Hello, ah yes Xmas daze...
Today's artists unwittingly or not, personified the ugly side of rave culture. They were thugs, purely and simply -- they brought out the latent violence that lay beneath the surface of any drug culture, even one as seemingly beatific as England's late-'80s/early-'90s rave scene. Under the leadership of vocalist Shaun Ryder, the group sounded and acted like thugs. Ryder's lyrics were twisted and surrealistic, loaded with bizarre pop culture references, drug slang, and menacing sexuality.Their music relied heavily on the sound and rhythm of house music, spiked with '70s soul licks and swirling '60s psychedelia. It was bright, colorful music that had fractured melodies that never quite gelled into cohesive songs. ......N'Joy
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
The band were signed to Factory Records after passing a demo tape to Phil Saxe, a trader at Manchester Arndale who was on friendly terms with Mike Pickering, a DJ at the Haçienda nightclub. Saxe became the band's manager.
Their first release was the "Forty Five EP", often called the "Delightful EP" after its first track. It was released on Factory Records in September 1985. Their first album, Squirrel and G-Man Twenty Four Hour Party People Plastic Face Carnt Smile (White Out), was released in 1987 and was produced by John Cale. This was followed by two further albums: Bummed, in 1988, produced by Martin Hannett, and Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches, in 1990, produced by Paul Oakenfold and Steve Osborne. The latter, recorded at Capitol Studios in Los Angeles, went platinum in the UK, selling more than 350,000 copies. Singles "Step On" and "Kinky Afro" from this album both reached number 5 in the UK singles chart.
By the late 1980s, the Happy Mondays were an important part of the Manchester music scene and personified rave culture. Numerous world tours meant the band had international success as well as massive success in their home country. The line-up of the band during this first and most important ten year phase never changed, and the six original members Shaun Ryder, Paul Ryder, Gary Whelan, Paul Davis, Mark Day and Mark "Bez" Berry remained a tight unit until the first incarnation came to an end in 1994.The band appeared on the bill at the 1990 Glastonbury Festival. In November of that year, Paul McCartney commented in NME: "I saw the Happy Mondays on TV, and they reminded me of the Beatles in their 'Strawberry Fields' phase."
Musically, the band fused indie pop guitars with a rhythmic style that owed much to house music, Krautrock, funk and northern soul. Much of their music was remixed by popular DJs, emphasizing the dance influences even further. In terms of style and dress, they crossed hippy fashion and ideals with 1970s glamour. Sartorially and musically, the band helped to encourage the psychedelic revival associated with acid house.[citation needed] One of their most popular songs was "Lazyitis (One Armed Boxer)", featuring a surreal duet between Ryder and Karl Denver. In February 1991, Happy Mondays played at the Maracanã Stadium in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil,[8] and famously went to meet Ronnie Biggs in Brazil with Piers Morgan, who at the time was a writer for The Sun newspaper. The Mondays also influenced many bands around the Northwest and beyond, including the Stone Roses, Oasis and the Charlatans. A multi-city US tour followed with the group returning home early in May 1991. By July that year they revealed details of a fourteen track 'official bootleg' live album, Baby Big Head, recorded in Leeds. The official record label release, Live followed later in the year.
Yes Please! followed in 1992, produced by Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth, recorded at Eddy Grant's studio in Barbados. The album was a commercial failure that bankrupted Factory Records.
What happened next
Happy Mondays disbanded in 1993, and Shaun Ryder and Bez formed Black Grape with ex-Paris Angels guitarist "Wags" (who would later go on to serve in the 1999–2000 reincarnation of the Mondays) and ex-Ruthless Rap Assassins star Kermit. Seven years passed, but in 1999 Happy Mondays re-formed,[14] with founding members Shaun Ryder, Paul Ryder, Gary Whelan and Mark "Bez" Berry minus Paul Davis and Mark Day. In the place of Day and Davis were Wags and a number of other session musicians including Ben Leach who had once been a member of The Farm, percussionist Lea Mullen and rapper "Nuts". Also joining the new line-up was soul diva Rowetta Satchell (who sang back-up on Pills, Thrills, and Bellyaches, and who would go on to have solo success). The band toured extensively in the UK and internationally, selling out the 20,000 capacity Manchester Arena and two nights at Brixton Academy and released of a new single, a cover version of the Thin Lizzy hit "The Boys Are Back in Town". The single reached number 24 in the UK Singles Chart. They provided support for Oasis on their "Standing on the Shoulder of Giants" arena tour, played at the Fuji Rock Festival in Japan, numerous European festivals including T in the Park and also toured Australia the same year. Although critically acclaimed and playing to sell-out crowds, the band once more ceased their activity in 2001 following the departure of bass player and founding member Paul Ryder.
A fictionalised depiction of the band is featured in the 2002 film 24 Hour Party People, with Danny Cunningham as Shaun Ryder and Paul Popplewell as Paul Ryder. Paul Ryder himself had a cameo role in the film as a gangster and Rowetta (who sang for the band on Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches and Yes Please!) appeared in the film as herself.
What would follow is a number ' reunions' whenever the money ran out usually around original members Bez, Whelan and Shaun Ryder Latest news the band return to Australia in March 2019 for a series of dates across the country to perform their seminal 1990 album 'Pills 'N' Thrills And Bellyaches' musicians.
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
Happy Mondays' debut album was in retrospect a false start, but not as much of one as has been claimed. Production by John Cale was an odd choice -- certainly fewer bands were out there who had less of an open connection to the Welsh legend's musical approach -- but the end results capture the cluttering mess of the band's approach well enough. The wild card is the presence of original member Paul Davis on keyboards, who adds some subtle touches throughout that make the band sound a touch more relaxed than they really were, as on "Oasis." (Bez wasn't around at this point -- but then again, was he ever around even when he was in the band?) Shaun Ryder certainly is well on his own way, though, his attitude-laden delivery already finding the perfect balance between random incomprehensibility, sharp images, and inspired nonsense. The album's standout track and more or less title cut "24 Hour Party People" -- ironically only included after the fact when the song "Desmond" had to be pulled for its blatant Beatles borrowing -- is a blast, a partying call to arms that is all about fun and chaos at once. If the remainder of the album can mostly be called a fusion of disco-tinged funk and Ryder's vocal insanity, though, it's still a great fusion, not quite the heights of the near future, but by no means a washout. The combination of slick and rough on songs like the well-groovy "Tart Tart" is offset by the quiet prettiness of the band at points. "Olive Oil" sounds a bit like a queasy Smiths song and both "Cob 20" and "Kuff Dam" almost sound a bit like the Cure. CD copies of the album include a variant of "Little Matchstick Owen" called "Little Matchstick Owen's Rap," which originally appeared as the B-side to "Tart Tart."
Happy Mondays - Squirrel And G-Man Twenty Four Hour Party People (flac 215mb)
01 Kuff Dam 3:06
02 Tart Tart 4:25
03 'Enery 2:23
04 Russell 4:53
05 Olive Oil 2:37
06 Weekend S 2:23
07 Little Matchstick Owen 3:43
08 Oasis 3:46
09 24 Hr Party People 4:40
10 Cob 20 4:21
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
Only a year after the intermittently thrilling Squirrel and G-Man, Happy Mondays snapped into focus on its sophomore album, 1988's Bummed. "Focus" is an odd word for the persistently addled, violently hedonistic Mondays, yet Bummed has its own peculiar drug logic, loping into view with the two-stepping "Country Song," a cut so twisted it goes far beyond irony, then settling into the dense groove of "Moving In With," its hook buzzing and circling, causing a cacophony. Such vivid, concrete textures are a hallmark of producer Martin Hannett, the Mancunian legend who has been brought on board to give the Happy Mondays direction by doing the opposite of what he did with Joy Division. His production for Unknown Pleasures was stark, austere, but Bummed is all smeared colors and harsh edges, a fistful of razors and menace cutting viciously into the subconscious. This is nasty, nightmarish music delivered with a lascivious leer by Shaun Ryder, a hallucinatory accidental poet portrayed on the album's garish cover as some kind of harlot put out to pasture. Decadence has rarely sounded as dangerous as it did in the hands of the Mondays and this is where they reveled in that debauchery, pumping out stiff psychedelic funk as Ryder spat out rhymes of luck, lazyitis and fat lady wrestlers. Hannett's bright, brittle production amplifies everything, creating a swirling hyper-reality that's almost a sonic black hole sucking everything into its vortex -- slide guitars, sound clips from "Performance," maniacally looped drum machines, Beatles melodies, drums that are pushed to the front of the mix so it all is a relentless assault, from the ears down to the loins. As jagged and lacerating as all this is, there's a sense of evil glee, that the Mondays want to drag you down to their level, but there's no sense of seduction here; you're either with them or not, as Bummed is music for after you've already succumbed to the dark side. This remaster is amazing, more spacey, more thud on the drums , bass is a little crisper , Shaun's vocal clearer and the keys are more distinct.
Happy Mondays - Bummed (flac 452mb)
101 Country Song 3:24
102 Moving In With 3:36
103 Mad Cyril 4:36
104 Fat Lady Wrestlers 3:26
105 Performance 4:03
106 Brain Dead 3:10
107 Wrote For Luck 6:05
108 Bring A Friend 3:44
109 Do It Better 2:27
110 Lazyitis 2:50
111 Hallelujah 2:36
112 Holy Ghost 2:50
113 Clap Your Hands 3:30
114 Rave On (Club Mix) 5:38
115 Boom 2:57
116 Mad Cyril (Hello Girls) 3:53
117 Wrote For Luck (Club Mix) 5:46
xxxxx
Happy Mondays - Bummed Bonus (flac 387mb)
201 Wrote For Luck (7' Version) 3:43
202 Hallelujah (Club Mix) 6:28
203 Wrote For Luck (12" Version) 5:42
204 Hallelujah (MacColl Mix) 2:40
205 Lazyitis (One Armed Boxer) 3:53
206 WFL (Think About The Future) 7:12
207 Hallelujah (12" Version) 6:21
208 Kilamenjaro 6:17
209 WFL (Vince Clarke 12" Mix) 6:12
210 Hallelujah (Deadstock Mix) 7:51
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
This American-only release was something of a catchall, drawing together tracks from the breakthrough Madchester, Rave On EP plus the WFL and U.K. Hallelujah remix singles. The result is a good balance between the rambling and shambling funk slop that made the band's name and the more dancefloor-oriented revamps that won the group even more attention. Steve Lillywhite's initial mix of "Hallelujah" serves up something of a Brit music classic, sneaking in Kirsty MacColl's voice around the chorus even while Ryder and company carry out another massive stomp and shake. The next three tracks make up the balance of the Madchester, Rave On cuts, with "Rave On" itself being the winner, with some distinctly Parliament-like backing vocal squiggles. Paul Oakenfold comes to the fore on the final three cuts, working with Andrew Weatherall and Terry Farley on, respectively, "Hallelujah" and "Rave On." It's his solo mix of "W.F.L. (Think About the Future)," prominently sampling Jack Nicholson from the first Batman film, which does the trick -- a full-on rock/acid house classic that easily showed the way for Primal Scream and hordes of others in following years.
Happy Mondays - Hallelujah (flac 237mb)
01 Hallelujah (MacColl Mix) 2:39
02 Clap Your Hands 3:28
03 Holy Ghost 2:50
04 Rave On 6:12
05 Hallelujah (Club Mix) 6:27
06 Rave On (Club Mix) 5:38
07 W.F.L. (Think About The Future Mix) 7:12
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
At their peak, the Happy Mondays were hedonism in perpetual motion, a party with no beginning and no end, a party where Pills 'N' Thrills and Bellyaches was continually pumping. The apex of their career (and quite arguably the whole baggy/Madchester movement), Pills 'N' Thrills and Bellyaches pulsates with a garish neon energy, with psychedelic grooves, borrowed hooks, and veiled threats piling upon each other with the logic of a drunken car wreck. As with Bummed, a switch in producers re-focuses and redefines the Mondays, as Paul Oakenfold and Steve Osborne replace the brittle, assaultive Martin Hannett production with something softer and expansive that is truly dance-club music instead of merely suggestive of it. Where the Stone Roses were proudly pop classicists, styling themselves after the bright pop art of the '60s, the Mondays were aggressively modern, pushing pop into the ecstasy age by leaning hard on hip-hop, substituting outright thievery for sampling. Although it's unrecognizable in sound and attitude, "Step On," the big hit from Pills, is a de facto cover of John Kongos' "He's Gonna Step on You Again," LaBelle's "Lady Marmalade" provides the skeleton for "Kinky Afro," but these are the cuts that call attention to themselves; the rest of the record is draped in hooks and sounds from hits of the past, junk culture references, and passing puns, all set to a kaleidoscopic house beat. Oakenfold and Osborne may be responsible for the sound of Pills 'N' Thrills and Bellyaches, certainly more than the band, which almost seems incidental to this meticulously arranged album, but Shaun Ryder is the heart and soul of the album, the one that keeps the Mondays a dirty, filthy rock & roll outfit. Lifting melodies at will, Ryder twists the past to serve his purpose, gleefully diving into the gutter with stories of cheap drugs and threesomes, convinced that god made it easy on him, and blessed with that knowledge, happy to traumatize his girlfriend's kid by telling them that he only went with his mother cause she was dirty. He's a thug and something of a poet, creating a celebratory collage of sex, drugs, and dead-end jobs where there's no despair because only a sucker could think that this party would ever come to an end.
Happy Mondays - Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches (flac 480mb)
01 Kinky Afro 3:59
02 God's Cop 4:59
03 Donovan 4:05
04 Grandbag's Funeral 3:21
05 Loose Fit 5:07
06 Dennis And Lois 4:25
07 Bob's Yer Uncle 5:11
08 Step On 5:17
09 Holiday 3:29
10 Harmony 4:02
Bonus
11 Step On (Twisting My Melon Mix) 5:55
12 Kinky Afro (7" Euro Mix) 4:16
13 Loose Fit (12" Version) 6:24
14 Bob's Yer Uncle (12" Version) 6:51
15 Tokoloshe Man 4:19
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
Today's artists unwittingly or not, personified the ugly side of rave culture. They were thugs, purely and simply -- they brought out the latent violence that lay beneath the surface of any drug culture, even one as seemingly beatific as England's late-'80s/early-'90s rave scene. Under the leadership of vocalist Shaun Ryder, the group sounded and acted like thugs. Ryder's lyrics were twisted and surrealistic, loaded with bizarre pop culture references, drug slang, and menacing sexuality.Their music relied heavily on the sound and rhythm of house music, spiked with '70s soul licks and swirling '60s psychedelia. It was bright, colorful music that had fractured melodies that never quite gelled into cohesive songs. ......N'Joy
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
The band were signed to Factory Records after passing a demo tape to Phil Saxe, a trader at Manchester Arndale who was on friendly terms with Mike Pickering, a DJ at the Haçienda nightclub. Saxe became the band's manager.
Their first release was the "Forty Five EP", often called the "Delightful EP" after its first track. It was released on Factory Records in September 1985. Their first album, Squirrel and G-Man Twenty Four Hour Party People Plastic Face Carnt Smile (White Out), was released in 1987 and was produced by John Cale. This was followed by two further albums: Bummed, in 1988, produced by Martin Hannett, and Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches, in 1990, produced by Paul Oakenfold and Steve Osborne. The latter, recorded at Capitol Studios in Los Angeles, went platinum in the UK, selling more than 350,000 copies. Singles "Step On" and "Kinky Afro" from this album both reached number 5 in the UK singles chart.
By the late 1980s, the Happy Mondays were an important part of the Manchester music scene and personified rave culture. Numerous world tours meant the band had international success as well as massive success in their home country. The line-up of the band during this first and most important ten year phase never changed, and the six original members Shaun Ryder, Paul Ryder, Gary Whelan, Paul Davis, Mark Day and Mark "Bez" Berry remained a tight unit until the first incarnation came to an end in 1994.The band appeared on the bill at the 1990 Glastonbury Festival. In November of that year, Paul McCartney commented in NME: "I saw the Happy Mondays on TV, and they reminded me of the Beatles in their 'Strawberry Fields' phase."
Musically, the band fused indie pop guitars with a rhythmic style that owed much to house music, Krautrock, funk and northern soul. Much of their music was remixed by popular DJs, emphasizing the dance influences even further. In terms of style and dress, they crossed hippy fashion and ideals with 1970s glamour. Sartorially and musically, the band helped to encourage the psychedelic revival associated with acid house.[citation needed] One of their most popular songs was "Lazyitis (One Armed Boxer)", featuring a surreal duet between Ryder and Karl Denver. In February 1991, Happy Mondays played at the Maracanã Stadium in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil,[8] and famously went to meet Ronnie Biggs in Brazil with Piers Morgan, who at the time was a writer for The Sun newspaper. The Mondays also influenced many bands around the Northwest and beyond, including the Stone Roses, Oasis and the Charlatans. A multi-city US tour followed with the group returning home early in May 1991. By July that year they revealed details of a fourteen track 'official bootleg' live album, Baby Big Head, recorded in Leeds. The official record label release, Live followed later in the year.
Yes Please! followed in 1992, produced by Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth, recorded at Eddy Grant's studio in Barbados. The album was a commercial failure that bankrupted Factory Records.
What happened next
Happy Mondays disbanded in 1993, and Shaun Ryder and Bez formed Black Grape with ex-Paris Angels guitarist "Wags" (who would later go on to serve in the 1999–2000 reincarnation of the Mondays) and ex-Ruthless Rap Assassins star Kermit. Seven years passed, but in 1999 Happy Mondays re-formed,[14] with founding members Shaun Ryder, Paul Ryder, Gary Whelan and Mark "Bez" Berry minus Paul Davis and Mark Day. In the place of Day and Davis were Wags and a number of other session musicians including Ben Leach who had once been a member of The Farm, percussionist Lea Mullen and rapper "Nuts". Also joining the new line-up was soul diva Rowetta Satchell (who sang back-up on Pills, Thrills, and Bellyaches, and who would go on to have solo success). The band toured extensively in the UK and internationally, selling out the 20,000 capacity Manchester Arena and two nights at Brixton Academy and released of a new single, a cover version of the Thin Lizzy hit "The Boys Are Back in Town". The single reached number 24 in the UK Singles Chart. They provided support for Oasis on their "Standing on the Shoulder of Giants" arena tour, played at the Fuji Rock Festival in Japan, numerous European festivals including T in the Park and also toured Australia the same year. Although critically acclaimed and playing to sell-out crowds, the band once more ceased their activity in 2001 following the departure of bass player and founding member Paul Ryder.
A fictionalised depiction of the band is featured in the 2002 film 24 Hour Party People, with Danny Cunningham as Shaun Ryder and Paul Popplewell as Paul Ryder. Paul Ryder himself had a cameo role in the film as a gangster and Rowetta (who sang for the band on Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches and Yes Please!) appeared in the film as herself.
What would follow is a number ' reunions' whenever the money ran out usually around original members Bez, Whelan and Shaun Ryder Latest news the band return to Australia in March 2019 for a series of dates across the country to perform their seminal 1990 album 'Pills 'N' Thrills And Bellyaches' musicians.
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
Happy Mondays' debut album was in retrospect a false start, but not as much of one as has been claimed. Production by John Cale was an odd choice -- certainly fewer bands were out there who had less of an open connection to the Welsh legend's musical approach -- but the end results capture the cluttering mess of the band's approach well enough. The wild card is the presence of original member Paul Davis on keyboards, who adds some subtle touches throughout that make the band sound a touch more relaxed than they really were, as on "Oasis." (Bez wasn't around at this point -- but then again, was he ever around even when he was in the band?) Shaun Ryder certainly is well on his own way, though, his attitude-laden delivery already finding the perfect balance between random incomprehensibility, sharp images, and inspired nonsense. The album's standout track and more or less title cut "24 Hour Party People" -- ironically only included after the fact when the song "Desmond" had to be pulled for its blatant Beatles borrowing -- is a blast, a partying call to arms that is all about fun and chaos at once. If the remainder of the album can mostly be called a fusion of disco-tinged funk and Ryder's vocal insanity, though, it's still a great fusion, not quite the heights of the near future, but by no means a washout. The combination of slick and rough on songs like the well-groovy "Tart Tart" is offset by the quiet prettiness of the band at points. "Olive Oil" sounds a bit like a queasy Smiths song and both "Cob 20" and "Kuff Dam" almost sound a bit like the Cure. CD copies of the album include a variant of "Little Matchstick Owen" called "Little Matchstick Owen's Rap," which originally appeared as the B-side to "Tart Tart."
Happy Mondays - Squirrel And G-Man Twenty Four Hour Party People (flac 215mb)
01 Kuff Dam 3:06
02 Tart Tart 4:25
03 'Enery 2:23
04 Russell 4:53
05 Olive Oil 2:37
06 Weekend S 2:23
07 Little Matchstick Owen 3:43
08 Oasis 3:46
09 24 Hr Party People 4:40
10 Cob 20 4:21
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
Only a year after the intermittently thrilling Squirrel and G-Man, Happy Mondays snapped into focus on its sophomore album, 1988's Bummed. "Focus" is an odd word for the persistently addled, violently hedonistic Mondays, yet Bummed has its own peculiar drug logic, loping into view with the two-stepping "Country Song," a cut so twisted it goes far beyond irony, then settling into the dense groove of "Moving In With," its hook buzzing and circling, causing a cacophony. Such vivid, concrete textures are a hallmark of producer Martin Hannett, the Mancunian legend who has been brought on board to give the Happy Mondays direction by doing the opposite of what he did with Joy Division. His production for Unknown Pleasures was stark, austere, but Bummed is all smeared colors and harsh edges, a fistful of razors and menace cutting viciously into the subconscious. This is nasty, nightmarish music delivered with a lascivious leer by Shaun Ryder, a hallucinatory accidental poet portrayed on the album's garish cover as some kind of harlot put out to pasture. Decadence has rarely sounded as dangerous as it did in the hands of the Mondays and this is where they reveled in that debauchery, pumping out stiff psychedelic funk as Ryder spat out rhymes of luck, lazyitis and fat lady wrestlers. Hannett's bright, brittle production amplifies everything, creating a swirling hyper-reality that's almost a sonic black hole sucking everything into its vortex -- slide guitars, sound clips from "Performance," maniacally looped drum machines, Beatles melodies, drums that are pushed to the front of the mix so it all is a relentless assault, from the ears down to the loins. As jagged and lacerating as all this is, there's a sense of evil glee, that the Mondays want to drag you down to their level, but there's no sense of seduction here; you're either with them or not, as Bummed is music for after you've already succumbed to the dark side. This remaster is amazing, more spacey, more thud on the drums , bass is a little crisper , Shaun's vocal clearer and the keys are more distinct.
Happy Mondays - Bummed (flac 452mb)
101 Country Song 3:24
102 Moving In With 3:36
103 Mad Cyril 4:36
104 Fat Lady Wrestlers 3:26
105 Performance 4:03
106 Brain Dead 3:10
107 Wrote For Luck 6:05
108 Bring A Friend 3:44
109 Do It Better 2:27
110 Lazyitis 2:50
111 Hallelujah 2:36
112 Holy Ghost 2:50
113 Clap Your Hands 3:30
114 Rave On (Club Mix) 5:38
115 Boom 2:57
116 Mad Cyril (Hello Girls) 3:53
117 Wrote For Luck (Club Mix) 5:46
xxxxx
Happy Mondays - Bummed Bonus (flac 387mb)
201 Wrote For Luck (7' Version) 3:43
202 Hallelujah (Club Mix) 6:28
203 Wrote For Luck (12" Version) 5:42
204 Hallelujah (MacColl Mix) 2:40
205 Lazyitis (One Armed Boxer) 3:53
206 WFL (Think About The Future) 7:12
207 Hallelujah (12" Version) 6:21
208 Kilamenjaro 6:17
209 WFL (Vince Clarke 12" Mix) 6:12
210 Hallelujah (Deadstock Mix) 7:51
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
This American-only release was something of a catchall, drawing together tracks from the breakthrough Madchester, Rave On EP plus the WFL and U.K. Hallelujah remix singles. The result is a good balance between the rambling and shambling funk slop that made the band's name and the more dancefloor-oriented revamps that won the group even more attention. Steve Lillywhite's initial mix of "Hallelujah" serves up something of a Brit music classic, sneaking in Kirsty MacColl's voice around the chorus even while Ryder and company carry out another massive stomp and shake. The next three tracks make up the balance of the Madchester, Rave On cuts, with "Rave On" itself being the winner, with some distinctly Parliament-like backing vocal squiggles. Paul Oakenfold comes to the fore on the final three cuts, working with Andrew Weatherall and Terry Farley on, respectively, "Hallelujah" and "Rave On." It's his solo mix of "W.F.L. (Think About the Future)," prominently sampling Jack Nicholson from the first Batman film, which does the trick -- a full-on rock/acid house classic that easily showed the way for Primal Scream and hordes of others in following years.
Happy Mondays - Hallelujah (flac 237mb)
01 Hallelujah (MacColl Mix) 2:39
02 Clap Your Hands 3:28
03 Holy Ghost 2:50
04 Rave On 6:12
05 Hallelujah (Club Mix) 6:27
06 Rave On (Club Mix) 5:38
07 W.F.L. (Think About The Future Mix) 7:12
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
At their peak, the Happy Mondays were hedonism in perpetual motion, a party with no beginning and no end, a party where Pills 'N' Thrills and Bellyaches was continually pumping. The apex of their career (and quite arguably the whole baggy/Madchester movement), Pills 'N' Thrills and Bellyaches pulsates with a garish neon energy, with psychedelic grooves, borrowed hooks, and veiled threats piling upon each other with the logic of a drunken car wreck. As with Bummed, a switch in producers re-focuses and redefines the Mondays, as Paul Oakenfold and Steve Osborne replace the brittle, assaultive Martin Hannett production with something softer and expansive that is truly dance-club music instead of merely suggestive of it. Where the Stone Roses were proudly pop classicists, styling themselves after the bright pop art of the '60s, the Mondays were aggressively modern, pushing pop into the ecstasy age by leaning hard on hip-hop, substituting outright thievery for sampling. Although it's unrecognizable in sound and attitude, "Step On," the big hit from Pills, is a de facto cover of John Kongos' "He's Gonna Step on You Again," LaBelle's "Lady Marmalade" provides the skeleton for "Kinky Afro," but these are the cuts that call attention to themselves; the rest of the record is draped in hooks and sounds from hits of the past, junk culture references, and passing puns, all set to a kaleidoscopic house beat. Oakenfold and Osborne may be responsible for the sound of Pills 'N' Thrills and Bellyaches, certainly more than the band, which almost seems incidental to this meticulously arranged album, but Shaun Ryder is the heart and soul of the album, the one that keeps the Mondays a dirty, filthy rock & roll outfit. Lifting melodies at will, Ryder twists the past to serve his purpose, gleefully diving into the gutter with stories of cheap drugs and threesomes, convinced that god made it easy on him, and blessed with that knowledge, happy to traumatize his girlfriend's kid by telling them that he only went with his mother cause she was dirty. He's a thug and something of a poet, creating a celebratory collage of sex, drugs, and dead-end jobs where there's no despair because only a sucker could think that this party would ever come to an end.
Happy Mondays - Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches (flac 480mb)
01 Kinky Afro 3:59
02 God's Cop 4:59
03 Donovan 4:05
04 Grandbag's Funeral 3:21
05 Loose Fit 5:07
06 Dennis And Lois 4:25
07 Bob's Yer Uncle 5:11
08 Step On 5:17
09 Holiday 3:29
10 Harmony 4:02
Bonus
11 Step On (Twisting My Melon Mix) 5:55
12 Kinky Afro (7" Euro Mix) 4:16
13 Loose Fit (12" Version) 6:24
14 Bob's Yer Uncle (12" Version) 6:51
15 Tokoloshe Man 4:19
xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx xxxxx
2 comments:
"happy to traumatize his girlfriend's kid by telling them that he only went with his mother cause she was dirty"
I don't believe that's accurate. In the song you're referring to, he is recounting his *father* is telling *him* this.
Hi Rho,
A re-up of these would be much appreciated.
Many thanks!
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