This playlist is 90% vinyl friendly. Impressive.

‘The Planet’ turntable. Put together in 2015 by a Lego loving lad named Hayarobi, using 2405 pieces, the only non-Lego part being the Audio-Technica 1Ea cartridge. He must like Swiss Rolls.

Any track marked * has been given either a tiny or a slightly larger 41 Rooms ‘tweak’/edit/chop and the occasional tune sonically might not sound quite how it did, originally… and note, there’s a few expletives uttered in this show.

Lyric of Playlist 106…

Wire were getting playful.

00.00

(Intro) THE FLAMINGOS – Stars (Edit) – Unreleased demo – 1983. Episode #1 for info.

00.41

NEW ORDER – Let’s Go – Salvation! (Original Soundtrack), v/a LP – Les Disques Du Crépuscule – 1988

Instrumental and raw, and as full a detailing of the song’s complicated history as you could ever need is right here.

04.41

SEA FEVER – Beleaguered Land – Download only – 2022

With just a slim back story knowledge of the band personnel involved here (New Order, Section 25 and Johnny Marr) you might nearly guess they’d sound like this… and they do! .

07.55

A CERTAIN RATIO – All Night Party (Peel session) – Early, CD only – Soul Jazz – 2002

More Manchester! Any ACR fronted by Simon Topping’s vocals soundtracks the ’79-’81 years for me nearly as much as anyone. This 1979 Peely session take though didn’t make it to the vinyl version there is of the above compilation.

11.41

STEREOLAB – Robot Riot – Pulse Of The Early Brain (Switched On Volume 5), 3LP – Duophonic – 2022

Both this track and another, Unity Purity Occasional were written for sculptures made by Charles Long – an artist the band had previously collaborated with on the project, Music For The Amorphous Body Study Center – ‘with the sound being channeled through three tubes that simultaneously blow the visitors’ hands dry with warm jets of air.’ I hope it was all quieter than those dryers in motorway service stations. Unity Purity Occasional was used but Robot Riot remained unused/unreleased until now.

14.28

THE HOLLIES – Bus Stop – 7″ – Parlophone – 1966

I’ve bemoaned this before but as time rolls on it gets tougher to imagine – let alone remember – the ‘life less cluttered’ and more innocent times in which records like this were made.

17.24

NICOLE WILLIS & THE SOUL INVESTIGATORS – My Four Leaf Clover – 7″ – Timmion Records – 2006

The production is the only give away this is not a Sixties soul tune, or indeed even a cover of one. How much it was deliberately honed to sound of those times? Dunno.

19.58

FRANKIE LYMON and THE TEENAGERS – Why Do Fools Fall In Love * – 7″ – Gee – 1955

I’m reasonably confident this will be the oldest record to get spun on 41 Rooms and back in my teens I remember picking up a Columbia label 78(RPM) of it somewhere in my ‘crate digging’ trips. The era and feel was never really my thing but this is a great vocal, from a then 13-year-old Lymon. Very weirdly, after I’d put this show together a friend Facebook posted a clip of Joni Mitchell from a recent and extremely rare live onstage appearance (at this year’s Newport Folk Festival) and one of her in-between-song anecdotes led to her and friends onstage running through a version of this. Way before the Mop Tops, some pop Doo-wop.

22.11

EVERYDAY PEOPLE – Headline News * – 7″ – SBK – 1990

I might be wrong but I seem to remember this possibly straddling a time they switched names from Floy Joy to this moniker. Worth it for the rousing chorus vocals and BVs production.

26.22

THE PASSIONS – The Swimmer * – 7″ – Polydor – 1980

I don’t care how much losing the first 31 seconds of this tune may unhinge the storyline, I am not including it here. It’s plodding and it… is… PANTS! I wonder if they ever ended gigs with this. They should have. It’s a real ‘credits rolling’ sound.

28.44

SOFT METALS – Voices – Self titled, LP – Captured Tracks – 2011

In existence for approximately two years and then vocalist Patricia Hall appeared a decade or so later with a new surname (Wolf) and not one but two ‘ambient’, ‘abstract’ and, very noticeably, instrumental albums. What does that tell us?

33.55

BRENDA and THE BEACH BALLS – Dancing Thru’ The Night – Yummy-Ya! 12″ – Siren – 1987

Brenda Kenny recorded and released under a number of guises in the Eighties, this being one of a few making it to 41 Rooms at one point or another. Overall, she had a bit of a left field approach that, to my ears, has stood the test of time well.

38.52

JUNGLE FIRE – Firewalker * – 7″ – Colemine – 2013

A play on coalmine the label name may well be, as their production line has them shovelling out releases in double quick time.

42.22

RECIPE – Upriver – 7″ – Inertial Records – 1984

The reasons I reckon this single died a death at the time are what now makes it interesting for me. Without the production (and maybe fully the song?) to match, there’s a stunningly bright and shiny three mins plus pop tune buried in this near six minutes, that still sounds endearing in 2022. Main man, Douglas Benford was also behind the earlier-in-the-decade Inertia 7″ singles now coveted by minimal wave/early electronic followers.

45.57

HEAVEN 17 – Soul Warfare * – Penthouse and Pavement, LP – Virgin – 1981

The bridge in this always pissed me off! It came in a verse too early for me… so for the show I moved it… for better or worse.

50.48

HERE’S JOHNNY – Hellzapoppin – 7″ – RCA – 1986

In its approach (and maybe reach for the charts?) not unlike the Recipe single earlier, albeit it with a clearer sound and a tad more even of a commercial feel.

55.13

WIRE – Eardrum Buzz – 12″ – Mute – 1989

‘Buffalo Bill, deprived of will. Chasing a hamburger down the hill… ‘ Of course, lads.

59.17

ROMEO VOID – Love Is An Illness – Itsacondition, LP – 415 Records / CBS – 1981

I bought the album at the time, only to find that the only track on it I’d heard to date… was the only one that subsequently grabbed me. With a reappraisal forty years later its hit rate for me has increased exactly 100%.

Half time and Lou’s nearly in the drink.

01.02.58

ECHO and THE BUNNYMEN – In Bluer Skies * – Porcupine, LP – Korova – 1983

Mac’s vocal on their most obscure track would still signpost it was them.

01.07.13

BOBBY BLOOM – Heavy Makes You Happy – 7″ – Polydor – 1970

Carefree, cheery sounds for my young self in the early mid Seventies.

01.10.04

KRAFTWERK vs EVERYTHING BUT THE GIRL – ‘Model Goes Missing’ – Youtube only – Mashup only – Who Knows?

Ho ho! And should you need another variation on this theme, there’s also a ‘Missing The Home Computer Numbers’ take out there on the ether.

01.13.04

KRAFTWERK – Numbers * – 7″ b-side – EMI – 1982

Definitely got spun on my deck duties at Winkles back in the day. Armed with a sharpness in the production that you could slice your head off!

01.18.32

WENDY and LISA – Someday I – Fruit At The Bottom, LP – Virgin – 1989

Part of Prince’s engine room at one point, here in their own right.

01.21.38

NANCY WILSON – Where Does That Leave Me – 7″ – Capitol – 1965

The name’s Wilson… Nancy Wilson. Three versions of the tune were released as singles in 1965, with this being the only one where the producer must have had a James Bond theme tune or two ricocheting around inside his head.

01.24.05

SAM COOKE – The Japanese Farewell Song (Sayonara) – Cooke’s Tour, LP – RCA – 1960

Was the album a cynical marketing move to tap into markets around the world? Who knows. His Gall-way (flat ‘A’) Bay was certainly less convincing a story but here, for his Japanese fans, he’s just the epitome of effortless vocal technique and control.

01.26.54

THE TWILIGHT SAD – It Never Was The Same – Split 7″ (with Robert Smith) – FatCat Records – 2015

For some reason I can’t exactly pin down, this reminds me of Carmine, a track by Cloud Boat that had surfaced the previous year.

01.31.43

UT – Wailhouse – Griller, LP – Blast First – 1989

They’ve made no new music since 1989 but they had a ‘sound structure’ that’s worn well, enough so for them to still occasionally (but regularly) regroup to play live.

01.37.16

THE BEATLES – It’s All Too Much – 7″ – Capitol Records – 1996

Being a pre-teener in the mid Sixties the Fab Four were omnipresent and I was fan. I wouldn’t though have put money on this (or indeed a certain other four) being in the first five Beatles tunes I’d get to spin on 41 Rooms… if said world had been known back then.

Lennon with some 7’s – chances are though the above isn’t below. I think there’s a Speciality Records 7 there, though. Bet it’s Little Richard.

01.41.12

HAWKWIND – Hurry On Sundown – 7″ – Liberty – 1970

For some reason I remember a copy I had of this back in the mid to late seventies being in near pristine condition. I suppose though that shouldn’t have been too surprising, given I’d picked it up only a few years after its release. Mine now long sold, another copy made £621 in 2019. Maybe it was the one I had. If you could have tracked the physical journeys of decades old vinyl, some will have journeyed a fair bit around the world.

01.45.33

THE WOODENTOPS – Well Well Well – 7″ – Rough Trade – 1985

Frantic… as nearly per usual.

01.49.37

CHASE & STATUS – Hurt You * – 12″ – Ram Records – 2007

Blistering stuff!

A UK acetate out there somewhere.

01.53.18

FELLOWSHIP (feat WAYWARD MIND) – Dark Flower Remedy – Split promo 12″ – Flagship Records – 1998

Fellowship was DJ/Producer, Darren Hickey (no relation… though you’re never quite sure with Irish ancestry. ) and as for Wayward Mind – ‘a vocal that is both breathtaking and beautiful. From the ominous lines the emotion of Joe Roberts … stated the aligned press release.

Show 107 will be out Sept 4

Dec

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