Tea For The Tillerman by Cat Stevens 1970

 

I was in Form 3 at Box Hill High School in 1970. I was besotted by records and sometimes I would talk about records I wanted as if I really owned them. Such was the case with Tea For The Tillerman by Cat Stevens. I had looked at the back cover in the record store so many times that I knew all the songs in order which helped in my subterfuge. When my friends at school talked about it I knew the song order on both sides. For a long time, I knew a lot of song orders of records. I used to take a lot of pride in knowing that.

I couldn’t swim so that year for a sport I was sent to a swimming pool just off Elgar Road in Box Hill North. I was going to get my Herald Swimming Certificate. After a number of weeks, I managed to swim the distance and collect my certificate. To tell the truth, my foot touched the floor as I was swimming but I wasn’t caught. 

I had to ride my bike from school to the centre. On the last week of the course I was speeding down Elgar Road when I hit a pothole and me and my bike hit the ground. There was a bus behind me that kept going so I was basically run over by a bus. Well, a little. I was 14. I wasn’t frazzled. I looked up to see the undercarriage of the bus. I dragged myself and the bike out from under the bus told the passengers who had come out to see me that I was alright and went onto the pool. And got my Herald Certificate. 

When I got home Tea For the Tillerman was on my bed in a brown paper bag. My mum knew how much I wanted it and had bought it for me that day. I didn’t tell her that day about being run over by a bus. Not even sure I told her about the Herald Swimming Certificate. I played that record until it was worn out. 

20 years later I’m in a rented Peugeot driving across the former East German border and Tea for The Tillerman was the only cassette we had. Still sounded good.

Daddy Who? Daddy Cool by Daddy Cool 1971

 In 1971 I was 15 years old. The big thing to do on a Sunday afternoon was to go to Ringwood Iceland Ice Skating Rink which meant a bus ride to Laburnum Station followed by a train ride to Heatherdale Station which was the closest to Iceland.

I tried to look as good as I could at that age making sure my jeans weren’t ironed and I didn’t have sweat stains under my armpits. I was fond of a pink shirt I used to wear. My friends and I would go round and round to the latest pop hits. One afternoon I went down onto the icy layer of water and the dye on my jeans bled into the shirt so that was the end of the pink shirt/blue jeans look.

The aim was to get a girl to hold your hand as you circled the rink. Preferably one that wouldn’t fall over and bring you down with her. We all heard stories of the poor kid who fell over and had their fingers sliced off by a speed skater.

One day someone did hold my hand. And we skated together for ages. And she lived somewhere near me. So her friends and my friends caught the train to Laburnum and then walked all the way up Middlesborough Road to the garage on the corner of my street. There was a phone booth on Fulton Road and we stood together in the small space and I showed her how you could ring a number that played the hit of the week. That week it was “Come Back Again” by Daddy Cool. It was like a summer day and started to get warm inside that small space. We stepped out and she told me she had to go and so she and her friends walked off. My friends went back to their side of Middlesborough Road. It was a perfect day. I never saw her again. I always looked out for her in Iceland but to no avail. 

And the Daddy Cool record was playing everywhere I went. And it sounded so good on the transistor radio.

Marquee Moon by Television 1977

 In the midst of what could be termed a punk rock explosion in the UK landed this incendiary record. And the fact that the album is still a favourite talking point for guitarists over 40 years later sustains it's recognition as a classic album.

In the seventies I treated my weekly copies of NME like a bible. Yes, it was already 2 months old before it got to my local newsagent but I would read it from cover to cover. Looking for clues about what was the best music out there. Often records would be bought without ever hearing what they sounded like. None of this punk rock was on the radio. There was no Spotify. There was only print. Or word of mouth. Or we went into the record store and asked the guy behind the counter to play it for us. After reading about it.  We trusted the journalists to describe what was on the piece of plastic. 

So I would buy The Ramone's first album because the reviewer compared it to the sound of jackhammers on a New York Street.

Marquee Moon was reviewed by Nick Kent in the NME. It was a two-page spread. And it sold the record to me. Actually, I would more often than not buy a record if Nick Kent recommended it. He was uber cool.  Maybe because of the time delay of when we got these magazines but often the records would be in the shop when you read about them. So I was on my bicycle to Box Hill and home within the hour with the LP. And it was almost as Nick described it. Especially the sprawling title track. A lot different to what had been coming out of the UK. 

It was great. And with all the great records, the first thing I wanted to do was get some friends around to listen to it. 

Late Night Movies, All Night Brainstorms by Doctors of Madness 1976

This is another album I saw at a Brashes sale and bought for something like 99 cents. Chosen because it was cheap and because it had an interesting title, an interesting band name and I liked the cover. Liking the cover was always the first step to buying an album.
This was 1976 and music was changing. We were hearing about new sounds coming from New York and London reading about them weekly in the NME but we had no chance to hear them. Doctors of Madness name kept popping up.
When I got the album home I put down the pillow and positioned speakers at either side of my ears. This was the best way for me to listen to records. I didn't have headphones yet. The music was wild. I mean really wild to my young ears. I could hear bits of Roxy Music and Cockney Rebel in it but there was another edge to the sounds. Something terrifyingly doom-laden. I wasn't sure if I liked it but I kept coming back to it.
It was also an album that my Mum didn't like the sound of. She was very happy to listen to my Beatles, Stones, Bowie and ELO records. Queen rocked a bit hard at times. But this record really annoyed her. It was like the first time it happened. Around this time I had started writing my own songs. Stuff like "Now I'm On My Own" and "State of Execution" were influenced by the Doctors. My Mum thought I sounded like Kid Strange the singer on this record. Knowing Mum couldn't stand the record I wasn't sure if it was a compliment.
Gradually it was pushed aside by the avalanche of punk records that started arriving in the record racks at my local Brashes and I moved on.
Other people were listening to them too. In 1982 we supported the Church at Macys in South Yarra. We all went for dinner beforehand in Chapel street. Talking about records as you do, as well as Cockney Rebel, The Doctors of Madness came up as a big influence on The Church. I always thought Steve Kilbey sounded a little like Kid Strange too, A bit.

Streetcore by Joe Strummer & the Mescaralos 2003

In the final years of his life Joe Strummer was back with a vengeance. I had seen him playing the Big Day Out (unfortunately I missed his Corner gig) and he was up there in the sunshine with his black jeans and black t-shirt rocking the crowd at the showgrounds. And he had lost nothing. He might have been a bit quiet in his years since the Clash but on this day he powered through Clash classics and his new stuff with equal zeal. Of course the crowd went mad for the old songs. That's the cross many rock stars have to bear. But the new stuff was never boring. And he just connected with the audience who hung on every word he spoke.
Then in December 2002 Joe passed away. For someone who looked indestructible he wasn't. And he left far too early.  I wore my Joe Public badge for days. This was one of my heroes. Someone who had got me into playing in a punk band in the first place.
His band got together to finish the album they were working on and in 2003 this brilliant album came out. Kicking off with one of his best songs ever "Coma Girl" he leads us through various styles of music just as he has been doing since "London Calling". I guess that's a little of the appeal of this record. In many places it sounds like the Clash. Or is it just Joe's voice?
And where the Clash is about rocking in front of the speakers or bouncing up and down on the dance floor this is an album to take out into the sunshine and relax with a beer or two. Or maybe round a campfire, the way Joe would have liked it.

Histoire de Melody Nelson by Serge Gainsboug 1971

The music of Serge Gainsbourg took a long time to become part of my musical landscape. I remember as a teenager hearing "Je t'aime" on the radio quite a bit so obviously it wasn't banned here as in other countries. It sure sounded strange. But quite alluring. But it was overdone and parodied by late-night TV hosts like Jimmy Hannan or Don Lane on IMT. It reminded me of the song "Where Do You Go To My Lovely" by Peter Sarstedt which wore out its welcome. (though I can listen to that song again now)
It wasn't until the early 90s that his name come up again when Dave Graney and the Coral Snakes released a track called "The Confessions of Serge Gainsbourg" and using that theme (French chic) had a CD launch at the Continental Hotel in Prahran. My friend and former Little Murders guitarist, Rod Hayward(though he's back with us again now), was in the Coral Snakes who were well on the way to some success. Rod would also play Mick Harvey records like Intoxicated Man where he had covered Gainsbourg with English lyrics.
Inevitably I bought myself a double CD and it became a backdrop to dinner parties in Elwood. Or drinking wine on the decking. I even played a few of the songs when I DJed. Usually "Initials BB" It might not have got people dancing but people always came over and told how much they loved that song. And it was always early in the night. I didn't want to clear a packed Lizard lounge dance floor.

When I got back into listening to and collecting vinyl a few years back at first I searched for a Gainsbourg compilation. Then I came across this album. I'd heard a lot about it so I thought I'd give it a chance. It also helped that the sleeve seemed to be bigger than normal sleeves with really thick cardboard. It looked and felt different from the normal albums I bought. Getting it home, from the time the needle hits the vinyl and the music slinks out of the speakers I was lost in Serge's world. It just sounds so good. Almost hypnotic at times. Even the incredibly short running time (28 minutes) doesn't detract from the record's attraction. This was another world to explore. I managed to get a few more Gainsbourg albums but I always come back to this one.

Odessey and Oracle by the Zombies 1968

Okay it's been two years since I last wrote about albums on this Blog and in this time I've been busy sorting my records, buying more vinyl, listening to more music in album form rather than bits and pieces on my iTunes. Actually I don't think I can ever go back to listening to music on random anymore. I have discovered new and old records and built up additional albums that I can say soundtrack my life.
I'd heard about this album for years and had it on my iTunes but never really listened to it. A couple of years ago I was in Off The Hip Records chatting to owner Mick Baty when I came across it in the LP racks. I bought it on a whim but when I got it home and put it on the turntable I don't think it came off for days. And the whole family liked it too. Well except for my oldest daughter who's not really into that sort of thing.
But it's such a joyous record just putting it makes you feel good. The fact that the album came out after the band had broken up and they the spelling on the title is all messed up just adds to it's allure.
In an album full of great tracks, including "Time of the Season", it's the song "Friends of Mine" which resonates for me. Because my wife Liz and I have danced to it so many times around the living room floor it almost belongs to us.