MUSIC LIST
l
Jazzateers, Hue and Cry and Love and Money. All three are very very worthy indeed so don’t miss it unless you can't get a student to sign you in. 9pm. £2.50.
18
SATURDAY
Edinburgh
0 Avalon Preservation Hall. Victoria Street. 9pm. Free. Folk-rock.
0 Charge and Same Animals Jailhouse, (Talton Road. Charge at about 2pm doing their Saturday afternoon sessions with various guests. Same Animals at about 10.30pm.
0 Rocky Horror Picture Show Playhouse Theatre. G reenside Place. 11pm. £2(£l .50). (See Fri 17).
Dunfermline
O Skanga Warehouse. 23 Kirkgate. (See Thurs lo).
SUNDAY 9 Edinburgh
0 Ranacanteen Jailhouse. Calton Road. 9.30pm. Free. (See Sat 1 1).
MONDAY Edinburgh
0 Charge Jailhouse. Calton Road. 10.30pm. Free.
0 Great Shakes Preservation Hall. Victoria Street. 9pm. Free.
20
TUESDAY
21 Edinburgh
0 Fat Sam’s Band Jailhouse. Calton Road. 10.30pm. Free.
0 Stripes Preservation Hall. Victoria Street. 9pm. Free.
WEDNESDAY 22
‘ Edinburgh
0 AC/DC Playhouse Theatre.
, Greenside Place. 7.30pm. £8. £7.
. these days. Australia‘s
' world-famous heavy rock/metal
? group are looking not a little dated —
but it doesn’t bother their fans. whom they satisfy with every action-packed. deafening performance. I‘ve never heard a bad report ofan AC/DC gig and have been known to embarrass my friends by leaping onto packed dance floors
Andrea Miller and Mab present their first irreverent ear to the ground guide to Rock gossip.
NDTEBDDK
0 We at The List apologise forthe lack of information about gigs and hope that something is happening outlhere . . . if not, then we hope that you got Trivial Pursuits for Christmas.
0 The reason forthis enormous peacefulness on the pop scene must be that the various pop stars have had such an indulgent festive season (like the rest of us) that they don't really wantto go back to work yet (unlike the rest of us who have to) and that, in a way, is why they are pop stars. The winner of the Hardest Working Band of ’85 must surely be King, who played to a massive TV audience and a rather diminished crowd of spectators in Glasgow Barrowlands on New Year’s Eve. King are most definitely the sort of band you either love or hate, but luckily British audiences haven’t been quite as physical in expressing their dislike as the anti-King brigade have been abroad, in Italy the band were attacked twice and in Switzerland, a country generally known for its peace-loving attitudes, they were attacked with an axe (now stop sniggering you lot) at least no-one was hurt.
o Hurt feeling still seems to exist between former label-mates Edwyn Collins and Lloyd Cole. Bumping (literally) into each other at a Painted Word gig on 2 January the two exchanged icy stares and no New Year greetings. Some sympathy should be given to Collins, after all Lloyd and the Commotions have resoundineg replaced Orange Juice as the rulers of Glasgow’s pop scene.
0 The Painted Word, on the other hand seem to have an inbuilt curse as far as record companies go. You may remember a previous List story about the band siging to Elektra Rekords just as that same company disappeared into its sister conglomerate, neverto be seen again. These days The Painted
Word are being courted by MCA
andthrashing myinvisible guitarinto I . . 5 will happen to THAT company in the
the ground. A kitsch appeal that knows no boundaries — everyone taps their feet to ‘Whole Lotta Rosie‘. don’t they? Don '1 they? 0 Small Businessmen Jailhouse. Calton Road. 10.30pm. Free.
THURSDAY
23 Edinburgh
0 AC/DC Playhouse Theatre. Greenside place. £8.17. (See Wed 22).
O Deja Vu Jailhouse. Calton Road. 10.30pm. Free. Ifmemory serves. an ageing combo embarrassing everyone by ‘rocking out'. Avoid.
0 The Heaters Preservation Hall. Victoria Street. 9pm. Free.
Records, so guess what rumour has it
nearfuture?
0 In the ‘whatever happened to?’ category is Marilyn (remember him? The only truly gorgeous gender bender and the guy who didn’t go outwith Boy
i George) recently spotted supporting
trendy, handsome, but as yet unknown band ‘Curiosity Killed the Cat’ (more of them in forthcoming issues) proving that it is very tough at the bottom. . .
0 Edinburgh District Council is
i planning to open a ‘multi-media’ club
’ in the Assembly Rooms, George Street,
sometime in February. No name has yet been decided, but the club sould be running three or four nights a week, with live music on Wednesday nights. The bands booked are likely to be the more experimental or ‘specialist’
bands, like Ege Bam Yasi (watch out for the seven foot tall papier-maché phallus!) There should be a diverse range of entertainments appearing - Wildcat Theatre have been approached and there will be appearances by dance groups and alternative cabaret. We’ll bring you more news as soon as we get it.
o Alter the success of the East Africa Drought Benefit at the beginning of December, the Electric Circus may be featuring more live bands occasionally in the future. No names have been mentioned at time of going to press. . . And the re-opening of the fire-ravaged Coasters has been put back by another two months. Originally it was hoped that Coasters would be open for business by Christmas, but this was realised to be unrealistic and February is hoped to be the time that the doors will finally open again.
0 Finally, a moment’s silence forthe big-hearted Iron Fist. Brainchild of Duncan McCallum who organised all those Live Aid gigs in the Edinburgh area last month, cracks were showing in the heavy rock band’s line-up before they even played their first gig. Nevertheless, they fulfilled all their charitable commitments including the climactic Live Aid show at the Assembly Rooms on 15 December before scattering to the four winds. Well done, chaps, and better luck next time. (Mab)
MAB’S PLAYLIST
Not particularly current or local this time, but those discs which have kept me from hypothermia in the last month, so I am forever in their debt. Normal service to be resumed next issue.
1. Rate Kapelle: Fergus! The Sheep! (Big Smell Dinosaur EP track)
2. The Woodentops: ft Wlll Come (Rough Trade)
3. The Shop Assistants: All That Ever Mattered (Subway Organisation)
4. Frank Zappa: Porn Wars (EMI import track- tapes of the recent Senate Committee on Obscenity in Rock Lyrics messed around and juxtaposed to . . . er, humorous effect)
' 5. Scraping Foetus Off The Wheel:
Descent Into The Inferno (Self Immolation LP track)
RECORD REVIEWS
Lowlife: Rai (Nightshift)
The Main point of interest here is leading LowliferWill Heggie who, if you didn't already know was an ex-Cocteau Twin, would leave you in no doubt with this 6-track mini-LP, which could quite adequately have been entitled The Young Person's Guide to Progressive Rock in the 80s. There is no mystery in this music, just half-hidden homages to New Order, the
entire Banshees canon, The Armoury Show (yes!) as well as The Cocteau Twins themselves. But where the Cocteau's saving grace is the ethereal
; but monumental timelessness of their
‘ music, Rain is pretty much a thud ‘n'
; blunder exercise. The band never
g achieve a cohesive sound, never attain ' that huge, sweeping sound that seems . to be just out of reach, whether due to
bad production of the band’s inherent limitations I'm not sure. Liz Frazer, even at her most wilfully
; obscure, could add the final touch to
monotonous new age riffs to make
; them something captivating and ; golden, but Lowlife’s singerhasthe ; archetypal portentous drone that this
sort of music needs like a hole in the head.
Sweden Thru The Ages: It Helps to Cry (SnaPPY)
A three-track 12in single thistime, Sweden Thru The Ages are produced by fellow Dundonian Associate Billy McKenzie; not too surprising since two of the group were Associates in the Aflecfionate Punch days. And what they have turned out together is an unashamed stab at the Top 40. It wouldn’t surprise me ifthis turned up in the lower end of the chart within a few weeks. lhate to play ‘spot the influence' twice in one column, but Sweden Thru The Ages plough through territory successfully navigated by Go West (The Sweetest Sound), King (Each Day) and a more muscular Lotus Eaters (It Helps to Cry). Acceptable pop and definitely a chart contender.
John Laine: Set Me Free (Radioman) Apparently Radio One are already playing this single by Edinburgh-born session singerJohn Laine (songwriter Willie Logan also hails from the same neck of the woods) and apart from the fact that it’s typical Radio One fodder it's hard to see why. If I didn’t have to review the thing I certainly wouldn't put myself through this experience twice. Turgid, bland and characterless, with a key change at the end, thrown in to try and rouse those of us who have succumbed to sleep somewhere around the first chorus.
The List 10— 23 January 21