Hey, please come check out these Ten Amazing Wreckless Eric Videos over at the THE BIG TAKEOVER!
Here's an undated but good-sounding Wreckless Eric (more HERE) solo set. Since it features a reading from his book 2004 autobiography "A Dysfunctional Success", a run-through of his 2002 single "Continuity Girl" and no mention of Amy Rigby we can safely assume this is from the earlier part of the 2000's.
Update: reader, Allan, suggest this is from Bonaventure Social Club 05.04.2006.
MRML Readers,whaddaya think of this live set by WE?
By 1994, Wreckelss Eric (more HERE) had created another short-lived ensemble, oddly
named, the Hitsville House Band. There's no drastic change in the Wreckless one's sound on the group's lone
album, 12:00 Stereo, other than
Eric's delving deeper into American country music. Like his first
producer, Nick Lowe, Eric's work has always been inflected with steely
melodies and emotional nakedness of country song-writing. "Guitar-Shaped
Swimming Pool" (with its tip of the Stetson to Webb Pierce) and
"Friend's on the Floor" (which squashes most Nashville song-writing
beneath it's heel) represent the gut-bucket country aspect of the album.
While raw, primal rock n' country courses through the album's grooves, Eric
hasn't stopped writing pop songs like, "The Girl With the Wandering
Eye", a devastatingly melodic post-mortem on love lost.
The Hitsville House Band were, according, to the liner notes:
DENIS BAUDRILLART -- drumset and maracas
ERIC GOULDEN -- succession of crapped-out guitars and organs, vocal
FABRICE LOMBARDO -- double bass, bass guitar, Javanese toe flute
André Barreau -- extra guitars, harmony vocals
Michael Lembach -- trumpet
Christoph Linder -- tenor & baritone saxes
MRML Readers,whaddaya think of this particular phase in Eric's ever-shifting muddle!!
Wreckless Eric (more HERE) has stuck to his guns. Those guns, his chugga-chugga
guitar and his garbled vocals, are like old flintlock muskets: crude,
noisy and deadly at close range.
Following the premature death of the Len Bright Trio, Wreckless Eric, by then dry and living in rural France, put out Le Beat Group Electrique
with Catfish Truton (drums) and André Barreau (bass) in 1989. LBGE were almost as grimy and roughshod musically as the LBT but with less
noise-for-noise’s-sake and more sharp song-writing. Eric sounds like a
ramshackle Buddy Holly on tunes like "Tell Me I'm the Only One", while
"Sarah" is Dylan-esque put-down that sounds somewhere between the early
Beatles (hopped-up in Hamburg era) and Van Morrison (circa early Them). At one point, he channels Lou Reed on “Just For You”
but not until putting a Wreckelss pop spin on mental illness, with the
ironically chipper-sounding "Depression".
Listen to this whole album, all 32:17 of it, and you'll be struck by how fearless Eric is; how he remains unbowed and well-armed!
Tracklist
A1 Tell Me I'm The Only One 3:10
A2 Wishing My Life Away 4:02
A3 Depression 2:56
A4 It's A Sick Sick World 1:39
A5 Just For You 4:45
A6 Sarah 3:17
B1 The Sun Is Pouring Down 5:00
B2 I'm Not Going To Cry 2:08
B3 You Sweet Big Thing 3:50
B4 Fuck By Fuck 1:16
B5 Parallel Beds 4:05
B6 True Happiness 5:00
Hope you enjoyed the re-up and feel free to leave us a COMMENT! about Mr. Eric and LBGE!
The BBC got pretty much every surviving Stiff vet - The Damned, Elvis Costello, Nick Lowe, Wreckless Eric, Devo, Madness, The Pogues plus, of course, label honchos Dave Robinson and Jake Riviera - to talk up a storm for this hour-long doc.
At the Shop is a crude document of ramshackle performance by Wreckless Eric (more HERE) and his Le Beat Groupe Electrique for a small crowd at the New Rose store in Paris in 1990. For much of the set Eric is teetering on the brink of chaos, and clearly loving every fucking minute of it. Then, on "If It Makes You Happy", Eric enters a staring contest with Nietzsche's abyss and half through the psychotic harmonica break, the abyss blinks.
Following that battle, Eric pulls back, slightly, pour un version Français of "Depression", followed by two oldies; Larry Williams' rockabilly stomper "Bony Maronie" and Eric's own '77 shout-along, "Semaphore Signals". Then, it's once more back into the depths for a harrowing, almost Dylan '66 style, take on The Captains of Industry's, "Our Neck of the Woods." Finally, without a flinch, Eric caps this gutsy performance with another of his tender love songs, "You're the Girl for Me." Those customers, who watched the whole brilliant mess while crammed in-between the racks of vinyl, must've left the store at once baffled and yet exhilarated.
Tracklist
A1 Big Old World 3:42
A2 If It Makes You Happy 5:04
A3 (Waiting For The Shit) (To Hit The Fan) 6:40
A4 Depression (version Francaise)
B1 Bonie Maronie
B2 Semaphore Signals 3:20
B3 Our Neck Of The Woods 5:28
B4 You're The Girl For Me 4:50
Hope you enjoyed the re-up (with AMAZING new footage!) and feel free to leave us a COMMENT! about Mr. Eric and LBGE!
Legendary English lo-fi fuck-up Wreckless Eric (more HERE) sends out his ramshackle Christmas wishes to all his faithful listeners
Tracklist
A Christmas
B1 Hawaiian Christmas
Credits
Guitar [Hawaiian Steel, Lead], Percussion, Vocals – Martin Stone
Vocals, Guitar, Bass, Percussion – Wreckless Eric
Xylophone, Bells [Jingle Bells] – Lo De Bodinat
"Sex,Drugs, Rock n' Roll and Chaos" is the (bastardized) title of the final track on this L.P , featuring Elvis Costello, Nick Lowe, Wreckless Eric, Larry Wallis and Ian Dury) and it's a pretty damn good summary of the whole enterprise. The enterprise was to gather the eminent Stiff artists of 1977 and send 'em off all together on a package tour like Motown did with its stars back in the sixties.
Those Motown shows were, witnesses say, professional, polished performances whereas the Stiff shows were, often, a shambles albeit a glorious shambles. Look at those lovable losers grinning out at you from the cover, as if to say, "We were third tier sloggers but now we've got a shot at the top." Sure enough, everyone of those grinners, save Wallis, took a serious shot at the pop charts, all with some, if varying, levels of success.
Nick Lowe's was long known for his love of just bashing the music out (hence that "Basher' nick name). That reckless spirit, which made Nick a conduit between the old pubsters and the angry kids, permeates this record. Nick's prominent on both versions of the cover (with poor E.C. hiding at the back). Nick's tunes here include his best released version of "I Knew the Bride" and a fun obscurity, "Let's Eat", Wreckelss Eric's songs - "Reconez Cherie" and "Semaphore Signals" are a bloody mess (and bloody good - much more here) while Elvis C. and the Attraction attack "Miracle Man" and, shades of Imperial Bedroom, cover Bacharch-David's "I Just Don't Know What To Do With Myself". Larry Wallis only gets to play his best song ("Police Car") so that polio survivor and funky eccentric Ian Dury can get three songs (counting that pile-on version of "Sex, Drugs and Rock n' Roll" that ends the album). Enjoy this raw document because it seems impossible to imagine prominent label nowadays with a roster of such resolute individuals surviving.
Every great artist survives a Difficult Period. During these periods, albums are marred by ill-advised instrumentation, spoken word sections, slack song-writing and a a burning desire to destroy a myth or two. Think of Neil Young's Trans or Dylan's Self-Portrait. These D.P. works are occasionally championed by wide-eyed fans intent on being difficult but for the rest of the world they remain baffling.
Karaoke (1997), Wreckless Eric's (see here) sole release under his own name, Eric Goulden, is such a beast. Don't say I didn't warn you.
Whether or not "Bungalow Hi" (2004) still falls under this ''Difficult Period" can be debated. Clearly Eric is developing a brooding, menacing musical style to complement his bilious lyrics but it's simply less listenable without his grasp of rock n' roll history and pop smarts.
As befitting MRML policy, the albums posted in this series are functionally out-of-print (and most, but not all, are quite expensive used).That being said, the following excellent releases remain readily available and we would plead with you to support Wreckless Eric so that he may continue to offer us whatever the hell he wants to record.
These are available from your local Amazon domain (no link needed).
As an added inducement here's the deeply-excellent "the Downside of Being a Fuck-Up from his most recent album(on Stiff!) with his new wife Amy Rigby.
Eric also wrote a witty book, likewise available on Amazon.
P.S. If anyone has the artwork for Eric's "Sweet Jane" single, the songs for his Christmas single or or the artwork and songs from his Southern Domestic e.p. let me know and I'll post 'em sometime.
Update: Wm Perry recommends WE's cool-sounding radio show available here (and this article on WE + AR here.)
Perhaps in response to the above quoted idea, assuming it's been floated before, Wreckless Eric labeled his 1993 album, The Donovan of Trash; not Dylan, just his second-rate English imitator, Donovan, not punk rock, just pure, unadulterated Trash.
There certainly are echoes of Dylan in the stripped-down sound of this record; the blunt acoustic strumming, the crazed harmonica huffing, the threatening organ lines, the untutored but knife-sharp voice jacked high up in the mix and of course the ability to shift from tenderness to viciousness without notice.
But Wreckless Eric is a different mess, his bastardization of country, blues, jazz, rockabilly and garage rock was galvanized by punk rock, not the folk revival, even if like Dylan he's really apart from the movement that brought him into prominence. This album, released on Billy Childish's Hangman label, is a lethal piece of work, indebted to no one man or style.
Wreckless Eric - "Joe Meek"
{MRML readers please weigh in with a comment; what, if anything, does Wreckelss Eric have in common with Bob Dylan?}
Wreckless Eric has stuck to his guns. Those guns, his chugga-chugga guitar and his garbled vocals, are like old flintlock muskets: crude, noisy and deadly at close range.
Following the premature death of the Len Bright Trio, Wreckless Eric, by then dry and living in rural France, put out Le Beat Group Electrique with Catfish Truton (drums) and André Barreau (bass) in 1989. LBGE bit were almost as grimy and roughshod musically as the LBT but with less noise-for-noise’s-sake and more sharp song-writing. Eric sounds like a ramshackle Buddy Holly on tunes like "Tell Me I'm the Only One", while "Sarah" is Dylan-esque put-down that sounds somewhere between the early Beatles (hopped-up in Hamburg era) and Van Morrison (circa his early work with Them). At one point, he channels Lou Reed on “Just For You” but not until putting a Wreckelss pop spin on mental illness, with the ironically chipper-sounding "Depression".
Listen to this album, all 32:17 of it, and you'll be struck by how fearless Eric is; he remains unbowed and well-armed.
{Thanks to MRML readers for the landslide of comments in favour of greater Wrecklessness. Now please leave us a comment on Le Beat Groupe Electrique or your angle on Wreckless Eric's highs and lows or whatever the hell else strikes you.}
Finding a new ally in Billy Childish's crew, not to mention another new band name, Wreckless Eric got back to basics; low-fidelity and high volume. At one extreme, on songs such as "Sophie", The Len Bright Combo's two 1986 albums (both are on this out-of-print CD) turn into a mass of buzzing, roaring and squealing - like a fleet of Harleys gunning their engines in a cramped slaughterhouse. In other spots Eric's heart is back on his sleeve, ready to be picked at in such finely-written, almost country-ish songs, as "Someone Must've Nailed us Together and "Shirt Without a Heart". Then running down the line between those extremes is the blazing punk track, "The Golden Hour of Harry Secombe". It's a smart, caustic mix of garage-punk energy and experimental noise-mongering, occasionally reminiscent of where Northwest bands like Mudhoney would later dare to trod.
If there's a track here that in twenty years, rom-com's and bands seeking novel covers will exhume it's the sing-along, "Someone Must've Nailed Us Together", which sounds like an older and wiser yet defiant take on the romanticism heard in "Whole Wide World".
{Attention MRML readers: Do you want more out-of-print Wreckless Eric? Hit that comments button and type a message right now or forever hold your peace.}
WrecklessEric did it. By it, I mean have a hit, twenty years after the fact, with one of those neglected classics of the late seventies I prattle on so much about. “Whole Wide World” is a magisterial song, one that demolishes the distinctions between the bottom of the gutter and the top of the pop charts. And now, everyone from Will Ferrell to the Proclaimers to Napoleon Dynamite has contributed to the song’s 21st century ubiquity.
I could go on but this is not the place to dote on that which already suffers from lavish praise (but do go here to hear the 2006 World Cup version and others by the Monkees(!) and Die Toten Hosen). Let us rather consider the messier parts of Eric the Wreckless’ saga. After making an almost commercial album that he loathed like a self-inflicted wound, Eric was dropped by Stiff Records. This conflict was detailed in “A Pop Song” which was, ironically, a damn fine piece of song-writing.
Next, like Neil Young before him, Eric went from the middle of the road straight to the ditch. Like Neil, Eric’s raw voice and penchant for noise can make for difficult listening but there’s a rough beauty in much of it. Case in point, in 1985 Eric released A Roomful of Monkeys by his band the Captains of Industry, offering not some Randist fantasy of capitalist might but rather a bleak indictment of the mess that was Thatcher's England. It’s somber melodicism was a deliberate break with his old jolly, “I’m a Mess” personae - it’s a bit like a record Joe Strummer could’ve have made in 1985. In fact, Eric at this time was managed by former Clash road manager Johnny Green who’d brought former Clash deputies Norman Watt-Roy and Mickey Gallagher in to record the album. (Side note, Eric later recorded “The Crooked Beat", Clash bassist Paul Simonon’s contribution to Sandinista for the odd tribute album, The Sandanista Project. Wreckless Eric - Crooked Beat
The album, his last before an alcohol-fueled nervous breakdown, is a bit subdued but grows in power with repeated and careful, listening, of particular note is the more traditionally Wreckless song, "Reputation (A Serious Case of)". .
MRML is a blog about the devestating effects of culture: music, politics, comics plus etc. blah blah blah. At times MRML will post fine, unpurchasable three-chord obscurica (punk, pop-punk, new wave, mod, power-pop, gospel, reggae, hardcore, rockabilly, folk, country...whatever.) - - - - - - "The otherwise unavailable files in this blog are posted for a limited time and are intended for educational, non-commercial use. These files were transcribed from what are believed to be out-of-print sources. If you are aware of any of these items being readily available from commercial sources, or if any of these files infringe upon rights that you hold, please notify us so that we can quickly remove the referenced items immediately." - - - SUPPORT THE ARTISTS - BUY MUSIC!
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