PSB go for OMG

So there is absolutely no doubt that the new Pet Shop Boys album 'Electric' is going to be great. The teaser track 'Axis' is a hi-energy disco tour-de-force. The first single 'Vocal' is everything I ever wanted from a PSB single in the 21st Century. I think it is astounding. In fact 'Vocal' is so good it banishes the disappointment of 'Elysium'. Yes, it really is that good.

Electronic "Especially Bad Edition"

There have been many poor “remastered” CD’s issued by increasingly desperate record companies in recent years. The New Order “Deluxe Editions” of 2008 remain the pinnacle of record company ineptitude and stupidity.

But there has emerged a challenger to New Orders crown with the release of the “Special Edition” of Electronics’ eponymously titled debut.

Why would you include a second CD with new edits of songs that are completely unrelated to the original album and exclude the rare and unreleased single edit of “Tighten Up”? Why add alternative versions of tracks recorded eight years later and omit remixes of “Getting Away with It” which have never been released on CD in the UK? Why label “Feel Every Beat” as the “2013 Edit” when it is in fact the DNA remix from 1991?

The release of this CD is a mercenary act that has been conducted by people who are completely ignorant. If you were to be generous to EMI records, you would describe this collection of music as ‘eclectic’. If you were feeling evil you would say it is a complete mess not worthy of a single penny of your hard earned cash.

If a CD is worth reissuing as a “Special Edition” surely it is worth getting right? This lazy ‘scatter gun’ approach to track selection is pathetic. I guess we should be grateful nothing on these two CDs has been taken from a vinyl source (unlike the afore mentioned New Order releases) and the uninspiring packaging does at least contain some new sleeve notes.

Personally I think it should be relabelled as the “Especially Bad Edition” and I encourage everyone to steer clear of it.

Naughty boys and their yellow magic

For a devoted fan of electronic music the pickings were slim in the early 90's. A backlash against the synth driven pop of the 80's led to the rise of Britpop and the guitar driven dirges of Pulp, Blur, Oasis, et al. During these bleak days I sought solace in a variety of strange (electronic) music; "any port in a storm" and all that.

Artists such as Wendy Caros and Isao Tomita didn't appeal too much (as my tastes have matured and both now have a place in my music collection) and never really came up to the standards of my hero Jean Michel Jarre. Tangerine Dream and The Art of Noise were two bands that I felt I should like, rather than having a natural affinity for. Yello and Vangelis were all well and good, but they still lacked melodic drive and proved to have quite inconsistent back catalogues (I'm thinking more Vangelis than Yello here to be fair).

That left the 'odd child' of electronic music; Yellow Magic Orchestra. My introduction to them came through their remix album Hi-Tech/No Crime. Albums like this where were quite de rigueur in the 90's (The Art of Noise's "FON Mixes" and Yello's "Hands on Yello" etc etc). I liked a lot of the melodies in the album but it somehow left me cold and uninterested. Yellow Magic Orchestra albums were (and to a certain extent still are) difficult to obtain and so my interest in them cooled. However, in 2003, remastered versions of their albums were released in the UK and I dipped my toe back into the YMO water.

To listen to Yellow Magic Orchestra you have to re tune your ears away from western sensibilities and remember this band were trying to do something new. Not only were they determined to retain the sound of their Japanese heritage but they also wanted to add the bright fun loving melodies and sounds so despised by Kraftwerk and their contemporaries. They were, and remain, unique and fun loving.

P.S. As I mentioned earlier, not all Y.M.O. albums are easy to come by in the UK. Albums such as "Solid State Survivor" and "Yellow Magic Orchestra" are very easy to find, whilst "×∞Multiplies" and "BGM" are quite rare. Consequently, the unscrupulous are trying to make a killing on amazon by charging silly money for these rarer albums. Top tip is to use eBay and collector sites such as eil.com as they actually represent the best value for money and there can even be a bargain or two to be had.

Wikipedia isn't always right

Wikipedia isn’t always right. I know this as members of the public occasionally refer to it in order to tell me how to do my job. Why anyone would trust a website with life and death decisions is beyond me. Especially one that tells you “West End Girls” by Pet Shop Boys wasn’t released in the UK.

Yes, that’s right. According to Wikipedia, West End Girls in its original form, as produced by Bobby Orlando, wasn’t released in the UK. Both the listing for the song and the main entry for the group state: “In April 1984, "West End Girls" was released, becoming a club hit in Los Angeles and San Francisco, and a minor dance hit in Belgium, and France, but was only available in the United Kingdom as a 12" import."

It really doesn’t matter that this statement is referenced with a link to the BBC website as it’s demonstrably wrong. 

To start with, the same Wikipedia page that says the single was only available as an import lists the original UK release along with all of the others. Secondly it is a matter of record that West End Girls reached number 121 in April 1984 on the UK Gallup singles chart. Thirdly and most tellingly of all is the fact that I, and many others, own a copy of the ‘Epic’ UK release.  

The original version of West End Girls was recorded in New York in September 1984 and produced by Bobby Olrando. It was released on Orlando’s “Bobcat Records” in the USA and subsequently licensed to various record labels in the rest of the world. In the UK, Epic Records offered a one off deal to release and distribute the track. Thus Epic Records catalogue number A4292 (7”) and TA4292 (12”) released on 9^th April 1984 is Pet Shop Boys “West End Girls”. 

That’s a fact, no matter what the BBC or Wikipedia may tell you.

It's OK not to love Tubular Bells.......

Like many others, the first Mike Oldfield record I ever heard was Tubular Bells. I didn’t buy the album when it came out as it was released the same year I was born. In fact, I didn’t buy it at all. Back in the 80’s when CD players were first becoming popular; manufacturers would bundle in free CD’s with a new player. One of my five (yes five) freebies was Tubular Bells. When I first played it I was totally bemused by it and rarely listened to it again - I was expecting something different.

It wasn’t until I saw the premier of Tubular Bells II on TV a few years later that I thought this Oldfield guy might actually be quite good. I went back to Tubular Bells but still found it a bit too odd and gritty for my taste. The sequel however, was a glistening and fluid journey through a magnificent musical landscape. I decided to blindly venture into Oldfield’s extensive back catalogue and see what else came up (not something I would recommend without assistance).

Now, if the next album I had bought had been Discovery or Islands my Oldfield odyssey might well have ended there and then. Happily my next purchase was Crises. As a fan of the Fairlight the title track was an immediate favourite. If you couple that with Moonlight Shadow and a few other less well known but interesting songs, you have a great album. In fact Crises (the track, not the album) remains my favourite Oldfield composition. Suddenly I was a Mike Oldfield fan.

When The Songs of Distant Earth was released I was stunned. For some reason I found it a quite affecting piece of music and the more I revisited the album the better it seemed to become. I still like to listen to the whole album rather than selected tracks as it is such a cohesive and moving piece of work. It remains my favourite Mike Oldfield album by quite some way.

Fast forward twenty years (surely not...*checks*…yes twenty) and Oldfield has just released some nonsense remix album that is barely worth the entrance fee. I started reading some reviews online just to check that my opinion of Tubular Beats isn’t too out of step with fellow fans. As a devotee of electronic, rather than acoustic or guitar driven music, I always assumed my opinions on Oldfield albums were often contrary to the majority of his fans. But the more opinions I read online the more I realised my destain for Tubular Beats and love of Crises and The Songs of Distant Earth is shared by many.

So if you are a Mike Oldfield fan; I’d just like to say, it’s OK not to love Tubular Bells. You are not alone.

Roland D-10: it's everywhere! (almost)

The first ‘real’ synthesizer I ever used was a Roland D-5 – it blew me away. Inevitably, the D-5 was soon stolen from our school and replaced by a D-10. I used this synth for various projects until I left school in the early 90’s

The D-10 isn’t the poor man's D-50 as its name would suggest; the two were very different machines. In fact it is a shame the D-10 has the ‘D’ prefix at all. The D-10 was a kind of early multi-timbral ROMpler that Roland began to perfect with the JV series in the 90’s. Even though it wasn’t much of a synthesis tool (changing the presets would incur a severe reprimand at our school) the D-10 had some nice sounds and was easy to operate.

Many years later when I had left school, I bought a second hand D-10 as it was familiar and, by then, cheap. Yet, I never really heard the D-10 presets on records and found I couldn’t quite get the sound I wanted from it (I was listening to lots of dance music in the early 90’s). I assumed the D-10 was just too ‘cheap’ for professional musicians and that I needed something more modern. I parted company with the D-10 around 2001 and haven’t missed it at all.

However, in recent years I am hearing the D-10 everywhere. Electronics’ “Lean to the inside” is almost completely Roland D-10 presets (actually a D-110 in this case) and the song "Idiot Country" features the Jamisen sound. 808 State used it for the lead sound on ‘In yer face’ and used various other sounds less prominently on their "Ex:el" album in 1991 (lots of Korg M1 and D50 on there too). The title track from Tangerine Dream's album "Lily on the Beach" features the drums and the preset HarmoPan and there are several other presets scattered around the album.

The most prominent use of the D-10 is probably by Mike Oldfield; his album “Earth Moving” features the D-10 on almost every song. Listening to the track “Innocent” I realise the drums, bass, and various other bits are all D-10 presets. I am at a loss as to why I never noticed the use of these sounds before.

The D-10 will never be a classic, but it was used by recording artists and there is evidence to prove it. So a synthesizer I dismissed as terrible (but one of few I could afford) is undergoing a re-appraisal.

Where is my phone? I need to look at my eBay app.

 

UPDATE MARCH 2023 - I've added a couple of other tracks I have noticed feature the D-10 and I have also recently acquired a D-110

Delta Machine is actually quite good!

The last few Depeche Mode albums have disappointed me. I guess, like everyone else, I am hoping each new release will be the “Violator 2” that, in reality, we will never see or hear.

I am gradually letting the idea of reliving my youth go and trying to accept each new album on its own terms. Yet producer Ben Hillier’s sound isn’t to my taste and both “Sounds of the Universe” and ”Playing the Angel” fell short of their potential. I will be honest; I wasn’t expecting much with new release “Delta Machine”, but I have been pleasantly surprised.

The single “Heaven” is a brooding “grower” in the “Only When I Lose Myself” mould. “Secret to the End” has some really clever touches that almost sound contemporary and hold the presses……even has some sounds that aren’t distorted. “Soothe My Soul” sounds like the “Personal Jesus” riff is about to break out at any minute and rumbles along very nicely. Tracks such as “Slow” aren’t to my taste, but there is much else to like on this disc that means the poorer tracks don’t seem to matter. “Soft Touch” sounds almost circa 1983 and “Goodbye” is a fitting ending.

So don’t approach “Delta Machine” with caution (even if Corbijn has outdone himself in terms of crap sleeves). It’s not a pop-fest by any stretch of the imagination, but it is a good album full of new ideas (and plenty of old ones) which not even Hillier could ruin.