYS SOAP: BUGGED OUT 1994- 1996.

PART 1

I FIRST met Jim whilst staring at a random ad poster on the wall in the Paradise Factory at a lively Discopogo night. 

He introduced himself as Dan; the DJ billed on the poster. I also remembered Dan when he served me in Vinyl Exchange. I used to like mid-week clubs, as the clientele were a bit more discerning about their music. 

However, I signed a Sunday 3 month contract with work, in addition to my 5 days, so, when I saw a Bugged Out flyer for a Friday night with Dave Angel guesting, it fitted into a new schedule. I didn't then realize that I wouldn't be sleeping on a Friday night for the next 18 months. Not fitting at all into my new schedule.

I'd been once before to Sankeys Soap when Ross gave me a flyer and been a bit non plus about it. Ashley Beedle's tunes weren't filling the space and there was no rush to go back. Bugged Out was something else though. The chill out area was at the front of the club, but there was no proper chill out music. I soon discovered everyone sat in there was in a different head-space from one another, but for some reason everyone got on great. 

The promoters were nearer my own age and Johnno was a slightly awkward popular music obsessive who was always cordial. Paul was no nonsense and much more outspoken, but their chemistry was perfect for the massive workload they gave themselves. (They edited Jockey Slut too.) I was soon invited onto the paying guest list. For someone who was frequently refused entry into places, this was definitely a step in the right direction.

After a few weeks, it became apparent Dan was an amazing DJ. I saw him DJ Discopogo with Moonboots and wrongly assumed he was just winging it but his tunes in that space were wobbly, wonderful, and entrancing. You just had to get there early to catch all his sets. Being locked into his music with the people I was getting to know, who you just knew, felt it too, are memories I'll cherish forever.

The sweat, the smiles, and the distinct smell of cheap brandy can not be replicated. I still try to recapture that otherworldliness by playing the same records and pouring myself a brandy and coke, but never can. They were sublime moments in time; I guess.   

After trying for aeons and failing, I was finally offered some work in my local nightclub on a Friday night. 

Fucking typical, yet no matter how hard I practiced, I was either accused of mimicking the radio, or of simply going over people's heads. After a few weeks and after a ramification with a guest who just played chart music but got everyone on the dancefloor, I simply gave up, deciding that missing Bugged Out simply wasn't worth it.  

PART 2

THESE CUTTING edge movers and shakers had never even heard of Shaw and Crompton, let alone given a toss about the people in it or their musical tastes. I moved away from there to put some space between myself and a few relationships, so was always preoccupied with making a triumphant return. (I finally ended up moving back and into my 84-year-old aunt's spare bedroom.)

Not long after my re-entry I was finally informed that this DJ was not called Dan but Jim, and for the next 18 months, a world of similar half-truths, out-and-out bull-shit, and high end mentalism, in the company of first and second generation heroes of acid-house, would become the norm.

 

I was proudly informed that I was a member of the Firm. This largely meant I was let in on all the bitching. I recall Johnno mumbling something disparaging about the Stickmen, who he felt were behaving like stars. Add to that list Green Velvet. They probably flew back to the States totally confused at the lack of style in the UK, whilst also putting their careers into a clearer perspective. Not that I met many big name DJs as they tended to be scuttled out of the club and put up in the Midland hotel's posher suites.  

However, I was duly present at the yawn-athon Dave Clarke sessions, even putting on Fabi Paras records to break the tedium. I was present when Kris Needs and his quickly grating anecdotes started infiltrating the post club sessions. Sadly, I was there to hear the fashion victim, James Lavelle's really annoying sirens. I also witnessed all the excitement and barely concealed envy at the meteoric rise of the Dust Brothers and Daft Punk, who both gave the place a lot of instant kudos. 

The only real travelling DJs who I actually hit it off with were DJ Hell and Orlando Voorn who were warm and surprisingly eclectic and ego free. I mainly hit it off with people who were probably informed they were in the Basics firm, or the Glasgow Underground firm, and who, like myself, were down to their last tenner. Basically, folk who were starting to worry about working in dead-end jobs in the coming week, when it was Saturday afternoon and they'd just lost sight of their hands and reflection.

A particularly heavy session in Sleuth, Justin's relatively limp Thursday nighter, preceded a lost weekend in which I also attended Bugged Out. I was later told if I ever turned up like that again I'd be barred for life but I can still only recall a particularly weird Sunday breakfast when my mother informed me I was carried home by her neighbour, rambling and barely conscious the night before.

After sitting down to a sausage butty at work a little later, I felt a massive pain rip through my chest. It was black in colour, then blue, before turning purple, then finally settling on an off-shade of yellow over what became a convenient 3 weeks. Euro 96 was just starting and so I had a 3 week sick-note, to recuperate for what I can only imagine being a good kicking, and just watched footy. After what felt like a lifetime of altered state experiences, I was finally able to buy some decent clothes. Something that had been sacrificed.

PART 3

I VIVIDLY recall the trepidation I felt when putting a freshly bought techno record on the turntable for the first time since my enforced sobriety. And the relief I felt when realizing I could still feel all the energy and warm strangeness, and subtle pleasure, necessary in justifying buying so bloody many. In all earnestness I believed the scene was going to transcend into other musical dimensions at the turn of the millennium, but was slowly waking up to the fact that nothing would sound as futuristic as Basic Channel, UR, Carl Craig, 430 West, or, Red Planet records, ever again.

Surprisingly, to me at least, I finally re-entered Bugged Out after a 6 week hiatus to a muted reception. Basically, I soon became a liability and my weird back story that was once riveting had itself become a tired old anecdote. When Roberto was deservingly given the upstairs space, I foolishly imagined a place for my eclecticism and passion, but was instead likened to Bez, a nutty dancer. His nutty dancer. 'Fuck that,' I thought, and after a few more weeks, the taxis were finding parties without me.

I had given my bright blue coat away in an attention seeking stunt that had roundly backfired as I spent my time freezing with constant colds which made me as interesting as the radiators I curled up against. As someone who had milled aimlessly around the scene forever, I suddenly felt old and very jaded. 

  

   

It was no coincidence that sat post club in the company of David Holmes; I had little to talk about, other than telling him I was a Catholic and that his music showed some promise, or, telling Tom, in all seriousness that I preferred his first band Ariel, musically speaking, but still liked Ed as a person. My frustration at the upstairs space attracting more train-spotter's than the main booth boiled over and I shouted over Domenic Cappello's loyal and large entourage to request some proper Italian piano house. Even the legend, and an integral part of Jockey Slut, that is Nick, was banished for a few weeks after insulting Darren Emerson. 

I jumped before I was pushed, but not long after others who had found a post club home there, were being barred for little or no reason other than their liability status. I think we were wanted for our energy and enthusiasm, and when all that disappeared; we were rightly regarded as superfluous. 

The club had moved away from flying over Detroit legends every month and began championing homegrown big-beat and electro clash practitioners. Two styles I was resistant to, and still am.

Along with the fanzine it had become a big franchise, winning awards, and just twelve months on from my departure, folk who had been enthusing about popular music, unpopular music, and, Carl Cox's massive entourage, with me, in flats dotted all over West Didsbury, Salford and Hulme, asked me to remind them who I was again when I excitedly passed them in the street. Looking back, it was only ever riotous fun when Fiona managed it for a very short while, when it redefined what freedom meant. However, it taught me a lot, that club and that 18 months, and I can safely say that it saved my life twice. 

Firstly, when I was in as it gave me a much needed sense of belonging, and then when I was out and could finally get my head down and sleep again.  

https://www.buggedout.net/25-years-of-bugged-out-qas

 LATE END OF YEAR REPORT. SHIT HAPPENED

 (AND THANKFULLY, LOTS OF EPs) 

BREXIT BRITAIN will inevitably move musicians away from artistry and towards careerism, as they will need more than a modicum of success to finance a tour. European stages will miss out on seeing all but the most compromised, moneyed British acts and Britain itself will suffer more so. Tragic. 

Against this sorry backdrop, what a single-minded and brave album Torn Sail's Leisure & Technology is, and what a much needed tonic it has been.  The temptation to make money and chip away at the formula that brought the band to the attention of the Balearic cognoscenti must have been huge but he's fearlessly changed the textures and tones inherent in the debut by instead presenting field-work elements and lyrical experimentation into its body. 

These make a massive difference when translated through loud-speakers and really add a sonic fizz that properly plays with the senses. As with the majestic debut, you soon acknowledge its importance and drop everything for a listening experience akin to the  reverence normally found in a church service. Only Robert Plant and Mark Hollis have traversed a similar path and created similar magic in their music. 

Another mind blowing album was George Koutalieris's Stop, Look, Listen. After years experimenting with AOR guitar and electronica with exciting results, he really delivers the Balearic goods (that's the second time I've used that word), and transports the listen to sunnier climes in a wholly organic way. Like the best holiday, only without the cramped flights and sore feet. Now all we need is a vinyl pressing. I've already started a pressure group, as I'm sure if George frequented British boozers in a Nado tee in the days of comparative freedom, there would be one. 

Moonboot's sole contribution to my year (a first) was to big up the amazing Common Saints Idol Eyes EP. Thank you for that. Thanks too to Box Bedroom Rebels for soldiering on and releasing Ciel's Movement EP. Wasn't Enough For Me is both playful and a tad unsettling, and sounds a bit like the inside of my head when it is time to wake up. 

Peter Graf York's Expedition Bahn is a tropical melting pot of sound and the woozy title cut properly hits the spot. A superlative slice of trancey electronica for dub-heads. On a more conventional path and label, Laura Groves continues on her trajectory towards perfect pop. Her Infinite Wisdom EP (a lot of EPs) is full of pearls with the title track jaw dropping in its greatness. 

Massive thanks to Julian for releasing Cracy Cocunuts magnificently insane Rubberdub Dance. I nearly paid silly money for it and was so pleased to see his post forewarning us of its imminent release. Would an exclusive only to my ears have sounded any better? Only slightly. 

We only got one Begin twelve, despite Jim creating enough downloadable vault work to release a triple box set. All Day Daydream is the winner for me, but making his latest tune out of a found guitar definitely deserves an hats off as well. As with George, 'more vinyl' is the cry from the bungalow. 

Good Morning Tapes became more than just a tee-shirt label and released some killer music. Skyrager's Rhizophere cassette landed at just the right time for my head space. Healing music of the highest order and thankfully no track-list as yet. All Welcome vol 1 compiles some magic moments, but vol 2 is better. D.K's work on the label is top drawer as well. 

Finally, another thank you to Robert Harris for turning me on to a bounty of reissues with his boundless energy and enthusiasm, but especially for turning me onto the majesty that is Shoko Yoshida's Up and Down EP. Yes, another. Unintentional, I promise. I normally loathe coloured vinyl, but this pressing is lovely. Hats off to Hot Buttered for releasing this in style. Not been off the stereo since getting 2 copies. 

As we supposedly step out of lock-down, I've learned a lot; life is precious, time is short, people are unpredictable, and records are in all honesty the only thing you can trust, other than Julian Cope books, and thankfully, on occasions, the people that make them. 

I anticipate, small time, loss-making enthusiasts, writing letters to the home office seeking permission to fly seldom heard of acts over to play shows, will be the new normal. Bring it on.