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Saturday Deluxe / 30 July 2016

By Paul Sinclair

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65

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Tears For Fears at Newmarket racecourse last night / copyright Raph PH

Shout! Tears For Fears back in the UK

Tears For Fears played live in the UK for the first time in over 10 years last night as they entertained the crowd at Newmarket Racecourse with a hits-packed set…

Although the band only played three tracks from Songs From The Big Chair (Everybody Wants To Rule The World, Shout and Head Over Heels) it was a fairly ‘democratic’ song-selection with four from The Hurting, three from their last studio album Everybody Loves A Happy Ending and four from The Seeds of Love. Radiohead‘s Creep was given a workout and Elemental stand-out, Break It Down Again – a TFF live stalwart – was also performed.

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click to enlarge / copyright Raph PH

So no surprises at all in the 16-song setlist – none of the covers they’ve recorded in the last few years and no new material, which must exist since they’ve been working on it for a least two years! In fact, only two songs in the set were not released as singles – Memories Fade and Badman’s Song.

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click to enlarge / copyright Raph PH
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click to enlarge / copyright Raph PH
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click to enlarge / copyright Raph PH
Photos courtesy of Raph PH (check out his work on twitter & instagram).


New Beatles doc trailer.

Here’s a new trailer for Ron Howard’s Beatles documentary, Eight Days A Week: The Touring Years. You know, the film they are advertising on the front of The Hollywood Bowl reissue…

The tag line is ‘The Band You Know. The Story You Don’t’. Hmm, really? I read Philip Norman’s Shout when I was probably 12 or 13 in the early 1980s and since then have consumed just about every book/film/documentary/tv show ever put out about the Fab Four. So forgive me if I feel like I DO know the story. Also, didn’t The Beatles themselves tell us this very ‘story’ in 1995 with the first few episodes of The Beatles’ Anthology? Don’t want to be too negative, because I know I will enjoy it, regardless. If nothing else the trailer, reminds us of how brilliant that line is from George… “we were normal, and the rest of the world was crazy”.


Incidentally, one interesting aspect to the theatrical release of Eight Days A Week is that as part of the screenings, the Shea Stadium concert will also be shown. The footage (shot with 14 x 35mm cameras by Ed Sullivan Productions) has been restored and will be screened in the 4K format with sound remastered at Abbey Road Studios by Giles Martin and Sam Okell. Good to know that this clean-up work on Shea Stadium has already been done. If they are showing this with the film, then you’d be forgiven for assuming it will be bonus content on the future blu-ray/DVD of Eight Days A Week, but I can’t see them being quite so carefree with something so iconic and important…

Read about The Beatles Live at the Hollywood Bowl.

frommoscowtomars

Erasure box set news

We already know that there is going to be an Erasure box set later this year, and we also know that two CDs have been allocated for B-sides, but now the set has a name. The anthology will be called ‘From Moscow To Mars‘. It will be released in ‘the autumn’ and the band are promising more news ‘soon’.

Kate-Bush

Happy Birthday, Kate.

SDE would like to wish Kate Bush a very happy birthday. She’s a sprightly (whisper it) 58 today. We love Kate, even she also annoys us by not reissuing ANYTHING and continues to sit on the audio and video recorded during her Before The Dawn run in 2014…

Talking of which, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but some enterprising journalist has looked into Kate’s company’s accounts and worked out that she made ‘just’ £1.7m from her Before The Dawn gigs back in 2014. This has turned into a tabloid story of how Kate (“the Wuthering Heights Hitmaker”) turned her back on ‘tens of millions’ (“Gig Mistake”) by choosing not to tour big arenas, and stay put in the relatively cosy surroundings of Hammersmith Odeon.

I’m not quite sure how this is any kind of surprise to anyone. Kate ‘could’ do a lot of things to make money (reissues, update her 30 year old greatest hits compilation, release albums more regularly, go on TV, do more promotion, play live more etc.) but she chooses not to.

Lots of artists talk about their desire to live a ‘normal’ life, but still turn up at premieres and court publicity and attention to maximise their career and earnings. I don’t want to single her out, but an example is UK soul singer, Beverly Knight. She does (0r did) promotional work for Audi. I went to a launch event quite a few years back (where she performed) and the company openly called her a ‘friend of the brand’. No doubt she gets supplied with a flashy car, combined with retainer, and healthy appearance fees etc. Nothing wrong with this of course (it doesn’t make her a bad person) but the point is you probably need a will of iron to turn down a brand new R8 every year and all that flattery, attention and corporate cash – if it is offered to you. But it is exactly these kind of ‘sacrifices’ Kate makes. She doesn’t feel she needs to earn extra cash by wasting energy doing something that isn’t her ‘core’ activity – making music, and having a happy family life.

Obviously, even if you factor in 18 months of preparation, £1.7m is still pretty good money, so while I do admire Kate’s resolve not to be swayed by filthy lucre, she’s still doing alright!

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65 Comments

65 thoughts on “Saturday Deluxe / 30 July 2016”

  1. @Paul

    I enjoyed the Big Chair notes, also the way they were ordered as a chronological outline of the 1983-1986 period, only “complaint” (but then I do complain a lot!) was that there seemed to be a lack of comments on the lyrical themes of the album (Cold War & all), compared to your brilliant analysis of The Hurting in the first box. I also would have wished for Ian Stanley commenting, after all he co-wrote most of the material, but as you said elsewhere on this site he doesn’t do interviews these days.

    Also, the question whether “Broken” or “Head over Heels” came first may well be the TFF equivalent of the hen/egg dilemma, because both Roland & Curt have both contradicted themselves on that matter!

    I remember the allmusic review stating that the liner notes of the 1999 Seeds actually ‘wrapped up more loose ends’ than the bonus tracks. We’ll see whether that is again the case…

  2. Paul, great work as always.
    Just saw your comment of Seeds of Love coming out this year, thats awesome news.
    Did you do work on the writeup for this again as with previous TFF boxsets?
    Of course fill us in on any definite prerelease information on this release as should be a great release.

        1. Oh yes!! Oleta was funny. Said she couldn’t get on with Marmite on toast :) That isn’t in the notes, so there’s an exclusive :)

          2. Thanks Julian. If you enjoyed the Big Chair notes then this is the same kind of thing, except with more people interviewed, namely Roland, Curt, Chris Hughes, Dave Bascombe, Oleta, Nicky Holland and Dave Bates.

  4. I honestly don’t think “Integrity” is the word for Kate’s apparent refusal to exploit her back catalogue, she just doesn’t seem to want to revisit her past work in any way, which is fair enough, though that makes it all the stranger that she’s actually taken to re-recording some of her work in the past (i.e. Wuthering Heights for The Whole Story, and The Director’s Cut album)…

    Compare & contrast with XTC, who have no problem releasing virtually every note they ever recorded at the time for their SEs, and don’t seem to think it damages their legacy in any way… horses for courses, innit?

  5. I have been a fan of Kate Bush since 1978. I have no expectations of Kate Bush either reissuing all or part of her back catalogue (didn’t she once say that we’ve all paid for them once?) or bringing out a new album or releasing Before the Dawn, but obviously would buy any of it if it happened.
    I respect artists for doing what they want and retaining integrity. Sometimes less is more, look at The Blue Nile (four albums), Talk Talk (five albums) in both cases some have been remastered, but in any case what a terrific body of work it is. This year I would have loved an SDE of the Colour of Spring but I knew it wouldn’t happen.
    Kate has given us a greater number of sublime albums to enjoy and appreciate and if she was forced contractually or otherwise to produce more who could say the brilliance would be maintained.

  6. You can praise Kate Bush as much as you want, but I think her behaviour is like that of Kraftwerk and a few others. They made a fortune with the Albums they released, but they own this fortune to the fans who bought millions of records worldwide. It’s pure arrogance (as great as the Music is they give us) to release something new only when they feel like it. These artists should consider themselves very lucky that they became so successful, while others struggle to make a living. They should either release material on a regular Basis or retire completely, but they should not (like Kraftwerk’s Ralf Hütter does) tease the fans by announcing that a new Album is about to be released “soon”. I wonder what Kate Bush would have said, had not a single Person bought a ticket for her Shows two years only to Show her that the fans’ Patience has finally run too thin.

    1. Orrrrr….. on the other hand one might think it is pure arrogance on fan’s behalf to expect or think that just because you bought a couple of CDs that these musicians owe you something. Just because I shop at Sainsbury’s doesn’t make me think they owe me something. You paid your money and you got an album. There ends the transaction wouldn’t you think? It’s different if it was a personal promo event like the Marc Almond thing the other say.

      Personally as a fan of Kate Bush since 1980 I don’t feel she “Owes” me anything. In fact as far as this analogy goes she probably owes us less than these pop stars you talk about. She isn’t clamouring for attention between albums. She isn’t teasing us, telling us something is happening soon. At no point has Kate said there will be a DVD of Before The Dawn, she never tells us anything until it is ready and it is happening. I am fine with that. Why should she. If one is a fan of Kate’s music and one doesn’t buy the next album because you don’t like the way she operates then there is only going to be one loser and it won’t be Kate.

      1. Sorry, Chris, but Kate would be the loser. I would save Money, and she wouldn’t sell her Album. If not only one disappointed fan acts this way, but many, she would notice it. After the boring-and-nothing-else-album 50 words for snow I will not take the money I have to work hard for and give it to someone who only works when he is in the mood to do so.

        1. Personally, I’d rather an artist take their time and only release what they feel is their best work and best effort than deal with someone like Rhianna, who, for some time, seemed to just record for the sake of having an album out every fourth quarter so she could get Xmas money to buy gifts with–no personality, no passion, pure product. I’d rather have art.

    1. Last I heard, it was supposed to be coming out later this year. They’re taking so long with their new album it’s now coming out BEFORE.

  8. Steven Wilson has expressed interest in remixing Kate Bush’s albums. Hopefully this will happen but we’re more likely to get the third Stone Roses album in 2016 than new Kate Bush releases.

  11. Good overview Paul of Kate B., The Beatles and T.F.F., who I would love to see live. I wish they would play Haydock Park Racecourse who put on concerts in the summer months.

    Wouldn’t it be good if The Shea Stadium show was released as aDVD/Blue-Ray extra but I wouldn’t hold my breath, same goes for ‘any’ reissue of old material from Kate B.

    How I would love to be wrong.

  13. I read Grace Jones autobiography recently she said she can live quite well doing 4 or 5 corporate events a year. Which I’m sure beats substandard music or films for revenue streams.

  14. If there’s a back catalogue in need of a big make over it’s got to be the Rolling Stones 1963-69 but I guess they still don’t have control over it?

  17. Have to agree that TFF were excellent last night, didn’t really think I would ever get to see them live. And Roland didn’t seem at all grumpy, although he did use the eff word during creep!!

    1. Artistic Integrity=Hammersmith Odeon=British Tour

      (there is something wrong with your working out,please attempt the question again)

  19. Is the 1.7 million Kate made from Before The Dawn AFTER she had paid all the people involved with it? I can imagine she would be quite generous and make sure they were paid well, or at least fairly, for their contributions.

  20. Maybe Kate Bush doesn’t want to release demos and unreleased music. She seems like a bit of a perfectionist and probably only wants to present listeners with the finished article as intended. Bizarre comparison with Beverly Knight – they’re from different eras, their style of music is different and Bush has sold considerably more records than Knight.

  21. Kate is 58 today. She was born in the same year as Michael Jackson, Prince, Madonna and David Sylvian. Not a bad year, but then I’m biased having been in that year too.

  23. Here’s another vote for Kate to sanction expansive box sets with plenty of video and unreleased music. Sadly, no reasonable hope. And at the risk of being a total anorak, isn’t she 58 now? Wear it well, lass.

  24. I know we’re awaiting the details on Erasure… Might it be an album’s box set? “Chorus” really needs to be remastered on CD… Though the new vinyl sounds really good…

    1. Still to this day don’t understand why they haven’t released deluxe versions of at least ‘Wild’ and ‘Chorus’ on cd. Fingers crossed for the boxset, hope they come up with a decent track selection and hopefully some video content as well (Docklands Arena 89, Milton Keynes 90, Tiny Tour, Cowboy Tour, …).

  25. That’s really sad and a bit shocking to hear Rolly is like that, I mean you / we are paying for his doubtless nice lifestyle by buying the TFF records. No need for it at all. If he was in a bad mood he could still have just acknowledged you both with a nod of the head. Would make me really want to lay into him with some verbal ‘home truths’ to make him see the error of his ways. Either that or just smash the record up and post it to him with a note attached explaining why.

    It’s not like he must have been pestered Bieber style at the height of TFF success, and even he (Bieber) doesn’t tell fans to ‘eff off now he is getting cranky with them.

    1. It’s a two-way street sometimes. Example: TFF, Seeds of Love tour at Wembley Arena, 1990.

      Roland (to audience, in full Showbiz Fondue mode near the gig’s end): “We’d love to take you all home with us!”

      Various members of audience: “Oh, f*** off Roland!”

      I guess if we based our record collections on artists’ affable, approachable personalities we’d have to jettison about 85% immediately. We’d definitely have no Lou Reed, Ray Davies or Terry Hall. But probably quite a lot of music featuring Suggs.

      Still, I’m looking forward to the next TFF album, no matter how grumpy its creators, or how long it takes to surface. ELAHE was an unexpected delight…has it really been 12 years??

  26. Good to see TFF back. Love the music, not so keen on the people. Not since Roland told me to eff off when I said hello to him in Bath some years ago. Maybe he was having a bad day.

    2. He said the same to me once, I live in Bath. I had bought The Seeds Of Love that day and in the evening I bumped into him and said hello and that I had enjoyed my first listen. He told me to eff off. I had assumed pop stars enjoyed recognition and positive reactions! Obviously not… Van Morrison lives here and is just as miserable, however Peter Gabriel always looks happy, friendly and approachable, though I wouldn’t bother saying anything myself after the Orzabel experience.

      1. You’d get nothing but a welcome from PG. One of the most polite rock stars I’ve had the privilege to meet, and I’ve met him a number of times. Looking forward to the European leg of the tour with Sting.

    3. Even he acknowledges he’s not a nice man. So no surprising about his rudeness. What makes a man so fickle? It was you who put those daggers in your eyes. Personally I would like to buy him for what he’s worth & sell him for what he thinks he’s worth.

    4. Good breeding usually equates good manners. In the case of artists, they are a weird lot for the most part. One never knows what to expect from any artist. But in the end I always say “never bite the hand that feeds you”.

  28. Like Rob said, Tears For Fears were amazing last night- I would rather have had another TFF song instead of Creep, but I shouldn’t complain as they played Badman’s Song and it was great. Let’s hope they don’t leave it another decade before they come back to the UK – and bring on the new album!

  30. Let’s face it Kate could, rather like ABBA could have (the Billion tour), milk it for all it’s worth. If there was an “Early Pink Floyd” style box-set available with 20 odd CDs / Vinyl remastered and bits and bobs on DVD / Blu-Ray of just about every TV performance they could write their own cheque. Hammersmith 1979 now exists in it’s entirety as a fan thing so that is due a proper release. Then there are the “Phoenix Demos” going back to 1974. Her Brother must have enough pictures left over to fill another 50 page book.

    I have a £400 book about to drop on the mat and that is just photos by Guido Harari, so Kate won’t see a penny and pictures of her 12 year old self go for £300 plus.

    Because these things haven’t been released many times over there is room for a mega-comprehensive box to bring everything together. The “This Woman’s Work” box set sells for a fortune and THAT has the Nice-price re-issue of a couple of her albums in it.

    Just imagine each album as a 2016 remastered double with demos /single mixes / 12″ mixes / rarities / the two live tours on Vinyl / Blu-Ray, book…. Ooh, I think I have just had an “emotional” moment.
    I could think of material I have or have heard / seen that could easily fill a box with a £500+ price tag. The unboxing video would be an event in itself.

    THAT is willpower. What she has in her life must be so much better than millions of quid.

    Sadly t’ain’t gonna happen.

    1. On the other hand: she could just let someone else curate the back catalogue. Right now it’s an inconsistent mess, and I cannot imagine that’s her idea of what it should be.

      Same with Prince: spent years saying how he doesn’t care about the past etc., yet over and over again he butted in when a compilation was being compiled, or he prevented remasters or re-issues, etc.

      Even Madonna’s back catalogue is severely lacking in care. Ditto Michael Jackson’s.

      I think it’s a disgrace that the only CD issue of Prince’s Sign O’ The Times sounds rubbish, and I think that’s part of the reason that album is featured less and less in “best of” lists, combined with the fact that its songs rarely featured in his concerts (whereas Purple Rain’s songs dominated more and more) and that Prince more or less sabotaged any attempts to remind people of his fantastic 1980s output through re-issues.

      Or even Madonna: why can’t I buy a box set with all of her 1980s output, including 12″ versions etc.? Preferably including “making of” documentaries etc., now that most of the people involved are still alive.

      I don’t get this. That’s just throwing away free money IMHO.

    2. Surprisingly, the library at my old college had a few CDs from the This Woman’s Work box set, so I burned them onto my computer.

  31. Kate’s still a wonder to enjoy! I do wish she’d oversee some updates on her albums; they could do with remastering. Still, I totally agree with you! The woman’s got integrity!

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