Tuesday 20 September 2022

The Adverts – "Cast Of Thousands" - The Ultimate Edition (The Devils Own Jukebox – SDEVIL905CD) 2005 / 1979


Another endlessly interesting and debatable aspect of the Punk Rock Explosion,is the seeming inability of any first or second wave group to actually expand upon the theme."What do we do now?"
A clutch of what, at the time, seemed like bloody terrible albums, were squeezed from between the butt cheeks of the new wave of Rock'n'Roll. A question as contentious as the "Who invented the Punk Rock" dilemma,is "What was Punk after Punk"? If you were The Buzzcocks or The Ramones it meant carrying on doing the same thing over and over again, maybe write the odd longer song,but they painted themselves into a corner. If you were The Adverts it meant getting a classically trained keyboard player to clunk away, Elton John and his fat stumpy fingers style, along with the newly penned two chord blunders from the gifted pen of T.V.Smith.Thankfully the record company didn't supply a string section,but the key-bored player had a polyphonic synth to supply a subtle wash of horrible string sounds. This difficult second album has,like a lot of prog albums, that lingering foul taste of the failed musical about it. However,as fan-bloody-tastic "Crossing The Red Sea" was,things were moving fast in the direction of experimentation for Punk's derocked  children in what is now referred to as 'Post-Punk'.Back then it was all thoughr of as punk proper...was it not?
The Pop Group, Gang Of Four, PiL,etc had kicked the chair from under the phenomenon that made all this possible,and the first wave survivors were dangling from a rope  after being caught in a post-punk pincer movement.
Despite wishing I was going out with Gaye Advert from beyond the first singles time, before she started getting constantly drunk and putting on the weight, one had hardly noticed that the Adverts had released a 'second' album,which upon leafing through the 'A' section in our local secondhand record emporium,
I had stumbled upon. I had heard "Televisions Over", and thought it was certainly rather splendid lyrically, but sounded a bit dodgy,like it had been recorded in a damp cardboard box.The drums sounded like cardboard too,and the guitar had all the bottom end and top end taken off,leaving this mid-range mud as the backing to Teev's impressively impassioned vocals....and it was so slow that it had got stuck in it's own mud.
Maybe the album was different?......turns out it was worse!/
As we now know, Timothy Smith is a rather fine wordsmith, and the words and tunes on "Cast Of Thousands, crackle with spiteful cynicism , the trouble is those dreadful keyboards.Be it a failed attempt at musicality,or to be taken seriously,or a desperate attempt to appear to be moving forward.....I dunno!? The trick was not to go forwards but to turn left or right,and whip out the oblique strategies cards.
Its another album that needs to be drastically re-mixed by someone who knows about EQ. The guitar needs re-recording, even though Howard Pickup is probably the worst guitarist in the Punk Years, which is indeed some kind of honor.Maybe they had it in mind to record Howard's parts again, but gave up the idea after he left rehearsals one day,said see you tomorrow,and was never seen again!
Of course Super-Fan of virtually everything that ever existed, Henry Rollins, is constantly ejaculating superlatives for The Adverts, saying stuff as if channeling the scriptwriter of Fast and Furious 79 million.Such as (I'm making this up by the way)This album kicks serious butt like a nuclear blast in a sea of napalm, or equally silly words to that effect. 
The fact is this album sounds like having a couple of pints of mud poured in yer ears, but I've grown to love it like a disabled child.....I now adore the sludgy guitar sound,and have zoned out the piano.I even like the flaccid wet cardboard sound of the drums?,,,,you can get to like most things if you dump your conceptions and preconceptions down the shitter. I need to like this album more than anything,the songs are badly recorded classics,but they remain classic....I surrender (my fav hymn to apathy ever),its flawed, killed off one of the best groups of my Epiphanal years ,ended Gaye's musical career,but ,like an ugly girlfriend you've  grown to love , I've....er...grown to love it.
The radio sessions included here,are a short but imperfect glimpse into what might have been. For the "Cast of Thousands" tracks a better production job clears away the dirt slightly,just as you'd expect from the BBC,plus a couple of tunes that TV would use for the much hyped Explorers album,which also bombed.However the classic session tracks on the bonus disc,tend to overshadow the later material somewhat unfortunately.....as they would for most Punk tunes.
The Adverts were a great example of how you could do Punk without going Metal.Mainly because they couldn't play their instruments...for real this time instead of a stunt by a svengali shop manager. 
Tim Smith would persevere over the ensuing thirty plus years,to now be a big draw as a solo artists with his intense one man shows....its never too late.

Tracklist:

Cast Of Thousands:

1.1 Cast Of Thousands
1.2 The Adverts
1.3 My Place
1.4 Male Assault
1.5 Television's Over
1.6 Fate Of Criminals
1.7 Love Songs
1.8 I Surrender
1.9 I Looked At The Sun
1.10 I Will Walk You Home

Bonus Tracks:
1.11 Television's Over (Single Version)
1.12 Back From The Dead

The Complete Adverts Radio Sessions:

2.1 One Chord Wonders
2.2 Bored Teenagers
2.3 Gary Gilmore's Eyes
2.4 Newboys
2.5 Quickstep
2.6 We Who Wait
2.7 New Church
2.8 Safety In Numbers
2.9 Great British Mistake
2.10 Fate Of Criminals
2.11 Television's Over
2.12 Love Songs
2.13 Back From The Dead
2.14 I Surrender
2.15 The Adverts
2.16 I Looked At The Sun
2.17 Cast Of Thousands
2.18 I Will Walk You Home


20 comments:

Anonymous said...

"Ahem"

P E N I S

julio said...

IN THE END PUNK WAS A MOVE FROM KIDS THAT WERE GLAM FANBASE. SO, WHEN THING CALLED TO, THEY DID WHAT KIDS DO UNDER PRESSURE: TURNED TO THEIR FATHERS. OR IN THIS CASE, BECAME GLAM. WHO WAS WISE TOOK THE MANTLE OF THE TIMES AND TURNED TO THE GLITTER BAND BEAT FOR SAFETY. OTHERS, LIKE THE ADVERTS, TRIED THEIR HAND AT STEVE HARLEY AND PERISHED. IT WONT MADE EM BAD, AND, AS I HEARD IT DECADES AFTER THE FACT, I LIKED THE ALBUM BY WHAT IT IS AKA SOME GREAT SONGS WITH A LOUSY PRODUCTION. REMASTER DID WHAT COULD HERE, SO I JUST CALL THE UGLY GIRLFRIEND ANALOGY AGAIN: ITS COMFY TO SLEEP WITH, GOT HIS THOUGHT IN LINE WITH MINE AND WE BUILT A HOUSE TOGETHER. SO I DONT CARE WHAT THE CROWD HAS TO SAY...

Anonymous said...

This and the Damned's second are a whole lot better than the current shite flooding the charts for the last thirty years.

Jonny Zchivago said...

I'm prepared to expand that to 'the last 40 years',lets say it all turned to shite about 1984...so 38 years of shame.

Anonymous said...

I always unironically liked this album and like you can usually tune out the piano parts. I think adding a keyboard player would have worked if it had been someone like Una Baines instead of this lounge band John Tesh bloke. He needed to be as incompetent as the rest of the band.

Kzka said...

Ha! Endlessly debatable indeed. I think The Slits and Wire expanded into some pretty interesting territory but let's face it, it's a pandora's box.

Jonny Zchivago said...

Hmm, i think the Slits qualify as the makers of a dodgy second album too.the Return of the Giant Slits is pretty bad.
But Wire are beyond criticism.

Kzka said...

Ramones: We're in a rut.
Sire Records: Ok, we'll get you Phil Spector.
Ramones: Now we're in a run with an echo chamber.

Jonny Zchivago said...

Ramones: we're in a rut,we can only rewrite Blitzkrieg Bop so many times.
Sire Records solution: rewrite it again 12 more times and we'll get the most minimal producer we can find...I know,get me Phil Spector.

Kzka said...

Ramones: We're in a rut. We've played Blitzkrieg Bop for 3 straight albums.
Phil Spector: Can you play piano, Dee Dee?
Ramones: End of the Century

Jonny Zchivago said...

Ahh...its good to hear dissent when it comes to the fucking Ramones.
I remember the first time i heard the ramones, which was after i heard the pistols dsamned clash, i could believe it some kind of badly produced metal band crossed with the beach boys,who looked like they were some kind of weedy bikers pretending they were from "the Streets". Obviously inspired by glam more than the MC ducking 5,they were a joke taken far too seriously by the Bohemian set in downtown NYC. I can't recall anyone walking around looking like the Ramones anywhere...ever!?....also, i bought a heavy vinyl version of the first album and was amazed that this was ever regarded as 'Fast'...that means ELP must have played at funeral pace? They said nothing,a fun band like the Damned...but slower, Nah, the Ramones were boring and sadly a lot of 2nd wave punks took the music as a template...but noticeably not the look....protopunk, like the runaways were.

Get RICH quick ! said...


I don't care what they told you
This stuff is relevant




.

Anonymous said...

Wire is an exception to the second album rule, but then were Wire punk? I dunno, maybe. Anyway, post-punk were the more clever punks going back to their art rock roots. Lydon, as you pointed out, loved Van Der Graff Generator and Levine supposedly roadie for Yes and Wire were about as art school as you could get.

Slacker said...

If you think Buzzcocks did the same stuff on the third album as the first, and 'Return of the Giant Slits' is ropey, then all I can suggest is you get your ears syringed, dude.

Jonny Zchivago said...

Yeah i do think the Buzzcocks third is the same as the other two LPs,just a couple of long version of You Doo Right with shellian lyrics......oh and a couple of really shite Diggle numbers. Good album though.
Slits.....you maybe right....very session man heavy espesh steve beresford again,and various pop groupies.Found it too dense back in the day,but played it on you tube and have to say i liked it.....maybe more to do with old age than any great change of opinion.

Jonny Zchivago said...

Although i do need my ears syringed.

Slacker said...

Yeah, it was bad enough when Diggle was allowed two songs per album (Mad Mad Judy indeed), but now he apparently IS Buzzcocks... well, Pete must be spinning. Those Can-esque numbers at least showed where Pete was looking (while Diggle was perfecting his Townshend windmilling) though, and that last handful of singles that Hannett produced for them different again. By the by, I'd have loved to have seen the results of Hannett producing an album with them. [And a Hannett-produced Nico LP, based on that single he produced for her, but that's another story]

ROTGS - well, I liked it when I was young, and I still like it now as an old person. Who knows? I've always wondered what they would have done for a 3rd album (had they stayed together, I mean, I'm not referring to Trapped Animal!)

Back on the subject of The Damned (I'm rambling, I know)... they may have fallen foul of the 'punk band shite 2nd album' curse, but 'Machine Gun Etiquette' >>>>>> 'Damned Damned Damned', and then they veered away from punk somewhat with the Black Album and Strawberries, both of which I love to this day.

martinf said...

Ever watched the movie "Brennende Langeweile" by Wolfgang Büld? Shame they never released the live recordings from Germany except 1 on a 7" flip side...

Amc said...

I bought this when it came out because I had loved the first lp, but even as a 14 yr old idiot punk in Selby I thought with absolute certainty I could do a better production job than this shit. Good songs great lyrics made to sound like cold arse gravy I gave it away in the end, shit cover too,soft focus pic on the front is real nob cheddar.

Jonny Zchivago said...

Shit cover indeed.....as for who could do a better production, i'd go for the chimpanzee option.
Dunno where Selby is?
I had the Adverts singles, but had to choose between Sham 69, And Crossing the Red Sea,as i had limited funds as a 14 yr old idiot in Leicester,
and like the wally I am,plumbed for Sham...i grew to love it. Thought about putting 'That's Life' by sham as one of my terrible punk second albums choices...the only punk concept album and potential musical LPas of yet?
"Televisions Over" lured me in for a second hand copy of "cast Of 1000's"....£1.50.....like a Crass album great lyrics,shite music.
Got Crossing Red Sea as a re-release in 1982 on red vinyl....a classic.