I AM A MEDIA MAXI-PAD ABSORBING THE CONTINUAL FLOW OF POP CULTURE.
THIS JOURNAL DOCUMENTS MY INTAKE OF ONE BOOK, ZINE, CD OR DVD A DAY. RATINGS ARE: ***** = Godhead, **** = Great, *** = Good, ** = Fair, * = Why Bother?
Pete Shelley: “The original records now sound like demos. These new versions, honed by years on the road, showcase the songs as we know they should be, the way we know audiences love to hear them.”
Steve Diggle: “What were songs of sophisticated innocence are now songs of experience. ‘Harmony In My Head’ and ‘Why She’s A Girl From The Chainstore’ now have a full panoramic view!”
Founding Buzzcocks Pete Shelley and Steve Diggle have taken their most popular songs over the last 30+ years and not just remastered or updated or played them live; rather, they've gone back to the studio to rerecord their back catalogue to showcase what the songs sound like now as played by the contempo 'cocks: Shelley, Diggle, bassist (and Steve Winwood lookalike) Chris Remmington and drummer Danny Farrant.
That said, I always thought Buzzcocks got it right the first time round - the songs represented here are as good as it gets in terms of punk-pop music and lyrically the sonnets of Manchester's Shelley are always reliably clever when they're not being downright brilliant (typical verbal gem from "Whatever Happened To?": "Your emotions are a compact case you carry") - leading to the inevitable question: Why buy these songs again?
The answer is twofold. The main reason to buy A Different Compilation (the first new Buzzcocks release since 2006's Flat-Pack Philosophy) is to experience what a Buzzcocks concert 30+ years later sounds like - which is still GREAT! All the excitement of a live show recorded with today's technology. Pete's voice is basically the same and Diggle's guitarmanship has only gotten better, and both guitars are beefed up with that Green Day Dookie-wall-of-sound metallic k.o. that kids today totally dig. The second reason is, well, this really is a different kind of compilation, one in which the "older, wiser" 'cocks can offer variations on their time-tested themes. An added riff here (like the wacka-wacka backbeat strumming on "Why Can't I Touch It?"), an extended solo there (e.g., "I Believe"). Even Buzzcocks tire of playing their greatest hits the same way every night and variety, that spice of life, keeps it interesting for them as well.
Steve Diggle gets to showcase seven of his songs, as well as two collaborations with Shelley ("Promises," "Fast Cars"), including adding a little Stuart Adamson-flavored electric guitar riff to the mostly acoustic closer "Love Is Lies," which makes it sound now like a Big Country song. The new recording of "Why She's a Girl From the Chainstore" is particularly inspired, while the beefed up guitars in "Autonomy" and "Harmony In My Head" lend these hard-rocking Diggle ditties a Wagnerian sturm und drang epic-ness. And the rerecording of "Alive Tonight" (the song celebrating "armchair groovers"!) marks at least the third time Diggle's recorded this one (it was originally released on 1991's Alive Tonight EP as a Stone Roses-influenced slice of neo-psychedelia, followed by the grunged-up 1993 Trade Test Transmissions album version).
And then there's Shelley's masterpiece "I Believe." The last "great" single from the (1978-1980) golden era Buzzcocks is here turned into a virtual set-closing jam session, with Diggle and Shelley's guitars duking it out for an extended three minute solo, with Chris Remmington and Danny Farrant both getting solos as well. That's new and certainly worth hearing - I would have made it the last song on the CD, but Diggle's acoustic "Love Is Lies" works well as a catch-you-breath cooldown after I Believe"'s guitar workout, kind of like The Beatles's "Her Majesty" on Abbey Road.
My only quibble with the compilation is the absence of a decent recording of my fave Buzzcocks song "Times Up," which was one of the four original recordings released on their 1977 Spiral Scratch EP. But two other spiral scratches, "Breakdown" and "Boredom," are showcased here and have never sounded better.
Finally, no dis to Danny Farrant, but listening to this set also reminded me that there's no substitute for original drummer John Maher. Danny Farrant is an excellent drummer, but John Mayer is arguably one of the top 5 rock drummers of all-time, one who seemed to have an extra gear when it came to lightning-fast rolls. I think he may even have had an extra limb or two that gave him the ability to beat out that extra measure in Buzzcocks songs. Still, he's gone and Farrant is probably as good a sub as possible.
The songs:
1. Boredom
2. Fast Cars
3. I Don't Mind
4. Autonomy
5. Get On Our Own
6. What Ever Happened To?
7. When Love Turns Around You
8. Why She's A Girl From The Chainstore
9. Why Can't I Touch It?
10. Alive Tonight
11. I Don't Know What To Do With My Life
12. You Say You Don't Love Me
13. Turn Of The Screw
14. Noise Annoys
15. Breakdown
16. Promises
17. Love You More
18. What Do I Get?
19. Harmony In My Head
20. Oh Shit!
21. Ever Fallen In Love (with Someone You Shouldn't've)?
22. Orgasm Addict
23. I Believe
24. Love Is Lies
My MLK Day shopping score of the day (well, after nabbing the last two pairs of Medium 60-40 Cotton-Poly Blend Men's Pajamas at WalMart for my 7-fresh-PJs-per-week-wearing dad!) was this Rhino "D.I.Y." compilation of UK punk and powerpop singles from 1978-1979, which I picked up for $5.99 from the Soundgarden used record bins. I thought maybe I had it already, but he who hesitates is not only lost but also not worthy of the name "hoarder," so I took a chance and am glad I did because it turns out that all of Rhino's excellent 1993 D.I.Y. series titles are out-of-print and hence expensive and hard to come by except for used copies.
I have most of the tunes included here - as a card-carrying Punk and Powerpop enthusiast, I have everything by Buzzcocks and The Undertones and most of the other groups on vinyl 45s or albums (e.g., The Yachts, Bram Tchaikovsky, The Jags, The Records, The Tourists - the latter featuring future Eurythmics Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart) - so this was a score mainly for car- and boombox-listening convenience, not to mention the half dozen tracks that were truly obscure/rare and probably unavailable anywhere else but this compilation: Belfast's Starjets ("Schooldays"), Dublin's The Radiators (who no doubt resent being lumped in with "United Kingdom" bands and whose leader Phil Chevron went on to join The Pogues; "Let's Talk About the Weather"), Leeds' The Squares ("This Is Airebeat"), Manchester's The Distractions ("Time Goes By So Slow" - one of the first singles on Factory Records), Glasgow's The Zones ("Mourning Star"; Zones bassist Russell Webb and drummer Kenny Hyslop later joined The Skids), and London's Mod revivalists Purple Hearts ("Millions Like Us").
The Jags: "Back of My Hand" 45
And I really, really wanted a digital version of my Jags 45 "Back Of My Hand (I've Got Your Number)" (UK #17) because not only is it a great powerpop song, it's also one of my favorite Telephone Songs (if only for the lines "I'm not a fuck machine, a 1960s dream" and "When I call you I get a stack of lies/You whip them out before you dry your eyes," the latter line sounding to my ears like "You wipe 'em out before you dry yer ass" thanks to singer Nick Watkinson's oft-indecipherable brogue).
You see, every pre-New Millennium pop band worth its salt either had a Girl's Name Song, a Car Song, or a Phone Song in their setlist and, yes, I compile those sort of playlists (especially Phone Songs - from The Marvelettes' "Beechwood 4-5789" and Wilson Pickett's "634-5789" in the '60s to ELO's "Telephone Line" in the '70s, and Tommy Tutone's "Jenny (867-5309)" in the '80s to contemporaries like Lady Gaga's "Telephone").
The compilation takes its title from The Records' bitter anti-Record Biz rant (set to possibly the most beautifully disarming jingly-jangly 12-string guitar chords ever) "Starry Eyes," but it's another Records' tune, Will Burch's "Hearts In Her Eyes" that is of greater interest here, because we get to hear it covered by an original, 1st Gen powerpop band (then just called "Merseybeat"), Liverpool's The Searchers.
And speaking of Merseybeat, there's even an answer song to Liverpool's famed beat group-inspiring river in this anthology: "This is Airebeat" by The Squares. The Aire river runs through Leeds and though no anthemic "Ferry Cross the Airey" song emerged to rival Merseybeat's place in history, "This is Airebeat" ("This is Airebeat for deadbeats/This is Airebeat for sound freaks/Airebeat it's so neat/Airebeat keeps me off of the street") amused John Peel enough to get played on his radio show, which led Sire Records to sign the Leeds lads - Paddy Hogan (bass & vocals), Brian Hogan (guitar & backing vocals), and Kev Bates (drums, maracas, organ) - in 1979.
Bram Tchaikovsky's "Girl of My Dreams" is a great pop song that belongs on another Rock Songs List - to wit, songs about inflatable girlfriends. Add it to the short list alongside The Police's "Be My Girl Sally" and Bryan Ferry's Roxy Music paen to the emptiness of opulence, "In Every Dream Home a Heartache."
"Girl of My Dreams": Cheap, portable, lightweight & never talks back!
And, lest I forget, there's the fun single "Where's the Boy For Me" by The Revillos, the band (named after a cafe in a Marvel comic) singers Faye Fife and Eugene Reynolds formed after the breakup of (the Jo Callis-led) Glaswegian New Wave retro-rockers The Rezillos - whose Can't Stand the Rezillos has been called by some (OK, well, by one!) The Greatest Rock & Roll Record of All-Time. (I still rue missing The Revillos when they played Baltimore's Marble Bar back in the 1980s! What could I possibly have been doing more important than that?)
Needless to say, the all-femme post-punk Mo-Dettes are great fun as well, and years of enjoying "White Mice" on various punk/D.I.Y. compilations such as this led me to purchase their 2008 anthology The Story So Far, a digitally remastered reissue of their lone 1981 album plus some bonus tracks. These gals, fronted by Swiss singer Ramona Carlier (who sounds like she either has a speech impediment or is singing with a mouthful of food), were once London squatmates of Joe Strummer and Sid Vicious. Guitarist Kate Korus (nee Katherine Corris) was a Yank and an original member of The Slits, while bassist Jane Crockford went on to marry Daniel Woodgate of Madness and drummer June Miles-Kingston ended up playing with Fun Boy Three, Everything But the Girl, Thompson Twins, and The Communards. They also did a song about the Kray Twins, which would have made them OK in my book even without the gem that is "White Mice."
Besides all the great music on offer, the Starry Eyes liner notes are quite nice and accurately point out the massive late '70s influence of one Elvis Costello who, though not appearing on this compilation, clearly influenced the fierce rock, rapid-fire clever wordplay, and mumbly invective of The Jags and Joe Jackson. And I like the observation that the members of XTC (whose Colin Moulding-penned "Life Begins At the Hop" appears here) "grew up to make the most quintessential English records that are loved everywhere but England."
"Starry Eyes" Tracks and Artists:
1. Ever Fallen in Love? - Buzzcocks 2. Get Over You - The Undertones 3. Yachting Types - The Yachts 4. Is She Really Going Out With Him? - Joe Jackson 5. Schooldays - Starjets (bonus track) * 6. Girl of My Dreams - Bram Tchaikovsky 7. This Is Airebeat - Squares 8. Life Begins at the Hop - XTC 9. Up the Junction - Squeeze 10. Back of My Hand (I've Got Your Number) - Jags 11. Let's Talk About the Weather - The Radiators 12. Starry Eyes - The Records 13. Mourning Star - Zones 14. Millions Like Us - Purple Hearts 15. Time Goes by So Slow - Distractions 16. Hearts in Her Eyes - The Searchers 17. Where's the Boy for Me? - Revillos 18. White Mice - Mo-Dettes (bonus track) * 19. So Good to Be Back Home Again - The Tourists
Graham Gouldman The Graham Gouldman Thing (BMG-UK, RCA-US, 1968)
The Players: Graham Gouldman: vocals, acoustic and lead guitars John Paul Jones: bass Clem Cantini: drums
The Capsule Description Thing: The Graham Gouldman Thing was the debut album by singer and songwriter Graham Gouldman. Gouldman had already written hit singles for Herman's Hermits ("No Milk Today" and "Listen People"), the Yardbirds ("For Your Love," "Heart Full of Soul," "Evil Hearted You"), the Hollies ("Look Through Any Window," "Bus Stop") and Wayne Fontana ("Pamela, Pamela", "The Impossible Years") and on this album Gouldman delivered his own versions of some of those songs as well as other new compositions. Gouldman, who would later become a founding member of 10cc, recorded the album at Olympic Studios in London, a studio that would later be extensively used by Led Zeppelin. It was recorded with the assistance of John Paul Jones and Eddie Kramer, both of whom would also achieve considerable success with Led Zeppelin. All songs composed by Graham Gouldman.
"From behind the counter of a gents' outfitters shop in a grimy Manchester suburb to a place in the front rank of the world's leading songwriters in three years. This is the achievement of Graham Gouldman - six feet, rangy and dreamy-eyed...There are many great artists who have paid tribute to Gouldman by recording his music...Citations and reviews also pay tribute to the melodic invention and distinctive style of what has become known as the Graham Gouldman Thing." - Original sleeve note, 1968
Graham Gouldman entered the pop scene at age 19 with "For Your Love," a song he wrote while working behind the counter at Bargains Unlimited - a men's clothing store near Salford Docks in Manchester, England - and which would eventually make its way to The Yardbirds and provide them with their first (and biggest) hit. Bargains Unlimited was Gouldman's day job; by night, he was gigging with his semi-professional local band The Mockingbirds, whose drummer was none other than his future 10cc bandmate Kevin Godley (whom he'd met while rehearsing at the Jewish Lads Brigade in north Manchester). The other 'birds were the aptly named bass player Bernard Basso and guitarist Steve Jacobson.
The Mockingbirds
"I was sleeping most of the time because I'd been gigging with the Mockingbirds the night before, and then during the day when I'd got any spare time I'd write in the shop," Gouldman recalled. He favored "soulful" minor chords, explaining that "Major chords seemed pale and white. We used to go to the synagogue which must have had some sort of influence, the melodies there were very beautiful, mournful and aching."
Gouldman explained, "I used to shut up the shop at lunch time and sit in the back writing. I’d sort of dabbled a bit in song-writing but I had a band and we wanted to make a record and so we went down to Denmark Street - Tin Pan Alley was Denmark Street, where all the songwriters were - in London, and went round all the publishers trying to find a song. And anyway we didn’t get any songs that we liked or we weren’t given any songs period and the Beatles had started and I thought ‘well, I’m gonna really have a crack at song-writing.’ I had dabbled a bit but they were really my inspiration and gave me and I think gave a lot of other people the courage to actually do it. We all wanted to be like the Beatles...most of us anyway."
Beatles-inspired fledgling songwriter Gouldman had written two songs for the Mockingbirds that he thought had potential, "That's How (It's Gonna Stay)" and "For Your Love," the latter envisioned as their first single. The mental giants at the record company, however, turned down "For Your Love" and instead chose "That's How (It's Gonna Stay)" to be the Mockingbirds' first single. "That's How (It's Gonna Stay)" did nothing for Gouldman's band but Mockingbirds manager Harvey Lisberg - who also managed Herman's Hermits and would later go on to manage 10cc - was so impressed by "For Your Love" that he advised Gouldman to offer it to the Beatles.
"I said, 'I think they're doing alright in the songwriting department, actually'," Gouldman replied with considerable understatement. "What he was thinking was that they did covers of Motown songs and rhythm and blues stuff." The Beatles's publishing company passed but, undeterred, Lisberg gave a demo of the song to publisher Ronnie Beck of Feldman's, who took it to the Hammersmith Odeon, where the Beatles were performing on a Christmas show. By coincidence the Yardbirds were also on the bill at the venue and Beck played the song to their manager, Giorgio Gomelsky, and the band.
With the lone exception of their guitarist, the Yardbirds loved it. "They were a blues band who wanted some chart success so they'd started looking around for outside material. It was a simple as that," Gouldman told Andy Morten in the liner notes to The Graham Gouldman Thing. "[Georgio Gomelsky] played it to them and it fitted into what they wanted to do."
In fact, the Yardbirds would go to parrot many of its unusual (for its time) songwriting traits - the minor chords, the slow-fast/start-stop tempo changes, the droning (almost Gregorian) harmonies - in their subsequent chart efforts. The Yardbirds' recording of "For Your Love" peaked at No. 3 on the UK charts, selling two million copies worldwide and becoming their highest charting single in the US at No. 6. And it also famously caused their blues-purist guitarist Eric Clapton to leave the 'birds' nest and join John Mayall's Bluesbreakers in protest at this new "commercial sound."
"That song, I think I read somewhere, was kind of responsible for Eric Clapton leaving the Yardbirds – he thought ‘I can’t play that, it’s too poppy’," Gouldman recalled in an interview with Alan Thompson for the BBC Radio Wales program I Write the Songs. "I think it was more like the last straw rather than any other reason, because the Yardbirds had wanted to get a hit record and they were playing rhythm and blues, and they were a fantastic rhythm and blues band and when they made this change to being commercial, Eric couldn’t take it and he left. And," he added facetiously, "they got another crap guitarist - Jeff Beck, and then Jimmy Page."
Rumor has it that another factor contributing to Clapton's departure was "Slowhand" having to recreate the song's harpsichord on a 12-string guitar when performing it live. It would later be handily handled by post-Clapton "crap" guitarist Jeff Beck, as shown in the clip below.
Though "For Your Love" may have been the final straw that caused Eric Clapton to leave the Yardbirds roost, it was undoubtably the song that helped propel the Yardbirds from being just another London blues-rock band into a chart-topping commercial pop presence, ushering in the sonic experimentations of new guitar whiz Jeff Beck and beginning what would blossom into a fruitful songwriting relationship with Gouldman.
"I saw The Yardbirds with Jeff Beck and and he just blew me away. To me he was and still is the ultimate player, so it was very exciting to be working with them," Gouldman told Andy Morten. "They ended up doing two more of mine and another one they didn't finish. I wrote those with them in mind." Those two Gouldman followup hits for the Yardbirds were "Heart Full of Soul" (UK #2, US #9) and "Evil Hearted You" (UK #3).
And so began a two-year period when Gouldman had the "Midas Touch" writing hit songs for other pop groups. The next act to reap chart success from Gouldman's songwriting pen was The Hollies. Inspired by the the view looking out a railway carriage on one of his trips to London to peddle songs, he wrote "Look Through Any Window." "They had separate compartments then," he told Bob Stanley (a member of the pop group Saint Etienne who writes the fantastic blog Croydon Municipal), "a great environment for writing."
Hollies Hits in Transit
"Look Through Any Window" - co-written with Charles Silverman and originally offered to the Country Gentleman (a group fronted by Gouldman's friend and frequent musical collaborator Peter Cowap) - was "placed" with the Hollies by his manager and became a Top 5 hit for his fellow Mancunians. But it was "Bus Stop" - specifically written with The Hollies in mind - that became their breakthrough U.S. hit, reaching #5 on the Billboard Top 100. Gouldman also offered The Hollies "Going Away," which was ultimately recorded (though never released) by Manchester's Toggery Five.
1965 was a busy year for Gouldman, with his manager Lisberg placing "I'm Gonna Take You There" with Dave Berry, "A Little While Back" and "Why Say Goodbye" with The Shindigs, and several singles for Columbia recording artist Little Frankie.
By the time 1966 rolled around, it was the Harvey Lisberg-managed Herman's Hermits who started recording Gouldman gems, including the singles "East West" (#33 UK), "Listen People" (US #3), and "No Milk Today" (#5 UK). The Hermits would later look to Gouldman's "Ooh She's Done It Again," "It's Nice To Be Out in the Morning," and "The World Is For the Young" to use on their Mrs. Brown, You've Got A Lovely Daughter soundtrack LP and '67 B-side "Marcel."
Bowled Over: Hermits Hermits tip their hats to Graham Gouldman's hits
Still later, Gouldman would even write a Yardley cosmetics promo jingle for Herman's Hermits, "The London Look," which they released as an EP in 1968: "See the country vicars and the city slickers, pearly kings and noble dukes. Everybody moving, everybody grooving. They've all got The London Look ..."
Country vicars and city slickers - all have The London Look!
But Noone's Hermits weren't the only musicos to cut their teeth on Gouldman gold that year, as Wayne Fontana took "Pamela, Pamela" to #11 on the UK charts, while the St. Louis Union recorded "Behind the Door," P. J. Proby and Toni Basil (yes, Toni Basil!) both recorded "I'm 28," Friday Brown cut "Getting Nowhere" (actually just a retitled version of "I'm 28"), The Downliner Sect added their rhythm and blues stylings to "The Cost of Living" (credited to Gouldman-Lisberp-Peter Cowap), and The High Society (a Gouldman studio concoction) released "People Passing By."
1967 saw Cher record what Gouldman would later deem a "great version" of "Behind the Door" and a post-Yardbirds, pre-Jeff Beck Group Jeff Beck recorded "Tallyman" - a title suggested by Gouldman's dad. "Because of my connection with [Herman's Hermits producer] Mickie Most," Gouldman explained to Andy Morten, "Jeff Beck ended up a song of mine after he left The Yardbirds. This is one ofthose songs where my late father used to help me with lyrics quite a lot. He should get a little bit of the credit."
The Shadows recorded "Naughty Nippon Nights" the same year, while (future 10cc bandmate) Eric Stewart's Mindbenders (who Graham would later join on a brief touring stint) covered Gouldman's "Schoolgirl" (which was banned by the BBC for its subject matter: teenage pregnancy), and Down Under rock star Normie Rowe (the "Ozzy Elvis" whose career was never the same after he was drafted for the Vietnam War) had a comeback hit with "Going Home," which rose as high as #7 on Australia's Go-Set chart listing. Gouldman also found time to release his own "Stop! Stop! Stop!" - a rare instance of him adapting a Northern Soul/R&B style.
Gouldman's own band The Mockingbirds were still around during this period (though by this time they'd left EMI to join Andrew Loog Oldham's Immediate label), but success still eluded them - even when Gouldman tried to emulate the style of more popular groups, like The Yardbirds. Encouraged by the commercial success of The Yardbirds' "For Your Love," The Mockingbirds released the very Yardbirds-sounding "You Stole My Love" (with a young Julie Driscoll providing backing vocals) on Andrew Loog Oldham's Immediate label in 1965; not surprisingly, it would later be covered by the Yardbirds themselves in 1966.
"You Stole My Love": Out-Yardbirdsing the Yardbirds
As Andy Morten characterized it in his The Graham Gouldman Thing liner notes: "One of Gouldman's best songs of the era, it almost out-Yardbirds The Yardbirds with its powerful melody and shifting tempo changes, beautifully rendered by a fierce Giorgio Gomelsky production and an ethereal Julie Driscoll backing vocal to boot. Despite being rightly recognised as a classic slice of mid-'60s Britpop these days, back then it merely became the third Mockingbirds single to do nothing." Or, as Gouldman put it: "It seemed that every song of mine we recorded failed and every one we gave away was a hit. I thought maybe that's the way it's going to be, although I didn't let it bother me."
Graham Gouldman relocated to the United States in 1968, where RCA Victor - encouraged by his hit-making track record for other artists - quickly signed him to a contract and molded him as a solo act. RCA let the maestro loose in the studio to record The Graham Gouldman Thing, wherein he played and sang his versions of the past hits he wrote for other artists, as well as some new songs like "My Father," "The Pawnbroker" and "Who Are They."
The album was originally intended to be produced by Peter Noone (whose Herman's Hermits had already reaped the benefits of numerous Gouldman-penned hits), but in an interview with Alan Betrock (reprinted on the CD), Gouldman explained:
"It was supposed to be something like the artist produces the writer, but he wasn't there on any of the sessions - though he is credited as producer. I did the whole thing with John Paul Jones who arranged the tracks, played on it and also helped produce it. It was an important project for me at the time; I put a lot of work into it." This concern is shown by listening to the album, which exudes tasteful arrangements and thoughtful production. Favourites are the hits like 'Bus Stop' and 'For Your Love,' but all the tracks have something interesting to offer. The orchestral arrangements on 'No Milk Today' and 'Upstairs Downstairs' are particularly refreshing. Strangely enough, the album was not released in the UK, and despite a heavy US promo campaign, didn't sell much to Americans..."
"I think Peter [Noone] came to the first session, had to leave early, and that was it," Gouldman remembered. "He never turned up for any of the sessions. He did us all a favour in the end because that left myself, John and Eddie Kramer [ominipresent engineer in-chief at London's Olympic Studios]. Clem Canttini played drums, John played bass, I played acoustic guitar and some lead guitar. That was the team that made the record...Some songs were made with just me, John and Clem, and some were done with a full orchestra, live. In those days you'd write the song, give it to the arranger, the arranger would write all the parts, you'd spend maybe an hour getting the sounds together and another hour getting a good performance, another hour doing the vocals and that was it. Because it was only a four-track it didn't take long to mix it. That's why these guys were so hot. I used to see John and he'd come in with his guitar in one hand and his amp in the other, plonk it down and say 'right, what are we doing?' and he'd be off. Then he'd go off and do the same thing in another studio. And we were all doing that, that's how records were made. Some of the best records ever made."
"Listening to it now," he later told Saint Etienne's Bob Stanley, "the first thing I notice is how good it is to hear real instruments. (Arranger) John Paul Jones loved strings and woodwind - you hardly ever hear woodwind anymore...Some things worked beautifully, especially 'Bus Stop'...It got nice reviews, but didn't set the world on fire." (Indeed sales were modest, with Gouldman later commenting that the album sold more upon its reissue in 1974 at the height of 10cc's fame than it had in the previous six years combined.)
Stanley christened the album's orchestral rock sound "Baroque Majesty," one influenced in equal measure by both Bach and The Beatles' "Eleanor Rigby." I call this sound "Chamber Pop," a late-60s fusion of classical and rock music prevalent in the songs of The Walker Brothers and bands like The Left Banke, Rolling Stones, Procol Harum, Love, and The Beach Boys. And nowhere is this more in evidence than on the opening track, "The Impossible Years"...
The Graham Gouldman Thing - Side 1
1. "The Impossible Years" - 2:38
These are the impossible years A girl must endure, adrift on the ocean Left with her unspeakable fears The torture of doubt and pent up emotion New temptations, strange sensations A great new world for explorations
An interesting song in that it takes the unusual (for a youth-oriented pop song) narrative point of view of a father trying to understand his teenage daughter and "show her the way" through the "impossible years" of adolescence when "the young bud comes to flower." I mean, it's pretty clear what we're talking about here, with lines such as:
When does the young bud come to flower It's petals are plain with color exciting When does the one sun choose the hour To change the green shoot to beauty inviting Girls are growing And without knowing They're the seeds that we've been sowing
Musically, "The Impossible Years" clearly shows the "baroque" or "chamber pop" influence that became so prevalent on the British airwaves in the wake of The Beatles' "Yesterday."
Wayne Fontana - yet another Mancunian artist drawn to Gouldman's work - recorded a version in 1967 that only achieved minor success in Australia; Fontana had more success in 1966 with Gouldman's "Pamela, Pamela," which he rode as high as #11 on the UK pop charts.
Bus stop, wet day, she's there, I say "Please share my umbrella" Bus stops, bus goes, she stays, love grows Under my umbrella All that summer we enjoyed it Wind and rain and shine That umbrella we employed it By August she was mine
Though the Hollies had already recorded Gouldman's "Look Through Any Window," they achieved their greatest chart success with "Bus Stop," a song he had written specifically with them in mind and which they took to #5 on the U.S. Billboard Top 100.
"We were supporting The Hollies at Stoke Town Hall," Gouldman explained to Andy Morten. "They'd already recorded 'Look Through Any Window' and said that if I came up with anything else, they'd love to hear it. I remember playing 'Bus Stop' to Tony Hicks and Graham Nash in the loo there as it was the quietest place we could find. They said they loved it and told me to make a tape. In those days if they said they'd do it, they'd do it and they'd do it quick. It was recorded and was out just a few weeks later. Things were done much quicker because you weren't waiting for the artwork or the video. There was a quick turnover and things were much more exciting because of that."
Fellow '60s British songsmith Tony Hazzard claimed he was so impressed by "Bus Stop" that he was moved to write "Ha! Ha! Said the Clown" for Manfred Mann in 1967.
Behind the door of every house In every street, in every town A story is unfolding, a story is unfolding Of love and hate...remorse, love's fate Of hopes and fears and smiles and tears Of dreams that lie emoldering
GG's melancholy, minor-chord drenched "Behind the Door" - perhaps the first-ever song to rhyme "unfolding" with "emoldering" (much less use this obscure term for - um, what exactly is emoldering?) - was first recorded by Manchester "freakbeat" mod rockers St. Louis Union, one of three singles (the others were a #11 UK cover of The Beatles' "Girl" b/w their version of Otis Redding's "Respect" and "East Side Story" b/w "Think About Me") they released on Decca Records in 1966.
Originally called The Satanists, the St. Louis Union won a recording contract after winning a Melody Maker beat band contest (where they drubbed a fledgling Pink Floyd!). They would later appear in the Spencer Davis Group movie The Ghost Goes Gear (1966), in which they performed "I Got My Pride" and "Show Me Your English Teeth" (great title!). According to Wikipedia, St. Louis Union keyboardist David Tomlinson - rechristened as "Dave Formula" (pictured right) - resurfaced on the late '70s New Wave scene as a member of (erstwile Buzzcock) Howard Devoto's Magazine, new romantics Visage, Ludus, and Luxuria, and also worked with Tuxedomoon's Winston Tong. (So there you have it, punk fans: the somewhat tenuous connection between Graham Gouldman and Buzzcocks!)
Across the pond, a young Cher also covered "Behind the Door" in 1966 (#94 US Billboard Hot 100).
GG's version of the song is notable for its tempo change - two-thirds of the way into this orchestral maneuvers in the dark, it shifts gears and turns into a sprightly rocker - only to return one again to its somber fade.
4. "Pawnbroker" - 3:02
Under the sign of the old pawnbroker There rests a man with our past success All that I value is in his keeping He is the guardian of everything I possess Everything I possess...
In on Monday, out on Friday I'm the only one to blame Waiting for that Thursday's payday Every week it's just the same
Over Flamenco-style guitars and a sped-up Bossa Nova beat, Gouldman authors the best pawnbroker song until, well, until The Ramones' "Chinese Rock"! With incredible detail, Gouldman describes both the man and the trade in faded dreams...
Behind the grill wearing gold-rimmed glasses The old man values the cost of fears Trumpets, guitars, pearly concertinas Assigned orchestra, lamenting four wasted years
Until the song's final resignation to endless debt:
Under the sign of the old pawnbroker Trail all the losers in life's contest Some hurry back to redeem their pledges My promise, I'll redeem, the day that I'm laid to rest
Drip dry dress, unshrinkable Who can they be? They're you and me - they're we
Gouldman showed his social conscience on a number of his mid- to late-60s songs and "Who Are They" is no exception, lyrically concerning itself with the world of 9-to-5 squares - "the faceless mass on the merry-go-round" who are too busy "getting wed, going to bed/Two kids to feed and the mortgage ahead" to ever accomplish anything. "So much to do, yet nothing's done. What a shame," the song concludes. This one makes me think of the future that awaited Albert Finney and Shirley Anne Field at the end of Karel Reisz's 1960 "Kitchen Sink" drama Saturday Night and Sunday Morning.
6. "My Father" - 2:47
My father knows more than I'll ever know My father's been places I'll never go I want to know - want to know all the words and phrases I want to show - want to show his fine airs and graces If only it were me
The greatest influence on Gouldman's mid-60s songwriting golden era was his father, Hymie Gouldman, aka "Hyme the Rhyme" in deference to his frequent lyrical assistance (Hymie was also an amateur playwright). "My father was a songwriter," he told Bob Stanley. "'No Milk Today' was one of his titles. He used to call himself 'the mechanic' - I'd bring him a broken lyric and he'd go 'D'you write them son? Ttcchh! Come back at five o'clock.' He used to say 'art for arts sake, money for God's sake' [later to become song appearing on 10cc's 1976 album How Dare You!]. I nicked that off him, too."
Though he sings of how much he'd like to emulate his dad, by the songs coda he realizes that "it's no use being somebody else":
On my own two feet, I've got to meet The world alone, I'm on my own Just me - independent and free The son of my father
Gouldman later referenced his dad's passing in the song "Ready To Go Home." Originally appearing on the 1995 (Graham Gouldman-Eric Stewart edition) 10cc album Mirror Mirror, it would later surface on Gouldman's solo album And Another Thing (For Your Love/Dome Records, 2000). Gouldman commented, "This was written not long after my dad died and it reflects my feelings at the time. I suppose I was trying to put a positive slant on his passing, remembering all the things we had done together and his artistic legacy to me. The last verse of the song best reflects my feelings on this. This song has been recorded by many artists and remains one of my favourites. Very emotional."
This is my favorite song on the album and one tied with Fire's "My Father's Name Was Dad" on my list of all-time greatest Pater Familias pop songs (narrowly edging out B-Rock & The Bizz's "My Baby Daddy").
No milk today, my love has gone away The bottle stands forlorn, a symbol of the dawn But all that's left is a place dark and lonely A terraced house in a mean street back of town Becomes a shrine when I think of you only Just two up, two down, just two up, two down
Hymie Gouldman told his son that "No Milk Today" would make a good song title and Graham followed this sage fatherly advice to write what would become a Top 5 hit for Herman's Hermits. It was notable as the first Herman's Hermits single to feature orchestral arrangements and, in an interview with the "Forgotten Hits" newsletter, lead singer Peter Noone said, "Personally I think 'No Milk Today' is Herman's Hermits' best recording, and perfectly captures the moment and the feel of Manchester terraced houses and what was the end of a British era."
Herman's Hermits recorded "No Milk Today," "There's A Kind Of Hush" (US #4, 1967), and Ray Davies' "Dandy" (US #5, 1966) all on the same day at Lansdown Studios. "This was in the period where we had just stopped using The Hermits on the recordings and were using the best musicians available to us to try to keep up with what had suddenly become The British Invasion," Noone recalled. "We were supposed to deliver 48 tracks a year to MGM so we were always scrambling to catch up. I recall that John Paul Jones played bass guitars (an upright and a fender bass) on the tracks and was also responsible for the arrangements, which I dare say are brilliant on all 3 tracks but I know he liked 'No Milk Today' and I would suggest that his arrangement turned this perfect Graham Gouldman song into a hit."
Noone would later comment that, given all the great songs Gouldman wrote, he should have asked him to join Herman's Hermits in their heyday. Hindsight is golden...
Upstairs every night There's a boy listening to his radio Downstairs just one flight A girl waits patiently... Each one knowing that the other is there Each one hoping that the other will dare To climb the first stair
Another song covered by Gouldman fan Peter Noone and his Herman's Hermits, who included it on their critically lauded 1967 album Blaze.
Herman's Hermits: "Blaze" (1967)
This perky pop song finds Gouldman crooning like Paul McCartney as he recounts the story of a boy and girl living in the same building who keep waiting for one another to make the first move. A happy boy-finally-meets-girl ending is guaranteed...
No more lonely Girl and boy have met The upstairs room is Advertised to let Now these two have met
Though the Yardbirds wrote many of their own songs as a group, it was Gouldman who wrote many of their biggest hits, though he wasn't always sure when he had struck gold. As he explained to BBC Radio Wales host Alan Thompson, "I think sometimes this knowing you’ve written a hit single or not, I’ve never been able to predict it. I mean there’ve been songs I’ve either written or co-written and you’ve thought ‘that’s a hit’ and it hasn’t been, and vice versa. It doesn’t always, I mean you have a feeling about a song sometimes and sometimes you’re right, sometimes you’re wrong but I don’t know whether the writer or the artist is the best judge."
The Yardbirds were certainly sure. Drummer Jim McCarty recalled that Gouldman's songs "...were always very original. Very interesting songs, very moody, because they were usually in a minor key, the ones we did, anyway. 'For Your Love' was an interesting song, it had an interesting chord sequence, very moody, very powerful. And the fact that it stopped in the middle and went into a different time signature, we liked that, that was interesting. Quite different, really, from all the bluesy stuff that we'd been playing up till then. But somehow we liked it. It was original and different."
Yardbird Chris Dreja added, "We owe a lot to that song because it sort of pulled us out from national to international and set the template for us - that time change in the middle, the weirdness of it."
Gouldman's friend Paul Thomas had played bongos on The Mockingbirds' version and the Yardbirds copied his percussion verbatim. But Yardbirds bassist Paul Samwell-Smith added a number of changes to Gouldman's original song, including the use of a harpsichord (replacing Gouldman's acoustic guitar intro), which was played by session muscian Brian Auger (later to achieve solo fame and with Julie Driscoll in Brian Auger and The Trinity, whose biggest hit was the Dylan cover "This Wheel's On Fire" - which, incidentally, later became the theme song for the BBC comedy series Absolutely Fabulous). In an August 2009 interview with Uncut magazine, Gouldman admitted: "The harpsichord was an absolute stroke of genius. The record just had a weird, mysterious atmosphere about it."
As for Graham Gouldman's version, he nixes the bongos and harpsichord altogether in favor of piano and a stately Church organ that wouldn't be out of place on a Prociol Harum record. It's a clever "alternate" version that's kind of funky in its own way.
In 1965 Gouldman's band The Mockingbirds had a regular warm-up spot for BBC TV’s Top of the Pops, which was transmitted from Manchester and the songwriter recalled how odd it was to hear his song being associated with the Londoners: "There was one strange moment when The Yardbirds appeared on the show doing 'For Your Love'. Everyone clamoured around them – and there I was just part of an anonymous group. I felt strange that night, hearing them play my song."
Many others have followed suit to cover "For Your Love," including the pre-Stevie Nicks/Lindsey Buckingham Fleetwood Mac, who included it on their 1973 album Mystery to Me and even released it as a single.
Pamela, Pamela, remember the days Of inkwells and apples, and sick and sore plays Where little Brer Rabbit kissed Pooh in the wood And Fluff was the cat that sat on the rug
"Pamela, Pamela" was Wayne Fontana's final single, which placed as high as #11 on the UK singles charts.
This classic example of the period's "fringe psychedelia-meets-dancehall vaudeville" British Cup of Twee-ness namechecks everything from A.A. Milne to Laurel and Hardy. And Gouldman's vocal is delivered with vintage Donovan BBC Radio enunciation.
Oh, Pamela I remember so well When Laurel and Hardy were shown at the flicks With sticky red lollies on splintery sticks Pigtails and ribbons and crushes on miss Secret discussions about a first kiss But you were young And everything was new Impatient to do things you couldn't do
Gamine chestnuts modeling in Antonioni's "Blow-Up"
Somebody accurately described this funky instro as sounding like the kind of Swinging London party music they'd play in Antonioni's Blow-Up. It's great and, dare I say, downright groovy! As one critic astutely remarked, it would make Stax guitar ace Steve Cropper proud.
At one point the jam features Gouldman reciting a brief schoolbook elocution exercise that sounds like something the Bonzo Dog Band's Viv Stanshall would sing circa the Keynsham album:
If all of us were doomed to die when we'd lived a minute I think I know what Ann and I would wish to happen in it We'd let our 60 seconds run where chestnut blossoms harden Some early morning in Kensington when Spring is in the garden
The song then features a dueling flute sequence that would not be out of place on Traffic's John Barleycorn Must Die LP.
The Graham Gouldman Thing catches our hero in a period of transition, between his stint as an internationally successful 1960s pop hit-maker and as a menber of a hugely successful 1970s art-rock band, when he was experimenting with any number of projects and saying 'saying yes more than saying no.' The album has gained an enviable reputation among '60s pop and psych fans as something more than just a curio in its creator's estimable canon. It's a jewel of late '60s chamber pop and worthy of reevaluation.
Gouldman himself reflected that "I did it and sort of forgot about it. Had it been more successful I might have paid more attention. But I enjoyed making it and it was great working with the people I worked with but then that was it. It was finished. Done."
And then Gouldman's two-year streak of hit-making genius hit a snag. "You're like a conduit when that magic happens," he told Bob Stanley. "You think, how did I do that? What happened there? In 1968 I was still doing what I did, but I was out of sync with what has happening."
Still, as Morten writes, 1968 was an eventful year in Gouldman's life. He and Peter Noone opened a short-lived boutique in New York called Zoo, and Gouldman helped get his friends Kevin Godley and Lol Creme signed to Giorgio Gomelsky's Marmalde label, where as Frabjoy and Runcible Spoon they released the (extremely hard to find) single "I'm Beside Myself" b/w "Animal Song" in 1969.
But after a short spell in The Mindbenders, Gouldman decided to move to New York and the Kassenetz/Katz hit factory, where the money was good and second-rate (by his standards, at least) trash like (future K-Tel novelty compilation fodder) "Simon Says" and "Yummy Yummy Yummy" would be recorded under various group names.
"They wanted to legitimize themselves, find writers with more cred," he explained to Bob Stanley. "It was pretty horrible." He reached his creative (but not commercial!) nadir with a song he wrote for Freddie and the Dreamers called "Susan's Tuba."
"It was like [Mel Brooks film] The Producers - let's wrote the worst piece of shit imaginable!" The record sold a million in France. "I couldn't believe it. Where did we go right?"
And then Gouldman got the call that changed everything. Ex-Mindbender Eric Stewart was setting up Strawberry Studios in Stockport and wanted his friend to join him. Gouldman "boarded the next plane home, to join the ultra-successful band he'd always dreamt of," writes Bob Stanley. "I'd always wanted to play guitar in a band," he admitted to Stanley, "but I became resigned to the idea of being a writer. And then we started 10cc and that satisfied every aspect for me, everything I'd ever wanted to do."
Still only 23, the best was still to come for Graham Keith Gouldman. He still had plenty more tunes up his sleeve to make his father proud. He'd done what his dad had called "money for God's sake"; now it was time for the "Art for Art's sake."
Hotlegs - Thinks: School Stinks (Philips/Capitol, 1971) Hotlegs - You Didn't Like It Because You Didn't Think of It (Philips, 1976)
Musicians: Eric Stewart / guitar, bass, vocals, synthesizer (Moog), arranger, producer Lol Creme / guitar, bass, keyboards, vocals, arranger, producer Kevin Godley / drums, percussion, vocals, arranger, producer - Graham Gouldman / bass ("Today") - Baz Barker / flute, violin - Mike Bell / saxophone - Ian Brooks / trumpet - Rod Morton / tambourine - Mike Timoney / organ - Cheadle Hulme High School Choir / Vocals on "Suite F.A." - Tony Harrison / String arrangement ("Today")
10cc fanatic Amy Linthicum bought vinyl copies of these two LPs online and then had them transfered to CD (thanks to Gary Gebler at Trax on Wax) for our digital listening convenience. All I can say is, "Hooray!" for Thinks: School Stinks is three-quarters 10cc (7.5cc?) at their prog-rock peak, two years before their titular 10cc debut album with Graham Gouldman. It is, in the words of one fan-critic, "the album many of us wished 10CC would make. It is largely devoid of the too clever for their own good lyrics and structures, the songs being simple, well crafted pop rock numbers."
I emphasize that last sentence because I think it points to the reason why the supremely over-talented band of musical brothers known as 10cc have been so criminally neglected by pop music historians. Could it be because they were too clever by far for their own good? Too multi-faceted (each member could write, sing, play, arrange, produce) to fit into rock 'n' roll's preferred pigeon-hole classification system of genres (pop, rock, soul, prog, AOR) and roles (i.e., lead singer, lead guitarist, drummer, etc.)
Amy's ears quite rightly heard a heavy Beatles vibe on Thinks School Stinks, especially the later Beatles albums released around this time period - specifically The White Album, Let It Be and Abbey Road. And, speaking of "Neanderthal Man," she astutely pointed out, "You know it's a '70s record when you hear a pop song with flute in it!" My ears found this album to be a synthesis of everything 1970s, with studio production values that rate Thinks School Stinks as a stereo demonstration record - in other words, it sounds great and uses virtually every production trick in the book, from cross-fades, cross-channel zooms (especially effective on Eric Stewart's guitar solos!) to layered overdubs, echo, strings, you name it.
OK, back to the plot...Thinks School Stinks is the album Mssrs. Kevin Godley, Lol Creme and Eric Stewart recorded as Hotlegs (Stewart coined the name in homage to the outstanding attributes of their sexy hotpants-clad Strawberry Studios secretary) to back up their insanely unlikely and massively popular (#2 UK pop charts, #22 US pop charts) reductio-ad-absurdum 1970 hit "Neanderthal Man," which sold two million copies worldwide.
Primal Stomp: "Neanderthal Man"
"Neanderthal Man" was as far from clever as a song could be, basically a sound check with a one-line lyric repeated for the duration of the song. It was so dumb, in fact, that it was the kind of thing that made bottom-line record company suits drool. Rock critic Dave Thompson picks up the story here:
In 1970, Kevin Godley, Lol Crème, and Eric Stewart were, alongside songwriter Graham Gouldman, the house band at the Strawberry Studios setup in Stockport, England. Gouldman was spending much of his time in New York, working as a contract songwriter for the Kasenatz/Katz bubblegum team - his partners remained at home, equipping the studio and testing the new equipment. It was during one of these tests, playing around with a drum kit and a new four-track recorder, that Philips label rep Dick Leahy happened by, heard what they were doing, and pronounced it an instant hit single.
"It" was a percussive experiment which evolved around a chant of "I'm a Neanderthal man/you're a Neanderthal girl/let's make Neanderthal love" and Leahy's instincts were correct. Restructured and released (under the name Hotlegs) in the summer of 1970, "Neanderthal Man" reached number 22 in the U.S., number two in Britain, number one in Italy, and ultimately sold over two million worldwide. The record was enormous. The Idle Race, heading towards the end of their brief but glorious career, wrested one final hit when they covered the song for German and Argentine consumption. Bandleader James Last included a version on his latest album; even Elton John, eking out a pre-fame career as a jobbing sessioneer, recorded his own distinctive version for a budget-priced collection of sound-alike hits.
"We thought we had it made," Godley thought at the time. "We were on our way baby!...We hit an unexpected nerve with 'Neanderthal Man.' It was one of those lucky accidents that turn into something both interesting and successful, without knowing how or why. When you go back and try to recreate the same circumstances it just doesn't work."
In his excellent glam rock history Children of the Revolution, Dave Thompson describes the events leading up to this unlikeliest of hits. In early 1970, Kevin, Lol and Eric were playing around with all the gear at their Strawberry Studios in Stockport, "strumming, wailing, and banging anything in sight" to test the new equipment coming into the studio. As Kevin Godley recalled to Thompson: "The first musical noises that had any cohesion...started life as an unorthodox drum test featuring fullkit overdubbed onto all four tracks, with Lol singing this spooky, retarded nursery rhyme that got mixed in via the bass drum mike. Like all the early work, it was driven by applied ignorance and adrenalin but we knew we had something. Unfortunately the track got erased but we liked the vibe so much we started again adding recorders, tone generator, anvil, backwards echo until it sounded like nothing else on earth."
Eric Stewart added: "Dick Leahy, from Philips, came in and said 'What the hell's that you're playing?' I said, 'It's a studio experiment; a percussive experiment.' He says, 'It sounds like a hit record to me - can we release it?' And we said, 'Yeah, okay. What should we call it?' 'Neanderthal Man.' And what should we call ourselves? Hotlegs.'We had a girl at the studio, Kathy Gill, who had very, very nice legs and she used to wear these incredible hotpants. Green, leather hotpants. So we called the group, ah, Hotlegs."
The flip side of "Neanderthal Man" was a song called "You Didn't Like It Because You Didn't Think of It," which later became the title of a 1976 Hotlegs compilation LP that simply rearranged the order of the songs on Thinks: School Stinks and added four more songs. The second half of the song "You Didn't Like It" would eventually evolve into the 10cc song "Fresh Air for My Mama."
"You Didn't Like It" - cover by Godley and Creme
Besides "You Didn't Like It," the "new" additional songs on You Didn't Like It Because You Didn't Think of It included "Today" (a reworking of a Godley-Creme song from their days as Frabjoy and Runcible Spoon), and both sides of the 1971 single "Lady Sadie" b/w "The Loser."
In between, Philips repackaged Thinks School Stinks as Songs (issued only in Britain, Germany, and Venezuela), omitting "Neanderthal Man" in favor of "The Loser" and "Today." According to rock critic Dave Thompson, Songs was Hotlegs attempt to nullify the "novelty hit" tag they were burdened with after "Neanderthal Man"'s surprising success:
Hotlegs broke through with a novelty hit, and they never lived it down. "Neanderthal Man" might have proven one of the most distinctive hits of 1970, but that's all it was -- distinctive, a thumping, crashing, grunting novelty its makers would rather have forgotten about completely. Certainly that was how it felt when they delivered their debut album, Thinks: School Stinks, and the suspicion grew even more intense six months later. Booked to open for the Moody Blues on a six-date U.K. tour, Hotlegs knew they could play up to the hit, and be laughed out of sight. Or they could play to their strengths, and maybe win the hearts of a few members of the headliners' audience. They chose the latter course and their U.K. record label, having long since abandoned any hope of any further hits in the "Neanderthal" vein, agreed to give it a go. Hence Songs, essentially a note-for-note reissue of Thinks: School Stinks, with one crucial difference -- no hit single. Both "Neanderthal Man" and the similarly jokey "Desperate Dan" were dumped, in favor of "Today" and the lovely "The Loser," and with the album's sleeve and title similarly revised, Hotlegs set out to try and gain some credibility. It should have worked. Even such minor surgery completely redesigns the album, planting it firmly on the edge of the soft rock boom, with the emphasis on the word "edge" -- even this early on, Kevin Godley and Lol Creme were more or less incapable of writing a straightforward song, while Eric Stewart's guitar playing is seldom short of rock-god revelatory. But "Neanderthal Man" remained a hard act to follow, and Hotlegs were never up to the challenge. By the time they transformed into 10cc, a little over a year later, both band and its album were long, long forgotten.
Stunned by their success, Hotlegs set to work out the album of songs that they hoped would be the antithesis (or antidote) to "Neanderthal Man," Thinks: School Stinks. Their creativity at a peak, they were clearly inspired to try out all the gizmos the studio had to offer on this long player - and use them they did; in fact, Kevin Godley believes that he and Lol Creme built their first Gizmo guitar prototype during this period (though I don't hear it anywhere on this album). And they took their time, not completing Thinks: School Stinks until March 1971, a full nine months after the July 1970 release of "Neanderthal Man."
Thinks: School Stinks (March 1971)
Songs / Tracks Listing 1. Neanderthal Man (4:19) 2. How Many Times (3:57) 3. Desperate Dan (2:12) 4. Take Me Back (5:01) 5. Um Wah, Um Woh (5:30) 6. Suite F.A.: On My Way/Indecision/The Return (12:53) 7. Fly Away (2:43) 8. Run Baby Run (2:50) 9. All God's Children (4:55)
Total Time 44:20
The first thing that strikes ones eyes is the album cover, designed by Godley and Creme, which depicts a scratched wooden school desk. Alice Cooper must have liked it too, because two years later a similar cover adorned his School's Out LP.
Alice Cooper's "School's Out" LP (1972)
With the exception of the infectious tribal-chant rocker "Um Wah Um Woh," little on this album bears any semblance to the hit "Neanderthal Man" - and the semblance is mainly to do with both songs' irresistable catchiness! (The simplicity of both songs' rote-repetitive lyrical chants makes me think of boozy soccer fans singing away in the terraces; in fact, this may help explain the success of not only "Neanderthal Man," but of other UK terrace-singalong bands like Slade and Oasis - bands that make music easy to interact with in a large crowd). Rather, in the words of Dave Thompson, "Hotlegs revealed themselves to be a very melodic, very gentle musical concern, a far cry from the proto-industrial crashing of 'Neanderthal Man.'" Ah yes, from the primordial ooze of "Neanderthal" arose the evolved, melodic concerns of pre-10cc...
In the interim between hit single and long-awaited support album, Hotlegs' U.S. label Capitol became so antsy for a follow-up single that they released a second, slower (5-minute) version of "There Ain't No Umbopo" - a song Godley-Creme-Stewart had previously released in the U.K. under the name Doctor Father (and which was probably also recorded by Hotlegs under the moniker Crazy Elephant for the Kasenetz-Katz bubblegum factory in the U.S.) - in August 1970. Kevin Godley described "Umbopo" as "one of those runt songs that hung around looking for a home for a long time. Everybody liked it, but couldn't work out where it belonged. I remember Lol coming up with this cool open guitar tuning and two hypnotic chords and us writing the song at my parents' house...forever. It was a long song, about six minutes or thereabouts and it was eventually released under the name Doctor Father."
Alas, "Umbopo" was not a hit.
Doctor Father - "Umbopo"
Though a follow-up hit to "Neanderthal Man" was not forthcoming, Hotlegs returned to to the charts anonymously at the end of 1970. With Graham Gouldman joining them at Strawberry Studios, they backed John Paul Jones (not the Led Zeppelin bass player but a comedian-turned-singer who Kevin Godley said "had the most wonderful rich voice") on his Christmas hit single "Man from Nazareth/Got to Get Together." A subsequent court order injunction by Led Zep's John Paul Jones forced the comedian to change his moniker to John Paul Joans (in the US market, JPJ was simply renamed "Jones"). The single rose as high as #25 on the UK charts.
What's in a name?: John Paul Joans
Then, under the guise of the New Wave Band (yes, "New Wave" debuted in 1970!), and with former Herman's Hermit Derek Leckenby in tow, the trio released a cover of Paul Simon's "Cecilia" backed with "Free Free Free" on the Major Minor label. Eric Stewart's "Free Free Free" was the first track he recorded at Strawberry Studios; though Harvey Lisbery is listed as the single's producer, this was an Eric Stewart production all the way.
New Wave Band: "Cecilia"
As Dave Thompson continues:
Undeterred, the trio (augmented by Gouldman) undertook a short British tour supporting the Moody Blues towards the end of 1970, but little more was heard from Hotlegs for another year. Then, in September 1971, they released a new single, "Lady Sadie," while Philips repackaged Thinks: School Stinks as Songs...Songs did no better than its predecessor, and Hotlegs was abandoned -- less than a year later, of course, the three members plus, again, Gouldman, would resurface as 10cc and, this time, enjoy considerably more success. It was at the height of this fame that the Hotlegs material resurfaced once more, as 1974's You Didn't Like It Cos You Didn't Think of It compilation brought together all the previously available Hotlegs material.
Moody Blues & Hotlegs, 1971 Tour Book
Regrettably, the Moody Blues tour did little to win over new Hotlegs fans. As Kevin Godley mused, "Audiences were expecting 'Neanderthal Man' and we were playing Thinks: School Stinks. Consequently, any momentum evaporated, the phone stopped ringing, and it was time for a rethink."
At this point, I'd like to echo the sage observations of Bob McBeath, who under his nom-de-plume "Easy Livin," rated Thinks: School Stinks - and the four extra songs on You Didn't Like It Because You Didn't Think of It - as follows: "The tracks are pretty much all founded in the acoustic guitars of Crème and Stewart, with occasional additional instrumentation being added as required. The songs are all written by Godley, and Crème, with Eric Stewart also receiving credit on the majority. In some ways, this is the album many of us wished 10cc would make. It is largely devoid of the too clever for their own good lyrics and structures, the songs being simple, well crafted pop rock numbers."
Kevin Godley, in a 1976 interview with George Tremlette (author of The 10cc Story - one of only two books ever written about 10cc), said the album included songs and ideas that he and Lol Creme had intended recording in 1969 with entrepreneur Giorgio Gomelsky for his Marmalade ("the sound that spreads") record label. Gomelsky had named the duo Frabjoy and Runcible Spoon, envisioning them as a sort of English Simon and Garfunkel, a notion Kevin Godley agreed with.
"Yeah, I can see that," he recalled to rock critic Dave Thompson. "The songs we were writing back then were kinda acoustic, rural-sounding stuff. When you're that kind of age, you are consciously copying someone, and we were probably consciously copying Simon and Garfunkel. It was only later in our careers, when we didn't really have too much time to think, that we started recording stuff that sounded like ourselves." Of Thinks: School Stinks, Godley added, "I still say that was a bloody good album. Most of the tracks were from the Frabjoy period and it's an interesting LP."
Eric Stewart, interviewed in 1976, recalled that Thinks: School Stinks presented a problem because it was so different from "Neanderthal Man": "It was totally alien to what people were expecting from us. It was a good record, a little ahead of its time. It was similar to the things we are doing now. It was very melodic with chord structures that hadn't been used before – and some of the sounds that we used on that album hadn't been heard at the time."
*** The songs ***
1. NEANDERTHAL MAN
Bob McBeath: "We open with the single "Neanderthal Man", an irritatingly catchy song which may not have much to do with 10CC, but it is undeniably fun."
2. HOW MANY TIMES
BMcB: "How Many Times" is a simple acoustic number with Crosby Stills and Nash like harmonies. Baz Barker adds some effective strings to the latter part of the song."
Midway through this song, a highly stylized string arrangement is introduced, recalling the type of orchestrations Marc Bolan was attempting in his pre-electric Tyranosaurus Rex days.
"How Many Times" was last single (released in the US) from Thinks: School Stinks. Unfortunately, it tanked on the charts.
3. DESPERATE DAN
"Desperate Dan" - a music hall piano-roll romp in the tradition of The Kinks (who name-check Desperate Dan in "The Village Green Preservation Society") or White Album Beatles at their most playful (think "Honey Pie," "Rocky Raccoon") - is Hotlegs' nod to the tough-as-nails (he shaved his beard with a blowtorch!), cowpie-loving Wild West character from Dudley D. Watkins's British comic strip The Dandy (which remains the world's longest-running comic strip, 1937-present!). And yes, a UK cow-pie (a meat-pie) is quite different from its US equivalent!
"Take Me Back" is a mini-symphony of sound and, like "Suite F.A." anticipates later complex 10cc arrangements such "One Night in Paris" from 1975's The Original Soundtrack. It's a medley of three different motifs, starting off as a pretty ballad with Lol Creme and Eric Stewart's acoustic guitars recalling "Mother Nature's Son" from the Beatles's White Album. Then the middle passage turns into an Eric Stewart electric guitar workout, calling to mind some George Harrison solo from Abbey Road ("I Want You (She's So Heavy"?), only to return back to an acoustic outro.
BMcB: "Take Me Back" is another delicate acoustic piece which offers a further glimpse of the music of 10CC, the vocals once again being particularly notable. The structure of the song is interesting, as it shows a willingness to draw a number of styles into a relatively short piece.
An absolutely amazing song, and one in which the boys throw in everything but the kitchen sink, production-wise. Highlighted by a stellar Eric Stewart guitar jam-out in the middle.
BMcB: "Um Wah, Um Woh" is a rather unfortunate title for what is actually a pretty good pop song. It may not have the class of 10CC, but it also lacks some of the pretentious indulgences too.
BMcB: "Suite F.A." is a three part, 13 minute suite written by Godley and Crème. It is similar in structure to the "One Night in Paris" trilogy which appeared on The Original Soundtrack but with a greater emphasis on acoustic and orchestral sounds. There is no great complexity to individual parts, but mood does change frequently offering at least a hint of prog."
Personally, this makes me think of Side 2 of Abbey Road, which is an unmistakable influence. Godley, for one agreed, telling Dave Thompson, "We just kept going until we had an album, complete with our version of side two of Abbey Road, 'Suite F.A.'"
7. FLY AWAY
"Fly Away" was a reworking of a Godley and Creme song that had earlier been released on a Marmalade record label sampler, 100 Proof as "To Fly Away" by Frabjoy and Runcible Spoon - with writing credit erroneously credited to Kevin Godley and Graham Gouldman. Marmalade was the short-lived British record label started in 1967 by pop impresario Giorgio Gomelsky; its roster included the early Godley and Creme band Frabjoy and Runcible Spoon, in addition to Julie Driscoll and Brian Auger, Blossom Toes, and others. The same duo also recorded a Graham Gouldman track for inclusion on 100 Proof, "The Late Mr Great" (about a gentleman whose timekeeping was so bad he missed his own funeral!).
In fact, Gouldman proved to be the connection that brought Kevin Godley, then still a student at art school, to Giorgia Gomelsky's attention. In Children of the Revolution, Dave Thompson describes how it all happened.
One day in 1969, Gouldman asked Godley to join him at a Marmalade session. The moment Godley opened his mouth to unleash his ethereal falsetto, Gomelsky offered him a record deal. It was, Godley laughed, the prequel to a nightmare.
"More than anything, I recall the life change. The scene is still vivid in my head. A three-hour drive, in howling gale, from one life to another, leaving behind three years at Stoke on Trent College of Art and heading for London, and a totally unknown future. I remember crying and trying not to show it as Lol drove my MG Midget out of the college car park. I was missing everybody there before we even hit the road. I also remember the hood of the car flying up and smacking into the windshield and nearly killing us, then operating the wipers by hand through a crack in the soft top.
Things were calmer in the studio, but only just. "Cut to Eddy Offord behind the control desk at Advision Studios. A small, dark space smelling of last night's session. A whiff of weed and Afghan coats. Very London. Very hip. There was an old Mellotron in one corner, Giorgia, big and rumbling, coming on like a hip Rasputin and me singing in a real studio. Intimidating, impossible, the beginning of everything. When he decided to call us Frabjoy and Runcible Spoon, it was almost the end of everything."
The first song they worked on was "To Fly Away" and Godley recalled it was quite a challenging session. "It was the first time I'd stepped up to a microphone."
As Frabjoy and Runcible Spoon, Godley and Creme began work on an album in September 1969, recording basic tracks at Strawberry Studios with Eric Stewart on guitar and Graham Gouldman on bass; their debut Marmalade single, "I Am Beside Myself/The Animal Song" was released by the end of the month.
"We were more confident for 'I Am Beside Myself,' which had brass arranged by Tony Meehan, late of the Shadows," Godley recalled. "Graham may have played on these sessions. Not one hundred percent sure, but I do remember Keith Tippett being vaguely involved."
Of the Marmalade period, Kevin Godley recounted to Dave Thompson, "We were one of many new artists on a very cool label. We were obviously thrilled when both records came out, but learned a valuable lesson when they promptly disappeared. The rest is more haze than history..."
Indeed, Marmalade folded soon after the Frabjoy and Runcible Spoon single and 100 Proof compilation LP, but Godley had no regrets and valued the experience working in a "real" studio, an apprenticeship that would pay dividends in future.
"Giorgio certainly had the right attitude. I'm not sure anyone really knew what they were doing, but I think his overriding concern was to document the music that was around; he didn't really think the rest of it through. Full marks to him for being around, though, because nobody else was doing it. He got a lot of bands recorded that no one else would touch."
8. RUN BABY RUN
"Run Baby Run" is a basic blues rocker in the Canned Heat style, driven along by an insistent cowbell (more cowbell!) and guitar boogie vibe.
The opening lines and percussive rhythm of "Run Baby Run" were later reworked to become the basis for "Art For Art's Sake" on the 1976 10cc album How Dare You!.
9. ALL GOD'S CHILDREN
"All God's Children" closes the album on a dreamy lullaby note, with Kevin Godley's angelic falsetto leading the harmony pack as he sings about sunny California (as only a Midlands-born Mancunian can!). Makes me think of "Golden Slumbers" from Abbey Road.
*** Extra Tracks from You Didn't Like It Because You Didn't Think of It ***
10. TODAY
I'm so glad Amy purchased the You Didn't Like It Because You Didn't Think of It LP, if only because it contains this exquisite gem that makes the whole album worth it, even if it only contains four new songs. (I like it because she did think of it!) "Today" features all four original members of 10cc, with Graham Gouldman strapping on his bass guitar to play alongside Kevin, Lol, and Eric.
As "Easy Livin" critic Bob McBeath observes, "The song shows that the transition to 10cc was complete, and actually ranks on a par with pretty much anything the quartet recorded under that name. The wonderful arrangement includes orchestration and a great synthesiser ending. For fans of 10cc this is a real lost gem."
This song, the B-side of "Neanderthal Man," spawned not one but two future 10cc ditties. The first part is an early precursor to the title track of 10cc's 1976 LP How Dare You!, while the second part turns into an early run-through of "Fresh Air for My Mama" (from 10cc's self-titled 1973 debut album).
A future two-fer!
12. THE LOSER
"The Loser" was the B-side that probably should have been the A-side of Hotlegs' 1971 "Lady Sadie/The Loser" single. A slide guitar fan's wet dream, it makes me think of what Little Feat would sound like if they weren't so boring.
BMcB: "The loser" once again has the sound of an early 10CC song, the upbeat rock melody being basic but functional.
13. LADY SADIE
Released as a single in 1971 as a hopeful followup to "Neanderthal Man"'s success, "Lady Sadie" is a mid-paced funk number that McBeath, for one, thinks should have been left undisturbed. Kevin Godley called it "a faux Rolling Stones song that explored Eric's love of dirty blues guitar. It was so obviously other people's territory. It had a nice feel but it didn't chart. Probably didn't deserve to."
***
Looking back on Thinks: School Stinks, Godley told Dave Thompson, "It was great just to try to punch above our weight. It's not bad, but it's not us [10cc] yet, is it? At the time, we didn't recognize 'Neanderthal Man' for the inspired piece of nonsense it was. No tune. Stupid lyrics. 'We can do better than this, chaps.' We were young and subconsciously aping our heroes, like you do until the real you shows up, so 'Neanderthal Man' was this bizarre anomaly that pointed one possible way forward but we failed to see it."
Thank goodness.
In 2006, Godley sampled much of Thinks: School Stinks album for the mid-section of GG06's song "Son of Man" (GG06 being his band with Graham Gouldman, the two musicians once again a dynamic duo, just as before when they were '60s bandmates in The Mockingbirds). (Godley and Creme would later revisit this strategy on 1985's The History Mix Volume 1, when they sampled three 10cc songs as the song "Wet Rubber Soup.") "I could hear something of what we [10cc] eventually became, under all the other influences," Godley recalled later. "In truth, we didn't fully discover our own musical identity until we stopped trying so hard and started feeling."
Bob McBeath sums the LP up by saying, "In all, an album which should be part of the collection of any 10cc fan. There is a wealth of indicators here of how the sound of that band came about, not to mention some fine songs in their own right too. Personally, I rate this album higher than the majority of the 10cc albums which followed."
Now that's high praise, indeed! One thing's for certain: Thinks: School Stinks offers a fascinating look at where music was in 1970 and (especially on tracks like "Today") where four talented lads from Manchester would eventually end up. Or, as Dave Thompson put it. "Take one red-hot axe-man [Eric Stewart] steeped in the stew ofthe British beat boom and armed with a chart-topping US hit single [The Mindbenders' "A Groovy Kind of Love"]; add the best British songwriter this side of the Beatles [Graham Gouldman, author of "For Your Love," "Bus Stop," "No Milk Today," etc., etc.]; sprinkle on a couple of eccentric art students [Kevin Godley and Lol Creme] and lock them away in a studio of their own. God knows what you'd get today, and nobody was really sure what would happen at the end of the Sixties, either."
What you got from this mish-mash stew of talents and influences would eventually be called "10cc," a band that made some of the most beautiful, clever and complex music of their era. And on this album, you get to see three-quarters of that entity as a very promising - and very listenable - work in progress.
