Sunday 1 January 2017

Various Artists ‎– "No Platform For Heels" (Tender Hooks Records ‎– HOOK 001) 1982


As its another new year's day, it's an opportunity to post some of the few things I have left from the original inspiration for this blog,from what is now termed, UK DIY.
One of the last great UK DIY compilations featuring some of the stalwarts of that brief period, Mark Automaton, Digital Dinosaurs,and Missing Persons.
The Missing Persons are ,as usual, a bit dodgy in the 'we're all Hippies' department; whipping out the acoustic guitar for a sing-a-long around the travellers camp communal fire, as they all invariably await their trust-funds to start paying for their future Docklands apartments,and inherit their place on the board of the Bank of England. That's proto-anarcho punk for y'all!
The other Hippies on this disc are The Digital Dinosaurs, but they were genuine, working class hippies who just happened to write fantastic pop songs.One classic of which is 'Sheena Easton'; which one can adapt for todays crop of plastic pop stars by simply replacing her name with any talent show winner of your choice, and Esther Rantzen with Simon Cowell.....if you know any of these wankers, because I don't!
Mark Automaton,does his usual Mark E. Smith without an ego versions of zero-budget pop, and sounds like the Instant Automatons, but is called, on this occasion, The Stan Tomato Band.
There is lots more of ambition-less, anti-pop charm to make up the rest of the tracks on this nicely understated compilation, from a time when life was, in retrospect, not quite so shit.


Tracklist:
A1 –Missing Persons - Claire 2:44
A2 –Missing Persons  - The Pioneer Spirit 1:55
A3 –The Stan Tomato Band -  InterCity 125 1:59
A4 –The Stan Tomato Band - Ignorance Is Bliss 2:08
A5 –The Victims Of Romance - All There Is 3:23
A6 –The Digital Dinosaurs Music - For The Teeth 2:30
A7 –The Digital Dinosaurs - Sheena Easton 2:23
A8 –Lurch  - High Steppin' Momma 4:32
B1 –Polish August - Desperate Romance 2:32
B2 –Polish August - Ten Tips For Beautiful Nails 2:17
B3 –Kill Your Sons - Obsession 4:11
B4 –Len Liggins - Womb With A View 1:17
B5 –Len Liggins - Sandwiches 1:35
B6 –Len Liggins - All The Dead Men 1:30
B7 –Product Of Reason - Execution Time 2:50
B8 –Left At The Lights - Dead At The Wheel 3:33

1 comment:

northfieldhat said...

thanks. obviously some drunken or overly innocent patron misheard the Instant Automatons name as 'The Stan Tomato Band'.
(or it's almost an anagram). Lind of like Matching Mole coming phonetically direct from
the french translation of Soft Machine: Machine Molle!
galen