Reupload - Starlings - Remember (Walkin' In The Sand)/ Typhoons - Little Red Rooster

Powerful and surprisingly brilliant cover of the girl-group classic on the budget Woolies label

Label: Embassy

Year of Release: 1964

We've encountered the Embassy label on "Left and to the Back" before, of course. (Yes. We have). It was the label John Lennon referred to in a moment of despondency, jokingly commenting that even they had rejected The Beatles. Pressing up cheap sound-a-like discs for the cash-strapped or just plain unfussy, they were responsible for some truly awful howlers in their time. Just listen to this appalling caterwauling take on "Wimoweh" if you don't believe me, or this underpowered take on The Beatles themselves. 

Occasionally, though, Embassy did turn up trumps, and it's to the credit of the session musicians they hired when things did go to plan. Frequently thrown in at the deep end, given next-to-no time to learn the songs and even less time than that to record them (usually a few takes at most) when these discs sound good, they sound good under the most pressured and unlikely of circumstances. 

So then, if you were pop-picking in Woolworths in 1964, this record would actually have been a rather good buy. The version of "Remember (Walkin' In The Sand)" is a staggeringly effective take on the girl group classic. Joan Baxter handles the lead vocals and positively nails the yearning qualities of the song - so much so that this actually becomes a perfectly strong alternative version rather than just a cheap substitute for the real thing. This isn't some kind of dilute-to-taste ageing session muso's take on teenage heartbreak, there's genuine power and a certain innocence behind the performance, piercing right through everything else. 

Fabulous Wealthy Tarts - The Last Time/ The Chase Is On

Label: Bright
Year of Release: 1983

I was watching "Top of the Pops" on BBC4 a few weeks back, and Paul Young appeared to perform "Come Back and Stay" with his backing group The Royal Family. There were two surprises to be enjoyed in that nostalgic televisual package. The first was that "Come Back And Stay" was a far better single than I remembered it - maudlin, eerie, slightly angular and as unusual as a mainstream, bluesy pop track can get away with being. The second surprise was the camera panning round on to the backing singers, one of whom I remembered having a weird childhood crush on. "Didn't they actually have a single out of their own?" I asked Twitter.

And here we are. Kim Lesley and Maz Roberts were singers not just for Paul Young, but also as participating members of Jools Holland and His Millionaires. Finding that their career as session voices for hire wasn't delivering everything they wanted out of life, they broke away to record this single. It's unsurprising that they were given the opportunity - they stood out visually, having an in-your-face, fun-loving, camera-friendly image which ensured that they hogged almost as much screen time as Mr Young when they appeared with him.

The small Bright label picked up the tab and let them in the studio to record this, a cover of The Rolling Stones "Last Time". In common with a vast array of other sixties covers in the eighties, this takes the minimal riffs of the original and gives them a rigid, staccato synth pop backing. This may have worked once for Soft Cell's take on the Northern Soul smash "Tainted Love", but for other contenders (including Tik and Tok's "Summer In The City" and Glass Museum's "Daytripper", and Naked Eyes "Always Something There To Remind Me" - though that was, to be fair, a hit in some countries) it proved fruitless, and this was no exception. Not helped by the fact that the prissy BBC took exception to the group name Fabulous Wealthy Tarts and apparently refused to play it, "Last Time" sank faster than the gumboots of a man foolishly trying to cross the Thames Estuary by foot at low tide.

As to whether it deserved that fate, judge for yourself. In common with many of Paul Young's covers, it's a complete reboot, taking the raw stomp of the original and replacing it with laser-eyed modernity.  When people take risks and attempt complete rewrites of songs rather than performing mere bog-standard covers, it's usually to be applauded. In my considered opinion, though, tracks like "The Last Time" mainly work because they're so gritty and grimy sounding in the first place - as soon as you scrub them clean and remove that aggressive swing, what you're left with is very polished, precise repetition with little atmosphere. The pair try to take the song in interesting new directions, but ultimately it's too bluesy and slight to be up to the challenge.

They never did release another single, but returned to their other duties instead. As for the woman I had a strange "Top of the Pops" crush on, she (Maz Roberts) entered a relationship with Paul Young's bass master Pino Palladino, and eventually married him. Who could blame her? He managed to create noises I never could summon from the depths of my bass guitar, and he also had the distinct advantage of not being an incredibly underage boy, thereby enabling her to have a normal relationship which wouldn't involve being placed on the sex offender's register. But he's still a git anyway.

Dora Hall - Satisfaction/ 5 O'Clock World

Label: Reinbeau

Year of Release: 1966

Regular readers of "Left and to the Back" will know that I have a soft spot for Dora Hall. This is the wife-of-a-disposable-picnicware-magnate's fourth blog entry in total, and for anyone wanting to know the full background behind her colossal back catalogue, the answers can be found here. Literally hundreds of Hall singles are out there for the taking, and quite a few videos and LPs too.

Whether you love or loathe her output, there's no question that she covered some downright unusual tunes at times. Clearly Hall's first love was the showy swing of the easy listening kings and queens - you can hear it in her mannered, measured delivery - but she was never afraid to put that to use on modern rock hits. In this case, "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" gets the Hall makeover, being turned into a big, brassy piece of suaveness. Her vocals aren't perfect, but the style suits the track oddly well, and it has enough oomph to carry itself entertainingly across three minutes. Andrew Loog Oldham surely approved, and by the time the horn section kicks in, so will you.

Less convincing is the B-side "5 O'Clock World" which is a struggle to listen to, despite the delightful premise of the idea. 

Oh Dora. You may be the Queen of the American Thrift Store Bin, but you're the kind of artist blogs like this were invented for. I salute your memory. 

Starlings - Remember (Walkin' In The Sand)/ Typhoons - Little Red Rooster

Label: Embassy

Year of Release: 1964

We've encountered the Embassy label on "Left and to the Back" before, of course. (Yes. We have). It was the label John Lennon referred to in a moment of despondency, jokingly commenting that even they had rejected The Beatles. Pressing up cheap sound-a-like discs for the cash-strapped or just plain unfussy, they were responsible for some truly awful howlers in their time. Just listen to this appalling caterwauling take on "Wimoweh" if you don't believe me, or this underpowered take on The Beatles themselves. 

Occasionally, though, Embassy did turn up trumps, and it's to the credit of the session musicians they hired when things did go to plan. Frequently thrown in at the deep end, given next-to-no time to learn the songs and even less time than that to record them (usually a few takes at most) when these discs sound good, they sound good under the most pressured and unlikely of circumstances. 

So then, if you were pop-picking in Woolworths in 1964, this record would actually have been a rather good buy. The version of "Remember (Walkin' In The Sand)" is a staggeringly effective take on the girl group classic. Joan Baxter handles the lead vocals and positively nails the yearning qualities of the song - so much so that this actually becomes a perfectly strong alternative version rather than just a cheap substitute for the real thing. This isn't some kind of dilute-to-taste ageing session muso's take on teenage heartbreak, there's genuine power and a certain innocence behind the performance, piercing right through everything else. 

On the other side, The Typhoons take on "Little Red Rooster" isn't as great, but manages to capture the lazy sleaze of the blues track almost as well as the Stones did. It's hard to pick fault.

At the time it's doubtful any self-respecting teenager would have actually wanted to own this record over the original recordings, but now, with the reasonable passing of time, this has actually become something worth having. A shame the same can't be said for all of Embassy's output, but them's the breaks.

The End - Shades of Orange/ Loving Sacred Loving

Label: Decca

Year of Release: 1968

Oh, of all the obvious records I could have picked... but it's high summer, nobody's dumping anything of much interest in the second hand record shops at the moment (this is a seasonal phenomenon, I'm sure, but don't ask me why) and taking a bit of a dip into the obvious backwaters of my record collection seems like the answer, even though I've had a copy of this little gem for years now.

The End are probably among the best-known "obscure" psychedelic bands in the canon, thanks to the involvement of a certain Bill Wyman who made them something of a pet project of his.  Initially spotted by singer and friend-of-the-Stones Elkie Brooks, The End initially supported Jagger and co on tour in 1965 and had an accompanying 45 out on Philips entitled "I Can't Get Any Joy".  When this bombed, it would take another three years before "Shades Of Orange" emerged into the sunlight with Wyman on co-songwriting duties and Charlie Watts on tabla.  Recorded during a break in the "Satanic Majesties Request" sessions, it's actually - sacrilege alert - a lot better than the messy trippiness of much of that album, the A-side in particular showing a mellow restraint faintly reminiscent of the most laidback Barrett-era Pink Floyd output.  If it has a fault at all, it's perhaps that it sticks stubbornly to its arrangement and theme throughout where some minor variations might have been welcome.  

Whilst The End never did achieve success in the UK, they managed a top five hit in Spain with "Why" (unreleased on these shores) and actually decamped to that country to capitalise on their following there. Decca did put out their album "Introspection" in Britain, however, where it has gained a cult following as being a fine example of psychedelia, and an enormous collectible amongst Stones fans for the involvement of Watts and Wyman.

The band eventually became hard rock act Tucky Buzzard and released another three albums under Wyman's wing, as well as signing to Deep Purple's Purple label.  All this high class patronage led to nought, though, and they too had all but dissolved by 1973.    

Please note that most of The End's material is commercially available online and in good record shops, therefore I've just included a brief clip from each side of this single here.  You can, however, hear both "Shades of Orange" and "Loving Sacred Loving" in full on YouTube. 

Second Hand Record Dip Part 76 - Nadine Expert - I Wanna Be A Rollin' Stone

Who: Nadine Expert
What: I Wanna Be A Rolling Stone
Label: CBS
When: 1978
Where: Wood Street Market, Walthamstow, London
Cost: 50p

Oh God. This is a prime example of a single you might spot in the 50p bin and do a double take about, not because you expect any good to come of chancing upon it - let's face it, the sleeve hardly promises a great lost artistic gem - but because you hope that it has some kind of kitsch appeal. And does it? Well, you be the judge.

Information on Nadine Expert online is about as scanty as the daywear she posed in for many of her record sleeves, but the media story appears to be that she happened to "bump into" Bill Wyman at an unnamed airport whilst he was on his travels (attractive young women seemed to stumble into Wyman's path a lot at this time) and following a chat with the man was offered the opportunity of a recording career. Well, it could happen to any of us. You can only wonder at the content of that conversation which must have occurred at the luggage carousel, or perhaps whilst they were both innocently waiting for the shuttle bus to ferry them to a useful terminal. This, the first single, was a disco medley of some The Rolling Stones classics, including "Paint it Black" performed in an absurdly joyous manner. It sounds exactly as you'd expect it to, and is only really notable for predating the trend for popular disco medleys of old hits by several years.

Nadine managed some success on the continent and is still respected by some aficionados of disco music. There's a clip of her performing this very track on some unnamed European music show, where she struts her stuff in a very confident, Suzy Quatro influenced, proto-Samantha Fox hybrid kinda way. Beyond that, it's very difficult to think of anything to add.