(note: the records themselves are this week pictured in a series of arty poses captured when they came with me on a trip to work this morning. Click on the images to see larger versions of their adventures in Levenshulme train station)
10 Brighter Does Love Last Forever?
Well does it? Brighter were the quintessential Sarah records act, in that they were shambolic, shimmering, ephemeral, eternally lovelorn and probably recorded their throwaway jinglyjangly songs about unrequited bedsit passion in a damp attic using borrowed guitars which they didn’t really know how to play. I certainly hope so. Anyway this is the third of three songs on their one-and-only (as far as I know) 7-inch release and for a good few months in Wolverhampton I had to stick it on the turntable as soon as I woke up. I would play it while drawing furiously on the first of the day’s forty Silk Cuts, surveying the French New Wave cinema portraits on my wall, and generally considering myself some kind of Black Country Indie Pop Jean Luc Belmondo.
11 Rythym Sisters American Boys
Who the hell were the Rythym Sisters? Where did they come from and what became of them after they produced this maniacally catchy ditty (it’s like something an indie-pop Bananarama might have come up with) about those pesky American Boys, who apparently fancy themselves as Elvis Presley, and ‘think that they are so damn sexy’? Something tells me that the Rythym Sisters’ only experience of American Boys was watching Starsky and Hutch in their Leeds bedsit, but that doesn’t stop them being damn wonderful, whoever they were.
12 Darling Buds Its All Up to You
The Darling Buds were briefly everyone’s favourite band in 1988, until they signed for a major record label and became persona non grata in indiepop circles. Time has treated their seemingly throwaway slices of furious-paced pop more kindly, even if I did once come across their entire back catalogue in the bargain bin outside of an Oxfam shop in Keswick. This seems cruel; I would rather dwell on my favourite Darling Buds memory, which is of stumbling out of their gig at the Newcastle Riverside and, disorientated by the preceding jangly onslaught (and several cans of Red Stripe) becoming hopelessly lost in the labrynthine passageways of the Swan House roundabout. If I had not been rescued by a fellow concert-goer and pointed back in the direction of the number 12 bus-stop at Eldon Square, I might have been still there now.
Might you be able to spare a thought for the Trembling Blue Stars? They were a favorite of late-night university radio.
Thanks for stopping by my page. Also, given that Glossop North End were founded in 1886, I must infer that the Wodehousian connection is no coincidence. Regards.
Posted by: The American Geordie | November 20, 2005 at 03:25 PM