BEATS OF LOVE

30. Young Parisians by Adam and the Ants

AS I type more and more peers are doing their end-of-year music appraisals. Generally speaking, to a dozen likes and a couple of comments. I think this time of year we sit back and reminisce much further back and ask ourselves whether Christmas actually once meant more to us than it does now. 

I recall my happiest Christmas was spent in 1981, crouched over the family stereo playing and re-playing every Adam and the Ants LP and single over and over. This went on until my father finally finished work over a week later to join us all. He soon put a curfew on it, so I then went out for the first time that school holiday and bought the biggest cards in Shaw for everyone before learning the adage less is more. 

That summer I went around the corner to a friend of a friend's house who was mad keen on boxing. I put on his red gloves and proceeded to get punched and punched and punched again. Luckily, after feeling frightened and nauseous, we sat down in his folk's living room and he put Dirk Wears White Sox on the stereo. I sat open-mouthed and really jealous because he had something I wanted. The fetishistic imagery went clean over my head, but I instinctively knew it was taboo. At least in my house. He then threw me back the boxing gloves, and I proceeded to run out of his house, never to return. 

Thankfully, after saving my holiday money on the drive back from Anglesey, I finally found a store that had a copy in stock. It had, up to that point, been a truly dreadful holiday. The highlight of which was sitting in my father's Capri listening to the top 40. Until it started swaying. Fortunately, before the locals could drag me out, I managed to wind up the windows and lock all the doors until my hapless father finally turned up to rescue me. He was furious about the scratches on his car.   

He was as furious when coming home from Christmas Day Mass, I knelt down and started playing my Ant collection. Everyone was ready to go to my Grandparents but as would often be the case in nightclubs a decade later, I screamed 'just one more' and played this. 

The song's simple structure belies the fact that Adam's lyrics were always adroit. Its provocative line may have escaped me, but not my father. It still smells more punk than a lot more noisy records made around that time. And still makes me smile listening to it. My Grandma did put my bloody great big card up in pride of place but I still wanted to leave that year and return home to my Ant collection. Not long after, my father upgraded his stereo and gave me my most prized possession. Largely to confine the noise, I guess. 

So, in answer to my question, the answer is no. Christmas never did mean more to us. At least those of us that are armed with a lot of records.  

 

  

BEATS OF LOVE

29. Tengo Amore by Michael Nesmith & The First National Band 

POSSIBLY, MY generation's greatest achievement is making the Monkees cool. Record digging at Oldham's record fair on Egerton Street on a Sunday in the late 80s was always exciting, but my greatest heist was blagging their entire back catalogue for a tenner in NM condition. Excluding Head. The seller was a serious rock collector and his lofty disdain led him to put them in a crate on the floor next to the Wurzels.    

They may have also landed me my first job too as my future boss asked me whether I liked it on the rock n' roll and I replied enthusiastically 'a bit, I wake up and watch the Monkees then do a bit of study then watch Going for Gold.' Then again, it might also have been Henry Kelly. 

However, it was when I heard Missing Links that Mike Nesmith usurped Mickey Dolenz and became another musical obsession of sorts. File next to the Cosmic country of Gram Parsons and you're nearly there. Parsons had a better voice, but Nesmith crafted finer songs with tighter musicians. An utter genius, basically. 

This song was on an LP that I had the good sense to buy from the Corn Exchange stalls and play incessantly. During my second breakdown when I was sleeping 16 hours a day, it probably was more important to my recovery than food. When you're in a big hole and shouting for help, it's too easy for folk to pretend not to hear. I finally realized I had to dig myself out. Luckily, as soon as I picked up the spade, my family started digging with me.

I eventually summoned some strength to face work again, but they'd only gone and installed a bloody radio on every floor. Blurting out late 90s commercial rubbish. I ran off floor 8 and collapsed in a bucket of tears because of it. And because my head was still a bit fucked. Rather than send me home, I instead had a heart to heart with my boss and told her I was bedding down in my aunt's house to save for a deposit but was finding everything extremely difficult. To my surprise, she magicked some overtime for me and I was finally able to turn the page in my life that had been stuck for so long.

I owe Mike Nesmith a deep debt of gratitude too for keeping me alive in those darkest of days. Sleep well, your magical music will live on forever.   

   

BEATS OF LOVE 

28. Love is the Message (Philadelphia Mix) by Love Inc featuring MC Noise

THE KEY difference between Lennon and me is I'm not God. He famously made lyrics up to rock'n'roll songs, whereas in my total obscurity, I just misheard lyrics through the haze of night-clubs. I could recount the times forever, but a couple of examples occurred during my evangelical phase.  

I must've had a convict mentality coz when Love Decade's Dream On got played, I'd rush to the floor shouting 'Prisoners are Free!' in my head. Similarly, when Greg Fenton blew my mind playing Tony Rallo & the Midnite Band's Holdin On, I thought the lyrics were 'All Day Long Working on the Chain.' 

Subsequently, I only bought it years later when Mark Luvdup played it and kindly gave me a random CD, then scrawled the title in marker pen. He second guessed I would forget all about it during the course of the day and night and day, so would need a subtle reminder. I wish more people were like Mark.  

Lennon would've been as confused by 1991 as me. For a few short weeks, metaphysical walls came tumbling down and Lee's bug-eyed enthusiasm for  Shelly's was every bit as relevant as my own escapades. Proper working-class heroes. Whereas I was feeling incarcerated at work on a Monday morning after massively over-doing it, he was still shuffling about. 

This tune really hit the spot for us both and even Lennon would approve of its sentiment. Black Box's  Daniele Davoli's rolling piano lines, MC Noise rapping coherently and brilliantly so even an idiot like me can understand, over pulsating synth stabs, and everybody in the place very high on hope. Enough said. In fact, by Thursday, nobody was higher than us two that summer. Nobody.

When Lee's band N-Trance hit the big time in 94, I asked him to guest DJ and play some Detroit techno. I thought it was a genius idea, showing off a more serious side. 'Sure,' he said. When he did, he proceeded to play happy piano tunes for an hour. I should've fucking known coz all he talked about was dancing and Sasha. 

Unsurprisingly, I last saw him in the line-up on an episode of Never Mind The Buzzcocks shuffling about and smiling. Good on him.     

     

BEATS OF LOVE

27.  Love Is by Martini

ANTICIPATION USED to be a regular feature of record buying. I recall the excited walk to Golden Disc buying Adam and the Ant's latest releases. If I was lucky and it was in stock, I then faced the tough decision of whether to buy a picture disc or poster pack. If I was unlucky, it was a long walk home. 

Or the ooh ahh when the Roses Second Coming LP was finally released after a 5 year wait. You could barely move around HMV to buy it on a cold and wet December evening, and when I finally got it home, the label was miss-pressed. It still span but looked unsightly and sounded more than a little disappointing. Love Spreads was the best tune on it. 

I've not anticipated much this year, but this has given me a proper itch. I nearly ordered one from the States a few months ago, but luckily I held back. It's another reissue so doesn't really feel exciting to hold but thankfully it has been mastered properly so sounds exciting. Marco Gegenheimer has been credited with bringing this light touch stepper to a wider audience so deserves a hearty thank you. Light touch, but majestic. Hats off also to the slightly mysterious Death on Wax for reissuing it. Not seen a label sell a tee after one release before. Next week I will be dipping into the remixes. 

As I only heard of it through the usual channels, I saw the eye-watering prices and just settled on this reissue. Then the itching started, and the waiting began. And then summer came and went and then Autumn. I'm so glad it has finally materialized.  

I now have this on repeat coz it is a magical medicine for my soul that has been through an intensely troubled time of late. Recommended is a massive understatement.  

BEATS OF LOVE 

26. Gennarino 'O Sioux by Tonica & Dominante

ARRIVING HOME after another empty day at work, and watching the rubber dinghies on the news, feeling overwhelmed, I picked up this beauty and started head nodding before finally dancing around my living room.

Despite it being the best thing Manu has put out (which is really saying something when you consider his label's output), and zoning out of my emotional state into a state of near delirium to the best bit of Neapolitan Funk music I've ever heard, it still felt a bit of shallow experience coz I momentarily forgot all about the rubber dinghies.

My only thought was now whether Manu was reissuing their recently reduced but still way out of my price-range masterpiece of an LP. I do hope so. Modern life conditions us to be easily distracted, and whether you're zonked out in front of the telly on a comfy sofa or tearing the cellophane off recent record buys, both of these activities are ones we should be a lot more thankful for.

It really is a privilege to be entertained and have spare time and cash, and not something we should simply take for granted. Under late capitalism, 689 million of our fellow human-beings live in abject poverty. I recall in about 1998 some wallpaper CEO rabbiting on about structural changes at work and the union holding folk back to say that they fully support the proposed changes. Some guy just got his coat and said 'fuck that' or words to that effect, and left. Everyone thought he was barmy, but in hindsight, he was the cleverest person in the place.

Off shore trillions have stolen what were once our terms and conditions and we get mad about folk in these rubber dinghies who in their desperation still look at our environment, wage slavery, and dehumanization, and think it's paradise. Makes you think what those off shore trillions have stolen from them.

God help the rich if we were to have a lightbulb moment and not for once blame the poorest people on the planet for everything we think is wrong with the world.

BEATS OF LOVE

25. Cherry Blossom Girl by Air

AFTER A spot of fanzine writing highlighted shockingly poor grammar, due to nearly two study free decades, I decided to spend my Saturday mornings adult learning. My cheery thespian tutor (a guy with a bicycle-handlebar moustache), after realizing I had soon reached an advanced standard, (on account of knowing some really clever people and reading a lot, I guess), told me to consider the OU. 

My enrolment class coincided with my referral to check a lump on my right testicle. January 12th 2004. 'That's nasty' were the specialist's words, or at least the only ones reverberating around my head. I read a feature on Jacques Brel in the free paper travelling to enrol. I learned he lived intensely and died at 36. What seemed like a ripe old age to me at the time. 

After being swiftly filleted and freed from my piss soaked hospital issue sock-bandages and right testicle, the first thing I did when I got home was play music like a lunatic. Largely to drown out the wails on the bowel cancer ward that were giving me constant nightmares. (Testicular cancer is rare and didn't have its own ward.) 

Talkie Walkie left an indelible mark on my senses after one day's play, basically. I think I knew it off by heart instantly and this track is perfect. More organic than the early material, but not in any way wishy-washy. Jean-Benoît Dunckel has never sung a finer song or sung as well. It became a life support after my op and gave me a license to feel truly magnificent despite being doubled over like Ratso Rizzo.  

I recall awaiting the biopsy results and playing the shit out of it, and thinking, 'this might not sound as good next week.'

Thankfully, it sounded even better and still does. Absolute heaven.

 

BEATS OF LOVE

24. Strange Encounter by Father John Misty

TODAY WOULD'VE been my brother-in-law's birthday, and it's the first my sister and nephew have had to endure in his absence. Beats of Love are just a bit of catharsis following his sudden death. There was so much left unsaid, and words on the subject are still extremely difficult. Despite experiencing the premature loss of my own father, I have been unable to find any significant words of consolation. This LP, the first and only LP my nephew has bought me, was ordered for my birthday in 2020, but bizarrely only arrived months later on the very day his father died.

It was the perfect escape hatch for my own grief, but I was reticent to play it without firstly doing a bit of leg-work. Worryingly, nobody I know digs this guy, whose reincarnation is a little too hipster for my natural bent. More worrying was the saccharine art-work that just didn't feel exciting to hold. Then the songs played on the stereo and sounded too trite. Not the updated Pet Sounds I was promised.

I was absolutely desperate to connect and luckily, when songs were fast running out, the needle hit the groove on this. I recall Richard Ashcroft being scared that chart success exposed his music to little kids, explaining that 'there is a loss of innocence in our music that I don't want them to hear.' * Thankfully, my nephew is now an adult. This song has clarified the fact.

Evoking Plush's mighty Fed LP in its musical ambition and to my ears at least the Wild Honey era Beach Boys, as favoured by Jim Morrison, in its casual, soulful feel, it both soars and touches my very being.

Sure, it's a little over-layered and self-consciously retro, but the harmonies actually crystallize into something pretty epic and moving. One-night stands can be pretty epic and moving. Or comic.

I still find words on the subject extremely difficult, but when this spins, I just know that, on some metaphysical level at least, enjoying a shared love of music, I'm where I need to be. With my sister, nephew, and brother-in-law.     

•  Face magazine volume 3, number 8