The Cannanes - 1991

The Cannanes were sort of the Australian version of Beat Happening, but better. You've got to love a band that names themselves after one of their members - and keeps the name even when she fucks off after the first album.

This is from their 1994 album "Caveat Emptor" and is one of those songs that you listen to wondering how on earth the lyricist managed to get into your own head.

Voice of the Beehive - The Beat of Love

Come on, what wasn't to like about Voice of the Beehive? Great name, great clothes, fun 'n catchy pop tunes.

Admittedly their lyrics did walk the fine line between clever and stupid, and they didn't really have the songs to sustain an entire album much less the three they actually released. But in moderate doses they could be great craic. Plus I once saw them live, opening for That Petrol Emotion, and they put on such an impressive performance they were called back for two encores. How many opening bands can pull that off?

This is a track from their 1988 debut Let it Bee (another great title - I'm a sucker for great titles!), which was either the first or second album I ever bought on CD.

Chris Knox - Not Given Lightly

I'm overdue for another Flying Nun post and this one is timely, as it was recently announced that a whole slew of indie musicians will be playing a gig in NYC next month to raise money for Chris after his devastating stroke last year. I'd love to go if I was able.

This is his best-known track, either solo or as a Tall Dwarf - and as one of the sweetest love songs ever written, it well deserves to be.

Pop Will Eat Itself - The Black Country Chainsaw Massacreee

I was never a huge fan of the Poppies, even back in their C86ish days. They were always a little too much of a joke band and I didn't think much of their songwriting skills either - most of their material from that era sounds to me like the least interesting B-sides put out by other C86 bands. And anything from 1987 on, forget it.

This one's good though, a track from an early single (I think) which found its way onto the compilation album Now For a Feast, the only PWEI record I ever bought. Or ever will.

Serena-Maneesh - Drive Me Home The Lonely Nights

Here's a cracking little tune by a Norwegian band who were frequently described as shoegazers, although they were more than a decade late for that genre's heyday. Personally I find their MBV-esque material pleasant but not particularly interesting, while this song, which has more of a Delgados-meet-the-Cardigans feel to it, is absobleedinlutely fantastic. Not sure what they're up to these days, if anything.

Happy Easter!

I'll be back after the long weekend...

Strawberry Story - Ashlands Road

When I first heard this band I thought they were Strawberry Switchblade, the 1980s Scottish duo of the delightful "Since Yesterday". They aren't, but the similarity is in more than name: both bands made sweet, sugary pop with angelic (and very very young-sounding) female vocals.

Strawberry Story came from somewhere in the north of England and put out a few singles, mostly in the early '90s. They got back together a couple years ago and released some new material on Cloudberry but I understand they've since split again.

This song appeared on the 1991 compilation The Waaaaah! CD which, if you don't have, you really should.