Sunday 26 January 2014

From Another Side #3A ( Sydney ) & #3B ( Melbourne )

Because so much potential follow up stuff came out of Sideroom 7" Singles #119 I decided to break this edition of From Another Side into two halves - one from Sydney & one from Melbourne.

From Another Side #3A ( Sydney ) 
  • Don't Slow Down - Love Positions
    The Garden - Love Positions
    Trespassers - Skolars
    City View - The Pranksters
    Crystal Palace - The Tripps
    It's Like A Zoo - The Tripps
    Another World - Skolars
    Sick - The Honeys
    Time Of Our Lives - Skolars
    Love Of Loves - The Singles
    Dave's Song - Fast Cars
    No Love Today - Fast Cars
    Can't Find Things - Fast Cars
    Pretty Pretty - Skolars
    She's Just Not Anybody - Division 4
    Brightside - Spy vs Spy
    Never Be Your Man - The Personnel
    No Room For Happiness - Skolars
    Take Me When You Go - Fiction Romance
    Young and Liberal - Skolars
    Telefone - Surprise Surprise
    If You Break It - Moving Parts
    Dress Up Picasso - Moving Parts
    Heart Of Darkness - Moving Parts
    Tell Me Why - Moving Parts
    People Laughing - The Products

From Another Side #3A - hear it

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From Another Side #3B ( Melbourne )
  • 2 People Per Sq KM - Models
    Pate Pedestrian - Models
    Local &/or General ( UK vers ) - Models
    Bantam Had ( Aus album vers ) - Models
    Two Cabs To The Toucan ( Cut Lunch vers ) - Models
    Two Cabs To The Toucan
    ( UK vers ) - Models
    Atlantic Romantic ( Cut Lunch ver ) - Models
    Atlantic Romantic
    ( UK vers ) - Models
    Man O'Action ( Cut Lunch vers )- Models
    Man O'Action
    ( UK vers ) - Models
    Tearing Hair Out
    ( UK vers ) - Models
    I Walk Away ( 12" Extended Mix ) - Split Enz
    Doctor Love - Split Enz
    Great Wall ( Extended Version ) - Boom Crash Opera
    Things - Serious Young Insects
    radio interview 2JJJ, 1981 - Serious Young Insects
    Nerve - Serious Young Insects
    Music To Watch Girls By -
    Serious Young Insects
    On Time -
    Serious Young Insects
    Unsafe -
    Serious Young Insects
    Trouble Understanding Words -
    Serious Young Insects
    Lowdown - Paul Kelly & The Dots
    Promise Not To Tell -
    Paul Kelly & The Dots
    Seeing Is Believing -
    Paul Kelly & The Dots
    Hard Knocks -
    Paul Kelly & The Dots
    Is Nothing Sacred ( live ) - Sacred Cowboys
From Another Side #3B - hear it

3A "Sydney" - 


This one is mostly being driven by Skolars tracks from various eras ( and associated bands ) - ie the Waterfront / Method Records eras. 

But before that we start with Love Positions..


The single "Light Of Day" kicked off #119 so we start here with 2 songs from the ( red vinyl as you can see ) "Billiepeebup" album from Love Positions, both featuring Robyn ( St Clare - late of The Hummingbirds ) singing ( the others feature Nic Dalton's vocals ). If there wasn't so much more to play in this edition, and so little time , I would have dragged out some Hummingbirds, them having already featured a lot on the Singles blog. I will save that for another day on this blog...


Then one of my favourite Skolars songs "Trespassers", from the "On The Waterfront" compilation . This Mini-LP has 2 songs each from The Tripps, The Pranksters, Love Minus Zero & The Skolars. In a lot of ways one of the reasons I started this blog was to be able to play songs like Trespassers, awesome yet not on 7" and thus it would never appear on the 7" Singles blog. So here it is today. Also played from the comp are "City View" by The Pranksters & "Crystal Palace" from The Tripps ( perhaps an ahead of it's time tribute to Mile Jedinak - ha ha ).


"Like a Zoo" from The Tripps is the other side of the "Sometime Today" single feature on #119. And speaking of The Pranksters way way back in the past on #17 we heard their single called "Living Edge" ( also on Waterfront ).

Still in the Waterfront era we then have a Skolars ep called "Next To The Oyster", and "Another World", we actually heard another song "Hammer In The Nails" from this ep on #97 as part of a sub-plot there called "The Rescued 12's", a concept I guess which is now hereby nullified by the existence of this blog.



Then, staying in 'great Waterfront bands' mode, we've got "Sick", a Honeys b-side, the other side of "The Man Who Was Through With The World", which was played on #71.

Then it's one more Skolars Waterfront thing ( for this episode that is ) - "Time Of Our Lives", from a double A side 7", the other side being "Love Of Loves"....

...which was a cover version by The Skolars ( see #17 )and originally a single by Sydney band The Singles - and as odd as this may seem I don't have a copy of that original 7" version of "Love Of Loves"...despite being able to somehow trudge through the piles in my room and find a million other original releases from this era I have to admit failure on that particular 7"...I will just have to live on with the disgrace. However....last year a compilation of singles, demos and live stuff from The Singles was released called "Use It For Yourself", which you can buy direct from the label - Off The Hip Records.

For now that song is a way to bridge us back in time to the earlier Method Records era for The Skolars ( and friends ).


The numero uno starting point for this new part of the journey would indeed have to be Fast Cars, firstly because band member Fabian Byrne ran Method Records ( along with the legendary figure Doug(ie) Lee  ). Secondly because the band were pretty much one of the centrifuges of the Sussex Hotel "Mod" Sydney scene of the time.


This ties with a bunch of tracks on the mix from the Method Records compilation "Sound Of Sydney Volume 1".

We start this section with "Dave's Song" by Fast Cars ( referring to band member David Pye ). This was originally on a live cassette ( called "Fast Cars" ), but later on vinyl on the b-side of the "Love Child" single ( that's the spunky blue 7" shown above ) ( see #29 ). Then we have "No Love Today" from the other side of the "Saturday's Girl" single ( see also #13 ). Then it's "Can't Find Things" a track from the 12" Ep "Annual",produced by Martin Plaza. Another track from this Ep "No No" is on "Sound of Sydney Vol 1" ( as is Saturday's Girl ).

At this point I'd like to present for your edification some info from that album regarding the recording info / release dates of various tracks on the album.

 

Then just to be contrary and possibly to test if you're paying attention, I then chose "Pretty Pretty" from The Skolars, a single not on this comp - though on Sound Of Sydney Vol 2. The other single shown in the photo is "Something Should Be Done", see #72 if you're busting to hear it, this IS on Sound Of Sydney Vol 1 ( and was also a giveaway single with the comp ). This is when the band was "totally ska" - ska being another major component of the Sydney scene of the time.

Getting back to the Sounds of Sydney Vol 1 comp, other tracks from there today are Division 4 with one of the sides of their only single ( not on Method by the way ) ( and another one of my failures / disgraces in that I didn't buy a copy of this at the time for some reason, which I now regret of course )... then we have early Spy vs Spy ( also not on Method, rather on Green Records at this point ). "Brightside" ( sic ) was originally released on the "Four Fresh Lemons" 12 Ep. Also on the comp is "Do What You Say" their earlier 7" single ( see #110 for that one ).

Another on the comp is "Never Be Your Man" by The Personnel, this is the a-side of their single ( yep, on Method ), earlier on #99 I played "Working Day Song" so here's the a-side ( complete with a jump...sorry about that ). Although we will return to this comp and it's era a bit later ( via Moving Parts and The Products ), we now move forward a bit in the Method Records timeline...

"No Room For Happiness" was a 1985 single for The Skolars.

A year earlier in 1984 Fabian Byrne was in a new ( post Fast Cars ) band called Fiction Romance and they released their 1st single "All Of This Is New"  - listen on #104 if you're interested.




Leap ahead to 1987 for the Fiction Romance album called "Marching Orders" - "Take Me When You Go" is from that. 

Then we have 2 b-sides from tracks played on #119 - late late late era Skolars with 'Young & Liberal" the b-side of "Where Is She" ( not on Method ) and also "Telefone" from Surprise Surprise ( on Method, 1985 ) the other side of "Cried All My Tears".


Then we whizz back to the Sussex Hotel era, firstly from Moving Parts ( ie the Sydney band not the US band of course ).

"Dress Up Picasso" was an unreleased track - at that stage anyway - on "Sound Of Sydney Vol 1"

"If You Break It" was one of 3 songs on their debut indie ep ( see also #68 ).


Then we have the two songs from the b-side of the legendary "Living China Doll" ( as heard on #1 back where this whole thang began for my blogs ) - the songs are "Heart Of Darkness" and "Tell Me Why".


Finally today in our disjointed look at Method Records we have MR-1, at least the b-side "People Laughing" by The Products which was pre-Fast Cars short lived project of Fabian Byrne ( he and Richard Mann ), "Powerplant" is the a-side of this and you can listen that on #25.



That wraps up our Sydney half...now over to the Melbourne half.


3B "Melbourne"


This one is mostly to do with various Models songs - mostly because on #119 we had the appearance of the single of Local &/Or General with 2 different releases ( Australian and UK )and I thought I'd compare the differences between the singles and some album tracks between the UK the Australian releases.


Again just to confuse you / throw the cat amongst the pigeons I thought I'd start  with a couple of songs from the album before Local &/or General - ie "Alphabravocharliedeltaechofoxtrotgolf" - We'll look into other periods for the band ( ie later and earlier ) in the future here (  I know there are singles from both eras coming up in the Singles blog ).

First up is a "promo only" 12" from the album, of "Two People Per Sq Km", it was "promo only" because the band wanted the album to be a "no singles" album - so this "radio stations only promo" was a compromise with the label I suggest. "Uncontrollable Boy" and "Young Rodents" from the LP are also on this 12".



Then it's "Pate Pedestrian" from the album ( which would have also made a great single ). The band at this point was Kelly / Duffield / Ferrie / Freidenfelds ( aka Johnny Crash ).




Then it's onto Local &/Or General......over on the Singles blog #119 we had 2 different copies of this song, the Aussie and Uk 7" singles of the title track. Over on that blog I played the Aussie a-side ( Local &/or General ) and the UK b-side of the same song "Bantam Had". Here they are reversed....ie we have the UK version of Local &/Or General and the original Aussie album mix of Bantam Had.


The UK album is different from the Aussie one via a changed tracklisting and it is a total remix / re-recording in some cases. Although originally recorded in the UK for Mushroom with producer Steven Tayler, A&M in the UK had it remixed and reversioned with Steve Brown. The band at this point was Kelly / Duffield / Ferrie / Stiggs.


There's a few songs totally remade for the UK LP which were originally on the Australian Cut Lunch 10" Mini LP.

The different versions are herein contained ( including the orig Atlantic Romantic" which was produced by Eddie Rayner ).

To close up the Models set I chose "Tearing Hair Out", which seems to predict the direction the band would next take....that side of their story to be continued at some later time...

Next up Split Enz, following on from the 7 version of "I Walk Away" on #119 - I thought I'd dig up the 12" Extended version ( a rare concept for the Enz ) - including the b-side 'Doctor Love", the funkiest I've ever heard Split Enz.


Another follow up from #119 is Boom Crash Opera, over there we heard the 7" of "Hands Up In The Air", an extended version does exist of that ( but I don't have it ), so I thought I'd dig out the 12" version of "Great Wall" - I don't have a 7" of Great Wall either, so a good excuse to play the 12. 

Then we move onto to a connected band...

the short lived but much lauded Serious Young Insects, firstly with "Things" from their ( only ) album "Housebreaking".

Then we have a radio interview with the band and the legendary Virginia Moncrieff on 2JJJ, circa 1981. Recorded on the much maligned "G-Tape" cassette brand ( pictured below ), often criticised yet the tape still plays perfectly. Incidentally on the other side of this cassette is an interview with Wild West which will also get a replay here one day soon.

Songs today are -

"Nerve" - on the album and b-side to "Be Patient" ( see #110 )

"Music To Watch Girls By" and "Unsafe" b-side to "Faraway Places" ( listen at #101 )

"On Time" - b side to 7" of "Trouble Understanding Words" - the a side was featured on #85, by all means listen there but the song is also featured again today, this time from a radio promo 12", I chose to play it again today because the 12" pressing is better quality than my slightly scratchy and well loved 7". ( This 12" has the one song on it,  a side = stereo version, b side = mono version in case you were curious ).


Then we move onto Paul Kelly in the "and the Dots" era. The single of "Lowdown" came up on #119, but as I mentioned there the a-side has a dirty big scratch on it, so I played the b-side "Want You Back"...knowing I had the "Talk" album and that Lowdown was on that ( with no scratch )...hence here we are today with Lowdown...also on the album is "Promise Not To Tell" and "Hard Knocks", although I in fact played Hard Knocks from the b-side of "Billy Baxter" ( see #86 ) and to tie up this era we have "Seeing Is Believing" a non album single. Although Paul Kelly himself seems to disown this album ( and Manilla, the follow up ) here we go today playing it....oh well. By the way there WILL be some Manilla stuff later in the year when the "Clean This House" single pops up on the Singles blog - which it will - and then some Manilla stuff on here.

Finally closing up today's double whammy with a live version of "Is Nothing Sacred", a live to tape version on Fast Forward Cassette Mag #13.

Hope that's enough for you for now !!!!!!!!