My Bloody Valentine - Don't Ask Why

An atypical MBV tune, especially for their later years - it's almost minimalist, with unusually prominent vocals and some of their most heartfelt lyrics ever. That line, from the look in your face, I believe it's not too late, that gets me EVERY time.

I'd rank this in my top five MBV songs ever, actually.  Probably top three in fact.

Engine No. 9 - Waterfall

Great b-side to a 1991 Bus Stop 7" - the only Engine No. 9 release ever, although half of them went on to become Fudge (who I never particularly rated). It's a bit more serious and less twee than a lot of what Bus Stop put out, in fact I think it's just a tiny bit overwrought, but mostly as affecting as it tries to be. Actually it sort of reminds me of McCarthy with an American indie-rock accent.

Peru - Clueless

East Midlands band who appeared on a couple compilations and a split 7" in the early '90s, disappeared for yonks and then resurfaced a couple years ago sounding like they'd never gone away at all. Which is always nice. You can get this one on their Across Blue Skies compilation on Jigsaw.

Ash - Girl From Mars

Hadn't heard this for ages but it was on when I went into the shop today and it knocked my socks off all over again. Radio friendly alternapop just doesn't get much better than this.

From 1977, from 1996.

Bunnygrunt - Favorite Food

Lo-fi punkish twee from St Louis, Missouri. I never saw Bunnygrunt, but listening to this makes me flash back to a million gigs in people's garages during my US East Coast visits of the mid-1990s. Anyway, haven't they got one of the best names ever?

From a 1993 EP, Standing Hampton.

Girl of the World - 5 Years Old

1993 single from a pre-Cat's Miaow band of Bart and Cameron. I think it's almost got a bit of a Britpop tinge to it. They went on to better things.

Ultra Vivid Scene - Guilty Pleasure

Track from the second UVS album, Joy 1967-1990. It's a bit overproduced - some would argue that's par for the course on this record - but catchy enough you stop noticing after a while.

They Go Boom!! - Everything is Weird

A rare Bring On Bull foray into synthy music. TGB's music actually did have much in common with the type of bands that label was better known for; it was only the instruments they played it on that made them different.

This is actually the least twee song on this 1993 EP. And ironically I also think it's the best.

Honeybunch - I Won't Stand In Your Way

A track that never made it onto any proper Honeybunch release, and only saw the light on their compilation album Time Trials 1987-1995. It says something about the quality of a band when even their outtakes are this good. True, it's not really a patch on their previous entry at this blog (here), but then there aren't many songs anywhere that reach those heights. This one is perfectly charming in its own right.

Pencil Tin - Friday

Side project of Bart Cummings from the Cat's Miaow and Robert Cooper from the Sugargliders and Earthmen. Their only 12" release was the album A Gentle Hand to Guide You Along, put out by Bus Stop in 1996 though it had been recorded two years earlier.

This is one of Robert's songs, a gorgeous and very Sarah-esque track.

Boo Radleys - Skyscraper

Boos posts are always popular round these parts so here's another one from my favourite album of theirs, Everything's Alright Forever. It's kind of just a straightforward album track, but it shows the quality of their songwriting at the time that they could come up with album tracks as solid as this one, which certainly wasn't the case for a lot of their contemporaries in shoegazeville. As with so much on this album, it's mostly about the way they get everything right in terms of arrangement, soundscaping, and letting the music take the lead where it matters instead of throwing in totally unnecessary words just for the sake of it.

From 1992.

Crystal Garden - Heaven's Kiss

Apologies for my no-show yesterday folks. I was suffering from Irish Sunstroke, a widespread affliction on this island in which the rare occurrence of a warm sunny day renders the population absolutely physically incapable of sticking to usual schedules or obligations. Seriously, it's like a spell of mass hysteria gripping the nation.

I'm over it now.

So anyway, here's a track from a 1993 Waaah! 7". It was something of a clever marketing ploy by Bring On Bull Records, putting the (relatively) well-known Orchids on the cover to make it look like a new Orchids single when the b-sides were actually by two different bands: Bouquet and this lot whom I know absolutely nothing about. Theirs is actually my favourite track on the record, though, a nice little bit of lo-fi twee pop with delightful boy-girl vocals and possibly the worst drum machine ever.

My Bloody Valentine - Honey Power

The title kind of makes me cringe now (weren't there just way too many indie songs about honey and sugar and all that back in the day?) but apart from that, this is a great song. It's from the 1991 Tremolo EP but I think it's more in the vein of earlier MBV, which I, apparently alone in all the universe, prefer to their final couple years. Not early early MBV of course, who were shit.

Oporto - Actors Studio

A short-lived band formed by Andy Davies after the Cudgels' split. As far as I know the French Blue 7", to which this was the opening track, was their only release; it came out in 1994 on Sunday Records. Twee pop fans will want to get it though to be honest I don't think it's up there with the best recordings on the Cudgels family tree.

The Charlatans - Just When You're Thinking Things Over

I pretty much lost interest in the Charlatans after their debut album but this song, from their (self-titled) fourth, was nearly as good as their early material. It does the same kind of Stones-to-a-'90s-dancebeat thing that Primal Scream are so well known for, but without the self-importance that ruins the latter band for me.

From 1995.

Voice of the Beehive - Monsters and Angels

Voice of the Beehive's debut album was a hit-and-miss affair, but its high points were, really, quite fabulous. The audaciously-titled follow-up, Honey Lingers, was inferior in terms of both the number and, erm, height of its own "high points": there's really only a couple of worthwhile tracks on it, and if they never existed you wouldn't really miss them. In fact, you could pretty much turn it off after this song - the first on the album - which would be a keeper for its opening couplet alone.

From 1991, though still seems stubbornly stuck in the '80s.

Space - Female of the Species

Ha. Remember this one? Back in the day - 1996, to be precise - this song was, like, humongous. It was everybody's favourite song for a while, lavishly praised by the critics, a guaranteed dance floor filler notwithstanding that it was really quite difficult to dance to. I was thoroughly sick of it within weeks.

Watching this video now in retrospect, a few things strike me:

1. Who on earth cleared this video for release? It's appalling.

2. They had the most uncharismatic lead singer I've ever seen.

3. Their "fashion" sense. Oh my.

4. Still, it really was quite a catchy - and clever - little tune.

It appeared on their debut album, Spiders, which you can safely skip.

Belly - Dusted

This is an album track (from their debut, Star) but a slightly different version preceded it on EP and was really the start of Tanya Donelly's "solo" career. As someone who always thought she was wasted in Throwing Muses, I snapped it up and fell in love with it instantaneously. And it still kicks my ass almost twenty years later.

One fucking great song.

Eggstone - Hang On To Your Eco

I seem to have been posting a lot of Swedish indiepop lately but, well, why not. Eggstone were around in the 1980s and '90s and put out three albums, which I'm told were fairly successful in Sweden although they didn't make much of a dent in this part of the world. I'm not sure they really deserved much more than they achieved, but they did have their moments.

This is a track from their second album, 1994's Somersault.

See See Rider - Rosey Singer

B-side from this East Kilbride band's 1991 Stolen Heart EP. It's good enough to be a single in its own right, if not as enthralling as the EP's title track (which I've already posted, here). Really wish they'd stuck around a bit longer.