Sunday, 13 November 2011

LIST 77 - 13/11/2011 (a second cover versions special)

Hello again,

The third and final List of this weekend's bumper crop is the second cover versions special, to follow-up the one that was List #62 back in August. 

As stated the other day, it wasn't necessarily the intention to do another one so soon, but the sheer volume of interesting enough material I unearthed in the interim made it a possibility.

...And so much of that material is new or nearly new - ten of the tracks hail from this year, as opposed to just one in the first covers List. 

Including two readings of The Smiths' There Is a Light That Never Goes Out is cheating, I suppose, except one is an indiepop version from 2011 and the other a classic piece of laptronica from over a decade earlier, so I'm good with that if you all are.

Elsewhere covers feature of everyone from Nirvana to Olivia Newton-John, from Big Black to Prefab Sprout, and from The Auteurs to Lonnie Donegan. 

Oh, and two bands have stabs at The Field Mice.  Not literally stabs, of course.  The bands would get in trouble for that.  And we don't endorse stabbing any indiepop bands, past or present.  Even if The Field Mice did break all our hearts when splitting up.

J xx


Click on the video or link to play each tune (links last checked as all working 23/10/2026).
Click here for a directory of updated older Lists.



THE FALL – Mr Pharmacist (1986) 

THE MAXINES – Sweet Nothings (live at the Northern) (2011) 

LITTLE ROY – Come As You Are (2011) 

F*CK-OFF MACHETE – Physical (2006) 

RICHARD SMITHERS – Starstruck (The Auteurs cover) (2011) 

THE WEDDING PRESENT – Cumberland Gap (1992) 

SINEAD O’CONNOR – Song to the Siren (2010) 

SEAPONY – Emma’s House (2011) 

BABY FORD – Children of the Revolution (Inca Mix) (1989) 

LIANNE HALL – Love Is A Stranger (2010) 

DUM DUM GIRLS – There is a Light That Never Goes Out (2011) 

SCHNEIDER TM – The Light 3000 (2000) 

TREMBLING BLUE STARS – Kidney Bingos (2011) 

DARREN HANLON – Together in Electric Dreams (2010) 

CALVINBALL – Heterosexuality Is A Construct (2011) 

COACH STATION REUNION – l.i.m.o.g.e.s. (2011) 

IMPOSSIBLE TYMES - Coach Station Reunion (1999) 

MAN... OR ASTROMAN? – Destination Venus (1994) 

THE PRIMITIVES – Need All The Help I Can Get (2011) 

MAGAZINE – Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Again) (1980) 

ST VINCENT – Kerosene (live at Bowery Ballroom) (2011) 

LIST 76 - 12/11/11 (25th anniversary of Indie Top 20 - part two)

Hello again,

Herewith as promised part two of the Indie Top 20 retrospective, and lots of happy musical memories for me. Should it interest, and I doubt it will, the chopped-down version of Triangle by The Field Mice exclusive to volume 10 was my first encounter of Sarah Records - some years later, I got a letter from Matt Haynes suggesting not many other people, if any, have got into the label via that track specifically. Fine as it is, the full nine-minute-and-then-some version from the Skywriting album absolutely knocks it out of the park, but you fine people know that already.

More through accident than skill, there are actually two connections between this List and indiepop mainstays Milky Wimpshake, who might rightfully have featured on one of these volumes had they had their time, what, 15 or 20 years earlier? True Love Will Find You In the End, here read by Spectrum, has been a staple of the Wimpshake's live sets for well over a decade (as part of a mash-up of sorts with a cover of Jonathan Richman's Don't Let Our Youth Go to Waste), whilst Brilliant Corners' Delilah Sands was apparently the inspiration behind Alice Nebulae from last year's Wimpshake long-player My Funny Social Crime.

Cover versions all the way tomorrow as part of this weekend's triple whammy. For the time being, though, over to Thurston et al for a cover version of sorts from all of 25 years ago;

J x



CICCONE YOUTH – Into the Groove(y) (1986)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZJTcQWuZ3Q

THE SUNDAYS – Joy (1989)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uD9ZRlvnh7w

THE GOD MACHINE – Home (1992)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nsmq0UJa0ZI

THE CHESTERF!ELDS – Ask Johnny Dee (1986)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHTkE4f_WpA

COMPULSION – Mall Monarchy (1994)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktDeuXe1AjY

SPIRITUALIZED – Run (1991)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xb9gLF8XVQ4

THE WOLFHOUNDS – Happy Shopper (1989)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5isRcKysUec

PALE SAINTS – Fine Friend (1994)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAlp_5_iq1Y

COOKIE CREW – Females (Get On Up) (1987)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVa65PG5gks

POP WILL EAT ITSELF – RSVP (1993)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GtHA5Nf1nU

SLOWDIVE – Alison (1993)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ol787NjpBS4

THE PIXIES – Dig for Fire (1990)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xekfBhiqfig

THE BRILLIANT CORNERS – Delilah Sands (1987)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33wian1Jmxk

SPIREA-X – Chlorine Dream (1991)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axXGAxbJGxM

WIRE – Silk Skin Paws (1988)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFn_mGFs1Vg

SPECTRUM – True Love Will Find You in the End (1992)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9od_Ggh7uOM

THE FAMILY CAT – Steamroller (1992)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lL48CZRC9NE

THE FIELD MICE – Triangle (Indie Top 20 Vol. 10 edit) (1990)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BhnUCRN0N4

LOOP – Arc-Lite (1989)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qc_pXs22ug

SANDIE SHAW – Nothing Less Than Brilliant (1988)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rExVKb4dZxs

LIST 75 - 11/11/11 (25th anniversary of Indie Top 20 - part one)

Hello again,

As telegraphed last week, this is both the first of three Lists this weekend alone and the first of two dedicated to my favourite compilation series of them all.

Indie Top 20 was devised by Beechwood Music and first released on cassette in 1986, with a line-up strong on the prevailing C86-era scene but broader than just that in remit - in essence, if a good song of any genre was released on a label with independent distribution, it would be considered for inclusion. Hence the appearance over the first few volumes, for example, of pronk gods Cardiacs, African-American vocal ensemble Sweet Honey In The Rock, Manchester acid house figurehead A Guy Called Gerald and any number of purveyors of goth, dance and rock alongside the perhaps more expected jangly guitar fare.

This was "indie" as I understood it, how it always was, and how it should have remained before the term got horribly misappropriated during the 1990s - "Indie" the state of being, rather than a guitar-based genre.

Ironically, Indie Top 20 was at least partly complicit in the gradual misuse of the term "indie" - covertly with the inclusion of one or two major label releases on volume 17 in mid-1993, and rather more explicitly on volume 18 a few months later. "Let's face it", opined Tim Millington, who had taken over the compiling of the series from founders Chet and Bee Selwood half a dozen renewals earlier, "who gives a toss who the distributor is as long as the music is good?"

That rated an atonishing statement given the compilation's original raison d'etre, and was made to appear all the more so as the subsequent volumes became ever more in thrall to the New Wave Of New Wave and eventually Britpop, narrowing in scope all the while.

More bizarre still, at least some of the final, mid-20 numbered volumes were officially endorsed by Melody Maker, which of the two weekly music magazines of the time favoured a broader musical remit more in tune with Indie Top 20's earlier sentiments - "C96 bands", Romo, DIY indiepop (from labels such as Slampt and Vesuvius), rural psychedelia, post-rock, intelligent hip-hop, etc, rather than the rather more Britpop-loving NME.

"Depressingly generic", one of Melody Maker's own reviewers wrote of the final volume of Indie Top 20, "Remember when the term 'indie' actually meant something?" Quite.

For each of this and tomorrow's List (number 76), I set myself the task of finding one track from as many Indie Top 20s as I could fit onto our usual notional blank CDR of just under 78 minutes, starting at volume one and finishing when I ran out of space. In the event, this happened to be after volume 20 on both Lists, about which I'm not especially sorry. Truth be told, it was hard enough to find two tracks I really liked on volumes 18 to 20 as it was!

The earlier editions, and particularly those from around 1988-1991, posed a slightly different problem, as there are so many tracks I loved from the releases around that time that many of them have already appeared in previous Lists. Nevertheless, I think I've been able to put together a couple of reasonably representative Lists from the material still available - see what you think. Do note that the selections are not in any sort of chronological order - I know this. Don't write in! ;-)

J x



TALULAH GOSH – Talulah Gosh (1985)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxY4Q2TmQAw

THE SHAMEN – Jesus Loves Amerika (1988)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWaQmQyTF24

FRANK BLACK – Hang On To Your Ego (1993)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzA29tCwyR4

SUICIDE – Rain of Ruin (1988)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usWFc2BPuig

THE STONE ROSES – Made of Stone (1989)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0whFVTxZs8

1,000 VIOLINS – Please Don’t Sandblast My House (1986)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0Fe5PcSuOc

THE FARM – Stepping Stone (1990)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPx6U6E45jQ

THE BOO RADLEYS – Lazy Day (1992)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSSgUwXJ3ic&ob=av2e

DANIELLE DAX – Big Hollow Man (1987)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqhym59ypUI

STEREOLAB – Lo Fi (1992)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcPhwzsv6VA

CARDIACS - Is This the Life (1987)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUDLA1LAzDo

ELASTICA – Stutter (1993)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ie4x8hWYYE&ob=av2e

INSPIRAL CARPETS – Move (1989)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75ENlCgERcQ&ob=av2e

SP!N – Scratches (In The Sand) (1990)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tX0V_Dfz9Aw

WELFARE HEROINE – Cry-Blood (Dub) (1991)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-iimm8wYh0

REVOLVER – Heaven Sent an Angel (1991)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vy-cQJcz6DE

THE BLUE AEROPLANES – Broken and Mended (1994)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpFsMqjorfo

DAISY CHAINSAW – Love Your Money (1992)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaZWCGs7tFw

RIDE – How Does It Feel to Feel? (1994)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElMjB1RrjhQ

SAINT ETIENNE – Nothing Can Stop Us (1991)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSuxnF8dOPU

Saturday, 5 November 2011

LIST 74 - 04/11/11

Hello again,

One more general mixture for you this week, but herewith advanced notice that I'm hoping to get THREE Lists uploaded next Friday, Saturday and Sunday! Two of them will commemorate the fact that 2011 marks the 25th anniversary of the launch of my favourite compilation series ever - and it's *not* Now That's What I Call Music, before anyone asks... The third will be our second-ever Cover Versions special, which I've been able to complete way ahead of the originally scheduled 2012 date simply on account of the welter of things I've been able to find for it.

Back to this week, then. The inclusion of the Dag For Dag and Moon Duo tracks serves as a reminder to me that, even this far into 2011, there is still a ton of great stuff from last year that I've still not got to the bottom of yet; and the video for the Fujiya & Miyagi track should provide an answer for those of you wondering what the scary, staring bloke out of the Never Mind The Buzzcocks identity parade is up to nowadays!

J x



THE PIPETTES – Boo Shuffle (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opSPgHQYiM0

ASH – True Love 1980 (2009)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=HXl8m_IJhpY

HELP STAMP OUT LONELINESS – Record Shop (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZvNNW3X7Z2Q

THE VICTORIAN ENGLISH GENTLEMENS CLUB – A Conversation (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUT3E7xh0BA

BIBIO – Pretentious (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1UsieqKob0&NR=1

MOON DUO – Catch As Catch Can (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40YHKbsbA5A

GRUFF RHYS – Sensations in the Dark (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBg_h9kmRhk

ATARI TEENAGE RIOT – Blood in My Eyes (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=at0KNQtWF_o

ATARI TEENAGE RIOT – Kids Are United (1995)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SIwUOII7hg

THE LADYBUG TRANSISTOR – Clutching Stems (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LezbUhQScUI

GEOFFREY GURRUMUL YUNUPINGU – Gopuru (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhgDqY7_RGs

NEW BUFFALO – I’ve Got You And You’ve Got Me (2004)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-wpN3bOBNA

COMET GAIN – You're Just Lonely (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_FuXf_GPlA

FUJIYA & MIYAGI – Sixteen Shades of Black and Blue (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhkyjcmBldM

THE PRESETS – Girl and the Sea (2005)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVvzBvjEz6s

COVERGIRL – Paris Burns (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lWaxtNKiw8

PLANNINGTOROCK – Living It Out (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDXpSg9DD5c

DAG FŐR DAG – Hands and Knees (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NPpm2XLRKI

D/R/U/G/S – Love / Lust (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=48Jsxfe24oE

VETIVER – Wonder Why (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmpAXq7sq8s

Tuesday, 1 November 2011

LIST 73 - 28/10/11

Hello again,

Ah, longevity. We may have seen REM off in the last few weeks but a veteran of an even longer recorded career, Tom Waits, hoves back into view with a new release which extends his innings to a - gulp -38th year. I wasn't even born when he started. Wasn't far off, mind.

Bibio, Casiokids and Moon Duo are personal highlights among the smattering of welcome returns this time around, and the Bart And Friends track is no less lovely than that of antecedent band The Cat's Miaow (which also spawned Hydroplane). I'm advised there is another Bart album due so imminently it may already be out at the time of typing this - much catching up for me to do.

J x



BIBIO – Excuses (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPCLbJujU8E

CANCEL THE ASTRONAUTS – Funny for a Girl (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGhBKzfj21s

2:54 – Cold Front (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mLax4Zf2S8

CASIOKIDS – Det Haster! (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BSeVFWiZnA

BAFFIN ISLAND - You Make Two Weeks Two Days (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JORQ-KdQgE

THE LOVELY EGGS – Watermelons (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fM3zwcKMqFk

SEAPONY – Blue Star (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNhzm3ERyPI

DJANGO DJANGO – Wor (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvOiFmjExx4

BLANCK MASS – Chernobyl (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_MLTbZ5CDk

TOM WAITS – Bad As Me (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6Ta3H-ck6s&ob=av2e

TOM WAITS – Earth Died Screaming (1992)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8reJvRWXKI

THE MUMMERS – Fade Away (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKGUsUnh7OU

VOM VORTON – Save An Insect, Save The World (2009)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zx93w2WWozQ

MITCHELL MUSEUM – What They Built (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cb8Zdp_itdQ

TELEX – Temporary Chicken (1988)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zMSLfIO52U

HERCULES & LOVE AFFAIR – Painted Eyes (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRFCcITmcoI

MOON DUO – Mazes (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvYUUes4O1Q

ASH – Space Shot (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5K06oxJbI6Y

BART AND FRIENDS – These Words Are Too Small (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JNvVFJ9oME

EMA – Milkman (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZrKAR32WKU

GIL SCOTT-HERON & JAMIE XX – I’ll Take Care of You (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvpgVXEBPSA

Tuesday, 18 October 2011

LIST 72 - 21/10/11

Hello again,

No apologies at all for starting with the reliably, endearingly deranged Lovely Eggs this time, given that between this List and the next your editor will have seen them in action in both Sheffield and Leeds.

No apologies, either, for including some typically adept, peerless plucking from the late Bert Jansch at the end of the List. A colossus astride the Folk Revival for over four decades and as relevant and revered now as then, his is certainly one of music's most significant and sad losses of 2011.

J x



THE LOVELY EGGS – F*ck It (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOsFadmH584

CATHERINE A.D. – Going Wrong (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bwh806w0HY8

CARIBOU – Odessa (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aiSa7THgxrI

ARNAUD REBOTINI – Personal Dictator (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXVcP1lifwE

HERMAN DUNE – Be A Doll (And Take My Heart) (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Buzf7MBkZFY

POSTAL SERVICE – Such Great Heights (2003)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wrsZog8qXg

DOWNDIME – The Chosen One (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVOjnKVcnkw

GIRLS – Honey Bunny (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxuDoYhQI2o

THE PRIMITIVES – Never Kill a Secret (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZ3wx2WevLQ

THE PRIMITIVES – Stop Killing Me (1986)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1so-4rS38A

LINKWOOD – B1 Untitled (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqewpf4oJjg

EVANS THE DEATH- I’m So Unclean (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZTebot8rJU

SCREAMING MALDINI – Secret Sounds (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KN81xpZ5ido

POCKETBOOKS – Harbour Lights (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5bTTgd5_2w

A HAWK AND A HACKSAW – Cervantine (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYjfBZxhUzU

DRUNKEN BUTTERFLY – Der letzte Mann (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AKq0kR28U1I

LANA DEL RAY – Video Games (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HO1OV5B_JDw

HAIKU SALUT – Snaffle (live at Indietracks) (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6f5ShWQqzWU

BERT JANSCH – Blackwater Side (1966)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jY-xpa9GWuo

LIST 71 - 14/10/11

If Tiswas or Dick & Dom ever went into making music videos for other acts, then the Lisa Hannigan promo included this time around might be what they'd come up with. Aggressive but beautifully choreographed slapstick / gunging, all Lisa's own idea, and impressively all done in the one take, first time up.

Having also let herself be drenched in melted chocolate (albeit for an Oxfam Make Trade Fair campaign) in the recent past, one wonders whether she's making up for lost time fun-wise in these post-Mr Rice days...

Fun also seems to be on the agenda for Be Like Pablo, whose perky new single has elevated them in my estimations somewhat after never really getting the track they donated to the Indietracks compilation two years ago.

Elsewhere we have a Beastie Boys then and now; some quality techno japery of the sort Peel would have adored; a Field Mice song and the band who named themselves after it; and Darren Hayman looking alarmingly like Mike Read when rendered in Lego. Another uneventful List, then...

J x



KITTY, DAISY AND LEWIS – Don’t Make a Fool out of Me (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogqcc0CkMIo

DOBLE PLETINA – Música Para Cerrar Las Discotecas (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3NsKaKOnZQ

FIELD MUSIC – Measure (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x257xocl4_k

BE LIKE PABLO – The Post-It Song (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4wRJrIvr3k

LISA HANNIGAN – Knots (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYdPtcx-4mo

OMD – Sister Marie Says (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALQsqR1rmLM

YUCK – Get Away (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kz7vyrFhFE8

ARNAUD REBOTINI – All You Need Is Techno (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjOYZ2gu4AI

BEASTIE BOYS – Make Some Noise (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdgLMslbDuY

BEASTIE BOYS – Gratitude (1992)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdJ5e70Q8mw&ob=av2e

LOVE INKS – Leather Glove (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Scb5-Iv5Lc

ZOEY VAN GOEY – You Told The Drunks I Knew Karate (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EwBNm1Uhs0

SLEIGH BELLS – Tell ‘Em (2010)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kJ05P-71gY

FISHBOY – Alyson Revere (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uv1-eqMkVYA

DARREN HAYMAN – My Dream Train (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEQEHx1w9yU

BLACK MILK – Brain (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldp-arHXRJg

THE FIELD MICE – Coach Station Reunion (1991)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rm3J8yY-3As

COACH STATION REUNION – Johnny Cash (2009)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rKgM0wxhiZg

EL HOMBRE PERCHA – Bocadillos de Jámon (2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcdEIBT9KVA

KATIE KIM – Jennifer (live at the Daghdha Space Theatre, Limerick) (2009)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybSUrax_sME

LIST 278 - 31/10/2026

(Gourock Outdoor Pool, as *not* featured in Lido , Darren Hayman's album dedicated to outdoor swimming pools.  Maybe in a future sequel?...