#amazing beautiful 10 outta 10 where’s the record label

[anew-flame]

I just know Cullen was a Chantry Choir boy with that voice

[djevsmev]

Episode 4: Mammoth 12″ Spectacular!

HELLO!

I hope you’re all keeping inside and keeping well.

To celebrate reaching hump-day of Lockdown week 3, I thought I’d go “full Subway” and get the 12″s out. It’s longer than usual but will still leave you feeling empty and disappointed.

I’m being hilarious! It’s amazing. Let’s begin.

Now, something to note about my 12″ records: Like the 7″s before them, I tended to buy them just on a whim, but unlike the 7″s quite often I’d buy dance and hip-hop 12″s in a pathetic attempt to look like my tastes were a bit more broad and eclectic than the wee indie pop boy that I absolutely was. Consequently I found 12″s by J5, Chemical Brothers, Basement Jaxx and other stuff. In fairness to me, they’re all tunes I like, but it did give me a chuckle. Anyway, they didn’t get a play because everyone knows how “Hey Boy, Hey Girl” goes. No, let’s get dug in to things I didn’t really remember, starting with...

TERRA DIABLO - THE WAY THINGS ARE AND HOW THEY’RE MEANT TO BE

And, as ever, we’re straight in to jeopardy and excitement. When people talk about Vinyl Lockdown, and they very much do, it’s all about the jeopardy and excitement. And the flawed the thematic posts, because this is a 10″, but let’s ignore that and get back to the j&e. Take a look at this:

Ignore the Glasgow Producer Legends that made this and check out the speed. OK, no problem. We can deal with that. BUT WAIT!

WTF? Well through trial and error, I can tell you the correction on the inner sleeve is correct, it’s 33rpm, but I think there’s only one track on this side and 2 on the other. Not entirely sure. Either that or I’ve given you 2 tracks, you lucky devils. Terra Diablo were based in Glasgow and while I don’t remember much about them, I’ll tell you this, even if they were good, I would not have bought their EP unless they were nice, because that’s how I was. I doubt they will thank me for saying this, but I think it’s kind of Grunge-y. Like Slint meets Pearl Jam, but I’ve always really liked Pearl Jam so I’m not intentionally being a dick.

LEMON JELLY - SPACE WALK

Look at that! Just look at it! Thing of beauty. God love Lemon Jelly, their artwork was always gorgeous. That’s why I bought this. I had this on the album so hadn’t even opened it to keep it all lovely.

But records are meant to be played so I bust it out.

God love Lemon Jelly. And it’s a great tune. the breakdown back to the acoustic guitar. Lovely stuff. Oh! And we have our first record skip on this! I could have re-recorded but I couldn’t be arsed.

REACHOUT ft ROOTS MANUVA- FOR WHOM THE HEART BEATS

You see? I like hippidy hippy hop, too! Straight outta Edinburgh, yo! There was a big hip hop scene in Edinburgh in the mid-late 90s and early 00s, but being from out in the sticks and being said little indie boy (see introduction), while I knew it existed, I had no part of it. I was not cool. Bristo Sq at the University where all the Edinburgh skaters hung out (at least they used to) so I remember seeing this at work and thinking it was worth a go. This first track’s great. Whilst I still don’t listen to a lot of hip hop, having mentioned J5 earlier you’ll be able to hear why this is right up my street.

OZOMATLI - SUPER BOWL SUNDAY

Talking of J5, this features Cut Chemist and Chali Tuna. You can tell both from the voice and, like every other track he’s on, he spells his own name or a variant of it. I’ll be honest, I put this on and thought “Yeah, this is great,” right up until the chorus which was pretty anti-climactic. Still, good brass riff, eh? And it’s about time Vinyl Lockdown had a Good Brass Riff (GBR).

RINÔÇÉRÔSE - LE MOBILIER

You see? I like the dance house techno, too! Straight outta Montpellier, yo! In fairness, I couldn't remember how this went, but to my untrained ear, it’s really good. It just funks along quite nicely in the background and I found my head bobbing away. I can imagine it being played when we’d decided to forgo the Pear Tree for a fancy trendy trip to Iguana in Edinburgh circa 2000, and we’d all shout over each other. Great days.

(NB: The Pear Tree in Edinburgh used to do an incredible cocktail which was Tia Maria, Cointreau, and Blue Boys topped up with a bottle of Schwepps OJ. It was amazing how much it tasted like a Jaffa cake. In these troubled times, if anyone wants to recreate it and let me know how it tastes, that would be great.)

SCISSOR SISTERS - LAURA

PICTURE DISC! I got this on its first release thanks to Mark and Lard making it their record of the week on their Radio 1 afternoon show. It’s such a great tune. I went to see them in The Venue (RIP) in Edinburgh off the back of this and what a show it was. They opened with Take Your Mama (this was before the album had come out) but even hearing it for the first time it was catchy as all hell. Then you had Jake Shears pole dancing on the pillars in the venue and Ana Matronic looking like a goddess and I thought “Aye, they’ll be big.”

(NB2: there are worse ways to spend your day than listening to old Mark and Lard on Youtube; Shit Agent, Missing Words, Fat Larry White, Classic Cuts. It’s all so good)

ORBITAL - BELFAST

This is a classic example of what I mentioned in my very first post: cheap Fopp Vinyl. When Fopp was on Cockburn St in Edinburgh (I think it was Cockburn St) their basement was all vinyl. I remember picking this up for about £3 because I knew Unfinished Sympathy, but didn’t own it, and had heard Orbital were good, so thought I’d give it a go. Lord knows who was making them. Handily, you’ll notice teen Ev has put handy instructions on the label. It’s what the gap toothed gypsy Dangerous Dave Pearce would do. I’ve put on Belfast. It skips again but I think that’s part of the fun (see: laziness)

SONS AND DAUGHTERS - DANCE ME IN

I don’t really know where this came from. I might have bought it because it’s a banging tune and Sons & Daughters were right good. BUT it might also be a promo from my work at the time, OR my flatmate worked for their label so he might have gifted me it. Who knows? All these memories are lost like middle-aged memories. Great re-mix though. I was only an occasional Optimo visitor, but throwing things like this in in between Zombie Nation and Schneider TM is what made it quite fun. There will be proper Optimo fans that will probably want to string me up for calling it “quite fun.” Luckily, none of them will have any interest in what I have to say so won’t be reading this. Quite right too.

SUFJAN STEVENS - MYSTERY OF LOVE

Back to firmer ground here with some indie-shmindie singer-songwriter loveliness. As you can see it’s from RSD a few years ago so it was probably grotesquely over-priced. But still, great tune and helps support the wee shops. That’s worth it, isn’t it?

That’s plenty for now. Keep safe and we’ll be right back to the less intimidating, more secure world of 7″ next time.

Fnar!