74. The Sisterhood - Giving Ground (Merciful Release)

One week at number one on w/e 22^nd February 1986

When we last visited the NME Indie Number One spot, we bore witness to a group riding the wave of some arguably unjustified hype with a nonetheless marvellous single. If Easterhouse have since become largely forgotten, nobody could fairly begrudge them their one moment in the sun. “Giving Ground”, on the other hand, is a bird of a different feather, a one-off indie hit created through gossip and confusion with some of the public potentially not understanding who the group even were.

The Sisters Of Mercy began to have some serious wobbles while recording their second (aborted) album, the prophetically and provisionally titled “Left On Mission And Revenge”. Guitarist Wayne Hussey offered a series of songs to Andrew Eldritch for potential inclusion, all of which were promptly rejected by either Eldritch or guitarist Craig Adams. Eldritch then put forward his minimal ideas, one of which, according to Hussey, consisted of just one chord. Adams and Hussey promptly left the group due to the usual (and in this case not inaccurate) claim of “musical differences”, and formed their own group The Sisterhood, announcing their plans to the music press and releasing news of a forthcoming live show and radio session with Janice Long.

Eldritch, however, was rattled by this, seeing the name The Sisterhood as a deliberate continuation of The Sisters of Mercy brand, which all parties had agreed not to use after the group’s dissolution. As a result, he considered his limited options, and decided to put a single out using that band name himself – later stating in Melody Maker that they “patently had to be stopped. And when they wanted to be called the Sisterhood, there was nothing I could do but be the Sisterhood before them – the only way to kill that name was to use it, then kill it.”

He promptly registered a company under the name and spent five days recording the single “Giving Ground”, playing all the instruments himself and giving lead vocal duties to recent Merciful Release signing James Ray (of James Ray & The Performance) to avoid any contractual complications.

Meanwhile, Hussey and Adams were left at a sticky wicket, and had to record their Radio One session under the ungainly pub rock name The Wayne Hussey and Craig Adams Band, reverting to the name The Mission at the end of February. Eldritch responded with a press release stating “We assume that their choice of name is entirely unconnected with the forthcoming Andrew Eldritch album that for some months has had the working title ‘Left on Mission and Revenge’”. This might have suggested further legal brouhaha was to follow, but fortunately the bickering stopped there (in public at least; Hussey has since said that various solicitor’s letters still circulated in private).

This soap opera played out in the press and on the airwaves across a number of weeks, and gave both parties more gossip column and news section inches than they would ordinarily receive – for some reason, there is little music fans enjoy more than two stubborn, egocentric band members at loggerheads with each other. Such things are usually the preserve of rock monsters rather than cult goth bands who had yet to score a single hit, but the subsequent publicity seemed to drive fans into record stores out of curiosity. As well as those swept along by the press, there may also have been a few confused fans in the mix who thought they were buying Hussey’s new record due to his earlier announcement.

And what were these unfortunate souls getting for their money? Not much. “Giving Ground” suffers from being a rushed creation recorded with a strategy, rather than a strong creative outcome, in mind. Opening with a minute of Numanoid synths before introducing a somewhat tedious bassline and basic drum machine track, it takes an indulgent two minutes to bring Ray’s vocals properly into the mix, which are hesitant and slightly too bright, failing to sell the idea (such as it is). The song then spends seven-and-a-half minutes going nowhere in particular. You wait and wait for something to emerge – a chorus, a change of mood, a rush of adrenalin or fury, or even some ambience - but the track bumps along the seabed, a flatulent seacow mooing along a dull, non-divergent course.

73. Easterhouse - Whistling In The Dark (Rough Trade)

One week at number one from 15th February 1986

Regardless of their claims otherwise, the “serious” music press have always been just as susceptible to hype as glossy teen magazines. Unlike Smash Hits and their metaphorical "dumper", however, they have often been more coy about their failings, crowing about their successes while hastily burying their dud predictions. The itinerary of NME hopefuls whose subsequent careers were either cruelly brief or never got off the ground is long; from Department S to Gay Dad to Terris to Brother (all of whom were cover stars) sometimes it's been hard not to wince at the risky long shots or desperate decisions.

As 1985 drew to a close, Easterhouse began to be sold as a solid proposition. Formed by brothers Ivor and Andy Perry in 1982, their credentials were impeccable – the group's association with The Smiths was strong, beginning with a Manchester support slot in 1983, and Morrissey and Marr had loudly proclaimed their brilliance to anyone willing to listen. The band also gave socialist diatribes to a music press happy to run over the word count for such things, and their first two Martin Hannett produced singles on London Records, while poor sellers, indicated a charged yet serious band.

Despite having all these credits on their side, London Records didn’t feel it was worth the effort investing further and dropped them, leaving them to be rescued by Rough Trade where, somewhat miraculously, the press enthusiasm continued unabated. One listen to “Whistling In The Dark” gives the game away as to why; this is an incredibly good and staggeringly robust record. It opens on a swinging Motown beat which subsequently dominates throughout, but that beat is augmented with hard, heavy guitar sounds – walloped metallic bass lines meet rhythm guitar lines which sound as if they’re echoing around a steelworks. “Let’s get to the point/ Get to the heart of it” bellows Andy Perry at the start, making it immediately clear that this was a band for whom toughness and directness were seen as virtues.

In a world where a band’s presence in the indie charts increasingly meant either deeply experimental music or delicate whimsy (or in the case of the Cocteau Twins, both) “Whistling” suggests that the powerful ideas birthed by punk rock weren’t necessarily exhausted. The music press were quick to suggest that Easterhouse may be Rough Trade’s Clash to The Smiths’ Pistols as a result, but in reality the bark and swing of the track feels as if it owes a bigger debt to The Jam; there’s the same strident, hectoring edge combined with a muscular but nonetheless irresistible delivery. 

Just when you think the track has shot its load and made its point, the final few moments turn out to be among the finest – “Don’t get caught the same way twice/ You give them money for old rage” yells Perry and the group completely let loose, thrashing, jangling and upping the dynamism past the point you thought it possible for them to go. It is, in short, a fine single and one I still play to this day.

Despite this, Easterhouse’s problem in the long term was multi-faceted. Firstly, a straightforward political punk revival clearly wasn't going to happen; even Paul Weller didn't want his records to sound like The Jam by this point. Besides that, the mid-eighties were a confused period in the music business, and nobody at either Rough Trade or any of the major labels seemed to effectively predict the way the wind was blowing. One of the common bets being placed by journalists and A&R reps was that if alternative music was going to crossover, it was going to have to adopt mainstream arena rock's production values and delivery. Throughout 1986 and slightly beyond, groups such as Goodbye Mr Mackenzie and Love And Money took the attitude and the sound of the alternative sector but turned their noise on vinyl into something airbrushed, vast and blown out. In the mid-eighties, any indie band getting signed to a major may have ended up sounding faintly like Big Country or Simple Minds in the end.

1986

Well, what other image did you want me to use to illustrate this entry? British Alternative music in 1986 was, after all, synonymous with the NME’s C86 cassette – a ragbag of independent sounds ranging from the unapologetically light-hearted, cheap and jangly (and some would also argue “twee”) to the utterly demented and Beefheart influenced. From Byrds approximations on your kid brother’s Argos catalogue guitar followed by A Witness thrashing discords and screaming hysterically about sharpened sticks and then early Grebo, the tape was a rather broader tent than it’s often given credit for. 

It’s been reissued on vinyl and CD numerous times since and eventually became shorthand for a certain kind of sound (generally the indiepop end of the spectrum), though rival music magazines to the NME preferred other labels; Record Mirror, for example, slightly sneeringly but consistently called many of the artistes “shambling bands”.

C86 is really only half the story, though. The tape didn’t emerge until May, and while the NME were happy to brag about their ability to underline the best DIY and homebrew talents across the land, it took a while for that hype to sink in. The first half of the 1986 indie charts therefore feel, in places, like a continuation of the year before; lots of earnestness, angularity and anarchic noise dominates, though the likes of the Wedding Present, June Brides and The Shop Assistants put in early bids for the near future.

Goth rock also sweeps its way right across the charts like a thick, black housepaint brush through the year, with the old hands continuing their schtick while forceful newcomers such as The Mission and Fields Of Nephilim emerge who would make more significant commercial breakthroughs. Their close cousins in the Industrial movement also shouldn’t be entirely dismissed; they don’t cross over at this stage, but they certainly make their presence felt.

Above all, though, to me 1986 feels like the first chart year I completely understand. Listening to the playlist on the right hand side of this page (more than 100 songs long, so please do click through to Spotify) I’m whisked back to John Peel playing on the kitchen radio, ten second snippets of fascinating noise appearing on the Chart Show Indie Chart rundown on Channel 4, and the music press featuring pictures of dorky kids with guitars strapped across their chunky jumpers. I can almost smell the ferric tape as I pop another cassette into the stereo to record a known favourite off late night radio. For me, this is where things start to get really interesting. For others among you, it may possibly act as a jumping off point. 

It will also become noticeable just how much competition there now is for the number one spot in the indie charts. Whereas previous years have sometimes felt like a coronation exercise for the half a dozen crossover artists who dominated at any given time, now it's thrown wide open for excitable newcomers on tiny bedroom labels, as well as the New Orders, Depeche Modes and Cocteau Twins of this world.

As for 1985, let’s wave goodbye with one last look at the playlist below. 

(If you're struggling to access them due to Spotify's strange "upstream" issues, the 1985 playlist can be found here, whereas the 1986 one is here).

71/72 - Cocteau Twins - Tiny Dynamine/ Echoes In A Shallow Bay (4AD)

Tiny Dynamine – number one for one week on w/e 7th December 1985

Echoes – number one for seven weeks from w/e 14th December 1985

Tiny Dynamine – number one again for one week from w/e 1st February 1986

Echoes – number one again for one week from w/e 8th February 1986

My Mum was idly browsing through the charts in my copy of Record Mirror in 1985 – uncharacteristic behaviour for her, but you’ll have to trust me on this one – and kept muttering the same group’s name as she went through the indie section. “Cocteau Twins” she murmured. “And there they are again. And again. And again. David, do you know this group? I’ve never heard of them but they’re all over these charts in here. They’re doing very well”.

Sometimes flippant comments made by people who aren’t invested in a band or genre reveal truths, and indeed, the Cocteaus were an utterly unshiftable force in alternative music in 1985. Unlike the Morrisseys, McCullochs and (Robert) Smiths of that world, though, their presence was often only felt through mentions in the music press, plays on evening radio, and their largely unintentional farming of the indie listings. Their records frequently slowly drifted around both the singles and album charts, gumming up the works and leaving long, murky pastel trails.

The absolute peak of this phenomenon occurred at the end of 1985, when 4AD saw fit to release two of their EPs in quick succession. Both “Tiny Dynamine” and “Echoes In A Shallow Bay” were recorded in short order as the group tested the facilities of their new recording studio, producing results they felt were good enough for public consumption in the process. The two records were not particularly stylistically distinct and could easily have been mashed together to create a mini-LP without losing any coherence, and history doesn’t record why the EP approach was taken instead.

Even if you didn’t already know that the songs featured here began life in a laboratory-like, testing environment, it becomes clear that something fresh is afoot almost immediately. Whereas previous Cocteaus singles had a sense of openness and vastness, particularly their previous release “Aikea-Guinea”, with both these records you feel – or at least I feel (never assume!) - as if a glass dome is being pulled over the group. The production begins to take on a radiated indoor warmth as thick basslines meet airy but artificial sounding washes. It’s hardly Dire Straits, but there’s a precision and slickness to the sound which causes you to imagine wandering around an empty shopping mall where only brief glimpses of natural light are seen through occasional tiny windows on the edges. The rest is strip lights, potted plants and tasteful muted colours.

You can hear this particularly strongly on tracks like “Pale Clouded White” on “Echoes”, where the ambient whine of treated guitars constantly linger in the background like the gentle echo of unoiled machinery, or on “Great Spangled Fritillary” where the background instruments approximate creaks, clicks, groans and distant foghorn blasts rather than providing any traditional anchor. In a sense, this is industrial music, but it sounds nothing like Foetus. Instead, it cuddles up to the machinery, accepting it as a tool which can be something other than a weapon.

It’s not as if “Tiny Dynamine” offers anything vastly different. The epitome of the phenomenon can possibly be found on there first, the instrumental “Ribbed and Veined” offering artificial cricket clicks alongside hazy muzak hums, occasional touches of wow and flutter, and a steady, unchallenging backbeat. If anything, this track almost sounds close to the modern idea of Vaporwave, where relaxing, smooth melodies meet cavernous echoes and badly recalled memories of the wonders of the eighties indoor shopping centre; it’s just that while those songs generally veer towards the bright and even groovy, “Ribbed and Veined” is closer to the music you hear in a jammed elevator just as the place is due to close for the evening; a gentle, unobtrusive thing wobbling its way towards the unintentionally nightmarish. Nor is the Cocteau’s music ever as straightforward as some dork pushing a few Garageband effects buttons over a loop of an instrumental break from some dinner party soul album.

70. The Cramps - Can Your Pussy Do The Dog (Big Beat)

Three weeks at number one from 16th November 1985

Of all the groups to visit the NME Indie Number One spot, The Cramps have been the slowest to peak so far (unless we count Robert Wyatt). Formed in 1976, their wait for a stint at the summit position – and indeed a debut within the UK National Top 75 – feels sluggish to say the least. If it were any other veteran punk group, you would assume it was something of a Toy Dolls situation; a freak novelty breakout hit pestering the peak slot.

The Cramps were a strange group, though; their obsession with trashy, furious old school rock and roll and B movies made them seem a heavy influence on the psychobilly scene, which by 1985 was only just shifting downwards from its 83/84 peak. Then their proclivity towards PVC stagewear and even on-stage nudity, plus the use of heavy make up and the aforementioned horror flicks, gave them an appeal to the more vampish goths. Punks also appreciated the high-paced attacks they threw into all their songs, and then there were weirdos like Mark E Smith who appreciated them purely for being fellow outsiders.

Alan McGee was also a fan, and when they inevitably signed to Creation in the mid-nineties, bouyed up by the label’s influx of Oasis cash, I was astonished by all the number of my friends who suddenly came out of the woodwork saying they’d always been fans. Once again, the sexier and camper goths, anarchists and leather jacketed rock and roll boys who rolled their own tobacco nipped down to the local record shop to buy “Naked Girl Falling Down The Stairs”. “Ha ha!” a friend of mine barked delightedly on learning of the title. “You couldn’t get a more Cramps song title than that”.

I’m in danger of making them sound like a gargantuan cult, though, one of those bands who accidentally pulled in so many freaks and art school kids that they were a constant Top 40 threat. That’s far from the truth. The Cramps played the club circuit and lived in the cracks and airless caverns of society, supported by a loyal fanbase but never making sense to quite enough people to come close to being called a phenomenon.

In 1985, “Can Your Pussy Do The Dog” proved to be the closest they’d come so far to a breakthrough, and given that, it’s surprising how much of a step backwards it sounds. It has the same wide-eyed swaggering rock vocals of The Damned in their punk prime, a similar hollow, under-produced yet heavy duty whack to last year’s psychobilly movement, and very faint echoes of The Fall at their rawest and scratchiest (in other words, the group The Fall had ceased to be). The key thing to remember when pulling these various similarities together, though, is The Cramps were on the opposite side of the ocean in New York while all these things were occurring in Britain. The psychobilly scene owed them a debt, and similarities to any other punk bands were usually either coincidental, or entirely due to transatlantic admiration of their work.