Pay pals

More album samplers: this time, Pay It All Back Vol. 1, the first in On-U Sound's long-running series of budget-priced introductions to the label. I’ve selected the cut that kicks off the album, and which sets the bar pretty high for the rest of the LP: Bedward The Flying Preacher by Singers and Players.

The man with the gravelly voice is Prince Far I, who was shot to death in Jamaica in 1983, not long before Pay It All Back was released. However, he recorded so many vocals for producer Adrian Sherwood that his voice keeps cropping up many years after his death; he played a prominent part in Primal Scream’s Echo Dek, for example, some 14 years after he collected his last royalty cheque. Along with artists like Eskimo Fox, Crucial Tony, Deadly Headley, Keith Levene and Ari Up, Prince Far I was the backbone of the On-U label in its first five years, and is sorely missed.

(As per, I don’t actually own a digital version of this album, and I’m not faffing about with turntables connected to computers right now, so what you’re getting is the version of the track from the Singers and Players album Staggering Heights. A slight cheat, but if memory serves, this version is more or less identical, though the Pay It All Back version starts with some echoey drumming taken from (I think) Pounding System by The Dub Syndicate.)

Check the rest of the album, which features tracks by short-lived artistes such as Voice of Authority and The Circuit, as well as long-serving On-U warhorses such as African Headcharge and Mark Stewart ; the original vinyl, which retailed for a princely £1.49, is hard to find, but CD reissues are relatively easy to come by.

Download Bedward The Flying Preacher by Singers and Players (Mp3) (deleted Aug 2009)

Object-Subject

I loved this, from an advance notice of a new compilation CD of tracks by Spherical Objects:

"Spherical Objects...ceased operations in 1981, after Steve Solamar resolved a lifelong contradiction by becoming a woman."

You gotta admit, it beats "musical differences"...

Could they by any chance be related...

More looky-likeys:

Massive Attack's Mezzanine and the new Flying Lotus album, Los Angeles (which is getting stellar reviews).

Booka- Prize idiots

Memo to Booka Shade: If your logo's so illegible that you have to append the name of the band underneath it, it's time to rethink your logo.

Tumb raiders

As promised, another quick post to accompany a recent article in Scream City on label samplers. This time the spotlight falls on ZTT and their 1985 selection entitled Zang Tuum Tumb Sampled.

Here's French chanteuse (Paul Morley referred to her at the time as a "scorch singer"- isn't he a wag?) Anne Pigalle and one of the two tracks on the album by her, Intermission.

Download Intermission by Anne Pigalle mp3 (deleted Aug 2009)

Where is Anne Pigalle now? I'm glad you asked. She's apparently at Glasto this year. I'm sure she'll look fetching in her Yves St. Laurent dress and wellies. And you can see her paintings at London's Aquarium Gallery.

In the article I big up Instinct, who, due to a falling out with Trevor Horn, only released one song in their short career. I haven't got the track (Swamp Out) they recorded for the sampler album -- indeed, I don't have a copy of the ZTT sampler itself any more, after lending it out 20 years ago and not getting it back-- but if you scoot over to here, you can download three session tracks they recorded, which at least give you an idea of their sound. Sure, the production means that Instinct can't quite transcend their time, but like their contemporaries Win, their lack of success belies their talent, and they retain their position as leading lights among the massed ranks of Nearly-Weres.

Eric idols

If you're quick, you can catch the fab documentary about seminal Liverpool nitespot Eric's on the BBC's listen again thingy. It's up for another two days at time of writing.