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Archive album of the week

Temple Of The Dog / Temple Of The Dog

Released: 16 April 1991.
Produced By: Rick Parashar. Temple of the Dog.
Label: A&M.

Temple of the Dog was released four months before Pearl Jam’s debut and nearly six months before Soundgarden’s seminal third LP. However, the album flew well below the radar of popular consciousness during the handful of months immediately following its release. Indeed it was only within the broader context of Ten and Badmotorfinger’s widespread success that people were compelled to reevaluate and embrace Temple of the Dog in a whole new light.

The story of the album’s genesis dates back even further, to the tragic circumstances that shook the Seattle music community on March 19, 1990. This was the day that Andrew Wood, the lead singer and songwriter for the influential bands Malfunkshun and Mother Love Bone, died from a heroin overdose at the age of 24.

As Cornell processed and grieved the loss of his friend, he found inspiration by way of composing a few songs in his friend’s honor. “Say Hello 2 Heaven” and “Reach Down” were the first compositions to emerge, representing considerably more subdued, melodic structures relative to the denser, more propulsive fare that defined Soundgarden’s signature heavy rock sound at the time. Encouraged by the songs’ direction, Cornell solicited the support of Wood’s Mother Love Bone bandmates and Pearl Jam founding members, Jeff Ament (bass) and Stone Gossard (rhythm guitar). Soon thereafter, the trio recruited Soundgarden drummer Matt Cameron (who also joined Pearl Jam in 1998), as well as future Pearl Jam co-founders Mike McCready (lead guitar) and Eddie Vedder (vocals). The sextet branded themselves as Temple of the Dog, a nod to lyrics that Wood penned for the opening verse of Mother Love Bone’s “Man of Golden Words,” the ninth track on Apple.

Notable standouts include the adrenalised third single “Pushin’ Forward Back,” which explores the push and pull of sustaining the support of a loved one, in this case the narrator’s mother. A prime showcase of McCready’s stellar guitar work, the somber “Call Me a Dog” depicts the struggles of a man confronted by the unreciprocated affection of a partner who believes he has not lived up to her unfair expectations. The most instantly recognisable and universally beloved track here, of course, is the unforgettable “Hunger Strike,” in which Cornell and Vedder exchange identical verses atop a rather straightforward guitar-driven melody. A a closer inspection of the song’s lyrics suggest that “Hunger Strike” also contains the perspective of two bands bound for the big time, attempting to make sense of the fact that they are destined to soon benefit—financially and otherwise—from the same decadent, corporate machine they condemn, while many continue to suffer with far fewer means at their disposal.

In retrospect, Temple of the Dog is an amazing musical artifact that captures the convergence of two ambitious bands on the cusp of realizing their superpowers, global fame looming in the not too distant days ahead. That Temple of the Dog performed these songs live on only a few occasions and never recorded again together only adds to Temple of the Dog’s undeniable mystique and brilliance, both of which are sure to endure for a long, long time to come.

books

Postcards from Scotland: Scottish Independent Music 1983-1995 / Grant McPhee

By 1983, many of Scotland’s post-punk bands had broken up or moved south to chase the major labels in London. That vacuum was filled by an influx of young musicians who were determined to remake the scene in their own image.

In this compelling and dynamic oral history, Grant McPhee chronicles the radical transformation of Scotland’s independent music scene from 1983-1995. Including archival photos and drawing from over 100 interviews with the key players of the time, Grant McPhee allows them to set the scene in their own words; including the Cocteau Twins, Shop Assistants, Teenage Fanclub, The Jesus and Mary Chain, Primal Scream and many more.

Postcards from Scotland is the definitive story of the radicals, misfits and experimentalists who made independent music what it is today.

Expected June 2024.

media

Legend: The Joni Mitchell Story

RADIO

Joni Mitchell’s songs have soundtracked our lives and her pioneering work changed music forever. Jesca Hoop explores her extraordinary story to reveal the life behind the legend.

In episode three (this weeks edition: BBCR4) we follow Joni from 1970 through to 1974 - an incredibly fertile period during which she creates her albums Blue, For the Roses and Court and Spark. A period of romantic highs and lows, heady successes and hermit-like retreats, of psychoanalysis and vulnerability, and of new creative directions. “I’ve always been a creature of change” – Joni Mitchell

Through archive, fresh interviews, narration, immersive sound design and an original score, we trace the story of an extraordinary life and explore what makes Joni Mitchell a singular artist: the genius of her lyrics; her incredible talent as guitarist, painter and producer; and her restless drive for innovation.

In Legend, we follow Joni from her ‘flatlander’ childhood on the Canadian prairies, through the folk clubs of Toronto and Detroit, to a redwood cottage in L.A.’s Laurel Canyon, to a cave in Crete, to a deserted desert highway, to recording studios and stages around the world. From her earliest home recordings to masterpieces like Blue, Court and Spark, and Hejira, we explore some of the stories behind her best-loved songs and celebrate her remarkable return to live performance in 2023: “like seeing, in the wild, a rare bird long feared extinct”.

Our guide through the series is the California-born, Manchester-based musician, Jesca Hoop. Jesca speaks to musicians like Blake Mills, Allison Russell, Holly Laessig and Jess Wolfe, who have played alongside Joni, and we hear tributes from those, like musician John Grant, who have been inspired and influenced by her music. We also hear from Joni's friends, including Larry Klein and Graham Nash; and from music critics and biographers, including Ann Powers, David Yaffe, Lindsay Zoladz, Kate Mossman, Barney Hoskyns, Miles Grier and Jenn Pelly.

The Joni Mitchell Story comes from the production team behind BBC Radio 4’s award-winning podcast Soul Music.

All episodes are available to stream on BBC Sounds.

Elsewhere .. It's Record Store Day on Saturday 20 April. There's a few corkers on the UK list. Get out and support if you can. Details here: https://www.recordstoreday.co.uk

Albums: new + current releases

UB40 / UB45

UB45 celebrates 45 years of UB40, featuring seven new tracks plus fresh recordings of some of the band’s most loved hits. “Gimme Some Kinda Sign”, a cover of Brenton Wood’s 1967 track “Gimme Little Sign”. The group added a special UB40 flavour to the legendary soul classic. It was chosen by Matt Doyle, who brought it to Robin Campbell, unaware that the song had been on the guitarist and vocalist’s wish list since the Labour Of Love (1983) days. Robin Campbell says: “We’re so proud of the new album. We wanted to record UB45 to celebrate 45 years of our music. When you play songs over so many years, the arrangements and vocals evolve and change. These updated versions of our hits are still close to the originals, but now reflect how we perform them today and they sound better than ever.”

ED SAYS - 45, THAT’S FOOD FOR THOUGHT.

Pearl Jam / Dark Matter

At a taut 11 tracks, Dark Matter conspires to distil 32 years of Pearl Jam doing the sonic evolution into one totalising whole. It nails the brief. A boisterous slice of their Avocado era can be heard in the crunchy power chords of brilliant opener Scared Of Fear, while React, Respond captures Eddie’s therapeutic mantra keeping pace with a zig-zagging groove à la their early years. Dark Matter is many things. It’s thrilling. It’s moving. It’s surprising. It’s a band still operating at the peaks of their powers. ‘Let us not fade,’ repeats Eddie at the end of elegiac closer Setting Sun. There seems little risk of that. Pearl Jam said it took three weeks to record Dark Matter. In truth, it’s the kind of record that takes a lifetime to make.

ED SAYS - 11 ON FROM 10.

Bodega / Our Brand Could Be Yr Life

Sometimes you have to move backwards to move forwards. Just ask punk cultural commentators BODEGA, whose new album sees them carve a new future from fuzz-soaked, consumerism-skewering shards of their past. Our Brand Could Be YR Life is BODEGA's first album release through Chrysalis Records. “It’s something we’ve been wanting to do for years,” guitarist and vocalist Ben Hozie explains of Our Brand Could Be Yr Life – a collection of catchy indie-rock ruminations on the slow-creep of corporate-think into youth culture, first written eight years ago. Our Brand Could Be YR Life's 15 tracks explore indie-rock subgenres, self-critique and everything in between. "I think it’s our best- sounding record to date,” says Hozie, "It’s got dance-punk. There's some shoegaze on there. There's slacker rock on there. There's psychedelic rock on there. R.E.M, too. We wanted to be another band in a long stream of missionaries, proselytising a certain type of rock subculture.”

ED SAYS - TRIP TO THE BAY REQUIRED.

Mark Knopfler / One Deep River

Mark Knopfler releases his tenth solo studio album on his own British Grove label via EMI. Entitled One Deep River, it features 12 unhurriedly elegant new Knopfler songs, and his warm Geordie vocal tone, his poetic storytelling lyrics and deft, richly melodic guitar playing are all present and correct and as dazzling as ever. One Deep River offers an unstoppable flow of future Knopfler classics, with their customarily learned lyrics and refined guitar textures. They draw on a lifetime of genre-crossing ingredients and influences in blues, folk, rock and beyond, and as usual, reveal their charms with unhurried grace and depth.

ED SAYS - TYNE TUNES.

Various / Back To Black - Songs From The Original Motion Picture

The official soundtrack release to the new film of Amy Winehouse, Back To Black. Amy Winehouse is widely considered as one of the greatest artists in recent history, selling more than 30 million records worldwide. Her acclaimed self-produced 2006 album Back To Black, propelled her to global stardom, going on to win a (then) record breaking five Grammy Awards, including Record Of The Year and Song of The Year for hit single "Rehab". The Shangri-Las, Billie Holliday, Dinah Washington, Sarah Vaughan, Minnie Ripperton, Nick Cave and Amy all feature.

ED SAYS - NO SINGING DOWN THE FRONT.

Jane Weaver / Love in Constant Spectacle

The foundations of Weaver’s sound are still evident – lush motorik drums, pulsating bass, custom modded synths and exotic fuzz pedals - but the stream is awash with scrabble piece poetry and Letraset lullabies leading to lush escapism, the free abandon that you’d associate with free jazz and the avant-garde. But, as determined and visionary as Weaver might be, Love In Constant Spectacle wasn’t executed without assistance. Here we find a long mooted unison with Jane’s first ever producer, John Parish (PJ Harvey, Aldous Harding), who has shared Weaver’s process in the surrounds of Rockfield Studios and Geoff Barrow’s Invada studio. Love In Constant Spectacle is otherworldly, it is both intimate yet distant, a surrealist interpretation of the foundations that make us human – the stories and landscapes it paints are habitats of their own. A voyage into undisclosed pastures, it’s a heartfelt manifesto from an artist that continues to boundlessly evolve with each chapter in her career.

ED SAYS - PURE AND POETIC.

The Libertines / All Quiet On The Eastern Esplanade

On All Quiet On The Eastern Esplanade, the quartet of unlikely lads have gathered from their new-found homes in France, Denmark, Margate and London to solder a strongest-ever internal bond, and scale new creative heights resulting in the best music of their extraordinary career so far. ‘I Have A Friend’ is the Libertines all over – spiky, driving guitar lines, twanging countermelodies, and Peter Doherty and Carl Barat’s call-and-response delivering a tumbling flow of imagery and lyricism. Same goes for ‘Merry Old England’, one of the album’s most visual offerings; implied grey skies yawn over “swings and merry-go-rounds” and “chalk cliffs”, darkness sprawls in the dense strings and choral vocals in the second half of the song.

ED SAYS - DOWN TO MARGATE.

The Black Keys / Ohio Players

The Black Keys are back and back on form and having fun with their 12th studio album, Ohio Players, released on Nonesuch. The album’s lead single, “Beautiful People (Stay High),” was co-written with Beck and Dan the Automator, while Noel Gallagher and Greg Kurstin contributed to several other tracks. The group made its name on fuzzy blues rock (those were the days - Ed), but the expanding dynamics of Auerbach and Carney are really on display on Ohio Players. “Don’t Let Me Go” is a majestic fusion of a psychedelic, loungy-sounding groove tossed into the blender with horns, soaring harmonies and a driving rhythmic beat.

ED SAYS - MARK IT 8 DUDE.

Various / Moving Away From The Pulsebeat - Post-Punk Britain 1977-1981

105 tracks charting the British post-punk explosion 1978-1981. Punk rock attracted both dreamers and schemers. Many were simply fired up by the music. Some were motivated by manifestos and personal agendas. Others vanished the moment the novelty wore off and the hair dye washed out, leaving behind one or two fine records. Others, like The Clash, The Jam and The Cure, resolved to stay the course, giving themselves new challenges while carving out successful careers. Above all, the post-punk landscape was populated with cult heroes. Moving Away From The Pulsebeat takes a whistlestop trip through that landscape as the dust settled on the apocalyptic overhaul of 1977. Curated in chronological order to preserve that journey, and capturing key singles, deep album cuts and fan favourites, this is the story of a genuinely subversive underground about to erupt upon the mainstream, rendering everything that had gone before irrelevant overnight. Presented in extreme detail, with band-by-band biographies, sleeve imagery, release information and introductory essay by the widely published Mark Paytress, Moving Away From The Pulsebeat is an essential time capsule for veterans, collectors and newcomers alike.

ED SAYS - THE SOUND OF THE, ER, SUBWAY.