Volume 17 - Side One - Depeche Mode, Inspiral Carpets, Saint Etienne, Pulp, Verve

Formats: CD, Double LP, cassette
Year of Release: 1993

This is by far the oddest Indie Top 20 sleeve of all, looking rather like a continuity slide for a BBC Television children's programme. (Tim Worthington was the first to point out to me on Twitter the odd way in which the "Independent 20" LP sleeves often look like continuity slides, but this one really takes the cake).

It's one of the best albums in the series, though. I bought this one and played it close to death at home, before it followed me to university later in the year and got spun morning, noon and night as the soundtrack to my earliest months in that new place. I do have to confess that some kind of nostalgia may cause me to over-rate this LP, but the tracklisting tells no lies - there may not be a cohesive strand or dominant musical style throughout, but it does contain some absolute corkers, including some high John Peel Festive Fifty entries for that year.

This was also the very last Indie Top 20 LP to only contain music from independently distributed labels. After this point, Indie got treated as a musical genre by the series. If you're a purist, you could therefore argue that this was the last "proper" Indie Top 20 LP. More on that particular subject and my feelings on it when we get to that point, though.

1. Depeche Mode - I Feel You (Mute)

Depeche Mode's supposedly harder sound and rougher image was actually an enormous shock to many people in 1993, not least a friend-of-a-friend who lived in Basildon near Dave Gahan's parent's house and still glimpsed him on his occasional visits. Gahan's new face fuzz caused him to yell from an upstairs window in a horrified voice: "Dave, why have you grown a BEARD, you twat?" (If this makes Dave Gahan's life sound a bit like Vince's in "15 Storeys High", that might not be inaccurate. Possibly everyone's life in Basildon is a bit like Vince's in "15 Storeys High". Somewhat bizarrely, the main character's full name is also Vince Clarke).

Rude though this person's outburst may have been, I'm inclined to partly agree. Depeche Mode were (and are) one of the world's best electronic bands - their sudden bout of grungey self-consciousness around this point is one of the only times they've swayed to the dominant forces of fashion around them, and as such was a disappointing move.

Musically, though, "I Feel You" may be somewhat distorted and growly, but it's not a million miles away from their last hit with 'Proper Instruments' "Personal Jesus". Driven completely by one repetitive blues riff and some shunting railroad rhythms, it's arguably one of the simplest singles they ever recorded. Dave Gahan's performance manages to convey the lustful message in numerous different ways, though, from subtle and seductive murmerings to downright RAWK hollering, and while this song isn't overtly commercial, it does go to prove that he had become an incredible frontman who could sell any song to the listener. Radio One happily playlisted this without any questions being asked.

Sadly, this would also prove to be a period of disorder and disarray for the group, where endless touring and decadence took its toll on Gahan's health and frayed the nerves of other members. Sometimes there's not a lot to be said for being given the grown up's keys to the dressing up box and cocktail cabinet of rock and roll, as Tommy Vance probably never said.



2. Inspiral Carpets - How It Should Be (Mute)

That said, all was not happiness and light in the Inspiral Carpets world either. While so far as I know none of them were taking speedballs recreationally, "How It Should Be" was a new single, not available on any LP, which failed to enter the Top 40. It was the first fresh Inspiral Carpets track not to be a proper hit since "Move", released on their own Cow label in 1988.

That's not entirely surprising. "How It Should Be" is a fierce sounding single which almost harks back to their stripped back garage days, but it's not an obvious 45, sounding more like something which might be buried halfway through an LP. "You're just a nail I can hammer home/ This is how it is and how it should be!" chants Tom Hingley obsessively, while Clint Boon's keyboards swirl all over the shop. It's a mite psychotic sounding, and it was never going to capture the general public's imagination.

These days, it's a likeable curio in the back catalogue, not to be found on any studio LP (presumably left off their fourth platter "Devil Hopping" either due to the poor public response to it, or because it was only ever supposed to be a standalone single). It's a nice burst of noise I like to return to every now and then, but I doubt it would appear in any list I'd make of Top 30 Inspiral Carpets tracks (should I have the inclination to make one) and at the time it felt like a slightly questionable release, a sign the group might be going off the boil.

In the comments on YouTube, someone is getting quite rattled and insisting that the Inspirals ripped the tune for this off him. I can only vaguely hear what he's talking about, but even if his accusations are true, it hardly seems worth bothering the group with a lawsuit over lost royalties. "The Inspiral Carpets stole my idea to produce one of their biggest flops!" is hardly going to gain you much money or push your career any further forward.




3. Saint Etienne - You're In A Bad Way (Heavenly)

And this is an absolute gem. It sounds as if it could have been written and issued in any year from 1966 to 1993, containing the shuffling basslines and digital sheen of a modern 1993 single, but also the deceptively simple sounding chiming melodies and conciseness of a mid-sixties girl-pop track. There's a slight sneer about the central lyrical message - "Don't you know that crew cuts and trainers are out again?" Sarah Cracknell asks the object of her affections - but it's backed up with promises to lift the badly dressed man out of his rut.

The lyrics also mention Bruce Forsyth on the Generation Game, bringing to mind instantly a terrible 9-5 life with solo quiz show watching in the early evenings being the only form of numbing light relief. In doing so, it does actually effectively evoke those shite moments of your life where you temporarily drift off-radar, leaving the television on in the evenings for company, working a job where your colleagues are indifferent to your presence. We've all been there, and probably all wished for a Sarah Cracknell (or her nearest male equivalent) to emerge and promise a definite shift in the routine.

"You're In A Bad Way" still rates as one of the group's finest tracks to me, being near perfect pop - fluid, seamless, with every melody line and element feeling completely effortless. It's one of their biggest hits, and it feels like it could have been a hit at any point in pop history.



4. Pulp - Razzmatazz (Gift)

But then this ups the ante. "Razzmatazz" was greeted with confusion by a few (but admittedly not many) critics at the time for being a 'somewhat depressing' follow-up to "OU" and "Babies". Somehow, the idea had got into some people's heads that Pulp were now some kind of kitsch funtime party band with lots of quirky songs about sex. "Razzmatazz", on the other hand, was actually bloody spiteful.

Throughout, Jarvis points his elongated index digit savagely at an ex-girlfriend and bombards her with insults. Some are childish playground taunts ("The trouble with your brother/ he's always sleeping with your mother" is the actual opening line) others are disturbing home truths. The line "Started getting fatter three weeks after I left you/ Now you're going with some kid/ who looks like some bad comedian" is particularly cutting (and some would argue misogynistic, though the blog "Freaks, Misshapes, Weeds" does a very good job of explaining that away).

In the end, we're given the impression of someone whose life has completely gone awry, in a similar but much more tragic way than the individual in "You're In A Bad Way". Whereas he had a routine to cling on to, the woman in "Razzmatazz" is clearly having an absolute chaotic crack-up - "Your mother wants to put you away" clearly hints at that. This is the noise of someone hectoring an old partner who has completely gone to pieces in his absence.

Well, I say that... but is it really? "Freaks, Misshapes, Weeds" explains that the lyrics "use empathy as a weapon" which is a fantastic description, but to me there's always been a little bit more to it than that. The exaggerated high drama of the single has never wholly convinced me that it's just a piece of straightforward observational spite about one person's misfortune. What it actually sounds like is the noise of someone exaggerating or possibly even imagining or fantasising how badly off an ex partner is without them. It's suspiciously like the words of one jilted, frustrated lover ranting to his friends in the pub and convincing himself that the life he's left his old lover with is pathetic, an endless round of cheap chocolates, weight gain, early nights and ugly boyfriends. Some of the above may be correct, but all of it? I've always thought it's just a scenario the singer desperately wants to believe is true. There's just too much fury between the lines for me, and an overload of spite. The end impression I'm left with is of someone who is just as tormented and screwed up as his ex. Perhaps they should get back together again. It's clearly what he wants, even if he can't quite bring himself to admit it, though the line "I was lying when I asked you to stay" comes damn close to revealing the truth behind the situation.

This is the kind of dark, layered nastiness you would expect to find in a single by The Auteurs, so it's not altogether surprising to learn that it's Luke Haines's favourite Pulp single.

Musically though, "Razzmatazz" is much busier and more complicated than the lyrics might have otherwise let it be. Full of bright synth lines and dramatic interludes, and soaring, almost Gloria Gaynor styled pieces of melodrama and defiance at the end, it's another piece of expertly produced pop. Indie bands - and God knows that Pulp were at one point one of the most low-budget, mend-and-make-do indie groups ever - were now getting incredibly good at this. This packs plenty of drama and so many little flourishes and detours into one song without ever feeling forced or unnatural that it's a marvel. I would also have to say that it's probably my favourite Pulp single, and one that's undeservedly tucked away behind their more obvious anthems.



5. Verve - Blue (Hut)

In which Verve manage to invent those particularly smoky, hazy, guitar overloaded tracks Oasis ended up specialising in a few years down the line. Disorientating, dizzy, psychedelic and riddled with then-unfashionable backwards drum sounds, "Blue" feels more like a representative soundscape in places than a traditional verse/chorus/ middle eight song. Rather than soaring upwards, Ashcroft sounds particularly rattled, paranoid and agitated here.

Verve hadn't broken through to the mainstream yet, and this sure as hell wasn't going to push them up over the line, but "Blue" is still thought of by fans as being a fine early single. I must admit, though, I find it rather messy sounding, inconclusive and dull. Each to their own.

Volume 16 Side 3 - Verve, Spiritualized, Pulp, The Jennifers (Supergrass), Spectrum

1. Verve - She's A Superstar (Hut)

While I slightly struggled with Verve initially, "She's A Superstar" was an enormous, towering single which emerged very early in their careers. Riddled with scaling riffs, chiming, music box guitar elements buried deep in the mix, and rumbling basslines, it seeps mood and atmosphere rather than clubbing you around the head with nagging hooks.

Unfortunately, if the finger of suspicion can be pointed at any band in particular for starting the lazy lyrical tropes of Dadrock, it's probably Ashcroft and company. "She climbs so high/ I don't know why", sings yer man airily and lazily, possibly inspiring the by-numbers lyricism of Oasis and their many minions along the way.

Still, "She's A Superstar" scales, swoops and turns at graceful angles like a majestic bird - even if Richard Ashcroft had contributed no lyrics at all and this had been an "Albatross" styled instrumental, it would be hard not to be impressed by it. It's a Verve track you won't hear often on adult rock or alternative stations, but really, for me it was the first sign that some of the hype was possibly justified.



2. Spiritualized - Medication (Dedicated)

Spiritualized were getting more sophisticated too, moving on from being blissed-out underground hippies with a mighty fine lightshow, to creating songs with tight, ambitious and occasionally almost unwieldy arrangements. Their epic and absurdly long single "Feels So Sad" acted as evidence to listeners that they weren't afraid of a challenge, and even if that particular attempt was perhaps too bloated for its own good, it was clear that they had an intent to be more than just an indie group.

"Medication" is a moody and bitter pean to drug addiction which is filled to the brim with dizzy jazzy riffs, eerie organ work, and rushing guitar noises. It's a single that sounds impressive rather than having much impact emotionally - it's difficult not to be taken in by its ambition and conviction initially, but I suspect I'm not alone in saying that I didn't end up listening to it much after 1992 waved goodbye. But for anyone looking for evidence that Jason Pierce had moved beyond his Spacemen 3 roots and was now creating finely sculpted and detailed work rather than the lo-fi psychedelic druggy drones of yore, it was here, and things would only get better.



3. Pulp - Babies (Gift)

Pulp had been around for over a decade by this point, and could actually have featured on Indie Top 20 Volume One had Beechwood been inclined (1986's macabre "Little Girl (With Blue Eyes)" would have been a cracking addition to that cassette, actually). But they were probably never close to being in the running. Pulp were very much a sideshow act in Indiepop's boom years, churning out dark, morbid and slightly twisted songs with claustrophobic, under-produced atmospheres to very select audiences. While I don't count myself among the fans who will argue that every LP the band has ever recorded is great, their debut 1981 Peel Session contains the amazing "Wishful Thinking" (the most under-appreciated Pulp track ever?), the 1983 debut LP "It" is uneven but worthy, and 1992's delayed "Separations" LP is riddled with cheap synthesiser squelches and early eighties dancefloor rhythms as well as Scott Walker-esque patches of melodrama, and is probably their finest pre-fame effort. Only 1987's "Freaks" is a completely undercooked and joyless experience.

Pulp's time had been by no means wasted, but most bands would have packed up before "Babies", going off to get proper jobs and raise families and being satisfied with having a footnote in the world of eighties British indie. The press were not all entirely welcoming by this point. When the group jumped ship from Fire Records (who they felt didn't have their best interests at heart) to Warp's subsidiary label Gift, this was greeted by some journalists with extreme scepticism. The NME were heard to make an off-the-cuff complaint that if those C86 chancers Pulp were being labelled as bright hopes, then something had gone truly, horribly wrong with British music. Others, however, were wowed by Pulp's increasingly energetic live shows, and charmed by Jarvis Cocker's eccentric and charismatic on-stage demeanour.

By this point, they even had a shit-hot Canadian manager who nonetheless didn't seem to quite understand how to best market the group. She wandered around talking to people of influence telling them that she had "the next Right Said Fred" on her hands. Clearly, even at this point, things weren't entirely locking into place.

Thank God for the songs, then, which by now were becoming truly staggering. "Babies" is one of their finest ever singles, and one the marvellous blog "Freaks, Mis-Shapes, Weeds" does a great job of unpacking (though I agree with the statement that it's hard to critically dissect and analyse something so effervescent and enjoyable). The foundation of an incredibly simple, if faintly unusual, two chord riff acts as the basis for all kinds of instrumental diversions for the group, from Candida's synthesiser squelches to twanging guitars and ambient interludes, to the downright euphoric ending... if Pulp described themselves as a "garage band" in the mid-eighties, they had travelled far beyond that now, and were as fussy (if not fussier) than Verve and Spiritualized... except they were playing with shaggy dog story lyrics and pop hooks, not scaling epic rock mountains. Pulp at this point were about smalltown stories and awkward situations and sex, rather than drugs and astral flying.

"Babies" would become the hit it was always supposed to be when reissued in 1994 by Island Records. For now, though, it was a curio, a marvellous single which did get some radio and television exposure - the fact it ended up on "The ITV Chart Show" marked an enormous leap forward - but wasn't really heard as often as you might suspect in 1992. I was a reasonably regular indie/ alternative clubber and gig-goer at this point, and I heard it played by a DJ once, at a small bar called Saks in Southend. Myself and a few friends strode on to the dancefloor to give the DJ our vote of confidence while almost everybody else ignored it. It was a sublime single, and everybody who liked "Babies" wanted to believe that Pulp might finally enter the mainstream... but the odds seemed so frighteningly long at this point.



4. The Jennifers - Just Got Back Today (Nude)

Another Britpop big name checks into "Indie Top 20" incredibly early. At the nucleus of this group were Danny Goffey and Gaz Coombes, both of whom would later form Supergrass. At this point, though, they hadn't even finished school, but after hometime and at the weekends their lives were consumed by the very young indie group The Jennifers.

"Just Got Back Today" sold rather poorly and it's somewhat miraculous it ended up being documented on "Indie Top 20" - I suspect that Nude Records approached Beechwood with a deal where they would pick up the license to a Suede track at a reasonable price if this effort was also guaranteed a place in the track listing.

Nonetheless, you can hear bags of promise in this, and while there's absolutely no evidence of Supergrass at their most turbo-charged, it does sound exactly like one of the group's maudlin moments. A wailing harmonica joins hands with a despairing vocal line, and the band sound heartbroken beyond their years. It's not a perfect track by any means, though. The chorus is rather too laissez faire for its own good, and the ending is clumsy and inconclusive, but given how downright young the group were, it's staggering to hear how developed they already were. This mood and sound would recur throughout Supergrass's career, from the rainy Sunday evening loneliness of "Late In The Day" to most of 2005's understated and under-rated "Road To Rouen" (so much so that I once actually padded my personal CD Rom copy of that LP out with "Just Got Back Today" as a bonus track, feeling that it acted as a sweet, innocent echo back to their early days).

Neither Danny or Gaz were quite ready for the big-time yet, but there's enough here to help you understand how some critics and record label bosses were already excited. In a couple of years time, they would be enormous news.



5. Spectrum - True Love Will Find You In The End (Silvertone)

If Jason Pearce left Spacemen 3 to scale musical mountains, it was starting to become fairly obvious that Pete Kember was quite happy to remain a minimalist. The more time progressed, the harder it was becoming to imagine them ever having been in the same group together.

"True Love..." is a shimmering and simple cover of a naive and hopeful Daniel Johnston track. If Johnston's original is childlike and sounds in danger of toppling over at any second, the Spectrum version is tight and psychedelically inclined, with ringing bells, wailing guitars, and Christmassy glitter toppling all over the well-meant intentions of the original. It manages to make the song sound both still more childlike, and also more stately.

For all that, it respects the simplicity of the original, and manages to make it sound like a hymn to the possibilities of life-long partnerships. There have been moments in my life where I've scoffed and even groaned at the sentiments in this song, but as a middle-aged man I've now come to appreciate that there was some wisdom in it after all.