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Revenge – One True Passion V2.0

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In 1989, Peter Hook formed his third band, Revenge. Although NME and Melody Maker went into raptures?this was, after all, one quarter of Joy Division and New Order?eventually his stage persona as the leather-trousered Viking bass god with the low-slung weapon of mass seduction affected the way the music was received at the height of aciiiid and baggy. The S&M-lite artwork for 1990's debut album, One True Passion, and the pseudo-repulsive song titles?"Surf Nazi", "Fag Hag", "Kiss The Chrome"?merely enhanced the perception of Hook as a rock pig peddling a chauvinist ideology and macho metal bluster. Truth is, Hook's DNA, shared with Bernard Sumner, Stephen Morris and Gillian Gilbert, prevents him from creating anything that's less than gorgeously dolorous, while those bowels-of-heaven bass lines here underpin two hours' worth of mournful melodies and Hook's lyrical declarations of despair and self-doubt.

In 1989, Peter Hook formed his third band, Revenge. Although NME and Melody Maker went into raptures?this was, after all, one quarter of Joy Division and New Order?eventually his stage persona as the leather-trousered Viking bass god with the low-slung weapon of mass seduction affected the way the music was received at the height of aciiiid and baggy. The S&M-lite artwork for 1990’s debut album, One True Passion, and the pseudo-repulsive song titles?”Surf Nazi”, “Fag Hag”, “Kiss The Chrome”?merely enhanced the perception of Hook as a rock pig peddling a chauvinist ideology and macho metal bluster.

Truth is, Hook’s DNA, shared with Bernard Sumner, Stephen Morris and Gillian Gilbert, prevents him from creating anything that’s less than gorgeously dolorous, while those bowels-of-heaven bass lines here underpin two hours’ worth of mournful melodies and Hook’s lyrical declarations of despair and self-doubt.

The Marbles

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Best known for their late-'60s hit "Only One Woman" and its identically arranged follow-up "The Walls Fall Down", the Marbles were driven by the sheet metal-bending larynx of Graham Bonnet and the prolific writing of the Gibb brothers, who are responsible for half of the tracks featured here. Bonnet, who a decade later would front Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow, leads a convincingly impassioned charge through "I Can't See Nobody" and "Stay With Me Baby" but fares less well with "A House Is Not A Home" and a somewhat overwrought "To Love Somebody". Although Bonnet's occasionally graceless histrionics get a little too much over the spread of a whole album, pastoral relief is provided by his partner Trevor Gordon, whose two self-penned contributions, "Daytime" and "Elizabeth Johnson", provide a welcomingly delicate counterpoint.

Best known for their late-’60s hit “Only One Woman” and its identically arranged follow-up “The Walls Fall Down”, the Marbles were driven by the sheet metal-bending larynx of Graham Bonnet and the prolific writing of the Gibb brothers, who are responsible for half of the tracks featured here. Bonnet, who a decade later would front Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow, leads a convincingly impassioned charge through “I Can’t See Nobody” and “Stay With Me Baby” but fares less well with “A House Is Not A Home” and a somewhat overwrought “To Love Somebody”. Although Bonnet’s occasionally graceless histrionics get a little too much over the spread of a whole album, pastoral relief is provided by his partner Trevor Gordon, whose two self-penned contributions, “Daytime” and “Elizabeth Johnson”, provide a welcomingly delicate counterpoint.

Sugar Mountain

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Like all back catalogues worth their salt?or in the case of this great early-'80s Scottish pop group, sweeties?the three Altered Images albums together provide a narrative arc. Play the records back to back and you can hear a band emerge blinking from the post-punk darkness, embrace New Pop and become chart sensations, before splitting up at the peak of their powers because they wanted a happy ending. Look at the producers of each record and you get the same story. For Happy Birthday, now with extras such as the brilliant kindergarten shadowplay of "Dead Pop Stars", Steve Severin was brought in because the band idolised Siouxsie & The Banshees. That debut, released in September 1981, is mostly scratchy, angular Joy Division-influenced gloom-rock enlivened by the squeaky vocals and effervescent presence of Clare Grogan, a frontgirl unlike any other in the history of the form, all cute charisma and giggly hypertension. Martin Rushent, who produced just the title track?and No 2 hit single?of the first LP, was drafted in for 1982's follow-up, Pinky Blue. Rushent gave the second album the sort of electronic polish he brought to bear on The Human League's Dare!, enabling the more-thana-little-strange Altered Images to become chart regulars?and a disconcerting, ubiquitous fixture on kids'TV?with "I Could Be Happy", "See Those Eyes" and "Pinky Blue" itself. And then, just as self-parody was about to set in with all those songs about bursting with fizzy sherbet fountainfalls of joy, they made 1983's Bite with Mike Chapman (Blondie) and Tony Visconti (Bowie, Bolan). On the cover, Grogan had suddenly become Audrey Hepburn. The music is no less sophisticated avant-pop and post-disco with Chapman and Visconti adding a "Heart Of Glass" gloss to "Bring Me Closer" and "Don't Talk To Me About Love". On "Love To Stay" and "Stand So Quiet", Clare doesn't so much sing as exhale sugar hiccups. Best of all, the sublime "I Don't Want To Know", previously only available on the cassette version of the album, finally makes it to CD. Will we ever see their like again?

Like all back catalogues worth their salt?or in the case of this great early-’80s Scottish pop group, sweeties?the three Altered Images albums together provide a narrative arc. Play the records back to back and you can hear a band emerge blinking from the post-punk darkness, embrace New Pop and become chart sensations, before splitting up at the peak of their powers because they wanted a happy ending.

Look at the producers of each record and you get the same story. For Happy Birthday, now with extras such as the brilliant kindergarten shadowplay of “Dead Pop Stars”, Steve Severin was brought in because the band idolised Siouxsie & The Banshees. That debut, released in September 1981, is mostly scratchy, angular Joy Division-influenced gloom-rock enlivened by the squeaky vocals and effervescent presence of Clare Grogan, a frontgirl unlike any other in the history of the form, all cute charisma and giggly hypertension.

Martin Rushent, who produced just the title track?and No 2 hit single?of the first LP, was drafted in for 1982’s follow-up, Pinky Blue. Rushent gave the second album the sort of electronic polish he brought to bear on The Human League’s Dare!, enabling the more-thana-little-strange Altered Images to become chart regulars?and a disconcerting, ubiquitous fixture on kids’TV?with “I Could Be Happy”, “See Those Eyes” and “Pinky Blue” itself.

And then, just as self-parody was about to set in with all those songs about bursting with fizzy sherbet fountainfalls of joy, they made 1983’s Bite with Mike Chapman (Blondie) and Tony Visconti (Bowie, Bolan). On the cover, Grogan had suddenly become Audrey Hepburn. The music is no less sophisticated avant-pop and post-disco with Chapman and Visconti adding a “Heart Of Glass” gloss to “Bring Me Closer” and “Don’t Talk To Me About Love”. On “Love To Stay” and “Stand So Quiet”, Clare doesn’t so much sing as exhale sugar hiccups. Best of all, the sublime “I Don’t Want To Know”, previously only available on the cassette version of the album, finally makes it to CD. Will we ever see their like again?

The Ace Of Cups – It’s Bad For You But Buy It!

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All-girl quintet The Ace Of Cups blew some weird R&B air through the Frisco Bay while their Quicksilver boyfriends were toning up with a more psychedelic version of West Coast acid blues. These ballroom babes swapped duties on tracks like "Pretty Boy" and "Boy, What'll You Do Then?", but it's the primitive gothic architecture of "Stones" and "Glue" that separate Denise Kaufman, Mary Gannon et al from the blowsier likes of Cold Blood and the Airplane. A genuine Haight-Ashbury treasure trove with a poetic, punky DIY edge and all the garage-girl guts you can stomach. Fill yer cups, girls.

All-girl quintet The Ace Of Cups blew some weird R&B air through the Frisco Bay while their Quicksilver boyfriends were toning up with a more psychedelic version of West Coast acid blues. These ballroom babes swapped duties on tracks like “Pretty Boy” and “Boy, What’ll You Do Then?”, but it’s the primitive gothic architecture of “Stones” and “Glue” that separate Denise Kaufman, Mary Gannon et al from the blowsier likes of Cold Blood and the Airplane. A genuine Haight-Ashbury treasure trove with a poetic, punky DIY edge and all the garage-girl guts you can stomach. Fill yer cups, girls.

Rae & Christian – Northern Sulphuric Soul

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Originally released in 1998, the debut album from Manchester DJ/remix duo Mark Rae and Steve Christian was something of an anachronism?too late to ride the last wave of trip hop but unconnected to the current drum'n'bass scene. For that reason, it sounded both vitally fresh and timelessly classic, and its setting of sample-based, lushly brooding atmospherics against tough, hip hop beats endures still. Now remastered and featuring three new tracks?of which the sweetly urgent "Premonition" is the standout?the album reveals itself as deserving a place alongside Massive Attack's Blue Lines for all fans of flawless British nu-soul and effortlessly funky beats.

Originally released in 1998, the debut album from Manchester DJ/remix duo Mark Rae and Steve Christian was something of an anachronism?too late to ride the last wave of trip hop but unconnected to the current drum’n’bass scene. For that reason, it sounded both vitally fresh and timelessly classic, and its setting of sample-based, lushly brooding atmospherics against tough, hip hop beats endures still.

Now remastered and featuring three new tracks?of which the sweetly urgent “Premonition” is the standout?the album reveals itself as deserving a place alongside Massive Attack’s Blue Lines for all fans of flawless British nu-soul and effortlessly funky beats.

Various Artists – Gary Crowley Presents… Where The Action Is!

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Regular listeners to his BBC London show will know of Mr Crowley's impeccable ear for vintage soul, R'n'B and ska. Let loose to compile his own fantasy all-nighter soundtrack from vaults as rich as those of Pye, Immediate and Trojan, he'd be hard pushed to disappoint. Across both discs?the first consisting of white beat-boomers, the second black soul and reggae?the balance of obvious mod anthems (Dobie Gray's "The In Crowd") and discerning purist favourites (Fleur De Lys'"Circles", Timebox's "Soul Sauce") has been brilliantly measured.

Regular listeners to his BBC London show will know of Mr Crowley’s impeccable ear for vintage soul, R’n’B and ska. Let loose to compile his own fantasy all-nighter soundtrack from vaults as rich as those of Pye, Immediate and Trojan, he’d be hard pushed to disappoint. Across both discs?the first consisting of white beat-boomers, the second black soul and reggae?the balance of obvious mod anthems (Dobie Gray’s “The In Crowd”) and discerning purist favourites (Fleur De Lys'”Circles”, Timebox’s “Soul Sauce”) has been brilliantly measured.

Bob Neuwirth

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First released in 1974, when Neuwirth was the latest addition to David Geffen's burgeoning Asylum stable. Fittingly for the man who'd been Bob Dylan's hip young lieutenant and tour manager, Janis Joplin's Chelsea Hotel neighbour and Patti Smith's mentor, the connections are impeccable: Cass Elliot, Chris Hillman, Booker T Jones, Clydie King, Kris Kristofferson, Don Everly and Dusty Springfield is just the top half of Neuwirth's guest list. Predictably?although the musicianship is faultless throughout?their combined musical might tends to overpower Neuwirth's knotty Willie Nelsonisms, so he's forever battling with the tide. Nevertheless, it's no dud, merely another soft-country curio from California's pot 'n' patchouli heyday.

First released in 1974, when Neuwirth was the latest addition to David Geffen’s burgeoning Asylum stable. Fittingly for the man who’d been Bob Dylan’s hip young lieutenant and tour manager, Janis Joplin’s Chelsea Hotel neighbour and Patti Smith’s mentor, the connections are impeccable: Cass Elliot, Chris Hillman, Booker T Jones, Clydie King, Kris Kristofferson, Don Everly and Dusty Springfield is just the top half of Neuwirth’s guest list.

Predictably?although the musicianship is faultless throughout?their combined musical might tends to overpower Neuwirth’s knotty Willie Nelsonisms, so he’s forever battling with the tide. Nevertheless, it’s no dud, merely another soft-country curio from California’s pot ‘n’ patchouli heyday.

Fop Of The Pops

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Kid in a big world was released to considerable CBS fanfare in February 1975. It received favourable reviews and sold 15,000 copies to lovelorn students in bedsitland. And then, nothing, although ever since that sole album from Howard has acquired a certain cachet on the record collector circuit. The awesomely effete creature in the pinstripe suit with the sunken eyes, ashen skin and bri-nylon hair, caught in a derelict building leaning against a dilapidated window box on the LP sleeve, like a closeted gay bank clerk from some early '60s grim northern film scenario, is the ultimate cult curio. And yet he could have been a contender. Kid In A Big World is a magnificent collection of rococo balladry and florid vignettes from a singer-songwriter who might have rivalled Elton or Bowie had his record company managed to market him right during that strange nether-period between glam and punk. Trained in classical piano at the age of five, Howard's interest in pop was piqued by "Strawberry Fields Forever", so he sent a tape of demos to Apple. He was invited to join an early version of?get this?Iron Maiden before making the transition from denim-clad hippie to Biba'd fop. The garishly decadent press photo on the left was taken in Park Lane by Dezo Hoffman (he shot everyone back then, darling). After providing music for the 1974 Peter Fonda film Open Season, CBS' brightest hope was unveiled at an industry festival in Cannes. That, however, was that. Kid In A Big World, recorded at Abbey Road with The Shadows' Tony Meehan, is bathed in the wan light of romantic failure. Even Nyro-esque show tunes like "Deadly Nightshade" and "Spellbound" have a sepia-tinted poignancy. But it's the lightly orchestrated ballads that devastate. "Goodbye Suzie" is a darkly ravishing tale of a girl's suicide. "Gone Away", featuring the actual Mellotron used by Lennon on the aforementioned "Strawberry Fields Forever", is absolutely heartrending. For "Missing Key", Howard's voice is multi-tracked for harmonic richness, like a one-man Bee Gees circa Mr Natural. On "Guess Who's Coming To Dinner", he's more arch, the missing link between Noel Coward and "tender pervert" Momus. Sessions included here for a projected second LP, Technicolour Biography, indicate no decline in quality. "Small Town, Big Adventures", in particular, is amazing, like a gossamer MOR "Seven & Seven Is" by Love. "There's a real soft sound from the other side of town", Howard warns against gently thunderous rhythms, "it controls your soul". If there's a more surreally evocative line in mid-'70s pop, Uncut has yet to hear it. What a discovery!

Kid in a big world was released to considerable CBS fanfare in February 1975. It received favourable reviews and sold 15,000 copies to lovelorn students in bedsitland. And then, nothing, although ever since that sole album from Howard has acquired a certain cachet on the record collector circuit. The awesomely effete creature in the pinstripe suit with the sunken eyes, ashen skin and bri-nylon hair, caught in a derelict building leaning against a dilapidated window box on the LP sleeve, like a closeted gay bank clerk from some early ’60s grim northern film scenario, is the ultimate cult curio.

And yet he could have been a contender. Kid In A Big World is a magnificent collection of rococo balladry and florid vignettes from a singer-songwriter who might have rivalled Elton or Bowie had his record company managed to market him right during that strange nether-period between glam and punk. Trained in classical piano at the age of five, Howard’s interest in pop was piqued by “Strawberry Fields Forever”, so he sent a tape of demos to Apple. He was invited to join an early version of?get this?Iron Maiden before making the transition from denim-clad hippie to Biba’d fop. The garishly decadent press photo on the left was taken in Park Lane by Dezo Hoffman (he shot everyone back then, darling). After providing music for the 1974 Peter Fonda film Open Season, CBS’ brightest hope was unveiled at an industry festival in Cannes.

That, however, was that. Kid In A Big World, recorded at Abbey Road with The Shadows’ Tony Meehan, is bathed in the wan light of romantic failure. Even Nyro-esque show tunes like “Deadly Nightshade” and “Spellbound” have a sepia-tinted poignancy. But it’s the lightly orchestrated ballads that devastate. “Goodbye Suzie” is a darkly ravishing tale of a girl’s suicide. “Gone Away”, featuring the actual Mellotron used by Lennon on the aforementioned “Strawberry Fields Forever”, is absolutely heartrending. For “Missing Key”, Howard’s voice is multi-tracked for harmonic richness, like a one-man Bee Gees circa Mr Natural. On “Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner”, he’s more arch, the missing link between Noel Coward and “tender pervert” Momus. Sessions included here for a projected second LP, Technicolour Biography, indicate no decline in quality. “Small Town, Big Adventures”, in particular, is amazing, like a gossamer MOR “Seven & Seven Is” by Love. “There’s a real soft sound from the other side of town”, Howard warns against gently thunderous rhythms, “it controls your soul”. If there’s a more surreally evocative line in mid-’70s pop, Uncut has yet to hear it. What a discovery!

Cat Stevens

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Stevens launched Deram, Decca's off-shoot progressive label, in 1966 with "I Love My Dog", followed by further hits "Matthew & Son" and "I'm Gonna Get Me A Gun"?ingenious, idiosyncratic, albeit lightweight pop. Like label-mate Bowie, Stevens was clearly an unorthodox talent. Typically, the singles and B-sides then bolstered Stevens' debut album, an impressive, diverse collection despite Mike Hurst's archaic production and fussy arrangements. By New Masters, Hurst was deploying an even heavier trowel. The songs also fell short, as if written for a prospective musical without theme or substance. The one redeeming song, future Rod Stewart hit "The First Cut Is The Deepest", was surprisingly given to PP Arnold as a single. Strange, given that Stevens' run of hits had long dried up. Following an enforced convalescence after tuberculosis, he re-emerged on the burgeoning Island Records in 1970 with a sparse acoustic sound and songs tailor-made for bedsit romantics everywhere.

Stevens launched Deram, Decca’s off-shoot progressive label, in 1966 with “I Love My Dog”, followed by further hits “Matthew & Son” and “I’m Gonna Get Me A Gun”?ingenious, idiosyncratic, albeit lightweight pop. Like label-mate Bowie, Stevens was clearly an unorthodox talent. Typically, the singles and B-sides then bolstered Stevens’ debut album, an impressive, diverse collection despite Mike Hurst’s archaic production and fussy arrangements. By New Masters, Hurst was deploying an even heavier trowel. The songs also fell short, as if written for a prospective musical without theme or substance. The one redeeming song, future Rod Stewart hit “The First Cut Is The Deepest”, was surprisingly given to PP Arnold as a single. Strange, given that Stevens’ run of hits had long dried up. Following an enforced convalescence after tuberculosis, he re-emerged on the burgeoning Island Records in 1970 with a sparse acoustic sound and songs tailor-made for bedsit romantics everywhere.

Lothar And The Hand People – Presenting…

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Robert Margouleff, later of Tonto's Expanding Headband, produced the first of these two albums in 1968, and the best of its Moog and Theremin embellishments sound like the blueprints for Tonto's groundbreaking Zero Time album. Elsewhere, alas, despite occasional nods to early Captain Beefheart, things never get quite as weird as you'd really like them to. The lyrics lapse a little too often into fortune cookie koans of the "today is only yesterday's tomorrow" variety, and at times the irritation factor couldn't be any higher if They Might Be Giants were jamming with Devo. John Emelin's off-the-wall vocal style lends proceedings a certain angularity, and the seven-minute title track of 1969's Space Hymn is absolutely ripe for sampling, but too often the synth bubbles and squeaks just aren't enough to disguise some stunningly average country-tinged pop.

Robert Margouleff, later of Tonto’s Expanding Headband, produced the first of these two albums in 1968, and the best of its Moog and Theremin embellishments sound like the blueprints for Tonto’s groundbreaking Zero Time album. Elsewhere, alas, despite occasional nods to early Captain Beefheart, things never get quite as weird as you’d really like them to. The lyrics lapse a little too often into fortune cookie koans of the “today is only yesterday’s tomorrow” variety, and at times the irritation factor couldn’t be any higher if They Might Be Giants were jamming with Devo. John Emelin’s off-the-wall vocal style lends proceedings a certain angularity, and the seven-minute title track of 1969’s Space Hymn is absolutely ripe for sampling, but too often the synth bubbles and squeaks just aren’t enough to disguise some stunningly average country-tinged pop.

Sid Vicious – Too Fast To Live…

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The career of John Simon Ritchie (he died as Simon John Beverley, but was known to the world as Sid Vicious) mirrors a cultural change that saw the hippies swept aside by the street rats. Vicious usurped the popularity of Johnny Rotten's Sex Pistols when his posthumously released single, "Something Else", outsold the punk heroes' own "God Save The Queen". This 25-years-on set is short, brutal and nasty, but it contains a few live items, Squid's post-Pistols versions of "Belsen" and "I Wanna Be Your Dog", plus an unreleased demo of "My Way". The Vicious cult has abated in recent years, but a new book and various documentaries will awaken interest in this diabolical performer.

The career of John Simon Ritchie (he died as Simon John Beverley, but was known to the world as Sid Vicious) mirrors a cultural change that saw the hippies swept aside by the street rats. Vicious usurped the popularity of Johnny Rotten’s Sex Pistols when his posthumously released single, “Something Else”, outsold the punk heroes’ own “God Save The Queen”. This 25-years-on set is short, brutal and nasty, but it contains a few live items, Squid’s post-Pistols versions of “Belsen” and “I Wanna Be Your Dog”, plus an unreleased demo of “My Way”. The Vicious cult has abated in recent years, but a new book and various documentaries will awaken interest in this diabolical performer.

Warren Zevon – Life’ll Kill Ya

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Awareness of his own mortality seemed to bring an even sharper blade to Zevon's cutting edge. It's a sick society, and few were better equipped to point that out than he; accordingly, the general theme of sickness underlies much of Life'll Kill Ya, from the cheery misanthropy of the title track to the brutal bodily awareness of "My Shit's Fucked Up" and the closing prayer of "Don't Let Us Get Sick". Elsewhere, Zevon turned his caustic eye on cults and crusaders, and even offered a new take on the Elvis story in "Porcelain Monkey", with the most compassionate moments saved for S&M love song "Hostage-O". The mordant humour continued on My Ride's Here, which features Carl Hiaasen and Hunter S Thompson as co-writers (on "Basket Case" and "You're A Whole Different Person When You're Scared", respectively). Witness the cynicism firing "Sacrificial Lambs", which condenses religion, politics and showbiz down to the same kernel of idolatrous sacrifice, and "Genius", a bitter reflection on love, success and reputation in which "the poet who lived next door when you were young and poor/Grew up to be a backstabbing entrepreneur".

Awareness of his own mortality seemed to bring an even sharper blade to Zevon’s cutting edge. It’s a sick society, and few were better equipped to point that out than he; accordingly, the general theme of sickness underlies much of Life’ll Kill Ya, from the cheery misanthropy of the title track to the brutal bodily awareness of “My Shit’s Fucked Up” and the closing prayer of “Don’t Let Us Get Sick”. Elsewhere, Zevon turned his caustic eye on cults and crusaders, and even offered a new take on the Elvis story in “Porcelain Monkey”, with the most compassionate moments saved for S&M love song “Hostage-O”. The mordant humour continued on My Ride’s Here, which features Carl Hiaasen and Hunter S Thompson as co-writers (on “Basket Case” and “You’re A Whole Different Person When You’re Scared”, respectively). Witness the cynicism firing “Sacrificial Lambs”, which condenses religion, politics and showbiz down to the same kernel of idolatrous sacrifice, and “Genius”, a bitter reflection on love, success and reputation in which “the poet who lived next door when you were young and poor/Grew up to be a backstabbing entrepreneur”.

The Nat Pack

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Hard as it might be to believe, there was a time in the '80s when 10,000 Maniacs were neck and neck with R.E.M. as the American band most likely to outgrow their college-rock constituency and pole vault their way to mainstream glory. By the time Stipe & Co were reaching both dizzying creative and commercial peaks with 1992's Automatic For The People, the Maniacs had already lost the plot and effectively perished in the choppy waters of their own hick earnestness and cloying political correctness. They always lacked the innate cool and innovation of R.E.M., and never quite lived down their reputation as post-punk folkies in cheesecloth and Jesus sandals, a kind of new wave Fairport Convention for people with clean pants and bad jumpers. Though, as parts of this two-CD set serve to remind, they deserve to be remembered as something more than a dry run for Natalie Merchant's largely underwhelming solo career. Thirty-one tracks in all, wisely confining themselves to the 12-year period with Merchant at the helm, mercifully omitting the dreary stuff the remaining Maniacs churned out following her mid-'90s departure. Three selections from their pre-Elektra period reveal them in all their endearing, ramshackle oddness. Gang Of Four meets rustic reggae, if you will, on "Planned Obsolescence". Slap-happy suburban punk rock on "My Mother The War". There's a measly single cut ("Scorpio Rising") from The Wishing Chair, their 1985 Elektra debut, but that's more than compensated for with five tracks from 1987's In My Tribe. Listening now to "Hey Jack Kerouac" and "Don't Talk", you're taken back to a time when rock music was in its most fallow period since the early'60s, and the Maniacs' effervescent folk-pop shone like a brand new shilling up a chimney sweep's arse. By the time of '89's Blind Man's Zoo, Merchant's quavering vocal still recalled a sanguine Stevie Nicks or a neutered Chrissie Hynde, but she'd already begun a headlong descent into bleeding-heart liberalism while her band were turning into white-bread MORists. The second CD of obscure and unknown recordings offers a bewildering tour through sublime highlights and risible nadirs. The former, represented by a sparkling demo of "Can't Ignore The Train" and a simply adorable version of Iris DeMent's "Let The Mystery Be", contrasts with shockingly bad takes on Bowie's "Starman" and Jackson Browne's "These Days". There's also a plodding desecration of Morrissey's "Everyday Is Like Sunday" which might just be the most laughably unfunny cover version this young turk of a reviewer has ever had the misfortune to endure.

Hard as it might be to believe, there was a time in the ’80s when 10,000 Maniacs were neck and neck with R.E.M. as the American band most likely to outgrow their college-rock constituency and pole vault their way to mainstream glory. By the time Stipe & Co were reaching both dizzying creative and commercial peaks with 1992’s Automatic For The People, the Maniacs had already lost the plot and effectively perished in the choppy waters of their own hick earnestness and cloying political correctness.

They always lacked the innate cool and innovation of R.E.M., and never quite lived down their reputation as post-punk folkies in cheesecloth and Jesus sandals, a kind of new wave Fairport Convention for people with clean pants and bad jumpers. Though, as parts of this two-CD set serve to remind, they deserve to be remembered as something more than a dry run for Natalie Merchant’s largely underwhelming solo career.

Thirty-one tracks in all, wisely confining themselves to the 12-year period with Merchant at the helm, mercifully omitting the dreary stuff the remaining Maniacs churned out following her mid-’90s departure. Three selections from their pre-Elektra period reveal them in all their endearing, ramshackle oddness. Gang Of Four meets rustic reggae, if you will, on “Planned Obsolescence”. Slap-happy suburban punk rock on “My Mother The War”.

There’s a measly single cut (“Scorpio Rising”) from The Wishing Chair, their 1985 Elektra debut, but that’s more than compensated for with five tracks from 1987’s In My Tribe. Listening now to “Hey Jack Kerouac” and “Don’t Talk”, you’re taken back to a time when rock music was in its most fallow period since the early’60s, and the Maniacs’ effervescent folk-pop shone like a brand new shilling up a chimney sweep’s arse.

By the time of ’89’s Blind Man’s Zoo, Merchant’s quavering vocal still recalled a sanguine Stevie Nicks or a neutered Chrissie Hynde, but she’d already begun a headlong descent into bleeding-heart liberalism while her band were turning into white-bread MORists.

The second CD of obscure and unknown recordings offers a bewildering tour through sublime highlights and risible nadirs. The former, represented by a sparkling demo of “Can’t Ignore The Train” and a simply adorable version of Iris DeMent’s “Let The Mystery Be”, contrasts with shockingly bad takes on Bowie’s “Starman” and Jackson Browne’s “These Days”. There’s also a plodding desecration of Morrissey’s “Everyday Is Like Sunday” which might just be the most laughably unfunny cover version this young turk of a reviewer has ever had the misfortune to endure.

The Scottsville Squirrel Barkers – Blue Grass Favorites

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Way too trim for its own good?less than 20 minutes and no extras?this 1963 masterclass in straight-backed country picking was the Rosetta Stone for a whole slew of West Coast wannabes (Gram Parsons once said he would give his right knee to be in the Barkers). Including 17-year-old mandolinist Chris Hillman and fellow future Burrito Kenny Wertz on banjo, this stunning acoustic fling was the torch-passing of Monroe, Flatt and Scruggs to a hip new generation with no regard for traditional country/rock boundaries.

Way too trim for its own good?less than 20 minutes and no extras?this 1963 masterclass in straight-backed country picking was the Rosetta Stone for a whole slew of West Coast wannabes (Gram Parsons once said he would give his right knee to be in the Barkers). Including 17-year-old mandolinist Chris Hillman and fellow future Burrito Kenny Wertz on banjo, this stunning acoustic fling was the torch-passing of Monroe, Flatt and Scruggs to a hip new generation with no regard for traditional country/rock boundaries.

Sue Thompson – Suzie: The Hickory Anthology

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For all the prom-queen sheen and chunky-ribbed homeliness, Thompson had already weathered three marriages, domestic abuse and a Hollywood TV show by the time she scored big with "Norman" in 1961. Hitching the diminutive sass of Brenda Lee to the popstomp of Jackie Wilson (and notwithstanding friend Roy Orbison's "Suzie", written especially for her), her best moments here are sub-Supremes hip-wiggler "Sweet Hunk Of Misery" and brassy belter "Walkin' My Baby".

For all the prom-queen sheen and chunky-ribbed homeliness, Thompson had already weathered three marriages, domestic abuse and a Hollywood TV show by the time she scored big with “Norman” in 1961.

Hitching the diminutive sass of Brenda Lee to the popstomp of Jackie Wilson (and notwithstanding friend Roy Orbison’s “Suzie”, written especially for her), her best moments here are sub-Supremes hip-wiggler “Sweet Hunk Of Misery” and brassy belter “Walkin’ My Baby”.

Various Artists – Century Of The Blues

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The blues continues to pour down in reissues, compilations and box sets. Century Of The Blues is superbly assembled to commemorate the centenary of the day in 1903 when WC Handy encountered a "lean, loose-jointed negro" playing a guitar in the style he was the first to name "the blues". There's no attempt to claim the music as a contemporary art form, for the selection ends mid-century. Even BB King, the only name here who's still working, is represented by a 1950 recording. But as a primer in the roots of the blues, it really isn't far behind the recent Scorsese five-CD set, which Uncut voted best compilation of 2003.

The blues continues to pour down in reissues, compilations and box sets. Century Of The Blues is superbly assembled to commemorate the centenary of the day in 1903 when WC Handy encountered a “lean, loose-jointed negro” playing a guitar in the style he was the first to name “the blues”. There’s no attempt to claim the music as a contemporary art form, for the selection ends mid-century. Even BB King, the only name here who’s still working, is represented by a 1950 recording. But as a primer in the roots of the blues, it really isn’t far behind the recent Scorsese five-CD set, which Uncut voted best compilation of 2003.

Strange Meeting

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DIRECTED BY Sofia Coppola STARRING Bill Murray, Scarlett Johansson, Giovanni Ribisi, Anna Faris Opens January 9, Cert 15, 102 mins Lose yourself in this. While the buzz may focus on its signifiers of hip (East meets West very stylishly, that hottest of directors, that Kevin Shields/Brian Reitzell soundtrack), Lost In Translation is a laconic, low-key Brief Encounter for an ad-fed generation. It's wryly funny, often moving, and it's very, very beautiful in a cool, uncloying manner. Coppola seems more confidently engaged with the material than she was on the dreamy, floaty, slightly overrated The Virgin Suicides. Johansson does well in a nebulous role (the whole film is nebulous, narcotic, in a terrific way). And Bill Murray? We've always known he was God, even though if you actually look at his filmography he's made three stinkers for every great movie. Here, he's perfect?everything we knew he could express, if he brought his A-game to the table, is expressed. He's an unlikely romantic lead, which is the kind of romantic lead which gets you. And if it seems impossible to make an authentically romantic movie these days, when formulaic rom-coms have hacked down our disbelief from wherever we were suspending it, this is that movie. Two strangers, stuck in Tokyo, a neurotic neon paradise. Bob (Murray) is a jaded movie star, shooting a silly whiskey ad for big money. He can't connect, over disjointed phone calls and time zones, with his wife of 25 years. He watches TV in his hotel room, offends a call girl, drinks, improvises sketches with running machines. He wonders where what's left of his life is going. The much younger Charlotte (Johansson), meanwhile, is abandoned in the same hotel while her photographer husband (Ribisi) goes off on 'glamorous' shoots (starlets, rock boys). He's not a bad guy as such; just preoccupied and distracted. Bob and Charlotte break the ice in the hotel bar; neither can sleep. An unconventional friendship develops. They hit the town, meet characters, sing wonderfully bad karaoke?for her, "Brass In Pocket", for him, a mournful, tragicomic "More Than This". They talk lots, realising that at any age, certain questions remain valid, certain puzzles can't be solved. They become very close, for a moment, an air-lock from the everyday. Each realises it won't physically lead to anything. They're grateful for a brief bond, a refreshment of their awareness of the possible. They're, for the first time in too long, inspired. And that's it. No big explosions, no major palavers. As it hums its gentle tune, the film makes lovely observations, both comic and poignant, about loneliness and learning, commitment and yearning. Bob and Charlotte's ennui (and subsequent energy) is portrayed via exquisite miniatures. Murray's scenes prior to their meeting are acutely funny, even if they're basically portrayals of a man dancing with self-loathing. Countered by a rising starlet (Anna Faris), he's a sitting, slouching symbol of celebrity unhappiness. He's seen through the shallow, but can no longer find the deep. The way he shifts away from a bunch of fans who are telling him he's great is Murray at his most knowing and long-suffering. The film's other star is Tokyo, shot brilliantly (and also, conversely, bleakly) by Lance Acord. Cultural divides are mocked, but with affection; the hospital waiting room scene is a joy. You feel transported by mood as much as by place. It's dislocated, yet accurately so. It's a film of melancholic grace and charm, low on sentimentality and thus all the more affecting and plausible. Magical to look at (be ready for one scene where Johansson and a crowd of umbrella-carriers teem through pouring rain in front of mile-high neon dinosaurs) yet truly soulful, it seems both classically timeless and very much of its time. As the camera stays with Bob's limo as it leaves Tokyo, you leave with it, leaving the film, feeling a sense of something like loss, something like there's a new chapter ahead. Some of us perhaps thought this particular Coppola was a flash in the pan. A media-friendly story, a mere style and who-you-know thing. We were wrong. This is fascinated and fascinating, bewildered and smart, sarcastic but never smug. The first absolute must-see of the year. Let's get lost.

DIRECTED BY Sofia Coppola

STARRING Bill Murray, Scarlett Johansson, Giovanni Ribisi, Anna Faris

Opens January 9, Cert 15, 102 mins

Lose yourself in this. While the buzz may focus on its signifiers of hip (East meets West very stylishly, that hottest of directors, that Kevin Shields/Brian Reitzell soundtrack), Lost In Translation is a laconic, low-key Brief Encounter for an ad-fed generation. It’s wryly funny, often moving, and it’s very, very beautiful in a cool, uncloying manner. Coppola seems more confidently engaged with the material than she was on the dreamy, floaty, slightly overrated The Virgin Suicides. Johansson does well in a nebulous role (the whole film is nebulous, narcotic, in a terrific way). And Bill Murray? We’ve always known he was God, even though if you actually look at his filmography he’s made three stinkers for every great movie. Here, he’s perfect?everything we knew he could express, if he brought his A-game to the table, is expressed. He’s an unlikely romantic lead, which is the kind of romantic lead which gets you. And if it seems impossible to make an authentically romantic movie these days, when formulaic rom-coms have hacked down our disbelief from wherever we were suspending it, this is that movie.

Two strangers, stuck in Tokyo, a neurotic neon paradise. Bob (Murray) is a jaded movie star, shooting a silly whiskey ad for big money. He can’t connect, over disjointed phone calls and time zones, with his wife of 25 years. He watches TV in his hotel room, offends a call girl, drinks, improvises sketches with running machines. He wonders where what’s left of his life is going. The much younger Charlotte (Johansson), meanwhile, is abandoned in the same hotel while her photographer husband (Ribisi) goes off on ‘glamorous’ shoots (starlets, rock boys). He’s not a bad guy as such; just preoccupied and distracted.

Bob and Charlotte break the ice in the hotel bar; neither can sleep. An unconventional friendship develops. They hit the town, meet characters, sing wonderfully bad karaoke?for her, “Brass In Pocket”, for him, a mournful, tragicomic “More Than This”. They talk lots, realising that at any age, certain questions remain valid, certain puzzles can’t be solved. They become very close, for a moment, an air-lock from the everyday. Each realises it won’t physically lead to anything. They’re grateful for a brief bond, a refreshment of their awareness of the possible. They’re, for the first time in too long, inspired. And that’s it. No big explosions, no major palavers. As it hums its gentle tune, the film makes lovely observations, both comic and poignant, about loneliness and learning, commitment and yearning. Bob and Charlotte’s ennui (and subsequent energy) is portrayed via exquisite miniatures. Murray’s scenes prior to their meeting are acutely funny, even if they’re basically portrayals of a man dancing with self-loathing. Countered by a rising starlet (Anna Faris), he’s a sitting, slouching symbol of celebrity unhappiness. He’s seen through the shallow, but can no longer find the deep. The way he shifts away from a bunch of fans who are telling him he’s great is Murray at his most knowing and long-suffering.

The film’s other star is Tokyo, shot brilliantly (and also, conversely, bleakly) by Lance Acord. Cultural divides are mocked, but with affection; the hospital waiting room scene is a joy. You feel transported by mood as much as by place. It’s dislocated, yet accurately so. It’s a film of melancholic grace and charm, low on sentimentality and thus all the more affecting and plausible.

Magical to look at (be ready for one scene where Johansson and a crowd of umbrella-carriers teem through pouring rain in front of mile-high neon dinosaurs) yet truly soulful, it seems both classically timeless and very much of its time. As the camera stays with Bob’s limo as it leaves Tokyo, you leave with it, leaving the film, feeling a sense of something like loss, something like there’s a new chapter ahead.

Some of us perhaps thought this particular Coppola was a flash in the pan. A media-friendly story, a mere style and who-you-know thing. We were wrong. This is fascinated and fascinating, bewildered and smart, sarcastic but never smug. The first absolute must-see of the year. Let’s get lost.

Black And White

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OPENS JANUARY 9, CERT 15, 102 MINS If nothing else, Black And White would be memorable for its portrayal of a young Rupert Murdoch, ambitious proprietor of the Adelaide News. The film explores the true story of Max Stuart, an Aboriginal convicted of the rape and murder of a nine-year-old white girl in 1959. Young solicitor David O'Sullivan (Robert Carlyle) is assigned to defend Stuart, and swiftly concludes that his client has been framed by the local police. But the complacent white judiciary have no doubt that Stuart is a murdering pervert, and O'Sullivan is scuppered until Murdoch adopts the case as a populist crusade. What fascinates the film-makers is how the case aroused furious debate and exposed faultlines in the South Australian police and legal establishment. Charles Dance is supercilious as Crown Solicitor Roderic Chamberlain, and the English appeal judges are some of the ghastliest Poms on celluloid, but the plot grips tighter than the noose threatening to drop around Max Stuart's neck. Never flashy, but absorbing.

OPENS JANUARY 9, CERT 15, 102 MINS

If nothing else, Black And White would be memorable for its portrayal of a young Rupert Murdoch, ambitious proprietor of the Adelaide News. The film explores the true story of Max Stuart, an Aboriginal convicted of the rape and murder of a nine-year-old white girl in 1959. Young solicitor David O’Sullivan (Robert Carlyle) is assigned to defend Stuart, and swiftly concludes that his client has been framed by the local police. But the complacent white judiciary have no doubt that Stuart is a murdering pervert, and O’Sullivan is scuppered until Murdoch adopts the case as a populist crusade.

What fascinates the film-makers is how the case aroused furious debate and exposed faultlines in the South Australian police and legal establishment. Charles Dance is supercilious as Crown Solicitor Roderic Chamberlain, and the English appeal judges are some of the ghastliest Poms on celluloid, but the plot grips tighter than the noose threatening to drop around Max Stuart’s neck. Never flashy, but absorbing.

Cold Mountain

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OPENED DECEMBER 26, CERT 15, 153 MINS Many were surprised when Anthony Minghella followed The English Patient, a visually dazzling epic of yearning love and churning war, with the creepy The Talented Mr Ripley. However, he's now milking Miramax for another grand-scale yarn of hot-flush romance and Bosch-like violence. And he doesn't stop at emulating his own Oscar-grabber. Here he's shooting for the mommy of them all: Gone With The Wind. The Civil War, the 1860s; immediately we're thrown into the bearpit of Gettysburg. The bloody scenes here will draw comparisons to Saving Private Ryan's opening. Southerner Inman (Jude Law) can't take any more and deserts. His goal, we learn in flashbacks, is to return to his beloved Ada (Nicole Kidman) at her farm in Cold Mountain. As Inman makes his long, dangerous pilgrim's progress, we see Ada's life fall apart as dad Donald Sutherland dies and evil Ray Winstone closes in. Add comic/poignant turns from Philip Seymour Hoffman, Natalie Portman and one Jack White, great photography and astute humour, and this almost topples Tara. But not quite.

OPENED DECEMBER 26, CERT 15, 153 MINS

Many were surprised when Anthony Minghella followed The English Patient, a visually dazzling epic of yearning love and churning war, with the creepy The Talented Mr Ripley. However, he’s now milking Miramax for another grand-scale yarn of hot-flush romance and Bosch-like violence. And he doesn’t stop at emulating his own Oscar-grabber. Here he’s shooting for the mommy of them all: Gone With The Wind.

The Civil War, the 1860s; immediately we’re thrown into the bearpit of Gettysburg. The bloody scenes here will draw comparisons to Saving Private Ryan’s opening. Southerner Inman (Jude Law) can’t take any more and deserts. His goal, we learn in flashbacks, is to return to his beloved Ada (Nicole Kidman) at her farm in Cold Mountain. As Inman makes his long, dangerous pilgrim’s progress, we see Ada’s life fall apart as dad Donald Sutherland dies and evil Ray Winstone closes in. Add comic/poignant turns from Philip Seymour Hoffman, Natalie Portman and one Jack White, great photography and astute humour, and this almost topples Tara. But not quite.

S21: The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine

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OPENS JANUARY 23, CERT 12, 101 MINS During the Pol Pot-inspired genocide in Cambodia that killed an estimated two million people, S21 was a detention centre in Phnom Penh where 17,000 people were questioned, tortured and executed. Director Rithy Panh's documentary (showing until February 1 at the NFT) brings two of the three surviving inmates face to face with their former captors. We hear how the guards, many of them barely out of their teens, tortured and murdered prisoners. The guards claim they were brainwashed and indoctrinated. Still, it's apparent that in some dark corner of their souls they'd far rather leave untouched, they relished their duties. What's even more bizarre?at least to Western eyes?is that the killers and their victims now live side by side. There have been no Nuremberg-style trials. As the guards wander round S21 and talk about their duties as if they're reminiscing about some humdrum municipal job, Hannah Arendt's famous remark about "the banality of evil" seems more pertinent than ever.

OPENS JANUARY 23, CERT 12, 101 MINS

During the Pol Pot-inspired genocide in Cambodia that killed an estimated two million people, S21 was a detention centre in Phnom Penh where 17,000 people were questioned, tortured and executed. Director Rithy Panh’s documentary (showing until February 1 at the NFT) brings two of the three surviving inmates face to face with their former captors. We hear how the guards, many of them barely out of their teens, tortured and murdered prisoners. The guards claim they were brainwashed and indoctrinated. Still, it’s apparent that in some dark corner of their souls they’d far rather leave untouched, they relished their duties. What’s even more bizarre?at least to Western eyes?is that the killers and their victims now live side by side. There have been no Nuremberg-style trials. As the guards wander round S21 and talk about their duties as if they’re reminiscing about some humdrum municipal job, Hannah Arendt’s famous remark about “the banality of evil” seems more pertinent than ever.

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