» Listings for 2024

1. 2023/4 Albums Thing 379 - Teardrop Explodes “Wilder”

   Posted on 9:30am Tuesday 16th Jul 2024

   Dave Balfe once said of the Teardrop Explodes “we sounded like Vikings on acid fronted by a lunatic” and I can’t think of a better description than that. Everybody’s drug intake, a fraught US tour and Cope leaning more heavily on Balfe as his main creative foil (even though all songs are credited to just Julian Cope) saw a shift in sound on “Wilder” and ultimately the end of the Teardrop Explodes.

   Lead single “Passionate Friend” suggested that “Wilder” would be a natural follow on from “Klimanjaro” but this turned out to be the only track on the album to feature the full touring version of the band. The sound here isn’t as upbeat as previously, many songs feature little or, at times, no guitars and there were songs just made up from Cope’s vocal and a synthesizer.

   “Bent Out Of Shape” starts proceedings. It has all the ingredients of the Teardrops with Cope’s strident vocals and the horns in the refrain. It doesn’t have the urgency of previous Teardrops but some life is injected next by “Colours Fly Away”. The guitars are back alongside the horns coupled with Gary Dwyers driving beats in the verses. The real highlight on Side 1 is final track “The Culture Bunker”, a song which name-checks the Crucial Three and is one of the Teardrops very best.

   Side 2 begins with “Passionate Friend” which comes on like a direct descendant of “Kilimanjaro”. “Tiny Children” is like a lullaby sung by a child, a distant relative of Bowie’s childlike songs, and is followed by the warped Psychedelic Funk of “Like Leila Khaled Said” (she was a Palestinian militant and activist). Which leads us to the final two songs, firstly the beautiful “…and The Fighting Takes Over”, just Julian Cope crooning over a hugely chorused and imperfectly played electric guitar, occasionally joined by a trumpet, it’s quite lovely. In a parallel universe “The Great Dominions” would be revered as and end of the night, lighters in the air stadium anthem, but this is the Teardrop Explodes instead. It’s the perfect end on a high to this musically confused album.

   “Wilder” isn’t a bad record but it’s obviously a band who don’t really know in which direction to jump. Whatever the makeup of the musical backdrop there are some great songs on “Wilder”, “The Culture Bunker”, “…and The Fighting Takes Over” and the closing “The Great Dominions” are all top notch stuff and “Passionate Friend” gave them their final Top 40 hit. After some fractious recording sessions for a third album and a disastrous UK tour with no band but lots of synths and backing tapes the Teardrop Explodes, well, exploded. It set Julian Cope off on a a fascinating career path, including records, books and a life as an antiquarian which I’ve followed ever since. He really is a treasure.

   The Great Dominions - https://youtu.be/S09LrFyP4lE?si=k5IQGMoUKlqgOF52

2. 2023/4 Albums Thing 378 - Teardrop Explodes “Kilimanjaro”

   Posted on 9:20am Saturday 13th Jul 2024

   OK, now we’ve cleared up those waifs and strays let’s get back on track…I’d like to talk to you about the letter T…

   The Teardrop Explodes are one branch that grew out of legendary Liverpool band The Crucial Three. That brief supergroup, before any of them were famous, consisted of Liverpool natives Ian McCulloch and Pete Wylie along with a student from Tamworth in the Midlands, Julian Cope. Just those 3 ego’s in the same room must have been trouble. The one song that I know came out of that formidable trio is “Books”, as it is titled on this album, or “Read It In Books” as it was on the B-side of Echo & The Bunnymen’s 1979 single “Pictures On My Wall”. There are stylistic threads twixt the Bunnymen and the Teardrops, hints of sixties psychedelia and Scott Walker about both, but nothing that would make you think they sounded just like each other.

   The Teardrop Explodes, the name was taken from a caption on a panel in the Marvel comic Daredevil (#77), formed around Cope and drummer Gary Dwyer. They very quickly came to the attention of Zoo Records, a Liverpool Indie run by Dave Balfe (who joined the band on keyboards) and another mighty ego, Bill Drummond (KLF and all that malarkey). Three singles were released on Zoo, “Sleeping Gas”, “Bouncing Babies” (which inspired the tribute single “I Can’t Get Bouncing Babies By The Teardrop Explodes” by The Freshies telling of the difficulty in trying to obtain a copy) and “Treason”. All three appear on “Kilimanjaro”, the first two in re-recorded form and the latter as it was released in the single and that was the first thing I heard by the Teardrop Explodes, beginning a 5 decade long (!!!) fascination with Julian Cope.

   “Treason” is 3 minutes of jangly pop perfection driven along by Balfe’s whiny keyboards and Cope’s singa -longa Julian chorus. New record company Mercury weren’t stupid, they re-issued it as the Teardrops third single for them and were rewarded with a Top 20 hit (#18 in May 1981). This was their 2nd hit as earlier in 1981 “Reward” had hit the dizzy heights of #6 in the UK chart, Cope’s opening line of “Bless my cotton socks I’m in the news” proving quite prophetic. Driven on by Balfe’s relentless drumming and a frantic horn section “Reward” proved a dancefloor filler across the land. Surprisingly it’s not on the original release of “Kilimanjaro” but was shoehorned onto the 1981 re-issue.

   Me and my dear old friend Mick saw the Teardrop Explodes at Birmingham Odeon in the summer of 1981, right between the release of “Kilimanjaro” and their next album “Wilder”. It’s one that has stuck with me. It was a warm day (you could rely on summer days back then) and Julian Cope spent the entire gig swathed in his rather impressive WWII brown leather, sheepskin lined fighter pilots jacket, he must have been melting ! They were bloody great too…

   Over their 2 albums the Teardrop Explodes enjoyed a very brief moment in the sun as proper pop stars but it wasn’t to last. Fall outs, musical differences and most likely drugs put a very quick end to them and Cope went on to forge his own way, making some mighty fine if slightly wacky records along the way.

   Books - https://youtu.be/cl0IM1biOKM?si=AMRcuS2R1C7_ZTwB

3. 2023/4 Albums Thing 377 - First Aid Kit “Stay Gold”

   Posted on 10:00am Friday 12th Jul 2024

   You may recall I’m something of an admirer of the angelically voiced Emmylou Harris. It came to my attention some months  ago that a duo known as First Aid Kit had released a song called “Emmylou”. I had a listen, liked it, made a mental note to look into them some more and promptly forgot to. Then one recent sunny Sunday afternoon in the pub (all the best things happen at the pub, right ?) one of our number was playing some tunes in the beer garden through a Bluetooth speaker when some voices and a tune caught my ear. On enquiring as to its source I was told it was First Aid Kit singing “My Silver Lining”. Remembering my previous mental note to discover more about them I went straight online and ordered this album on which said song  features as the all important track 1 side 1.

   First Aid Kit are two singing sisters, Johanna and Klara Söderberg, who sing “Country” music. And so the clue to their unique selling point lies in their names, for Johanna and Klara are singing sisters from Sweden who sing “Country” music…I’ve put “Country” in quote markes as it’s Country Jim, but not as we know it, filtered through Swedish Folk and pop music and Country Rock. Their Dad, Benkt Söderberg, was a member of successful Swedish rock/pop group Lolita Pop, imagine Roxette but Swedish with song titles like “Tarzan On A Big Red Scooter” ! The sisters discovered Emmylou Harris and Gram Parsons in their mid-teens and it had quite the effect on them both. They harmonise beautifully with voices that are harsher than the sweetness of Emmylou, it is however a beguiling sound their two voices create together.

   “Stay Gold” was their 3rd album, originally released in 2014. It’s very much influenced by the Emmylou Harris of “Wrecking Ball” and “Red Dirt Girl”, it’s country music alright but this ain’t stories of Cowboys and Trucks and Rodeo’s. I guess it is what was known for a while as alt.country, the basics of the style are there with great harmony singing, lap steel guitars etc. but the lyrics mention New York and Chicago which really isn’t Country territory. Standout songs include the already mentioned “Silver Lining”, “Cedar Lane”, “The Bell” and “Waitress Song”. I promise I will now listen deeper into their releases (5 albums so far) so you might well encounter them on here again in the future.

   My Silver Lining - https://youtu.be/DKL4X0PZz7M?si=kB3JqLjJDxdQH-JM