I’ve asked a group of people well placed in media, music, arts and other general culture vultures to venture their high- and lowlights of Liverpool in 2009.
RIP Derek B
UK old-skool hip-hop pioneer Derek B, who has died at the age of 44, had skills as an MC, DJ and producer.
Sadly he’ll always be known best for The Anfield Rap, which, incredibly, he co-wrote with Craig Johnstone. In amongst all the drivel listen for some famous hooks.
Clinic, Mugstar and Married to the Sea at the Kazimier
Married to the Sea, Mugstar and Clinic at the Kazimier as part of Mass Freak-Out
Crucial playlists: Bunnymen, Wah! and Teardrop Explodes
On a particular online message board I frequent, author, journalist and pop-culture know-it-all Keith Topping holds forth on all matters pertaining to footy, cricket, music, Hammer horrors, TV and curries. Keith’s knowledge of music, film and TV is encyclopedic, but coupled to a obvious love, or sometimes loathing, of the subject matter.
The subject of essential playlists for punk and new wave bands recently cropped up, with some serious muso knowledge being thrown about. Keith knows his shit, so he allowed me to reproduce them here. I dare any Liverpool music types to attempt to better them.
Sadly, my brilliant idea to replicate the playlists on Spotify hit a hurdle with Wylie. The music jukebox has a few blank patches going back over the years, rather like…well you can probably see where I was going with that.
But, there’s Bunnymen and Teardrop Explodes playlists to listen to, and if you’re of a mind to you can fit them on a CD. Until Spotify catches up with Liverpool’s three wise men, here’s the playlists.
Go to Friend Or Foe this Friday
I wouldn’t normally do this sort of thing, but Uncle Ross Charnock has been in touch to let me know about a Friend or Foe gig at the Ship & Mitre, Dale Street this weekend (Friday 7 August).
The Wild Swans at Static Gallery
Formed in 1980 by ex Teardrop Explodes keyboardist Paul Simpson, The Wild Swans cut a stylishly epic swath through Liverpool’s fertile post punk scene.
Along the way they spawned two revered splinter projects in Care and the Lotus Eaters, while all manner of other Merseyside luminaries ventured into their orbit (the Lightning Seed’s Ian Broudie, Pete DeFreitas of the Bunnymen and the Icicle Work’s Ian McNabb to name but three).
Blessed with Simpson’s Bowie-esque looks and voice, an alchemic guitar sound and a lyrical sensibility that seemed to predate Britpop’s romantic mythologizing of England by about 10 years, the Wild Swans inexplicable lack of success was a mystery that looked very unlikely to be solved.
Thankfully their recent decision to reform 21 years after their split has put forward a whole no case for them being one of Liverpool’s most underrated, seminal and downright brilliant bands.
Julian and Cynthia Lennon at press launch for White Feather: The Spirit of John Lennon
I’ve just returned from The Beatles Story’s White Feather: The Spirit of Lennon press launch at The Beatles Story Pier Head, where Julian Lennon gave the closest thing to an interview he’s provided in years.
Lennon and mother Cynthia were answering questions on the exhibition, created with mementoes and artefacts they’ve largely collected themselves over the years.
A such it’s an intriguing and invaluable insight into a man frequently described as ‘difficult’ and ‘infuriating’ – it’s hard not to come to the conclusion having read various accounts of John Lennon that these were not simply euphemism for ‘nasty piece of work’.
Of course, behind every nasty piece of work is often a rather vulnerable character, and the anecdotes and notes from the Lennons paint a portrait of John as man equally difficult and easy to love.
They go beyond what one might generally expect to see at an exhibition: beyond the Beatles memorabilia; beyond the obvious anecdotes; beyond myth and legend.
Liverpool Sound City
I finally made it to some Sound City stuff, taking in Hallo I Love You, Little Boots, Charnock & Russell, Sidney Bailey and His No Good Punchin Clowns, The Two Man Gentleman Band, Clinic and a.p.a.t.t. at various venues, although I only managed to see one entire set out of that lot thanks to some duff planning, bad luck and general confusion.
In amongst the mayhem I spent most time in the View Two gallery, an oasis in the middle of Sodom and Gomorrah, watching a series of folky, jazzy, swingy, skiffle-y performances. The Punchin Clowns and Gentlemen Band were a particularly rare form of Vaudevillian fun.
Seeing Clinic again after so long was great, especially as it was apparently the first gig they played in Liverpool in donkey’s years. Listening to Clinic always makes me think of what it might be like to die from an overdose of mogadon – creepy and disturbing, but not entirely unpleasant.
Sound & Vision: Francesco Mellina at the Conservation Centre
I was on the lig the other day at the Conservation Centre’s Sound & Vision exhibition of Francesco Mellina’s pictures of Liverpool during the birth of punk, new wave and new romanticism.
Francesco Mellina was Dead or Alive’s manager – a dubious honour, I’d've thought – and once asked a cricketer friend of mine to play bass for the band. Wisely, I think, he declined.
Mellina’s role in the scene at Eric’s and other bars with fantastically- ridiculous names between 1978–1982 was outlined by the always-entertaining Paul du Noyer.
The exhibition is a genuine visual record of the music scene at the time, with an impressively wide range of images – both in terms of their style and content.
The film grain that dates these kind of pictures lends a stylised filter to images like Mellina’s, as does the low-light high-contrast black and white tone.
Like the difference between vinyl and digital, they are technically inferior but have much more character.
Pete Wylie's 80's Liverpool tour, Julian Cope's cross-dressing police bother
Two superb and, certainly in one case, distinctly bizarre updates from two of the Crucial Three – the trio of Julian Cope, Pete Wylie and Iain McCulloch that made up the core of the new wave of Liverpool talent that emerged from Liverpool in the early 80s.