Tied To The 90s: Part 2

This is obviously going to be a long process. Life tends to get in the way of finding the time to share these memories with you all. It is kind of fun though, remembering what particular albums and songs mean to me. For example at the moment I'm listening to Left To My Own Devices by the Pet Shop Boys from the album Introspective - an album I bought on limited edition 3x 12" vinyl from Abergele Woolworths (where I also bought my first PSB record - a limited double 7" pack of Suburbia) and then later got on CD - I think from the second-hand rack at Phase One Records in Rhyl.

Remember I mentioned last time that I was a multi-format sucker? I bought the single of Left To My Own Devices on 7", 12", cassette & CD single (all in yellow outer sleeves) as well as owning it on the album. Twice. And then bought the B-sides again on the Alternative compilation. And now I'm listening to it on Spotify punctuated by adverts about energy drinks and commercial radio stations.

I just remembered - I also have a promotional Introspective carrier bag from Kavern Records in Rhyl.

Hopefully more such exciting revelations to follow...

43. Carter USM - 101 Damnations

My friend James introduced me to Carter - they'd played some early shows in Leicester where he was at university and he had seen them for the musical/lyrical geniuses that they were. Now generally I have a lot of faith in James' taste, but then he also tried to convince me about the Manic Street Preachers so I always have to be slightly wary.

Of course, it goes without saying that this time he was right. I remember seeing the LP in Swordfish Records in Birmingham but I don't think I actually bought the CD until maybe a decade or more later. Of course 30 Something, 1992: The Love Album and subsequent singles were bought on release, and seeing them supported by The Family Cat at Leicester Granby Halls (Songkick tells me 11/12/92) remains one of my favourite gigs to this day.

42. Pavement - Crooked Rain Crooked Rain

I bought Slanted & Enchanted from a hi-fi shop in Braunschweig, Germany which had a very impressive indie section (stand-out memories are of buying Trompe Le Monde & PJ Harvey's Dry from there)

I tried to like it, I really did. It has been one of those albums that has eluded me for many years. Every so often I'll give it another try but it still won't click for me.

So what possessed me to buy Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain? I can only assume that I was sufficiently persuaded by lead-off single Cut Your Hair. This is another though that I didn't buy on release, but got second-hand. My memory is that Eifion rang me from a second-hand book shop in Colwyn Bay and asked me if I wanted this for a fiver. Now he has no recollection of this, or of said book shop ever selling CDs. I have 6 months on him so I'm going to put it down to old age affecting his memory.

I certainly have other singles from this album - Gold Soundz, Range Life - so I don't think it would have taken much to persuade to go for the album.

As a matter of fact I only think they bettered it once.

Oops, sorry - SPOILER ALERT!

41. Pulp - His N Hers

The tale of how I fell in love with Pulp is one of my favourite stories to tell, and no doubt some of you will have heard it more than once already, so feel free to skip to number 40.

James & I were off to see Saint Etienne at De Montfort Hall not long after they had released So Tough. I had bought the album on CD from Spinadisc in Coventry on release day but not knowing there was an in-store planned at Andy's Records I'd left it at home. Therefore I had to buy it again to have a good reason to meet Pete, Bob and (who am I kidding - I really only cared about meeting...) Sarah. I'm pretty sure that this was the first band I ever met.

When we got to De Montfort Hall that night we had no idea who were supporting St Et, but onto the stage walks a lanky charmer by the name of Jarvis with his band. They were (obviously) amazing. They were on the cusp of great things as we now know, but they stormed that stage. Jarvis was brilliant and witty as we know. Sharing a box of Milk Tray with the audience before launching into Razzmatazz is still the best thing I've ever seen anyone do between songs. The fact that Babies and Lipgloss are on this album just about edges it over Different Class and Intro as my favourite Pulp album.

For once my memory fails me about where I bought this, but my money is on Rhyl Our Price. What I do know is that I had to make sure I handed over the right copy of So Tough when I went back to Spinadisc and said "Look - I've got two".

40. The Bluetones - Expecting To Fly

There isn't a great deal to say about this one really, except that it remains my favourite album to come out of what was known as Brit-Pop. Just some cracking songs, especially on the second half (after the needle run-off and click in the middle of the CD) and it still gets played on a regular basis when I'm in the mood for great tunes.

39. Madder Rose - Bring It Down

I guess Swim got some airplay on The Evening Session or something. I can't think how else I would have heard of Madder Rose. I went into Penny Lane Records in Chester looking for the single and came out with the album. Scuzzy guitars, cool female vocals - what's not to love. Right up my street.

Second album Panic On was pretty close, but this remains my favourite of theirs.

38. Airhead - Boing!

Airhead didn't need to release anything other than this album, although the stand-alone single Counting Sheep was ace and subsequently added to the album. Another album I got second hand in Rhyl's Phase One, but I'd had a tape copy of it for ages from someone.

Cracking singles like Right Now, Congratulations (got this on ltd 12" in a poster sleeve under their origianl moniker Jefferson Airhead), and the story-of-my-young-life Funny How are interspersed with equally great album tracks.

Back then I thought "It's funny how the girls you fall in love with never fancy you / Funny how the ones you don't do" was up there with anything Morrissey had ever penned.

37. Cake - Fashion Nugget

Cake are great. The Distance was the big radio & chart hit but all their albums have great songs with, often very funny lyrics. Their sweary cover of I Will Survive featured here along with tracks like Frank Sinatra and Italian Leather Sofa showed off their talent to the extent that I ended up paying £15.99 for the next album Prolonging The Magic from Kavern Records.


That's seven more for you. Let's see when life gives me time to do some more.

Tied To The 90s: Part 1

The 1990s were a time when I bought what can only be described as "an absolute shit-load of music". And I mean a shit-load. In 1990 I was still one of the last lot of students who had any hope of leaving university without a massive overdraft and a huge loan to repay. The student grant was a wonderful thing, and mine was spent vigorously in the record shops of Coventry and Rhyl.

September 1991 to June 1992 was spent working and studying in Germany and thanks to the failure of a Czech student to turn up for the course I was on, I managed to assume his identity and receive an EU grant on his behalf. Yay identity theft!!

The record shops of Brauschweig and Wolfsburg profited from this and some classics were bought during this time: Buffalo Tom's Let Me Come Over, Bandwagonesque, Screamadelica, Foxbase Alpha, Trompe Le Monde, Dry, Slanted & Enchanted, Lazer Guided Melodies, Diamonds & Pearls... I could go on for some time.

And then after uni that leaves 6 years of working to build up a pretty reasonable (predominantly indie-rock orientated) CD collection. And that's really only taking the albums into account. There wasn't a week that went by when I wasn't scouring the new release CD singles at Our Price, Woolworths or Kavern Records for the 99p first week bargains. Of course being the multi-format sucker that I was I often ended up with 2 (occasionally 3 - see Orbital's Satan (Live)) versions of the same single.

So yes, a shit-load of music. In retrospect, my quality filters did slip up occasionally, and some things haven't held up to the ravages of time, but I make no secret of the fact that this decade is easily my favourite time in music.

And that's why the challenge of making a top 50 albums of the 90s list has been a pretty big job. Big insomuch as the sheer volume of stuff to pick from was pretty daunting, and the original long-list was particularly long.

When you think about it, 50 for a whole decade is pretty ridiculously restrictive. I mean, 5 per year? Especially when you consider 1997 has 7 albums I couldn't really live without. Thankfully when I looked at it I thought "Well first of all I'd better pick the definite ones" and ended up with 51 ticks (sorry to the War Child Help! collection).

Some of you (I'm kidding! I know no-one's reading this!) may remember that I did a top 50 albums of all time list last year. I warn you now that if you're comparing that list to this one you'll find that they don't necessarily correspond with their chart placings. I haven't checked back on that previous list, I've just winged it based on my gut feeling this week. There's an element of both "loved it then" and "love it now" in the selections, but they're all corkers and that's what counts.

As ever I hope you find something you didn't know and look it up. I've only written up 7 so far so that's what you get for now...

50. Throwing Muses - Red Heaven

I'm pretty sure that the first time I heard Throwing Muses it was from a cassette my friend Eifion had of Hunkpapa. The disjointed rhythms worried me slightly, but I remember enjoying Dizzy particularly.

The Muses became one of my favourite bands over the years. The album was the first they released after the departure of founding member Tanya Donnelly. Tanya always had a slightly poppier sensibility than Kristin Hersh so I wasn't sure how I would feel about this when it was released but I needn't have feared anything.

From the single Firepile, to the Bob Mould Duet Dio and the unbelievable Pearl this album is chock full of great songs.

I bought this from one branch of HMV in Coventry and then went up to the other branch and exchanged it because they had the version with the live solo acoustic show bonus disc. And let's face it, a live acoustic solo Kristin Hersh set of Throwing Muses songs is pretty much the best thing you could ever want to hear.

49. The Stone Roses - Second Coming

I liked it.

48. The Amps - Pacer

Pretty much the most rocking Breeders album there is.

47. Buffalo Tom - Birdbrain

You know when you first start going to gigs and you get to see your favourite bands in person for the first time? I went to see The Wedding Present in Leicester De Montfort Hall with my good friend James in May of 1991. Seamonsters was newly released so the boy Gedge was at the height of his powers and we were geared up to immerse ourselves in the our first bit of real hero-worship (although I *had* seen Prince once and Frank Sidebottom twice by this stage). The last thing either of us expected was to be completely blown away by the unknown support band.

Don't get me wrong, The Weddoes were amazing that night. I  mean PROPERLY amazing, but both James & I left the show understanding that we had just discovered a band that could go on to great things.

The following day we walked into a record shop in Leicester city centre and saw this album on vinyl. Of course this was 1991 and *no one* bought vinyl. So we walked out again.

In the end I didn't end up buying it until I was in Germany over a year later, and by this time Let Me Come had also been released. I don't remember which I bought first, although I'm pretty sure I got them both (and also the eponymous debut eventually) in the same shop.

Over the years Buffalo Tom have been consistently in my top 10 bands of all time, along with Gedge & his lot, so when James & I had the opportunity to see them play in Manchester in 2011 we were front and centre from start to finish, and to talk to and get autographs from two of them after the show was a big thrill.

I took this picture. I was pretty happy with my point of view. Bill Janovitz is a bona fide rock star in my eyes.

46. the Mountain Goats - Full Force Galesburg

You know by now that this is my favourite band, but I didn't get into them until about 2001. Some of their earlier stuff isn't as accessible as the records that got me hooked on them, but Full Force Galesburg is chock-full of great tunes and is my favourite early-period tMG album.

45. Money Mark - Push The Button

The first album in the list that I bought on cassette. Not quite sure why that is because I've got Mark's Keyboard Repair on CD. I  guess at this stage I must have still chosen my format based on my budget. It's a cracking little album too. Having discovered Mark through his work on The Beastie Boys' Ill Communication album I found Mark's Keyboard Repair a little too keyboard-noodly but while this one has its fair share of noodle, it also has proper hit singles.

44. Teenage Fanclub - Bandwagonesque

Right, remember that shop in Germany where I bought those Buffalo Tom albums? We'll be returning there quite regularly on this journey.

One of the first things I did when I got to Germany was to take out a subscription to the NME. Back in '91/'92 it was still worth buying the NME and especially in Germany where the radio options were the local chart pop station (Radio FFN!) and BFBS (although you did get Peel once a week). I had to really rely on reviews to give me some clues about what I might want to buy. Thankfully it was pretty difficult to go wrong in 1992.

I knew nothing about Teenage Fanclub prior to reading NME's rave review of Bandwagonesque  but bought it, possibly at the same time as Lazer Guided Melodies, and from the opening "She wears denim wherever she goes / Says she's gonna get some records by the Status Quo" I was hooked. A friend had asked me to copy his CD of Nevermind onto a cassette for him and I remember telling him that it was "a bit too metal for my taste". I think Bandwagonesque filled the grungy niche in my collection, and although I would later come to see the error of my ways about Nevermind, it still never overtook this neon pink & yellow wonder in my eyes.

Been meaning to post this for ages.

Some time ago I was honoured to be asked to be guest-editor/curator of the marvellous Twitter account @thelostrecord and post a top ten of my favourite band the Mountain Goats.

As I tend to do with these things, I've just copied the original tweets, and I hope you enjoy the tunes...

So here we go, get ready for some treats from the man The New Yorker called "America's best non-hip-hop lyricist" Mr John Darnielle #tMG10

Before we get to the #tMG10, a couple of the "Big Hits" to get out of the way. 

tMG have a cycle of Going to... songs & here's the seminal Going To Georgia 

Next, from wonderful The Sunset Tree LP, the uplifting This Year. A live singalong favourite

Another with a proper video, from the beautifully fragile Get Lonely LP, Woke Up New 

One here which didn't quite make it into the #tMG10 but that means a lot to me personally 1 John 4:16 

So off we go with the @maffrj "Completely-subjective-definitive-Mountain-Goats-top-10-no-returns" #tMG10

#tMG10 10: Heretic Pride isn't my favourite tMG album by some way, but Autoclave is a cracking tune 

While I'm thinking about Heretic Pride, here's a glorious live version of San Bernadino from Manchester Academy 2011 

#tMG10 9: From The Sunset Tree, an LP about Darnielle's relationship with his abusive step-father, Love Love Love 

#tMG10 8:"Bill Gates will singlehandedly spearhead the Heaven 17 revival" Cubs In Five always brings a smile to my face 

#tMG10 7: Snow Crush Killing Song 

#tMG10 6: Twin Human Highway Flares

Halfway through the @maffrj #tMG10 so we'll have a break with a few covers & oddities that I didn't feel right including in the 10.



Next, from Darnielle's side project The Extra Glenns here's Baltimore #tMG10

From Black Pear Tree tMG's collaboration with Kaki King "Thank You Mario But Our Princess Is In Another Castle" #tMG10 

Before we kick back off, an amazing cover of Trembling Blue Stars' Sometimes I Still Feel The Bruise #tMG10 

#tMG10 5: There Will Be No Divorce "If I ever want to drive myself insane, all I have to do is watch you breathing" 

#tMG10 4: A room full of people singing "Hail Satan" to The Best Ever Death Metal Band In Denton is the most fun thing 

#tMG10 3: How beautiful can a song about 2 alcoholics called International Small Arms Traffic Blues be? This beautiful 

#tMG10 2: The 1st @mountain_goats track I ever heard, from the stunning Tallahassee LP, the other Big Hit, No Children 

The #tMG10 #1 was also #1 in my list of my all-time favourite tracks so if you know me & if you've been paying attention this will be no surprise.

#tMG10 1: From the opening "She came in on the red-eye to Dallas Fort Worth" Color In Your Cheeks = shivers down my spine 

So there you go, my (current) top 10 @mountain_goats songs. Just have to thank @eifion for being a 4AD nut & buying Tallahassee in 2002.

Matt's written a new blog post - that must mean he's made another list...

Yes, you guessed it, another Twitter-inspired list. Books this time.

I think over the years I've mistaken reading a lot for being well-read seeing as how I appear to have read very few acknowledged classics. 

I stuck to novels, meaning Julian Cope's Head On/Repossessed autobiography missed out, and also left out children's books, meaning Dr Seuss's Green Eggs And Ham is sadly ignored.

I did consider including Graphic Novels just so that I could put Art Spiegelman's Maus in there, but decided against it.

So here it is, a list of 15 books that I like. Comments just copied from the original tweets...



15 DBC Pierre - Vernon God Little. Bought on a whim for a holiday read and was blown away. By the book, the weather was fine.

14 Patrick Süskind - Perfume: The Story Of A Murder. You wouldn't think a story about smells would work so perfectly.

13 Haruki Murakami - Norwegian Wood. Maybe I was just swayed by the fancy edition I had but I'm pretty sure it was the story.

12 Mark Haddon - The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time. Ingeniously written. I love a concept like this...

11 Kurt Vonnegut - Slaughterhouse-Five. You know this surely?

10 Iain Banks - The Wasp Factory. Even though I guessed the ending I still loved it. Should really read more of his.

9 Nick Hornby - High Fidelity. From back when music lists didn't give me a cold sweat! Need to re-read to reignite the spark.

8 Donna Tartt - The Secret History. A murder mystery where they tell you the ending at the start. Brilliantly written.

7 Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett - Good Omens. I love Pratchett but here Gaiman brings out the best in him.

6 Douglas Coupland - Microserfs. Coupland tends to disappoint me, especially recently, but this one's a peach.

5 JD Salinger - The Catcher In The Rye. An obvious one I guess. I read it at the right age, which I'm sure helps.

4 Jonathan Safran Foer - Everything Is Illuminated. This book is so clever, so thoughtful, so happy/sad, so funny. Perfect.

3 Irvine Welsh - Trainspotting. I remember cramming this in before I saw the film. Wasn't a problem - couldn't put it down.

2 Douglas Adams - The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy. Laugh-out-loud funny and SO FAR ahead of its time. Genius.

1 Harper Lee - To Kill A Mockingbird. The only thing that made O level EngLit bearable. Really haven't got the words for it.

The mother of all lists

I'll be honest with you, I'm sick of lists. This will be a temporary thing obviously, but right now if I didn't see another list for a month or two I'd be quite happy.

The reason for all this list-hate is, slightly paradoxically I guess, a big-ass list that has taken up a lot of my time for the past month. 

You may have seen from my previous 2 posts that I compiled a list of my top 50 albums as part of a "thing" that a bunch of my "friends" on Twitter were doing. 

There was only one rule for those compiling lists, and that was that a maximum of 3 albums per artist were allowed in your list. Pretty much anything else was fair game - live albums, compilations (although the majority of people shied away from best-ofs). Some people took it upon themselves to limit themselves further to the extent that they only allowed themselves 1 album per act. I did this myself and found that it made for a more varied list - you would have had more Mountain Goats, Pixies, Pavement, Prince, Teenage Fanclub etc otherwise.

So fool that I am, I went and volunteered to compile everyone's lists into one big list and post the results. Now, I did this last summer on a much smaller scale for a few people's lists of favourite songs. It was during the time when MrsJ was working 4 nights a week so I had a lot more time to myself of an evening. This time it got a bit out of hand.

We ended up with 40 people submitting lists, and by that stage I was ruing the fact that my spreadsheet skills aren't on a par with my nun-chuck skills. I gave points to each album/artist depending on their position in people's lists - 50pts for first place down to 1pt for 50th place.

And, after much hard work, I did it. It hurt a lot, but I did it. I'm going to post a link to it in a minute so you can see it in all its glory, but here's a quick preview.

The most popular artists ended up looking like this...

...and the top 30 albums were...

I had 6 of those artists & 3 of the albums in my list, so maybe I'm not as mainstream as I tend to think I am.

Anyway, here's the link to the big spreadsheet for you peruse at your leisure. Just don't ask me to do it again.