A Win Win situation

Once asked how the recording of the most recent Nectarine No. 9 album was progressing, frontman Davey Henderson responded: "I'm actually taping over Win albums at the moment because I can't afford blank tapes."

Henderson delivered the above crack tongue planted firmly in cheek; however, it still summed up Win's existence rather neatly: frequently brushed aside, hardly a success (aside from the band's "You've Got The Power" being used in a TV advert for McEwan's Lager.

Casual fans may regard Win as a mere stopover for Henderson; him bidding adieu to the frenetic, spiky guitars of Fire Engines and casting an eye toward the future: the avant-rock, quirky leanings of the aforementioned Nectarine No. 9. But that's simply not the case. During its brief, two-album lifetime, Win managed to craft some terrific pop numbers.

Maybe that's the problem: Henderson had gone (gasp!) pop. (I'd have killed to been present when zealous fans of Fire Engines first heard Win.) The debut, Uh! Tears Baby (A Trash Icon), featured danceable rhythms, sunny vocal harmonies, glossy synths. This record actually grooved. It was far, far removed from the sonic adventures undertaken with his previous and later outfits.

Maybe too far removed. Read an interview or three, and one gets the feeling the enigmatic man from Edinburgh actually does possess the desire to erase those old Win albums. "I've been through all that pop stuff with Win," he once said, "and it's not a time in my life I like to go back to. Once in a while one of those pop songs pops up and I have to get rid of it."

Hear it for yourself. Download: "Shampoo Tears" by Win.

Chew on this

History has relegated them to mere footnote status. "Meat Whiplash? I think I've heard of 'em. Weren't they one of the bands at the Jesus And Mary Chain riot?" (Note: This response would likely be typical of those individuals living north of the Pennines. Those south might respond: "Meat Whiplash? Why of course. Wasn't that the Plymouth record shop run by Jeff Barrett, founder of Heavenly Records?")

Yes, Meat Whiplash did play at the notorious 1985 North London Polytechnic gig -- a gig that famously spiraled into utter chaos. (Yes, it was also the name of Barrett's store. One more note: Both the band and the shop took their name from a Fire Engines' B-side.) And as the stories go, the East Kilbride bampots were partly responsible for whipping the large crowd into a fine froth. According to legend, a wine bottle was lobbed on stage during Meat Whiplash's opening set; the band tossed the projectile back, much to the chagrin of those in attendance. Bassist Eddie Connelly was socked in the kisser. The lads then further agitated the crowd by announcing their closing song would be a 20-minute opus.

Full-blown madness later ensued when The Jesus And Mary Chain hit the stage, their notoriously short set shorter than usual. JAMC feedback still ringing in their ears, the audience then invaded the stage, toppling the PA stack, breaking equipment, throwing beer cans.

Six months later -- and certainly taking some of the sting away from the North London mix-up -- Meat Whiplash scored a hit with their seven-inch single, "Don't Slip Up." Song spent almost five months on the UK's independent music chart, climbing as high as No. 3.

Rumors persist to this day that The Jesus And Mary Chain's Reid brothers played the instruments on "Don't Slip It Up." Listening to the interminable drone of thick, fuzzy feedback . . . well, one can hear why.

Hear it for yourself. Download: "Don't Slip Up" by Meat Whiplash.

'The stock market for your hi-fi'

"Top of the Pops": Can't-miss, cultural institution, or, in the business of showcasing slick, pre-packaged rubbish?

We know where The Rezillos stood regarding this matter. Unfortunately, the producers responsible for putting together the aforementioned, long-running, British music television program did not. The track "Top Of The Pops" was a lampoon of the TV program, humorously ridiculing the show's penchant for insipid shlock. Hackneyed, soulless artists miming to pre-recorded dross.

At least, that's how The Rezillos felt.

Now, here's what makes this particular story worth telling. File this under "truth is stranger than fiction": The single actually climbed as high as No. 17 in the U.K. charts; the group was then invited to "play" it on "Top of the Pops" . . . twice. The show's producers assumingly misunderstood the sarcastic lyrics for a rousing tribute. Yes, one imagines the ole irony detectors were switched to "off" when hearing couplets like, "There's one -- born every day/Sing song -- then fade away," or, "What is selling, what to buy/The stock market for your hi-fi."

It's no surprise The Rezillos -- who hailed from Edinburgh -- crafted a song so colorful and fresh. After all, this is the band Brian Hogg once described in his book, All That Ever Mattered, as: "The mutant bastard offspring of the original Roxy Music and a greasy Dr. Feelgood . . . ."

Hear it for yourself. Download: "Top Of The Pops" by The Rezillos. Catchy as hell with some lovely Fay Fife vocals. No wonder the TV roasters fell for it.

An old picture with a new Frame

"The sensitive young man with the fringed jacket." That's how East Kilbride's Roddy Frame once described himself.

And on a track like "The Boy Wonders," the second on High Land, Hard Rain, the debut album from Frame's songwriting vehicle, Aztec Camera, that sensitivity -- that innocence, that vulnerability -- is clearly evident.

The song opens with the drunken revelry of the Scottish New Year: "So come Hogmanay when love comes in slurs/Resolutions I'll make and you can label them 'Hers.'" According to Hogmanay tradition, a new year will be a prosperous one if, at the stroke of midnight, a "tall, dark stranger" appears at the door with a lump of coal for the fire. In "The Boy Wonders," Frame is that "tall, dark stranger," only he's toting fuel for fires of a different variety.

His affections are strong, but those ancient insecurities are too; doubt is already creeping into our smitten hero: "Now this boy wonders/Why the words were never worth the wait." Then, and not surprisingly, our seemingly autobiographical tale of young love (Frame was just 18 at the time of this album's release) plays its coda -- over before it even really began. "And my traveling chest will be open to you," Frame sings. "And boy will you learn that you haven't a clue."

What makes this woebegone jaunt so easy to stomach is the sweet, jangling guitars. It's hard to get teary for Frame when he's strumming away so joyfully. Balancing aching lyrics and a honeyed sound . . . well, that's part of what makes Frame so damn terrific.

Hear it for yourself. Download: "The Boy Wonders" by Aztec Camera.

An Olympian artist, song, post

So forgive me: I'm having a rather difficult time picturing it.

A furtive, crepuscular art-rudeboy (someone else's words, not mine) doing something as pedestrian as being glued to the idiot box. An artist deft at crafting cracked, morally provocative sketches of everyday life captivated by figure skating?

Was he one of the 24 million folks, Valentine's Day 22 years ago, watching intently as the former policeman and insurance clerk took to the ice? (Remember, this is an individual the NME's Betty Page once equated to a mussel: "It tastes good when swallowed whole, but examine it too closely and it looks as disgusting as a shriveled, unidentifiable piece of sexual organ. Spit it out immediately.") So was he actually taking note of what transpired that day? A sensuous free dance performance of Ravel's Bolero, followed by a storm of flowers and a raucous standing 'O' from the 8,000-and-change on hand? Nine perfect scores for artistic impression, Soviets named Andrei and Natalya bound for a Gulag, a pair of gold medals?

(Wait. Did I just dedicate an entire graph to ice skating?)

Okay, so maybe Paisley's Momus (née Nicholas Currie) wasn't captivated by the gold-medal performance of Brits Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean at the 1984 Winter Games in Sarajevo, Yugoslavia. But he was paying attention.

"Love On Ice" -- from the his acclaimed third album -- twists and perverts Torvill and Dean's figure skating fable in a way only Momus can. The track deals with sexuality and its divisive position within common culture (the protagonists are closet homosexuals), as well as the public's penchant for the glorification and gutting of its icons (the duo are crucified in the tabloids following their defeat).

"But the ice is a mirror in which people see," go the words, "their nation and their sexuality/And now we've come out of the closet." It's stark, it's honest; it's Momus at his most challenging.

Hear it for yourself. Download: "Love On Ice" by Momus.