album overview
The Repeelers
Not In Our Backyards
DL / Restricted Version 12″ Vinyl
Out now
(4/5)
The Repeelers are ‘extra of a collective than a band’ constructed round Tim Carson of Scrotum Clamp infamy and his songs. The road-up embrace Rhoda Dakar‘s producer Lenny Bignell and the legend that’s Terry Edwards. Album paintings is by Flux of Pink Indians Colsk Latter. That is an album of acoustic-plus ‘anarcho-punk’“songs of constructive resilience, that acknowledge the current, reference the previous, however in the end look to the longer term”. Ged Babey even forgives the Exploited cowl model.
I don’t assume I’ve EVER heard a music by Wattie & co carried out acoustically earlier than. And guess what? The Repeelers handle to find a tune, melody and little bit of pathos within the music. It’s fairly an achievement.
There are three cowl variations on Not In Our Backyards and along with the content material of his personal songs, they gave me some thought of Tim Carson’s age and background.
The Mobs ‘I Want’, Flux of Pink Indians ‘Tube Disasters’ and The Exploited ‘Various’: So I assume that might make him about 14 in 1981, born in 1967 so 58 now.
(Spot on. 58 in a pair weeks time..)
His CV reads ’38 years in Scrotum Clamp‘ – which I sincerely hoped meant a London punk band of that title. Three of my capital-based Fb pals knew-of the band ‘Nice dwell!’ all of them mentioned.
My educated guess* is the Clamp members moved to London within the 80’s (like my provincial mates who ended up within the AK47’s and Dread Messiah), fashioned a party-punk-anarcho band, ‘for amusing’, saddled themselves with a ridiculous however memorable title, performed squats, advantages and festivals, and any out there help slot inside a radius of 20 miles, had a dozen line-up adjustments, breaks for jail, rehab, marriage, youngsters, however someway saved getting in some type or different for almost 40 years: – there may be some music on Bandcamp and dwell movies on Youtube and so they do sound numerous enjoyable: Cabaret punk, dressed up, tousled & experimental stuff a bit like Anarchistwood possibly.
I digress (Ronnie Corbett fashion), The Repeelers are Tim’s solo challenge. His songs reflecting on 4 a long time of punk-attitude, outlook and experiences: taking inventory and attempting to show his ideas and concepts into tough and prepared pop-songs bashed out Patrik FitzGerald fashion. Soul-baring Protest punk, stripped again to its core – three chords and one mans reality – at occasions despairing, getting a bit nostalgic however questioning whether or not it was all price it, and whether or not something has really modified within the real-world. The ‘songs of constructive resilience’ do break through the clouds of remorse although.
(Tim) By likelihood I met Lenny Bignell (Rhoda Dakar, Parma Worldwide, Sidewalk Medical doctors, the Juks, Phoenix Metropolis Allstars) in a brewery faucet room in Penge, we talked and ended up in his studio (additionally in Penge). What started with one man and a guitar quickly turned two…. Punk Acoustic Plus! Alongside the way in which we elicited assist from Terry Edwards, Franck Alba, Sean Quinn, Petra Bishai and Harvey Reehal.
Keyboards, xylophone and trumpet are all integrated giving the songs a sparkle while the tough edges are retained within the vocal and battered acoustic. It’s neatly, subtly achieved. What might’ve been probably a Patrik FitzGerald ‘tribute’ is one thing else altogether.
There’s a little bit of a Zounds/Chumba vibe however the vocals recall to mind Jim-Bob from Carter USM as does the sense of melancholy and triumph in little-victories.
The stand-out observe (or my favorite) is the duvet of The Mobs I Want – however as a result of it’s a such a basic piece of poetry that comes with sarcasm and factors to an entire ideology… however a few of his personal songs have that very same plaintive edge to them.
Johnny No one is a cross between a campfire Conflict and the Tornadoes ‘Telstar’.
Mary Broke a Window (the one Scrotum Clamp music on the LP) is a vigorous checklist music and train in rhyme on the face of it however stands as testimony to feminine acts of resistance and tribute to the indomitable She-punk angle of previous.
Anyplace City is a well-known punk-theme, the small city / small thoughts mentality and undercurrent of violence in such locations. The music does outstay its welcome at seven minutes although.
Generally is mid-life id disaster in music while Nameless Being is in regards to the anonymity of getting older, thematically much like Interrobangs Am I Invisible But?
Songs to Riot to is ‘activism nostalgia’ maybe or a soundtrack for the subsequent technology possibly.
This isn’t an album for everybody. It has a stunning naivety however an enormous attraction.
If you’re somebody whose life and outlook was modified by punk – and continues to be guided by the assumption that it was a pressure for good and it’s later values of protest, resistance and activism (a fizzing cocktail of socialism, anarchism, humanitarianism and artwork mischief…) then you’ll completely get the place Not In Our Backyards is coming from.
Don’t let the very fact it begins with an Exploited music put you off! Moreover, it ends with an awesome model of the ‘Fairly Vacant’ of anarcho punk’ Flux’s Tube Disasters.
Manufacturing and enter from Bignell, collectively one of the best UK Pop-Reggae alongside Prince Fatty, provides the challenge a excessive definition readability. Terry Edwards provides brass and sophistication to every little thing he does, nevertheless it’s Carsons songs that are the beating coronary heart of an oddly inspirational album.
Purchase from Bandcamp
All phrases Ged Babey
Put up Script.
*I despatched Tim a draft of the overview to see how good my guesswork was….
Age. Spot on. 58 in a pair weeks time..
Background. I did get into punk in 1981 (and have positively, positively and intentionally not discovered a doorway out of it ever since), within the again waters of Herefordshire (I used to be on the similar college, two years above Ian Glasper and his cousin Mobs (Decadence Inside / Stamping Floor) and my brother Tom (yeah, I do know! Tim and Tom! Certainly, there have been occasions when this wasn’t useful!) who at present fronts punk band MC16.
I did transfer to the London space (Epsom) in 1986, to coach as a jeweller at Artwork Faculty. Me and my good friend Harvey (nonetheless within the band), who adopted the identical street, did type the band there, for a nasty style celebration.
Scrotum Clamp. We’re a London band (aside from the Dutch violinist (jeweller) who lives in Norway), we’ve got managed to maintain taking part in continuously, aside from the odd hiatus (principally for rather more mundane causes than those you provide). Turnover has been comparatively small contemplating, 3 bassists, 5 guitarists and a trumpet participant. And we’ve got a cut up single, with The Scuts, popping out in June/July.
The band title: Scrotum Clamp – I bear in mind the Bull & Gate as soon as wanting to place us on with Anal Beard and Clitoris All-sorts, unsure if it was for the synergy of the music. Or as a result of the road up would make a rattling good flyer. (Tim Carson)
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