Day 258.
Northern Portrait: perhaps the best news in a while is that the Danish combo will be back with an album called “The Swiss Army” soon. To promote the comeback of the band, Northern Portrait and their label, Matinée Recordings, have unveiled a song to become a classic, “At Attention”. Amazing! Can’t wait to hear their new album!
The Royal Landscaping Society: on other Matinée news we have our Spanish friends with their classic song “Frost”! The B side for this digital single is “This Gift”, a cover of They Go Boom! This digital release is to get everyone ready for the upcoming 17 track album “Means of Production”!
Mummy, Mummy Please Look At Me: A Tribute to the Television Personalities: is the name of a new tribute cassette tape for the classic TVPs. The cassette is released by Dandy Boy Records from Oakland, California, and includes 13 covers, all recorded during the pandemic. Some bands included are Jeanines, The Kitchenettes, Odd Hope, So Cow, and more.
Leach Me Lemonade: back in 2015 this amazing Indonesian band released a tape on Shiny Happy Records. It was an EP called “Rainy Days” and it is now available on Bandcamp. There are here 4 songs of pure pop. Jangly as it can be. No wonder the band was featured on our Sound of Java compilations. This is a must listen.
The Pale Kings: this Birmingham band have released a very interesting 3 songs. They are jangly, very 80s sounding, and I must say that they leave me intrigued. The songs are “Poison Darling”, “Happy Birthday” and “Roll Call”. There is no information about who are behind the band but as I said, this is very promising.
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Let’s head to Huntington Woods, Michigan, to discover a very fine jangle pop band.
Three releases, all on a label called Certain Records. I strongly believe it was the band’s own label. I don’t know much about them, they are a brand new discovery to me, but I think this is a good guess.
The band was around in the 80s, releasing their first record in 1984, the “Radioland” 12″ (CER 1001). This record had four songs, “Radioland” and “Different Light” on the A side and “Go Along with You” and “Looking Glass” on the B side. All songs had been recorded at Tremor Studios in August of the same year.
We know the band lineup too on this record. Chris Lindensmith was on bass, Matthew Smith on guitar and vocals, Brad Ross Fairman on percussion and Stephan Vernier on piano, synths and vocals. The engineer for the record was Rodger Wesch while Kathleen Smith is credited as executive producer. The photos on the sleeve are credited to Matt Vernier.
The band’s second release was a 7″ with two songs, “The Party She Cried” on the A side and “As If it Were Today” on the B side. This came out in 1986 with catalog number CER 1002. AT this point we see that the band had changed bassist, Brian Salk was replacing Chris. The band produced the record with Bill Potter, and recorded and mixet it at Quadrangle Studios in Ann Arbor between 1985 and 86.
“Awaken at Twilight” is a superb album. It is jangly and poppy. It came out in 1987 with catalog number CER 1003. It sounds like many records from the British Isles from the time. I wonder what were they listening at when recording this album. Again there were some lineup changes, Josh Sparbeck played bass, Robert Wonnacott played drums, Keir McDonald keyboards. The only member from the original lineup was Matthew Smith!
The album had 11 songs, 6 on the A side, “Days That Don’t Begin”, “Another True Door”, “Moments Like These”, “If I Drift”, “Winter” and “Repeat”. The B side had the remaining 5, “Christine is Not Herselft Today”, “Upstairs”, “Again”, “In Empty Harbors” and “Awaken at Twilight”.
One thing that surprises me is that the band, at least on Discogs, has no compilation appearances. Oh well, so these are all the releases then?
Looking if the band members had played in other bands, I see that not really. Robert Wonnacott played in Viv Akauldren and Medusa Cyclone. Keir McDonald also played in those two bands as well as in Volebeats. Matthew Smith did play in a few bands though, Volebeats, Chatoyant, Crime & the City Solution, Monster Island, Odd Clouds, Spring Reverbs, The Witches, THTX and Outrageous Cherry. I have hear the last only!
What else do I find? On the Michigan Daily newspaper dating from October 25, 1985, the band is mentioned to be playing the U-Club and being compared to New Order or The Smiths.
Another article on the same paper dating from December 8, 1987, reviews the band’s album. It doesn’t really give us much detail, but it is cool, to see the band being praised.
I find an interview with the band by Hobey Echlin. I don’t know where it was released. When you click on the google link you get a text document. Oh well. But here I do hope to find some details!
One thing it says that the band supported Guadalcanal Diary and played gigs at Halfway Inn. Matthew Smith mentions being influenced by Brian Eno, The Damned and The Stranglers.
Aside from these two articles and short interview I only find some blogs that used to offer the songs for free download. No good. I don’t like that.
Now we need to know more about them. Why so many lineup changes? Were they only successful in their home state? Are there more recordings? Their music is great and deserves to be rediscovered!
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2 Responses to “:: It’s Raining”
This song is so great. I first heard this song during the worst days of the pandemic, and now associate those pandemic days with those lyrics about that “days that don’t begin.” I especially like the first verse, the chord change before the chorus, the horns before the 2nd chorus, and way the 3rd chorus is drawn out. A similar song by another underrated band: The Veldt’s “You Take the World.” Thanks for posting this great write up and the MP3!
I knew Brad Ross Fairman and worked with him in a studio. Very entertaining and talented guy. He played me a lot of the It’s Raining songs they were working on at the time. Sadly he passed away a few years ago.