Hot Press, October 30, 1977

Bibliography   72 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 UK & Ireland weeklies UK & Ireland magazines UK & Ireland newspapers US newspapers US rock magazines US music magazines US magazines US alternative weeklies European magazines European newspapers Canada  •  Mexico  •  Asia Australia  •  New Zealand South America  •  Africa Blogs  •  Fanzines  •  Books Online publications Hot Press   1977 August 19 1977 September 17 1977 October 30 1978 March 30 1979 January 25 1980 February 13 1981 January 24 1981 June 26 1981 July 23 1982 January 22 1982 February 5 1983 June 10 1983 August 19 1983 November 11 1984 July 27 1984 August 10 1984 August 24 1984 September 21 1984 October 5 1984 November 2 1984 December 14 1986 February 27 1986 March 27 1987 July 16 1989 February 23 1989 September 21 1991 April 18 1991 July 25 1991 August 22 1992 March 12 1994 March 9 1994 April 6 1996 July 24 1999 August 4 1999 September 1 2002 April 10 2002 September 5 2004 May 10 2004 October 22 2009 June 3  2010 November 9 2012 May 28 2013 September 5 2015 January 21 2016 July 18   2018 June 24 2018 October 12 2020 July 22  2020 October 30 2021 October 27  2022 January 14 2023 September 8 UK & Ireland magazines  Arena Backhill Bang Bass Player Big Issue Brighton Magazine Buzz Magazine City Life City Limits Classic CD Classic FM Classic Pop Classic Rock Country Music International Cut Dark Star Dazed & Confused Emma Encore Eve Fab 208 The Face Flexipop Folk Roots Fresh GQ Get Rhythm Gramophone Guitar Guitar & Bass Guitarist Hi-Fi News & Record Review Hi-Fi World Hot Press In Dublin International Musician Jamming! Lancet The List Loaded Making Music Marxism Today Midweek Mojo Music Music Maker Music Technology Music & Video, May 1980 Music Week New Manchester Review New Statesman No 1 Noise! Opera Now Penthouse Phaze 1 Punter Q magazine Record Business Record Buyer Record Collector Record Hunter Rhythm Rock On RTÉ Guide Saga Select SFX Shindig The Skinny Songlines Sound International Sound On Sound Spectator Star Monthly Sun Zoom Spark Superpop Studio Sound Time Out Top Of The Pops Total Guitar Tracks TV Times Uncut Vive Le Rock Volume Vox Vulture Hound Waitrose Weekend What's Happening The Wire The Word ZigZag 19 magazine — Come to Stiff country, home of a million hits Hits Greatest Stiffs / Stiff Records Dermot Stokes Wha?! A compilation?! Stiff records, recently affiliated by personnel problems, began last year almost by accident, one little thing following another, building slowly, with the help of commitment, zany advertising, genuinely strange and wonderful talent, and the New Wave explosion, into quite a significant operation. The purpose of this album is not to show how significant, though it does, as a by-product of its content. Basically it's like a retrospective for the year since Nick Lowe's "Heart of the City" launched the enterprise in August 1976, and it contains singles, B-sides and stuff which were released, or not-released-but-should-have-been in that period. All great stuff in its own way, but an acquired taste. Like you're due a couple of blinks if you pop this on after the Eagles, and while a lot of Eagles fans won't, I'd like to think that it's not so absurd as it seems to suggest that they might. Lowe's "Heart" kicks off the album, with a bashing drum intro, and Lowe's Americano vocal and beat group sound. He plays everything except drums. A clever little song (as are most of his) with pisstakes here and there of things you've heard somewhere before — "It's a girl my lord" no, not in a flatback Ford slowing down to take a look at me (that's right, "Take it Easy"). No, this one passes him in the street, so he turns and doubles back (no, chuck, not to see her split in a coffee-coloured Cadillac)... he adds at the end that "a bird in the hand is worth two in the street." Pink Fairies offer "Between The Lines," real amphetamined stuff, arums biff-biffing, and Larry Wallis straining away on voice and guitar. Wallis is the Fairy who survived their break up to stick with Stiff, and who contributed the pretty weird "As Long As The Price Is Right" to the new Feelgood album. Then there's Roogalator's ulllltra sassy "Cincinnati Fatback," lazy and funky, very American and clubby, real rolling music, late night and dirty. And to close side one we have two Tyla Gang songs — "Styrofoam," for me the strangler of the pack, and the less distinctive "Texas Chainsaw Massacre Boogie." "Styrofoam" is a Beefheartian batter, the band chug-chugglin' up behind his gravelwords. "A li'l lady lives in a home / made entirely of styrofoam / styrofoam fireplace / styrofoam logs / styrofoam cats / and styrofoam dogs" Bada-bada-dam, bada bada-dam. "Styrofoam people / styrofoam bodies / styrofoam pencils / styrofoam bath / that li'l lady living in a home / ev'ry damn thing made of styrofoam."... great idea! But he missed out on styrofoam windows / styrofoam doors / styrofoam ethics / styrofoam mores... Hey it's catching... this li'l lady lived on a hill, made entirely of chlorophyl... Side two has "Caravan Man" by Lew Lewis, a bluesy harp song, recorded on a Revox, i.e. a sophisticated but quite orthodox nonstudio tape-recorder, with a strangely powerful and appropriate 1950's Chicago sound. "Help" by the Damned, which is funny once or twice. (very fast, y'know). and ... "You Gotta Lose," by Richard Hell. A cheap sounding guitar enters picking an off time riff, cheap r 'n' b guitar enters alongside, then Hell's demented James Brown's "Yeah!" before the lyric... or is it leer-ic. A bizarre little world wanders across the room from this track... of pinheads, flies, boredom, and Hell's sneering "You gotta lose." Funnily enough, I can't hear it without the feeling that I've heard it before... no, not the lyrics, but the rest. Even down to his vocal... it's like a more gibbering version of Tom Verlaine, and it's related to Patti Smith too, which maybe explicable, since TV and Hell were once buddies in a band, and Smith was a Close Associate. The voice I'm talking about is high, strained and has a strange forward-thrust mini-yodel at emphatic moments. Try listening and see if you get it. After that there's "This is the World" by Plummet Airlines, which is like some odd mutant of Jerry Lee Lewis rockabilly and Jethro Tull, "Learn Here" by motorhead, derivative but fun, and "Radio Sweetheart" by Elvis Costello. Ah, yes, Elvis... comes in strumming like lightnin' Hopkins, singing like Van Morrison — then like Richard Mannel... and no, I'm not numbering him or his influences. Early recordings often sound like someone else, before an artist emerges into the light in their own unique style, and the heir apparent has shown and is showing that he don't need no comparisons to make it... This one is right up to standard... even a little more interesting than some album tracks. The acoustic guitar and the steel guitar heighten other aspects of his work. Just how many of these artists have developed is made clear in the witty liner notes. The frightening possibility they pose is that there are literally dozens of undiscovered talents lurking around waiting for a street-level operation of this nature to emerge. Ok, people are doing it in England, but it's still a serious indictment of the record industry that in it's complacency it ignored even the possibility that this kind of talent might exist and it's not just a matter of contact with the street, and what's going on. Nope, Elvis Costello had his tapes rejected by a lot of companies before Stiff took him up. The biggest irony of all is that while Stiff is bang-in-there New Wave, it's original impetus (street level sales, limited pressing, accurate knowledge of the potential market, contempt for the high-budget, big-ad major approach) is more quintessentially hippy than almost anything that has happened in music in years. You don't believe me? Check out the articles in IT, The Ecologist, Undercurrents. An Index of Possibilities, Radical Technology... not just the anarchism latent therein, but their ideas on a alternative technology, local organisation and printing (above all). Translate them into records and you've got Stiff. And believe me, any company that sells its compilation record with an inner sleeve listing its own trivia for the collector, and "recommends some fine records from other labels you might enjoy," i.e. stuff by Abba (Abba??!?!) Tom Petty, Mink DeVille, Dave Edmunds, Chiswick Chartbusters, Lee Dorsey, the Rumour, Elvis Presley (sun collection), the Ramones, Nick Drake, MC5, Little Feat, Blondie, Steve Winwood, Jonathan Richman and Captain Beefheart, has got class and ideals. It deserves a long life. Let's hope it gets it. << >> Hot Press, October 30, 1977 Dermot Stokes reviews Hits Greatest Stiffs. Images Clipping. Cover.

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