Category: vinyl

The world of music is littered with great debut albums that never got a follow-up record, so we’ll never know whether there was any more amazing music to be played by a specific musician, or if this was everything they had distilled into something pure and captured on wax.

When it comes to Danny Holien’s eponymously-named debut, it really doesn’t matter. What is captured in these ten tracks is unadulterated singer-songwriter beauty.

Now, I’m not the biggest country music fan. It’s a personal thing. As a genre it’s generally not for me. Yet, there are some albums that people might think of as country music that step beyond the stereotypical boundaries, and this is one of them. I’d probably place it in the Acid Folk genre on tracks like Satsanga, and Country Blues on other tracks. It’s a real mix of styles, almost experimental at times.

Released in 1971 on Tumbleweed Records – a story that’s worth a detour, if you’re unaware of the label and its achievements – this is a set of songs that burrows deep into your psyche and won’t give up its hold on you. Not that you’d want it to.

The album shifts between bluesy rock and country-tinged songs set against a backdrop of gently picked acoustic guitar. A product of its time, yes, but timeless, too. It was produced by Bill Szymczyk, Tumbleweed Records co-owner, and producer of albums by Eagles, B.B. King, The J. Giels Band, Wishbone Ash and many, many more. He brought out the best in Danny on tracks such as Home, Labor Man, and Colorado, which is perhaps why he disappeared without a trace following the demise of the label on which this album was put out.

The opening track was featured on a Sing It High, Sing It Low, a compilation of Tumbleweed Records releases between 1971 and 1973, released by the wonderful Light In The Attic Records. Yet, so far, there has not been a release of the album itself. Which is a real shame.

The gatefold release is something special, too. It has a die-cut window on the front cover, which is also embossed, and comes with a 16-page booklet on textured paper. This is the kind of design touches that cost a fortune nowadays, let alone in the early seventies. Regardless of the expense lavished on packaging this album, it’s definitely overlooked and deserving of wider attention. It’s really due a reissue, if only it were possible to find out where Danny Holien is and who owns the rights. For now, we’ll have to make do with this Unspun Heroes playlist pulled from various people across YouTube.

In the meantime, we’ll keep on searching for Danny’s whereabouts.

If MBV and Drugstore had a baby it would be called Sharkboy. Formed in Brighton in the early 90s, they released their albums on Nude Records, which was notable at the time for having brought Suede into people’s ears. Their debut, Matinee, was played so much in my car and on my personal stereo I had to buy a replacement cassette because the first one wore out and snapped. I only have the sleeve these days, so it was an absolute joy to discover that someone has been uploading obscure 90’s bands to YouTube.

And Sharkboy is one of them.

I say obscure, but many of the original Sharkboy went on to play in some well-known – some might even say famous – bands such as James, Placebo and Salsa Celtica; lead singer, and chief creative in the band, Avy, continues to release music under the Sharkboy moniker, mostly soundtracks to her award-winning short films. It was Avy’s vocals and laidback playing style that were the mainstay of the band’s sound: her guitar playing gave it that stoned shoegaze sound, but with a sharpness that lifted it above many of the other mid-nineties indie blandness that precipitated the BritPop era.

The thing that drew me to their music was the use of different instruments to those being used elsewhere in the guitar-based indie scene: trumpet, cello, and percussion. There is a Country-feel to some tracks, thanks to the liberal use of slide guitar, but the music is firmly rooted in indie. It’s hazy, blurry with multi-layered instrumentation, such as the opening to My Star, or the chorus on Crystaline. To my ears, they sounded anything but British.

Given the multi-layered atmospheric music of Sharkboy, it’s really no surprise that Avy crosses a multitude of artistic disciplines, from illustration to filmmaking, from music to fine art. Her willingness to experiment put Sharkboy’s music ahead of its time, so in 2023 that debut sounds as fresh now as it did then. It’s subtle, the way the songs on Matinee get absorbed, yet the osmotic quality they have means each song embeds inself into your consciousness; in early interviews, Avy gave off a ‘salty’ personality, so perhaps that is where this ability comes from? Regardless, it’s not as if you’ll be afraid of a repeat listen, so just let it happen.

And there is definitely a dark underbelly to Sharkboy’s songs, such as the verse on Forest Fire, or the entire three minutes of Sugar. However, like seedy parts of any city in the world, it enriches you the more time you spend with it. And you’ll definitely want to share the experience with your friends.

So, listen to the YouTube playlist and send the link on your mates. As with every Unspun Hero, they’ll thank you for it.

When you think of supergroups, you’re probably thinking of musicians who have been around for a long time and have got together, finally, to write and release some music. Occasionally, though, a supergroup comes together before you even know they’re a supergroup and then writes and releases on album’s worth of amazing music before everything gets shelved because another side project takes off unexpectedly.

This is the story of OP8. One album – oh, but what an album – and then done.

Let’s rewind. Giant Sand is a band that is surely on most people’s musical radar, or so I’d like to think. (And if not, are you in for a delightful weekend of listening?!) The long-time rhythm section of Howe Gelb’s band were drummer, John Convertino, and multi-instrumentalist, Joey Burns. If those names ring a bell it’s because you’ll know them as Calexico, the alt-country veterans and all-round awesome band.

OP8 was a spin-off of Giant Sand, featuring Joey and John. The idea to add a collaborator for each record came from the founder of label 4AD, Ivo Watt-Russell. The first was vocalist, violinist and multi-instrumentalist, Lisa Germano, who was signed to 4AD and had released the excellent Geek the Girl in 1994. While it was later decided Watt-Russell’s idea, while amazing, was unfeasible – probably because Calexico’s career trajectory was near vertical at that point – one album did make it through the process and was released on CD. That album was Slush.

The first thing to note is that this is an album with its feet firmly in the alt-country scene. Yet, despite being over 25 years old it doesn’t feel dated, which perhaps goes to show how ahead of its time it sounded back in the late 90’s in what was then quite a fledgling genre.

Opening track, Sand, is a call and response vocal between Germano and Gelb, with feedback over an acoustic guitar and a variety of backing instruments from organ, accordion and percussion. It’s like alt-country noir.

The chilled vibe is carried through the album, with its reliance on laidback acoustic guitar and interesting bursts of percussion, occasional piano and violin. Vocal duties are shared, often shifting between the various members. If I Think I’m In Love might not have her vocals, but you really get to hear Germano’s influences in the use of strings and the piano refrain that bubbles up, bringing a jazz touch to the simple chords and arrangement.

Yet it is Germano’s breathy vocals that keep me coming back. She has an effortless way of imbuing a song with emotional intent that takes songs like It’s A Rainbow and Cracklin’ Water into deeper waters where it feels less safe and ordinary. Her smoky voice on The Devil Loves L.A. makes the discordant jazz touches less jarring angular chair and more velvet banquette.

Slush is a perhaps an album for a rainy day, or perhaps, given its name, for those days when the snows are melting but it’s still too cold to venture out. However, it’s not a warm blanket under which you can snuggle, but more of a stupor that I would suggest gives the supergroup its name. It’s an opiate, a way to bring a layer of harmonic gauze to your listening pleasure without diminishing the experience, and one that you miss when it ends.

For now, you’ll have to enjoy it via streaming, or if you’re lucky enough to own a copy, on CD.

I admit it. I love pop music.

Let’s just add some clarity to that statement, while you pick yourself up from the floor. Pop music is a lot of things. It’s melodic. It’s catchy in a way that makes you tap your feet or hum the tune. It’s usually, but not always, sub-four minutes. The Cure are as much a pop band to my ears as Taylor Swift. Pop is not throwaway, though. It’s not the musical equivalent of an airport paperback. That’s muzak. Or Coldplay.

So, now that’s settled, it’s time to talk about a particular pop band, although they may not describe themselves that way. Milo Greene.

They’re pop because they have those catchy tunes that you want to hum, like a lot of their debut album’s tracks, including Perfectly Aligned and Take a Step. The harmonies, the effortless way it burrows into your conscience and lodges there for days. The final track on this record, Autumn Tree, is as captivating as the first notes on opener, What’s the Matter.

Released in 2012, like a lot of great pop music, it sounds contemporary. Yet there’s also nostalgia wrapped up in these songs. It makes sense that the band is comprised of seasoned songwriters, showcasing their craft. It makes sense that they started wanting to write songs that would be used in TV series and films, which possibly comes from their LA roots.

Yet, despite their commerciality and obvious success in their home country, I think they’ve managed to steer clear of the schmaltz, which is likely down to the harmonised vocals alongside obvious musicianship rather than leaning on studio techniques. This means their sound tends more towards peers such as The New Pornographers than it does your average pop act. Just enough indie, perhaps?

There’s authenticity at play here, which when set against the plastic allure of LA is pause enough for thought. Yes, it’s manufactured like all good pop, but in clever ways. The band name came about as they decided to create a fictitious booking agent called Milo Greene so they could get shows early in their career. And inventing this persona, it obviously worked. They’ve since gone on to play Letterman, Bonnaroo and Lollapalooza.

So, yes, it’s pop music. But it’s not. Because like all good pop music it defies the ‘pop’ label as much as it defines it. Yes, they have almost 80 million plays of a track from this debut on Spotify, yet they’re relatively unknown outside their own country.

Give it a listen, you can’t tell me you’re not a fan of pop music, too.

There have been a number of tribute albums to David Bowie over the years, especially since his untimely death in 2016. That very same year, an album came out by a band who had, to my mind, created one of the best covers of a Bowie track some six years previously. The band was Genuflex, the track was Soul Love, originally released on The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars.

Of course, one member of Genuflex was already known to me: Finn Vine.

In the previous decade he’d been the singer and creative catalyst in White Rose Movement, a post-punk electronic band who were constantly fêted by the music media as the ‘next big thing’ yet never managed to reach their obvious potential. While their debut, Kick, was an excellent and coherent album, they crashed and burned in 2008 with their second album incomplete and unreleased.

Perhaps it was the post-punk element that held them back? If so, it’s the (almost complete) erasure of this side of their musical style from Genuflex’s only album to date, the eponymous subject of this post. Instead, they lean heavily on the synths, while employing Vine’s vocals to great effect. It’s really only on track three, Santantango, that you get a glimpse of what came before. Now the sound owes as much to Anthony and the Johnsons as it does to that mid-noughties guitar-based electronica White Rose Movement helped to define.

The band takes its name from the act of dropping to ones knees to pray, to genuflect. While that may be so, this isn’t a new church, rather the realisation of an artist’s true intentions and committed to tape.

One of the pieces of the band’s output that really stands out was a remix of their single, The Last Gods, from the late (great) Mark Stewart of Pop Group who sadly passed away earlier this year. This remains, perhaps, the only example, of where Genuflex could have headed had they kept going. The vocals are soaring heavenwards, the music the wings. It’s astonishing – and not just because of Stewart’s work.

Genuflex was as grandiose as Vine’s previous bands, yet remains one that flies below the radar. Undeservedly, I would like to think.

If the links above have tingled your spidey sense, then you’ll be delighted to listen to their one and only album. Yet another example of one of the music world’s Unspun Heroes.

Imagine: you’re at the height of your fame, despite being a new band (although you yourself have been in several bands over the years), and you’re described as the focal point of a ‘movement’ that only really exists in the minds of the media. You want to do something out of the ordinary, musically, but it would be career suicide (again, in the minds of the media. Mostly).

What do you do?

You start a side project.

Here at Unspun Heroes, we know a thing or two about a side project. This is, after all, one of them. But we’re not (hopefully) at the height of our fame and we’re not going to do anything that breaks our initial vision.

For Pearl Jam’s founding guitarist, Stone Gossard, an outlet for his considerable musical talents came via jamming with his friends. And so, Brad was formed. Named after the man who owned the rights to the band’s original name, Shame – which subsequently became the album title – they released a very un-grunge record.

It’s experimental, off-beat, different, constantly shifting its musical references, shuffling them like a blackjack croupier on the Vegas strip. Yet, it’s so very Stone in sound and intent.

Kerrang placed it in their list of 100 albums you need to hear before you die, five years after its release, but in 1993 it barely troubled the charts on either side of the Atlantic.

30 years on, it’s held up (rightly) as one of the best albums of that year. I’d suggest it’s better than the output of Pearl Jam’s difficult third album, but that’s my opinion and it may well differ from yours. I know, it’s hard to comprehend that people can like different things and still like the same things as well.

Four years ago, Shawn Smith, the singer of Brad (and Satchel, plus others) passed away. The album he was working on with the other members of Brad was released earlier this year, in tribute. Yet, the first Brad album showcases Smith’s unusual style and Gossard’s abilities to reach past the niche he was placed in by the rock media. The original pressing commands high numbers on the resale market. Now it’s 30 years old, not only it is worth a second, third… hundredth listen, it’s surely worth a reissue. They came close on subsequent releases, but Shame was the album that defined them. Rather than shame, though, it’s pride that shines through.

Listen here.

As the eighties came to an end, and the heavier punk rock days of the NYC indie scene gave way to psychedelic indie pop, so Lida Husik arrived. Originally from Washington D.C., she settled in New York and signed to seminal label, Shimmy Disc (home to artists such as Ween, Galaxie 500 and Daniel Johnston). They released three of her albums, of which Bozo was the first.

Introspective and almost like a collection of demos, Lida played virtually every instrument on Bozo’s 12 songs – a huge feat considering she is completely self-taught. Imagine if The Velvet Underground had sprung up a couple of decades later and you’ll get a sense of the sound, but there is more to this than a pastiche of that well-known NYC sound.

Described as an album with songs that are ‘programmed to sink slowly into the listener’s subconscious, like a magic potion’, it’s feels like it could have been created as an aural depiction of a drug haze, or the US-version of shoegaze; it reminds me of the morning after wandering around the countryside while on ‘shrooms. Impressionistic, experimental.

It’s claimed that Lida’s first two album were recorded while on massive doses of hallucinogens, which might explain things. No doubt, also influenced by The Teardrop Explodes’ use of swirling organs and liberal use of LSD from a decade before. It’s this that makes it both of its time and timeless.

This is not a dark album; its naïve construction and hazy delivery ensure it is lifted away from the introspection contemporary artists were known for. Occasionally, on songs such as Halloween and Mom, it delights with melodies that might even be described as catchy. For sure there are earworms here (Farmhouse, for example), yet this is not music I would describe as tunes for bopping along to while you mix cocktails or make cheese on toast (or both, I’m not here to judge).

What it does deserve is wider attention. Bozo showcases an artist doing things on her own terms, and succeeding.

And as the late, great Bill Hicks said, “If you think drugs are bad, go home tonight and burn all your albums, all your tapes and all your CDs, because the people who made that great music that has enhanced your lives throughout the years… real fucking high on drugs.”

Listen on Spotify, or YouTube.

“This might be the greatest record no-one has ever heard of!”

It’s not unusual for the Unspun Heroes team to send each other over-excited WhatsApp messages about new discoveries, but two weeks ago we found a record that none of us had heard of, doesn’t exist on Spotify and where very little is known about the musicians. 

The eponymous debut album of a short-lived UK group, Tranquility, is sort of folky, Americana, proggy stuff with immaculate close harmony singing that CSN would have been proud of. The guitar playing is tight and on the right side of noodly, the rhythm section is bang on and the driving organ underneath gives it all a sense of epicness.

If Tranquility were released in the late 60s, rather than early 70s, it might have done very well. But it got caught between changing musical times and tastes. Everyone had come down from the Summer of Love, the economy was shot to pieces and people were looking for a different, grittier type of escapism. While Bowie was giving birth to glam and Sabbath were inventing doom metal, Tranquility were still making gorgeous songs that talked about love and gratitude and nature. Post decimal UK was more interested in sequins, space and Satan.

Now, not every song on the album is a winner; a couple of the songs on Side Two stray into the sort of music hall nonsense that The Beatles and every other UK band in 1968 were peddling. But, the main songwriter and lead guitarist Terry Shaddick hits much more than he misses. 

And that brings us on to the musicians – who are they? There is no wikipedia entry for the band and no information on the usual sources such as Allmusic. A bit of digging shows most of the players disappeared into obscurity, but Terry Shaddick did re-emerge in the 1980s as a professional songwriter, penning – of all things – Physical by Olivia Newton John. Which is weirdly great.

You can pick up the original Tranquility LP on Discogs for less than a tenner. Or you can listen to it on YouTube if you “want to get digital, digital”. [Ed: Complaints about Dad jokes to @moonbolt please.] Either way, it is perfect Sunday listening and a complete joy to have picked up on a whim. 

Feel free to drop us a line with any similar Unspun Hero recommendations, or add to our playlist which you can find out more about here.

Editor’s note
After a little more digging, it turns out Tranquility were put together by Donovan’s former manager, Ashley Kozak. They were held in high esteem in the US, so much so that when they toured in support of their debut they booked an additional two months’ worth of dates!

Also, it turns out that Physical was originally penned for Rod Stewart.

When it comes to pop’s mainstream male black musicians, the mid-1980s belonged, ostensibly, to Michael Jackson. Alongside were the supporting cast of Billy Ocean and Luther Vandross. You could hear the intros to any music from these three artists and know instantly who was singing. Yes, there were others, but these three were household names in the UK.

I think the same thing could, or should, be said of the singer who’s the focus of today’s post. Especially when referencing Track One, Side Two from one of the albums that passed a lot of people by when it came out in 1985. An album that continues to pass many people by.

Back in the 80s, people living in large towns and cities in the UK bought their music from a shop called Woolworths. Okay, they used independent records stores, too (and at Christmas from WHSmith when your gran bought you vouchers – because it’s a stationers and pens and pencils and beautiful notepads aren’t the kind of thing 12 year old boys like me wanted, they’re the kind of things that 50 year old me wants, but I am totally off-track now, so…)

What I’m saying is, there were only a few places that always had the latest, greatest thing. Woolworths was one of them.

Back in 1985, I can vividly remember walking into my local Woolworths, taking the stairs to the second floor and seeing an album that had a man in a brown leather trench coat on the front. He had a moustache even though Movember hadn’t been invented. And he oozed coolness to pre-teen me. The cover also had a sort of cartoon-style text that just said Colonel Abrams. I probably thought that, maybe, he was in the army or something. Whatever, it spoke to me. I wanted the album.

I pulled out my money and paid whatever it cost to have it. I’m guessing it was about four pounds. I treasured it on the long bus journey home.

Then I made a mistake that, it turned out, was the best mistake to make. I put Side Two on first.

The song that kicks off the second side of this debut album is Trapped. Wow. What a track. As an opener (to me) it blew my tiny mind so much I lifted the needle at the end of it and placed it back down so I could hear it again. I was hooked.

That’s not to say the rest of the album is bad. It’s not. The basslines and synth work on many tracks is sublime, including the actual opening track, The Truth, I’m Not Gonna Let, and Picture Me In Love With You. This is a man who played in a band with Prince on guitar and had been working as a singer in the music industry for a couple of decades before scoring his biggest hit.

Colonel made the kind of music I would later hear as the soulful building blocks of Chicago House, and what is now known as R&B. The rhythms are layered. The toots and wheeps of the synths don’t follow the melody but suck the listener in like a sonic whirlpool. And the beats… it’s here that the production (by the notable producer, and drummer, Richard James Burgess) not only positions this album in the decade of its making, but also makes it more than the sum of its parts.

This was a man at the top of his game, with major label backing and some of the best production available. However, a glittering career was to remain out of Colonel’s reach. In 2015, he was back in the limelight, but sadly for very different reasons. The man behind the soulful voice from Detroit, a city renowned for its music and its musical legacy, was struggling. Homeless and suffering from diabetes, he was down on his luck. Despite a crowdfunding campaign, Colonel passed away in 2016. A year of many legends passing away, so his name was simply added to a long list of lost luminaries.

Unlike many of those artists, Colonel’s work has yet to revisited. The CD of this amazing debut was reissued in 2010. It contains a gold-selling record, but it’s more than just one track. It’s time to revisit it for the classic it absolutely is.

Prizes awarded to artists for their work are not often controversial. 2005 was different. Certainly for the Mercury Music Prize, which is awarded to an album that a panel of industry judges deems to have been released the previous year in the UK for a British or Irish act. It’s usually obvious who will win. However, in 2005 it was controversially awarded to Antony & The Johnsons who many complained was living in the US and therefore not eligible.

It was almost as controversial as 1994, the year that M People won it.

Of course, any judgment that isn’t the one you would have made is wrong. However, the point is often not who wins but who doesn’t. And in 1995, the biggest winner was a young man from Devon called Seth Lakeman.

Previously known for his work with his brothers, Sam and Sean, Seth went solo in 2002. Kitty Jay, nominated in those controversial Mercury Music Awards, was his second album. The story goes that it was recorded for less than £300 and its title track tells the story of a Dartmoor landmark, Jay’s Grave.

What was immediately clear from Seth live appearances was here was a young artist reaching his potential. Often singing while playing violin, the album is everything folk can be while also not sounding like a folk album might be expected to sound. It’s pacy. It has an undercurrent that might be described as unnerving and potentially violent. It makes your heart race and the hairs on the back of your neck rise. It’s also contains a warmth and humility thanks to the stories that act as scaffold for Seth’s songwriting skills.

And then there’s his voice, shown off on more traditional interpretations such as Farewell My Love and Cape Clear. Strong, with a tone that evokes bucolic scenes and the traditions from which its words are drawn, but which has an edge of punk venom.

It’s undeniably indie pop wrapped in folk instrumentalism. And that’s a good thing. It takes the elements of pop composition and presents them using sounds and instruments not traditionally associated with the oeuvre from which it draws. The result is something quite special.

Its rawness perfectly suits the subject matter. However, it would sound just as amazing with a full orchestra, I’m certain. I can attest to the fact that seeing this album live lifts it into another realm. Seth is a performer from whom you cannot tear your eyes, or ears. Listening back now, as I write this, the title track could easily be sampled by Wu Tang Clan and no one would think anything of it. As versatile and it is virtuoso.

Available on CD only, it’s an Unspun Hero that really needs to make the leap to vinyl. Stream it in full below.