Happy Mondays: "Kinky Afro"

17 October 1990

"At least they're thieving stuff with a bit of humour."

— Robert Smith

By the autumn of 1990 I had become a full-on Anglophile. My TV viewing was made up of Coronation St, Home & Away (an Aussie soap but one that I first encountered in Britain so it was close enough) and any British sit-com new and old that I could find. I drank tea everyday, wore my Tottenham Hotspur and Norwich City scarves regularly and began reading Sue Townsend's Adrian Mole novels. And the music I listened to was almost entirely from the UK.

There were, however, gaps. I have still never seen an episode of Only Fools & Horses, imported British chocolates were prohibitively expensive and as a result were only consumed at Christmas and The Stone Roses somehow completely passed me by until I sought them out in 1995. I also lacked context for what was going on. I didn't have access to Smash Hits (I now wonder why I didn't get a subscription but the thought never occurred to me at the time) which ensured that I'd be permanently out of the loop. When baggy emerged it took time working its way across the Atlantic. I suddenly became aware of a whole new generation of indie guitar bands and I figured they all came packaged together. If it now seems odd putting Happy Mondays, The Stone Roses and Inspiral Carpets (a group who have never come close to prompting me to want to dance) under one umbrella, Madchester had become even more of an odd ball assortment when they were teamed up with Candy Flip, Jesus Jones, EMF, Blur, The Beloved and even The Cure.

While most acts put out remix albums because of record label pressure, Robert Smith and whoever else happened to be in his band at the time seemed to do so as an artistic statement. Mixed Up came out that fall and if it is "complete bandwagoning" as Smith admits, at least they did so in a timely manner. Like most remix LPs it isn't very good, consisting mainly of extended mixes that fail to add anything to the originals. The highlights are new track "Never Enough", which is as baggy as they ever got, and a Paul Oakenfold reworking of their 1985 single "Close to Me".

Smith must have been happy with the results as he nearly made it his Single of the Fortnight in his second go at reviewing the new releases for Smash Hits. I suspect that not wanting to be seen as a total prat prevented him from doing so. Instead, he goes with Happy Mondays and their latest offering "Kinky Afro". Where The Cure busy were doing their "bandwagoning", Smith praises ver Mondays for sounding "refreshingly unlike [their] and it hasn't got that "Manchester beat" on it".

This is the third SOTF for Shaun Ryder, Bez and the rest which reaffirms that 1990 was their year. It wasn't quite an imperial period (while "Step On" and "Kinky Afro" would both become big hits, their remix of "Lazyitis" failed to grace the Top 40; album Thrills 'n' Pills and Bellyaches got a lot of critical acclaim but it failed to top the charts) but impressive nonetheless for a bunch of ne'er-do-wells who hadn't sniffed a hit single prior to a year earlier. While there are a small number of singles and albums from that year that I prefer, no one better represented the first year of the nineties like the Mondays.

As I have previously mentioned, there was a lengthy gap between the Top 5 success of "Step On" and the release of their third album. More acid house/indie rock rave ups were expected of them (which probably goes at least some way to explaining the failure of "Lazyitis") but the Mondays were surprisingly musically diverse in their own warped fashion: they weren't about to try to master one sub-genre when there were several more they could butcher in their own unique way.

Smith makes note of Ryder's memorable "yippie-yippie ey-ey ay-yay-yay" in the chorus being nicked from Labelle's classic seventies' hit "Lady Marmalade" (even if he initially thinks it came from Sister Sledge) and this something that older listeners would have been aware of. To those of us of a more tender age it wasn't borrowed at all, it was something new and cool. Now it seems cool that they chose to pinch a bit of nonsense from an R&B trio that dabbled in funk and glam rock.

"Kinky Afro" proved to be an apt opener to their breakthrough album. Are you expecting loads and loads of Madchester beats? Look elsewhere. But if you want something grubby, loutish, sexy, moronic, funny and wise? This is the place. It was also an effective single to move them away from the baggy scene. Who knows which direction they were going but it was certain to be someplace mad and unique.

While it doesn't have quite the thrill of "Step On", "Kinky Afro" is still an ace number in its own right. Robert Smith is impressed that they returned with something so unexpected and this is a quality that few would credit Happy Mondays with. All ten tracks stand out on their own but it manages to be an effective taster for Thrills 'n' Pills and Bellyaches because it opens up listeners to a host of possibilities, not unlike the way "Taxman" got The Beatles' Revolver going. 

Meanwhile, I had grouped all these indie dance bands from Britain together when most of them had nothing to do with one another. In my isolated world, Madchester was alive and well throughout 1991 and '92, the groups that were using hip hop influences or were Shoegazers or were ushering in the Britpop era or were typically classified as 'grebo' were in my mind all extensions of baggy. And I think I proved correct because very few of them had anything in common beyond being unruly youths with crappy haircuts and bad clothes — and that's precisely what Madchester had always been. As Brian Eno said, only 10,000 people bought the first Happy Mondays album but everyone who did grew a mushroom cut, dropped acid and formed a band.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

Seal: "Crazy"

The man who sang on Adamski's "Killer" didn't get a featured artist credit but being on one of the singles of the year must have raised his stock. "Crazy" was nothing like its predecessor but vocalists venturing out on their own have put out far worse. Smith doesn't give it all of his attention, his thoughts diverging to crapping on rap and Adamski's "bloody ugly" dog, with only the observation that it sounds like "half the groups in the charts" being directed at the song itself. Surely Seal's voice alone gave it a fresh air, right? It sure seemed like a might good record at the time but the singer's subsequent move towards more mainstream pop has undermined it a bit. He could do well to go a little crazy himself from time to time.

Happy Mondays & Karl Denver: "Lazyitis (One-Armed Boxer)"

30 May 1990

"What's "Lazyitis" when it's at home? If this single's anything to go by it's an ailment that afflicts top Mancunian pop rascals rendering them too idle to compose their own tunes. So they pinch other people's."

— Richard Lowe

This batch of singles has a distinctly Mancunian air to it. With five Greater Manchester acts represented, this truly was the year of Madchester. Or was it? Among the groups here hailing from the so-called Warehouse City (does anyone actually call it that?) is New Order and A Certain Ratio, not exactly the baggiest of groups. That said, why shouldn't they qualify too? Just what linked these bands beyond their locale (and even that was flexible given that Scots Primal Scream and The Soul Dragons and Scousers The Farm were also involved)? Was it that they all made indie music that people could dance to? Only sometimes really. Oldham's Inspiral Carpets were on the second tier baggy groups and no one could possible get down to any of their stuff — and, also, New Order's best material is their songs you can dance to. Was it that they were all one indie labels? I suppose so even if the indies in 1990 were an entirely different beast from a decade earlier — and, also, New Order and A Certain Ration both happened to be on small labels themselves. Did they tend to be young? Not for the most part, barring the odd Charlatans — most weren't a whole lot younger than members of New Order and A Certain Ratio. In an era when anyone could do Madchester, everyone seemed to belong.

Usually when it's your year, everything goes right. The Human League toiled through half-a-decade's worth of anemic sales before and general indifference before their commercial prospects blossomed with hits such as "Love Action (I Believe in Love)", "Open Your Heart" and, of course, the global smash "Don't You Want Me". They did so well that a grave pop injustice was righted when former flop "Being Boiled" got reissued and they had yet another Top 10 hit. ABC quickly became the next Human League when their Lexicon of Love album took the place of Dare as Britain's LP of choice in the early eighties. They also reeled off a string of hits from their masterpiece. A year on and it was Culture Club's turn to sell boat loads of albums and singles.

Though different from The Human League, ABC and Culture Club in terms of style and form, Manchester's Happy Mondays seemed to be the same sort of group that could do no wrong during their big year. "Step On" had already given them a breakthrough Top 5 hit and they seemed primed for more of the same. The only trouble was they didn't have anything new to capitalize on their fame. Their third album wouldn't come out until close to the end of the year and a proper follow-up was being held back until closer to that time. Until then, it would have to be yet another remix that would have to suffice.

"Layzitis" had originally popped up on their second album Bummed back in 1988. Like much of that LP, it's a fine track that didn't draw much attention to itself beyond the blatant theft of The Beatles' "Ticket to Ride" in the chorus. Ripping off from the Fab Four as well as Sly & The Family Stone and David Essex may seem beyond brazen but it's actually a clever way of hiding all that plagiarism. Feel nervous about having stolen a riff or chord? Why not bury the song in yet more layers of riffs and chords that have been nicked from a variety of sources. Sure, clever clog reviewers like Richard Lowe will notice but no one else will. The group that had previously relied on sampling themselves was now bogged down in plundering others to such an extent that it could scarcely be heard.

Perhaps what is most surprising is how this 'One-Armed Boxer' mix sounds so unlike a remix at all. You're not going to track down the great yodeler Karl Denver only to pointlessly use him on some dodgy Ibiza party mix, are you? While not a folk or country record that the veteran singer would have been accustomed to, a straight up jangle pop record suits him just fine. What is off-putting at first is the fact that he and Happy Mondays leader Shaun Ryder are out of synch with one another. It's not unlike the overrated David Bowie/Bing Crosby Christmas perennial "Peace on Earth/Little Drummer Boy", only it seems less deliberate. While old pros Bing and the Dame find their sweet spot to finally come together ("Every child must be made aware..."), Denver and Ryder meet up almost accidentally at the song's half-way point. It is only then that I realised that the two were singing the same lyrics. Indie pop's greatest living junkie had laid his vocal down much earlier and there clearly wasn't any effort made for him to re-record it along with Denver for this remix. It's unprofessional and slipshod but I think it gives the song character and charm. And in any event, why would you be anything but shoddy on a song called "Lazyitis".

It's very much a grower and must have been too strange for much in the way of public consumption. Lowe considers it the "weirdest record in a long time" and this is a point in its favour for him. But the pop kids who shelled out for "Step On" must have found this a difficult one to swallow. A light, twinkling melody? A slightly warped take on sixties' baroque pop? An old man with a crackling voice who could've been Ryder's dad? It may not have mattered that one couldn't dance to it because it was Madchester all the same but that didn't mean they had another sure-fire hit on their hands. Unjustly but understandably, "Lazyitis" just missed the Top 40. (A few weeks of chart action may have allowed listeners to get used to it and it might have enjoyed a more respectable run) In what seemed to have been the Happy Mondays' year, they couldn't avoid having a flop single to throw off their momentum a tad. The run up to the release of their third album — more on that in a few weeks: this blog is sure getting its fill of these loony Mancs — was handcuffed enough that it failed to reach number one, yet another odd anticlimax in a year that was should've been filled with nothing but highs. But enough about Shaun Ryder's drug habit...

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

Englandneworder: "World in Motion"

And New Order's Single of the Fortnight-less streak continues. "Lazyitis" is an excellent record and it would normally be a fine SOTF but it's no "World in Motion", not even close. (Discerning listeners love the Substance compilation which covers the early part of New Order's recording career but I'm more partial to The Best of New Order which is well stocked in their 1988-93 pop side of which this is one of many highlights) People will always point out that this is easily the finest football pop song but it's outstanding even without factoring in the chanting at the end and the samples of the patrician announcer calling the final seconds of England's '66 World Cup triumph. The lyrics from comedian Keith Allen manage to evoke the beautiful game while avoiding being drowned in it and that's all you can ask for. Purists scoff but there aren't many New Order songs that are better — and, for once, it's as if they know this too. No longer everyone's second or third favourite group.

Happy Mondays: "Step On"

4 April 1990

"The Mondays aren't daft. People always liked the dance remixes of their singles more that the group's original versions, so this time they've made a dance record straight away."

— Tom Doyle

Generation X never had a 'Beatles on Ed Sullivan' moment that unified everyone. Nirvana and Public Enemy were probably the two acts that came closest to being spokespeople for us but they didn't speak for everyone — and, in fairness, neither of them were attempting to do so. It wasn't simply that some people didn't like these two groups, more that some were even indifferent to them — and that they, in turn, were indifferent or even hostile to some of their potential fans. Kurt Cobain had no time for racists, misogynists and homophobes and was uneasy with the high school jocks he despised being into his music. (This is all music to my ears though he had to ruin it by insisting at that no "lame ass limey bands" share the bill with them at the Redding Festival) Similarly, Chuck D wasn't overly pleased with middle class white boys listening to Public Enemy albums. For the first time, we defined our tastes in music while groups were defining who was allowed to be into them.

It's possible that the Madchester acts wouldn't have approved of a Canadian fan like myself. I was tall and gangly, had spots, bad dress sense, wasn't popular, did poorly in school and was extremely moody. (Come to think of it, I was exactly the sort of fan they had in mind) I liked some of the old school indie acts like Morrissey and New Order but I needed something new to come along. The baggy groups had been around for a while back in the UK but they didn't mean anything across the pond. It would take a while for them to get exposure in North America and even then they were met with mostly indifference.

But I was fortunate to get a jump on most people in Canada, even if I was still miles behind the British. I was taking the bus to school one morning in the autumn of 1990 when my good friend Ethan lent me the copy of Now That's What I Call Music 17 that he got from a family member who'd been over to Britain that summer. He was very much a rock guy at the time — The Beatles were his first love but he was generally well-disposed to the majority of guitar bands from the sixties and seventies — and he didn't have much time for all that modern pop stuff on Now 17. He knew I was missing the UK and it was as if he let me borrow this comp out of a sense of possibly filling a whole in my heart or something. At no point did he recommend I "listen to the second side of the first tape" or suggest songs that he was fond of. For all I knew, he'd never given it a listen at this point.

Ethan wasn't wrong to be disinterested in the bulk of it, particularly most of the second cassette which leaned heavily on the techno-dance side. Twenty-six of Now 17's thirty-two tracks are somewhere between wan and pretty good but none of them are ear-catching enough to merit much discussion. The six remaining tracks were simply mind blowing, songs I'd never encountered before and had never dreamed of. Just to have one of these present would have made Now 17 worthwhile listen but for there to be a half dozen of them qualifies it for one of the most important albums I've ever heard (This was a big time for me since I was also exploring Pet Shop Boys' Behaviour which is still my favourite album of all time) Five of those songs were Adamski's "Killer" (see below), Beats International's "Dub Be Good to Me", Depeche Mode's "Enjoy the Silence", Orbital's "Chime" and Primal Scream's "Loaded" (The House of Love's "Shine On" and Jimmy Somerville's "Read My Lips (Enough Is Enough)" were two other selections that I loved but they weren't nearly as earth shaking as the others). The sixth was "Step On" by Happy Mondays.

Manchester's baggy scene had been building slowly over the late-eighties. UK indie had been lorded over by The Fall, New Order and The Smiths who all hailed from there but other groups from the area ended up being left behind. (An odd trend of this next generation of acts was that they weren't especially young: members of the Mondays, James and The Stone Roses were in fact a year or so older than Smiths Johnny Marr, Andy Rourke and Mike Joyce) Fortunately, they were trapped in a scene that was still thriving. Acid house had shown the way forward: down in the south of England this meant electronics and house beats but up north it became all about groups with guitars trying to carve out much the same sound.

In this issue of Smash Hits, both Tom Doyle and Sylvia Patterson make note of Happy Mondays and their similarities to the Sex Pistols. Beyond the obvious sleaziness shared the the two groups (something they have in common with plenty of other bands as well), this isn't a comparison I ever thought of before. (Given how rapidly the Mondays would implode over the next couple years, there may have been something to it) What I failed to notice was the modest musical abilities of the two groups. "Step On" was so brilliant that I was convinced that the Mondays were actually a brilliant band, not a bunch of chancers who made the most of their rudimentary skills.

In any case, what difference does it make if a band is of limited talent if they can record songs as great as either "Pretty Vacant" and "Step On"? Possessing an abundance of spirit, band camaraderie and a strangely charismatic vocalist-dancer combo of Shaun Ryder and Bez, Happy Mondays had some elements going for them. Where the Pistols couldn't play (itself an exaggeration), ver Mondays didn't need to. Producers and remixers did the heavy lifting and everyone knew it. "Wrote for Luck" is a hopeless work in their own hands and only gained life when Paul Oakenfold and Vince Clarke were tapped in to transform it into the magnificent "W.F.L.", in which most of the Mondays are pushed to the back as far as possible. Instead of them soundtracking a rave, they are there to witness one, something that stands out even more in the accompanying promo. "Hallelujah" got them into the Top 40 and a memorable spot on Top of the Pops but its remixes are what make it special.

As if remixing themselves, "Step On" is a series of bits of guitar, piano, bass and drums that have been looped over five minutes. It ought to be boring and predictable but the sheer simplicity, the addictive vibes and Ryder's astonishing performance turn it into an incredible single. There isn't a sample of "Funky Drummer", nor Paul Simenon's bassline from "Guns of Brixton" (used to outstanding effect on fellow Now 17 standout "Dub Be Good to Me"), nor those ubiquitous "whoo's" and "yeah's" that were all over early-nineties' house — this is all Mondays playing the same two bars over and over and what more could you want? Ryder's growling vocal is a wonder and his extended whistle near the end even smacks of showing off.

The single also managed to completely overshadow John Kongos' original from 1971. Then known as "He's Gonna Step on You Again", it is an engaging enough record that fully merited its Top 5 placing. Swampy blues rock that hints at both country and glam is remarkable enough but it absolutely pales next to this remake. The majority of cover versions fail to match the originals, while others become so well known that they lead listeners to assume that they are the originals. In this case, however, "Step On" was known to be a cover, albeit one that had rendered its antecedent redundant. No one was going back to explore Kongos, we were all too busy getting into Happy Mondays.

They would fade from the scene but their influence on me would remain. By 1992 I was into the likes of The Wonder Stuff, EMF, Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine and Blur but this music wasn't able to knock me over the way I had been two years' earlier. While English Language Arts class with Mr Harker was my favourite subject in school at that time, I was also into shop class. I wasn't particularly good at making anything but I was interested in trying my hand at photography and printing (I even attempted welding to very little success). Mr Monahan suggested that we could print a sign or even make a t-shirt via silk screening and I chose to do both. I made a very nice Pet Shop Boys Behaviour shirt while the sign read 'HAPPY MONDAYS STEP ON'. Once again, I was living in the past. So much for getting the jump on everyone.

~~~~~

Also Reviewed This Fortnight

Adamski: "Killer"

Another highlight from Now 17 that took its sweet old time elsewhere. In spite it's month topping the British chart, "Killer" was a non-factor on the other side of the Atlantic until the spring of 1991 when vocalist Seal took off with "Crazy" and then usurped Adamski by taking full artist credit with a vastly inferior version. (As Tom Ewing has said, the singer didn't deserve top billing since he had so much around him to compete with) One of several top flight number one singles of 1990, it proved impossible for either Adamski or Seal to top. And who can blame either of them? You try bettering something as wonderful as this.