Jemblog

More Dion and why not

The Guardian has a "Music's Secret Weapons" list this week (ie: 49 movers and shakers talk about their favourite "hidden gems". I won't get round to entering the competition to win £500 and write No.50. Anyhow Sean Rowley has already bagged mine. The genius that is Born to be With You from Dion. Still makes me weep every time.

If singers employed the Lee Strasberg method Dion would have been Brando. To inhabit a song is a gift given to few performers, and for me Dion is the master. This was produced by Phil Spector and its shadow looms across contemporary music from Spiritualized to Primal Scream. As for me and my humble opinion, the greatest singer joined the greatest producer in the studio and made the greatest record ever.

Get well soon Edwyn.

Edwyn - Hope you're ok soon.

UPDATE (Mar 30): He's starting to recover.

Magic Numbers/St Etienne Brighton

Saw the Brigton St Etienne/Magic Numbers warm up for their Shepherds Bush NY Eve gig.
Missed the start of Magic Numbers cos we were in Burger King but when we got there I took this rubbish picture that spookily whites out their faces (like the cartoon thing) from about 20 rows back. St Etienne did a great cover/encore of The Zombies; 'This will be our year" with Magic Numbers supplying fine backing harmonies.

The Field Mice

Oh how I loved the Field Mice. In January 2005, their entire back catalogue (including flexis and assorted compiliation gubbins) is being reissued on 3 CDS (4 discs) on LTM records. Alastair Fitchett (Tangents, Unpopular) has done a lengthy biography.
Sensitive. That was the one.

Timi Yuro - What's a matter baby?

(Another thing i first did for Fiddlesticks but now with new added 'hyperlinks'.

I've waited by the phone and they never fucking call, I've lied (to myself over and over), I've searched through their stuff, I've cried so much after saying goodbye once that a policeman asked me if i was alright. Just don't fall in love with girls who live with their boyfriends. It made me ill. It made me make dozens of compilation tapes for her that I hoped would convey my frail condition through old Sea Urchins singles. Ok I was 19. What's a boy to do? The aftermath of affairs is the subject of this amazing 39 year old r'n'b single and I stuffed this one on several of my efforts probably between Patsy Cline and Brenda Lee (What is it with me and tiny young women that can belt out a soulful ballad) hoping she might get the picture. To be honest I'd hoped she'd burst into tears. 2 minutes of anguished howls, contemptious laughs, and a spectoresque military drum roll are now par for the course round my way on a friday night but it was the astonishing voice that got me back then. The old Dusty/Elvis/er, Rick Astley cliche that 'everyone thought she was black" was inevitably pinned on a young Rosemarie Timotea Aurro (Timi was her childhood nickname and Yuro cos its easier to spell) when she first surfaced but she had to throw a hissy fit before her clueless record company rescued her from the MOR lounge circuit and 'What's a matter baby? was one of the rare times she was handed material that did her justice.
Her usual producer had done a bunk and it really is fellow teen Phil Spector in the studio compressing the orchestration to death and maximising that pained soul voice. Timi's ex boyfriend has been crying. His current girl has finally left him having cheated on him for months so he's wanting the seceptical Timi back. Not likely says Timi who reveals that she too has found a man and wishes it to be know that ' ..My hurting is just about over' but 'its just starting for you'. And she's not very sorry at all. I married the girl who lived with the boyfriend (she left him) and we lived happily ever after. She didn't actually play most of the tapes I sent her in
the end (too painful, too rubbish) So its true that like Timi.. my/our hurting is just about over. The evil thing is every time I used to listen to this I pictured the hurting that was just starting for her ex lover and a big grin broke out on my face. And thats why I'll always love this record. The most romantic single ever made. For keeps.

Born to be with you - Dion

(I wrote this for Fiddlesticks a while ago and just found it again and added in a few explanatory bits of hypertextery) 

       It starts with some great humming, v. big drums, swirling cowboy twang and ends with ex herion addict Dion DiMucci pleading "yeah its true". I only heard this for the first time today (Nov 2001) and I'm listening to it for the fifteenth time in a row. 'Born to be with you' is one of the most glorious singles ever made.

10 guitar players, Hal Blaine *and* another 2 drummers, Phil Spector wasn't messing around when he asked to record with boyhood hero Dion. 7 minute epics, horns, choirs and sobbing throughout. Of course. And as is usually the case with the poor fella post 1967. Nobody got it. Warners refused to release it. Dion never spoke to him again and that was
about it for Phil. Apart from The Ramones. Which doesn't count.

I don't know why I'd never encountered this single/album until now. I'd always sneakily liked Dion's 50s teen hits like Runaround Sue, and start playing the Christmas album (sorry "A Christmas Gift for you" - Various Artists) from November onwards every year boring my Dad with the usual geek/mojo anecodote about 'It didn't sell because JFK was shot on the day of release you know.'

And according to Sean Rowleys excellent fan sleevenotes from the 1975 albums recent reissue the single has always been one of Bobby Gillespie's faves. Now I've slavishly followed his tastes for years from MC5 to Love even down to some v.dodgy Thin Lizzy singles so I'm amazed I missed out on this. Also as Rowley corectly points out, Spiritualized owe their entire career to this 6 minutes 52 seconds epic. I, er, loved their early stuff and so 10 years too late have finally worked out where they ripped off their take on the Troggs 'Anyway That you Want Me'.

Those trademark strings are making me weep. You're going to love this. I just know it.

Indiepop Vol 1

As I'd hoped/suspected Rough Trade Shops: Indiepop Vol 1 (I finally bought it...horror of horrors from the HMV at Victoria Station) is brilliantly put together with admirable care and love. Sean (from Rough Trade) has compiled just the right set of songs. In my haste I did compile a list of all the stuff missed out only to discover (of course) that he'd been unable to get any of em (that’s you Girls At Our Best). But its full of the bankers (Pristine Christine, All Fall Down, Pooh Sticks), some recent in the spirit ofs (Camera Obscura, Modesty Blaise) and a few didn't feel right until I listened to em again (Lush, A.R Kane, Groove Farm). Although Everett True sums it up with Pop Will Eat itself "I should fucking coco"....
He's tasked the right duo (fighting talk manifestos from The Legend! and Matt Haynes) and a comprehensive supporting cast (Stephen Pastel, Clare Wadd, Steve Drew) to do 32 pages of ludicrously exaggerated sleevenotes claims, name checked the best sources (Twee net, the colossal "Great Indie Discography Vol 2) and written nearly 35 anecdotes himself all better than I 've tried to come up with..

The cd pamphlet *design* is also note perfect. You know the thing. Bad dark photocopies of (mostly old Sarah inner sleeves/fanzines) overlaid by blotchy typewriter type cut out by scissors, stuck on by a Jumbo Pritt stick and scribbled felt tip clarificiations.

For many years I was hoping that someone one would go to the effort of doing this. Thank you very much to all of you from this very old indie boy who cos of listening to and reading this sort of nonsense got out of my bed and actually did stuff. It also made me wander round with that get up over there (see left) for many a year. Ho Ho.