10 Great Comebacks

Some artists go under the radar for years after being dumped by a fickle record label or are victims of current trends. Some of the artists listed below also had their own personal battles to deal with, but came out at the other end with these killer comeback albums. Craig Stephen presents ten of the finest comebacks …

Tina Turner - Private Dancer (1984)

How low did she go?

After the breakdown of Ike and Tina - both the act and the marriage - Turner became something of a nostalgia act, playing in small venues and Vegas-style cabaret shows to pay off her debts. She’d released two solo albums under her own name since leaving Ike and that last one was in 1979. Love Explosion was a disco-tinged funk album which was not even released in the United States. There followed five years of dead air.

What happened next?

Turner was in her 40s but in an era of Madonna copyists and other young female artists, a major record label took a chance on her. The end result was Private Dancer. It was a team effort with eight producers including Martyn Ware of Heaven 17 credited, and Mark Knopfler and Jeff Beck also on board. There are several covers but Turner’s vocal talents stand out and several singles from it became mega worldwide hits. Commercial radio continues to pound their listeners with ‘What’s Love Got To Do With It’ to this day.

Morrissey - You Are The Quarry (2004)

How bad was his shit?

Dropped by his record label following 1997′s dismal Maladjusted, Morrissey retreated to the Hollywood Hills, where he would become a bit of a recluse. His devoted fans sat twiddling their thumbs but no one else seemed to be bothered if Morrissey released another record.

What happened?

In 2002 Morrissey went on a world tour parading new songs and a year later signed with Sanctuary. A single, ‘Irish Blood, English Heart’, heralded a beefier sound and the album was along the same lines. Sales of You Are The Quarry on both sides of the Atlantic were excellent and critics generally gave it a thumbs up. The missing years had been dispensed with; Morrissey was a rock star again.

Johnny Cash - American Recordings (1993)

Where are we at?

Like many stars of the 60s and 70s, such as Dylan, Johnny Cash was rejected and neglected in the 1980s. Columbia dropped him and his next label, Mercury, didn’t care much. Health problems, drug issues … yep those too.

Yeah … so?

Cash was offered a deal by producer and American Recordings head Rick Rubin. His label specialised in rap and metal so this was a bizarre sideways move. The recordings were just Cash and a guitar but the critics loved it. The NME said it was "uplifting and life affirming because the message is taught through adversity, ill luck and fighting for survival". In the end of year best album reviews, American Recordings was up there with the best pop, rock, rap and metal albums around, including being rated No.4 in the British monthly Mojo’s annual round-up.

 Elvis Presley - The Comeback Special (1968)

Down the toilet?

By mid-1968, Presley was at a personal and professional low point. He had gained weight, his musical career had been taken over by a series of mediocre movies, and pop music had changed with all the ‘super’ bands like The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and The Doors. He had been left behind.

What did he do next?

Collaborating with NBC Television, and sidelining his conservative and controlling manager, Colonel Tom Parker, The King appeared on his own show, Singer Presents …. Elvis, but more commonly known as The ’68 Comeback Special. It was a one-hour concert that aired in early December. This was the old Elvis, the leather-jacket wearing rocker and he played hits and new songs. The watching public loved it and the following year Presley released singles such as ‘In The Ghetto’ and ‘Suspicious Minds’ and he was back as pop star rather than a bad actor. 

David Bowie - Black Tie/White Noise (1993)

The lowdown:

Bowie’s solo career had slipped with the disappointing Never Let Me Down in 1987. His next move was surprising: a four-piece called Tin Machine was his attempt at being part of a band again. The self-titled debut was reasonably well received but Tin Machine II is generally considered a poor cousin and received some rather abrasive reviews. The band split due to personal issues.

The comeback:

Bowie’s first solo album in six years was presaged by the brilliant single ‘Jump They Say’ about the tragic life of his brother Terry. Bowie was in Los Angeles at the time of the 1992 riots and Black Tie/White Noise is about that and a plea for racial unity. It isn’t one of his best post-80s albums but it kick started a more productive period.

The House of Love - Days Run Away (2005)

Where were they at?

When guitarist Terry Bickers famously spat the dummy mid-tour in 1989, the band was left without its talisman. By 1993 the band had run itself into the ground and Audience With The Mind, was by far the poorest of the four albums they recorded to that point. They split soon after and didn’t lay a glove on the world for more than a decade.

What happened next?

The troubles of the past seemingly resolved and with Bickers back in the gang, the House of Love got its groove back with the result being this excellent collection. The Guardian was happy with the result. “Their sound is back to its subtle best, all Velvet Underground rhythms and guitars swooping over gentle melodies.”

Dexy’s - One Day I’m Going to Soar (2012)

Dexy’s Midnight Runners’ main man Kevin Rowland was suffering from financial problems, drug addiction and depression following the dismal reception to his first solo album The Wanderer in 1988. Over the next few years he was in and out of rehab and signing on the dole.

What happened next?

There was a band reformation in 2003 but little activity until 2012 and the release of One Day I’m Going to Soar. They were now called simply Dexys and featured old hands like Pete Williams, Mick Talbot, Big Jim Paterson and a new, female vocalist, Madeleine Hyland. Mojo wrote of the album: “Intense, painfully frank, hysterically funny, and in the end, exultant... ODIGTS isn't always an easy listen, but it does offer a fearless experience that invests pop with more theatricality than the form can usually tolerate.”

 Wanda Jackson - The Party Ain’t Over (2011)

Jackson was the Queen of Rockabilly, a massive star in the 1950s and early 60s. But once rock’n’roll became passe so did all those great stars, and Jackson then recorded country, blues and gospel albums. She had never retired and her most recent prior record was in 2006. But as numerous as they were, those albums couldn’t release her from the tag of the former Queen of Rockabilly.

What happened next?

White Stripes’ Jack White offered to produce … and who says no to him? White looked to reconnect the 73-year-old Jackson with her teenage style, resulting in frantic horns and White's fuzzed-out guitar. The result was the surprise return of rockabilly in the 2000s with an album that stood on its own.

John Lennon and Yoko Ono - Double Fantasy (1980)

Please explain:

In early 1975 Lennon released an almost forgotten collection of 1950s and 60s standards, and followed it later that year with a compilation, Shaved Fish, which sold moderately. Lennon spent the next few years as a house-husband.

What happened next?

In 1980, Lennon was inspired by the 2-Tone and new wave scenes that spawned the likes of Madness, The Pretenders and the B-52s. The album he and Yoko Ono made, Double Fantasy, was the ideal comeback, a fresh start for a couple ready to greet the world again. Alas, it turned out to a sad farewell as three weeks after its emphatic release, Lennon was killed by a lone gunman.

AC/DC - Back In Black (1980)

Which ditch were the band in?

Scots-born singer Bon Scott died of acute alcohol poisoning in early 1980. The end seemed nigh for the band with the remaining members considering closing this chapter. Instead, they roped in Brian Johnson, ex of British rock band Geordie. 

And then?

Back In Black was recorded over seven weeks in the Bahamas and released in July 1980. It had the signature guitars and hard rock of AC/DC. The album's all-black cover was designed as a "sign of mourning" for Scott. It sold 50 million copies worldwide and is regarded as one of the best heavy metal albums of all time.

My Cassette Pet

Craig Stephen on the cassette tape mini-revival …

Defying logic, there has been something of a cassette revival over the past few years. We even have a Cassette Store Day – the format’s equivalent of Record Store Day, which has done much to revive sales in vinyl.

Its revival is one of the more curious revival movements because for decades the humble cassette effectively disappeared from store shelves. Well, in the west anyway. In some African countries, the Middle East and South Asia the tape has never gone out of fashion.

They’re cheap and don’t take up space so you can see their attraction. With new release vinyl albums now costing $NZ60 and upwards, it’s clear why a far more economical format might gain traction.

I wasn’t entirely convinced about the availability of cassettes so I had a look around. The JB Hi-Fi website has a section for cassettes for sale, and as I write there’s 15 listed. Four of those are reissues by De La Soul and there’s also 72 Seasons by Metallica and Autofiction by Suede. The retailer’s prices vary from $28 up to $49, but generally they are around the same price as the CD.

Marbecks didn’t have a separate tape section but did have a pack of blank cassettes, Southbound in Auckland had the same number as JB Hi-Fi and Real Groovy had 115 listed, which I guess was a mix of new and second hand.

There are even tape-only labels in New Zealand catering to bands that don’t have the money to invest in vinyl. This is a subject to be developed for later.

 In the big music markets, sales are on the up. The British Phonographic Industry says cassette sales have increased for 10 consecutive years – rising from less than 4000 in 2012 to more than 195,000 in 2022. That’s still small fry compared to vinyl and digital, but it’s a massive increase nevertheless. It’s the same for the United States while in Japan there are cassette-only stores and Tower Records, which is still around in the country but not anywhere else, has increased its shelf space of the format.

In the 1980s the cassette was sold at the same price as vinyl. Back then blank tapes abounded and the mixtape was an artform. This was a way of making tapes for your mates, or for yourself from a selection of albums.

You could select whatever songs you wanted, and in a preferred order too. Sod a ballad, I want just fast tracks, or I could rearrange an album whereby the weaker songs are at the start. Furthermore, I could tag on B-sides and unreleased tracks.

Meanwhile, live gigs were easily recorded and issued on cassette, providing a source - the legendary bootleg - for fans that otherwise wasn’t available in the pre-internet age.

While much of the technology we have used in the past has become obsolete (eight-track cartridge, mini-disks etc), cassettes, like vinyl, still have niche value for the music fan.

This mini revival comes as this writer is culling a box of cassettes. I have the ability to play them, I just don’t, so something has to give. I gave three to an op shop: the Stranglers’ No More Heroes because I now have the vinyl version, but the Wedding Present cassingle was a no-brainer: I just don’t like the band anymore.

Here a small selection from my all-time homemade favourite tapes:

The Associates double: Sulk, the American edition, which is slightly different from the UK release, is on one side, and Perhaps, released a couple of years later, is on the opposite. This was one of the first tapes I had and was made by a friend who introduced me to the band and other Scottish delights such as the Jesus and Mary Chain and the Cocteau Twins.

Midnight Oil 1982 to 2003: I’ve got very little Midnight Oil music as they were an oft-erratic band so it made perfect sense to go through half a dozen albums and fill up two sides of their best songs.

 Mix and match Vol 67: Hot Hot Heat – three tracks; Electric Six – three tracks; Maximo Park – nine tracks; and a bunch of tracks by the likes of Wolfmen, Razorlight, The Rapture, Stephen Duffy, and Manic St Preachers. This is quite a varied selection. The Maximo Park tracks are a selection of the B-sides compilation and 2007’s Our Earthly Pleasures.

Reggae Classics Vol 48: Reggae is so wonderful and there’s so many compilations around. I used to get loads of them out of the Napier City library and stick them on tape. This one features Gregory Isaacs, Mikey Dread, Poet and the Roots, Junior Murvin and many others.

Godzone’s Gifts: There are some great acts from New Zealand. This mixtape includes Goldenhorse, The Front Lawn, Collapsing Cities, The Bats, The Clean and Cut off Your Hands. Bands you might be challenged to lump together but it actually melds quite well.

David Bowie 1980-84: Nobody could truthfully say the eighties were a productive era for Bowie so this condenses the best of the early part of the decade, starting with Scary Monsters and Super Creeps, which takes up most of the tape. By 1984 and the Tonight album, he’s lost it, and the quality avoidance would continue until 1993.

And now for some that were commercially available, made in a factory.

Various – C86: The superstar of a long line of New Musical Express cassettes and a legend of compilations. A Nuggets for the 1980s.  Somebody has even written a book about the cassette which was later released on vinyl that same year (and much later on a 3-CD deluxe edition). The timing of the release was crucial. An underground indie scene had been brewing for a couple of years and came to the boil in 1986 with clubs and scores of releases. The twee or jangly scene featured bands that apparently only wore anoraks, had floppy fringes and played guitar music that sounded like the Byrds or Love.

 The first side of C86 included many of those scenesters: Primal Scream, The Pastels, The Bodines, Mighty Mighty, The Shop Assistants, the Soup Dragons and the Wedding Present. If it was only a round-up of all the greatest twee songs of the time it probably wouldn’t have the impact it did. Conversely, an album that showcased a burgeoning scene was in fact a varied, Catholic collection with the inclusion of agit rock-dance band Age of Chance, sarcastic bastards Half Man Half Biscuit, and acts such as Miaow!, Stump and The Mackenzies. It was a deft adventure into a world that had no boundaries.

The The – Soul Mining: Soul Mining is a classic of the time but at seven tracks was deemed to be too short for American tastes even though most of the tracks stretched to more than five minutes and ‘Giant’ clocked in at 9:34. So a version of ‘Perfect’ was added to some versions and the UK cassette version had another five goodies. It’s likely that at least one of these tracks was from the discarded Pornography of Despair album.

The Phoenix Foundation – Trans Fatty Acid: This tape came with initial editions of the band’s Give Up Your Dreams vinyl album released in 2015. Of the four tracks (all great btw), there’s a special cover of Can’s hit single ‘I Want More’. 

The Cure – Standing on a Beach, The Singles (And Unavailable B-sides): Now, isn’t that title a giveaway or what. With the extra space on the tape, there was always the opportunity to expand the track listing, and in this edition the 13 singles were joined by a dozen B-sides. These included the likes of ‘Another Journey By Train’ and ‘The Exploding Boy’. Some tracks were B-sides for a good reason, but some could have been included on a studio album. 

Various – The World At One: Another NME cassette only release available by sending a cheque or postal order and hoping that you received it in a week or so. The World At One was one of the most valuable of the series as it introduced readers to music from Bulgaria to Zambia to the French Antilles. Readers could hear almost certainly for the first time Jali Musa Jawara or Kass Kass. It was issued in 1987 as the term ‘world music’ was becoming a saleable asset.

Orange Juice – The Orange Juice: Over to my OJ-obsessed mate Scouse Neil for this one … “The Orange Juice cassette, which I got from a Woollies sale for the giveaway price of £1.99, had the 10-track album on one side, and a whole side of B-sides and 12-inch mixes on the other. Considering I hadn’t heard some of these versions before, this was like gold dust to an OJ fan. Apparently, the tape version sold more than the vinyl, which is not saying much since it was the only one of their albums not to make the Top 100.” Scouse Neil did perk up a bit at learning that the album reached No.28 in the New Zealand charts in 1984.

Bow Wow Wow – Your Cassette Pet: Released in November 1980 only on cassette, and therefore it was classified as a single for the UK charts. They were musically inept but something of pioneers as a single released a few months earlier ‘C-30,C-60,C-90’ (a nod to the different lengths of tapes) was apparently the world’s first cassette single.

For the record, the first compact cassette, in the format that became million sellers, was first introduced in 1963. The first Walkman appeared in 1979.

Please Release Me … Top 10 potentially great unheard albums

Nostalgia is a niche sales opportunity in the music industry and labels have become adept at tapping into fans’ desire to have as much music as they can by the artists they adore. I’m thinking of David Bowie’s Toys or Neil Young’s Homegrown which were released about 20 and 40 years after being recorded.

Critical acclaim was unlikely to be foisted upon either album if they were released in 2001 or 1975 respectively, but the focus now is giving the punters what they want.
In the blog’s latest line of compilation lists, Craig Stephen lists a mere 10 albums that never saw the light of day at the time – and probably should have. These include completed albums, works in progress and even just album ideas.

 The Who: Lifehouse (recorded 1971/1972)

After Tommy, The Who intended on doing a science fiction proto-environmental catastrophe rock opera. Sadly, as exciting as this idea sounded, the project was abandoned in favour of the traditional rock delight Who’s Next. Very little of it has not been released (elsewhere) with half a dozen tracks, including ‘Bargain’ and ‘Baba O’Riley’, appearing on Who’s Next and others popping up on Odds and Sods or other albums. But fans still want the album as it was supposed to be recorded and released.

House of Love: Untitled (recorded 1989)

After the burning success of their phenomenal self-titled debut and following their signing to Fontana, the House of Love hit the studio to record what was due to be their second masterpiece. It didn’t quite work out, however. The band was disintegrating and the recording sessions are said to be below par. What is certain is that two singles, ‘Never’ and ‘I Don’t Know Why I Love You’, would have been at the forefront of the album. As would ‘Soft as Fire’ and ‘Safe’, both B-sides but certainly album material. In 1990, after the official second album, Fontana or the Butterfly Album as it is sometimes dubbed, the label issued a collection of B-sides and outtakes called Spy In The House of Love. Among these were four tracks that would have been on that now mythical album. The standout was ‘Marble’, but the other three do hint at the issues the band were experiencing.

The The: Pornography of Despair (recorded 1982)

This would have been Matt Johnson’s debut album under the moniker of The The but was considered too oblique. Several tracks were released as B-sides and some of the album landed on the cassette of Soul Mining, the incredible album that was released in 1983 to massive acclaim and chart success. It is logical to see the merits of this decision as tracks such as ‘This Is The Day’ and ‘Uncertain Smile’ are among the best tracks The The have ever recorded.

 Clare Grogan: Trash Mad (recorded 1987)

When Altered Images broke up in the mid-80s it was only natural that lead singer Clare Grogan be set free on a solo career that capitalised on her beautiful voice and photogenic appearance. Trash Mad was written and recorded and all set to sail in 1987. But … the opening single ‘Love Bomb’, ahem, bombed despite a number of TV appearances. It certainly wasn’t a stinker, in fact it’s a near perfect pop song. Its follow-up ‘Strawberry’ was subsequently shelved and London Records also pulled the album, causing distress to millions of schoolboys. Surely Cherry Red will have eyes on issuing Trash Mad for the first time ever, ending nearly 40 years of hurt.

The Clash: Rat Patrol From Fort Bragg (recorded 1981/1982)

There was the double album (London Calling) and the triple album (Sandinista). How could the Clash possibly follow these lengthy meisterwerks? The original idea was for another double. This was Mick Jones’ baby, but sadly he was outnumbered and outgunned. Fort Bragg was shelved, and instead CBS issued Combat Rock, which is not a bad album to have in your cannon. Jones distilled various elements and influences that The Clash had used previously into a 75-minute, 18-track beast. Fort Bragg would’ve included all of the tracks that made up Combat Rock, and plenty more besides. But ‘Rock the Casbah’ et al would’ve sounded so very different. Various bootlegs have appeared over the years, but the full, unedited and mastered version NEEDS to be given a proper release.

The Bodysnatchers: Untitled (some tracks recorded 1980)

The Bodysnatchers only issued two singles, ‘Easy Life’ and ‘Let’s Do Rock Steady’, eager takes on the ska revival sound that 2-Tone mastered so well. As well as their B-sides, there’s a track that was recorded for John Peel and a version of ‘The Boiler’ which was later covered by singer Rhoda Daker and the Special AKA. In 2014 Dakar recorded an album entitled Rhoda Dakar Sings The Bodysnatchers. You can imagine that the 10 tracks were set to form The Bodysnatchers’ debut album, but it is still a solo effort.

Space: Love You More Than Football (recorded 2000)

Space were everywhere in the 1990s with supernova global hits like ‘Female of the Species’ and ‘The Ballad of Tom Jones’. After the latter, a top five hit in the UK no less, the public’s interest waned and when a single, ‘Diary of a Wimp’, flopped like an octogenarian in a brothel, the Edwyn Collins-produced Love You More Than Football (an impossible construct, of course) was scrapped. Promo copies popped up at the time and the odd track subsequently came out on compilations. It wasn’t till 2019 that a remixed version of the album was included on a boxset of all the band’s material. Is that a proper release for an unissued album? Don’t be so daft, lad.

 Department S: Sub-stance (recorded 1981)

Named after a 70s television series, this English outfit had a surprise UK hit at the end of 1980 with the rather eerie but beguiling ‘Is Vic There?’. Subsequent singles, ‘Going Left Right’ and ‘I Want’, both excellent ditties, flopped and the band have now become known as one-hit wonders rather than the indie stars some liken them to. The album recording sessions were iffy and with poor sales from the two follow-up singles, Stiff Records dropped them. A version of the album has since been released, albeit a very low-key release. Somebody do the proper thing eh!

David Bowie: The Gouster (recorded 1974)

Sometimes there’s a thin line between an unreleased album and the one that came after. The Gouster is one such item. The question is whether it was a bona fide album, or an early version of Young Americans. By 1974 Bowie had become infatuated with American soul and funk. His 1972 single ‘John, I’m Only Dancing (Again)’ was updated with the sound of Detroit and New York for The Gouster. The opening three tracks clocked in at 20 minutes, so only seven tracks would fit onto the vinyl. Four of them, ‘Young Americans’, ‘Somebody Up There Likes Me’, ‘Can You Hear Me’, and ‘Right’ were re-recorded for Young Americans which came out in 1975.  That leaves the abovementioned ‘John, I’m Only Dancing (Again)’, ‘It’s Gonna Be Me’ and ‘Who Can I Be Now?’ as discarded waste. The Gouster appeared as part of the Who Can I Be Now? (1974-1976) boxset. 

The Clash: Cut The Crap (1984-ish)

Yes, Cut The Crap was released and I retro-reviewed it [here]. But the version that appeared in 1985 was a travesty, a record that only really involved Joe Strummer and band manager/wannabe producer Bernie Rhodes. Paul Simonon was sidelined, and guitarists Nick Sheppard and Vince White and drummer Pete Howard weren’t even playing. Rhodes used an electronic drum machine instead of Howard. Nevertheless, when the new songs were played live in 1984 they sounded fresh and the demo versions made that year were the sound of a proper band. Rhodes takes all the blame for the dismal final effort and that is fully justified. But there is an album in there, it just needs someone to take the original demo tapes and rework them.

2020: Compilations, Reissues, & Boxes

Timely as ever, I just want to belatedly offer a few more thoughts on some of the releases added to the everythingsgonegreen music vaults across 2020. When it came to compilations, reissues, and box sets, it was a fairly heavyweight line-up.

Starting with perhaps the heaviest of them all, reputation-wise at least. Digging Deep: Subterranea, which offers a barely anticipated but very welcome 30-track Robert Plant solo career overview. One that sees the more obvious “hits” like ‘Big Log’, ‘Ship of Fools’, and ‘In The Mood’ sitting snuggly alongside a whole bunch of far less obvious stuff. And as any Plant fan will tell you, it’s the latter category where the real gems can be found. Digging Deep: Subterranea collects work from all but a couple of Plant’s post-Zepp solo releases across nearly four decades. The only notable absentee being work from the superb Alison Krauss collaborative effort, although Jimmy Page himself would surely argue that particular point. There’s three new (or previously unreleased) tracks to be found, the best of which is the Patty Griffin duet, ‘Too Much Alike’. More than anything, the album highlights what an exceptional career Plant has had. And still has.

In December 2020 the pop world found itself mourning all over again with the realisation that a whole 40 years had (or have) passed since John Lennon was so needlessly gunned down outside his NYC apartment. Naturally, without wishing to get too cynical about it all, a lot of fuss was centred around a new collection of Lennon post-Beatles work in the form of Gimme Some Truth. At 36 tracks in its deluxe form, it’s a balanced mix of his (and Yoko’s) best known material, alongside the not so well-kent stuff. I grabbed it, because I wanted to play the game, I like a bit of John, and of course I needed a long overdue companion set for my 2007 remastered version of Shaved Fish (1975). Apparently.

A far less-hyped late-in-the-year compilation release from a band that rarely put a foot wrong during its pomp of roughly a decade ago, was The Kills’ Little Bastards. Which is everything it promises to be on the tin. Rough, ready, raw and rudimentary rock n roll, across 20 tunes, the vast majority of which are hugely improved from their original form thanks to 2020 remastering. Highly recommended, and all that.

Speaking of rough and rudimentary, the long lost and I guess, very overdue, obligatory White Stripes Greatest Hits set was sitting in my collection before I even knew I needed it. Which I very much didn’t. I’m a Jack White fan, I don’t mind owning that … what else can I say? I’m also a bit of a Meg fan, if I’m being completely vulnerable and honest about everything. You’ll know all of these so-called greatest hits, or more shamefully, you might be someone who knows only ‘Seven Nation Army’. If you’re the latter, don’t sleep on this one, the White Stripes’ Greatest Hits album is here for you, not me.

Which brings me to a couple of compilations that aren’t really compilations because they appeal as being a little more niche or specific than that broad brush stroke might allow. New forms of old work:

Foals Collected Reworks Volumes 1, 2, & 3. More than four hours’ worth of the Oxford band’s finest moments reconfigured for what appears to be a rather large heavily lit dancefloor. Although it’s nowhere near as dubious as that may sound. Volume 1 is actually rather good, with serious producer-types, the likes of Hot Chip, Alex Metric, Purple Disco Machine, and Solomun, for starters, going mental on a career-spanning collection of Foals’ best stuff. In fact, Solomun’s edit of ‘Late Night’ is the stand-out track across the entire three volumes, which can all be picked up separately - as opposed to the full set I managed to snare. It is however a three volume set that falls slight victim to the law of diminishing returns. I felt a little jaded by the end. Volume 1 is probably quite enough techno-fried Foals, thank you very much, despite the best efforts of Jono Ma Jagwar Ma, Lindstrom, Mount Kimbie, and Trophy Wife on the second and third instalments. File this one away under: good to have, but not essential.

A little more essential for me, and another release that was both new material and yet not quite new material, was another intriguing instalment in David Bowie’s Changes series. This one - ChangesNowBowie - being specific to a radio special the great man recorded back in 1996. Featuring tunes like ‘The Man Who Sold The World’, ‘Aladdin Sane’, and Tin Machine’s ‘Shopping For Girls’. How much Bowie is too much Bowie? … wash your mouth out with soap. Reviewed here.

Reissues and deluxe sets: yet more heavyweight carry-on.

I’m probably preaching to the converted here, but New Order’s Power Corruption and Lies deluxe reissue, and Joy Division’s 40th anniversary edition of Closer proved irresistible additions, even though I’m sure I already have both albums in their original form somewhere. Maybe even on cassette. The key thing worth noting about each work is the way these albums made a mockery of the age-old “difficult second album” cliché. Of the two, I think the New Order release was the best value for money, if indeed deluxe releases are ever really value for money, with an Extras disc featuring those pesky non-album singles and previously unreleased versions of many of the album cuts.

Another landmark album celebrating its 40th anniversary in 2020 with a multiple disc deluxe edition, and yet another release I didn’t really need but couldn’t resist, was Ultravox’s Vienna, the highlight of which was the “Rarities” disc featuring early versions (‘Sleepwalk’), soundcheck versions, the single version of ‘Vienna’, the 12-inch version of ‘All Stood Still’, and a bunch of live takes (at St Albans City Hall and The Lyceum) from the year of its release. Some of this stuff is incredible to listen to again, and a timely reminder of just how special Ultravox was during its pomp.

Ditto Depeche Mode, of course, and somewhat by accident, more by crook than hook, I managed to pick up a copy of the Violator 12-inch singles box set. Multiple versions of ‘Personal Jesus’, ‘Enjoy The Silence’, ‘Policy of Truth’, and ‘World In My Eyes’, plus all of the associated b-sides … 29 tracks all up, including a dizzying 15 and a half minute ‘The Quad: Final Mix’ version of ‘Enjoy The Silence’ (phew).

An eight-volume deluxe set of Prince’s Sign of The Times, anyone? Probably unnecessary, but wow … the quality of the material he didn’t release when he was alive is all the testimony needed, if ever needed, for indisputable proof of Prince’s sheer genius. Or his commitment to his art. Or his perfectionist stance on releasing music. I found more than a few hidden gems modestly tucked away amongst the 90-plus (count em) tracks included on this deluxe set of an album I’d always previously (wrongly) regarded as being slightly inferior to Parade. I'm quite sure Parade didn’t have this many quality cast-asides, but that may yet remain to be seen. Just wow.

Last, and probably least, to be fair, a Bandcamp name-your-price I picked up was Pitch Black’s Electronomicon Live, which was essentially a prelude to the first ever vinyl release of the duo’s fantastic second album, Electronomicon, which celebrated its 20th birthday in 2020. As difficult as it might be today to process the fact that the relatively DJ/club-friendly original album had never previously been the beneficiary of a vinyl release, the live version - with tracks sourced from hours and hours of DAT tapes/live recordings from the era - stood up pretty well I thought.

Right, we’re nearly there, albeit weeks after the fact, I’ve got just one more 2020 retrospective blogpost to come, one that looks at the best EPs I picked up during the year.

The Year That Was ... 1976

Craig Stephen steps back in time to present a Top 10 (plus one) of all things 1976 …

There’s something about 1976. Above all, it was a pivotal year in music: reggae was its peak and punk was an obscure art school sub-genre about to be turned into a commercial anti-art dogma. While punk flared up on the streets of London, Manchester, and New York, Jamaica’s capital Kingston was literally on fire, with uncontrolled violence and gang warfare. 1976 was also about many more things and while this article focuses mainly on the albums released in the 12 months, I have broadened it out, as you shall see. 

Max Romeo: War Ina Babylon 

Diatribes on poverty and inequality, corruption of the clergy and a call for politicians to take the road to righteousness litter the magnificent War Ina Babylon. The cover reflects the music: a distraught woman holding her head in her hands with a handkerchief to cry into. Roots reggae opener ‘One Step Forward’ urges politicians to take the “narrow” road to righteousness. Then we’re into ‘Chase the Devil’ with its famous opening “Lucifer son of the morning, I'm gonna chase you out of earth”, the frightening title track and ‘Uptown Babies’, a dissection of the class divide.

Ramones: Ramones 

Sounding a little dated now, perhaps, but incendiary then, Ramones was latched on to by anyone who mattered in 1976 and became THE must-have item of that long hot northern hemisphere summer. To many, it’s considered to be the first true punk rock album, and still inspires to this day. It’s 14 tracks, among them ‘Beat on the Brat’ and ‘Blitzkrieg Bop’, last all of 29 minutes. Nowadays, T-shirt City is bustling with Ramones tops but do those snotty teens wearing them even have a copy of the album that set them to a career of trademark buzzsaw guitars and short songs?

David Bowie: Station to Station / Nic Roeg: The Man Who Fell To Earth 

Changing tack once more, the album’s opener, the 10-minute title track began with the sound of an approaching train, more than three full minutes pass on a slow, hypnotic instrumental march before Bowie finally sings. It then erupts into a celebratory groove, leading into a lengthy, wild outro. It’s almost two songs welded into one. Kraftwerk were also an influence for Bowie and he would continue the musical adventure on the so-called “Berlin trilogy”. The cover used a still from the film The Man Who Fell to Earth in which Bowie took the lead role as a stranded alien. Released months after the album, it is a monumental sci-fi flick that bemuses and bedazzles in equal measures. 

100 Club Punk Special 

You could pin punk’s rise to the very first Sex Pistols gig, to the Screen on the green Midnight Special in late August, or even the Pistols’ foul-mouthed tirade at Bill Grundy on prime-time television that sparked tabloid front-page headlines. But this mini festival was the moment that seemed to propel the burgeoning movement into something more tangible and publically-consumable. It featured the Sex Pistols, Buzzcocks, The Damned, and The Clash, as well as Siouxise and the Banshees which had only just formed and pretty much played on the hoof. Whatever happened to the Stinky Toys? 

Can: Flow Motion 

I had to force myself to like Can but it was worth the pain. They are very much an acquired taste. By 1976 the German avant-garde prog-jazz-punkers found themselves on Top of the Pops with the electro-beat heavy ‘I Want More’ which features here. Flow Motion might be more accessible and it plays with disco rhythms, but it remained very much a Can album with a ten-minute track to close that continues a fine tradition of freeform recording.

All the President’s Men 

The film of the book of the event. Watergate was still raw in America, and in journalism around the world. The revelations of reporters Woodward and Bernstein in the Washington Post (and by other reporters) were like a Molotov Cocktail thrown at the established political processes. This was Dirty Politics before it became part of the culture. Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford play the said reporters braving obstacles at every turn to get the story. And there were many of them, but their doggedness culminates in the president resigning. A film can’t truly encapsulate years of chasing or a 336-page book but it covers whatever it is able to do with fantastic dramatic effect. 

Debris: Static Disposal 

From Chickasha, Oklahoma, Debris formed in 1975 and self-released this solitary LP. A Dada/punk/psych masterpiece recorded in just under seven hours. It was a mindblowing album coming with a provocative, bondage-themed sleeve. Like The Saints’ debut, they were a band oblivious to the coming punk explosion yet this also sounds like a punk masterpiece. Debris came from the same harvest as Captain Beefheart, the Stooges, early Roxy Music and other pre-punk mainstays of the time. After this, they disappeared.

Godzilla vs Megalon 

Nuclear testing unleashes mayhem on the undersea kingdom of Seatopia, causing a series of environmental disasters that nearly wipes out Rokuro, the schoolboy protagonist at the centre of this film. Then ... fighting … a flying robot … napalm bombs … the world in danger … Tokyo smashed. In other words, exactly what all the original Godzilla films do best. (Although the film was released in 1973 in Japan, it didn't receive a full theatrical release in the US, and more generally "the west", until the balmy summer of 1976 - Ed)

The Damned: New Rose 

It might be lauded as the first British punk single, but ‘New Rose’ was a classic three-minute pop song. The famous spoken intro – “Is she really going out with him?” – is from the Shangri-La’s ‘Leader of the Pack’ for fox sake. Fuelled by amphetamine sulphate and cider, ‘New Rose’ laid a marker for all other punk bands to follow. Only a few ever did. 

Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry: Super Ape 

Genius at the controls. Take a breath, open your mind and listen to this masterpiece of roots music. A must have for all Perry lovers and for the new generations interested in reggae music. Super Ape might not be the best reggae album of the 70s nor even Perry’s finest but it set a trend; reggae and dub meets, well, all sorts of sounds and influences. Various reissues and re-shaping has occurred in the past 44 years but the original still stands strong. 

Scotland 2, England 1, Hampden Park, 15 May 

This game would become a skeleton in goalkeeper Ray Clemence's cupboard after allowing a saveable Kenny Dalglish shot to roll through his legs for Scotland's winning goal. Mick Channon had given England an early lead but there was only ever going to be one winner. Bruce Rioch equalised just six minutes later. Clemence would later say he had Dalglish’s shot covered, but it bobbled and the next thing he knew it went through his legs and into the net. Scots fans didn’t care, they’ve never let the keeper forget it to this day.

Album Review: David Bowie - ChangesNowBowie (2020)

In November 1996, as he prepared for his 50th birthday celebration show at New York’s Madison Square Garden, David Bowie recorded a handful of rehearsal tracks for a radio special called ChangesNowBowie. That show, and those recordings, circulated in bootleg form for many years but were, in April 2020, set for an official Record Store Day release on a newly sanctioned (or official) album with the same title as the radio show itself.

That plan, of course, hit a snag when RSD was postponed in wake of the Covid-19 global pandemic outbreak which has pretty much brought the entire planet to a standstill. That 
setback didn’t prevent ChangesNowBowie being released in digital format (only) however, with a more extensive release (including vinyl, CD) earmarked for the rescheduled RSD date of June 20.

Unlike the three previous ‘Changes’ offerings - ChangesOne (1976), ChangesTwo (1981), and the 1990 hybrid compilation, erm, Changes - ChangesNow isn’t really a “Greatest Hits” type set. But it does include a few gems. Nine quite special tracks, and something of a pick n mix assortment of mostly stripped back acoustic takes on (again, mostly) older 1970s material.

For the ChangesNow sessions Bowie was supported by revered guitarist Reeves Gabrels (Tin Machine, The Cure*), bassist and co-vocalist Gail Ann Dorsey, and keys man, Mark Plati, but rather typically, the minimalist nature of these versions means its all about the man himself, and that incredible voice.

The radio interview itself and the general chit-chat narrative of the original broadcast has been omitted from the album, naturally. If you want that, you’ll just have to dig deep for the aforementioned bootleg editions. 

Highlights include fantastic takes on standards like ‘The Man Who Sold The World’, ‘Aladdin Sane’, and the live/cover favourite ‘White Light/White Heat’, which is easily the most uptempo, or straight up rock track of the bunch. There’s also the Hunky Dory sleeper, ‘Andy Warhol’, Ziggy’s ‘Lady Stardust’, and the Lodger-era ‘Repetition’. But for me, the pick of the bunch is Tin Machine’s ‘Shopping For Girls’, which is given new life on this. 

All up, it’s a cool addition to the wider Bowie discography. I’ve got the digital version of the album, which does quite nicely for now, but completists will want this on vinyl, so don’t sleep on RSD’s June 20 release date. 

* Incidentally, Bowie’s 50th birthday bash at Madison Square Garden was pivotal in Reeves Gabrels eventually joining The Cure. It was there, in early 1997, where Gabrels met Robert Smith, who performed a track alongside Bowie at MSG, with the pair going on to forge a close friendship. Years later, in 2012, Gabrels guested with The Cure for a few festival shows before later becoming a permanent member of the band. He remains a member of The Cure at the time of writing.

Classic Album Review: Flight of the Conchords - Flight of the Conchords (2008)

There was talk in the local media recently that Jemaine Clement and Bret McKenzie, aka Flight Of The Conchords, were working together again. Planning something special. It may even have been in the context of putting together a brand new television special, I can’t recall the exact details. But it’s been a full decade since the release of the duo’s self-titled debut album, so it seems timely to acknowledge the ten-year anniversary of that release, and the scarcely anticipated success that followed ... 

The Wellington comedy/musical outfit certainly lived the dream. From humble, relatively isolated, small-town New Zealand roots, to the big wide world of HBO sitcom celebrity, best-selling albums, lengthy international tours, Grammy Awards, Oscars, and Emmy nominations, it was a wild ride for a few years there. 

Just because they’re funny. Or rather, just for being able to strike the otherwise frequently elusive balance between good music and good comedy. Without ever crossing over too far into that murky shameless world otherwise known as the Novelty Act. 

It’s more of the knowing smile/quiet chuckle, warm fuzzy type of humour, as opposed to the belly laugh variety, but then that’s an integral part of its charm. Quiet, observational humour about everyday situations, occasionally dark, often sardonic and mocking, seriously satirical, and usually highly self-deprecating – what’s not to like? 

And who says they’re trying to be funny anyway? On this evidence these blokes are surely serious musicians … purely in a not so serious kind of way, obviously. 

Did I mention, gee whizz, they also collectively nabbed a coveted Wellingtonian of the year title? Ahem. 

Best tracks: ‘Inner City Pressure’ (Neil Tennant eat yer heart out), ‘Leggy Blonde’ (featuring sidekick and “band manager” extraordinaire Rhys Darby), ‘The Most Beautiful Girl (In The Room)’, ‘Business Time’ (“that’s why they’re called business sox”), and the best of the bunch, ‘Bowie’ (self-explanatory … inter-planetary, even) … 

Porky Post ... Classic Album Review: The Stooges - Fun House (1970)

Another outing for Porky, looking back at a classic album just two years shy of its 50th birthday …

I am a strong believer in music coming to the listener, rather than the individual seeking out the music.

My personal tastes have shipped and shaped over the decades. I’m now at an age that I should be appreciating Dylan, Neil Young, and Fleetwood Mac, but thank Buddha that’s never occurred.

Conversely, I am these days an aficionado of more robust, deranged, and frankly unloveable sounds than in my youth, when tweedom and indie ruled. I listened to Can in my mid-20s but couldn’t stomach them. But, now ... I understand.

Many years ago I bought The Stooges’ second album, Fun House, on CD at the same time as I got (the debut) The Stooges. But the gnarly, snarly nature of Fun House just didn’t resonate with me – the songs were too long and there wasn’t an ‘I Wanna Be Your Dog’, so I ended up giving it away. Sacrilege, I know.

I now have this bastard on vinyl and I’ve played it a lot over the past year. It’s got to me.

It kicks into action with ‘Down On The Street’, a blistering, bruising face-off with the devil in which Iggy Pop hollers words that skimp on the thinking and focus on the stinking: “Down on the street where the faces shine/ Floatin' around, I'm a real low mind/ See a pretty thing/ Ain't no wall/ See a pretty thing/ It ain't no wall.”

It’s the riffs that matter here and they are ear-bleedingly brilliant, amounting to a near four-minute battering of the senses.

‘Loose’ is a true rock’n’roll song; a hark back to the debut classic, while retaining a connection to their soul brothers, MC5. It has a brief but memorable chorus: “I’ll stick it deep inside/ I’ll stick it deep inside/ Cause I’m loose.” Make of that what you will.

While the Stooges were releasing this, David Bowie was in a whole different stratosphere. In 1969 the Londoner released his second solo album, the self-titled David Bowie, which included the radio-friendly ‘Space Oddity’. He appeared on course for a career as an intriguing but slightly kooky singer-songwriter. In late 1970 Bowie’s first bona fide hit album The Man Who Sold The World was issued in America (and six months later in the UK). Bowie had beefed up his sound, but his voice remained fey and there were no comparisons between the soon-to-be-superstar and The Stooges. And yet, in 1976, Bowie and Iggy Pop would unite to work on two Iggy albums released in 1977, and in return the American sang backing vocals on Low in the same year. But back in 1970 it would seem inconceivable that such a team-up could be possible.

Not when you had a track like ‘TV Eye’. The third track on Fun House is a dad-fucking rollercoaster of a four-minute ride. Listening now, with punk having bludgeoned its way through the youth consciousness, it’s impossible to comprehend just how out there this would have sounded at the time, and the rest of the album for that matter. Imagine. In the mid-60s there were The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Small Faces and Hendrix, to name just a few. All pushed the envelope in some way or another but musically the bass levels were kept at modest levels. That all changed in 1969 when MC5 thrashed away to ‘Kick Out The Jams’ and The Stooges gifted the world ‘I Wanna Be Your Dog’, the ultimate punk song in a non-punk era.

Then there’s ‘Dirt’, which is slow, bluesy and meandering. It’s almost a dirge, almost a pop song; in a way it’s The Stooges lowering the pace, but the grungy, existential guitars and discordant drums take it elsewhere.

Flip over to ‘1970’, a natural successor to ‘1969’ from the debut. Such a shame there was no Stooges album in 1971, what could they have done there? Both songs have a tribal hypnotic rhythm that repeats to the point of mild torture, but the newer track is more frantic.

The opening line is a potent one: “Out of my mind on Saturday night/ Ninteen-seventy rollin' in sight/ Radio burnin' up above/ Beautiful baby, feed my love all night.”

The title track is the longest, at just under eight minutes, but well worth the effort. Steve Mackay’s saxophone adds to the raucous, late-night-jam feel.

But this is tame sat alongside (or chronologically just before) the album closer ‘L.A. Blues’, a totally chaotic blitz that takes some stiff drinks before being listenable for its entirety. It’s registered as an instrumental because Iggy just shouts and screams like some sort of rabid wolf. It has to have been one of the first truly out there sonic cacophonies of noise that today would be described as experimental. It’s like watching a car crash video: you are appalled but can’t take your eyes away.

Which in a way is apt description of the experience of listening to the entire album.

The Stooges crashed and burned thereafter. Drugs and more drugs didn’t do them any favours; there was one more album*, Raw Power, and the live compilation Metallic K.O. which heralded new tracks such as ‘Rich Bitch’, which would have made for a phenomenal mid-70s album, but sadly those tracks only exist only in non-produced form.

(*Two inferior post-millennium albums notwithstanding - Ed)

Albums of 2016

It's time for the annual blog year-end wrap, and a list of 2016's best albums. Or in the case of the way we roll here at everythingsgonegreen, the "best" as in a list of the ten "most listened to" albums in my house this year. The only prerequisite for inclusion here is that I had to purchase a copy during the year. And, of course, I had to like it more than the other 100 or so new (or reissue) albums I picked up in 2016. Streaming doesn't count, and Spotify is dead to me - for OCD reasons that I may one day expand upon in a separate post.

10. The Leers - Are You Curious?

Yet another of the many great recent things to come out of Auckland's Red Bull Studios with Ben Lawson's name affixed to it, The Leers' debut album was a firm favourite across the first half of the year. Are You Curious? was an absorbing radio-ready blend of indie pop hooks and big slabs of bluesy psychedelia. My review can be found here.

9. Crystal Castles - Amnesty (I)

Evidently no longer the critical darling he was when Alice Glass was fronting his unique form of agit-electro-rave on three previous albums, Ethan Kath returned in 2016 alongside a new vocalist, with a new full-length work, and thankfully, more of the same. My review is here.

8. Radikal Guru - Dub Mentalist

Dub Mentalist arrived right at the end of the year so I didn't manage to get a full review up on the blog. But it was nonetheless impressive enough to get more than its share of pod time, and that's all that really matters in terms of where it ultimately stacks up. This is the third straight Radikal Guru album to make the blog's year-end list, so some context here might be that I’m a committed fan of the Polish dub fiend, and therefore, Dub Mentalist, by default, was always guaranteed more ear time. But it still had boxes to tick and expectations to meet, which it did with some aplomb, and Radikal Guru’s signature mix of the deep, the digital, and the rootsy, ensures Dub Mentalist rates just as highly as the other two albums. The tunes given the most room and space to breathe, sans vocalists, take on lives of their own, and those are my favourites here. But that doesn’t mean contributions by guest conspirators like Jay Spaker, Echo Ranks, Solo Banton, and Earl 16, don’t also have their place. This guy keeps on rolling out a wholly unique brand of extra-terrestrial dub at fairly regular intervals, but his genre of choice and area of expertise is so niche, nobody seems to notice.

7. Pacific Heights - The Stillness

Shapeshifter-come-electro-head-bobber Devin Abrams came up with something personal, intimate, and quite raw (in parts) with The Stillness, yet it was also polished, accessible, and everything a successful breakout solo album should be. During a year when local work blasted all preconceived limitations out of view, The Stillness could quite easily have placed much higher on this list. My review is here.

6. The Radio Dept - Running Out of Love

On the surface Running Out of Love appeals as a dose of saccharine Swedish indie pop. Scratch a little beneath that, however, and you’ll find something much darker buried deep within its slightly rotten core. My review is here.

5. Adrian Sherwood/Various - At The Controls Vol.2 1985-1990

This is another one of those pesky compilation albums that has no place on a list such as this (see unwritten blog rule 425, clause 1b). Well it would be, if it wasn’t an On-U Sound compilation, and a collection of prime On-U era archive material, mixed by label guru and occasional world leading mixologist Adrian Sherwood. In defiance of the rule, At The Controls v2, also topped one of the annual lists over at the obviously very learned website, The Quietus. Admittedly it was a list for rogue releases, oddities, and collections that don’t really fit in anywhere else. A little bit like Sherwood himself. My review is here.

4. Underworld - Barbara Barbara, We Face A Shining Future

Aside from the Radikal Guru album, Underworld’s awkwardly-titled BBWFASF (phew) was the only other entry in the ten that I failed to write a full review for during the year. But just like Radikal Guru, Underworld’s place on this list was practically assured as soon as the album arrived in my inbox. As an Underworld fan, I was always bound to give more time to BBWFASF than some others. I even thought their otherwise indifferently-received Barking album of 2010 was one of the best of its year. The thing that makes new Underworld material so hard to resist is the sense that they’re always a few steps ahead of the game, always state-of-the-art, despite massive changes in the rules over the course of the 25-odd years they’ve been doing their thing. And all - for the vast majority of those years - within that most fickle of flighty genres, dance music. In truth, it probably doesn’t hit the giddy or euphoric heights of their first couple of albums, and there’s no ‘Born Slippy’ or an epic ‘Rez’ to be found here, but the music of Underworld has evolved to occupy a different space these days, and there’s still a lot to love on BBWFASF.

3. Pitch Black - Filtered Senses

See all of the above. Add in a local context. Ahead of the rest, state-of-the-art, across 20 years. Etc. For me, one of the best Friday mornings of 2016 was the one when I skyped Paddy Free in New York, and he spoke of Pitch Black’s accomplishments and getting to do what he loves every day like it was the most natural thing in the world. Reviewed here for the blog and for NZ Musician magazine. 

2. David Bowie - Blackstar

Only David Bowie could pull this off. What better way to go out than to do so just two days after releasing an album that positively oozed all things life and death? Without giving us so much as a hint in advance. I’m still a little spooked by it. A massive loss, but he left us with an incredible legacy. My review is here.

1. Radiohead - A Moon Shaped Pool

I told anyone that would listen just how good this was. Every listen felt like it was turned up an extra notch. As Radiohead continue to astound and build on an already expansive discography, A Moon Shaped Pool is merely the latest flawless instalment. In reality, daylight was second. My review is here.

Five Honourable Mentions:

The Average Rap Band album, El Sol, very nearly pipped The Leers for a place in the final ten, falling just short in the end. It probably just needs to simmer through another summer.

I thought the Suede album, Night Thoughts, had a lot going for it, in a very insular and retro kind of way, but it also felt a little bit out of step with everything else going on in 2016. I remain a Suede devotee and completist.

The also no-longer-particularly-relevant Primal Scream released something close to an actual synthpop album in the form of Chaosmosis, which had a few cracker tunes on it. But the feeling I got listening to it, given the Scream’s cutting edge past, is that cliché commercial pop, in this instance, might just be the last bastion of the ultimate Nineties scoundrel. Bobby Gillespie has a lot to answer for, and that vocal is now more irritating than ever.

I know Warpaint’s Heads Up got a lot of love elsewhere, with good reason, and I did enjoy it, I just didn’t find myself wanting to go back for fourths, fifths, or a sixth listen. Even though I understand that’s probably exactly what I needed to do.

My guilty pleasure quota was sated by the music of Icelandic blues-rockers Kaleo, and their album A/B, which arrived somewhere out of left field and was an album I wouldn’t *normally* find myself listening to.

Some other end-of-year gongs (“the EGGs”):

EP or short album of the year was Yoko-Zuna’s Luminols, five quite diverse and distinct tunes, with the Tom Scott collab, ‘Orchard St’, going on to become a big pod favourite.

Reissue of the year was Jack White’s Acoustic Recordings 1998-2016, because I’m a big White fan, and cos I like the idea of putting some of this stuff together, where it wouldn’t ordinarily be automatically compatible by default. And because, if for no other reason, the stripped back bluegrass version of The Raconteurs’ ‘Top Yourself’ blows me away every time I hear it. White’s release was pushed closely by two deluxe/expanded releases: the 40^th anniversary issue of The Ramones’ 1976 debut, which became a triple disc featuring demos and live takes, and Pure McCartney, which was another scarcely needed yet still strangely compelling post-Beatles career overview from his nibs. There was also the small matter of Michael Jackson’s Off The Wall getting a deluxe makeover.

Freebie or exceptional name-your-price release of the year: as found on Bandcamp, toss a coin and choose between Adi Shankara’s dark and dense Structures, or the Auckland-based Peach Milk, with her delicious Finally EP.

The everythingsgonegreen gig of the year was Tami Neilson’s San Fran (Wellington) set from way back in March. Thoroughly polished and professional, great company, and a brilliant vibe on the night. 

More generally, 2016 was a year of relentless mourning for pop culture fiends. All of those barely anticipated deaths: from Bowie to Prince to Leonard Cohen to George Michael. And everyone else in between. Farewell to popular artists like Glenn Frey, Sharon Jones, Maurice White, and Pete Burns. To roots and country music stars like Leon Russell and Merle Haggard. To iconic producers like (Sir) George Martin and Prince Buster. To local (NZ) legends such as Ian Watkin, Ray Columbus, and Bunny Walters. To stars of the big and small screens - Gene Wilder, Debbie Reynolds, Carrie Fisher, Alan Rickman, Jean Alexander, and Caroline Aherne. Even beyond the world of music, film, and the arts, transgenerational global figures such as Muhammad Ali and Fidel Castro couldn’t survive the cull. Plus there will be many others of varying importance and influence to you personally (that I simply haven’t covered here). Bottom line: it’s been a rough year …

And while I’m sorely tempted to use the last paragraph of this post to launch into an opinionated rant about global politics - Aleppo, terrorism, the global refugee crisis, Brexit, Trump, and the rise of the xenophobic Right in general - I’ll spare you …

Be gone 2016 ... watch your arse on the way out.