A round-up of recordings by five nineteen-year-olds from Birmingham. Featuring Stephen TinTin Duffy and Dave Kusworth.
Quite often, hearing a musician's juvenalia can be something of a let-down. I should know, stashed in my attic is a carrier bag of cassettes featuring some of my early musical endeavours. Solo demos, rehearsals by my first band and reverse tape sonic experiments, all lovingly captured on a Tascam four-track portastudio. To listen to them now would be an excruciating experience.
I mention this because one of the more interesting releases to have landed on my promo pile recently is The Hawks' Obviously 5 Believers. It's a collection of the early recordings by a group of five young Birmingham musicians made as Margaret Thatcher came to power and the 1970's gave way to the 1980s. Each member was only nineteen years old at the time. Whereas my assorted cassettes would create a cringe-fest upon hearing, The Hawks' recordings reveal a band with a wealth of talent beyond their meagre years – great songs which are well sung, played with verve, and youthful swagger.
As you may have garnered from the band name and album title there's a debt to purple patch Bob Dylan. Indeed the Hawks do a decent job of updating Dylan's “thin wild mercury sound”. But alongside the classicism, they're also freed up by some post-punk freedom in the subject matter, delivery and attitude. So what became of the Hawks and why did they not go on to bigger things? Well, actually some of them did. The band included Stephen “Tin Tin” Duffy, famously a member in the early line-up of Duran Duran, who would go on to have success both solo and with his group The Lilac Time. Guitarist Dave Kusworth also progressed in his musical career, going on to play with Nikki Sudden along with numerous other bands.
Fans of Stephen Duffy will be pleased, and probably not surprised, that he comes across as a fully formed artist here – there's the unmistakable voice for one thing, but it's the quality of writing that impresses most. Among the album's highlights is 'All The Sad Young Men' which offers a sideways look adolescent melancholia. 'Big Store' examines the emptiness of consumerism backed by a darkly descending chord sequence. 'Bullfighter' is probably the poppiest offering – jaunty, intelligent guitar pop sounding not unlike Mick Jones leading The Clash, whereas 'Aztec Moon' has a mystical feel, and hints at the depth and direction the band could have explored if they'd stayed together.
Dave Kusworth's guitar playing is the other big presence here. His solos and motifs, sometimes mercurial, always tasteful and song-serving. The perfect foil and accompanist for Duffy's young-man-discovers-the-world songs. Sadly Dave Kusworth passed away suddenly in September last year. To honour a promise to his friend and bandmate, Duffy is releasing The Hawks' recordings on CD and limited vinyl LP via newly formed label Seventeen Records. Without that all important lucky break, acclaim outside of Birmingham and them eluded them. A shame as the evidence here shows a band that could have gone on to great things. Appreciation is still appreciation however, even if it comes 40 years later.
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