Ripe for reissue

Eight years ago, Dan Selzer (of Acute Records) and pals discuss The Distractions' one and only album to date at ilxor:

The Distractions - Nobody's Perfect

After a Buzzcocks does power-pop EP on Manchester's leading punk label, and a beatiful done in every possible way single on Factory Records, The Distractions signed to Island and delivered an album that may not completely match the peaks of those first two releases, is still one of the great post-punk/power-pop/just plain old rock and roll records that time has forgotten.  The Distractions sang '60s girl group worthy melodies and played party garage rock worthy rhythms with a New Wave slant, while just about every single song is about a girl.  The Trouser Press said:

Decades from now, rock historians will scratch their heads in bewilderment that the Distractions' fine body of work didn't ensure the Manchester quintet a longer lifespan.  The 1979 EP (which contains rougher versions of two songs that would later turn up on Nobody's Perfect, plus a live pair — "Too Young" and "Maybe It's Love" — unavailable elsewhere) hints that the group was working from an abnormally broad palette, a sense confirmed by its one fine album.

A lot of records belong to a specific time, but Nobody's Perfect continues to measure up as an ace slab of educated pop rock, right in tune with the ground rules laid down by Blondie, Squeeze and others of that ilk.  Part of the problem may be that Nobody's Perfect is too weighty to be passed off as a simple diversion.  The band's eclecticism draws on everything from Chuck Berry to Phil Spector to psychedelia — often within the same song — and the vocals tend to be more somber than carefree.  "Boys Cry" comes on like a Ronettes tune but delivers none of the upbeat emotional release seasoned pop listeners are trained to expect.  Regardless, Nobody's Perfect very nearly is.

[David Sprague/Jon Young]

And while this record is long-ripe for reissue, with the members of the band fully supporting such a project, the rights are lost somewhere in Island/Universal red tape.  Anyone with any leads or connections at Island or Universal...?

I think (the album) appeals to people who've spent equal amounts of time with Singles Going Steady as the Phil Spector Back to Mono box set.  If that sounds great to you but you don't feel The Distractions, we'll just have to agree to disagree.  However, I'd also ask if you've spent good time with the Factory single.  The LP production isn't nearly as interesting.

God, The Distractions at the Rock Garden, Spring 1980... sigh.  "It Doesn't Bother Me" was a severely underrated single, I thought. I *lived* that record. *LIVED* it, I tell you!

Rafters, Ranch, the Hacienda

More on the Manchester scene of the late '70s, early '80s, as The Distractions emerged...

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Next to open was Rafters in the cellar of 65 Oxford Road.  Magazine made their debut here in October '77.  At an audition here in Spring '78, Joy Division failed to impress Stiff execs, but they did impress Factory boss Tony Wilson (who signed them) and club DJ Rob Gretton (who became their manager).  Mick Hucknall's Frantic Elevators made their debut at Rafters in June '78, supporting Sham 69.

In late '77, Morrissey (Smiths) and Billy Duffy (Cult) made their public debut as the Ritz in Whitworth Street, when they were both in The Nosebleeds.  The Smiths made their debut at the same venue in October '82 (supporting London poseurs Blue Rondo A La Turk).

A popular late Seventies watering hole was the Ranch, a gay bar often "littered with Bowie casualties" in Little Lever Street.  The Buzzcocks played an early gig there.

First local label of note was Rabid in '77 by flyposter king Tosh Ryan.  Operating from 20 Cotton Lane in Withington, it released early singles by Slaughter & The Dogs, The Nosebleeds, Jilted John and John Cooper Clarke.

Most stylish and successful local label was Factory, started by Tony Wilson in late '78, with premises at 86 Palatine Road.  Its roster was breathtaking - from the earliest days of A Certain Ratio, The Distractions and Joy Division to the latter days of New Order and The Happy Mondays.  Expansion saw them setting up the Dry Bar in Oldham Street and moving into new, expensively refurbished offices in Charles Street.  Sadly, an insoluble cash crisis developed in late '92 and the greatest provincial label in Britain went tits up.

New Order made their début as a trio at the Beach Club (a Wednesday night takeover at Oozit's Club in Shudehill) in July '80.

The Hacienda club (operated by Factory records and New Order and given the Factory catalogue number FAC 51) was a self-styled post-industrial fantasy venue, opening in May '82, at 11-13 Whitworth Street West.  The Stone Roses first played there in August '85.  The Happy Mondays came last in the Battle of the Bands contest in late '84.  For years it lost money - subsidised by Factory and New Order - but in the late Eighties, the Hacienda became the womb of acid house, the hub of rave culture, the hippest venue in Britain (Ecstasy had more influence that acid ever had).  Gangster infiltration and drug-war violence caused January to May '91 shit-down - but it reopened and thrived until January '97 closure.

Richard Boon's Buzzcocks management company New Hormones operated from 50 Newton Street.  The New Hormones record label roster included The Decorators, Ludus, The Diagram Brothers and the Tiller Boys.  The Buzzcocks recorded their Spiral Scratch EP at Indigo Studios in Gartside Street, with Martin Hannett producing, in December '76.

(c) Pete Frame's Rockin' Around Britain, Pete Frame (1999)

  

The Distractions at De Villes

The Distractions appearing at 'Tingle Tangle's' at De Villes on Lloyd Street, Manchester.  This flier is advertising a gig from 14th February 1980 and the photo was taken at Belle Vue, Manchester, most likely by Kevin Cummins. Thanks to Chris McNally for the photo of the poster.

YMIR7DC017

The new Distractions album is nearing completion, evidenced by the Occultation Recordings catalogue number that has just been announced in the latest label press release.  YMIR7DC017 on LP and CD will be the third Distractions release and the seventeenth on the label, with the sixteenth being the intriguing self-titled debut from New Zealand's Opposite Sex.

New Zealand’s Fishrider Records and UK-based Occultation Recordings (Wild Swans, Distractions, June Brides, etc.), are pleased to announce a trans-global alliance for the UK release of the self-titled debut album by Opposite Sex, available on 180g vinyl and CD from www.occultation.co.uk and distributed in the UK and Europe by Proper from 23rd April 2012. 

The subversive pop of Opposite Sex will warm the heart of anyone who viewed the heady years of 1978-1982 (Rough Trade Records including the NME's C81 Cassette, No Wave and the start of Flying Nun Records in NZ) as a watershed period in alternative music - a time when there were no rules and anything seemed possible.

Definitely going somewhere

The third and final part of Dave McCullough's brilliant Sounds article from June 1979:

ALL DRESSED UP AND SOMEWHERE TO GO

OR: GET YOUR WOOFING DOG OFF ME... DAVE McCULLOUGH MEETS HOT MANCUNIANS THE DISTRACTIONS

THE BAND's background lies in the roots of the Mancunian new wave pastures.  Steve and Mike formed the band in '75 when Yes were playing Manchester's Belle Vue, discovered or as they put it "found" the Buzzcocks a year later and started taking things seriously.

"I wanted to get things out of my system," Steve reflects.  Steve worked as a social worker in those days ("Spot the loony, that sort of thing...") while the burly Mike was in Customs and Excise white collar work ("You get it drummed into you that, you know, these people are The Enemy and I couldn't accept it.  I still can't after being there for seven years").  The band shifted through the usual variances in line-up before the TJM single came along.

"We had a single night to do it in 'cos T. J. (Davidson, the entrepreneur at the head of TJM) didn't like spending too much"  We'd all been to work that day and we went in at nine that night and came out at eight the next morning with the thing finished, ready to go to work again..."

Irony of ironies, their current recording boss, Tony Wilson of the newly instated Factory Records, offered them a deal just a week after the fatal TJM blow.

"We're not expecting any money out the TJM single.  It did what was needed.  It got us noticed..."

Since then the Distractions have attempted to no avail to "get around the country".  They got as far as Sheffield.

Constant gigging around their own parts has however steadily tightened and honed them to their present sweetly purring power.  Quietly the Distractions have become a major band.  The temporary lull in action has been to their advantage.  As Steve puts it, "When we get to London now we'll be more or less ready to do it.  We've a better chance than if we'd gone down as soon as the single got those rave reviews.  Yeah, we're ready..."

The music has changed as the band has matured as people, though the base of darkly soft rock has remained always.  Mike:

"Fashions changed and it went our way a bit I think... people were more willing after a while to listen to something other than the Pistols, perhaps the Buzzcocks opened it up... that's arguable."

The Buzzcocks influence was inevitable, Steve and Mike seeing Shelley's heroes in action at so many early gigs that, as Steve puts it, "something must have rubbed off."

But a much truer base for the band lies, I feel, in Mike's love of old Stax singles and the rest of the band's fondness for disco.  Steve likes Alicia Bridges, Evelyn 'Champagne' King, Anita Ward and others; "Maybe it'll creep into the music in the future more obviously.  We've already recorded a disco track which I expect will come out sometime..."

He goes on: "People don't seem to quite know what to do with us.  Like in '77 we were playing to a pure punk audience and we were doing the same things we're doing now.  Like 'Still It Doesn't Ring', one of our slower numbers... people said 'you can't do that, you'll get killed'."

And as we smoothly glide around Manchester I'm thinking that the Distractions are definitely going somewhere.  Brandon keeps up the chat and tells me that the new single, 'Pillow Talk' / 'Valerie' will be out in a few weeks on Factory.

"I think they're great, a really fantastic band" he says, steering into the searching, seeking headlights, like hungry wolves looking for food, like an industry looking for the band fodder and finding it in the very wieldy Distractions.

"Yeah, fantastic," I answer mechanically, feeling sad and thinking of the photo of Prince The Wonder Dog and his beaming master.

"Sausages..." I bark and laugh like the rest of the spastics.  More meat is on the way.

Dave McCullough, Sounds, 1979.

Loving, crafted, often brilliant

Part two of Dave McCullough's Sounds article from June 1979:

ALL DRESSED UP AND SOMEWHERE TO GO

OR: GET YOUR WOOFING DOG OFF ME... DAVE McCULLOUGH MEETS HOT MANCUNIANS THE DISTRACTIONS

LATER that same night as the band tear through a quite brilliant set of songs, you can see the different personalities shining through in the corporate rock and roll band set-up... Pip standing like a proud little warrior just DARING somebody to make something of her still noticeably feminine features and hair, injecting seemingly so much heartbreak and pent-up emotion into every racing bass line she plays... Mike almost out-singing a Feargal Sharkey with breathtaking quivers in his voice and a crooning, impassioned delivery... while the other three luminous with energy, and yet more passion, work up a mighty lather.

The Distractions were so impressive, so absurdly READY to take on any competitors in the pure pop race and beat them after maybe just the few seconds of the Shangri-La esque intro to 'Maybe It's Love', brimming with versatility for nearly every current pop genre, including disco, welding each pointer of influence into a cemented image and range of music!

They sound like the Undertones (a similar blend of soft and hard, a similar image of emotion through comic surface), like the Velvets (the duel guitar sound is derived from spending their early gigs copying the sound of 'There She Goes' and 'Waiting For My Man'), like the Monkees (the band image is so perfect it's almost unreal).

But there's a solidity to the songs that's got more to do with Blue Oyster Cult or The Byrds than anything less substantial.  Take the new song they played at the Factory, 'Waiting For The Rain', reminiscent in structure of 'Don't Fear The Reaper', a song full of atmosphere and urgency that's just GOT to sound dynamic on record, given the subtle, shaded guitar belt and strong vocals.

'Still It Doesn't Ring' is typically sixties based and blessed with a hook to sharp it could skin a whale, Steve and Mike's vocals again combining powerfully.  Then there's the more obviously r'n'b based numbers, like the marvellously raucous 'Do The' which for sheer speed could leave the '79 Ramones scampering back into their gatefold double live album sleeves like old men.  The set could have lasted all night, I felt so stimulated and refreshed.

Loving, crafted, often brilliant, words that buzzed in me all the way back to London.  "Fuckin' amazin', man!..." seemed to be the crowd's verdict.

To be continued...

Dave McCullough, Sounds, 1979.

All Dressed Up

Part one of Dave McCullough's article in the 23rd June 1979 issue of Sounds.  The Distractions are pictured by Paul Slattery near Arrow-Indigo studios which were in the shadow of Granada TV (home of Coronation Street):

ALL DRESSED UP AND SOMEWHERE TO GO

OR: GET YOUR WOOFING DOG OFF ME... DAVE McCULLOUGH MEETS HOT MANCUNIANS THE DISTRACTIONS

THERE WAS this dog called Prince.  Liked doing the usual sort of things that dogs do, chasing after sticks, eating pairs of socks, running after cars, a fairly typical family mutt, much loved by his owners, a charming Mancunian couple, and living the sort of life-style that the less fortunate human beings in this cruel world would no doubt envy.

One evening, however, a very strange thing happened.  While giving Prince his usual helping of Winalot and Pedigree Chum, Prince's owner Charlie stood  agog with shock and, like a man possessed, stared glassily at the dog for several minutes, unable to move.  Charlie, you see, had heard Prince say something, he had heard the dog speak.

"Sausages" had in fact been the word uttered from Prince's slobbering jaws, and it was just the start of a series of phrases and wild sentences that rolled from the canine tongue in the ensuing months with growing assurity.

Soon, Prince became a regular guest on TV's Esther Rantzen Show and an EMI recording pup-star, complete with his debut single, which through cruelly scant promotion flopped dismally.

That's the story of Prince and it's a story that rolls around my head as we speed through the shiny darkness of the Manchester suburbs.  Prince's producer, Brandon, is the driver, and his wife is a companion who shares my intrigue in the talking wonder dog.  We've just seen Brandon's newest proteges, The Distractions, play Manchester's Factory club, and after a busy day of continual interviews they're at last heading home for some sleep in warm cosy beds.

Brandon Leon is a well-known producer at the city's Arrow-Indigo studios, a short, thin, dark-eyed little man who's deeply into The Business, the industrial rolling stock that is rock and roll in these parts, clearly a man with connections and, as the Distractions' lead-singer Mike Finney puts it, plenty of pull.

Brandon has been the Distractions manager for precisely one week, and obviously preparing to shake this particular outfit out of something of a rut and place them firmly on a smooth operative course to success.

The band are known chiefly for an EP they released last March on TJM called 'You're Not Going Out Dressed Like That', a marvellous quartet of pop songs of a quite staggering standard that were the first real fruits of a 'buzz' that had been ringing around the Distractions for some time.

Only four thousand had been pressed by TJM and the single has become intensely collectable.  I didn't own a copy.  Brandon didn't own a copy.  The band shared two copies between the five of them.  Earlier at the gig drummer Alec Sidebottom had stolen away to the band's van and had returned furtively with two fresh copies of the EP under his coat like dirty postcards, slipping one each to Brandon and yours truly.

'You're Not Going Out Dressed Like That', uniformly Single Of The Week back in Spring I recall, was a very hot item indeed, reminiscent in many ways of the Undertones' 'Teenage Kicks' scorcher in that it positively spilled-over with kicking, biting, hissing potential.

The Distractions clearly had exceptional songwriting skill-kids in Finney and guitarist Steve Perrin-Brown, and, moreover, a powerful enough backing fuel in bassist Pip Nicholls, drummer Alec Sidebottom and rhythm guitarist Adrian Wright to stoke the already considerable songwriting fires.

Over the Spring months and up until Brandon's assignation, it's been all quiet on the Distractions front and I came to Manchester to see what was happening.

Over the phone Brandon had told me that the band couldn't get gigs in London, dim promoters who are obviously as out to lunch as most other departments of the r'n'r bureaucracy, displaying a hesitancy that is currently all too rife in booking bands outside the major corporate London agencies (one prominent promoter told Brandon that he could only give bands gigs if they had had full-page ads in the music-press).

It had been Brandon's task in the seven days he'd been in control to surmount this warrant ignorance in the booking-field, and to sever all final connections with TJM whose, er, methods have earned that an, um, controversial reputation.

His first achievement in many ways, I suppose, was the fluke of myself choosing THAT week to pay the band a visit.  That gig at The Factory was indeed arranged through Tony Wilson, Factory owner and local media personality star, for MY benefit, the Distractions being slotted in at the last moment between support bands and the headlining Simple Minds.  A 'Sounds gig' as many were to call it with a chuckle later that evening.  I call it PULL. (Arrogant bastard. - Ed).

After bursting my way into the sound-check like Superman and checking the bodies I'd left in my path for Band Members, I team up with the rugby-ball shape of lead-singer Mike Finney.  Mike wears little clear-rimmed specs and tonight he is dressed to the nines in a stunning black velvet (I think) suit and shining black winkle-pickers that are polished in a way that leads me to inquire if he's getting married after the gig.

"No," he smirks, "I thought I'd wear something special, like..."  Mike is chubby and looks like your favourite northern comedian.  He laughs a lot and is an extremely likeable lad.

His partner Steve Perrin-Brown has neanderthal features and seems more serious, contemplative even.  Later that night he strolls around stage in a pink suit.  Drummer Alec, a veteran of the classic Jilted John album, is a dour professional and one of the very best at his trade.  He's married with kids they tell me.  Adrian Wright has Steve's seriousness and bears an uneasy resemblance to his partner Alec.  Adrian sits-in on the interview and appears to be challenging Mike and Steve's hitherto monopoly in the song-writing stakes.

Which leaves us with bassist Pip, who looks for all the world an eight year old boy but who is in fact more than twice that age.  Pip is one of the best young bassists I've seen this last year and is currently going through the terrible pressure of changing a girl's body into that of a guy.

To be continued...

Dave McCullough, Sounds, 1979.