2018 is the year of Lawrence

[holyzombiejesus]

Well, that's what Cherry Red are saying. The first 5 Felt albums are getting reissued - vinyl comes in gatefold sleeves, CDs come in a box with a related 7" single and other bumpf - and the (final?) Go-Kart Mozart album is finally coming out. Teaser video for the latter here.

Not too sure whether to bother with the reissues. I've got the records already although the remixed Ignite The Seven Cannons appeals. The CD boxes are quite nice and there's a limited signed pre-order available but I don't even have a CD player any more and am not 14 so might well not bother. Still, really like the GKM track.



https://www.cherryred.co.uk/news/

http://thefeltdecade.com

[wosl]

I've got the original vinyls of the first four LPs, although they're very well played, and I've lost the lyric insert to Strange Idols.  Not bothered about the underwhelming 'Snakes (or much of anything post-Deebank). Will probably end up plumping for some of these.  What I want re-released most of all is the Primitive Painters/Cathedral 12 inch, because mine's gone missing and I might prefer the version of Cathedral on that to the album version; it's certainly as powerful, in a more in-your-face way.

[itsfredtitmus]

Looking forward to the new album a lot.

[Jockice]

He is God.

[PaulTMA]

This was some nice surprise news to slightly compensate for the seemingly never-ending Morrissey misery getting worse by the second.

[Brundle-Fly]

This was some nice surprise news to slightly compensate for the seemingly never-ending Morrissey misery getting worse by the second.

When You're Depressed seems to have upstaged Spent The Day In Bed for me. One for the Cheery songs about unsavoury subjects thread.

[holyzombiejesus]

Charlie Brooker did Desert Island Discs this week and not only chose Denim's New Potatoes as one of his discs, he also had it as his 'if you could only take one' option. Christ.

[Gregory Torso]

I've not heard a lot of Felt but Sunlight Bathed The Golden Glow and I mean the 12" version not the inferior one on the album, is one of my top 20 favourite songs. Anyone recommend a Felt record for me?

[wosl]

Start at the beginning and work forward.  Those first two albums are quite singular: shimmering, detached, astral.  Because they were so out of sync with the time they were put out, they still sound fresh and distinctive.  Strange Idols is a lovely mix of Lawrence's idea of precision pop and Deebank's chiming solos and interludes.  After that, things get progressively less extraordinary, but there are worthwhile tracks on everything, even their flattest offering, Poem Of The River.  Another way in is to get a comp: Absolute Classic Masterpieces or Gold Mine Trash, if you can find them.

Edit: looking again, you must already either have or have heard either Strange Idols or one of the comps, since you're familiar with both versions of Sunlight, so I'd plump for one or other or both of the first two, if you've not got around to those yet.

[Gregory Torso]

Thanks. Yeah, I've heard a compilation (Absolute Classic Masterpieces) and then Let The Snakes Crinkle Themselves To Death or something like that, which I wasn't really into. I'll check out the first couple then.

[wosl]

If you can put up with their slight (or maybe not so slight) air of preciousness, you should be able to get quite a bit out of them.  Lawrence's vocals are less foregrounded and more reverby, and the lyrics less deadpan, than they would be later on, and I much prefer the former approach.  Deebank's playing on them is superb, needless to say.  The vinyls, if you go down that route now or at some time, are lovely artefacts all-round; super sleeve designs, especially Splendour and Strange Idols.

[wosl]

Let The Snakes Crinkle Themselves To Death

For the shortly to be reissued clutch of early Felt albums, this has been retitled The Seventeenth Century, Lawrence's original choice of title, apparently.  He's got previous in terms of fiddling around with his back catalogue; when Strange Idols got a CD re-release a good few years ago, the original - and lovely - cover art was replaced with a dreary all-over one-colour design, and if I remember rightly, one of Deebank's interludes was axed.

[mippy]

Still amused at the idea that Summer Smash would have been a massive hit were it not for the death of the Diana.

[mippy]

Is the Stains on a Decade comp not still available?

[Chriddof]

Still amused at the idea that Summer Smash would have been a massive hit were it not for the death of the Diana.

The thing that no one ever brings up is that it's a song that celebrates the start of summer which was going to be released in September.

Mind you, if it had been released, Diana or no, I do think it would have been a decent enough hit. More of a lower half of the top 40 kind of hit, maybe, but Britpop was still just about running on fumes at this point and it might have just slipped in as one of the very final moderate indie successes before it went all Steps and Travis for the next few years. EMI's actions were weirdly extreme, though - I understand the paranoid thinking resulting in shelving the single, but the way they basically ripped up Denim's contract to boot has never made sense to me. I always felt there must have been some other additional reason that we were never privy to, and the Diana thing was partially an excuse.

[PaulTMA]

I read somewhere (i.e. the internet) that supposedly they wanted rid of Lawrence anyway, so it could have been sabotage.  Fuck knows.

Did anyone actually ever hear Summer Smash on Radio 1?

[marquis_de_sad]

A youtube comment from a video of Denim's performance on Jools Holland:

Lawrence's 2 main faults - 1. being a junkie. 2. Having no fucking stage presence whatsofucking ever. oh and 3.....for being a baldy. Other than that , love him!

[itsfredtitmus]

4. bit of a pedo as well

[PaulTMA]

4. bit of a pedo as well

wot's this based on

[koeman]

Did anyone actually ever hear Summer Smash on Radio 1?

Mark and Lard played it, a few years after the fact.

[PaulTMA]

Mark and Lard played it, a few years after the fact.

Sure, but there was a lot of talk of it being A-listed on Radio 1.  Did it actually hit the airwaves in the run-up to it's cancelled release date?  I don't remember hearing it anywhere until I downloaded it years later.  Think I might have seen an advert or review in the NME.

[jobotic]

wot's this based on

His love of recording how many steps he takes each day.

[Chriddof]

I could have sworn I heard a single play of it on Mark & Lard's breakfast show before it got yanked, but I'm not sure if I'm mis-remembering that from it being played a few years later.

[itsfredtitmus]

wot's this based on

Christiane F, I love that film so much. At the end of our film, when I put the white label on the turntable there's a lobby card from Christiane F on the wall, I've got all of them. One of them is on the wall, a picture of her shooting up in a toilet, I love that film, I'm in love with that girl. She was I think 14. And I love the real Christiane F as well. I've got pictures of her. I love teenagers. I like Larry Clark, I'll be like Larry Clark mooching around kids when I'm older, I'll be one of those suspicious guys. I really do love teenagers, because they're not bogged down by the mundane aspects of life, and are still full of hope. I love teenage films, Kids by Larry Clark, that kind of life, Streetwise.

Like I said - a bit of one

[marquis_de_sad]

Just sounds like every other wanker on Creation before Oasis.

[Mark Steels Stockbroker]

Christiane F, I love that film so much. At the end of our film, when I put the white label on the turntable there's a lobby card from Christiane F on the wall, I've got all of them. One of them is on the wall, a picture of her shooting up in a toilet, I love that film, I'm in love with that girl. She was I think 14. And I love the real Christiane F as well. I've got pictures of her. I love teenagers. I like Larry Clark, I'll be like Larry Clark mooching around kids when I'm older, I'll be one of those suspicious guys. I really do love teenagers, because they're not bogged down by the mundane aspects of life, and are still full of hope. I love teenage films, Kids by Larry Clark, that kind of life, Streetwise.

Like I said - a bit of one

Also the lyrics to "Listening To Marmalade".

[Mark Steels Stockbroker]

Nice to see that "Crucifix Heaven" is reinstated. Any particular reason why it was removed from earlier CD editions?

Put me down as someone else who prefers the Deebank era. Incidentally, Deebank did do an audition to be the guitarist on Morrissey's first solo album, although by that stage Vini Reilly pretty much had the job.

I spoke to Lawrence a few years ago, he was stepping out of Whitechapel Gallery next to Aldgate East, where he'd been in to see if they had a particular art book. He said lots of promoters and related people wanted him to do gigs playing Felt songs, but he didn't want to. We also talked about Mark E.Smith for a bit, and he commented "the trouble with major labels is they expect you to sell. You can't carry on like you do at independents." something like that.

[Mark Steels Stockbroker]

I could have sworn I heard a single play of it on Mark & Lard's breakfast show before it got yanked, but I'm not sure if I'm mis-remembering that from it being played a few years later.

If anyone played it it would have been them. They also supported GKM's "We're Selfish And Lazy And Greedy".

[Mark Steels Stockbroker]

The thing that no one ever brings up is that it's a song that celebrates the start of summer which was going to be released in September.

Just like "Summertime" by The Sundays, which was released and a hit at the same time.

[itsfredtitmus]

Also the lyrics to "Listening To Marmalade".

I can't listen to that one anymore shame cos it's really good