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
Die Toten Hosen (more HERE) followed their 1991 punk covers album, Learning English Lesson One, with an all-English album of originals called, Love, Peace & Moneyin 1994. That album (which I bought in the dollar bin at Extreme Noise in Minneapolis in '95), seemed a bit grunge-damaged at the time but now sounds like a fun rock-punk mix with Wagnerian production.
This EP, donated to us by Bristolboy from the fantastic My Life's a Jigsaw (as a response to this gift from our reader, Roberto - don't you just love the cycle of giving!) comes from that album. Both album tracks, "Love Song" and "My Land" are cynical and utterly catchy and well worth your time. It seems lesson two of the band's plan to learn English was to form an alliance with The Boys, whose members Honest John Plain and Matt Dangerfield get writing credits on every song on Love, Peace & Money, including the two aforementioned anthems. One of those Boys, John Plain also get a co-writing credit on the terrace-echoing football song, "Long Way From Liverpool" and (I believe) he and Dangerfield pitch in on a foul-mouthed-but-still-kinda-clever cover of "Guantanamera" that would've sent Pete Seeger into an axe-wielding frenzy! Plus you get the band running through "Whole Wide World" with it's writer, Wreckelss Eric (more HERE) on lead vocals.
Track listing
"Lovesong" (Breitkopf/Frege, Plain) − 3:41 (English version of "Liebeslied")
"My Land" (Breitkopf/Frege, Dangerfield) − 3:55 ("Willkommen in Deutschland")
"Whole Wide World" (Wreckless Eric) − 3:19 (Wreckless Eric cover)
"Long Way from Liverpool" (Breitkopf, John Plain/Frege) - 3:01
"Guantanamera" (Joséito Fernandez) - 3:20
So you're all familiar with the give/receive binary and how the former is widely considered to be optimal here during the jolly season.
Therefore in order to give you, dear readers, a chance at betterness, here is a list of out-of-print releases for which MRML is seeking donations of decent quality rips and cover scans for:
If you can help, please feel free to e-mail me at:
musicruinedmylife(at)gmail.com
~
Mega City Four: Any demos (1987-1994)
UK pop-punk
The Gas: Emotional Warfare (good rip) + early singles. (1981)
UK new wave
The Cry: Leave Your Bones in the Hallway (1981)
Canadian new wave/power-pop
Ruggedy Annes: Jagged Thoughts (1984)
Canadian indie-punk
V.A. - Not Just Mandella (1987)
UK pop, punk, indie compilation
On the Air: Ready for Action 7"
UK mod-punk w/Simon Townsend (Pete's bro)
Swalk: No Shame (~1983)
Eighties glam-pop w/ Jo Callis
Modernettes: Gone But Not Forgiven LP (1981)
Canadian power-pop
The Payolas: China Boys/Make Some Noise 7" (1979)
Canadian power-pop
Wreckless Eric: Yuletide 45 (1990)
UK/France rock n' roll
Poisoned 12" (1986)
Canadian Eighties new wave band w/ Art Bergmann
Rise: Joy 12" (1990)
Canadian melodic hardcore
Doug and the Slugs: Ten Big Ones LP and any radio broadcasts (1979-1981)
Canadian new wave
The Slugs (-Doug) "Running Around" 7" (1981)
Canadian new wave
Graham Shaw: Good Manners in the 80's (1981)
Canadian new wave
~
Speaking of of all that giving, MRML loves fitting musical donations of Mp3's and cover art (as you shall see in just a few hours, meine freunde). So if you think you're in possession of other out-of-print treasures not listed here (nor available at cooler blogs) by all means let me know at the e-mail above!
"As a producer, my biggest break came during working on "Watching the Detectives" and I discovered where the echo button was on the tape machine."
Nick Lowe
Despite being a fabulous song-writer, a smart quipper and passably handsome, Nick Lowe never hit stardom. Part of the reason might be that Nick, a long-time bass player, never loved the spotlight quite enough. From Kippington Lodge to Brinsley Scwharz, to Rockpile to Noise-to-Go and Little Village (and those are just the more famous ones) Nick always seemed to want to be part of, not just a band, but a team of equals. He used to seem a bit like a McCartney in search of his Lennon.
Further proof of his knack for team-work is the number of classics for which he's sat in the producers chair. Despite a catalog stacked with witty pop songs, more people probably own a song that Nick Lowe (more here) produced than one he performed. In interviews he often expresses amazement about this, as he believes he's no whiz at the mixing board. And certainly he's no sonic architect like Phil Spector or (shudder) Mutt Lange. After all, he earned his nick-name, Basher, for his recording philosophy of "bash it out now - tart it up later". But that gut-level style fit the times so perfectly and even when times changed and things got electronic ("Any barnyard horse can kick a synth" he once said) Nick always kept the songs and the people who played them right up front.
1. Graham Parker Back to Schooldays
Nick's first gig at the controls was this album, where much of his former band, Brinsley Schwarz, were now backing up this fiery little British soul-punk under the name the Rumour.
2. The Damned New Rose
Nick also produced what is commonly called the first punk rock single (which contained a love song and a Beatles cover - hmmm).
3. Snuff Rock Gobbing on Life
C.P. Lee(of Albertos Y Lost Trios Paranoias who deserve a post of their own) strikes again with first punk piss-take, which mocks the Pistols, the Damned and the Clash in a few short minutes.
4. Wreckless Eric Whole Wide World
Lowe's only production for Eric was this single, but it's a monster that will never die.
5. Elvis Costello Watching the Detectives
Lowe and Costello's partnership is another example of his ability to draw out the best in others, I mean how else can you explain how Nick produced Elvis Costello doing what many consider the definitive version of Nick's own "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding"?
6. Dr. Feelgood She's a Wind-Up
The Feelgoods may be the very embodiment of pub-rock and they certainly cranked up the tempo and the volume of what began a a bit of a laid-back movement.
7. Carlene Carter Baby Ride Easy
Johnny Cash's step-daughter (and child of country legends, June Carter and Carl Smith) married Nick Lowe who produced some hit-an-miss albums for her. Strangely, her move to Nashville, thankfully accompanied by her husband (and Tom Petty sideman), the late Howie Epstein, began her prime period.
8. Mickey Jupp Old Rock n' Roller
Jupp is another lesser pub rock vet (he did write "Switchboard Susan", which got covered by both Nick himself and the Searchers when they recorded at Dave Edmunds' Rockfield studios).
9. The Pretenders Stop Your Sobbing
I suppose there are more popular nominees for the absolute zenith of Chrissie Hynde's catalog but I'd say she's made a fine, storied career out of never quite topping this one.
10. Richard Hell Kid With the Replaceable Head
Nick produced Hell? Yup, again just the once. (The 'video' is for the Destiny Street version produced by Alan Betrock and Hell.)
11. John Hiatt Love That Harms
Nick's would have a strong hand in bringing Hiatt's taut song-writing to a broader audience but not just yet.
12. Johnny Cash Without Love
When Johnny Cash is your step-father-in-law you better write him a damn good song, you better play on it and produce it in your basement. Much later, Nick's "The Beast in Me" became the linchpin in both his and Johnny's mid-nineties comebacks.
13. Fabulous Thuderbirds Diddy
The fun-loving, crowd-pleasing retro-minded music the Brit's cheerfully call "pub rock", North Americans derisively refer to as "bar rock". This is probably because while the back-to-basics movement Nick and his contemporaries built was vital and alive, sometimes the North American equivalent sounded like paint-by-numbers boogie even when, in the Fabulous Thunderbirds case, they have Stevie Ray Vaughn's brother in the band and had some middling eighties hits.
14. Paul Carrack Don't Give My Heart a Break
It's Lowe's song-writing and production (alongside Carrack's warm vocals) that keeps this from descending into tinky eighties pop.
15. Moonlighters I Feel Like a Motor
Austin De Lone, from Eggs Over Easy, was the Yankee in pub rock's court and even in his next band, the Moonlighters, he kept a vigil for the sounds of '75.
16. The Redskins Keep on Keepin' On
Their goal was,"To sing like the Supremes and walk like the Clash" and Nick's job was to keep them from sounding like a Trotskyist version of the Commitments.
17. His Latest Flame Somebody's Gonna Get Hurt A pretty, if lushly melodramatic, pop song that bears little evidence of Nick's tricks.
The Men They Couldn't Hang Greenback Dollar
Sure TMTCH were Pouges-ian but what a ripping version of this Hoyt Axton-via-the Kingston Trio song.
18. Katydids Lights Out (Read My Lips)
An Anglo-American folk-pop band, to whom Nick gave a bright sound, to no commercial avail.
19. Rain A Taste of Rain
Liverpudlian jangle, probably owned a lot of the same records as the guys in R.E.M.
20. Mavericks Blue Moon
The Mavericks, not a name you'd want to be pallin' around with in these post-Sarah Palin times, played country with a keen sense of history, which made them a perfect choice to do one song (again) with Nick.
Nick hasn't produced much in recent years. Since the nineties, he's focused on his ideal micro-niche as a writer and performer of tightly focused soul-country-pop songs over a four album Brentford Trilogy.
"It's either this or the biscuit factory, really."
Nick Lowe on his career
Speaking of Stiff Records, their second L.P. release, after Damned, Damned, Damned, A Bunch of Stiffs emphasizes the lark-ish side of the label. The hits here are Wreckless Eric's "Whole Wide World", Elvis Costello's "Less Than Zero", "Back to Schooldays" by Graham Parker and Motorhead's "White Line Fever" (officially released on Chiswick). Then the going gets weird. Nick Lowe's "I Love My Label" works as a laugh and a song, Dave Edmunds' cover of Jo Jo Gunne fulfills the rock n' roll quotient and, predating Dewey Cox by thirty years, we have "Food" by the Takeaways with a Mystery Guest you're all supposed to hope is Bob Dylan. As if, deep into his mystic-poet guise (not his best but far from his worst) between Desire and Street Legal, Dylan did boozy self-parody.
I Love My Label - Nick Lowe Go The Whole Wide World - Wreckless Eric White Line Fever - Motörhead Less Than Zero - Elvis Costello Little By Little - Magic Michael Back To Schooldays - Graham Parker (uncredited)
Jump For Joy - Stones Masonry Maybe - Jill Read Jo Jo Gunne - Dave Edmunds The Young Lords - Tyla Gang Food - The Takeaways
This post owes some inspiration to Bert Muirhead's Stiff: the Story of a Record Label. After a little more digging I found this on some other blogs (including one of the first, and still one of the best, music blogs, Power-Pop Criminals). I was in too deep to stop, so to add some value (the book sells for almost a hundred bucks on eBay), here's its gossipy entry on this album:
A 'cash-in' record all the acts here were old friends of (Stiff founders) Jake (Robinson) or Dave (Rivera). The album worked well considering the ragbag of demos and finished articles from which it was compiled. The blend of heavy metal, rock and roll and new pop combined to make a potent album. Certainly, when the word punk was on everyone's lips and there was little of it in the shops, it helped fill the void.
Only the Costello and Wreckless tracks had been issued as singles and Motorhead's would have been if they had not signed to Bronze. Of the rest, "I Love My Label" was a typical Nick Lowe ditty (co-written with Jake). Magic Micheal was well-known on the benefit concert scene and was on the first Greasy Truckers album. GP's track was uncredited as he'd just signed with Phonogram but was still managed by Dave Robinson. Stones Masonry featured Martin Stone and postdated his spells with Mighty Baby and Chilli Willli (famous Jake connection). Jill Read was in fact Dave Edmunds. (Sean) Tyla was also part of the pre-Stiff crowd. The Takeaways were a studio band comprised of Lowe, Edmunds, and Larry Wallis. The nasal intonations are probably* Tyla imitating Dylan. Recording costs were minimal and the profits were probably high as the album sold like hot cakes.
* According to roberto (and backed up by the authoritative 45 Revolutions) the faux-Dylan was in fact C.P. Lee, head of faux-punk band Albertos Y Lost Trios Paranoias and author of the definitive Stiff slogan, "If it Ain't Stiff, it Ain't Worth a Fuck".
* C.P. Lee dropped by to give some excellent detail, "It was me - It was the second take - the first take was done in the 'style' of Brian Ferry - Jake and Nick asked if I could do Dylan - I did and got £25, a free copy of the album and a night out at The Marquee - Vive Le Rock!!" Bless you, C.P.
"(Ronnie) Biggs is a fool, a buffoon....if you're going to worship a train robber, why not the one who got the money?" Johnny Rotten
For decades Die Toten Hosen have ruled the charts of their native Germany by mixing the swagger of glam rock, the aggro of '77 punk and and the sing-along choruses of schlager (a central and Northern European easy listening genre whose name sounds like a portmanteau of schmaltz and lager for good reason). Outside Deutschland, the band, whose name means "The Dead Pants", are best known for the 1991 album Learning English: Lesson 1, in which they covered punk classics by the likes of the Ramones, the Vibrators and MRML favourite Wreckless Eric, each with a guest from the original version. It's an impressive achievement, though no more musically memorable than their albums of schlager songs and Christmas carols done under the pseudonym Die Roten Rosen.
The key to this seemingly backward-looking exercise is in the sole original,"Carnival in Rio". The special guest on this track (and on the two B-sides: the Sex Pistols' '"Everybody is Innocent" and Eddy Grant via the Clash's "Police on My Back") is notorious lowlife and Great Train Robber, Ronnie Biggs. To say Biggs comes off as like your disheveled, creepy old uncle, is sort of an insult to the disheveled, creepy old uncles of the world.
Fortunately, Biggs is used here as a punk prop (watch singer Campino give up on trying to get Biggs to sing at the 34 second mark) just as he was with the very late period Sex Pistols. While Malcolm McLaren used him to hide the fact that the Sex Pistols were dead, Die Toten Hosen use him, and a shit-load of curses, to disguise their song's surprisingly sweet sentiment. "Carnival in Rio (Punk Was)"is where the band lays their guts on the line. The song is both a tribute to their forefathersand a paean to punk's indomitable spirit of defiant optimism, exemplified by those shouts of, "It'll all be coming back!" at the end. Amen. Punk never dies, fuckers.
"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?}
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!
If you have any questions or music to donate you can contact me at musicruinedmylife (at) gmail (dot) com
Re: Re-Ups
MRML does not plan to restore all of the content lost in The Great Mediafire Gutting of 2012. Polite requests may be made in the appropriate section, regular commenters will get priority.
Support the artist
Support DTH! 
Support the band!
These are available from your local Amazon domain (no link needed).
{MRML readers please weigh in with a comment; what, if anything, does Wreckelss Eric have in common with Bob Dylan?}
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