mixtape | bleak house: a uk post rock primer (vol 1)

after a 2-week break it's time to get back into the fray. and here's a mix that i've been tinkering with for a while now. if you're a last fm user and a fan of post rock, then you're probably aware of samuel macklin's uk post rock group and therefore of the compilations he's been posting. in which case, here's my version.

post rock, by definition, is hard to define, but i think the original premise of post rock as a genre was the idea of the rock song deconstructed. think of it as an evolution of the dub/beefheart/punk melange of post punk, with added jazz and house music, plus a genuine sense of space combined with an "anything goes" approach. kind of.

i've sequenced the compilation in basic chronological order, so you get a rough idea of the evolution, though of course i'm not included any of the actual influences, just the influencers (if that makes sense). volume 1 covers the period 1981 to 1994.

anyway, like i said, this is just my take on it. i started to write about each track individually, but really you don't need my waffle.

::: dif juz - heset
::: ar kane - sperm whale trip over
::: bark psychosis - i know
::: my bloody valentine - instrumental
::: talk talk - after the flood
::: earwig - every day shines
::: moonshake - seen and not heard
::: papa sprain - bathtime
::: butterfly child - lunar eclipse
::: disco inferno - the last dance
::: insides - darling effect
::: laika - coming down glass

get.

papa sprain | flying to vegas

first-class debut ep from gary mckendry & chums. if you've listened to the demos already then you've heard the lead track already. and if you've listened to the "may" ep then you'll already be familiar with the dreamy ambient style of "spout". my favourite is "rich", all thumbclicks and gary's intimate "back home/my room/with your letters", reminiscent of no one except his cohort butterfly child.

my copy is a bit crackly and judders a little at the outer edges. bummer.

12" released by h.ark! in 1991.

get.

**bonus**
::: papa sprain - flying to vegas [remix] (from "volume one")

for more about papa sprain, take a look at this post on bubblegum cage iii.

*update*
defintely take a look at bubblegum cage if you haven't already - sam's post brought some former members of papa sprain out of the woodwork and revealed some recent recordings!

papa sprain | demos

wooooooo. first post back from holiday and house move, and it's a doozy. a mysterious benefactor submitted a link to this, offering no explanation, so i can't tell you much. perhaps these are demos of some of the songs for the album rough trade refused to release? or maybe it's just stuff he never got round to re-recording, except for vegas of course (not listened to the released version for ages so not sure how different it is)...

either way, i like these a lot. you have to wonder how they would sound given the usual lusher studio treatment.

get it.

papa sprain | peel session

i must thank last fm user connecti_cut, and our previous papa sprain benefactor, darren durham, once of fortdax, for passing this on. as i've said before, there were precious few papa sprain releases, so getting hold of a new one is pure gold. especially this session, which displays a slightly less "feathered" version of the band, giving what i imagine is a fairly good impression of the band as a live act.

::: time bath
::: i got stop
::: you are ten million needless people
::: cliff tune

you can read a little more info about the session here. sadly can't find any pictures of the band at all. once upon a time i had a copy of a fanzine with a load of live pictures of them and butterfly child. can't remember what it was called - it may have been kerosene but not sure... those were the days.

bbc radio one session broadcast 1 may 1992.

where are they now.

papa sprain | may

i can't take credit for this upload - the files come from darren durham, once of fortdax (great melodic electronica if you don't know - loads of stuff for download at that link), who clearly got tired of waiting for the papa sprain post i promised back in 2006!

anyway, papa sprain - what to say? one of those bands that managed to say an awful lot with very little with just three brief releases. part of the h.ark! stable alongside butterfly child and ar kane, gary mckendry's music is so fragile as to almost not be there, yet it has this soothing, amniotic presence akin to the first insides album and the first few butterfly child releases (which he mixed).

"u swell" pulses below gary's half-spoken vocal. "mayflower" is a swoon of guitar neck harmonics. "i got stop" sparkles and twinkles. "bathtime" neatly pre-empts the sea & cake's groove... 17 minutes and it's all over, but it's enough to have become something of an enigma, the lack of profile only serving to enhance the otherworldly quality of the music.

i wonder what he's doing now.

12" released by h'ark! in 1992.

it's better to burn out than to fade away.