Soul on Delivery - Hustle (Dance Of The Day)

Label: Decca
Year of Release: 1975

You know, this isn't necessarily the kind of blog where I'd expect much support for this statement, but there was a period in the mid-seventies in the UK (post-glam, pre-punk) which would have been utterly dead if not for the dancefloor. Northern Soul continued to keep its grip on parts of the nation, and far besides that funk began to really take hold too, and then… disco. Yes disco, my friends. Some of the slickest, richest grooves ever, many still loved to this day.

One huge atmospheric disco hit of 1975 was "The Hustle" by Van McCoy, all puffing flutes, cooing vocals and deep-voiced exhortations to "Do it!" Oo-er. It wasn't Chic and it wasn't James Brown, but it was pretty damn good, and for what was essentially an instrumental, it caught the public's imagination rather strongly. "Hustle (Dance Of The Day)" appears to be something of a cash-in, but is actually a lot rougher and groovier - squeaking electric organs bump up against insistent basslines and abandoned alley car-chase funk. It's a treat.

The man behind it is Mike Vernon, a man with a long history in music behind him by this point, having created the British blues label Blue Horizon which launched Fleetwood Mac. Besides that, he produced David Bowie's early work, Dr Feelgood, Level 42 and Focus in his career. His seventies disco work was better served by the great Olympic Runners, but this is a nice addition to the discography.

Reupload - The Spectrum - Headin' For A Heatwave/ I Wanna Be With You

Label: RCA
Year of Release: 1967

I've freely admitted before that I'm no big fan of The Spectrum, but I realise that they're a highly sought after act by some fans of all things popsike, so I'm including this single on the blog for the benefit of the curious.

However, because I have no great love of their work, and there's nothing particularly absurd or unusual about it either, it's rather tricky for me to wax lyrical about the contents of this disc. Suffice to say that this is a very smooth, slick blend of sixties pop which did manage to pick up a lot of airplay on the pirate stations at the time. Soulful vocals and pounding orchestral arrangements dominate, along with some agreeable electric organ work (on the flip) and close harmonies. This makes them seem like they must have been a very professional act - but there's a certain lack of energy, adventure or excitement which prevents both sides from completely winning me over. Nonetheless though, their fans will probably be happy to listen to these tracks as MP3s. Curiously, the B-side "I Wanna Be With You" is definitely the best offering, sounding like the work of a finger-poppin' mod band you might have heard playing in dive bars around the time.

RCA released shedloads of Spectrum 45s throughout the decade which frequently pop up in second hand record stores in quantities which make me suspect that some of their singles may have bubbled just outside the charts. Sadly though, that's just a hunch, and I can't tell you for definite how close they were to the big time. They made it in Spain, however, where "Heatwave" was a massive smash. So there you go.

(I originally wrote this blog entry back in October 2008 when the site was in its infancy, and it really shows - it's such a noncommittal blurb that I have to wonder why I even bothered. A blank page would have been better.

To make up for it, here are some proper FACTS. The Spectrum contained Keith Forsey and his brother Colin on drums and bass guitar, the former of whom went on to write "Flashdance - What A Feelin'" and "(Don't You) Forget About Me". He was also sticksman on Donna Summer's legendary "I Feel Love" and additionally appeared on a variety of other Moroder recordings.

A rumour has been circulating amongst popsike collectors for years that The Spectrum were formed as a deliberately manufactured band, a la The Monkees. While details of their full line-up - apart from the involvement of the Forsey brothers - are sketchy, there is nothing to confirm this as being true. What is certain is that RCA encouraged them to form an association with Gerry Anderson and dress in Thunderbirds styled uniforms for certain photo-shoots. You can't help but think that such a promotional gambit would have alienated more people than it attracted…

Since I originally wrote this entry, The Spectrum have also grown on me a lot more. I still don't think you should trouble yourselves parting with £80 for their album, but at their best they've produced some interesting sounding and quite moody psych-pop. For a more positive evaluation, head over to the Vinyl Antiquity blog where you'll read some seriously over-excited descriptions of their work.)

Chris Sievey - Camouflage

Label: EMI
Year of Release: 1983

I suspect that there will be non-British readers of this blog for whom the name Chris Sievey rings very few bells, the significance of it being utterly lost. But then again, maybe not - maybe times are changing. Since the release of the film "Frank" this year, which was partly based on Sievey's Frank Sidebottom persona, more people around the world are beginning to question who he was and what drove him on through numerous years of near-breakthrough success and utter failure.

Sievey's bullheadedness and resilience became apparent very early on. In 1971, at the age of sixteen, he and his brother hitch-hiked from their home city of Manchester to the Apple headquarters in London  and refused to leave their offices, demanding to meet one of the Beatles so they could play them their music. Staff were unable to help, but the Head of A&R Tony King allowed them some time in Apple's studio to record a demo, but clearly wasn't interested in making a signing upon hearing the results. For the next few years the rest of the music industry remained similarly oblivious to Sievey's charms, and he self-released numerous cassettes and slabs of solo vinyl to the public's general indifference.

His solo efforts gradually morphed into the band project The Freshies in 1974 (who, according to Sievey, a very young Johnny Marr tried to join) who slowly began to attract attention, hitting their peak after being signed by MCA in 1981 and almost having a hit with "I'm In Love With The Girl On The Manchester Virgin Megastore Check-Out Desk". Follow-up efforts such as "I Can't Get Bouncing Babies By The Teardrop Explodes", however, were greeted less keenly, and MCA lost interest, as eventually did the rest of the band, leaving Sievey to release solo material again.

While even his greatest fan would probably have to admit that Sievey was sometimes much too keen on gimmickry and whimsy to connect strongly with the general public, "Camouflage" is one of those eighties hits that should have been but never was. Bulging with hooks, anthemic riffs, a Springsteen-esque chorus and a keyboard line peculiarly reminiscent of Carly Simon's "Coming Around Again", its a lean and marvellous pop record which should have been on the radio dozens of times a day. In the event, "Camouflage" got a slot on Channel 4's "The Tube", some minimal radio exposure, and little in the way of sales. If he seemed to give up on a straight pop career after this, I for one can't blame him - "Camouflage" is the sound of someone throwing every last great idea they have at the wall and smoothing everything over to commercial neatness and perfection.

Always searching for a novel marketing angle, Sievey included free computer programs on the B-side, including one original game he'd written called "Flying Train", and a computer video for the track "Camouflage" itself. While this might have seemed like a quirky one-off idea, it did actually inspire his next career move, which was to properly issue a computer game called "The Biz" which was a flawed but horribly addictive band management simulation for the ZX Spectrum. Nestling on the same tape that the computer program could be found was audio of a comedy character called Frank Sidebottom. Computer games magazine reviewers remarked that this character was "hilarious", and a brand new phase in Sievey's career was born for which he specially donned a large papier-mâché head.

Sidebottom is very difficult to explain to people who are unfamiliar with his work, being a cumbersome, eternally boyish, over-enthusiastic whirlwind of a character with more energy than talent. People who worked with him at the time have said that the alter-ego may even have been a safe haven for the chaotic Sievey, but what is certain is that it gave him more headlines, television appearances and exposure than singles like "Camouflage" had ever managed, and so - career breaks notwithstanding - he stuck with the character until the end of his career in 2010 when he died of cancer.

Whatever you think of his work, there's utterly no question that Sievey made the world a much more interesting place. Self-releasing singles before punk broke, creating multi-media computer games before such a thing became common practice, releasing singles with gimmicky catchphrases for titles - his approach to the media circus was frequently ahead of its time, and its impossible not to conclude that with a bit more fortune and focus he might have managed a short spell of genuine, run-of-the-mill success. But that would have meant that the comedy of the equally over-enthusiastic budding pop star Frank Sidebottom would never have been born.

Sometimes when obituaries are published for media figures, someone spouts the cliche "We will never see his/her like again". It seems trite, a half-hearted sentiment faxed from one star's agent to a journalist's dusty corner of an office in London. But in Sievey's case, it's an entirely genuine observation. There's almost nothing else to say - nobody will ever come along and have a remotely comparable career in the media again, and everyone should spend some time online digging around his work and interviews. This blog entry would have been finished weeks ago if I hadn't been so distracted by the monstrous online Sievey trail, not least the rather marvellous computer game "The Biz" which left me hooked for almost an entire Saturday.

Good Ship Lollipop - Maxwell's Silver Hammer/ How Does It Feel

Label: Ember
Year of Release: 1969

Here's a riddle for you all - which Beatles album tracks haven't been released as singles by other singers or groups based anywhere in the world? "Revolution #9" would, I suppose, be the first obvious answer to this question, closely followed by "Her Majesty" and some of the other song cycle tracks off "Abbey Road" (but by no means all of them). After that, I wouldn't be willing to place too many bets. Wherever there's a Beatles song which hasn't been issued as a single already, there's always been somebody out there trying to generate a hit with it for their own group or label.

"Maxwell's Silver Hammer" is probably one of the more bizarre choices I've come across. "Abbey Road" is an astonishing album which showcases, possibly more than any other Beatles LP, how untouchable Paul McCartney's songwriting skills could often be. Taking McCartney's talents for granted has sadly become something of a familiar stance in recent years, but one listen to the roller coaster ride that is the song cycle on Side Two should be proof enough that the use of the word "genius" is not, in this case, inappropriate. Despite this, there is one definite weak spot on the record, and it's this thudding, clanging novelty march about a fictional mass murderer. Passably amusing for the first listen and then progressively more and more irritating thereafter, "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" is the kind of track skip buttons were invented for, doing very little but stink the place out with its violent whimsy. Whole debates have been had about why the hell this, of all the "Abbey Road" tracks, was granted such an early slot on the album.

Still, The Good Ship Lollipop - who I assume were a studio group - produce an accurate facsimile of it here, and one which is likely to be of interest to people curious about Beatles cover versions. A certain chirpiness and polite jollity is added to the fantasies about caving skulls in, and does, to my ears, add a few new twists to the track.

The B-side is interesting too, being a cover version of the sixties rarity "How Does It Feel" by The Perishers. It fails to match the mod majesty of the original track, but is definitely a slightly rawer and rougher interpretation.

Sunfighter - Drag Race Queen/ Riding On Your Star

Label: EMI
Year of Release: 1976

Sunfighter came so close to making something of themselves, yet ultimately fell short of the mark for reasons which have perplexed some amateur pop historians since. They had a major record label deal with EMI, a well-respected of-the-moment rock producer in Roy Thomas Baker, and even an opening slot on "Top of the Pops" to promote themselves with.

It's not even as if this, their debut single, didn't sound as if it stood a chance. Filled with powerful rock vocals, snaking, subtle little hooks and detours and a slightly suggestive title, it must have horrified everyone involved when it didn't even chart. But while 1976 was a very sleepy year for popular music (as anyone who sat through BBC4's "Top of the Pops" re-runs for that period will know) change was still afoot, and it's quite possible that the slightly glam image and sound of Sunfighter was widely dismissed by many as passé. By '76 even the big names behind the movement were starting to struggle, and not even Sunfighter's stylistic similarities to Queen - who weathered the storm gracefully - saved them.

But what next for the group? Well, members Rob Boughton, John Hardman, Jeb Milne and Ricky Peebles did switch style to disco by '78, issuing the rather more boogie orientated "City Nights". It did well in various nightclubs but still wasn't a hit, and EMI finally lost patience and dropped them.

John Hardman has since become a successful session musician and recording studio owner, and is perhaps better known these days for being Sarah Harding's (of Girls Aloud fame) father. So, were Sunfighter ever as good as the best Girls Aloud records? No, frankly. But still, he deserves a bit more than occasional mentions in the tabloid press for his daughter's success - he was on "Top of the Pops" once himself, you know.