The Sisters were from Dundee, and were led by Jock Ferguson, an actor who went by the stage name Plenty O’Tool, after a character in a James Bond film (where else?)

The first time I saw them was at Clippers, although it may have been known as the Duke of Montrose by then, a pub that initially basked in the town’s oil-related economic boom, but by the early 90s had become just another pub as the novelty wore off. 

This evening saw the debut of female backing singer, Pussy Farts, a coy young lady who performed very well, despite the place being full of bevvied-up bikers, alcoholics and general wasters, which included myself. With a bunch of hairy bikers you’d expect a band to be careful. But Jock laid into them, with his customary Dundonian wit, and the bikers loved it.

Musically, they would play 70s glam-cock, Jeepster being a regular, as well as Jayne/ Wayne County’s If You Don’t Want to Fuck Me Baby, Baby Fuck Off played in  their typical, over-the-top manner.

A night with the Beaver Sisters was less about music than about debauched entertainment. Jock was the kind of larger-than-life character who could get away with anything on stage, so he’d berate anyone that looked a bit out of place – and his victims would girn their teeth and wish he’d get distracted by some other poor unfortunate.

They would play all the toilets of Dundee (the ones at Foreigners being quite, ahem, fun apparently), Montrose, Arbroath, Kirriemuir, Forfar, Brechin probably, basically anywhere that would take them.

The core of the band was Drew Ramsay, Pete Silvers, Anth Brown, Barry Gibson and Steve Hamilton, according to the Retro Dundee blogsite http://retrodundee.blogspot.com/2010/02/beaver-sisters.html

Despite being together for six or seven years, the Sisters never released an album, nor even a single, just three cassettes sold locally. Perhaps a highlight was being introduced by a rather bemused looking Richard Madeley on national television, as they performed Sweet Transvestite, from the Rocky Horror Picture Show. I found this revelation in a Herald interview with Ferguson but couldn’t find any confirmation of it anywhere, not even if it was This Morning, the popular morning show Madeley did with his wife Judy Finigan.

After the Beavers put away their make-up and lavish costumes, Ferguson threw himself into acting, landing the part of a lord in Chasing the Deer, alongside Brian Blessed and Iain Cuthbertson. 

In my research I found this letter to the editor in a local rag that had an unusual view of the band: “With their spirited renditions of show-tunes and pop oldies performed in glamorous stage costumes, they soon acquired a big following on the pub circuit.” (Letters to the editor, Dundee’s Evening Telegraph, April 2006). The writer’s pseudonym was Pipe and Fluffy Slippers and talks of “us old older lads” and the tone of an old foggy reminiscing of the good ol’ days, which makes me wonder if this was Jock himself pulling people’s legs, especially as he knows their debut gig was at the Tayside Bar in 1986.

PJ Harvey: Let England Shake (Island) 

The bugle’s used to majestic effect on The Glorious Land, one of a few tracks that reference the horrors of World War I and in particular the gory Gallipoli campaign that is etched so strongly in the psyche of the people of New Zealand and Australia. The militaristic and national soul-searching elements aside, this is a generally uplifting album that shows a musical diversity and even includes a sample of Niney the Observer’s reggae classic Blood and Fire.

Wire: Red Barked Tree (Pink Flag)

Wire sound, like how Wire have always done, in 1977, 1987 and 2011. There’s some sort of random wordplay going on in Two Minutes, Colin Newman shouting statements like ‘A dirty cartoon duck covers the village in shit, possibly signalling the end of western civilisation, and ‘Coffee is not a replacement for food or happiness’.
That may be the best track of the album but Adapt is the most potent: a slow moving beast it may be but that is an ideal pace to delve deep into the state of the modern world – extreme climate change and disaster, the failure of financial markets and hollow politics. There’s a strain of melancholy and it’s difficult to ascertain much hope in the song, just a denouncement of how things are, but it remains aesthetically beautiful.
And in those two tracks you have the essence of Red Barked Tree: quiet or loud; random or thoughtful; brutal or delicate.

Little Bushman: Te Oranga (Little Bushman) 
As someone who comes from the thought process that angry is better, born of a youthful love of punk and reggae, I often have to remind myself that some of the best records and songs are those about love, peace and the human condition. So, there’s no axe to grind, no point to make. Just some sprawling, ambitious tracks like Gone, that are long, but the length is justified as Warren Maxwell, and co delve into different layers of sound and weave them together. That track and the space-rock Dream of the Astronaut Girl come in two parts, saddled together rather than as a reprise. This means the four-piece allow themselves the luxury of developing the tracks as much as they can, but it doesn’t sound like prog-rock-esque indulgence and in the true nature of a concept album, which I guess this is, Gone Part II segues nicely into the eight-minute Big Man.

Arctic Monkeys: Suck It And See (Domino)
On the first couple of listens Suck It And See sounds like their adventure in Indie-Rock, as if a sober Pete Doherty ghosted into the studio and left some ideas behind. Could it be … no, I dare not so their name ….damn I’ll have to now, but have they been listening to post-Madchester James?  Later listens suggest a broader palate, but you get the picture.

Regardless, Alex Turner’s words remain as potent as ever, if you’ll forgive the monotonous Brick By Brick. Turner’s come up with some gems like “Topless models doing semaphore” (Reckless Serenade), or “You’re rarer than a can of dandelion,” (title track).

Oh yes, and there’s those gloriously long-winded titles, like Don’t Sit Down ‘Cause I’ve Moved Your Chair.

The Horrors: Skying (XL recordings)  

From looking like a bunch of black-clad goths reading Joseph Conrad all day, the four-piece now remind me of Pink Floyd, circa 1969, both in look and sound. What enters the ears is the most pleasant and surprising thing, as Skying is choc-full of lush, ethereal tracks such as You Said, which builds into an enormous monster of a tune with its captivating verses and pounding beats. Endless Blue begins like Velvet Underground, but at 1:44 out come the grinding guitars while Faris Badwan gives it his best rocking frontman impression. Their development from garage rock to post-punk psychedelia is reminiscent of the same path tread two decades ago by The Telescopes, who’s self-titled second album remains one of my personal favourites, with its ability to blend in the emerging indie-dance sound with killer rock noise. Time was not favourable to the Telescopes, so I hope there’s a better outlook for the Southend-on-Sea’s finest talents.

Iggy Pop: Roadkill Rising … The Bootleg Collection 1977-2009 (Shout Factory!)

Recorded at various venues around the world with much of the latter two disks being recorded at festivals, it offers a broad overview of Pop’s career, peppered with covers such as the Batman Theme and Les Feuilles Mortes, a French favourite sung by Yves Montand and Edith Piaf. These are welcome additions to the familiar (I Wanna Be Your Dog, TV Eye, Lust for Life, Nightclubbing etc) and the not so familiar: the album tracks and the singles from the largely barren early 80s period.

The tracks are laid out in an awkward manner, so you want to stay with one concert and skip another but, really, that’s my only real quibble. The quality is generally good, Pop has great interaction with the audience and he puts his heart and soul into Search and Destroy, Raw Power and the rest.

Nick Lowe: The Old Magic (Proper Records)  

Age has invigorated this quintessential Englishman, with 2007’s At My Age delving into the nuances of his approach toward the big six-oh. In fact, he confronts it with typical wit and adroitness: “I’m 61 years old now, and Lord I never thought I’d see 30/ Though I know this road has still some way to go, I can’t help but thinking on.” (Checkout Time).

He ponders lost love; selling a house where love once resided (House for Sale) and finds solace in the printed page: “not just magazines, but more serious things” to get over a deserted lover (I Read a Lot). Meanwhile, Lowe also finds he has the “wander dust” in his feet, on Restless Feeling, though he doesn’t know where it’s leading him to. With a strong backing band, Lowe has found a niche, and there seems little let up, a la Lee Scratch Perry.

S.C.U.M: Again Into Eyes (Mute)

S.C.U.M have a longing for psychedelia, space-rock, avant-garde and ambience. There’s a spiritual element to the five-piece as they ponder the essence of life, as on Sentinal Bloom: “What I hold as time/ Nothing without you/Buried ‘neath the water.”

There are deep and meaningful thoughts, set to a soundscape of epic, swaying guitars and moody bass, reminiscent of shoegazing, My Bloody Valentine and Radiohead in reflective mood. The single, Amber Hands, is a triumphant, multi-layered cascade into pop’s bitterest tendencies. It takes some practice to master the art of S.C.U.M, but, equally, there is a limit to their often one-dimensional material, with some tracks drifting into a black hole of emptiness. Some tracks lack substance and diversity but the beauty of Days Untrue, Amber Hands, and Cast Into Seasons render them obsolete. I find the more I listen the more goodness I uncover.

The Waterboys: An Appointment with Mr. Yeats (Puck records)  

Like Primal Scream who change stripes with every album, Mike Scott is no stranger to a challenge, keenly adapting WB Yeats’ symbolist words, written between 1893 and the late 1930s.
Most of the songs, such as The Hosting of the Shee offer themselves to music, with Scott’s ever-beautiful voice ensuring the words are given the grace they so deserve. Sweet Dancer is a clever welding of two poems published 22 years apart. On A Full Moon in March, Scott emphasises the darkness of the theme, with the band matching his mood.
With a band that includes a variety of talents include long-time Scott collaborator Steve Wickham, Irish singer Katie Kim, keyboardist James Hallawell and multi-instrumentalist Kate St John, Scott and friends provide an engaging background to 14 poems, and while it could be argued that no band could ever provide the vigour and realism of a poem regaling his own words to a crowd, there is sufficient enthusiasm and understanding of the works to make this a worthwhile effort.

Half Man Half Biscuit: 90 Bisodol (Crimond) (Probe Plus)

All the elements of a Half Man Half Biscuit album are here: the play on words and the witty titles and songs about the things we actually talk most about: korfball, Betterware products, and “Ross Kemp on Watership Down.

The Biscuits are a breed apart, leaders of a small clique of obscurantist artists delving into the minutae, the strangeness, the uniqueness of our 21st century lives. Porky adores Joy of Leeuwarden (We Are Ready) which is bizarrely derived from a song written about the 2010 European Korfball Championships in the Netherlands. Meanwhile, Nigel Blackwell uses the narrative style he’s used to good effect on previous albums, on Descent of the Stiperstones, to describe a meeting a dullard has with a former Coronation Street star.

Title: 50 Words for Snow 

Label: Fish People

Tell me more: Gosh, she releases albums as often as a coup in Fiji then unveils two in one year. 50 Words for Snow follows May’s Director’s Cut, a reworking of songs from two previous albums.

The Lowdown: Long gone is the Kate Bush who pranced and danced on Top of the Pops, and hit ear-piercing notes on Wuthering Heights, or indeed the Kate Bush who showed her teeth on such rocky numbers as Rubberband Girl. In 2011, as in 2005 for her magnificently ethereal comeback album, Aerial, Bush creates pieces of music, songs that build and grow, something that is eminently achievable when the whole album is 64 minutes long and one, Misty, clocks in at over 13 minutes.
In this winter-themed work, Bush gets Stephen Fry to reel off 50 words for snow; her son plays the role of a falling snowflake and Misty is about the consequences a snowman faces after a night of passion with a beautiful woman.
The orchestral, neo-Eno rhythm of 50 Words, with the use of technology and pace, resembles late-era Talk Talk when the development of a song, using whatever was available, was far more important than cranking out three-minute pop songs. All of which make the use of Elton John, on Snowed In At Wheeler Street, all the more beguiling. That is not a statement of John’s talents, but a little irritation that his voice is somewhat out of place. It sounds as if he hasn’t been given the full job spec, or hasn’t grasped the feel of the work, as he overdoes his vocal duties. It is my sole gripe, however, and the song is decent regardless. 50 Words is a concept album of sorts … a unifying theme, tracks bearing their sole with their successors, and the sense of worth that abounds.And there are plenty of examples of that, from the Himalayan adventure of Wild Man to the mesmerising minimalism of Among Angels.

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Who: Lisa Crawley

Title: Everything That I Have Seen

Label: Rhythm Method

Tell me more: Crawley first came to prominence supporting Paul Weller when he played three nights in a row in Auckland late last year. Support acts to those with a huge following are always in a tricky position, but Crawley and her band, The Conversation, received lukewarm admiration from the Weller army.

The Lowdown: Crawley writes about love and loss, with the fear of being alone clouding her thought process. “Loneliness should be against the law” she sings on You Won’t Be There. Everything That I Have Seen is a delicate little angel that critics have lumped into the folk-pop bracket, though that wouldn’t quite tell the whole story. Crawley’s voice is eerie and comforting at the same time and the band are doing a grand job. But it’s too laidback, lacking in energy and I could easily envisage Crawley playing in a lounge bar to 50-somethings on their first date. Pleasant but hardly arresting.

Anything else: The who’s who of the album credits lists members of Kiwi bands Bannerman, The Ruby Suns, The Checks, Artisan Guns and TinyRuins.

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Who: The Gorillaz 

Title: The Singles Collection 2001-2011

Label: Parlophone

Tell me more: With time to kill before another Blur album, Damon Albarn created a band that use pseudonyms, were illuminated as cartoon characters and dipped into hip-hop, dub, rock and whatever.

The Lowdown: The mix of styles was always the most captivating part of the Gorillaz. Blur may be a fairly straightforward rock/ pop band but Albarn has been to Mali and Iceland in search of new, exciting forms and to record in such places. After hearing Clint Eastwood for the first time I found it hard to comprehend that this was by the same person responsible for Britpop classics like Country House and Park Life. The track listing is pretty much in chronological order, with a bit of tinkering. 19-2000 has always been the most played Gorillaz track of all time both in its original form and as the remixed, beefier Lil’ Chief Dubbin, and alongside Clint Eastwood and last year’s On Melancholy Hill are the standouts. No surprises but a couple of versions end the collection.

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Who: Surrealistic

Title: Surrealistic/ Thoughtghost

Label: Sarang Bang records

Tell me more: Surrealistic is the vehicle for multi-instrumentalist and Mellotron enthusiast Ben Furniss from Auckland. Since releasing his debut in 2004, Furniss has been spending a lot of time in groups such as The Broken Heartbreakers, White Swan Black Swan and Superturtle.

The Lowdown: There are clear but gentle strains of Superturtle, who’s 2010 album I reviewed on these pages click here and are subtly obvious on what is two mini-albums in one. The first six tracks of Surrealistic are uplifting, with plenty of hooks and harmonies. There’s some glorious melt in the ears moments here, such as the simple beauty of Even Deeper in Thought or the dreamy Tell Me When It’s Over. Surrealistic is over too soon, before Furniss switches to Thoughtghost, a near-minimalistic collection of semi-acoustic and languid tracks that allow the listener to wallow in peaceful thinking.

Anything else: Available from click here  http://www.sarangbang.co.nz

Read Part 1

Mansun - Attack of the Grey Lantern.

The copy I have is a tin box which had the same cover as the one sold in the high street and this was repeated on the CD itself. As a promo this is a pretty amazing item. I won a copy in a competition organised by the Sheffield Star newspaper. Of course, the idea of housing your product in a metal box wasn’t new by 1997: PiL’s metal box album came just in that, 18 years earlier. I was shocked to see the starting price alone for the Mansun item on eBay.

Easterhouse - Contenders.

As a teenager and into my early 20s I would sometimes swap stuff with mates and in this instance I was enticed by Gav’s copy of Contenders by this Mancunian band who Morrissey had hailed. I didn’t know much about them apart from their left-wing viewpoint (they were aligned to the tiny Revolutionary Communist Party). My mate liked my Lloyd Cole and the Commotions’ second album, and I really liked it too. But I thought I could get that back at a later date. I never did but I do have a copy on cassette, which ain’t the same. Thankfully, Contenders is a classic political album.

Anaemic Boyfriends: Guys Are Not Proud

MacKenzie sings Orbidoig: Ice Cream Factory.

On a trip to north-west England, Porky took a clutch of seven-inch singles that had recently arrived at the sty. These came from a package of new wave singles from a different trader to the one that sent the Neon single (see below). The Anaemic Boyfriends single came without a picture sleeve but the A side, Guys Are Not Proud, is a tantalising song about how lusty men are, but not in an admiring way: “Guys are disgusting, they’re always lusting, Guys are obscene, vile and unclean, Guys are such creeps, they’ll even do it with sheep”. The last line was the killer and got me, Scouse Neil and Da Judge laughing like crazy. Scouse Neil was practically pleading with me to give it to him, but he would have had to anal rape me to get it.

The tables were turned on a future visit to Liverpool when he unveiled an absolute gem by Billy MacKenzie, the lead singer of The Associates, a band I’ve adored since I heard them as a teenager. Under the banner, MacKenzie sings Orbidoig, this 12-inch had the playful Ice Cream Factory which was full of innuendo over a bouncy pop sound. Unlike The Associates’ big hits of that year – 1982, beginning with Party Fears Two – this didn’t intrude into the nation’s consciousness. I heard this and tried in vain to get Neil to give, or sell to me. But I did find a copy later on.

Neon – Bottles 7″

Who are they? To be honest I have no idea and neither Dr Google nor Prof Wikipedia can help me, other than to confuse me by informing me of an Australian band of the mid-90s. This lot were from the late 70s. My friend at sixth form college, Gordon, who wasn’t a moron, put this on the end of a tape for me and I thought I was wonderfully bizarre and overdone. Later, I actually found the single in a bunch of new wave singles sold by a company that sold bulk singles for cheap. You had no idea what was enclosed, but with new wave you could be certain of some good ones. I guess some of these things sell quite well nowadays given the interest in anything from 1977 to about 1983.

Fan club stuff

Before MySpace and online websites, fans would rely on fan clubs, which the record labels would sometimes organise themselves. Some offered very little for the money but some were worth the effort. I was only ever a member of two, The Levellers and House of Love, and both were well catered for as they were run by people who actually liked and were close to the band. Like most fan clubs, these two offered freebies, such as a compilation of offcuts by the Brighton band, which suitably had a cover of various bits of offal, and in the House of Love’s case a cassette that had two rare tracks. The Levellers sent a fabulous A4 magazine, the HoL people would issue lyric sheets and all sorts of bits and pieces.

Spinal Tap: Back from The Dead

Funniest film ever. No argument. Two years ago the original soundtrack was re-released with extra tracks and a DVD, which was groovy enough but there was also the addition of a unique pop-up diorama package that unveiled three 12-inch action figures of the band along with a proportionally-sized Stonehenge. It’s good to see that some record labels still make some effort with a package.

Flying Nun 25 Years boxset

An iconic label in New Zealand, and a cult beyond Aotearoa, Flying Nun is defined by Dunedin and the individual style of the city in the 1980s. The Clean, The Gordons, The Chills, Straitjacket Fits, The Verlaines, The Bats, D4 and the Mint Chicks all released material on Flying Nun. And all of those acts are on here, as well as a glut of largely-forgotten heroes and heroines of the Dunedin and Otago scene … people like Rik Starr, King Loser, Chug, Sombretones, The Victor Dimisch Band, Marie and the Atom and Naked Spots Dance. Much of it groovy, some of it woeful, but this is a fantastic reminder of the influence and charm of the label. This boxset also includes a booklet of artists’ photographs, artwork and scribblings.

The The – Soul Mining tape

In the 80s, a professional footballer would tell a glossy magazine they liked to listen to Wham! or Whitney Houston in between games. One who would have been mocked in the changing rooms for his eclectic tastes was the Scotland and Chelsea winger Pat Nevin, who once listed the Cocteau Twins and Pink Industry among his top 10 in one of the weekly music rags. He also included The The’s Uncertain Smile and I can think of no greater accolade for a band than the thumbs-up from that rarely-spotted species: the footballer with a couple of braincells. In 1986 I was buying a lot of tapes – they were compact and a little cheaper than vinyl. Soul Mining is an absolute classic but at seven tracks was deemed to be too short for American tastes even though most of them stretched to more than five minutes and Giant clocked in at 9:34. So a version of Perfect was added to some versions and the UK cassette version had another five goodies, some of which could well have been on the original line-up. It’s likely that at least one of these tracks was from the discarded Pornography of Despair album.

Read my blog on taping and the mystique of cassettes

So, in a tribute if you will to what is a new, tech-savvy era, this ageing Luddite says goodbye with a tear in his eye to all that goodness attached to a price tag, with a glorious trawl through some of the musical tat and collectibles that have enlivened a life of living with the volume on medium to high.

The Manic Street Preachers: UK Channel Boredom. 

The Manics were virtually unknowns in 1990, with just a limited-edition promo single and a raft of incendiary but low-key gigs behind them. This flexi disk came with a fanzine and was coupled with a track by long-forgotten The Laurens, who’s poppier sound was out of synch with the brash and brazen Manics. The disk was so light I had to put some pound coins on top of it just to get the damn thing to play. This was worth 100 pounds a few years ago, a figure which may well have increased.

Jesus and Mary Chain – Psychocandy/
Echo & the Bunnymen – Songs to Learn and Sing
I bought these pretty much at the same time, on glorious vinyl, shocking my parents with the Mary Chain one, as, well, it just looked so ….. strange, and dark. This was more than just a case of purchasing some classic mid-80s sounds, this was Porky becoming a bona fide music fan. This shocks me even now, but the stuff I was buying up until about mid-85 was Level 42, Queen and Dire Straits. Only Madness could be considered acceptable. I had been subjected to a stream of radio-friendly unit shifters while working during a balmy summer on a wire rope mini-factory that served the oil industry in Aberdeen. These guys played Radio 1 or the local commercial station all day long, and with that wafting in your ears it takes a lot of will power to resist. With some new mates, the transition to New Order, The Cure, Half Man Half Biscuit, the House of Love, The Pogues and the Cocteau Twins had begun.

The Smiths – anything on vinyl

I only bought a few of their singles, and only the 7inches as the 12” cost double for one extra track although that was often a cracker. They had wonderful sleeves, always bouncing with colour and featuring people the world were largely unaware of, such as Warhol star Joe Dallesandro, and pools winner Viv Nicholson. The vinyl part also came inscribed with the run-out groove: Another Porky Prime Cut, which of course gave this site its name.

The Free French: It’s Not Me It’s You

At the beginning of the century I was working at the Bury Free Press in the beautiful setting of west Suffolk. Englishness at its finest. The landlord at the Priors pub, which is tucked away in a housing estate, was a right character by the name of Geordie and he allowed all sorts of bands to come into his establishment. The over-hyped Cord came, so did miserable Mancunians Longview, and local favourites Miss Black America were always there. There were a procession of largely indie bands, from East Anglia and the south-east that blew their candles in front of about 60 people. The Free French were one of those who stand out, playing what I described as XTC meets Tony Hancock. Afterwards I blagged their last album, which I felt I deserved since I wrote about them in the local rag. There’s no doubt this is a fine album with its delicious melodies and down-to-earth lyrics and it’s included here because this is a one of the great lost collections, a rarity that’s hard to find.

Frisbee fight, with 7” records:

I had been at a market while studying in Hull, and saw someone selling a pile of 7″ singles. It was the sturdy box that tempted me more as the records were old chart mush, though there might have been a couple of the 40+ records that may have been worth keeping. This was the summer, virtually the end of term, so there was a lot of drinking and watching the European Championships in which England were in. I was a Scot down south so there was some lively banter going on. So, with the cheap cider, the football, and a pile of crap singles in a corner, you can almost imagine what went on next. How no-one didn’t have their neck badly cut by a copy of a Sam Brown single I’ll never know.

Blue Ox Babes: Apples & Oranges

A forthcoming blog will explain the legacy and mystique of the vastly under-rated Babes, who influenced, if that is the word, one of the biggest British bands of the 80s, Dexys Midnight Runners. I found the Babes’ International Hope Campaign 12″ in a bargain bin for 50p. Bought it on a hunch and that was proved correct. By the mid-90s I’d largely forgotten about them until a friend living in the same student hellhole in Hull, Scouse Neil, brought back a cassette by the band. This was the album, and he’d got it in a charity shop for 50p – my favourite price. Blimey, I thought as I took it off his hands. Blimey tripled a few years later when I found that this was a promo, and the album had never actually been released. A mighty find indeed.

The Redskins: Lean On Me 7”

Pretty rare and I’d been looking for it for some time, not searching the graveyards kinda thing, just monitoring the racks of a record shop I might happen to enter. Found this at a record store in a small town in north-east Scotland, selling for 15 pounds. The owner wasn’t around but some young lad doing a Saturday job was, so I said how much did he want. A fiver. Sold. Deal of the bloody century.

Gene promos.

Gene were endlessly compared to The Smiths in their mid-90s heyday, and while there is an element of truth in that, they had a whole new sphere and were one of the best bands of the time, pissing on many of the Britpop acts. By 1999, however, their star had fallen and they weren’t selling so much. While writing a music column for a newspaper in north-east Scotland I would be sent loads of promos by their record label, most of the one-track singles coming in a slimline, card case, and like many promos, had a slightly alternative cover to the normal release. We press journos were so lucky to have these we’d often flog them on eBay. The Gene singles, and the label did the same thing for the As Good As It Gets compilation – remain treasured items for Porky.

Title: 90 Bisodol (Crimond)

Label: Probe Plus

All the elements of a Half Man Half Biscuit album are here: the play on words and the witty titles and songs about the things we actually talk most about: korfball, sellers of Betterware products, “Ross Kemp on Watership Down” and a “bothy on the Knoydart”, the last one being a reference to a peninsula in the western Highlands that’s only accessible by sea. And don’t we all talk to our mothers about the late English singer Kathleen Ferrier while dunking gingernuts into our tea? Maybe that’s just me then.
Like the late, legendary DJ John Peel, I love the Biscuits. They are a breed apart, leaders of a small clique of obscurantist artists delving into the minutae, the strangeness, the uniqueness of our 21st century lives. That group could include The Fall, I, Ludicrous, Sultans of Ping FC and others whose refusal to pander to traditional rock and pop subject matter centering around love, sex, money … and more love, sex and money.
As funny as their songs can be (who couldn’t help but chuckle to Rod Alive is Alive – Why or The Trumpton Riots?) there is a real politic among the biscuit tin, an anger against the mundanity of modern, pervasive culture and the descent of British culture towards a homogenised, more Americanised version that’s palatable to someone trying to flog the masses of their pennies. And even if Britishness, and whatever that entails, pervades the record, in a sense it is plausible to empathise with the clan if you’re in New Zealand or Vancouver.

Porky adores Joy of Leeuwarden (We Are Ready) which is bizarrely derived from a song written about the 2010 European Korfball Championships in the Netherlands. Meanwhile, Nigel Blackwell uses the narrative style he’s used to good effect on previous albums, on Descent of the Stiperstones, to describe a meeting a dullard has with a former Coronation Street star.

Nevertheless, it’s difficult to resist fast-forwarding the utterly pointless L’enfer C’est Les Autres, which is actually sung in English, and Blackwell’s dark tale of The Coroner’s Footnote is less appealing than it sounds with a monotonous drone.

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Who: Noel Gallagher  

Title: Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds

Label: Sour Mash records

Tell me more: Everybody and his midget lover knows Noel was the true talent in Oasis, the driving force, the songwriter, the organiser, the one who did the thoughtful interviews etc etc. Maybe Beady Eye has scuppered that view. This is Noel’s official debut, following a live album two years ago as well as numerous worthy guest appearances on other people’s records.

The Lowdown: Without the constraints of the rock beast that was Oasis, Gallagher is free to develop his own niche, though whether he allows himself enough of a leash is a moot point, with some tracks retaining the stadium expansiveness of his former band. This is  most obvious on the opener, Everybody’s On The Run, which may be a continuation of his past work but as a statement of intent it is quite impressive. I’m sometimes left with the feeling that Gallagher is regenerating back into Morning Glory, rather than experimenting enough but there are moments that make you realise the Mancunian is one of the industry’s characters, and of course an immense talent. That’s evident on the edgy (Stranding on a Beach) and in the overall lyrics, which resonate with a love of life, but also an acknowledgement of how tough it can be: “Hard times – life is getting faster/ And no one has the answer/ I try to face the day down in a new way/ At the bottom of a bottle,” from The Death of You And Me, for example. And,finally, there is Stop the Clocks, a track that’s been bootlegged like crazy over the past decade, but never felt appropriate for Oasis. I would agree on that count, but its beautiful easiness (until 4.15 that is when it goes off on a tangent) is well suited to High Flying Birds.

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Who: Vile Imbeciles 

Title: D Is For W

Label: Tea Vee Eye

Tell me more: Not a nu-metal band as name might suggest but they do have a bit of a rockist history as Andy Huxley was the former songwriter and guitarist for The 80s Matchbox B-Line Disaster, who were as woeful as their name suggests. Has Huxley learned from that, ahem, disaster?

The Lowdown: D is For W comes across as made by Captain Beefheart fans who have recently found out about bonkers English band The Cardiacs. That’s admirable influences, but

I’m not quite sure what the Imbeciles are attempting here, and I’m not entirely sure if the band themselves know. One reviewer felt a Vile Imbeciles record required a goodly number of listens to ‘get it’ but this has been on the stereo a few times I’m as bemused and irritated as I was when I put it on first. It has a broad range of ideas, but the band can’t blend them together. Apathetic Innocence is a stodgy funked-up number that Prince would pass on to his favourite enemy, Bitches Kisses falters at the starting blocks and finishes 10 seconds behind the sprinter from Equatorial Guinea, while It Makes You Sad is a jam session led by the drummer’s three-year-old daughter. Okay, let’s move on.

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Who: JD Meatyard 

Title: JD Meatyard

Label: Probe Plus

Tell me more: Meatyard was once part of Calvin Party, which he admits “some people liked and some didn’t”. It would be fairer to say most people didn’t know about them but John Peel certainly did and played them regularly.

The Lowdown: Nice to see Probe Plus putting out a few releases with label head Geoff Davies also releasing an album by Lovecraft recently; sadly time and space prevents Porky from reviewing that one. This self-titled album is a largely acoustic album without as much turnip as Porky would like, but we find the energetic Myspace Star very amenable, especially for the opening lines: “Fifty-thousand pictures of my mouth wide open, my mouth wide open, a fag in my hand; I’m a star, we’re all stars, Myspace stars.”

Here’s a video that will give you a better idea of what they’re like.

Title: An Appointment with Mr. Yeats

Label: Puck records

Tell me more: Mike Scott returns to the mystical, wonderful words of one of Ireland’s greatest literary sons, W.B. Yeats, having adopted The Stolen Child for 1988′s classic Fisherman Blues album, and Love and Death for 1993′s Dream Harder. Now, he’s done an entire album of Yeats’ work.
The Lowdown: It requires literary understanding as well a musical ability to put poetry to music. It doesn’t always work, as any fan of Rabbie Burns will testify – the work of the bard has never been truly matched in a recording studio.
Scott, who is, in effect The Waterboys, has taken the band on a musical whirly-jig, going from what was called The Big Music – after one of his own songs – to folk, and even encompassed rock elements into his work. Like Primal Scream who change stripes with every album, Scott is no stranger to a challenge, keenly adapting Yeats’ symbolist words, written between 1893 and the late 1930s.
Most of the songs, such as The Hosting of the Shee offer themselves to music, with Scott’s ever-beautiful voice ensuring the words are given the grace they so deserve. Sweet Dancer is a clever welding of two poems published 22 years apart. On A Full Moon in March, Scott emphasises the darkness of the theme, with the band matching his mood.
With a band that includes a variety of talents include long-time Scott collaborator Steve Wickham, Irish singer Katie Kim, keyboardist James Hallawell and multi-instrumentalist Kate St John, Scott and friends provide an engaging background to 14 poems, and while it could be argued that no band could ever provide the vigour and realism of a poem regaling his own words to a crowd, there is sufficient enthusiasm and understanding of the works to make this a worthwhile effort.

 
Who: Edward Rogers 

Title: Porcelain

Label: Zip records

Tell me more: Porky Prime Cuts’ inbox is chocka with record label people and their publicists telling us what records we should like. Bypassing those emails with subject lines containing the names of the over-hyped newcomers, or past-it icons, Porky peers into those promoting those with a profile as high as the Cornish independence movement. Hence the arrival of Porcelain, all the way from New York.

The Lowdown: Rogers was born in Birmingham, England, but has lived most of his life in  New York, which explains the slightly trans-Atlantic feel of the record, although the ‘British’ element strays more to Celtic rock. That said there’s a number of lackadaisical moments such as the lumbering Nothing Too Clever, which may have been best relegated to a b-side. Contrast this with the beautiful, uplifting Love With The World, which could be an insight into how rock stars of the 1970s would have sounded like if they’d discovered, and fallen in love with, new wave. If he eschewed the desire to be a rocker, Rogers would have had this album down to a tee: it’s songs like Link To The Chain that define the singer, his ability to change pace when necessary  and individualise it, creating tracks that have vigour.

Anything else: Rogers lost his right arm and right leg below the knee in an underground train accident in 1985.

Who: Tori Amos 

Title: Night of Hunters

Label: Deutsche Grammaphon

Tell me more: She’s sold 12 million records over the past 20 years, gone disco and slowed-down Nirvana. Tori Amos has had many hats and hairstyles and the one in 2011 is fiery red.

The Lowdown: If Amos was a road, Night of Hunters would be a sudden hair-pin bend with a radius drop of 35%. There’s virtually no guitars, no dalliances with technological explorations into dance rhythms; instead this is 14-track song cycle drawing on themes from classical composers such as Chopin, Satie and others. The only concession to anything approaching radio-friendly cock-sucking is that it is a love story with a link to Ireland’s mythic past. You cannot but admire Amos’ ambition, bringing classical music into the 21^st century in a concept album that lasts well over an hour. There is drama and beauty and Amos’ voice is always enthralling. But the lyrics are sometimes too cringeworthy to bear and it’s impossible to consume this in one setting, which is apparently the objective.

Label: Mute

Tell me more: Gosh, what a arresting name: the  name of militant feminist Valerie Solanos’ Society for Cutting Up Men manifesto.
The Lowdown: Putting on this CD without reading up on them, I anticipated, given their moniker, plenty of invective and angst-ridden posturing. But, boy, it’s a misleading name as this album has nothing of those emotions. Rather, S.C.U.M have a longing for psychedelia, space-rock, avant-garde and ambience. There’s a spiritual element to the five-piece as they ponder the essence of life, as on Sentinal Bloom: “What I hold as time/ Nothing without you/Buried ‘neanth the water.”

There are deep and meaningful thoughts, set to a soundscape of epic, swaying guitars and moody bass, reminiscent of shoegazing, My Bloody Valentine and Radiohead in reflective mood. The single, Amber Hands, is a triumphant, multi-layered cascade into pop’s bitterest tendencies. It takes some practice to master the art of S.C.U.M, but, equally, there is a limit to their often one-dimensional material, with some tracks drifting into a black hole of emptiness. Some tracks lack substance and diversity but the beauty of Days Untrue, Amber Hands, and Cast Into Seasons render them obsolete. I find the more I listen the more goodness I uncover.

Who: The Kooks 

Title: Junk of the Heart

Label: EMI

Tell me more: The Kooks began releasing records in 2005-2006, when their pop/folk/ Beatles outlook was at odds with the Franz Ferdinand-led revival of all things 1981 and post-punk and Art Rocker was essential reading. But the public wanted more beyond noise annoys and two million copies of The Kooks’ debut album Inside In/ Inside Out made its way out of the shops and the internet sellers’ warehouses.
The Lowdown: That debut contained childish moments like Jackie Big Tits, but thankfully, the Brighton band are a little more grown up, and the themes reflect that maturity. But with maturity and progression through their 20s, comes the defection of the naivety and innocence that was an attractive part of The Kooks. The Great Pop Songs that made Inside In/ Inside Out so captivating are few, replaced by more solemn affairs such as Time Above The Earth, which never really takes off. However, in Rosie the love of a good ol’ rock out remains, and Petulia, despite its corny lyrics, sounds like the ideal soundtrack to the start of a summer barbecue. I just can’t figure out what the objective of Runaway is, while Killing Me has a riff that could have come from a 1980s Big Hair Californian chart hit. Junk of the Heart has apparently taken three years to complete, but it may be that this has been too long, with no doubt plenty of changes haven taking place in that time, many of them perhaps a hindrance rather than a help. But I have no intention of writing the Kooks off yet, and I am sure they can bounce back, if they put the junk aside.

Who: Gold Medal Famous

Title: Gold Medal Famous

Label: Powertool records

Tell me more: I know nothing about them. The release came without a press release and the copy itself has little more than two photos of a glam-friendly band and a range of thanks, including codfish island, immunisation, left-wing politicians and “people who like to read books that aren’t crap.” On that basis alone, how could you not love ‘em?

The Lowdown: Don’t'cha just love toilet humour and songs about sexual prodigiousness? Gold Medal Famous certainly do, with the track Justin Bieber referencing female private parts while I Want To Make You Come, is well, I think you get the idea. To be honest neither has any depth, and they feel like appeals to the lowest-common denominator, but at least they add some variety to the album. Porky is no prude, in fact, he wallows in the stuff every day. I mentioned variety there, and there’s plenty of that, from the electro-pop clamour of They’re Drinking My Punch, the gloriously space-cadet instrumental Party Theme and the Goldfrapp-esque synth and sexy vocals that is All The Shining Lights. To add to the ubiquitous, adventurous nature, there’s also the 70s-rock of Don’t Just Text Me, Call Me while Chemo Heavy Hard Core features inane chanting and a drum’n'bass beat.  It’s like The Fall meets The Go!Team.

Who: Vorn 

Title: Down For It

Label: Powertool records

Tell me more: Vorn Coglan has been busy. He’s also a member of Gold Medal Famous. Porky loved his previous effort, Vorn’s Modern Classics, with its tales of nights out in Wellington’s party central and waiting at a railway station as a body is scooped up from underneath a train.  Chris Wilson of GMS is also heavily involved in this, as the Wellington music scene shows its incestuous nature.
The Lowdown: Vorn has a fondness for catchy songs, and equally snappy song titles, as Stop Making Bedroom Albums and You Don’t Have to Hate Yourself to Sleep With Me (But It Helps) attest. I have bought albums purely on the basis of alluring song titles, and this is one that might have caught my eye in a record store, if there were any left. Vorn tells tales about the embarrassment of going for free condoms at the family planning centre, of a Pavement fan who has worn the same band T-shirt since ’97 and living on the dole after chucking a job in. Even if his pseudo-rap on Formula doesn’t work, Down For It is charming and intriguing. This is New Zealand’s version of Chris T-T.

REM at the University of Virginia, in 1986.

In just four years they had gone global, every radio station in the western world was now unafraid to play them, and 1991′s Out of Time, had launched a sparkling new era. A year later came Automatic For the People with a near equal amount of success. A comedown of sorts came in the form of the bruising, glam-rock influenced Monster with a mountain of distorted guitars. I have not come across an REM fan yet who truly loves this, but for Porky this represents the band’s peak. Thereafter, they released good albums, moderate albums and plain stinkers (1998′s Up) and never matched their pre-94 glory, though Reveal, from 2001, and Accelerate (2008) came pretty close.
This year’s Collapse Into Now came into the moderate quality category and it was clear the impetus that drove the three-piece for many years had waned. Their split today is timely and, while they will be much missed, the risk of becoming a rock cliche was apparent.
For Porky a defining memory will be of their gig in Christchurch, New Zealand in March 2005. They were so sharp it was intimidating, and they finished off with I’m Gonna DJ, a crashing, vibrant tune that became ensconced in my head until it finally appeared on an album three years later.
So, to messrs Stipe, Buck, Mills and Berry, Porky says thanks for some fantastic songs over the past thirty years, and while It’s The End of The world As We Know It for some, Porky will forever remain Near Wild Heaven.