'Welcome To The Pleasuredome' - Frankie Goes To Hollywood (1984)

“If you are caught in the open,
lie down.”

Much as I hated my school days, I never bunked a lesson. Never seemed much point. I’d ask the kids who did: “Where’d you go?” “The woods.” “Oh, but wasn’t it raining?” “Yes.” “So what’d you do there?” “Skipped stones on the pond.” Brilliant.

But despite my bid for the perfect attendance record, I can clearly remember one Monday in 1984 when I was 13 and faked a sickie. The reason? The new Frankie album was out. And it was a double! I was bursting with excitement and actually close to making myself sick for real (the irony!). I’d spent the year buying everything they released. Which was only actually two songs, but each came in a dozen different remixed versions. Now the album was finally here.

Somehow I actually managed to convince my parents to pop out to Our Price in town that morning and buy it for me. I guess they thought, ‘Surely our son wouldn’t try to get a day off school just to hear an album. Who’d do that?’ Parents, eh? They never understand you.

At the time, it was every bit as magnificent as I had hoped. Just trying to decipher Paul Morley’s sleeve notes was a joy before you’d even put the album on. Then you had the first side of the first record basically taken up by one song (a master stroke in the days before I’d heard Dylan and the Velvets). Followed on the second side by yet more remixes of their first two singles. How could sides 3 and 4 get any better? They couldn’t. Looking back, there’s an awful lot of filler and peculiar covers. But there’s ‘The Power of Love’ nestling at the end. And I still really love just holding this record and thinking of that day. Like I’m doing right now. And that’s more than many albums give you.

Spotify linky:
Frankie Goes To Hollywood – Two Tribes - Annihilation
(Another album that isn’t on Spotify yet, but here’s the classic ‘Annihilation’ remix of ‘Two Tribes’ that reminds me of going down the youth club with my cousins.)

On this day ... 1989 (aged 18)

Scribblings from my diary ...

“Apparently, this has been the hottest May for 140 years. This record will no doubt be broken when the sun explodes and we are showered with radioactive rock.”

Now playing: 'Saint Bartlett' - Damien Jurado (2010)

“I wish that I could float,
float up from the ground.”

If you find yourself on the train to Guildford on a sunny Spring morning, I can highly recommend this album – the second pick in my (almost weekly) series of new releases that are tickling my ears.

You’re going to discover a lot of alt-country/Americana in these ‘Now playing’ posts. Don’t start griping. Damien Jurado has been releasing consistently heart-rending albums for over a decade. Songs that sound like plaintive sighs. I guess my idea of Spring music may be a little different than yours.

Spotify linky:

Damien Jurado – Cloudy Shoes

'You And Your Sister' - This Mortal Coil (1991)

“You say my love for you’s not real,
But you don’t know how real it feels”

So, you’re Head of the College for the Distributive Trades – part of The London Institute (that name used to take up half my CV). The building is five floors, but each is too small for an exam hall (it’s now the home of Capital Radio in Leicester Square). So where are your pupils going to sit their HNDs? Oh, here’s an idea: the crypt at St Martin’s Church. (!??!)

Yes, you can imagine the welcoming atmosphere (after you’d carefully weaved your way past the ‘colourful’ characters queuing for the soup kitchen in the building opposite). We sat in huge, dank stone vaults and strained to see our exam papers in the half-light (while outside the world was basking in the May sun). I’ve never seen so many students finish their papers early just so they could escape the place. The examiners must have seriously wondered why all our essays on retail distribution channels were tinged with such melancholy and maudlin thoughts.

This Mortal Coil were a treasured discovery of the time. Circling the nucleus of 4AD-boss Ivo-Watts Russell were collaborations from some of my favourite artists on the label, including the sublime pairing of Kim Deal and Tanya Donnelly on this track. (My grandad always likes it when I play this one.) The three This Mortal Coil albums also uncovered many new musical paths for me through their wonderful covers, including Chris Bell, Tim Buckley and Syd Barrett.

St Martin’s crypt is now a café and gift shop. But for me it’s haunted by memories of exam days. The shepherd’s pie looks good though.

Spotify linky:
This Mortal Coil – You And Your Sister

Bonus Spotify linky - the original version:

Chris Bell – You And Your Sister

On this day ... 1986 (aged 15)

Scribblings from my diary …

“I find a used British Telecom phone card.”

'Disintegration' - The Cure (1989)

““The shallow drowned lose less than we”
You breathe
The strangest twist upon your lips
“And we shall be together …””

My alternate title for this blog was The Shallow Drowned. But it seemed a bit heavy.

My love for ‘Disintegration’ knows no end. It knows a beginning though. And that was twenty-one years ago to the month. In fact, The Cure have just reissued the album today in one of those shiny gatefold Deluxe Anniversary Editions (which obviously means I have to buy it for the fourth time). The first time round, I bought it on cassette during school lunchtime on the day it came out and it became the soundtrack to my A-level revision. Except very little revision got done if I was listening to it (which could account for the grade D in Geography).

“But what about that girl you hit with the snowball?” I hear you ask. “We’re only putting up with another Cure post to hear about her.” That’s a good memory you have there. Don’t worry, if I’m writing about The Cure then I’m also writing about Toni. Having restrained from throwing anything at her head for over two years, I felt a wave of confidence and invited her to see The Cure on The Prayer Tour that supported this album. It was a baking hot Saturday evening in July at Wembley Arena (the second of three shows that weekend), and for all three and a half hours they were mesmerising. Even people who didn’t go with Toni seem to agree it was just the most wonderful night.

I’ve listened to ‘Disintegration’ five times today. (Which, in 2010 terms, must make me Mayor of this album surely.) And although it’s the second in The Cure’s ‘doom’ trilogy, it only reminds me of the best of times.

Spotify linky:
The Cure – The Same Deep Water As You

My life in passport photos - Part 1