Stately Xanadu

The Mayflower Club Manchester, where I spent many a strange afternoon at the dawn of the eighties, watching punk bands, like Discharge, Vice Squad ( ah, Beki! ), Anti Pasti, and even The Damned. This is another photograph from the excellent Manchester District Music archive. The former Corona cinema, was opposite the entrance to Belle Vue, and apart from Punk bands also gave a venue for a lot of Reggae. Joy Division played here, too. The place was black as pitch inside with overflowing toilets and dodgy electricity. I loved it.

Happy Mondays

My photo of the Happy Mondays at the Manchester Show, an agricultural kind of affair, hence the bloke in tweeds, circa 1984/85. It rained most of the day. There were no more than 30 to 50 people in front of the stage.

There's much more of this kind of thing at the Manchester District Music Archive, an excellent collection of things.


photo: Alastair Price

Jeux sans Frontiers

Whilst in Manchester for a lightning visit I met up for food and drink in the Cornerhouse with some old friends. Bruno, once the bass player in my French band, Dynamos, now resident in Salford, and even older friend Otto Smart.

Otto had just returned from a ten date tour of Spain as part of Roger Quigley's other project At Swim Two Birds. Otto also plays with Roger and Mark Trainer in Montgolfier Brothers, Mark is otherwise known as Gnac. Not to be left out Otto is also part of Curvilinear. All fine and dandy, but what Otto really should be known for is his solo work under the nom de plume - The Otto Show.

His songs are beautifully intimate, intelligent, eccentric and English. Subjects range from the observationally humorous ' Frowning Baby' to ancient mythology- 'Furies,Come', there's even a rendition of RL Stevenson's ' Good and Bad Children'.

So far The Otto Show, sharing its name with an episode of the Simpsons, has produced two albums. The first, self titled, released on Spanish label Annika in 2004, was actually recorded several years earlier in Brittany. With the assistance of me and my band, and particularly les fréres Goujon, Nicolas and Francois, the whole thing was recorded in about three days. Most of Otto's contributions were memorably first takes.

Francois would later be part of duo Octet, signed to Diamond Traxx / Discograph. The people at his label were so taken with Otto's recordings that they invited Otto to play at an Octet gig in Paris. A scratch version of the band on the album was hastily rehearsed for the concert at La Maroquinerie.

The second album, 2005's 'The Very Spit of...', on Manchester's Vespertine and Son, was an even more remarkable affair. Otto had been making home recordings on to a Fostex X15 cassette four track recorder since the 1980's and Richard and Roger ( Vespertine ) decided to compile a collection of the best of these songs, unembellished and as I'd first heard them as far back as 1984.

Otto has a mass of excellent new songs, and despite a positive review of 'The very spit of...' in the Daily Telegraph of all places ( and a couple of return trips to Spain ) - he seems to have as much trouble as ever getting anyone to release them. He's contributed a vocal and lyric to Francois' latest project ( Pyjaman ) - ' Queen Mary ' ( is real fun ) ' and you can hear it on his Myspace. I play a few notes on the track myself , how incestuous can you get?

photos and cornerhouse drawing : Caroline Johnson

Hearing-ade

Currently grooving to :

Footsteps - Bricolage. So Orange juicy it must be ... Bricolage are from Glasgow, and signed Memphis Industries.

Grounds for Divorce - Elbow. Enormous tune from Guy Garvey and co.

Witchfinder General

Only half awake yesterday morning, I heard the newsreader announce : "Last night Lady Thatcher was driven from her home in Belgravia..." happy thoughts of the baying mob, torches blazing, played upon my mind for the rest of the day.

Five Odes to Joy.

1. Stand Down Margaret - The Beat
2. Tramp the Dirt Down - Elvis Costello
3. How Does it Feel ( to be the mother of a thousand dead? ) - Crass
4. Margaret on the Guillotine - Morrissey
5. Blue - Fine Young Cannibals

Honourable mention : the last 45 seconds of 'A Country Practice' - Half Man Half Biscuit

Ting Driven Thing

Plat du Jour

May I recommend the rather wonderful The Ting Tings, whose Great DJ single is available today, albeit probably in download form only, their vinyl and cd releases so far have been as rare as hens' teeth.
Having caught them first on Channel M, Manchester's local telly / satellite station, I had the good fortune to meet Katie and Jules whilst providing comedy Englishman translations for the kind people of French radio station Le Mouv' -at the Transmusicales festival in Rennes last December. After their storming set- a contender for 'La Revelation du Trans '- I had a chat with Katie. She originates from Leigh, in Lancashire, which I was very happy about, being a Lancastrian in a strange land myself. They'd also spent some time in Brittany, trying some early recordings, and so could share that " where is everyone? " sensation that you get in rural France.
The pair have been based at the Islington Mill in Salford, a sort of 21st Century bohemian artists' dwelling, recording and playing in its own venue. The group released a first single ' That's not my Name ' through Manchester's Switchflicker Records. As members of the defunct Dear Eskimo they had already been swallowed up and spit out by major label Mercury Records, without releasing a note of music. However, when we spoke Katie had only been playing her guitar for seven months, and knew just five chords. This adds to their garage pop charm, although the duo's stripped down arrangements are anything but naive, having a sort of Toni Basil immediacy. I discovered that they had a liking for the Talking Heads / Tom Tom Club which makes sense. They seemed to have avoided becoming cynical and battle hardened despite their previous experiences, honing their songwriting down to the essentials. Good, memorable tunes. Expect hits.
An album on Columbia Records is due later in the year.
( photo from : Le Mouv' )