Number one for seven weeks from w/e 15th December 1984
1. As the enthusiastic accompaniment to somebody “downing a pint”.
2. As the tense sound made by football supporters during a critical penalty shot (usually followed either by cheers, an “ooh!” of disappointment, or even a deflated, almost sarcastic “Oh.”)
3. The noise made shortly before a group of pissed-up beef-necked overgrown schoolboys start throwing increasingly heavy objects around in a pub. It might start with beer mats and end with chairs. Usually, deep down, you know you should have left the place long before this occurred.
4. The sound shortly before the chorus of “Nellie The Elephant”.
Spot the odd one out there. We’ve encountered The Toy Dolls multiple times in our journey through the indie charts, and on every occasion it’s been noticeable just how much they inhabit their own world; it’s an absurd but not particularly sophisticated cross between the abrasive and the fey, the childlike and the rough.
The group’s roots were firmly in the Punk Pathetique subgenre of Oi, where banal and trivial working class observations combined with a general air of frivolity and stupidity; if most of those groups focused on simple comedic situations such as trying to get served in a bar before closing time (Splodgenessabounds) or being caught kissing someone else’s woman and having to make your escape (Peter & The Test Tube Babies), the Toy Dolls were essentially doing the same only writing with thick crayons. Titles like “Cheerio and Toodle-pip”, all delivered in Olga’s high pitched music hall voice, felt as if they had emerged from ancient episodes of “Watch With Mother”. You got the impression that in Olga’s opinion, the whole of adult society hadn’t moved far beyond the kindergarten, so why should he?
Their cover version of the Mandy Miller song “Nellie The Elephant” had been released in 1982 to indie chart success, but didn’t really make much of a mark beyond the kind of dancefloors where punks gathered. The track never quite disappeared from those club playlists, though, and slowly and steadily found a fresh audience in 1984 thanks to stray bits of Radio One evening airplay getting noticed by the daytime crew (though John Peel, interestingly, consistently ignored it in favour of other Toy Dolls material). The track was reissued, and entered the lower reaches of the Top 100 in November, building up steam and then finally gatecrashing the Top 40 by early December.
Its popularity feels almost entirely due to the absurdities of the British Christmas market. Record buyers at Christmas time will happily part with money to hear anything which sounds as if it might evoke collective fun, whether that’s songs with superhumanly anthemic choruses, tracks their children could also appreciate, or novelty records which are frankly stupid but annoyingly catchy. For all its chugging punk rock stylings, “Nellie The Elephant” managed to tick all those boxes, and found itself appreciated by kids both literal and overgrown - the children at home getting excited about Christmas, and the ones in the outside world getting drunk at the works party; the Olgas and the Juniors of this world, some growing up and others falling down.
The Toy Dolls suddenly found themselves in the Christmas number four position, right behind the Three Kings of Band Aid, Wham’s “Last Christmas” and Paul McCartney’s Frog Chorus – all monstrous sellers. It was a colossal achievement for their tiny Sunderland indie label Volume, who were usually only used to worrying about getting enough copies of their singles pressed to keep them in the Indie Top 20. In this sense, “Nellie The Elephant” is an eccentric British victory for the rank outsider, the everyman partaking in daft follies in his spare time and then finding himself eyeballing an ex-Beatle for a top three chart position. And at Christmastime too! It’s a wonderful life indeed.
It has to be said that it’s not really a great piece of work in itself, though, and Peel’s reluctance to engage with it is not surprising. It’s a groundbreaker in that it feels like one of the first attempts by a punk or metal band to create a single out of unlikely source material. In the decades to come we will be treated to ironic covers of children’s songs and "cheesy" pop hits by no end of young men wearing studded leather jackets, but even taking that “innovation” into account, the single is really just a boozy racket.
In this respect, the gap between “Nellie” and Scaffold’s 1968 Christmas number one “Lily The Pink” is actually quite narrow. Both depend on the same stomping, chugging rhythm, perfect for bashing beer tankards on tables to. Both sound perfect for the kind of overly raucous Christmas party I must admit I never got along with – the toxically mixed kind which occasionally saw somebody fired from their job in the New Year, or saw old rows between good friends being resuscitated. Sometimes the line between the jolly drunken cry of “WooooAAARGH” and much more aggressive screaming and shouting can be very fine.
There’s also the suggestion that the Toy Dolls didn’t really enjoy their brief spell of success that much. In later interviews about his experiences as a one hit wonder (spoiler alert - the Dolls never managed sustained mainstream success) Olga was heard to complain that the money from this hit disappeared very quickly and the song destroyed their credibility. He also told tales of children being brought along to Toy Dolls gigs in the expectation of family friendly material, though I’ve always doubted this aspect of his story; were small schoolchildren really welcomed alongside their parents at the Hull Adelphi?
Whatever short-term harm the success of the record did the group, in time they were able to build on their brand as the original daft punks, and they remain a popular live draw for people who just want to hear something jagged but stupid for an hour. There’s no shortage of such punters, and I count among my friends a couple of Toy Dolls fans.
In broader terms, though, this record is a slightly depressing full stop. “Nellie The Elephant” was, so far as I can ascertain, the last original punk record to enter the British Top 40 (ignoring later 90s and 00s US punk records) and the only second wave punk record to get into the Top 30. The British public had learned to tolerate punk rock provided it was silly. On the television consumer programme “That’s Life”, Esther Rantzen’s gang occasionally vox popped punks in the street and asked them to yodel, or asked for their views on a new household product. Each time Adrian Mills put his mic under the nose of a spiky haired youth, the more mature studio audience shrieked with laughter in anticipation. So long as they either acted like village idiots, or were presented as such, punks were fine – the mainstream media had gone from seeing punk rock as a social threat comparable to the cold war to framing it as risible. In this mid-eighties world, “Nellie The Elephant” was an acceptable punk hit, but there would be no more.
I attended a punk disco in Soho on a few occasions in the early 00s, where the DJ would spend all evening spinning bona fide punk classics before finishing on “Nellie The Elephant” - at this point the bar staff would all do a daffy dance in celebration before closing up. This used to annoy the hell out of me; it’s a DJ’s prerogative to end the evening on something ridiculous, but “Nellie” always sounded so limp and mocking after so many other classic records. More recently, I’ve started wondering whether he ploughed through his copy of the Guinness Book Of British Hit Singles, noticed a logical endpoint, and decided to go with it, shrugging as he did so. The endings we get in life or on our nights out are usually not the ones we ourselves would have chosen; they’re picked for us.
Week One
Their cover version of the Mandy Miller song “Nellie The Elephant” had been released in 1982 to indie chart success, but didn’t really make much of a mark beyond the kind of dancefloors where punks gathered. The track never quite disappeared from those club playlists, though, and slowly and steadily found a fresh audience in 1984 thanks to stray bits of Radio One evening airplay getting noticed by the daytime crew (though John Peel, interestingly, consistently ignored it in favour of other Toy Dolls material). The track was reissued, and entered the lower reaches of the Top 100 in November, building up steam and then finally gatecrashing the Top 40 by early December.
Its popularity feels almost entirely due to the absurdities of the British Christmas market. Record buyers at Christmas time will happily part with money to hear anything which sounds as if it might evoke collective fun, whether that’s songs with superhumanly anthemic choruses, tracks their children could also appreciate, or novelty records which are frankly stupid but annoyingly catchy. For all its chugging punk rock stylings, “Nellie The Elephant” managed to tick all those boxes, and found itself appreciated by kids both literal and overgrown - the children at home getting excited about Christmas, and the ones in the outside world getting drunk at the works party; the Olgas and the Juniors of this world, some growing up and others falling down.
The Toy Dolls suddenly found themselves in the Christmas number four position, right behind the Three Kings of Band Aid, Wham’s “Last Christmas” and Paul McCartney’s Frog Chorus – all monstrous sellers. It was a colossal achievement for their tiny Sunderland indie label Volume, who were usually only used to worrying about getting enough copies of their singles pressed to keep them in the Indie Top 20. In this sense, “Nellie The Elephant” is an eccentric British victory for the rank outsider, the everyman partaking in daft follies in his spare time and then finding himself eyeballing an ex-Beatle for a top three chart position. And at Christmastime too! It’s a wonderful life indeed.
It has to be said that it’s not really a great piece of work in itself, though, and Peel’s reluctance to engage with it is not surprising. It’s a groundbreaker in that it feels like one of the first attempts by a punk or metal band to create a single out of unlikely source material. In the decades to come we will be treated to ironic covers of children’s songs and "cheesy" pop hits by no end of young men wearing studded leather jackets, but even taking that “innovation” into account, the single is really just a boozy racket.
In this respect, the gap between “Nellie” and Scaffold’s 1968 Christmas number one “Lily The Pink” is actually quite narrow. Both depend on the same stomping, chugging rhythm, perfect for bashing beer tankards on tables to. Both sound perfect for the kind of overly raucous Christmas party I must admit I never got along with – the toxically mixed kind which occasionally saw somebody fired from their job in the New Year, or saw old rows between good friends being resuscitated. Sometimes the line between the jolly drunken cry of “WooooAAARGH” and much more aggressive screaming and shouting can be very fine.
There’s also the suggestion that the Toy Dolls didn’t really enjoy their brief spell of success that much. In later interviews about his experiences as a one hit wonder (spoiler alert - the Dolls never managed sustained mainstream success) Olga was heard to complain that the money from this hit disappeared very quickly and the song destroyed their credibility. He also told tales of children being brought along to Toy Dolls gigs in the expectation of family friendly material, though I’ve always doubted this aspect of his story; were small schoolchildren really welcomed alongside their parents at the Hull Adelphi?
Whatever short-term harm the success of the record did the group, in time they were able to build on their brand as the original daft punks, and they remain a popular live draw for people who just want to hear something jagged but stupid for an hour. There’s no shortage of such punters, and I count among my friends a couple of Toy Dolls fans.
In broader terms, though, this record is a slightly depressing full stop. “Nellie The Elephant” was, so far as I can ascertain, the last original punk record to enter the British Top 40 (ignoring later 90s and 00s US punk records) and the only second wave punk record to get into the Top 30. The British public had learned to tolerate punk rock provided it was silly. On the television consumer programme “That’s Life”, Esther Rantzen’s gang occasionally vox popped punks in the street and asked them to yodel, or asked for their views on a new household product. Each time Adrian Mills put his mic under the nose of a spiky haired youth, the more mature studio audience shrieked with laughter in anticipation. So long as they either acted like village idiots, or were presented as such, punks were fine – the mainstream media had gone from seeing punk rock as a social threat comparable to the cold war to framing it as risible. In this mid-eighties world, “Nellie The Elephant” was an acceptable punk hit, but there would be no more.
I attended a punk disco in Soho on a few occasions in the early 00s, where the DJ would spend all evening spinning bona fide punk classics before finishing on “Nellie The Elephant” - at this point the bar staff would all do a daffy dance in celebration before closing up. This used to annoy the hell out of me; it’s a DJ’s prerogative to end the evening on something ridiculous, but “Nellie” always sounded so limp and mocking after so many other classic records. More recently, I’ve started wondering whether he ploughed through his copy of the Guinness Book Of British Hit Singles, noticed a logical endpoint, and decided to go with it, shrugging as he did so. The endings we get in life or on our nights out are usually not the ones we ourselves would have chosen; they’re picked for us.
New Entries Elsewhere In The Charts
There were no new entries on the NME indie chart during the first week of the Toy Dolls reign at the top. One reason for some of the recent chart sluggishness is that Christmas was coming up, and if an indie label was lucky enough to find a pressing plant which wasn’t at full capacity with major label business, they still may not have fancied their chances taking on those majors in the festive market.
The other reason was a bit more painful. Pinnacle, who besides being valve manufacturers were also one of the largest indie distributors, had entered into a serious financial crisis. While the distribution arm of the business was eventually rescued by Windsong, many indie labels either held back new releases until the new year or sought the help of major labels to get them into shops, thereby disqualifying them from this chart.
Weeks Two and Three
No new chart was published for w/e 29th December 1984 – therefore both these entries occurred on the 22nd December chart:
21. Sid Presley Experience - Cold Turkey (SPE)
Peak position: 4
An early incarnation of garage rockers The Godfathers, who would go on to greater cult success and notoriety as the eighties progressed. “Cold Turkey” was their first single and is a surprisingly straightforward facsimile of John Lennon’s underperforming debut solo record, and not the garage classic "Cold Turkey" by Big Boy Pete, which might have been a more expected choice.
25. Smiley Culture - Police Officer (Fashion)
Peak position: 7
Glorious breakout reggae hit which satirised the police force’s practice of stopping and searching young black men without explanation. Smiley takes the very troublesome topic and manages to make it sound earthy and jovial at the same time – just when you think he’s about to become another victim of police brutality or charged with possession, he flips the track on its head in a carefree way.
Sadly, in one of life’s more depressing ironies, he died from a “self inflicted stab wound” while police were searching his property for drugs in 2011.
Week Four (First chart of 1985)
13. The Cult - Resurrection Joe (Beggars Banquet)
Peak position: 6
The NME Indie Chart began including the label Beggars Banquet in its chart for most of 1985 – a peculiar move as their distribution was consistently handled by Warner Brothers who were not, by any stretch of anyone’s judgement, an independent distributor akin to Rough Trade or Pinnacle. Beggars were a small label, but so also were ZTT, Ze, Stiff and any number of other micro projects with similar major backing. It’s not clear if their inclusion was a mistake or not, but it’s going to lead to some interesting and unfair results as 1985 unfolds.
It’s an oversight that allows The Cult to continue appearing in the indie charts, and after a couple of singles which sounded as if the group were now firmly ensconced in rockville, the standalone effort “Resurrection Joe” actually sounds like a return to their post-punk roots in places. The fat basslines and high pitched guitar chimes are back, almost as if to convince fans they weren’t about to be deserted – but much bigger leaps and bounds would occur as the year progressed.
22. The Flowerpot Men - Jo's So Mean To Josephine (Compost)
Peak position: 17
Not some psychedelic throwback as you might expect, but some heavy, pulsing, Suicide influenced synth-pop which pins you to the floor.
The group would later find their way on to the soundtrack of “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” with their later track “Beat City”, an almighty piece of placement which could have turned their careers around, but ultimately it wasn’t to be.
27. Thee Milkshakes - Ambassadors Of Love (Big Beat)
Peak position: 13
Week Five
15. The Farm - Hearts and Minds (End Product)
Peak position: 12
In the early 90s when The Farm became the baggy group favoured by your football playing older brother who thought The Mondays were too weird, much was made of their long and hitless past, and the journey they had taken from the skint edges of life to Top of the Pops. Surprisingly few people bothered to track back to their older material, though.
Had they done so, they’d have found that “Hearts And Minds” showed that actually, there genuinely had always been a dance element to their music. While the single’s heart is still beating to the uncertain offbeats of post-punk, there’s enough groove here to predict the group's evolution.
The group also commanded a strong presence on the Liverpool gig circuit, but found that being big in Liverpool in the mid-eighties didn’t necessarily result in a contract, and they were subsequently stuck releasing records on their own End Product label.
30. Dormannu - The Dread (Illuminated)
Peak position: 30
Week Six
13. You've Got Foetus on Your Breath - Wash It All Off (Self Immolation)
Peak position: 8
Another entry for Jim Thirwell’s Foetus project, from which he constantly issued records under slightly different names, from Foetus All Nude Revue to my personal favourite, Scraping Foetus Off The Wheel (one of the few things I actually witnessed my Dad getting outraged by when they made a brief appearance on the Chart Show Indie Chart rundown).
“Wash It All Off” is a bit more primitive than I expected, sounding closer to Fad Gadget than the unpredictable explosiveness of some of his later work, but it still manages to sound volatile despite the basic synthetic hardware.
22. Billy Bragg - St.Swithins Day (Go! Discs Import)
Peak position: 2
“St Swithin’s Day” was never issued as a single in the UK, so a large number of copies of the German release were picked up on import and subsequently found their way into the indie chart.
Besides the fact that “St Swithin’s Day” is one of the most touching and honest songs in Bragg’s catalogue and absolutely worthy of a chart entry in its own right, a big part of the single’s appeal was the appearance of “A New England” on the B-side. This had recently been covered by Kirsty MacColl to huge success and curious record buyers were keen to track back to the original version. Bragg’s is obviously a much more barren and spartan take, but proved that he was, for all his busked minimalism, a gifted songwriter.
The other reason was a bit more painful. Pinnacle, who besides being valve manufacturers were also one of the largest indie distributors, had entered into a serious financial crisis. While the distribution arm of the business was eventually rescued by Windsong, many indie labels either held back new releases until the new year or sought the help of major labels to get them into shops, thereby disqualifying them from this chart.
Weeks Two and Three
No new chart was published for w/e 29th December 1984 – therefore both these entries occurred on the 22nd December chart:
21. Sid Presley Experience - Cold Turkey (SPE)
Peak position: 4
An early incarnation of garage rockers The Godfathers, who would go on to greater cult success and notoriety as the eighties progressed. “Cold Turkey” was their first single and is a surprisingly straightforward facsimile of John Lennon’s underperforming debut solo record, and not the garage classic "Cold Turkey" by Big Boy Pete, which might have been a more expected choice.
25. Smiley Culture - Police Officer (Fashion)
Peak position: 7
Glorious breakout reggae hit which satirised the police force’s practice of stopping and searching young black men without explanation. Smiley takes the very troublesome topic and manages to make it sound earthy and jovial at the same time – just when you think he’s about to become another victim of police brutality or charged with possession, he flips the track on its head in a carefree way.
Sadly, in one of life’s more depressing ironies, he died from a “self inflicted stab wound” while police were searching his property for drugs in 2011.
Week Four (First chart of 1985)
13. The Cult - Resurrection Joe (Beggars Banquet)
Peak position: 6
The NME Indie Chart began including the label Beggars Banquet in its chart for most of 1985 – a peculiar move as their distribution was consistently handled by Warner Brothers who were not, by any stretch of anyone’s judgement, an independent distributor akin to Rough Trade or Pinnacle. Beggars were a small label, but so also were ZTT, Ze, Stiff and any number of other micro projects with similar major backing. It’s not clear if their inclusion was a mistake or not, but it’s going to lead to some interesting and unfair results as 1985 unfolds.
It’s an oversight that allows The Cult to continue appearing in the indie charts, and after a couple of singles which sounded as if the group were now firmly ensconced in rockville, the standalone effort “Resurrection Joe” actually sounds like a return to their post-punk roots in places. The fat basslines and high pitched guitar chimes are back, almost as if to convince fans they weren’t about to be deserted – but much bigger leaps and bounds would occur as the year progressed.
22. The Flowerpot Men - Jo's So Mean To Josephine (Compost)
Peak position: 17
Not some psychedelic throwback as you might expect, but some heavy, pulsing, Suicide influenced synth-pop which pins you to the floor.
The group would later find their way on to the soundtrack of “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” with their later track “Beat City”, an almighty piece of placement which could have turned their careers around, but ultimately it wasn’t to be.
27. Thee Milkshakes - Ambassadors Of Love (Big Beat)
Peak position: 13
Week Five
15. The Farm - Hearts and Minds (End Product)
Peak position: 12
In the early 90s when The Farm became the baggy group favoured by your football playing older brother who thought The Mondays were too weird, much was made of their long and hitless past, and the journey they had taken from the skint edges of life to Top of the Pops. Surprisingly few people bothered to track back to their older material, though.
Had they done so, they’d have found that “Hearts And Minds” showed that actually, there genuinely had always been a dance element to their music. While the single’s heart is still beating to the uncertain offbeats of post-punk, there’s enough groove here to predict the group's evolution.
The group also commanded a strong presence on the Liverpool gig circuit, but found that being big in Liverpool in the mid-eighties didn’t necessarily result in a contract, and they were subsequently stuck releasing records on their own End Product label.
30. Dormannu - The Dread (Illuminated)
Peak position: 30
Week Six
13. You've Got Foetus on Your Breath - Wash It All Off (Self Immolation)
Peak position: 8
Another entry for Jim Thirwell’s Foetus project, from which he constantly issued records under slightly different names, from Foetus All Nude Revue to my personal favourite, Scraping Foetus Off The Wheel (one of the few things I actually witnessed my Dad getting outraged by when they made a brief appearance on the Chart Show Indie Chart rundown).
“Wash It All Off” is a bit more primitive than I expected, sounding closer to Fad Gadget than the unpredictable explosiveness of some of his later work, but it still manages to sound volatile despite the basic synthetic hardware.
22. Billy Bragg - St.Swithins Day (Go! Discs Import)
Peak position: 2
“St Swithin’s Day” was never issued as a single in the UK, so a large number of copies of the German release were picked up on import and subsequently found their way into the indie chart.
Besides the fact that “St Swithin’s Day” is one of the most touching and honest songs in Bragg’s catalogue and absolutely worthy of a chart entry in its own right, a big part of the single’s appeal was the appearance of “A New England” on the B-side. This had recently been covered by Kirsty MacColl to huge success and curious record buyers were keen to track back to the original version. Bragg’s is obviously a much more barren and spartan take, but proved that he was, for all his busked minimalism, a gifted songwriter.
Week Seven
5. Anti-Nowhere League - Out on the Wasteland (ABC)
Peak position: 4
Look who’s back! For most of 1982 journalists and music buyers alike observed the progress of the Anti Nowhere League and wondered if they would buck all trends and become the next punk band to make it big. In the end, the Toy Dolls were the ones to go Top Ten whereas the League’s efforts produced ever-diminishing returns outside the walls of that “all important” top 40.
Likely mindful of this, their comeback single is a serving of good old-fashioned proper Rock, and to prove it they’ve got some cliches for us. “Out on the wasteland live or die/ Nomadic man, cold and mean” Animal snarls, and anyone waiting for rude words or jokes (in other words, most of their fanbase) was left disappointed.
What they were given instead is a slightly cut-and-paste pub rock take on the Billy Idol style. Regrettably, by trying to sound like a proper group with proper tunes and not just crude punk rock jokes, they ultimately sound like nobody in particular; their fans were disgruntled, “Out On The Wasteland” wasn’t even close to becoming a hit, and they wouldn’t release another single in the UK until 1990 – the reassuringly back to basics “Fuck Around The Clock”.
5. Anti-Nowhere League - Out on the Wasteland (ABC)
Peak position: 4
Look who’s back! For most of 1982 journalists and music buyers alike observed the progress of the Anti Nowhere League and wondered if they would buck all trends and become the next punk band to make it big. In the end, the Toy Dolls were the ones to go Top Ten whereas the League’s efforts produced ever-diminishing returns outside the walls of that “all important” top 40.
Likely mindful of this, their comeback single is a serving of good old-fashioned proper Rock, and to prove it they’ve got some cliches for us. “Out on the wasteland live or die/ Nomadic man, cold and mean” Animal snarls, and anyone waiting for rude words or jokes (in other words, most of their fanbase) was left disappointed.
What they were given instead is a slightly cut-and-paste pub rock take on the Billy Idol style. Regrettably, by trying to sound like a proper group with proper tunes and not just crude punk rock jokes, they ultimately sound like nobody in particular; their fans were disgruntled, “Out On The Wasteland” wasn’t even close to becoming a hit, and they wouldn’t release another single in the UK until 1990 – the reassuringly back to basics “Fuck Around The Clock”.
Say what you want about The Toy Dolls, but at least they didn't try something similar, such as resuscitating their careers with a single entitled "Saharan Desolation Blues".
19. The Membranes – Death To Trad Rock EP (Criminal Damage)
Peak position: 10
21. Various – The Last Nightingale (Recommended)
Peak position: 21
An EP featuring Robert Wyatt in collaboration with Lindsay Cooper, Chris Cutler, Bill Gilonis and Tim Hodgkinson on the A-side and Henry Cow and Adrian Mitchell on the flip, it was limited to 2500 copies with all proceeds going to striking miners.
30. Sweet – Block Buster (Anagram)
Peak position: 5
Long before the days of Cherry Red’s enthusiastic reissue campaigns, the indie chart would occasionally find itself entertaining what would be known these days as “heritage acts” (careful, somebody might put up the Mike Read batlight). In this case, the camp, ridiculous and completely wonderful “Block Buster” was unnecessarily mixed with other hits by the indie Anagram to promote a Sweet compilation they’d recently licensed. And don't get your hopes up; this is a stuttering and slightly glue-and-paste Jive Bunny approach rather than Fatboy Slim.
A shame it should have come to this, because The Sweet genuinely were a fantastic proposition who have perhaps always been under-appreciated in the UK due to being perceived as pop puppets. “Block Buster” may have been a Chinn and Chapman tune, but man, those drums, those aggressively manhandled blues riffs and that general swagger, all undercut with the shriek of “We just haven’t got a clue what to do!” are magnificent. It’s slightly feral yet obviously ridiculous at the same time, and is probably the only track we’ve discussed this time around I actually feel like listening to for a second time. Somewhat startlingly, it also manages to sound more punk rock than the Anti Nowhere League’s comeback record.
19. The Membranes – Death To Trad Rock EP (Criminal Damage)
Peak position: 10
21. Various – The Last Nightingale (Recommended)
Peak position: 21
An EP featuring Robert Wyatt in collaboration with Lindsay Cooper, Chris Cutler, Bill Gilonis and Tim Hodgkinson on the A-side and Henry Cow and Adrian Mitchell on the flip, it was limited to 2500 copies with all proceeds going to striking miners.
30. Sweet – Block Buster (Anagram)
Peak position: 5
Long before the days of Cherry Red’s enthusiastic reissue campaigns, the indie chart would occasionally find itself entertaining what would be known these days as “heritage acts” (careful, somebody might put up the Mike Read batlight). In this case, the camp, ridiculous and completely wonderful “Block Buster” was unnecessarily mixed with other hits by the indie Anagram to promote a Sweet compilation they’d recently licensed. And don't get your hopes up; this is a stuttering and slightly glue-and-paste Jive Bunny approach rather than Fatboy Slim.
A shame it should have come to this, because The Sweet genuinely were a fantastic proposition who have perhaps always been under-appreciated in the UK due to being perceived as pop puppets. “Block Buster” may have been a Chinn and Chapman tune, but man, those drums, those aggressively manhandled blues riffs and that general swagger, all undercut with the shriek of “We just haven’t got a clue what to do!” are magnificent. It’s slightly feral yet obviously ridiculous at the same time, and is probably the only track we’ve discussed this time around I actually feel like listening to for a second time. Somewhat startlingly, it also manages to sound more punk rock than the Anti Nowhere League’s comeback record.
Number One In The Official Charts
Band Aid: "Do They Know It's Christmas" (Mercury)
Foreigner: "I Want To Know What Love Is" (Atlantic)
Mention must be made of Annie Nightingale's Sunday night request show regarding Nellie The Elephant's unlikely success. It was sequestered there for a good eighteen months before it was reissued. That's where I first heard anyway - in the same way as probably many others, idly flicking through stations when I should have been doing my homework.
ReplyDelete'Last original punk record to enter the Top 40' though? I'm not so sure. Of course, it all depends on your definition of 'punk' but surely The Clash have a greater claim to the term than most and the post- Mick Jones version of the band reached No 24 with This Is England the following autumn.
That's why I deliberately used the word "original" - discounting re-releases and reissues provoked by advertising campaigns, I think it is the final one. Might have been better if I'd said "new" or "newly recorded"...
DeleteHate to be pedant and all that, but This Is England wasn't a reissue. It was newly recorded (and some may say badly recorded, with Bernard Rhodes in the producer's chair) that year.
DeleteWould like to echo others here though - this is an excellent blog.
Suspect the Foetus record sounds more primitive than expected because it’s a remake of his 1981 debut 7”. If you think -this- version’s ramshackle…
ReplyDeleteInteresting to see The Anti-Nowhere League go from a label whose name was made up of the last four letters of the alphabet to one whose name is the first three.
ReplyDeleteAs for that Toy Dolls chant, the last time I heard it was when flicking round YouTube and finding this clip from the 'auditions' ending to an episode of "Phoenix Nights". (apologies for this, truly)...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NH0s8T2bT6M&list=RDNH0s8T2bT6M&start_radio=1
Brilliant! I'd forgotten about that.
DeleteAs for the WXYZ/ABC coincidence - both labels were run by the same man, I think (John Curd). WXYZ seems to have ceased activities in 1983 or so, then ABC was born. I'm not sure what motivated the change of name.
DeleteA second consecutive week on this blog of a single suffering legal action. It turns out the lyrics to the B-Side of The Toy Dolls' hit, "Fisticuffs In Frederick Street", portrayed said regular fights outside a club in said street, opposite to where the band rehearsed. The club sued for loss of custom and reputation after the chart action, and the band lost £10,000 as a result.
ReplyDeleteWow, I never knew that The Flowerpot Men sounded like that! Like you suggested, I expected them to be C86/psyche-pop throwback material not Ministry c.1988 four years earlier than Mr Jourgensen - and then I saw Ben Watkins' involvement and it started to make sense.
ReplyDeleteI wish I'd heard it back then, like I did when Peel played 'Wash It All Off' - that started a life-long love of Foetus.
GREAT blog, btw, I look forward to reading it each Sunday morning!