← Political Beats
Political Beats
Episode 134: Guy Denton / Echo & The Bunnymen
03:27:20
Scot and Jeff discuss Echo & the Bunnymen with Guy Denton.
Loading summary
Transcript451 lines
- [00:00]
Scott Bertram
Foreign.
- [00:06]
Jeff Blair
Hello again everybody and welcome into another edition of Political Beats, a presentation of National Review. You can find us on X at Political Underscore Beats. Also on Facebook as well. Subscribe to our feed for new episodes through Apple Podcasts and tune in. You can also find the show@nationalreview.com Click on the podcast tab. Find all the fine NR audio that is available. Plus we invite you to join us over at Our patreon site patreon.com politicalbeats support us there. Help the show stay ad free as it has been. We have entry level support for well support and also some voting privileges and odds and ends along the way. Mid Level gets you early access to all of our shows plus you get them at a higher audio quality. It sounds better and our upper level best friends early access, higher audio quality. Those monthly exclusive content episodes, very fun. Remastered episodes from our past playlists and more. All of that@patreon.com politicalbeats join us there. Now the part of the episode where we thank some of our Patreon supporters individually and specifically especially those who have joined us since the last episode. Hello and thank you Jeffrey Sherman, Roscoe Shamblin, Mark Dowell, Robert Little and Andrew Howard. Also some of our longtime supporters over at Patreon, Trung Doan, Steve Lewis, Eric Cohn, Gene Rooney, Adam Anderson, Bill Cunningham, Stephen Bailey and Kelly Corbett. Thank you for helping us over@patreon.com politicalbeats my name is Scott Bertram. You can find me on xcott Bertram, my tag team partner. Standing by as always is Jeff Blair. Jeff, how are you?
- [02:02]
Guy Denton
I don't know, Scott. I'm standing here on the rocky shores of Lake Michigan, smoking a cigarette contemplatively here in the early morning dawn as the seagulls flock about me wearing an overcoat and a hat and thinking to myself, how has it come to this fate? Up against a will, the podcasting time unwillingly mine.
- [02:22]
Jeff Blair
There is a somewhat funny story about the picture Jeff alludes to we might get to later on in the program. Jeff is at X at Esoteric cd. Our guest on today's program co hosts the Wrong Stuff podcast with Matt Lewis. He contributes regularly to publications like the Dispatch and National Review, and until recently he took Jonah Goldberg's abuse for a living. He got paid for it on his podcast, the Remnant. Guy Denton is with us for this show. Guy, thanks so much for joining us.
- [02:54]
Guest Speaker
Thank you both so much for having me. I'm looking forward to it. Any excuse to nerd out about something more pleasurable than politics. I welcome.
- [03:03]
Guy Denton
That's why we exist, my friend.
- [03:05]
Jeff Blair
We fill that hole in the market. Guy, before we get to our band today and the music a little later on, tell us first about your experience. Tell us about the wrong stuff and anything else people should know about you.
- [03:18]
Guest Speaker
Sure, I'll give you the as abridged of an account of my tragic background as I can. I was born and raised in England, spent my entire life there until two years ago, but always wanted to become American and move to the US for largely ineffable kind of reasons. I guess I couldn't give much of a rational explanation for it. But I got interested in politics in 2016, which was my equivalent to senior year of high school, when the delightful election cycle that year was going on. And that was how I discovered conservatism and came to realize that I agreed with it and thought that the arguments of people like the authors at National Review just intuitively made sense to me. And I tried for a long time to make it over to the US until two years ago. I managed to do it. I came over the work at AEI and now I branching out a bit more. I took Jonah Goldberg's abuse for a while, as you mentioned, Scott, which was delightful. I still wear the I still wear long sleeves so no one can see the bruises. But thankfully I'm in a less abusive podcast format now where people can find me with Matt Lewis of the Daily Beast. We recently launched a show called the Wrong Stuff. You can find it everywhere. Follow it. Ongstuffpod, I think, is the Twitter handle. I stubbornly refuse to Twitter, although I may cave eventually. But we talk about it's rank punditry blended in with rank pop culture nerdery like you'll find on this show. So I think listeners of this program would hopefully find it appealing.
- [04:56]
Guy Denton
Of course, Matt's also been a guest on our show in the past. He came to join us for our John Cougar Mellon camp episode, if I recall.
- [05:02]
Jeff Blair
Indeed, we'll have to talk to Matt about increasing the abuse. That's something we can help out with.
- [05:07]
Guy Denton
Yeah, you got to ramp some of that up. I mean, that's amateur numbers, frankly. You can do better.
- [05:11]
Guest Speaker
I mean, he's in West Virginia, so that's the only reason that the cane can't reach that far, I don't think.
- [05:17]
Jeff Blair
Guy Denton joins us today to talk about one of the bucket list bands for Jeff on the list of uncovered bands and artists for Political Beats, one he's had his eye on for quite some time and one I Expect he will turn in a magnificent effort with today on the show. Joining him is another fan of Echo and the Bunnyman, Guy Denton. So, Guy, we open the floor back up to you to tell us how you found out about the band, why you love them, and why other people should care about this music.
- [05:48]
Guest Speaker
So to the first point, I became. I sort of became a big music nerd gradually, then suddenly, I guess, and I'm not sure if you two would share that experience, but I remember the first time I got really interested in music was around 2011. And first I went through a spell of being very obsessed with particular things.
- [06:10]
Guy Denton
So I'm, for me, Guy, what was your age?
- [06:12]
Jeff Blair
That'll help.
- [06:13]
Guy Denton
I think it's very telling in a way.
- [06:15]
Guest Speaker
So when I first. When I remember the first music I really, really loved was the Rat Pack and vocal jazz and things like that. Sinatra and that kind of thing, which I can't remember how I discovered, but I would have been about 12 or 13 then in then, when I was about 13, 14, I, for some inexplicable reason, became an obsessive Kiss fan, which I'm sure you will deplore, Jeff.
- [06:42]
Guy Denton
Many, many stories. Many such stories have been told, apparently. So, like, you're not alone.
- [06:48]
Guest Speaker
There's a surprising Kiss contingent among center right politics, too, I've discovered, which is heartening for me. But with that, I was about 13, 14, I started to take a wider interest in rock and learning about rock and things like that. And then I learned about things like funk music and soul music, because that was what my dad liked and what he grew up with. So he taught me about things like James Brown and Parliament Funkadelic and so on. But it was when I was 15, and I remember it would have been probably the fall of 2013 that I discovered post punk and discovered the Bunnymen in turn. And I vividly remember. So my dad lived through all of that. He was big into it at the time. He had crocodiles on vinyl.
- [07:31]
Guy Denton
Is he from the north or what part of Britain?
- [07:35]
Guest Speaker
I grew up where he grew up, which is a town called Northampton in the East Midlands.
- [07:43]
Guy Denton
Yes.
- [07:43]
Guest Speaker
So just sort of. No, it's in between.
- [07:47]
Guy Denton
Yeah, definitely in between. London and like, you know, like Manchester.
- [07:52]
Guest Speaker
Plopped right in the interzone, I guess. Indeed, he. He was. He. He was big into funk music and everything, like I mentioned. But then he became a punk when the Sex Pistols happened. And then after all of that, he fell in love with post punk and bands like Talking Heads and so on. And it was when I started Talking to him more about music. But I began to learn about it. And I vividly remember there was one night, it probably would have been maybe September, October 2013, but I was at his office with him after school and for some reason we just start. We went on YouTube and just started playing music videos and falling down one of those rabbit holes of discovering songs. And I remember he probably played me things like Psycho Killer and Blue Monday, New Order, which I vaguely knew. But one of the songs he played me was the Cuthber by the Bunnyman, which he used to love. And it immediately struck a chord with me. And I didn't revisit the Bunnyman for a bit until listening to Joy Division. For some reason, I remember buying. I think hearing Blue Monday prompted me to buy a New Order compilation, which also had some Joy Division tracks on it. And the song Transmission blew my young feeble mind and opened captivated me and really intoxicated me with post punk and made me want to learn more about that world. And that was what prompted me to get into the Bunnyman. And the Kathu was what initially hooked me in. Dad had crocodiles, so I listened to that a lot. But the first thing I ever owned was a box set called Crystal Days that I got for Christmas that year. And that's a comprehensive overview of the first decade of the band. And listening to that repeatedly for a couple of months was what really sucked me in and made me a lifelong fan. Up to this point, anyway.
- [09:46]
Unknown Speaker
Walked on a tidal wave Laughed in the face of a brand new day Food for survival thoughts mapped out the place where I plan to stay all the way well behaved Just in case it slips away the sky is blue my hands untied A world, it's true through all clean eyes Just look at you with burning lips you're living proof but my fingers hill.
- [10:28]
Scott Bertram
La.
- [10:44]
Guy Denton
This is actually the most beautiful introduction I could have ever hoped for because, okay, here's the hilarious. Here's the hilarious thing, guy. You take your experience, which, what begins like 2011, 2013, something like that, right? You can transpose it back to 1999 and it's mine, okay? The only difference is at that point, I'm in college, right? But I started with Joy Division just like you did. And of course I did it a little different. Of course I have a college. I have a wanton college kids budget, which is to say I'm not spending my money on clothes, I'm not spending my money on drugs because I'm a dork at Johns Hopkins. I'm Spending my money on boxed sets. So the first thing I did is like, oh, here's this band, Joy Division. I'm told they're super duper important. I've never heard a note of their stuff. I might as well just do it. Hey, if it's really awful, I guess I can get a return. Plunk it down. I become a Joy Division fan, I become a New Order fan. Then I go in and I swear to God, the timeline gets contracted in your brain, right? It's like I can't tell you exactly when this all happened. It was like freshman year, sophomore year. Because it was the same store. I know that for sure. I walk in on the back wall, I just see the most gorgeous looking album cover box set I've ever seen. And it's Crystal Daze. It's the same dang set that guy got.
- [12:11]
Unknown Speaker
The God, you said is that the only thing you care about. Splitting up the money and sharing Top the cake makes being eaten straight through the mouth Poison poised to come back in season oh, once you like reason Measure by measure drop by drop A.
- [12:37]
Scott Bertram
Powerful power taking shot of all the treasures still unlocked the love you found.
- [12:46]
Unknown Speaker
Must never stop.
- [12:51]
Guy Denton
How again I didn't not know a note, not one note. I had never heard this band. I had only heard of this band. And these, of course, are the upper middle class indulgences that I refuse to regret. This is my privilege and I'm proud that I was able to just on spec, buy that set on the look alone. And the knowledge that, okay, this is a band that I heard did some pretty cool songs. I'll bet if they're compiled this lovingly, as I observed, like the backtrack listing and all, like the fourth disc of rarities and Pieces, well, they must be good enough to merit it, right? You don't. You don't devote a Rhino 4 CD box set to crap. Of course I found out I was wrong when I bought that Doobie Brothers box set. You do sometimes. But in this case, it was like getting struck by lightning. It was a clarifying moment musically for me in my life. One of the most wonderful experiences. I think I can. I can still remember taking it home, just spinning the first two CDs and hearing all of this shockingly sort of like referential music. The lyrics, they didn't make sense to me then, and by God, most of them still don't make sense to me now. It never mattered. It was the sound. This was the sound in my mind. When I had first read about people writing about Post you know, the joke about Talking Heads is that they'd never heard Joy Division at all until they wrote the Overload. And they'd read critics writing about the band. They said, okay, let's do a song that we think sounds like Joy Division would sound. And of course, it sounds exactly like Joy Division. In my mind, post punk was always supposed to sound like Echo and the Bunnyman.
- [15:16]
Scott Bertram
Hand in hand.
- [15:35]
Guy Denton
And it immediately I realized that this is actually one of my favorite genres as well. At that point, I'd already been familiar with the fall magazine, Wire, all the sort of the founding generation of post punk, you know, the original Rebels and back in like 78 or so. But I realized this second generation, which actually includes U2, a band we'll be discussing, I think, a fair amount during this show. Because the parallels are eerie. This echoey spacious sound, this soulful sound, this sound that is. Is unafraid to be very jagged and weird and orthogonal. Orthogonal and aggressive. But also is unafraid to grasp for beauty the way that later Joy Division singles. It's funny when. When Guy says he was triggered by a transmission. For me, the songs when I. When I heard Echo, the first songs that I referred to in my mind, of course, were not only Love Will Tear Us Apart, but atmosphere. And atmosphere is what Echo and the Bunnyman brought in spades. That effortless atmosphere which to me has always epitomized post funk and has made them secretly one of my favorite bands of all time. And if I can make any better argument for why this group matters, then that's it.
- [17:35]
Scott Bertram
Fades up against a windmill through the.
- [17:42]
Unknown Speaker
Thick and thin he will wait until you give yourself to him.
- [17:56]
Guest Speaker
Yeah, that pretty much covers it.
- [18:00]
Jeff Blair
I mean, by coincidence, my experience is exactly the same as your 2 experience. I can vividly remember the first time I listened to an Echo in the Bunnyman record some six days ago. And this is.
- [18:15]
Guy Denton
Yes, but it was Crystal Day, because I told you to start with that set.
- [18:18]
Jeff Blair
That's right. Jeff lovingly shared with me his box set. So I new through Jeff, Echo and the Bunnyman. Because we've been doing the show now for. I don't even know how many years, seven. Now, it is one of those bands. And we both have our. I don't know what five or six bands that we reference often have never done a show on. And perhaps never think we'll be able to do a show on because of guests and things like that. And certainly Echo is one that Jeff wanted to do. And we did a show on the year 1981. In music for our exclusive content people. A while ago, one of Echo and the Bunnyman's albums was, was highlighted by Jeff. So I, I was excerpting, excerpting songs.
- [19:02]
Guy Denton
I literally picked the year so I could talk about the album in despair of ever getting a guest. So I hope I'm not going to repeat myself. But, yeah, that's why we did that year. It's like I just needed to talk about that record.
- [19:17]
Jeff Blair
But it's not a, it's not a band I had any familiarity with. It was not on my radar screen while I was, you know, enjoying and learning about music. And look, there are some, there are some reasons why, meaning there are some red flags for someone with my musical tastes. Post punk is not my genre. I mean, we know this. It's Jeff's ball of wax. It's not so much mine I can appreciate, but it's not where I lived for many, many years. Bands, perhaps, who influence Echo and the Bunnyman. And you'll see this if you, some of these bands will probably pop up in their conversation. You'll see them if you sort of Biography. Velvet Underground, not my favorite. I, I, I, I respected, I love.
- [20:00]
Guy Denton
Them, as you well know, Right.
- [20:01]
Jeff Blair
So I kind of respect them, but don't love them. The Doors, famously not a fan at all. Great episode, by the way, with Randy Barnett. Not with Randy Barnett, we did it with Stephen Levy. And we all had three very different distinct takes on the Doors, which made it a very fun episode. But my take was probably certainly the least positive of the three of us. So, I mean, there are kind of clear reasons why Echo and the Bunnyman didn't show up anywhere in compilations I was listening to over the years. So this is my first extended experience, and I've mentioned time and time again on the show, one of my things I really try to do as much as possible, except with, like Dylan, when there's 62 albums or Willie Nelson, is to give everything three times, three spins, three opportun. And, you know, each album. And Jeff said to him, this one probably is going to take all three. And he wasn't wrong. But I will say, as that third spin approached, I found myself understanding, figuring out, appreciating things. I will say, though, I think things that I appreciate about Echo and the Bunnyman might not be the things that Jeff loves about Echo and the Bunnyman, but that's okay because we could appreciate different things. So I come to this, the complete newbie of the three of us, having just ingested almost all of this music. And it's not. This is kind of my Rush. I didn't even, like, accidentally hear an echo in the Bunnyman song. Like, Jeff never even accidentally heard a Rush song during his 42 years on Earth before we did the show with Brad Birzer. I never saw it. Pretty in Pink wasn't exposed that way. You know, the various ways Echo and the Bunnyman may have entered the pop culture realm, I was not exposed to. So, yeah, there was nothing even vaguely familiar. But that also made it.
- [21:55]
Guy Denton
Just to make clear, you're saying you never heard a single one of these songs, not a one before the show.
- [22:00]
Jeff Blair
Much like your defense of not hearing Rush. It is, certainly. I mean, I'm an xrt. I was an XRT fan in Chicago, as you are now that you live there. And so just play Lips Like Sugar.
- [22:09]
Guy Denton
This morning in the car. Scott. I was literally driving this morning, laughing. It's like I'm doing a show on these people later today. That's hilarious.
- [22:17]
Jeff Blair
So I'm certain at some point one of these songs are on first wave on SiriusXM. One of these songs I've been exposed to, but not intentionally. Not in a way that I would have remembered, except I do remember from the 1981 show a promise. So when I heard that, that one registered in my brain just about everything else brand new.
- [22:53]
Unknown Speaker
She floats like a swan Grace on the water Lips like sugar Lips like sugar Just when you think you've caught her she cry to cross the water she calls for you tonight to share this moonlight.
- [23:39]
Scott Bertram
Sugar.
- [23:45]
Guy Denton
Well, I mean, I guess I spent about 10 minutes discussing the song. This is why I was. I'm actually. I was afraid to go back and listen to that episode because I just knew I'd get paralyzed at the fear of repeating everything I'm just gonna say again today. I. I'd rather freestyle it.
- [23:58]
Jeff Blair
That's right.
- [23:58]
Guy Denton
Just find out later. They'll find out later that I have the exact same things to say then as I do now. But I guess it's my job here to just give you guys a little background into who this band was and who they were. Of course, they were the crucial three initially. If. If you start really, I guess where the and Begin, which is with Ian McCulloch in Liverpool, England. This band comes from the north of England, just like the Beatles. Right. But of course, from the post punk era. And so I'd say it around 1977, after the sex Pistols, while the Clash are in their hay down. Everybody's getting their stuff together in garages and it bedsit Rooms, he gets together with Julian Cope of the later of a different band. And when some other guy goes on to stuff that I'm not really too entirely familiar with, and they're the crucial three, they never even, even record, the other guy quits. Then it's just him and Cope and they're in this other group that becomes the Teardrop Explodes. They write some of the earliest Echo and the Bunnyman songs as well during that period. And then of course, famously cope fires in McCulloch because he's too much of a moody get and he's too much of a prima donna as a lead vocalist and an only semi competent rhythm guitarist. So out with your buddy. And that is when Ian gets together with two other guys who are going to be very important in this story. One of them is Les Pattinson, who is their bas, but most importantly, Will Sargent. Will Sargent, who is going to be the guitarist and one of the main, most important songwriting parts of this team. And they form a band they call Echo and the Bunnyman. Now here's the thing about the name of this band, and nobody can quite agree what it means or where it comes from. They insist that it was just like we were looking for, like, you know, like. Like one of those 60s names like Fag and the Cannibal Hunters, like a cool sounding, like, rock band name. So we just was somebody just free associated Echo, Bunnyman. But most of their fans, and frankly myself included, took it to mean what I think it eventually became to mean sonically over time, which is that, first of all, they did not have a drummer at this point. It was two guitarists and a bassist. They didn't have anything but a drum machine. The drum machine was the Echo and they were the Bunnymen. And in fact, if you go look at the writing on their early singles, they build themselves as the Bunny Men, quote with Echo. So like, even whoever their marketing people were, bought into that idea or that take on it the most sense to me, because as this band evolves in this early phase, they're rough, ready, they're people recording demos in cheap studios. And they sound like every other early punk band, but they even then still show some promise. But the echo, the idea of the echo and the spacious spaciousness in their sound is going to take them over before we get to that phase. I guess we should start with this early trio era, which is fascinating to me, even though I'm sure Scott has no time for these weird post punk dorks who can barely play their instruments and just bark into cheap microphones. I Listen to this stuff. Okay, so there are three songs, really, in the studio that hail from the trio phase, and then there's a John Peele session. So it's interesting to hear some of the early songs that would go on to Crocodiles in that form. But the most important one you have to know for me is they released an early single, an A side and a B side. The first single they ever released. Their debut, the A side is called Pictures on My Wall. It's. It's good. I don't think it's great. It's the B side that kills it. Something called Read it in Books, which fully plagiarizes three quarters of all of its lyrics from other, more famous songs, including Curtis Mayfield's People Get Ready. But still with a drum machine behind it and all, just kicks a ton of ass and is basically prototypical Echo and the Bunnyman right there. From the start, I knew I was gonna love this group.
- [27:51]
Unknown Speaker
You said you couldn't find anyone to love you I said there's more alive and a broken heart didn't console you I've seen it in your eyes and I've read it in books who wants.
- [28:11]
Scott Bertram
Love without the love.
- [28:14]
Unknown Speaker
Hugs? People get ready There's a trainer coming. You don't need no, take it. You just get on once I like crying twice I like laughter Come on.
- [28:32]
Scott Bertram
Tell me what I'm after.
- [28:39]
Guy Denton
Do I heard anybody?
- [28:41]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, I heard it. And it's. I mean, it's a demo. It sounds very demoy to me. And all three of these songs that are sort of on this, from the pre Crocodiles era, play to a drum machine, obviously, as Jeff explained. And it's such a massive difference when you replace the drum machine with a real live person behind the kit. And you know the song written in books.
- [29:06]
Guy Denton
I like drum machines, Scott. I'm okay with drum machines.
- [29:10]
Jeff Blair
I like it better when there's someone actually playing. This one does sound a little stiff to me, but it does incorporate, like, these fake hand claps. And by the end, you kind of overcome the fact that the song starts a little stiff with the drum machine because the guitar has a very 60s, almost garage rock X ish feel to it. And by the end, everything sort of comes together. So, yeah, I agree. There's a lot of promise in these first, early three songs.
- [29:41]
Guest Speaker
I definitely prefer the original, rather than books, to the version that ended up on Crocodiles, where they slowed it down.
- [29:51]
Guy Denton
And tried to make it change up the rhythm.
- [29:52]
Guest Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And tried to make it almost. Almost kind of oddly sexy in A way which I remember McCulloch said he wanted to do with Villiers Terrace too, which I don't think really works as much. Works as well as the stripped down, sort of toothsome, gritty original does. I would like to mention too, the original version of Monkees. I remember putting that CD in for the first time while I only knew a couple of Bunnyman songs. And it made me giggle because you could hear the kernel of a very interesting song, but it sounds like it was recorded on a. With a tape deck and a Casio keyboard and you've never.
- [30:35]
Guy Denton
Yeah, exact.
- [31:02]
Unknown Speaker
I need a drink. Always sensitive to entertaining.
- [31:20]
Guy Denton
And the lyric makes no sense because he sings Keemon, Keemon. Right. It's such a ridiculous joke.
- [31:27]
Guest Speaker
And I. I still don't understand what that song is supposed to mean, if it's even supposed to mean anything.
- [31:34]
Jeff Blair
Thing.
- [31:34]
Guy Denton
Well, and the funny thing though, guy, is that everything you need to know about the difference between the trio era of the Bunnyman and. And what happens when they actually add a drummer can be heard in the contrast between that song and it's like, you know, demo, goofy version and the way it sounds on Crocodiles. Yes, the difference between that has everything to do with one man. Pete DeFreitas, Echo and the Bunnyman decide. Hey, you know what? You know, we can read the writing on the wall. We could read it in books. We're not going to make it without an actual drummer behind us. We need a little dynamism in our music and they find it in spades with this guy. He's, you know, apparently was always kind of the semi posh outsider. He was from London or thereabouts and he was a sort of good natured, drug addled chap. But Peter Freitas was also a magnificent drummer. He died far too young. The guy's talents aren't even remotely as recognized as they ought to be, just given the versatility of the work. He's going to now spray all over Echo and the Bunnyman's next five albums. He starts right on this record. He starts right with. With Monkeys, which now becomes. With these, these giant, very professional sounding keyboards that are like resonating pianos. Keymon Dom, the chiming guitars, the sort of like, you know, ostinato guitar that. That Will Sargent plays over top of it all. And the drums, the thundering drums of defreitas. Everything changes for the band once they become a four piece. Then they become fully who they are and they start, a lot of people would argue right out of the gate with one of their greatest albums. Some People would actually say their greatest alb with crocodiles. And since. Guy, I know that this is your favorite album, why don't you start first?
- [34:02]
Unknown Speaker
I can see you've got the blues in your alligator shoes Meow Smiles I got my crocodile.
- [34:24]
Guest Speaker
This is my personal favorite, and it might. It's probably largely just for sentimental reasons, because this was the first one I heard all the way through, and I played it a lot at the time, and it obviously has a lot of memories attached to it. But I think that even. Even if that wasn't the case and I came back to it later on, I still may have gravitated to it more so than the others. I think it has. It has a lot of the same strengths as Heaven Up Here. And I would probably put Heaven Up Here in second place if I had to rank the original five. But I love. I love the hunger of it. I love the atmosphere of it. The first five albums, one thing they always had a knack for is picking album covers that perfectly mirrored the sound and atmosphere of the music contained within. And it was always. It's always been one of my favorite albums for listening to in the middle of the Night or for driving at night, maybe down a deserted woody back road, but just for songs on here. The power and the hunger and the rawness of a lot of these songs, like all that jazz, I remember hearing that for the first time and it felt like a kick in the head in the best possible way.
- [36:14]
Unknown Speaker
No matter how I shake my fist I know I can't resist it.
- [36:21]
Guest Speaker
No.
- [36:21]
Unknown Speaker
Matter how you shake your fist it know you can resist it.
- [36:40]
Guest Speaker
Crocodiles too. And Rescue, obviously, it's you. You mentioned the three. This is drumming. And I'd put the three. This alongside Stephen Morris from Joy Division and Rat Scabies from the Damned as one of his. One of those very underrated drummers of the era who people acknowledge and respect, but who never really gets as much credit as he should for pure energy, the pure energy he had without being on mounds of cocaine like a lot of other drummers were. It's incredible. Some of the. Some of the. It's incredible what he adds to a lot of these songs and the way he propels them forward. And when you couple that with Sergeant, sort of sharp, rhythmic, not jangly, but very piercing guitar playing, and McCulloch sounding young and howling out these weird, abstract, sort of oddly sexually charged lyrics. But I still don't understand what a lot of them are supposed to be, other than that they probably just came from angst and ambition. More than anything else, I'd never get tired of listening to this album. And it's one of those albums, I know note for note. And every time I listen to it, it can still excite me as though I'm hearing it for the first time.
- [37:59]
Guy Denton
So I've got like two pages of notes that I wrote out just for this album alone. I'm about to ignore them all and just make this point first. And actually then I'll hand it over to Scott, which is that this is one of those albums that shocks me for its maturity. And of course the lyrical. It's not about the lyrics, right? Of course the criticism that will always be lodged against Echo and the Bunnyman is that a lot of times, what is Ian MC colloquially on about? It's sort of. It was this. These criticisms were made even at the time. It's just sort of like, you know, vaguely doomy sounding nonsense that has no real meaning. Right, fine. As sonic propositions. They know exactly what it is they want to be already in a way that to me compares like to REM On Murmur, where you just like, okay, you have a concept. And it's almost like. It's almost shocking given how sort of primitive the early demos sound. And then you go from that to Going off, which is the opening track on Crocodiles, which is like a four part prog rock song. Like, you know, there's three little bits, they're all really memorable, short, like, you know, post punk, spiky bits. And then it ends with this two minute long play out instrumental that gets reprised at the end of the album. So the ambition is clear right from the outset. They do not come out half hearted. They know what they want to be. And I got a lot more to say about this record, but. Scott, you have any thoughts?
- [39:18]
Unknown Speaker
Let's get the hell out of here. Let's get the hell out of here. Going Up, Going down.
- [40:03]
Jeff Blair
I'll just pick up right there with Going up, which is the first song. And the way it begins, the dramatic climb into which the band emerges out of. And I think immediately to my ears, of course, the difference a live drummer makes. You hear it on Going up, but that switch that happens around the 2:15 mark, like it's just such a sign of the interesting thought out and planned ideas they have about what this music is supposed to sound like. It's a total and complete switch to this very galloping beat to close the song. The last two minutes or so. The what Rescue is the single, I believe, from this album.
- [40:48]
Guy Denton
I think it's the weakest song on the album.
- [40:50]
Guest Speaker
Ask me really.
- [40:52]
Guy Denton
That's how strong this album is, in my opinion is. I think the single is the weakest part of it.
- [40:56]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, I like it. I like that opening riff, which is instantly recognizable. I. I like that little skip beat they throw in the verses and a very hooky, solid chorus. Won't you come down to my rescue? I think that's a good track.
- [41:11]
Unknown Speaker
Things are wr Going wrong Can you tell that in all song don't know what I want anymore First I wanna kiss and then I want it all Won't you come on down to my. Won't you come on down to my rescue?
- [42:02]
Guy Denton
I don't know.
- [42:02]
Jeff Blair
If you want to talk about. Do it clean here because it's. It's not on the UK version.
- [42:05]
Guy Denton
No, I think we'll save that.
- [42:07]
Guest Speaker
All right.
- [42:07]
Guy Denton
I'll save that Comes right after this.
- [42:08]
Jeff Blair
Save my thoughts on that. That the song Pride and because I don't have a long background with this band, you know, different things will occur to me. I. I hear the beginning of Pride and that very spiky sort of punk feel it opens with. It reminded me of the way that Elvis Costello starts Man out of Time with that raging punk version. And then the song sort of twists 10, 15 seconds into be Something Else Entirely. And Pride is not quite. Quite that because it does transform to a different song, but it sort of comes back to that. That. That angsty punk in. In the chorus. But that's what Pride made me think of. Lots of reverb, even from the. The start here, how important the rhythm section is. You know, Pattinson's bass lines dominate in a lot of places here. Rolling, rumbling bass lines throughout a lot of these songs. All that Jazz, which. Which guy mentioned that. That was a slow grower for me. That one needed. All incongruous at first. My ears don't want to hear how this song begins, but eventually it fits together. By the end, it all seems right. And I needed time to put that all together. And it has a. I'll mention this a few times at this band, a few times, and it's already been, you know, Talking Heads, a psycho killer vibe. The way that that bass line is so prominent and such a thump throughout all that Jazz. I ended up liking that one by the third time I. I gave it a spin. It's a very accomplished debut album. And as Jeff. I think Jeff mentioned by a quartet of. Of musicians who had a clear understanding about what these songs should be and how each song has a life of its Own.
- [43:53]
Guy Denton
Each song has a life of its own, and they all play for different moods successfully. I really don't. As I said, I'm not kidding when I think that the single is the weakest track on it. There are songs here like Stars Is Stars. Stars. Stars Are Stars is just like their attempt to write an actual straight ballad. And they succeed beautifully on it. It's, you know, of course, entangled and it has a sort of meandering path as. As post punk songs will. But it even fades with like, glistening chimes, you know, in the instance it's gone away, it's gone away and it comes to a complete stop, the way a well written song properly ought to, in my opinion. And they do that one right after, you know, going up, which is the one that just drifts off into silence, just immediately showing you they can do different things on the record.
- [44:55]
Unknown Speaker
In the making of the day you came here late, you got home early.
- [45:01]
Scott Bertram
Oh, remember now you've gone away gone away, gone away.
- [45:22]
Guy Denton
There are things here that just shouldn't work, you know, like with Happy Death Men, where the horns come in, there's like goofy, pompous sounding horns to emphasize a song whose title, I might point out, is called Happy Death Men. And yet the pretension somehow succeeds. And half of it is in Ian McCullough's vocal performance. He sings nonsense with such conviction that it's practically a wonder. He gets away with things that. That Bono dreams of in his lyrics just.
- [45:50]
Guest Speaker
Just.
- [45:50]
Guy Denton
Just because he sounds like it's a cigarette dangling out of his mouth. And if you really don't like it, I'll give you a pop in the nose. But the song you mentioned, Scott, that I think also sticks with me the most from this record is Pride, kind of emphasizes a lot of the aspects of echo that I just love right off the bat. They. They're willing to introduce other sounds, you know, the vibes or I guess, xylophones. And I guess that's got to be the Fridas playing them. The xylophones that suddenly come in like mid verse and in the middle section of prime, they might seem in a posit, but they add an extra color that again creates a spacious feeling to that song, which otherwise would be really claustrophobic. And I love that middle breakdown where they just all start grinding up to gears. One of the things that's underappreciated about the band is you think Ian McCulloch is a vocalist, but he's also a rhythm guitarist for the group. You know, it's not all just Will Sargent who plays the leads and all the really difficult stuff. But you know, it's a two. Two part gear, the way they. They operate and I. You start to hear like, you know, on songs like Pride, it's like the sound of my mind. The instrumental bits of that song very much are.
- [47:30]
Scott Bertram
Mother says.
- [47:33]
Unknown Speaker
Sister says the man laugh at you Mind if I sang with.
- [47:42]
Scott Bertram
With you? Daddy says, brother says.
- [47:51]
Unknown Speaker
Make us proud of you. Do something.
- [47:55]
Scott Bertram
We can't do it.
- [48:01]
Guest Speaker
I love Pride as well. I'm glad that you two single it out because that's when I never really heard talked about and so I always assumed a lot of fans would dismiss it. But I love the jagged. The kind of sharp, jagged sound with that pummeling grinding bass from Les underlying it. And those lyrics that clearly gesture at, I'm sure a lot of the. The feelings that stirred the band in the first place, like that adolescent alienation and. And loneliness and so on. But they. They aren't pretentious and they don't sound juvenile or. Or kind of kind of six form, which is the term that people in the UK would use for lyrics like that, but are probably best left in a student's notebook. They're just straight. They're too abstract for that. They're just strange and moody and evocative enough to work and to not make me cringe at 25 and to not make me regret enjoying them at 15.
- [49:00]
Jeff Blair
Scene.
- [49:01]
Guest Speaker
I'm surprised though, Jeff, that you think Rescue is the weakest track. I definitely understand it or understand the.
- [49:07]
Guy Denton
Argument for it, but it's just too repetitive for me. It's really it, you know, he has the one riff and that's all you get. Basically.
- [49:19]
Guest Speaker
I. For me, it moves between. For me, the different sections of the song fit together well enough to keep it varied and for me to not feel like it turns into a grind in that way. If I had to pick a least favorite. It's hard. I would probably either go for the remake, the rewrites of Villa's Terrace or pictures on my wall just because Villiers Terrace.
- [49:44]
Guy Denton
I think Villiers Terrace is amazing with this thundering piano and again Pete Defreitus on the drums. That drives it home to me. But you know, tastes terr.
- [49:58]
Unknown Speaker
There's people rolling round up the carpet Passing round the medicine. Been up to Billions Terrace. I saw what's happening. People rolling right on my carpet. Biting wool and pulling string. You said people rolled on carpet boys, but I never thought they'd do those things.
- [50:45]
Guest Speaker
It's not that I don't really like both. I think what it is is that the first side sounds so raw, raw and so. So oriented and just sort of back to basics rock and is so punk influenced. That hearing that kind of more bombastic, sort of drippy keyboard sound on the second side. It's interesting, Scott, that you said that all that jazz feels incongruous and I sort of see what you mean because I think that all that jazz would be more. Would fit in better on the first side.
- [51:15]
Guy Denton
On the first side. Because remember what falls right after all that jazz, It's Happy Deaf Men, which is again the pompous horn one. So like that's more the mood of side too, in some ways ways, yes.
- [51:24]
Guest Speaker
And it be a bit more coherent if all of those songs were kept together and all of the more forceful, raw, post punk songs were on the thirst side. But if that's the only complaint I could think of about this record. And also I would. I would say I will come to do it clean in a minute. But that's why I think the original UK version beats the US version. As much as. As much as I love Do It Clean. It completely ruins the immersion when you set. When you put it in the middle of Going up and Stars of Stars, those two songs flo together so.
- [51:57]
Guy Denton
Well, it doesn't sound like anything else on the album either. That's the other thing. It's like that's a different kind of energy from the band than anything on this record in a lot of ways. So. Yeah, I agree. I agree it shouldn't be there, I think. You know what, since you brought us here, why don't we just get to it? So right after Crocodiles, Ekko and the Bunnyman released the. The classic UK non album single. I missed non album singles, man. That's when bands were bands. Well, there was just so much gold just to be found on random B sides rights. Because the ironic thing is the A side of this is called the Puppet. It's probably one of the least prepossessing songs in the entire Echo and the Bunnyman discography. Which is actually saying something because they have pretty strong discography. But like, even they're vaguely embarrassed by it. It's nothing you need to know. Luckily for them, the B side of it is one of the most famous songs of their career. Maybe one of their live, you know, standards. And I think one of the best kind of post punk anthem ever written. And it is called Do It Clean Now. I actually just interrupted you, guy. It sounds like you might be ready to tell us all about this one right now.
- [53:00]
Guest Speaker
I do absolutely love this song. However, I would say that I really like the Puppet too.
- [53:10]
Guy Denton
Okay, well, that's fair. I'm sorry.
- [53:13]
Guest Speaker
No, but I don't. I don't blame you or take any Umbridge review, Joe Jeff, because you will know that in the box set of Crystal Days, there's a booklet included where the band walks through each track and Will and Ian make it very clear that they absolutely hate that song and are embarrassed by it and wish that it didn't exist.
- [53:35]
Guy Denton
Which I totally influenced by their opinion of it, I'm sure. It's so funny. You're right.
- [53:39]
Guest Speaker
And to me, I. I get why you might see it as lesser compared to being sandwiched between Crocodiles and Heaven up here. It definitely sounds a bit. A bit rushed and the lyrics definitely sound a bit sillier and a bit more strained than they do on most songs on either of those albums, but it still absolutely hits hard and it still gets stuck in my head often.
- [54:05]
Unknown Speaker
Would like to know what he has done. You like this in your hands all.
- [54:15]
Scott Bertram
Along.
- [54:17]
Unknown Speaker
I was the puppet I was the puppet.
- [54:47]
Guest Speaker
However, I don't disagree that Do It Clean is absolutely magnificent and is definitely the superior song. And the total. Just cacophony of guitars layered on top of guitars with McCulloch howling on top of it and this chorus almost bludgeoning you, but being just restrained enough and just melodic enough not to feel like total noise and instead to feel like a gripping, rallying post punk anthem instead. It's one of the purest musical statements in the catalog, and it saddens me to no end. I remember the last time I saw the band live was in D.C. two years ago. And along with a couple of guys next to me, we kept yelling out for do it Clean in between every. In between every song. Until eventually McCulloch. And it was the one thing McCulloch said all night but I could actually understand turned around and said, never gonna happen. No, do it Clean. And that was it.
- [55:51]
Guy Denton
Which made me tired of it well too many times around the corner with that. I guess I can see why. He's always been known for his moodiness in any event. But by the way, I've given that song a lot of thought. I've analyzed that track lot. It's the organ. It's the organ secretly, quietly, in the background. You don't even realize it's there only until the end you hear it finally petering out. That's the glue, sonically, that holds that thing together. Scott, did you have any thoughts on this one before we moved on?
- [56:18]
Jeff Blair
Only to sort of comment. Guy said it's kind of a cacophony. There's a lot of things happening. One thing I'll mention is nothing is obscured, right? There's space for everything. There's space for the bass to take, so space, sort of front stage, center stage. There's space for Sargent to do his guitar work. There's space for the drums to sort of power the song forward. And of course, space for the vocals as well. You hear all of them cleanly through the mix, no pun intended. I think the melody here is interesting too, because I had mentioned with Reddit and Books that it sort of has the 60s garage rock feel to it. I think Do It Clean very much does too. Has this sort of underground up, upbeat sound of the. Of the late 60s, like garage rock guitar sound. I would imagine this is where you hear some of the Velvet Underground influence too, in the way that guitar works and the guitar sounds that powers something like Do It Clean. But I agree it's one of their best, you know, single efforts in the catalog.
- [57:54]
Unknown Speaker
It.
- [57:56]
Scott Bertram
I do it CLE I do it play. Hey, do it play.
- [58:06]
Unknown Speaker
Do it play. Not I made do it.
- [58:13]
Scott Bertram
Do it play.
- [58:14]
Unknown Speaker
I know I made.
- [58:15]
Scott Bertram
I.
- [58:21]
Guest Speaker
I quickly. It reminds me of Roxy Music too, especially. I think I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of the inspiration for the guitar part came from Pajamarama, the Roxy Music song. And the intro. It sounds like the intro to that, but put on steroids and thrown into a post punk blender.
- [58:39]
Guy Denton
I never thought about making that comparison. And I'd actually do here, now that you pointed it out. That's a good one. Well, actually, I guess the question now becomes. I suppose it's my turn to take us on to 1980. 81. And I guess this is. This is the moment I've been waiting for for far too long. Hey, folks, you ever been to my Twitter feed? You ever wondered who those four sketchy looking fellows were standing off in the distance staring at the seagulls? As, you know, the dawn. The dawn or the dusk. You can't. I'm not sure which one it is, but it's a very moody photograph. Why is that there? That's there because what we're about to discuss next is one of my favorite albums of all time. And basically when I close my eyes. No, no, actually, a better analogy. If I were walking in the Athenian grove with Plato and he asked me to name the Platonic ideal of what post punk is supposed to Sound like it would be heaven up here. 1981's heaven up here, the second echo and the Bunnyman album, and one of the greatest records and most revolutionary to my mind, to my sensibilities, records that I ever heard when I was younger and maybe one of the least easy records on the planet to immediately love, as I'm Scott will tell us. But I remember I already spent about an hour talking about this one album alone. So I'm going to let. Actually, I think I'm going to let Guy start because I want to hear his opinion on this one, which I think to me is. I wouldn't say it's the absolute peak for Echo because they didn't really decline from here. They went on to several great records right after this and in different styles. But to me, in the same way that, like New Order had a certain. Like a post punk phase and then they turned into a dance rock band, Echo began to slowly evolve beyond this. And by the time we're at Ocean Rain, they're at a little different place. This, to me, is the greatest post punk album ever made.
- [60:54]
Scott Bertram
This is the world for the dreams this is the world called heaven this is the one for me over.
- [61:37]
Guest Speaker
Again. I. I personally lean toward Crocodiles. However, I think a lot of the strength the same. You could apply the same strengths or recognize the same strengths in both albums. And if anything, the advantage that this album has over Crocodiles is what we alluded to when we talked about the second side of Crocodile Styles. Meaning that it's more coherent.
- [62:02]
Guy Denton
Yes, yes. It doesn't. It doesn't compromise one iota with anybody. It is such a relentless record, sonically, and it.
- [62:09]
Guest Speaker
It flows a lot more naturally. It's a lot bleaker, a lot grimmer. The. The emphasis on Crocodiles was more on mood and more on mood and space, which is true of this album as well. But again, I think that the album cover perfectly mirrors what. What's inside, which is just bleak and sort of lost and alienated and existential and sort of existential. And it's sounded in its lyrics without any anchor, almost hopeless on a lot of the songs. But the music is.
- [62:39]
Guy Denton
It's color. The color blue colors these songs. There's a song on this album called All My Colors, and the color of this record is that deep midnight blue on the album cover itself stuff.
- [62:49]
Guest Speaker
I love that the song is called All My Colors, and yet it's one of the most solemn and great tracks on the album too.
- [62:57]
Guy Denton
Right? Exactly.
- [62:58]
Guest Speaker
Zimbo and bows and Bow. Yes. I mean, I. To me, Jeff, I think the best place to start with this is by talking about over the Wall, which even if I don't. Even if I wouldn't say that this is my favorite post punk or I. I wouldn't quite say that this is the definitive post punk album in my mind. I think there's a very strong case to be made that along something like. Alongside something like Joy Division's Transmission or. Or the Cur's Killing an Arab or Public Image or Hong Kong Garden, this is the definitive post punk song and an absolutely incredible piece of music that every time I listen to it just leaves me awestruck with how much power and detail is crammed into it and how it certainly doesn't feel like six minutes.
- [64:37]
Unknown Speaker
What do you say?
- [64:41]
Scott Bertram
I couldn't.
- [64:52]
Guy Denton
Sweet. That's what I actually didn't even comprehend the first 14 times I heard it. Because I just would listen to the song over and over again and it would roll over you. That song rolls over you like a thundercloud. All the drumming, first of all, it's actually hearkens back to the beginning of their career because you've got the drum machine fading things in, right? That the cricket beat comes in and you think, well, what kind of a song am I getting? It then sounds like 79 year old Bunnyman. But then the thing turns into this squall of avant garde. No, it actually begins with that ominous Dom Dome Dome. Those little keyboard almost guitar sounding notes that then move into about four or five distinct sections. The way they pile the chaos atop one another and build to this climax without ever repeating. It is. It's a symphony of post punk madness. And that's one of my favorite songs of all time. See, this is what I said on that other 81 episode.
- [66:13]
Scott Bertram
To my logical limit.
- [66:47]
Guest Speaker
Something that always makes me giggle is the fact is the opening line of show of Strength, which is. Realistically, it's hard to dig it all too happily. I remember the first time I heard that. All I could think was who starts an album with the word? Who opens an album with the word realistically sung in that kind of yearning aggressive. That kind of yearning, howling, McCulloch tone? And then this. The entire song is like that. Sort of jagged and jagged and peculiar in that. Again, the word I keep coming back to is angsty, which I think is true, but the lyrics aren't. I think that does a disservice to the lyrics because the lyrics aren't simple and they also aren't pretentious, they aren't frustrating they don't seem silly. They're just peculiar. Peculiar. They're just sort of abstract. And I think it's more about the imagery that they evoke in your mind than the things they connote to you. Which I don't know if that's what McCulloch was ever really going for when he wrote strange words. Like. Words like, you can never set it down. Guts and passion. Those things you can't even set down. But that's how they work for me. And what I think is always helped make the Bunnyman successful in my mind.
- [68:13]
Unknown Speaker
Hard to deal with properly, but I.
- [68:18]
Scott Bertram
Can see not always.
- [68:22]
Unknown Speaker
There's no to me a funny thing. There's always a funny thing.
- [68:30]
Guy Denton
But.
- [68:31]
Unknown Speaker
No.
- [69:06]
Guy Denton
But I couldn't agree with you more about the elusiveness of their lyrics. And I know it for a fact, because there are times in my life where I've listened to Bunnyman tracks playing at different times in different places. And like the phrase light on the water, which is something I'll never forget. The last lines of A promise. Light on the water will sail on forever. Right? I've been, you know, watching the sunset over Lake Mendota, thinking that, or Lake Michigan, for that matter. And of course, that's why that line in is so resonant with the album cover. And I guess before I toss it to Scott, I'll just make a note here about A Promise, which is the only single from the album. Basically the only thing on this album that is remotely releasable as a single and in itself is almost monotonous in its cyclical repetition of that chord sequence throughout the song, you know, as Ian just emotes. You said nothing would change. What is he singing about a promise? Talk about vague lyrics. What's the promise? No one knows. It's very unclear. But then all of a sudden, the song, in some emotional way, is entirely clarified when that one lone organ chord just somehow comes in near the end of the song and adds an extra chord change underneath that recontextualizes the chord sequence, the chord progression of the chorus. And there's a promise. He wails a promise. And in the background there's Light on the Water, Will Sail On Forever. And he's singing it around with himself. It's one of the most beautiful moments in post punk history. It's up there, I think, with like, Leave Me Alone by New Order or, you know, maybe, you know, All Cats Are Gray by the Cure or something like that, where it's just absolutely inexplicable on a rational level. But you are so engaged by the sound of it that it's one of those magical moments for me from my childhood that I've always, always returned.
- [71:36]
Scott Bertram
R.A.
- [72:07]
Guy Denton
Now, Scott, any thoughts on this very Difficult Otherwise to Love album?
- [72:11]
Jeff Blair
On that song itself, that's one where I love listening to the guitars interact later on in that song, where you have these very insistent sort of staccato riffs versus the soaring work that then Sargent is laying over it. This is where I hear some. You mentioned you two going to come up here. And again, this is where I hear some of those comparisons. Some of that guitar work sounds very edge, like as he would become very well known for the way he played. And some of those vocals become sort of big in a Bono sense. But it's a fantastic song and the way that Sargent has those sort of spiraling, jangling guitar moves throughout, it's great. How little I knew of Echo and the Bunnyman. Quick story about the COVID of this, which Jeff mentioned has been his Twitter wallpaper, whatever it is, for years and years. For years and years I thought he was a big Wilco fan and he is, but I didn't know this was the COVID from Heaven up here. And there is a fairly prominent Wilco photo shoot that happened around Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. And it's the COVID of I Am Trying to Break youk Heart, the movie by Sam Jones. The COVID of Greg Kot's book about Wilco learning how to die is from that photo shoot. And it's very similar. It's four guys. Because this is after Jay Bennett was. Was kicked out. So was Tweedy and Cocci and Stewart and Bach, Leroy Bach. And they're on the shores of Lake Michigan. And it's the same sort of gloomy, but also, you know, use of color. And I thought, well, that's just a different picture from this Wilco photo shoot.
- [73:50]
Guy Denton
Little outtake from the session, right?
- [73:52]
Guest Speaker
Yeah, outtake.
- [73:53]
Jeff Blair
Little did I know it had nothing to do with it whatsoever. It was the E and the Bunnyman tribute Jeff was paying.
- [73:58]
Guy Denton
It goes back to your miraculous, complete avoidance of this band all throughout your life.
- [74:03]
Jeff Blair
Yeah. I don't know if it's because you set me up. I didn't find this album to be as difficult as you claimed to appreciate, to enjoy, to get into. I think there's a lot of places where, I mean, look, the disease is tough and you know, what's going on here. It's kind of a twist point in the album for me.
- [74:27]
Guy Denton
I like that song.
- [74:28]
Jeff Blair
Right. I'm not saying I don't like it.
- [74:29]
Guy Denton
I knew you're gonna hate it, but I like it. It's such a. It's such a dirge. I thought to myself, there's no way Scott can ever like this crap, but I like it.
- [74:37]
Jeff Blair
But, you know, you already mentioned over the Wall, which is a great song. You said there's only one song. Only a Promise, perhaps could be considered to be a single. I think it was a pleasure. Would have been a very interesting single off this album. Sort of has more. More dancy, funky moves. It is certainly, again, centered in the rhyth, the bass. And I love that part. It's like 225 in. Where for a couple of measures, they just break into this Motown beat. You know, tambourine, this Motown beat. While Sergeant's sort of squiggly, funky guitar line is. Is. Follows it up. It's a great section. That's a. That's an upbeat sort of. I want to say danceable so much, but. But it. It does have sort of funky rhythms. I think that would have been a. An interesting single from the album and certainly is one that didn't take me very long to appreciate.
- [75:30]
Scott Bertram
Now, I know you like that, too.
- [76:19]
Jeff Blair
I like all my colors. It took me again, probably two, if not the third time, to get my arms around it. It went from being very mystifying to being really beautiful. That Marshall drum beat, this slow burn to the whole thing. And that sort of one of those.
- [76:38]
Guy Denton
Like, the Scottish pipes in the background, Irish pipes. I wouldn't know what the instrument is, but it sounds very, kind of like funeral march, like. Yeah.
- [76:45]
Jeff Blair
Yes. And. And that nonsense refrain of Zimbo. Zimbo. I am curious as to whether or not that is. I don't want to say a reference, but you can't hear that. Not think of Talking Heads. And I Zimbra from Fear of Music, which was just two years prior to this. And I. I guess that's where I want to bring in my comparison, which is, you know, the Talking Heads can be a difficult band to throw your arms around. But with Echo and the Bunnyman and Talking Heads, I hear both of them, you know, playing with rhythms and playing. I mentioned sort of that Marshall drum beat or the tribal drum beat or the way the bass is so prominent. I hear both of these bands sort of, especially on Heaven up here, playing with rhythms in very much the same way. And that is interesting to me. Dark Things features tremendous work on the drums. And again, in no Dark Things, the guitar is almost used as a weapon. I Mean, there are portions in here where it's like a blade cutting through everything else you're hearing, like. Like steel hitting steel. It's. It's. Is it discordant? Yeah, a little bit. Right. But it's so.
- [78:57]
Guy Denton
It's so musically discordant. It's well timed. Those slashes belong there. They are placed.
- [79:03]
Jeff Blair
Absolutely. Yes. Yes. And so I enjoy that. And again, that's. That's a track where. Mentioned those Doors references earlier. That's a track where I hear, you know, the Morrison Type delivery of McCulloch coming. Coming through. I like, have it up here. I did not find it as hard to appreciate or as hard to get into as you perhaps had. Had promised me it would be. But that's a fine thing. It's a fine thing.
- [79:29]
Scott Bertram
Wall.
- [79:31]
Unknown Speaker
You walked over in the middle of the wall. The pictures are still hanging from the corner of my. You stick ended in the middle of the floor.
- [79:52]
Scott Bertram
I fell over.
- [80:18]
Guy Denton
I'm so pleasantly surprised. Guy. Guy, do you have any other thoughts?
- [80:23]
Guest Speaker
I agree with Scott, but I don't think the album is difficult. I think something like you, the first Public Image Limited album or Flowers of Romance by Public Image. Image.
- [80:34]
Guy Denton
Yeah. Those are both super metal boxes. Pretty. I don't know why you skipped that one. That's a tough album too, man.
- [80:39]
Jeff Blair
That's.
- [80:39]
Guest Speaker
At least you could dance to some of his songs on Metal Box and sort of in kind of a weird. Kind of a weird angular way. But yes.
- [80:47]
Guy Denton
I actually joke sometimes with Scott about one day we'll do pil and he'll just hate every second of it. Every single second second of it.
- [80:53]
Guest Speaker
Oh, he'll love theme. I don't know what you're talking about.
- [80:57]
Guy Denton
Or the fodder stomp. That's going to be his favorite track. Yeah. Oh, God.
- [81:01]
Guest Speaker
Musical equivalent of being clubbed for 10.
- [81:03]
Guy Denton
Minutes straight to a horrible disco be. But anyways, back to Echo.
- [81:08]
Guest Speaker
Yes. This. This album, I don't think is. Is difficult or even necessarily challenging. I think it's just bleak and a bit abrasive, a bit sharp edged. I remember the first time I heard a Promise. I agree with you Promise, Jeff. I ab. I adore that song. It's one of. I think, see it as one of the definitive Bunny Men tracks too. The first time I heard it, I really didn't like it just because I wasn't really prepared for it and it sounded so sort of unpleasant coming off of Crocodiles. It sounded so sort of unpleasant and off putting to me with that maniacal Ian's almost maniacal vocal and will playing it isn't a discordant guitar line, but it's a. It's. It's not a very comfortable guitar line.
- [82:05]
Guy Denton
No, it's like. It's like very nervously circling its tail forever like a very agitated dog. And that's the thing about it just keeps bobbing around and bobbing around and bobbing around. And that's all it does.
- [82:17]
Guest Speaker
Yes. There's no resolution to it. And that in music will always drive you mad if you don't know. But then as I started to listen to it more and more, I realized just how powerful, how genuinely powerful without feeling pompous that chorus really is. The chorus just grabs you by the throat and absorbs you completely. And I love that point you made, Jeff, about how this is a perfect example of what Ian. How Ian could be very evocative and affecting with very vague lyrics. Because the lyrics on this, I always intuitive, intuitively took it as a love song. And there was never any question in my mind for years listening to it that it was about love. But when you actually step back and look at the lyrics, there's absolutely nothing in them that means that you should inherently take it as a love song. Doesn't have to be. Could be a song about an infinite number of things. Could be. Could be a song about business, right? Could be a song about friendship, a song about family, a song about.
- [83:21]
Guy Denton
That's what I took it to be. I thought it was. I thought it was a song about broken trust, that it didn't have anything to do with love. That was the way I took it when I heard it. So it just proves your point.
- [83:29]
Guest Speaker
And that works so much better than writing a conventional song about heartbreak, regardless of what the inspiration for it may have been.
- [83:40]
Unknown Speaker
It's exactly the same.
- [83:45]
Scott Bertram
You said toast the same.
- [83:48]
Unknown Speaker
But I'll make it change into something the same.
- [83:56]
Scott Bertram
I promise.
- [84:31]
Guest Speaker
One other point I would make and I. This always sticks in my head, so I can't not make it. Is the line, it must be hell down there, but it's heaven up here. Gets stuck in my head all the time and is one of my favorite favorite lyrics ever put on the record. I remember the first time I heard that. It's. It hasn't left my head since the first time I played it probably 10 years ago.
- [84:53]
Guy Denton
We, you know, we didn't even mention that title track, which is just, again, just a fireball. I mean, the thing is just nothing but spiky flame, hot energy. And in the middle of some of these longer and more like esoteric avant garde tracks. That one just shows them with all of their blades out. Everything is a sharp angle on Heaven up here. I guess the one last thing I want to say about this album because obviously guys, you know, know how much I love it is it's also really well sequenced. I mean I think one of the things that I've really come to appreciate it over time is how everything flows. It starts with a show of strength which is frankly does what it says on the 10. It's a show of strength. Then it goes to with a hip total move much quicker, much more aggressive mood change. Then it goes into the big long over the wall. But I always love the way that album ends with All I Want which is a song that fades in and fades out almost as if it's it. It's taking place on a field recording where like you know, the. The recorder has just sor. Driven into view of this band that has been playing for four hours. This relentless Pete the Freddis drip drum beat. And it is, you know, Ian of course singing All I Want and the vibes again in the background setting the mood. It's this long drifty farewell that you know, maybe doesn't have form but then again, you know, 40 by U2 doesn't have a lot of form. I mean it's still a fantastic way to end an album. This is one of their most effective album enders and it's just a perfect capstone too. As I said, it's the greatest postponed record of all.
- [86:36]
Unknown Speaker
I had asleep in the chair I laid my head on a curse there.
- [87:01]
Scott Bertram
All I love All I love.
- [87:08]
Guest Speaker
All.
- [87:08]
Scott Bertram
I want is all I want.
- [87:15]
Unknown Speaker
All.
- [87:15]
Scott Bertram
I love do all I want.
- [87:33]
Guy Denton
And I guess at that point we have to move on to the a lost year more or less an echo on the Bunnyman's career which is 1982. They took more a couple of months off but. And then they released a non album single at the time. It ended up going on to their next record because they had a lot of difficulty recording it before we get to the next record itself. And of course this song is part of it. I was wondering if we had any specific thoughts on the Back of Love and also maybe I'm throwing this one out in the hopes that Guy might have some thoughts about those B sides as well. Because this is just another aspect of Echo and the Ponyman as a band that I've always been fascinated with is how great they are as a beast size act.
- [88:16]
Guest Speaker
I love the Back of Love. This has always actually Been one of my favorite songs in the catalog. I remember the first time I heard it. Much like with. I think what I said about all that jazz was listening to the. Listening to it the first time was like being kicked in the head and finding a strange pleasure in it. And I would say exactly the same thing about this. Just again, these odd but naturally sort of. Sort of naturally poetic. These. Those lyrics that are just one rung above high school English class and feel so satisfying and sort of say so much. I'm on the chopping block. Chopping off my. Chopping off my. My desperate thoughts. Like I'm forgetting what the line is. I probably mang angled the line, but I always. There's another line in there.
- [89:12]
Guy Denton
Self doubt and selfism were the first things I ever bought and I. And boy, I can't believe I pulled that one out of my head. I'm terrible with lyrics myself, Guy.
- [89:20]
Guest Speaker
There's one that I love nowadays that I didn't really appreciate when I was younger. We can't tell our left from right, but we know we love extremes. It certainly is relevant to 2020, 24. Probably more so than it was to 1983.
- [89:52]
Scott Bertram
When you say that's love, you mean the B of love. And you say that's love. Love. Breaking the back.
- [90:44]
Guy Denton
And you know. And then of course, the song is about kissing goodbye to the giving of the back of love, which is like giving him the back of your hand. And the thing about that song, by the way, again, just to say a word about Peter Freitas, the guys drumming, it just doesn't. It's this relaxing, relentlessly galloping, thundering when it cuts into those choruses. And he'll do this trick a couple times on the next album, by the way. But the absolute power behind it is just remarkable. I remember thinking it at the time, thinking like, these guys are a cut above. Instrumentally. This is. As I said, as I said right at the front. This is the music I wanted to hear in my brain when I was thinking about post punk, which is that they have this attention to dynamics. They really amp it up and they bring it down. They know how to arrange a song. You get that in the back of love. But here's what I don't know. Scott, do you have any thoughts on this one before? I just talk for at least a moment about why I think Echo is one of the more underrated B side bands of its era.
- [91:37]
Jeff Blair
Yes, I will say very quickly, I agree with Guy. I think this is one of the best. Their best songs I really enjoy it. And the point you're just making now about the drumming, it's relentless. It's fantastic. It's very tight bass work as well. I love the shift from sort of the higher end, like Trebley verses and then you have this droney, lower, almost synth powered chorus. I think it's among the best of their songs as a single. And it's included in the next album too. But it's not Quite a wasted 1982 when you do have this song to look back on.
- [92:15]
Guy Denton
Hey, you know, the other thing about the Back of Love is you have to notice maybe carefully, they are really effortlessly inserting new elements into the sound. Sometimes you don't even know. This is the first song to my knowledge, that includes strings things. They're right there at the end where it goes and it just. It works. It all works to some sort of furious climax. Strings are going to be coming back in a major way on. On porcupine. But they also work it into these B sides which showcase at this point they're getting a little weirder, a little more exploratory on, you know, the stuff that they're. They're not putting on the records. But this stuff is by no means worth ignoring. Like, I think there's a B side from the Crocodiles era called Simple Stuff. It's the B side of Rescue. It's better than Rescue in my opinion, you know, because you guys know I don't rate that song so highly. I love Simple Stuff. Just more of a real simple, early nasty, grungy song.
- [93:18]
Unknown Speaker
Three words again.
- [93:22]
Scott Bertram
Time has come by the double by the way My, we don't understand everything.
- [93:50]
Guy Denton
The B side of A Promise is this insane droney jam called Broke My Neck, which I think I described as. Scott as everything I love about this group and everything you will not.
- [93:59]
Jeff Blair
It's true. This, you were correct. This, this, you were right about.
- [94:03]
Guy Denton
Yeah, this is long morose New Order like. Or more like even Joy Division like Drone that goes on for eight minutes and just won't end. Okay, maybe those last two didn't need to be there, but I am so here for this experimental side of the band.
- [94:19]
Scott Bertram
Satan.
- [95:01]
Guy Denton
If you find it on the B sides of this one, which are Fuel and the Subject, you know, the One is A Subject is much more kind of a guitar, you know, forward, kind of relentless stomp. Fuel is as much more moody, kind of sort of base and low register guitar driven thing. These are them if they're more a tonal. But this is the again, to me, post punk this is. These are the weird places I want post punk to explore and. And, you know, that's why you got to get the box set, man, because that's where you find these songs.
- [95:44]
Unknown Speaker
Way up we go, I'm the way and up we go.
- [96:13]
Guy Denton
I guess that brings us to Porcupine. They started recording this album and it just didn't work out. They came up with a bunch of alternate tracks. I think they now circulate on these various reissues. But you can hear them and listen to them and sort of immediately understand why they felt the need to go back to the drawing board. They had the elements there. They kind of knew what it was they wanted to do, but it was all rather chaotic and it just did not gel. So they finally, after a year of dithering about in 1983, release Porcupine. It's another one that has just this beautiful cover that. That I think Guy mentioned right back at the start, where they're, like, on this frozen waterfall somewhere in, like, Norway or Sweden or something like that. Like, way the hell out where nobody ought to be. And, you know. And they actually did a whole, like, film for this. If I recall. Echo and the Bunnyman had a whole, like, visual side to them that nobody talks about these days because it's not really easy to access. But they were big on that as well. And the COVID is glorious. But I think porcupine, to me, of their early, early run of this classic Ear Eyes is the one where it dips just a bit. And I say that, and it's like, the weakest criticism possible because I can still name five songs in this record that utterly fascinate me. But I'd say this one is just a touchdown from Heaven up here, and certainly not as good as what's going to come beyond it. But it is still a remarkable document on its own. And it is every bit as icy cold as that cover photograph.
- [97:43]
Unknown Speaker
Well.
- [97:46]
Scott Bertram
I will be there, you will be there.
- [98:38]
Guest Speaker
I agree. I definitely. But agree. But it's a step down from the first two albums, I'm not sure. And I've never really been able to resolve in my mind whether I like it more or less than Ocean Rain. I think to me they're about equal. Even though Ocean Rain and we spoke about Coherence with Heaven Up Here, I think Ocean Rain is a more coherent and a more fully formed album overall. There are definitely a couple of songs on here, but I don't like, like very much and that I don't really find satisfying. But the strong tracks are so good and so interesting and so layered and represent such growth and such. Such a desire to keep developing and to keep adventuring onward and not simply. And not to be stuck, not to be confined within a particular space that they explored on the first two albums. That the album that porcupine still has a lot to. I mean, should we start with a Cutter, Chef? Just because it's. It's inescapable.
- [99:42]
Guy Denton
You've got to. And by the way, just to cue it up. That's such a good point that hadn't even really occurred to me, is that one thing they need to be given credit for is that on these records, every single one of them, they are not treading water. They are always moving forward. This is certainly not the same as having up here. And even if I don't like it as much, that certainly doesn't mean that they aren't advancing. Let's start with the Cutter, which opens with that swirly El Shankar violin, the electric violin, which is, I think, even people who don't know Echo and the Bunnyman. That will trigger, like, a sense memory. I wonder if it did for Scott or if it was completely alien to him. Because even for me, the first time I heard that, I thought to myself, oh, I've heard that. And it is just one of the most striking singles of its era. And the. The lyric. I always. I always hear the lyric differently. I always says, I say, conquering myself again until I see another hurdle approaching Say you can say you will not drop in the ocean Instead of conquering myself until. But the way it opens up right at that moment into that was it horns, synthesizers. I don't even know what goes on in the Cutter. But the middle section of that song is just for me. I can remember where I was as a child. An utterly revelatory moment.
- [101:07]
Unknown Speaker
I see another hurdle approaching say we can say we will not Just another drop in the ocean Am I the happy loss? Will I still recoil when the skin is lost? Am I that will be cross? Will I still be soiled when the dirt is on.
- [101:58]
Scott Bertram
Come.
- [102:00]
Guest Speaker
One of those songs that I must have heard, and I'm sure this is true for you as well, Jeff. More definitely more so than me. But I must have heard well over a hundred times. And yet every time I listen to it, it sounds completely fresh and it hooks me in exactly the same way. And not only that, but I always feel myself being drawn back to it. Like I want to keep playing it. It doesn't feel played out to me, like. Like the. Like major Singles from other bands who I love do where I just wouldn't want to revisit them. The Cure is a great example where there are certain Cure songs.
- [102:35]
Guy Denton
I never tire of it the way I tire. Like, you know, you two singing Sunday, Bloody Sunday or New Year's Day. Like, I've heard it too many times. I'll never hear this song enough. Never hear it enough.
- [102:45]
Guest Speaker
I mean, we've talked about New Order. I absolutely love New Order at this point. I never need to hear Blue Monday again in the course of my life. And I definitely never need to hear a horrendous live performance of it, like I've heard a couple of times. But this, I think it's so effective because it's so idiosyncratic. Again, what kind of band would orient a song around not just that Eastern instrumentation, but the lyric couldn't cut the mustard Spare us for cut I. I would. I do.
- [103:22]
Guy Denton
Are people getting laid off at work? That's what I always it to me. Like, you know, you would avoid layoffs or something like that.
- [103:48]
Unknown Speaker
Once in the bottom draw Waiting for things to give Spare us the cutter Spare us the cutter Cutting cut by mustard Conquering myself Until I see another herd of approaching say we can say we will not just another drop in.
- [104:22]
Scott Bertram
The ocean.
- [104:30]
Guest Speaker
One thing I do want to quickly mention that I think is a fun little detail is that I. This may be wrong, but I'm sure it is right. The inspiration for the lyric was a line in the Clockwork Orange where Alex and his gang beat up the truck and the Tramp. But the Tramp gets their attention by saying, can you spare some cut of me, brothers? And I love catching references to A Clockwork Orange in post punk and in the British culture and music of this time. And the most obvious one is that Crocodiles and these early albums were released on Corova Records, which is named for the.
- [105:11]
Guy Denton
For Corova Milk Bar. Okay? See, I never put two in two together. You know what I know of that reference? I have never seen A Clockwork Orange. And so I have missed this in my entire life. And you've taught me something. This is wonderful.
- [105:24]
Guest Speaker
There is. It would be a. If you watch it, it will be a revelation, Jeff, because there are so many references to that scattered throughout. Scattered throughout British music of this period. Because all of the. Every. Every member of all of those bands probably snuck into the theater to see it when they were 14. And around the same time that Bowie was doing Ziggy Stardust and all that kind of thing was going on oh.
- [105:50]
Guy Denton
Man, I've missed a key urtext my entire life. I need to go back and do my research.
- [105:54]
Guest Speaker
I only. I only know this point because, again, my dad grew up with all of this and the Clockwork Orange has always been his favorite movie. And I remember him telling me about the effect it had on him. And you can see it everywhere. New Order had a song called Ultraviolence on. On Power, Corruption and Lies.
- [106:09]
Guy Denton
I get all those references, but I never. I should. This freaking film.
- [106:15]
Guest Speaker
It's. But. But no, the. The Cuth itself is just magnificent. And there's no. We. We can. I hope we get to talk about the band's live performances and seeing the band live at some point. But whatever. Criticism can sometimes be level at the band in its live form. There is nothing more satisfying than being. Being in an. Being in a. An auditorium or a club full of people all singing along to the bridge and chorus of this song at the top of their lungs. And that's. There's no better proof than that that they really captured something magical with that.
- [107:07]
Scott Bertram
Lo am I the happy lo Will I still recall when the skin is lost Am I the world it grow Will I still be so when the dirt is over Sa.
- [107:57]
Jeff Blair
I would agree with both of you in different notes, different ways, but I think porcupine is my. My least favorite of this initial, what, five album run or so. And I. I sort of had the least to. To say about it, especially because you guys have. Have talked at length about the Cutter, which is a great song, and also Back of Love, which is on here, but we spent time with it as the. The standalone single. The one thing that I'll pull through for sure is this idea that I think Jeff mentioned, which is they're not standing still. They're never standing still. Even though there are parts here that I don't love. And there are some, again, I don't think it's quite as memorable, perhaps as some other albums. There are elements. There are pieces on My White Devil. That spiky xylophone that pops through a song like clay evokes a certain image that I'm not sure they had reached previously. It's like a soundscape. You could hear it maybe soundtracking a film. There's a couple songs in here that sort of have that a little more of a vast scope to it, I guess. I'd say my favorite song that hasn't been mentioned yet is definitely is Ripeness. That's one on the second half of this album. The second half, I think, is where it really struggles. There's Higher Hell and Gods Will Be Gods. I think both are fairly weak, at least compared to what they were capable of previously. But Ripeness is really a fun song. Just listen to the baseline and listen to the guitar and then listen to Shankar play. And the drums is what keeps it all in line. That sort of holds it all together. I love the hand claps and the stomping beat on the chorus. And you have this dichotomy in places with this very, very driving beat. And then the very detailed and precise playing. I really love Ripeness. That's certainly my favorite song that we haven't talked about yet on. On. On Porcupine. An album that, while still is good, I just won't remember it as vividly as I do the other albums in this run.
- [110:25]
Scott Bertram
Me, I will be recovering. I lost something in a big room.
- [110:59]
Unknown Speaker
Take the Savior.
- [111:08]
Guy Denton
I mean, I think the problem with it is that it doesn't have the same sort of virtues of formatting that the other two albums have. I mean, Crocodiles, of course, is just, you know, sort of compact, post punk energy. Heaven Up Here is almost sort of like a bold statement of purpose. This one doesn't quite know what it wants to be. I think you get that most clearly on a song like In Bluer Skies, which is the ending track on the album. And then, you know, it's the first time I ever really have disappointed me. Higher Hell, I don't like that much either. Clay never did too much for me. But the things I do appreciate about it are the places where they try it again, add extra instruments to their ensemble. There's this moment on God's Will Be Good Gods. You said you didn't like that one. That one appeals to me. It's a weird one. Isn't there a vibes break somewhere in the middle of that? And there. There are like these wonderful sort of like, I don't know, very odd, very sort of intentionally aggressive chords and, you know, you know, you know, chord dissonances that they put together on those songs that, again, are just, you know, to be quintessential post punishment.
- [112:15]
Unknown Speaker
When there's so much at stake that it's a different world Than your hands.
- [112:23]
Scott Bertram
Don'T see.
- [112:31]
Unknown Speaker
At the end of the.
- [112:32]
Scott Bertram
Road at the front of the bar.
- [112:37]
Unknown Speaker
We were resting on arms and making our arms. Why do you defend the part you have to take with your fingers on the world Your hands don't shake.
- [113:10]
Scott Bertram
I.
- [113:10]
Unknown Speaker
Was half willing.
- [113:16]
Guy Denton
And I'm surprised you didn't mention Heads Will Roll, which, you know, you say side two here is more difficult. I'm going to grant you that's the case. But I love Heads Will Roll because it. First of all, it opens with that incredibly fresh little acoustic guitar, little line, and then. Then it busts out during its solo section into what I guess sounds at first like an orchestral kind of. You. You hear real strings underneath. And then Al Shankar comes in and plays this wild electric violin solo as it goes tumbling back into a chorus where Ian is. I don't know. He's. He's on some sort of God trip. I don't want to know what it is. Heads are apparently gonna roll, but it is, again, just a musically utterly exc. Exciting moment in a way that the band capably delivers on songs like, you know, was only capable of delivering with, like, the Cutter, the Back of Love. The kind of energy they had here on this record, they're never going to have again.
- [115:19]
Guest Speaker
You both hit on essentially all the main points for. I would have raised. I agree with you both. I agree with you, Scott, but I think the second side falters a bit and can be a bit of a struggle. And I agree with you, Jeff, that Heads Were Roll is one of my favorites too. I think that's a magnificent song. And we've. We've mentioned and sort of gestured toward it. One of the best things about the original five albums, but especially the first four, is the production and the way these songs are mixed and the way these albums sound so spacious but also so thick and th. And so dynamic too. It really speaks to how important it is that to not compress. Not compress albums and flatten them out. And on Heads Will Roll, I. I love the intersection of Will's guitar, but almost. It's true of A Back of Love and Mata as well. It almost doesn't sound like a guitar. It sounds like a special effect was created for a movie set soundtrack, almost. And the. The strings equally. They sound like they belong in a dramatic. They sound like they belong on the score of a Spanish drama or some kind of.
- [116:27]
Guy Denton
They do. They have that sweeping romantic feel to them, don't they? Yes.
- [116:30]
Guest Speaker
And. But then you couple that with, again, the three. This and Pattinson pummeling their instruments, playing this gallop, and McCulloch howling out these lyrics as though he's trying to reconcile something and find something within him, within himself that's driving him mad, but it's just out of his grasp. I. I'd group my favorites. My favorites I would group together. I'd say the Back of Love Heads Will Roll and Clay are my favorites on the album and the ones that resonate most with me and they all share those, those same compelling elements.
- [117:06]
Guy Denton
You know what the interesting thing about this, you know, I guess, you know, just to move on or just to wrap, you know, wrap porcupine up is that even though I consider this album to be a dip in between some pretty tall stools, it's clear that even though that they were struggling, they had not yet lost the plot in any way. Like they, they knew where they were going, they were going somewhere interesting. It was just a question of where they were going to end up. And so after that like extended period of indirection in 1982, then a bunch of wonderful things just start happening all of a sudden. And the first of these. Scott, I am praying you got around to listening to the next single. They released this non album song called Never Stop which is Ekko and the Bunnyman as taking new orders gig from them and saying we can do it better than you. We are a better dance band than you. Because this thing is one of the hottest like post punk. What do you call post punk dance songs? Who, who else is competing in this genre? It's new order in them. This thing is a miracle. It's like a forgotten little lost one, one off miracle. I love the song and I don't know if you got to hear it.
- [118:11]
Jeff Blair
I did. Of course I did. You asked me to.
- [118:14]
Guy Denton
It's my favorite, by the way. It's my favorite Ian McCullough lyric of all time. Good God, he said. Is that the only thing you talk about? What is it? Sk up stealing up the money and share it out and eating cake straight through the mouth. I. I don't know what any of that means, but I still, Since I was 18, 19 years old, I still listen to every word with pleasure.
- [118:35]
Jeff Blair
It's a fun song and it's like nothing else in their catalog. It. It is things that were happening around the time, but it's like nothing else really in the Echo and the Bunnyman catalog. It makes sense given the rhythmic nature of songs that are happening around them. I love those little dance effects that really only show up on a non album single like this. It's also a very odd song considering what the next move would be. But I don't know if they wanted to get something out of their system. They had a couple great ideas hanging around they wanted to put together for, for. For a one off. But Never Stop. Yes, well worth a listen. Very fun song.
- [119:16]
Guy Denton
Maybe they said like hey, you Know, Cure just put out love Cats. Why can't we do something with piano on it? You know? And I. You know, that's actually a pretty. That's a pretty great single by the way. But this is better. This thing just. I just love the energy of it, you know. Measure by measure, drop by drop. Do you have any thoughts on it, Guy?
- [119:33]
Guest Speaker
No. I love this song too. And I would echo everything you both just said, especially your point, Scott, that I. It will never Stop compared to Ocean Rain doesn't exactly sound like the most. Doesn't exactly seem like the most natural evolution in sound.
- [119:51]
Guy Denton
But dude, compare Never Stop to monkeys or crocodiles for that matter. They're moving along at a fast clip wherever they're going.
- [120:00]
Guest Speaker
But I agree with you. No, it's that perfect combination of a big bomb, bombastic hooky pop chorus. That's when you once. Once it's in your head, it's not singing. It's irresistible. You can't not sing along to it whenever you hear it.
- [120:27]
Unknown Speaker
Right from bad and wrong from good to deny that you ever tempted by the light that there's an answer in.
- [120:37]
Scott Bertram
The sky Measure by measure, drop by drop A powerful power taking st. Of all the treasures still unlock the love you mine must never be.
- [121:23]
Guest Speaker
And I'm surprised that it didn't. It did reasonably well on the charts. I'm surprised it wasn't a bigger hit and isn't talked about more by critics than in the popular conversation around the Bunnymen. But no, I agree completely. This is one of the. This is one of my favorites too. Although I have to say, and you may find this blasphemous, Scott, but as familiar as I am with the full length version, and as. As good as the full length version obviously is, I wouldn' even really argue that the full length version isn't the definitive version of the song. I'm a little bit tired of it. And nowadays when I listen to it, I take the edit.
- [122:03]
Guy Denton
That's fair.
- [122:03]
Guest Speaker
I take the edit. Yeah, I want to just cut the intro and get right to the chorus and right to the meat of the song. But I think it's only because I've heard the full length version so many times that at this point, whenever I need to scratch the itch, I just want the core of it, you know.
- [122:20]
Guy Denton
You talk about taking interesting left turns sonically. So what were Echo and A Bunnyman doing at this exact time that Never Stop was going into the charts? Well, they recorded an acoustic session, like an Unplugged, basically session with the BBC I think it's actually available as a set of bonus tracks on the next album. They, they did kind of a free wheeling cover of all you need is love. That's fun, but a little bit half assed. And they played some of their.
- [122:46]
Jeff Blair
So was the original.
- [122:48]
Guy Denton
Yeah, right. Well to be fair. Exactly. I don't think the Beatles at least would knew they were going out live across the world. They put a little more effort than Echo, I'd say. But you know, they, they, they also did some really nice, lovely acoustic versions of earlier songs like Stars are Stars and Villiers Terrace. It's worth hearing these things. But then they debuted a new song and they played that acoustically as well and that signaled where this band was going next.
- [123:29]
Unknown Speaker
Under blue moon I saw you so soon you'll take me up in your arms Too late to beg you cancel it Though I know it must be killing time Unwillingly mine Up against your whale through the thick and thin.
- [124:00]
Scott Bertram
He.
- [124:00]
Unknown Speaker
Will wait until you give yourself to him.
- [124:09]
Guy Denton
And the name of that song would be the first single from 1984's Ocean Rain, which I think a lot of people, if you have any understanding, if you sort of semi knowledge of Echo and the Bunnyman, that might be the one of theirs that, you know, it's the of thought of it as their critical peak. We obviously are going to have some disagreements about this, but the lead single from that song was a song called the Killing Moon. I think we're all going to have a lot to say about this song and I think maybe it actually makes sense to tackle it here individually as a single. For the only reason that I have controversial opinions about the version of this song, it's maybe echoing the Bunnyman's most most famous song. I don't think anybody has ever heard the right version except weirdo super fans. So before I get to that, anybody have any thoughts on this song? This song, which I have so many, so many passionate memories about.
- [125:10]
Guest Speaker
McCulloch would certainly tell you that Ocean Rain is the greatest album ever made and Killing Moon is the greatest pop song ever made.
- [125:18]
Guy Denton
Well, I tell you a lot of things, he will got quite the ego on him.
- [125:22]
Guest Speaker
I wouldn't go quite that far about the album. We'll come to the album. However, I think there is a perfectly fair case to be made that this is one of the most perfect pop songs ever constructed. And I really wonder where it came from and what the inspiration for it was. But every time I listen to it, it's complete magic. I think he said, you'll know this Jeff, correct me if I'm wrong. Didn't he say that the lyric. Didn't he say that the chorus just came to him in a dream? He just woke up with it one day.
- [125:52]
Guy Denton
That's my. That's my memory of it. And by the way, maybe, of course, because it's Ian McCulloch, maybe he was self consciously trying to make himself sound like Paul McCartney doing yesterday. That's also something that he could have done. But I know I've heard that story. But yeah, and it is possible. You can see it though, actually waking up in a fate up against the will. That's the kind of thing you might wake up with your. In your head.
- [126:14]
Guest Speaker
And it. Again, there's just enough. The lyrics are just sort of airy and vague enough to say so much and to. To be taken in so many different ways. It's obviously a powerful. It's seductive. You could read so much into it about love and desire and relationships and so on, but it feels like a much. It feels like a much more sweeping song about it. It feels grander. It feels more dramatic and more sprawling and the kind of themes that McCulloch is gesturing toward. It's almost religious in a way, and especially the kind of magical sound to it. The way the strings blend into the guitar and the atmosphere they conjure up. Again, it's so thick and so dense, but it's so captivating and so accessible at the same time in a way that the earlier material. Material often couldn't be. But it's just listening to it. If you're in the right mood again, especially in the middle of the night, maybe if you can't get to sleep, is just complete bliss and only music can give you that kind of feeling. And this is one of the best examples of that.
- [128:13]
Unknown Speaker
Under blue moon I saw you so soon you'll take me up in your arms Too late to beg you or cancel it Though I know it must be the killing time Unwillingly mine.
- [128:39]
Guy Denton
People often accused Ian McCulloch of the critics certainly in the day accused him of spouting, you know, cod mystical nonsense. Right. You know, spare us Cod. Swallow up. What does it mean? It's all vague, you know, portentous guff. This is song. This is a song that utterly transcends the. Those criticisms. I have this very impassioned. Again, when I encountered it, I was still somewhat emotionally turmoiled teenager. Right. So this song. And again, maybe because of the context that I next saw it in which I want to ask you about Guy. This song feels like Almost like a romantic, 19th century, impassioned romantic sort of midnight. You know, you swear an oath to fate. Something truly like apocalyptic. A life and death circumstance. Well, very kind of, you know, maybe, you know, has that sort of juvenile Romeo and Juliet kind of feel to it, but the power and the commitment of not only the vocal, but the string breaks all of a sudden. There's pizzicato strings that break into the chorus. There's Ian singing things about like, you know, who is it that Under a Blue Moon song? Is it, you know, the sweet goddess fate, who's going to make him embrace this cruel future that he must embrace? The killing moon that's come too soon doesn't have to mean anything. It can mean everything to you when you heard it in the right mood, the same way that guy pointed out. And the thing is, is that right after I got that box set, I immediately saw this song in a film that was so perfect for it, that used it so perfectly, that had been showing in my Johns Hopkins University student theater. And I was just like, my friends, they want to go see it. And it's like, yeah. I was like, whatever. Because it had flopped in the movie theaters, right? It was like after 911 or something like that. And she was like, you want to go check this out? I was like, fine. It was a film called Donnie Darko, and I've already asked Scott this, and Scott's never seen that film. Guy, have you ever seen a film?
- [130:46]
Guest Speaker
Yes, I have. So a couple of funny things on this, actually, that I think you and anyone listening who loves the movie will appreciate. Jeff. So I love the movie. It's one of. It's one of my favorites. But I think that's largely the case because I saw it at just the perfect point in my life. I was 15 or 16, I think, the first time I watched it. And so it really resonated with me. But what's interesting is the director's cut of the movie exists.
- [131:14]
Guy Denton
Oh, yes.
- [131:15]
Guest Speaker
Is. I imagine you will agree with me, Jeff, when I say it's markedly, in theory, to the original.
- [131:23]
Guy Denton
Never wanted the director's cut. For some reason, whoever the producers were, they got it right.
- [131:29]
Guest Speaker
They did. They absolutely did. So what's interesting is the Killing Moon plays in the opening sequence of Donnie Darko. And it's perfect. It establishes the atmosphere just perfectly. And there are many. I won't spoil anything, but there are many clever, subtle moments in which Valerie lyrics of the song correspond. Not don't just correspond to what's happening on screen, but also Serve as a. But also serve as a sort of portent of certain things that are going to happen in the movie.
- [132:02]
Guy Denton
How about the name of the band serving as a portent of certain things that are going to happen in this movie?
- [132:07]
Guest Speaker
That didn't even cross my mind, but absolutely. Yes. But what's a crime is that if you want. The Killing Moon does not play in the opening scene. Never Tear Us Apart by NXS plays instead, which. And the funny thing is, the first time I saw the movie, I saw the director's cut. And so I still fell in love with it and it still affected me in a very deep way. But later on, when I finally saw the theatrical version, I realized, oh, where has this been all my life? This is superior in so many ways. And besides, I have so, so glad.
- [132:44]
Guy Denton
That despite the misfortune of having encountered the director's cut first, you were able to go and appreciate that film as it was meant to be seen. Because that, that to me is. I'm so glad you brought that up because it is such an important difference. And again, you know, diving deep into the echo and the bunnyman nerd weeds here, the placement of the song so crucial to the film and the director's cut. He uses the all night version, which I'll point out, put that in your back pocket. He uses the long, unedited version during. During the party scene where all bubble. Whatever. I'm not going to explain it. It's complicated. It's. It's a complicated film, kids. You should go see it.
- [133:20]
Guest Speaker
And he doesn't. He doesn't use the chorus. And the party scene in the original version is bad.
- [133:27]
Guy Denton
In the original version, it. Without even getting into the film as he point, as Guy points out, it sets up the stakes instantly. This is a song about foreboding. This is a song about whatever it is, whatever nonsense Ian might be on about, it matters. It matters. And when you see Donnie biking down the mountain after waking up there and you know, no idea of how he got there, and he's just a confused kid that plays in the background as he rushes down the road. And it just makes you think something more important than the typical thing is going on in this film. I've mentioned Donnie Darko on this show a couple of times. And I remember the other reason I brought it up was when we talked about Tears for Fears. It's just brilliantly uses Head Over Hills in a different way, but it uses its music so well. Richard Kelly is one masterpiece. The man never made another good film, really. He made some interesting failures, but Donnie Darko is the film that I saw just I feel almost months after I got into Echo and the Bunnyman. So I heard the Killing Moon in all of its glory refracted right back at me in this film that also had an immense effect on me and which set me up to consider Ocean Rain. I guess I'm just going to be a square like the critics and say this is one of their greatest achievements. I love this record. I love everything about except the fact that it does not include the full length version of the Killing Moon. About which does anybody want to just let me crank out about this now or do you have any opinions either?
- [134:55]
Jeff Blair
Go ahead.
- [134:56]
Guest Speaker
I'm happy for you to take the reins on this, Jeff.
- [134:59]
Jeff Blair
Okay.
- [135:00]
Guy Denton
The only problem Killing Me was the greatest thing Echo and the Bunnyman have ever done in their career. In my opinion, that's single slot. And yet you don't really appreciate just how grand it is unless you've heard the all night version, which is this sort of ichthyos, the extended. It is literally the track as it was cut and fully envisioned, which is about nine minutes long, has a full introduction, has a lot of instrumental sections in the middle, but most importantly it has a vastly superior mix where the strings are much more present in ways that you. You never would realize. If all you know is the version from the album Ocean Rain or the greatest hits records hear it in this version, which unfortunately, and this is the sad version, you can't hear it on YouTube. Officially it's only available in like scratchy like 12 or 4512 inches where you can hear like vinyl hiss is the only way you can even hear it on YouTube right now. I'm not sure if it's available on Spotify. I hope it is, but that's the only way that song should ever be heard. And that's my two cents on this matter. And that's the last time I'll act like such a nerd about echoing the Bunnyman for this show.
- [137:11]
Jeff Blair
I don't believe that actually.
- [137:15]
Guest Speaker
You will.
- [137:16]
Jeff Blair
You will nerd out again.
- [137:19]
Guy Denton
Care about this band. It's like so funny. I told you I've been waiting 20 what I say before we started the tape. I've been waiting 24 years to do this show, right? So I've got my. My hard opinions and a firmed up time.
- [137:33]
Jeff Blair
It's I only. Well again I'm sure I heard I have heard the album version of Killing Moon a time or two and just not realized it for purposes of this conversation. I listened to Jeff and only listened to the all night full version and it's great. I can't compare it to the album version. I don't know what's been cut, but I imagine and it's mixed much more.
- [137:57]
Guy Denton
Dryly to focus only on the band and not the classical instruments and all.
- [138:01]
Jeff Blair
Of the, which is what makes it special. I had emailed both of you guys, you know, after I heard it the first time. The orchestral move that happens around five and a half minutes in, in this long version, it's just magnificent.
- [138:16]
Guy Denton
That's the part that's cut, that's the.
- [138:18]
Jeff Blair
Most beautiful part of the song. And then after that, that mix again, you say different mix. Well, the mix on this longer version is perfect. So it has to be better than the other version. This mix that has the guitar kind.
- [138:32]
Guy Denton
Of screaming, wailing guitar solo at the end.
- [138:36]
Jeff Blair
It's such a wonderful choice. And that's what, that, what makes the song so special to me. McCullough's talked about it being somewhat of a hymn. If it is, it's because of that portion, that back half the back, what, three, four minutes on the long version. That's where it all comes together. It is really beautiful, really powerful.
- [138:57]
Guy Denton
So any thoughts about this here album that it's associated with, which is also really fantastic?
- [139:02]
Guest Speaker
Oh yeah, yeah, there's that too.
- [139:04]
Guy Denton
Yeah, there it is.
- [139:07]
Guest Speaker
Do you want to go first?
- [139:08]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, well, yeah, sure, I'll continue tell you so.
- [139:11]
Guy Denton
Okay, you go.
- [139:12]
Guest Speaker
Just go.
- [139:12]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, yeah. Ocean Rain. I, I, I really enjoyed Ocean Rain. Someone had tipped me to the fact that McCullough has said it's the most perfect album ever recorded. So that's where the standard was. But yeah, I'm not sure it, it is quite that good, but it's awfully good. A 35 piece orchestra orchestra recorded this, the album with them and it makes a difference. You know, as we talked earlier, it's a band that's never standing still. So you go from a song like Never Stop this, you know, dance, post punk dance effort into Ocean Rain where you have, I would say, more conventional structures to a lot of these songs married to this lesson, less conventional idea about using, you know, string instruments and orchestration in a lot of these places and yet it works. I really enjoyed a lot of this. You know, the first song, Silver Moody pop, certainly, but big drama, big sweep thinking, big planning, big Crystal Days is one of the times that I hear McCullough sort of become a singer and not as much of a vocalist. You know, it's such an instrument his voice is. And here he's sort of singing and not going over the top and not sort of making his voice necessarily the central part, but really trying to blend more so than he had in the past. Crystal Day is such a strong melodic foundation to it. I really like that song.
- [140:54]
Unknown Speaker
Whole at last with a golden view Looking for hope and I know it's you Splitting my heart cracked right in two the pleasure of pain and joy to purify our misfit ways of Magnify our crystal days Purify our misfit ways of Magnify our crystal.
- [141:37]
Jeff Blair
Thorn of crowns I haven't talked a lot about lyrics because oftentimes it's the last part that I am able to sort of grasp. Grasp. And, you know, the lyrics on Echo of the Bunnyman sometimes isn't all that important anyway, but very important here. When he says cucumber, cabbage, cauliflower met on Mars April showers.
- [141:58]
Guy Denton
See, that's why you got to pay really close attention. Because if you miss some of the subtleties, unless you're paying, you know, they deserve. They deserve to be read.
- [142:07]
Jeff Blair
Yeah. Yeah. Two songs on the back half that I'll talk about brief, briefly, and then hand off. Boy, I like Seven Seas an awful lot. And I think one of the differences with Ocean Rain is in the hands of this production and with these instruments and this presentation, it becomes a warmer song. It has a wonderful atmosphere. If perhaps previously we might say some songs like this were dense or. I think I even used the term like gloom pop earlier on. This is more dreamy. It's.
- [142:43]
Guy Denton
You feel like a springtime day with the bells chiming in the background. It's like a breezy springtime day. It's so light and it floats away and I.
- [142:52]
Jeff Blair
Well, floats away. So I'm gonna say the last 45 seconds of the song feels like the tide at seven seas ocean ray. It feels like the tide is pulling them all to the end of the song. With such a great momentum to how everything comes together on the back half of Seven Seas.
- [143:10]
Unknown Speaker
Burning my bridges and smashing my mirrors Turning to see if you're cowardly Burning the witches with Mother Religious. You strike the matches and shower me in water games Watching rocks below Tort and tame Entirety of Floor Savin there somewhere Glad to see my face among them Kissing the tortoise swimming there somewhere well, let's see my face a moment Kissing the. To Swimming there so. Well, let's see my face among them.
- [144:19]
Jeff Blair
Kissing the tortoise shell and then. But then title track is such a beautiful Ballad, this lush orchestration. No, there's none of that sort of stabbing, spiky, porcupine crocodile things to instrumentation around the song. And you got to tell me if I'm right or wrong, because one of the other bands that Jeff also mentions very often the band artist is Scott Walker. I hear from the little I know like Scott Walker influence on a song like Ocean Rain.
- [144:58]
Guy Denton
Well, you know what? I can play Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon here if you want. So Scott Walker came to the attention. His career had been languishing in unknown repose after bombing out during the early 70s, but it came only to the attention of the UK record buying public in the early 1980s because of the efforts of one Julian Cope of the Teardrop Explodes, who of course kicked Ian McCulloch out of the band, forcing him to start Echo and the Bunnyman. It was Cope who compiled a record for, you know, some label. Zoo Records, I think was the label. We were talking about them the other day with Matthew Sweet. And so I'm guaranteeing you McCullough knows who Scott Walker is because Julia Cope knew who Scott Walker was and they were in the same band. So I think you could well be on to something. And I never made that connection, so. Never until now.
- [145:47]
Jeff Blair
See, I'm good for something around here.
- [145:50]
Guy Denton
Connect the dots like that. I love it. How you can just sort of back your way to the right thing. That's. I think you're right.
- [145:55]
Jeff Blair
It's a fantastic way to close this record, which is probably more accessible than others. It does have more of a pop tinge and as I said, I think there's more conventional structures and patterns to these songs, but it doesn't take away the individuality of each of the tracks. Again, each track has been very carefully planned and very carefully constructed, especially now with the introduction of the strings and the orchestration. It's very. I don't call it sophisticated pop necessarily, but there is a, perhaps a greater level of sophistication in some of the writing and arrangements here. And it pays off for Hands on.
- [146:34]
Unknown Speaker
Deck at dawn sailing to satisfy your.
- [146:42]
Scott Bertram
Port in my heavy stones hovers the blackest thumb.
- [147:28]
Guy Denton
Guy. What do you want to say about the greatest masterpiece in the history of popular recorded music? You give you the man to tell Ian McCulloch he's wrong.
- [147:34]
Guest Speaker
Yes. Written by the greatest and most gifted performer in the history of popular music. Indeed.
- [147:40]
Guy Denton
Indeed. I mean, the man is nothing if not confident.
- [147:43]
Guest Speaker
I would nothing if not coherent too. Very clear diction in all circumstances. Okay, well, first of all, that is A great point. Scott and I have never made that Scott Walker connection either. And I can definitely hear a strong influence on this now that you have prompted me to think about it. From Scott 4, in particular Scott 3 and Scott Thor and a song like angel of ashes on Scott 4. There's a very clear similarity between something like that.
- [148:15]
Guy Denton
What a perfect comparison. I think that's exactly right.
- [148:20]
Guest Speaker
But I like this album a lot. However, I prefer it doesn't resonate with me as much as the first two albums. And probably the best way I can put it is that contrived isn't a fair word to use because contrived has a negative connotation to it. And I think the songwriting on here is obviously very good. However, this album sounds like Ian McCullough. Like Ian McCulloch, probably principally Ian, but also the rest of the band sat down and deliberately tried to write the greatest album. Album of all time that would hit all of the beats necessary. Necessary to impress the critics and change the face of popular music and elevate pop to a whole, whole level and blend different eras of pop together. And just to deliberately create a masterpiece, which. It's like trying to sit down and write the great American novel. You can't do it. It just needs to happen. Whereas the first two albums sound like. Sound like exactly what they were, which.
- [149:23]
Guy Denton
Is very elemental and a natural product of their. Of their evolution. I get it.
- [149:29]
Guest Speaker
Yes. And the problem.
- [149:30]
Guy Denton
Self consciousness to them, right?
- [149:32]
Guest Speaker
Yes. There's no self consciousness. There's no pretense to them. They were made by a group of hungry kids who wanted to be rock stars, who probably had a lot of things that they were struggling with, had a lot of talent that probably hadn't really been nurtured or tapped into, and went into a studio and wrote a bunch of great songs, but just on the merits of how good those songs were made them successful. And that's the difference. And that's why I think the first two albums feel more. Are more appealing to me. They feel more organic to me. I. I connect with them more and I just find more to enjoy in them. I like that roar sound more than what's on this.
- [150:11]
Guy Denton
You know, if Ian McCol were here right now, you know what he would say? He'd say.
- [150:17]
Guest Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
- [150:19]
Guy Denton
That's right.
- [150:20]
Guest Speaker
Then he would probably throw a drink at me and storm off. However, that doesn't mean that I don't again, really, really like this album. But I don't think there are a lot of great songs on this. And obviously you have The Killing Moon and Ocean Rain, which are both majestic. But Silver and Crystal Days, which I think are almost sort of the same song or more charitably, two sides of the same coin, I guess, but are both one wonderfully melodic, fun, bouncy pop songs. And then Seven Seas, which I have it, which almost sounds like a children's storybook. I have absolutely no idea where those lyrics came from or what on earth he was angling Thor with them or what the inspiration was, but it works. And it's certainly. It's certainly an indelible kind of song because of that. The imagery he creates in it. It's quirky, it's certainly more playful and quite far removed from some of the more morbid and twisted and gloomy imagery on the initial records. But it's just as sad. But it's just as it's. It comes from the. Say, there's just as much artistry to it. And Scott mentioned the one. The last point I would make is that Scott mentioned Thorn of Crowns, but where did that come from compared to a lot of this? I mean, that's such an. An aggressive, weird, almost freakish kind of composition with that bendy rumbling bass from less underlying it and all of these disparate elements colliding. It feels like. It feels like a track that would. It feels like a track that was stripped out of one of the first three albums and then reconstructed in a kind of schizophrenic way to match the style. Style of this album. And I've never really heard anything like it anywhere else.
- [152:13]
Unknown Speaker
Wait for me on the blue horizon Blue horizon for everyone Wait for me on our new horizons New horizons for everyone I want to be one.
- [152:46]
Guest Speaker
Greatest pop album of all time. I wouldn't quite go that far, but very good and very accomplished pop album nonetheless. Absolutely.
- [152:54]
Guy Denton
I mean, listen, that's actually a really fair point. And actually I think it's well taken that this is a more self conscious album. But I say, you know what?
- [153:02]
Guest Speaker
That's.
- [153:02]
Guy Denton
I like you when. When bands sometimes grasp for the best. Here's. Here's to pretension. Okay. You know, every now and then a genesis needs to do the Land Lies down on Broadway. Damn it. You know, let me make a very.
- [153:14]
Jeff Blair
Quick point here because grasping for the brass ring guy said, you know, a bandit's in a room trying to write a perfect song. You know what I thought of when I heard all the orchestration on Here is a previous show we did on Smashing Pumpkins and like tonight. Tonight from Melancholy. Like Melancholy is very specifically Billy Corgan trying to write this masterpiece that will cover all, you know, every possible angle of pop rock music ever recorded and you know, their version of it and adding orchestration and doing all these strange things. And for a while I was very resistant to that for that reason. And when we went back and did the Smashing Pumpkins episode, I had and I just sort of gave myself over to it especially, especially on Tonight Tonight, which I over always thought of this overproduced.
- [154:03]
Guy Denton
Too cute, you know, find that touching now. I find it. I find it. I'm moved by the fact that, man, look at how hard they're really trying. It's really sincere and so like when the heart's there, I think it works.
- [154:17]
Jeff Blair
Yes. And so I would make that comparison to how I sort of interpreted Ocean Rain. I gave myself up to something like the title track and just said, man, they went for it and I think they actually got it. They did it the right way.
- [154:33]
Guy Denton
Right. I mean, you know, it's funny you mentioned Scott Walker when you talked about the title track, Ocean Ray. And I've always thought it was the moment where Ian McCulloch just sounds most like Bono. I mean the most. Absolutely. Like whenever you hear Bono and his lower register singing a ballad, they sound like doppelgangers. Of course, they've always been kind of doppelganger bands. If you recall, every year they've released albums in 80, 81, 83 and 80 and then 87. And I think up until 87 Echo was having the better run than you two, actually. But then again, the Joshua Tree is the Jasher Tree. But here I think that the mood of this album is peace unto itself. You know, it's. I think this is a point that Guy touched on briefly. He talked about, you know, the dark texture of crocodiles. That's his nighttime driving album. Or then the gloomy free morning dawn. Or is it dusk, you know, dark dusk of heaven up here and then the ice cold of. Of crocodiles. This is. Even though it's like a grotto, sound like an Italian blue lit grotto. This is a much more breezy summery album. This is a fall album, maybe a pleasant weather album. It's so much lighter in so many ways. That's, I guess probably why Thor, the crown sounds so out of place, as he points out. But I love this. I love the, the grandness of just opening with, you know, Silver, which, you know, the strings work for me. Yeah, they're a little bit big and I guess, you know, they're very formal. But I think I think the big bright chords work. Crystal Days, you guys already mentioned, I guess, you know, since we talked about most of it, I'll just point out. I'm surprised that nobody brought up what I think even a the Killing Moon isn't on this album the way I want to hear it. So for Ocean Uran, my single favorite song here is My Kingdom, and I'm surprised no one mentioned it. I think it's Ian McCogg's best lyric and I think it's one of the most beautiful drum beats to Pete the Freedis ever laid down for the band. That light shuffle and then this thing is built around acoustic guitar. And then like again, only later does Will Sargent go into that slashing guitar figure. But it's Ian's best set of lyrics. I chop and I change and the mystery thickens there's blood on my hands and you want me to listen to brawn into brains when the truths in the middle Born of the pain like all good riddles and then it's burn the skin off and climb the rooftops Thine will be done and you know, it just descends into this glorious, echoing, tailing chorus that again, you talk about how a band truly evolved into their name. The chorus to My Kingdom is echo and the bunny bit, it is the echoing guitar of sergeant and then it goes into a guitar solo that's more a drone than anything else. And it's beautiful the whole time because again, it's driven by that organ from the beginning to the end. I think it is one of the most beautiful things they've ever done. And I'm always surprised people don't mention it as one of their greats.
- [157:43]
Unknown Speaker
I tell when I tings and the mystery thickens there's blood on my hands and you want me to listen to Born and Supreme when the truth's in the middle Born of the green like all good riddles Put the blood burn the skin off and grind the rooftop I will be dumb look the bag the nose off and make.
- [158:30]
Guy Denton
All right, so 1984 was actually a year of huge triumph for the band. And what do they do? Well, I think they make a real, real big mistake. They take an entire year off. Apparently they got bad management advice is what I've read. I can't imagine why at the peak of your powers, at the peak of your fame, the peak of your press, you're just going to go take a year off. But they did. And what they did do in the meantime, at the very least, which deserves notice for sure, is rather release A greatest hits album. And this is actually the way I think a lot of older guys probably found out about Echo and the Bunnyman for the first time. It's called Songs To Learn and Sing. The title actually comes from that song Fuel, I mentioned earlier, the obscure B side. But of course, it's kind of the standard greatest hits album. I think it includes the Puppet, which makes it a problem. But it also includes the one song, the one teaser track, the Bait, which is truly one of the most wonderful Echo songs of all time. It's called Bring on this Dancing Horses. It was also released as a single, so you can take it that way. But I love the. The COVID of Songs To Learn and Sing is. It's one of those great 80s images with the four of them in silhouette, walking across the background. Again, just another fantastic, iconic visual image. The last of their career, really. But I just love how you can immediately identify Ian McCullough because he has the carrot hair. It's just so much higher than all the other members of the band. They're so.
- [159:58]
Guest Speaker
You can.
- [159:58]
Guy Denton
You can tell who they are by profile, which is a fascinating thing. It's a memorable group. And Bring on the Dancing Horses is just a wonderful song. I've always considered it to be kind of a tribute to New Order. It sounds a lot like your Silent Face. I mean, a lot. Especially if you've heard the extended mix. But again, it's just Ian at his most vague, but still just sort of movingly resigned, singing one of the most memorable melodies of the 1980s. As far as I'm concerned, I never heard it at the time, but as far as I'm concerned, I was listening to this song in 1985 as well. I just. I wish that were true, but I guess I've retconned my own.
- [161:09]
Unknown Speaker
Jimmy Bob, Made of Stone, Charlie Clark, no Way Home.
- [161:25]
Scott Bertram
We lost from the.
- [161:27]
Unknown Speaker
Dancing horses Headless and all alone Shiver and say the wor Every lie you've heard First I'm going to make it and then I'm going to break it till it falls apart Hates it all up Fake it looks shaky While I'm breaking your British.
- [161:59]
Jeff Blair
You should mention both Jeff and I never have seen Pretty in Pink, in case anyone's wondering.
- [162:06]
Guy Denton
Nope, Never have. That's another. Another shameful confession today. This is Clockwork Orange. I gotta catch up, folks.
- [162:13]
Guest Speaker
I've never seen Pretty in Pink either, actually. I've only heard the song far too many times.
- [162:22]
Guy Denton
Do you have any thoughts on the single or do we want to move on to. I Mean, I guess a lot of chaos.
- [162:26]
Guest Speaker
Well, I would say that, you know, there's. There's no shame in buying and loving a good greatest hits compilation. And so either this is one of the best greatest hits comp. Greatest. Well, one of the best greatest hits compilations that I have ever owned or I had ever heard. Every track is fantastic. It's just the right length. It's a great overview. It flows well, crucially, which many greatest hits albums do not. And then it all ends with the new single which great way to say bye too.
- [163:03]
Guy Denton
It's a great way to end an owl.
- [163:05]
Guest Speaker
And I think will a lot of what the. What Bring on the Dancing Horses represents. I think we'll dig into more. I'm sure we'll dig into more with the next album, but definitely a shift in the direction of a slicker, more commercial, more eminently radio friendly kind of pop sound. But nonetheless very infectious song, very fun song, very enjoyable song, very memorable song. And in no way a step down from the type of pop songs that they'd written before. Just a step in a different direction. Not a lesser one, but certainly a more Americanized one. And that would expand and I guess we'll talk more in a moment about where.
- [163:55]
Guy Denton
Where that left them have to go through some mess here. Have you ever heard the demo version of that song? It's kind of obscure. It's like a bonus track on one of the reissues, I think it's called Jimmy Brown. Have you ever heard that version? I don't think I ever have, actually.
- [164:09]
Jeff Blair
No, I did.
- [164:10]
Guy Denton
You saw the echo in the.
- [164:11]
Jeff Blair
Yeah. When it was listening to some album. Right? To it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [164:15]
Guy Denton
It's a very different take. It's much more rocket oriented. It's just as very stripped down. It's kind of an alternate vision into what like a different version of the next album could be. But of course it's going to take a long time to get there because a lot of really dumb things happen at this point. And of course the most important of them is their drummer goes on tilt. Pete DeFreitas, probably never the most sober man on the planet, goes on like an epic bender, I believe in Christmas 1985 or thereabouts. I'm not good on that timeline. He. He moves to the United States with his like clutch of hangers on and fellow musicians, I guess not the band, and labels himself like the Love Gods or the Sex Gods. I can't even remember what ridiculous thing is, but he essentially quits. He basically goes on a wacko drug bender and quits. And I think, you know, in retrospect people say like, oh, they're rebutting mental problems and this the other thing, but either way, it's a pretty damn dodgy thing to do to a band, especially a band that's, you know, got to follow up the biggest hit of their career. In a lot of ways that was a sort of an irrevocable shattering of the magic of the band. I think later on he. They. They were starting to record without him. I think there's. I got one demo where Stephen Morris of New Order is playing on them, you know, and I. They think they brought in other commercials. They were a little bit lost. Wouldn't you be? Your drummer's gone. You got to find a new drummer and remember what Pete DeFreitas meant to this band as a drummer. Okay? How many times have I praised his work throughout this show? And then he's gone. So when he finally asked to rejoin the band, they said, yeah, you can, but I don't think they gave him a salary. They kept him on salary. They didn't make him an equal partner again. And so there he is looking off to the side on the COVID of 1987's Echo and the Bunnyman. It's the first album to include a portrait of the band and they're always off in the distance in the rest of their albums. This one, they're right and close and sepia tone, looking incredibly miserable, which of course you're supposed to, even if you are because you're a post box band, to be fair. But now they're genuinely unhappy and there's something a little confused about this record. This is a kind of generally panned record in its day, although it's sold and it was commercially pretty successful, particularly in America, but it hasn't really been well loved in retrospect. Everybody looks at it sort of like, yeah, that was our slick commercial album and nobody was in a good frame of mind at the time. And the songs really, really don't work. I don't know what your guys opinions of this record is, but I guess to me this one is, I guess I'd say the surprise of the show where I was really kind of pleased to come back to it and find there's a lot more to it than I thought there was. I thought this was like a two songs and well, I don't really have too much to say about it record. It's a little bit deeper than that, but it's definitely off the peak of the band's years and I think that's permanent.
- [167:05]
Unknown Speaker
Reason why the favorite season is the favorite season. Winter winters and those summer suns are good for everyone Are good for everyone. Spring is fall, autumn so well done.
- [167:23]
Scott Bertram
So well done.
- [167:24]
Unknown Speaker
And it's a better thing that we do not forget everything the Wild.
- [167:46]
Jeff Blair
I.
- [167:46]
Guest Speaker
Think the album is perfectly good. It's definitely not a bad record. There's plenty of intense, intelligent and well considered songwriting on it. The problem is that it could just as easily be the problem is there's very there also isn't very much on it to distinguish it as an echo on the Bunnyman album it sounds it has that slicked up, sort of generically popular pop rock ish late 80s sound that could have been could have been could have been late period psychedelic thurse could have been late period. U2 even sounds a bit like early 80s new wave on certain tracks. Some of the songs on here sound a bit like Blondie to me. That kind of style, a bit sugary, a bit overblown. There's some of the melodies are a little bit over drama, a little bit over dramatic without having much underneath them to really back it up. And the lyrics are a bit more generic and a bit more faceless this time around. But on the last couple of records, again clearly angling toward greater pop success and greater American success that they never really followed through on to the same extent as other bands, which I think and you can't really hold that against them. But I think just unavoidably that works against this album, even though that isn't really a fair excitement indictment of the actual songwriting on it. But there are plenty of good hooks and plenty of strong choruses and plenty of plenty of perfectly memorable melodies and enjoyable melodies and hooky melodies. Lips Like Sugar is obviously the big hit, the one everybody loves Baby, you would you2 would have to tell you would have have to tell me. Jeff, is Lips Like Sugar probably the band's best known song in the us? Was it their biggest hit over there?
- [169:51]
Guy Denton
Well, it's funny because remember my my understanding of this band is shaped more by the box set than by popular memory, because I didn't know a thing about echo back then. So I think you're right. And I'll tell you why I think you are. To me, I would have said, no, it's the Killing Moon. Of course it is the Killing Moon. But I think it slips like Sugar because that's the one they always play on wxrt. That's the one I just joked about about. I heard it this Morning and I wasn't lying when I said that. Like, I think you're right. I think it's got to be the one.
- [171:03]
Unknown Speaker
My head and my s Twin alone Mirror kissing Mirror kissing.
- [171:28]
Guest Speaker
Perfect. Great song. And again, we talk about how on the. The earlier records, they blended sort of disparate elements together in a way that wasn't discordant, but actually all of the elements complemented one another and elevated one another when you aligned them. And on that you have the McCulloch's. You have the big. The big bombastic chorus, but also the fairly delicate vocals from McCulloch that rise into the grand crescendo as he belts out the title. The pulsing synth sound that actually works quite well. It doesn't feel dated, it's just restrained enough to still be effective today. And it's balanced out by just enough of Sargent's distinctive guitar. Great pop song.
- [172:24]
Unknown Speaker
About the world and my choked. I would never believe that I ever.
- [172:40]
Scott Bertram
Could Feeling blue again Never wanted to.
- [172:45]
Unknown Speaker
Under the weather and it's over.
- [173:01]
Guest Speaker
I really like. I really like New Direction for the same reason I think over you is very solid. Satellite is good. Some of the songs drag on a bit too long, but there really aren't any tracks on here that I dislike. It's more the attitude of it that sometimes rubs me the wrong way. It has that kind of U2ish, a bunch of lads recording a rock album kind of sound. And not really the post punk, not really the earn. It doesn't have as much as the earnestness and as much of the purity of those early records that distinguishes them in my mind. But there's plenty to. There's plenty to like and enjoy about it. It just can't help but pale in comparison to the thirst for it. Kind of a shame. And it's. A lot of the problems with it are sort of external, which isn't very fair, but it's. It's just unavoidable. But I'm really. I'm interested to hear what you two think.
- [173:58]
Guy Denton
Guy, you're onto something so clever here that I just have to pipe in to. To make this point, because it's kind of only coming to me as I listen to you. Which is. The problem with this record is precisely because it sands away the parts that make Extra Echo and the Bunnyman unique. All those. Those. Those sharp edges and weird angles, these strange instruments, the Julian pipes and like the. The. The vibes coming from nowhere. All the stuff that made themselves echoey in space has just now been sanded away to this nice kind of pop sheen. And the songs are good, they're well written, but it kind of just sounds like, oh, this is Ian McCullough Expand. So if you dig this singer, you're going to dig these well written songs. It's not the whole, the weirdness of the whole Bunnyman appeal to me quite in the same way anymore.
- [174:43]
Jeff Blair
Yes.
- [174:43]
Guy Denton
Before I get into like, my thoughts about it, Scott, I wanted to know what you had to think.
- [174:47]
Jeff Blair
Well, as a, as a longtime Echo and the Bunnyman fan, I can identify three ways in which this.
- [174:52]
Guy Denton
It's a crusty hardcore.
- [174:53]
Jeff Blair
Yes. But yeah, I think there's three ways this is different. In three ways. It's not quite what you might have expected. One is that it's something that Jeff was just getting at, which is these tracks on the 87 album are not as sonically distinctive as tracks on previous albums. And not, not just on the whole, but individually. I, I said I like to give albums 3, 3 spins if at all possible. That allows me to, you know, understand, comprehend, see what's going on. So for these first Echo and the Bunnyman albums, I needed three spins to sort of see what they were doing and what they were getting at and how the instruments were playing with and around each other. For songs on this album, I need three spins to be able to figure out which one is which and how they differ from each other. They all have the same sound generally. They all have the same pace beats per minute. Generally. They're not sonically distinctive from each other. One of the reasons is that that this has transformed from a, a rhythm band with drums and bass given very prominent placement in the mix to a band here on this album that is very much a vocal and guitar band and very much a vocal keyboards.
- [176:19]
Guy Denton
Frankly, it's a keyboard censored band in a lot of ways at this point.
- [176:23]
Jeff Blair
But this, you know, I think this is the album where the vocals are pushed highest of everything we've heard so far. The vocals are pushed to the forefront. That also forces you to pay a little more attention to the lyrics, which again I would say aren't necessarily always a strong suit of, of the band. Right. And the third thing I would say is that they are just less disciplined here. Something Jeff pointed out about the first album, you know, from the get go, it's a band that places things very intentionally and knows what the song should sound like and how they want to pull it off and what's going to go where. And Guy alluded to this, but there are songs here that just don't need to be anywhere near as long as they are. Blue Blue Ocean is the one I had for my example. It just won't stop. It's five. It's almost five and a half minutes long. And it keeps going well after the point is made. And again with no sort of very first track, very first album we. We talked about going up, going ups has these very distinct movements inside of it. And Blue Blue Ocean just sort of continues it's moment. It continues until it's going to stop. But we don't really hear anything new. Those are the three big ways, I would say. And it's not to say it's a terrible album, much like I was getting at. It's. I don't mean to say it's bad and I don't like it. I like it, but it's not what we were accustomed to. And you know that post punk haze is gone. The production is so clean and punchy and very much sort of late 80s, 1987, 1988. The same guy who produced this produced cozy fan Tutti Frutti for Squeeze, which is one of my not really favorite Squeeze albums.
- [178:01]
Guy Denton
Tells you everything you need to know.
- [178:03]
Jeff Blair
Right from that same era. So I like over you a lot. That's a very nice song. But again, it's one where the drums hardly make an impact. There's a great bass line going on. You have to strain to sort of hear what's going on in over you. I like something like all in your mind, which is almost synth bass driven. That's the sound they're going for in that one. All My Life is a great closer. Second straight album, I think, where they pick a perfect song to close. And it does sort of have that sort of cinematic scope, you know, painting on a big canvas. With All My Life though, that's one of my favorite songs on echo and the Bunnyman 2. But I think all those. For all those reasons I laid out, it's why it's disappointing. To many years.
- [178:53]
Unknown Speaker
Cannon fire burning on the hillside. You and I are side by side.
- [179:07]
Guest Speaker
Listen.
- [179:08]
Unknown Speaker
Tim's Soldiers L My all my life falls my laughter and cry as my.
- [179:24]
Scott Bertram
Life turns round and round and round.
- [179:35]
Guy Denton
Yeah, I think you guys really did a perfect job of summarizing the problems with this album. I mean, you covered the waterfront. The only thing I really want to add is that there are the songs for me that are the most memorable. Okay. Actually, first is. Is a good example where the album fails. New direction Guy mentioned it. There's a demo version or an Alternate version, I guess, of this song from, I guess, the year before 1985. It's on the boxed set. Another one of those obscurities you can find. I don't know, it's like disc three. It's a much, much more fearsome song. It's a much better. Sounds much more like the band has the unique sort of sonic signature. Bit of the chaos, honestly, of Echo and the Bunnyman. And when you finally hear it all, all cleaned up and sweetened up and sanded down for this record, it. It loses all the character that it has.
- [180:49]
Unknown Speaker
I was told when I was seven all the things must go to heaven all my evils would be blessed if to God I did confess he wiped.
- [181:09]
Guy Denton
So for me, you know, to mention just one other song that no one did, that has a ton of character and give it some credit, is Bedbugs and Ballyhoo. Now, I know Scott's not a fan of Ian's more profound thoughts on record, but. Buffalo and bison Bison and buffalo that's the way the bee bumbles that's the way the bee bumbles Listen, my wife and I just love singing that stupid little tune to us every. And it's actually. It's a remake. It was the B side to bring on the Dancing Horses. The earlier version is just a little rougher sounding. This one's a much more smooth. And by the way, this slicking this one up does it all the favors in the world because Pete the Fres gets to deploy the one memorable drum beat on the album. It's that really slick kind of shuffly samba groove that he gets into. And I know you've been inherently suspicious of any song that Ray Manzarek plays on. You mentioned this before the show. Yes, but he plays. He plays the organ on that song, and I think he does that perfectly fine. It's immediately obvious that it's the guy from the Doors. Like, you hear that? Like, oh, dude, that's the dude from the Doors. It's got to be. And you're correct, it's Raymond Z popping in to do it. And I love that song.
- [182:17]
Scott Bertram
Samos.
- [182:45]
Unknown Speaker
Cannonball. That's where the thunder rumbles that's the way the thunder rumble.
- [182:53]
Scott Bertram
Rumble down on your knees again say please again yeah.
- [183:12]
Guy Denton
So I wanted to say something in that one's favor. Bobbers Bay, I also think, is a nice, very pleasant ballad that doesn't, you know, gets overlooked because, you know, who's going to look for a song sandwiched in the middle of the 1987 album. But everything else you guys said about it is correct. And it basically points up the problems here. I mean, again, Ian McCulloch, who's never the humblest man on the planet at this point, he said he was basically. Basically fed up with the band, probably not happy with Pete. The Freitas did. I don't know how anybody could be, but he felt like he was doing too much of the songwriting work and not getting enough of the credit for it. So, boom, he quits. And so the three of them say that they're resolved to carry on. Then Pete the Freidas goes and dies and he dies, apparently, while traveling to rehearsal. The first day of rehearsal for the trio, I don't know what they thought they were going to do until terms of a lead singer. They then go through a regrettable era. Ian is gone and Pete is now dead. Remember how Pete DeFreitas, to my mind, was the engine of this band? Well, they actually make a decision to release another album as Echo on the Bunnyman, called Reverberation. So bad that it was never included on the box set as a kid. So bad that I have heard it once prior to this recording and at least for me, so bad that I have no on it other than that it should never have been. I'm sure you haven't even listened, Scott, and you didn't miss a thing. It's just a shame. It was a great band. And of course it doesn't end here. Not exactly, but this is certainly the end of their. Their classic era. This is the end of the stuff that I think it's just truly why I was so thrilled to always cover this band. What happens next is that I think Ian and Will Sergeant patch it up and they. They go and do a side project called a Electrofiction, which has never been my cup of tea. Sounds a lot like sort of Smashing Pumpkin Knees that does. Just doesn't work. And then they finally decide to recruit less patents back into the fold. And then they put out a reunion album called Evergreen. And they're basically begging for it with the critics with this because they basically. They recreate the COVID of Crocodiles and they're all older and slower because it's 19, what, 97 or 6 at the time when this happens. And as miraculous as it is, it's actually not a terrible album. I actually. I think it's okay. And I do listen to it from now to. From time to time, and I was wondering if you guys had any opinions on it. And I guess at this point, since we're at the end of this journey. More or less. Whether you had any opinions on sort of the reunion era of Echo and the Bunnyman as a whole last. Patton is going to depart from the band, I think, after the second album because he felt like he just. Just didn't have anything to do.
- [185:54]
Jeff Blair
Yeah.
- [185:54]
Guy Denton
And it was basically, it was basically the Will and Ian show. So what you're getting is those two men, which of course were the creative hinge. But as Scott himself emphasized, what was it that made this band so spiky and exciting and energetic? It was the rhythm section.
- [186:10]
Jeff Blair
Yep.
- [186:10]
Guy Denton
And now the rhythm section is gone. And I think that is unfortunately sort of what my overall feeling on the reunion era of Echo and the Bunnyman is going to be.
- [186:19]
Unknown Speaker
I want to be like I want to laugh and cry about the things we do Never ask why.
- [186:35]
Scott Bertram
Cause I don't want to go.
- [186:38]
Unknown Speaker
So it just be good. I want to be there when you.
- [186:45]
Scott Bertram
Come.
- [186:49]
Unknown Speaker
I want to be there when you come.
- [187:06]
Jeff Blair
They really miss that engine, both the drummer and the bass. That whole rhythm section is gone obviously at some point and that means the songs have to change and they sound a lot more like the sort of compositions from the self titled album in. In 87. I. I'll. I'll sort of go first here with a few thoughts on the reunion years. I picked and choosed a few things I did listen to to Evergreen, that first album back together. There's some very decent stuff there. I think that the very first song, don't let it get you down is a good song. There's two others later in the album that I liked more than the others.
- [187:42]
Guy Denton
I want to be there when you come is a great song I think as well. I mean there's some good songs.
- [187:46]
Jeff Blair
Yeah. Altamont certain of borrows a lot from the. The Brit pop of that particular era, the mid to late 90s. And they do it pretty well. And I like Empire State, Halo quite a bit. Another sort of lush soundscape that leaves room for Sargent's, you know, textured guitar work. Some very warm vocals from Ian and. And some orchestration there too. So those are good tracks. I think Evergreen sounded like a pretty decent album. The other album I gave some time to from the reunion years, thanks to a tip from John J. Miller. Previous guest on this program was Siberia released in 2005. And John's like, hey, don't sleep on Siberia. Of all those reunion albums, that one's pretty darn good. And he wasn't wrong. There's a stretch in the middle of Siberia with three songs in a row that are pretty darn good. Parthenon Drive, in the Margins and Of a Life, and I think it's 2, 3, 4, or 3, 4, 5 on the record. Those are really pretty good songs. I mean, as good as you might be able to expect from a band that, again, is missing its rhythm section and essentially using Hired hands and now is, what, 25. At least 25 years into its creative phase. It's a pretty good representation of what they could do at that time. So I guess I'm saying John wasn't wrong. There's some songs to. To pluck off Siberia, if I'm going to give you one. I think Partha on Drive is very, very good. That's probably my favorite from Siberia.
- [189:33]
Unknown Speaker
Leave all the Earth to be.
- [189:38]
Scott Bertram
Watching 12 in Dreams will Fall Off My Shells In Off My Wall that's my wall of my wal.
- [190:06]
Guy Denton
There are four more albums after that, Scott, and I know you've listened religiously to all four of those, haven't you? I. I'll admit it, I haven't. I mean, I've listened. I listened to meteorites. I've listened. Listen to this one. And you actually kind of took the words out of my mouth with Parthenon Drive. I think it's an excellent song. I think all the songs you mentioned there are really good. But before I get to my thoughts about this, I was wondering, guy, do you have any thoughts yourself on the sort of reunion years you think it's worth? Think it's just sort of like a nice little kodo that you shouldn't worry too much about.
- [190:35]
Guest Speaker
Yeah, I more or less agree with everything Scott said. One song I would mention from Siberia is Scissors in the sand, which I think is excellent and almost sounds like an outtake or like a. Like an outtake from Crocodiles or Heaven Up Here that they came to later on and finished up really good, really raw, really cooks. But all of the. All of the post reunion albums, my attitude is they're fine. They're largely inoffensive. There's some enjoyable. There's some very enjoyable material spread throughout all of them. They just don't like hearing the Foo.
- [191:14]
Guy Denton
Fighters are out with another album like, oh, yeah, after the drummer died. Great.
- [191:19]
Guest Speaker
Exactly. And they just don't really have very much to offer. There's just not really that much of a reason to listen to any of them when the original five albums are so good and really give you. You everything you'd need. One funny thing. One funny thing I would like to share I became. So I got into the band and it would have been late 2013, I guess, and I remember in early 2014, so 10 years ago, which is terrifying to think about. Meteorites came out and I heard it when it was new and I thought it was fine, but I saw the band live for the first time. Time on that tour in a small English town called Leamington Spa. And it may have been. Let me actually quickly Google.
- [192:08]
Guy Denton
That's one heck of a picturesque name to say.
- [192:10]
Jeff Blair
I saw.
- [192:11]
Guy Denton
I saw Echo in the Bunnyman at Leamington Spa back in the day.
- [192:16]
Guest Speaker
I tell you, you know something, you.
- [192:18]
Guy Denton
Know Lemington, that's too good to be true.
- [192:20]
Guest Speaker
Doesn't it sound like. It sounds like a. Like a. A word that was made up for Ocean Rain. It doesn't sound like a real place. But what's. You know what's funny, Jeff? I saw them 10 years for the first time 10 years ago to the day. It was May 2, 2014.
- [192:38]
Guy Denton
That's amazing. Well, there you go.
- [192:40]
Guest Speaker
It really is.
- [192:41]
Guy Denton
This is your decade anniversary. How fitting.
- [192:44]
Guest Speaker
It's. I. I can't believe that actually. That's so funny. But that's actually a little bit.
- [192:48]
Guy Denton
That's a little bit ominous, man. That's a little bit. That's a little bit too. Too good to be true. That's a wonderful.
- [192:55]
Guest Speaker
The Killing Moon may come too soon for all of us, I think, after that. But I remember this was the opening night of the tour, which. Opening night of the tour. That could mean all sorts of things. Never really the most encouraging.
- [193:09]
Guy Denton
Never really a thruff ones on the first night. Right.
- [193:13]
Guest Speaker
But I remember going. I remember going to this show with my dad and it was a perfect. We were close to the front. It was a perfect, perfectly good show and a fairly long set. A little pretty heavy on stuff from a new album, as you'd imagine. But that's fine. Until they got to the encore and the final song, which was Lips Like Sugar. And I know for a fact you can find this on YouTube because I found it there before, but I think they got up to the first chorus of Lips Like Sugar and I remember us seeing it. Someone threw a drink. Now, not like a glass bottle or even a can. Someone threw like a plastic cup of beer or whatever at McCulloch. And I remember seeing it sort of splashed. I don't even think it hit him. It maybe splashed him. At which point McCulloch, who. I'm not go. I'm going to be careful not to say anything slanderous here. But it did seem to me like he may have been indulging in a few choice beverages or substances prior to the show because he went off on many incomprehensible rants about various things. I remember at one point he demanded that the crowd yell out whether they preferred the Beatles or the Stones, and then gave some kind of incoherent answer to whatever he thought the crowd's response indicated. But they get to the chorus of the song. Someone throws this drink at McCulloch. At which point he stops, forces the band to grind to a halt and for about a minute and a half goes off on a. On an expletive laden tirade imploring this fan to come up on stage and that the either he can knock them out or they can knock him out. And it's a fair, it's a fair game. I remember verbatim was what he said until eventually, obviously no one responds until eventually he tells everyone to F off and storms off stage. And I remember we thought and doesn't finish the song. And I remember we thought this was so funny. But still to this day my dad and I, whenever we talk to him, I'll sometimes say to him, who threw that? In a McCulloch voice, which I remember was the first for he said, who threw that? Get up here and throw it again. As you can see, Will rolling his eyes and realize and thinking, well, at least we made it to the encore this time.
- [195:19]
Guy Denton
Yes, the gig's over. Thank God we're at least at the end. Oh dear. That's the most wonderful reunion era story. And of course you know, I, I think fairly. Do you. Okay, so is it actually at Levington Spa? Because I'm gonna have to look this up for the video now. Is you think it really is on YouTube? Have you searched?
- [195:38]
Guest Speaker
I, I have found it before and in fact it's probably in my liked videos and I, I after we finish recording Jeff and Scott, I will see if I can find it and I'll email it to you because it made. I thought it was hysterical at the time.
- [195:52]
Guy Denton
Please do. I mean, I guess the only thing I have to add about the reunion years is that, you know, you guys subbed it up pretty well. It's a view. Whatever. They're doing their old man thing and it's fine. It just doesn't interest me for the same reasons. I started right at the beginning saying when you, when you miss the rhythm section, you miss a lot. I think ironically though, my favorite song of this whole period is the most sedate Adult rock, one of them all. It's the. The title track of their second reunion record called what are you gonna do with your life? And it's, you know, very kind of a contemplative acoustic guitar based stroll with Ian just sort of singing in his cruder voice, a very mellow and relaxed song. I remember it was actually, I think, the final track on the box set that I got. The first one that ever turned me into a lifelong echo in the bun and fan back in the day. And I always thought it was a really kind of nice and reflective way for that one to end. And I guess it's probably a nice enough way for us to end this show as well. It's not. Not a patch on anything they did during their classic years. And then nor could it be, nor does it have to be, but it's still a fun song.
- [197:04]
Unknown Speaker
If I knew now what I knew then I'd wonder how not wonder when something going wrong again with me in mind it's only ever what it seems Memories and might have beens Heaven sent the smell of dreams will never find.
- [197:25]
Scott Bertram
Tell me, tell me what, tell me.
- [197:33]
Unknown Speaker
What are you gonna do with your life? What are you gonna do with your life? What are you gonna do?
- [197:55]
Guy Denton
You know, these albums, I've heard most of them, but I don't really have anything more to add about them than what I had for me, Echo of the Bunnyman. What they stood for is those first five records, which to me are an achievement that honestly it, you know, talk about bands that you get personal about. Same way I wish people really knew how great Talk Talk were really respected. Genesis, they're not just a dorky band, you know. I really, really wish people appreciated how great a group Echo and the Bunnyman were. They are also ran group from the early 80s with a goofy name. They aren't just some people whose sound YouTube made a lot more money with. All right. They were a fantastic band in their own right. An absolute guiding star for me musically and one of the greatest groups that just expanded my mind and also it's kind of fulfilled what a sound was, what I. What I'd always hoped and dreamed that the sound of my dreams would be. What I wanted to hear was the sound Echo and the Buddyman created. And. And so that's why I've always loved this group since I was, you know, in college.
- [199:04]
Jeff Blair
There we go, the political beats. Look at Echo and the Bunnyman. And we come to the part of the program where all three of us, even the newbie, gives you recommendations Two albums you should own. Five songs you must hear from our featured band on today's edition. Our guest is first, Guy Denton. He's the co host of the Wrong Stuff with Matt Lewis. You can see him writing a dispatch and National Review. Guy, your two albums and five songs, please.
- [199:31]
Guest Speaker
Two albums. I'm going to cheat a bit with this. I. My gut says, I think with two albums that you should own are the first two, Crocodiles and Heaven Up Here. However, if it feels a bit. It feels a bit like I'm not, you know, not being a true fan, quote unquote, to do this, but I almost think, but especially if you've never listened to the band before, really the first thing you should get just to familiarize yourself with the sound is songs to learn and sing. And then I pick up.
- [200:05]
Guy Denton
Well, that's entirely valid. Yeah, that's a great reason, I think.
- [200:10]
Guest Speaker
I really think, especially, especially again, if you don't know very much about post punk. That's a great overview and a very accessible introduction. And then I would get Crocodiles, not just because it's my favorite, but because it will also set you up nicely to just proceed chronologically through the discography and evolve and see. See the band's sound evolve as it naturally evolved for the five tracks. This is very difficult. I would say over the Wall, the Katha, just because it's inescapable. The Back of Love, Crocodiles and All that Jazz. Just because those are the first five that come to mind. Number five that have the most. The greatest number of memories attached to them. For me, however, if I were to compile the first five songs that maybe a casual newbie should listen to, that wouldn't necessarily be the list, but I think all of the songs that you should be introduced to if you're just getting into the band you can find on that compilation. So those are the ones that probably matter the most to me personally.
- [201:21]
Jeff Blair
All right, my two albums from Echo and the Money Man, I, despite Jeff's warnings, have It Up Here is one of the two I would recommend to you. And then if you do find that a little more difficult, as discussed, Ocean Rain. Ocean Rain should not be anywhere near as difficult for you to enjoy. So how about Up Here in Ocean? Ocean Rain are my two albums I would recommend. And then the songs, a couple of singles, A couple of album tracks, from front to back or oldest to newest, do it clean. I think A Promise for sure is on this list of 5. I agree with Guy. Back of Love is one of their best songs. Seven Seas from Ocean Rain. What a beautiful track. And then from the self titled, I'll pluck one off of there and it's final track, it's All My Life. Those are my five tracks. Jeff, over to you.
- [202:18]
Guy Denton
Well Scott, you're. You're such a. A rebel or I'm so mainstream I don't know which one it is because we actually have the same two albums. It's heaven up here. You guys know, it's obviously heaven up here. And the other one is obviously to me, Ocean Rain. And because I like to maximize my spread, I'm always concerned with getting as much coverage in because I think you honestly just need every song on both, both of those records. Here's some stuff from everything that isn't those records from Crocodiles. My first song would be Stars are Stars them in a much more melodic form and just proves that they can write that kind of song if they want to. From porcupine, it's the Cutter. I mean there's nothing wrong with the cliche. That's one of their most famous songs. It's one of the most memorable things you'll ever hear. Speaking of similarly memorable, I'm gonna have to say never stop. I love this little dance pop one off from in between porcupine and Ocean Rain. And since I already mentioned that and I'll move on and I'll say bring on the Dancing Horses number four because that's the non album single. And I guess maybe I should go watch Pretty in Pink, but not before I've seen A Clockwork Orange. And I guess finally I'll say Bedbugs and Ballyhoo from the Echo and the Bunnyman album, the self titled album. That one just has so much little joy and character and wit and sprightliness to it in a way that really is kind of otherwise missing from that album. And it kind of makes you realize what you missed with Echo and the Bunnyman. And by the way, listen, this has been my White whale episode. So host prerogative, mention of six. It's also not on any of these albums. It's the all night version of the Killing Moon in all of its nine minute glory. Even if you have to listen to a hissy scratchy, you know, copy off of a 45 RPM on YouTube. Or maybe if you just have to hit me up on the Twitter DMS and you need to hear it this way, it's maybe their greatest achievement.
- [205:11]
Jeff Blair
There we go. Political beats. Look at Echo and the Bunnyman. Scratch that off of Jeff's list. Of bands to cover on the program. We thank our guest on today's show, Guy Denton. Find him co hosting the Wrong Stuff Pot podcast with Matt Lewis. Read him in publications like the Dispatch and National Review and Plume. The Archives plumb the archives of the Remnant where he would take yeah right. I'm just second guessing myself. Where he co hosted and helped Jonah Goldberg on his podcast the Remnant. Check that out. Guy Denton, thank you so much for joining us here on Political Beats.
- [205:49]
Guest Speaker
Thank you both so much for having me. It's been a lot of fun. And Jeff, I'm very glad we got to scratch your itch.
- [205:55]
Guy Denton
Thank you so much.
- [205:57]
Jeff Blair
And Jeff, the summer is not here yet, but it is approaching. We have a few ideas for how to spend a little extra time that we sometimes have during the June, July and August. So plans are moving forward.
- [206:10]
Guy Denton
It's going to be exciting.
- [206:12]
Jeff Blair
Find Jeff on x@ esoteric CD. I'm there at Scott Bertram again. Join us at patreon. Please patreon.com support us. Help the show stay ad free entry level, mid level and our upper level friends get everything we have to offer including the monthly exclusive content episodes, which are a ton of fun. Jeff and I spent some time reminiscing and taking a stock of those memories of MTV videos from what ended up being mostly the 1980s. You can find that at patreon.com politicalbeats subscribe to our feed for new episodes, Apple Podcasts, tunein or elsewhere. Plus find us@nationalreview.com or on Facebook on X. Join the Conversation oliticalbeats this has been a presentation of National Review. This is Political Beats.