The Fishheads – Pleasant Valley Sunday / Let's Get Together 7”

Fruits de Mer all-stars cover version single, just in time for Christmas!

 

We love a decent cover version here at HD, and here's a piece of 7” black plastic featuring two of them! The Fruits de Mer label have assembled an all-star band of their favourite acts to record versions of The Monkees' 'Pleasant Valley Sunday' and 'Let's Get Together', a song written by Chet Powers aka Dino Valenti, and covered by loads of people. Perhaps best known is The Youngbloods' version as featured on their eponymous 1967 LP.

The Fishheads feature Astralasia's Swordfish, Anton Barbeau, Crystal Jacqueline, Icarus Peel, John Chinn, Paul Chousner, Holly Bowler and more. Their version of 'Pleasant Valley Sunday' is a fairly faithful take, with that lovely folk-rock guitar motif and lovely layered harmony vocals. 'Let's Get Together' gets a spirited upbeat makeover, its communal cooperative vibe enhanced with suitably festive flute flourishes. In a just and fair world it would be a contender for Christmas number one. Unlikely I know but should you purchase this 7” single I suggest you play it loud in the run up to the big day.

As an extra incentive to purchase the mono-mixed vinyl, it comes with an accompanying CD featuring stereo mixes and a 40 minute mix by Swordfish that takes the songs as a starting point but branches out into new sonic realms. Well that certainly beats hearing Mud's 'Lonely This Christmas' for the millionth time while queuing at the checkouts in Tesco.  

 

Click here for the Fruits de Mer website.

 

 

Bearhug - Eight Song EP

  

The rediscovery a four-track cassette recorder sparks a series of homespun CDR releases.

The rise of affordable digital home recording over the last couple of decades has in many ways been a great boost to musicians. Not only can they save massive amounts of money by not hiring expensive studios, the technology's boundless capability has theoretically made anything possible. You can literally recreate a 40-piece orchestra in your box bedroom. 

A good thing then surely? Well yes but there has been some negative knock-on effects. Firstly the struggle to survival experienced by some dedicated full-time recording studios. But even sadder than that, to my mind at least, was the almost overnight extinction of four-track cassette recorders. In my late teens and early twenties much of my spare time was spent laying down rudimentary tracks, experimenting with drones, tones, tape speeds. It was a voyage of discovery that led me to find out about mic placement, how to double track vocals, and the instant psychedelia achieved by flipping the tape over to enable a backwards guitar solo or the effects of reversed cymbals.

I'm reminded by all this by way of a self-released CD that I received in the post recently by an artist called Bearhug who makes music on a rediscovered four-track recorder that had been laying dormant in an attic for several years. Bearhug plans to release a new EP/mini album each month, some under different names. There will be 40 numbered CD copies of each release and a video posted online to accompany one song from each release.

I'm heartily in favour of this homespun cottage-industry approach. It's done not in pursuit of perfection but to celebrate spontaneous creativity. And before you start thinking it's marginal and twee, I bet you'll have records in your collection that were made in the same lo-fi spirit. McCartney's debut solo LP, Beck's early work, or Michelle Shocked's The Texas Campfire Tapes are just three example that spring to mind.

Featuring eight songs with a total playing time just a chorus shy of 13 minutes, Beahug's first mini album is a playful affair. Kicking of with 'Harry Hooper', a song about the baseball star with lyrics read from the blurb of a book. It's a sweet melodic affair, recorded quickly featuring just ukulele and vocals. Elsewhere there's lo-fi electronica, industrial fugs, experimental indie, a delightful untitled ukulele instrumental, a track about Sylvester Stallone, and my personal favourite track 'Graham's Melting Circuit Boards'.

It would be nice to think that this is somehow the start of a revival of lo-fi four-track recording, and that there'll be a groundswell of cottage industry CDR labels. Unlikely perhaps but the music here, along with the attitude in which it was made is something to be celebrated. It will be interesting to see what Bearhug does next.