From: owner-idealcopy-digest@smoe.org (idealcopy-digest) To: idealcopy-digest@smoe.org Subject: idealcopy-digest V4 #80 Reply-To: idealcopy@smoe.org Sender: owner-idealcopy-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-idealcopy-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk idealcopy-digest Saturday, March 17 2001 Volume 04 : Number 080 Today's Subjects: ----------------- [idealcopy] golden anorak etc [PaulRabjohn@aol.com] Re: [idealcopy] "80s" Wire [PaulRabjohn@aol.com] Re: [idealcopy] OT okay, here's my play list (sticks tongue out) [PaulRab] Re: [idealcopy] golden anorak etc [MarkBursa@aol.com] Re: [idealcopy] "80s" Wire [MarkBursa@aol.com] Re: [idealcopy] golden anorak etc [PaulRabjohn@aol.com] Re: [idealcopy] "80s" Wire [j alberson ] Re: [idealcopy] OT okay, here's my play list (sticks tongue out) [John Ro] Re: [idealcopy] golden anorak etc [PaulRabjohn@aol.com] [idealcopy] Illuminated Eardrum Schism (Fruit) [=?iso-8859-1?q?Graeme=20R] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 05:15:44 EST From: PaulRabjohn@aol.com Subject: [idealcopy] golden anorak etc 3 wire-related things that made me laugh this week ; 1. certain listers will be chuffed and others distraught at the news jeff lynne is reforming ELO. maybe we underesimated ol' jeff , his new cd is going to be called "zoom". no doubt in honour of the new wire set-opener of that name. probably. 2. i see in yesterdays guardain that the working title of the new gay dad album is.......commercial suicide :-( 3. well an item i bought off ebay arrived in the post yesterday and i am staggerred to report there is a genuine link between the careers of wire and shakin stevens. this weeks golden anorak goes to the first person to guess what this could be......... p ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 07:19:40 EST From: PaulRabjohn@aol.com Subject: Re: [idealcopy] "80s" Wire << If by "80s" Wire we mean the first reunion, here's my order of preference: 1. Wir (album & ep) 2. Manscape 3. Ideal Copy 4. Drill 5. IBA ... 6. Bell ///// must admit i'm surprised to see "drill" rating so highly in several lists. and very surprised to see manscape rated so highly above , but there's no rights & wrongs for me , as time goes by i get more into TIC and IBTABA , less into ABIAC. but drill always props up my list , with manscape a not-very-close-second-last. p ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 07:35:37 EST From: PaulRabjohn@aol.com Subject: Re: [idealcopy] OT okay, here's my play list (sticks tongue out) At home: Vic Godard and Subway Sect - 20 Odd Years 2nd disc Vic - Long Term Side Effect Vic - TROUBLE ////// 20 odd years is a terrific album , TROUBLE not bad at all. but i really can't get into LTSE ; do you like that? similarly i really hated the "long decline" album vic did with mark perry ;great idea on paper but sadly they let some other bloke be the singer and mark played drums. hmmm.p ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 09:09:19 EST From: MarkBursa@aol.com Subject: Re: [idealcopy] golden anorak etc Produced by Mike Thorne, perchance? Mark << 3. well an item i bought off ebay arrived in the post yesterday and i am staggerred to report there is a genuine link between the careers of wire and shakin stevens. this weeks golden anorak goes to the first person to guess what this could be......... ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 09:23:04 EST From: MarkBursa@aol.com Subject: Re: [idealcopy] "80s" Wire For me ABIAC is still the best of the '80s' albums (unless you count Snakedrill) because it holds together....TIC feels like a compilation by comparison. TIC is second, then IBTABA. First Letter and Manscape trade places regularly for me - depens which one I played last I guess you could have made one really good album out of the two. And again for me, Drill is battling to avoid relegation... Mark << for me , as time goes by i get more into TIC and IBTABA , less into ABIAC. but drill always props up my list , with manscape a not-very-close-second-last. p >> ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 09:39:56 EST From: PaulRabjohn@aol.com Subject: Re: [idealcopy] golden anorak etc In a message dated Fri, 16 Mar 2001 9:09:19 AM Eastern Standard Time, Mark Bursa writes: << Produced by Mike Thorne, perchance? //// nope , guess again. although a shaky remix in a new romantic style might have been "interesting". mind you , that reminds me that i saw an ad for a soft cell reunion gig in a few weeks. pretty low-key so far though.p ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 08:25:14 -0800 (PST) From: j alberson Subject: Re: [idealcopy] "80s" Wire Wow...it's hard to really pick an order where I'm concerned. I believe Manscape would probably sit at the bottom with ABIAC. My favorites: 1. Wir (First letter and EP) 2. IBTABA 3. Thee Ideal Copy (sorry, too much Genesis P-Orridge) 4. Drill 5. ABIAC 6. Manscape My reasons are mine alone on this, though I'll disclose that Manscape seems so (unintentionally)sterile and complacent to me. ABIAC suffers from that previously mentioned sequenced drum problem. Ideal Copy is great but its songs are far better realized on IBTABA (goes for ABIAC too)...and Wir is just damn lovely. Feel free to disagree. Jack Get email at your own domain with Yahoo! Mail. http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 09:35:11 -0800 (PST) From: John Roberts Subject: Re: [idealcopy] OT okay, here's my play list (sticks tongue out) > Vic - Long Term Side Effect > Vic - TROUBLE > > ////// 20 odd years is a terrific album , TROUBLE > not bad at all. but i really can't get into LTSE ; > do you like that? similarly i really hated the "long > decline" album vic did with mark perry ;great idea > on paper but sadly they let some other bloke be the > singer and mark played drums. hmmm.p Of the three, TROUBLE was the one that took me the longest to get in to. (I think it was the jazzy version of Chainsmoking that put me off.) LTSE is very poppy but an excellent album. What amuses me about it is how a lot of the tracks are so blatantly ripped off of other tracks (a bit like Swell Maps in that respect). 'In the Shadow of Your Ego' is basically Bonzo Dog Band. 'I Wish' is the theme tune to Film 75. Whilst 'Zero Tolerance' is Crossroads theme tune. Not heard the Long Decline album but a great shame when you have MP in your band and don't let him sing. John Get email at your own domain with Yahoo! Mail. http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/ ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 16:20:58 EST From: PaulRabjohn@aol.com Subject: Re: [idealcopy] golden anorak etc In a message dated 16/03/01 17:47:50 GMT Standard Time, johnroberts_stats@yahoo.com writes: > Shaky also did some installations with a cardboard > tube on his head? > > John > > /'////// sadly i think not. clue ; think obscure solo releases. and hey , where's shaky these days anyway? p ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 22:26:51 +0000 (GMT) From: =?iso-8859-1?q?Graeme=20Rowland?= Subject: [idealcopy] Illuminated Eardrum Schism (Fruit) John said >>>>They must have foreseen that Eardrum Buzz was potentially their most commercially viable product for a long time. Actually, Wire wanted 'In Vivo' out as a single and 'EBuzz' was only put out at the request of Daniel Miller. Colin was also unsatisfied with Rico Conning's sampling on the original version of 'In Vivo', and insisted on redoing it for the eventual single release. The only Wire singles of the eighties that I would regard as 'best songs' are 'Ahead' and 'Silk Skin Paws', but they're all good in some way or another. I like Ideal-Bell-Beginning all about the same really. All of them hang together very well as albums. The IBTABA versions of 'Public Place' and 'Its a Boy' are particularly stunning. 'Illuminated' is one of the catchiest bits of music they ever recorded! 'Boiling Boy' is welcome in any guise, of course. >>>>IBTABA was a way of pissing off both any potential new audience who had bought the album on the strength of the single and their record company at the time Rubbish! IBTABA was more a way for Gilbert & Lewis to spend a while fiddling about in a half built Spanish studio... any excuse... fiddle fiddle look its a boy as usual... if this pissed off a potential new audience then that's just a by product of the fiddle factor. Seriously though, Wire were interested in the potentials of the studio and new technologies and IBTABA was more a result of that than any premeditated pissoff tactic. I don't think Wire have ever gone out of their way to piss anyone off... except perhaps whoever inspired Graham's 'TITLE' diatribe! >>>>I was working for the Cartel when this album came out and it was scaled out to all kinds of major high street stores inc. W H Smiths and Woolies I think. I daresay that each and every copy ended up either in a bargain bin Every copy of just about everything ordered used to end up in the bargain bins of these shops in Salisbury. Lots of cheapo Fall singles in midlate eighties but never saw a Wire record reduced. Still I was in Liverpool by IBTABA, where cheap records tended to come more via the discarded promo route... And there was no definitive eighties Wire sound! (From Ahead to Feed Me in one album side) In 'Everybody Loves A History' Colin said that EBuzz, "is another of those where we did a verse each." Bruce said, "The verse came from a poem I'd written which was about being in a cave and searching for a light switch. A modern man totally at odds with something natural. But somehow you attempt to retain your identity by scratching your name on the walls of the cave. The cave being society. 'Well at least I've got that'. It's a very mixed kind of emotion. A lot of ideas flying around. But the only constant thing in the cave is the sound of your pulse, and this buzzing noise." Graham said, "On top of that, are all these characters, who if they hadn't had their 'gifts', what would they have become? Cassius Clay could obviously box, but the thing that made him very famous was his rapping." One of the things I've always liked about Wire is that when they do explain the songs, the songs generally seem even better! Of course, you can take or leave the explanations, but they're always interesting to me. Ian - 'There Are' was transcribed by me, so errors are possible. I've never sat down and tried to work out 'Long Lost Life' perhaps it should remain a long lost mystery? But I was never in doubt that angels were floating on the water... what do you hear? I'd agree with Jeffrey that 'Take Care' is by far the weakest Wire related album - it sounds very dated and weak compared to say, IBTABA. I also think 'It Seems' has weathered badly and was a bit too weedy (although 'Commercial Suicide' is still a unique & satisfying listen). These recordings were lacking that secret weapon: the Gilbert. All Bruce's albums still sound amazing to me - in fact the startlingly original 'Music For Fruit' (1991) is possibly my most listened to eighties early nineties Wire related album over the last few years, a veritable masterpiece and an animated triumph for those who are not vegetables! Autechre fans would love it! Well, some might... ;-) Lock up your hats! Graeme ===== Cracked Machine webzine http://www.webinfo.co.uk/crackedmachine "What one thinks of as extremes seldom are" :: BC Gilbert Get your free @yahoo.co.uk address at http://mail.yahoo.co.uk or your free @yahoo.ie address at http://mail.yahoo.ie ------------------------------ End of idealcopy-digest V4 #80 ******************************