Perhaps the best Autumn record ever.
Arguably, the defining, founding fathers of the whole "cosmic scally" movement (c.f. The Coral, The La's, The Lightning Seeds et al), this fantastic band are woefully underrated. Ian McNabb has a great voice and his phrasing on this beautiful, beautiful lyric is bordering on the transcendental. I never, ever get tired of hearing it, the imagery is so strong.
On the Barrow scene, we had a running joke that all of his vocal melodies were broadly similar, but what the hell, if it isn't broke etc. etc.
On my very first trip to London with Neil, Mike and the very beautiful Michelle, we saw them at the Astoria (now sadly deceased) on the Charing Cross Road. The venue was probably about a quarter full. They were great beyond belief. They suffered from patchy album syndrome, but as both a live prospect and a classic singles band, they were AMAZING.
McNabb still continues to do great work and remains horribly under appreciated.
Vinyl rip at 320 Kbps.
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5 comments:
This is such a joyous record.
The best thing he's done solo is Sex With Someone You Love.
You' re standing in the disco, like the Count of Monte Cristo
Funny you should say you find it autumnal - I was sure you were posting this to commemorate the sudden winter snap. It always sounds like deep snow to me, with McNabb stalking through the song like Scally Zhivago doing the Neil Young apewalk.
Saw the IWs in Aberdeen, summer of 85, at a gig which exploded into a full-on rammy as soon as they hit the stage, forcing them to bail out four songs in. They returned to the same venue a few months later, McNabb starting the gig with, "Well, now, let's try that again, shall we?", as if he'd been backstage all the time just waiting for things to calm down, & proceeded to play a blinder. Every time I see his name, I picture him stood there wagging an admonishing parent's finger at the beery crowd.
Lovely song, agreed. Ta for jogging the memory.
Hope all's well in Micronworld! Yrs aye
DMcA
Ian McNabb is magical!
They could be hit and miss sometimes. But I saw the IcicleWorks twice. And both times they were awesome. Up here in the North of England, Nirvana and Shit Creek. fantastic.
I must dig out the singles album. Utter quality. I've got the initial double CD edition with a B Sides disc. It doesn't get played too often, but CD1 is something to be treasured.
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