In the Pines/Calenture - big press list

[KrieB]

Could be right about Uncut but I'm sure there'll be plenty of others.
Oor and Parool have good reviews in Holland and there's one here.

The Parool-one is here: http://archief.parool.nl/artikel?text=triffids&SORT=presence&ED=ola&PRD=2y&SEC=%2A&FDOC=0
Any of our Dutch (or Belgian) members care to buy the article for 1 euro? (I'm not a KPN-member...)

Here is the text of the Parool online version:
(I'm chewing on a translation - the term "lekker huilebalkerige pedal steelguitar..." any suggestions? - I hope someone is faster than me to turn it into English)

The Triffids
In the pines
(Domino) -HHH
Calenture
(Domino)-HHH

Echt doorgebroken zijn ze nooit, al scheelde het maar een haartje. De Australische Triffids, die bestonden van 1978 tot en met 1989, zullen voor altijd een groep voor een kleine schare liefhebbers blijven. Tot die liefhebbers behoren ook de mannen van Domino, een Londens platenmaatschappijtje dat bezig is het complete oeuvre van de Triffids op cd te heruitgeven. De klus is inmiddels aanbeland bij de tweede helft van de jaren tachtig.
In 1986 brachten de Triffids In the pines uit, het jaar daarop verscheen Calenture. Een groter verschil is ondenkbaar. In the pines werd voor zo goed als geen geld opgenomen in een boerenschuur op het Australische platteland. Calenture werd met een ruim budget gemaakt in een super-de-luxe Londense platenstudio.
In the pines laat The Triffids op hun allerkaalst en allerdirectst horen. Zo desolaat kan alleen muziek uit Australië klinken. De treurnis in de zang van David McComb, die in 1999 overleed, wordt onderstreept door de lekker huilebalkerige pedal steelgitaar van 'Evil' Graham Lee.
Calenture werd geproduceerd door Gil Norton, die later zou werken met de Pixies en Foo Fighters. Zo kaal als In the pines is, zo vol en soms zelfs regelrecht bombastisch is Calenture. Maar ook die jaste paste de muziek van de Triffids. Het heerlijk dramatische Bury me deep in love, de openingstrack, is het ideale beginpunt voor wie de Triffids niet kent.

PvB
Copyright: Het Parool

I browsed through Oor in the shop but didn't buy it, (by memory) it is quite alike (in length, approval,...) as the Parool review. (I'll check it again - maybe it's online...)

I think I also came across (somewhere online) a longer Andrew Mueller review with more critical details about the extra's of the reissues (Has that been mentioned already?...)

[KrieB]

I think I also came across (somewhere online) a longer Andrew Mueller review with more critical details about the extra's of the reissues (Has that been mentioned already?...)

You can find that longer Andrew Mueller review on several websites. It ends with:
Two very, very different albums from one very, very different band -
and two chances to buy records this astonishing is one more than anyone should need.

www.whisperinandhollerin.com
www.betweenplanets.co.uk
www.godisinthetvzine.co.uk

Seeing that review (at least) 3 times online makes me think that chances are rather small that it will also be published on paper.

One of those 3 websites has as an addendum some "Words of Fluff and Validation" by Bill Drummond (... he who knows a thing or two about the clockwork of pop myth, but he may be as mystified as the rest of us about when and how the fishes bite)

[Urpal]

Thanks KrieB. I hadn't seen Bill Drummond's "Fluff & Validation". It's fairly typical of his writings - tough but tender and telling it like it is. It also had me laughing out loud. I hope Dave's friends can see the funny side of his sales pitch. What he forgot to mention is that if the Bunnymen's Ocean Rain was "The Greatest Album Ever Made" then, of its grand orchestral kind, Calenture was better

Thanks go out to Bill - and Andrew Mueller cos his piece is excellent too.

[Eke]

Thank you KrieB.

And well done whoever roped Drummond in. A lovely piece and hopefully it'll get noticed. Not to belittle Andrew's work but Bill's a pop star after all

[glee]

Thanks KrieB for starting this thread rolling. Nice to see some press beginning, but, as bdroop has said elsewhere, most reviews will be in March issues that hit the stands in Feb.
This is the bit where I get nervous, hoping it all goes well, noticing little things that weren't meant or got overlooked in final pressings (there aren't very many but one or two always sneak through) and rationalising that they'll be collectors items because of it.
I think you'll like them, certainly hope so.

[Urpal]

I'm sure we'll like 'em. The only question is how much more than the originals. If the BSD re-issue sets the standard the answer is likely to be a lot.

Bill Drummond's article is like a lot of his writings. It's funny, off the wall and challenging. You apply it to where you're coming from and it makes you re-consider your own feelings and motivations. That's what makes him good to me.

The "fluff and validation" piece ties in with Drummond's "how to be a great rock star" theory about which he has written in From The Shores Of Lake Placid and elsewhere: the idea being that if you make a grand exit before you have a chance to fuck up or just fade away then your reputation grows and grows exponentially, whilst if you make it big and linger you're almost certainly damned by the hereafter.

It's got me conjecturing about how things might have been had Dave not died, as that would have meant this "unique selling point" would have not come to pass - or at least not right now. Inevitably, things would have been different. Only he could answer this, but I guess Graham may not have set up thetriffids.com. It began as a spin-off from an online memorial tribute to Dave.

The plaque and the feelings that fuelled that emanated in an abiding sense of public oversight amongst fans, the particular and immediate tragedy of which was enhanced by Dave's death, so it wouldn't have happened either. Dave would have still been around to fight his own corner.

All I can say with certainty is that my personal love of the music and continuing interest in what David McComb might or might not have been doing in terms of music writing would be the same. I'd have still been regularly checking out the T and M sections of the record store racks hoping to find something new in them, or at second best something older breathing new life as a reissue.

My guess is that The Triffids and Dave's music would have undergone a process of re-assessment and renewed interest about now anyway, 20 or so years after the making. The re-issues would have been on the cards too.

So the story might have been a bit different, but the ending would have been the same. As Bill says, "the critics back then didn't help them sell records and I don't know if ones by me will now". Regardless of the outcome of this latest campaign, it’s the "pristine body of work" that perpetuates....and, rather than his death, the fact that Dave lived and produced it. We all die, but (excepting children) few leave behind something of lasting value. That's the key, and why things can't go awry. The race is already won. The only question is how many spectators will witness it on this particular action replay.

That’s how it seems to me anyway.

[glee]

urpal, thanks for your moving piece. You hit quite a few nails on the head there.

[glee]

Here's a couple from Holland for those who haven't seen them online...

[glee]

And Spain, RockDeluxe - #5 re-issue.

[glee]

Spain again - ADN a free daily.

[Eke]

There's a mention on the CD-Wow Music Gossip page. The emphasis here usually seems to be more on your typical pop celebs so a nod to the Triffids reissues at the bottom came as a surprise. Not really "big press" but I mention it here anyway.

[Urpal]

That's astonishing Eke. From my past knowledge of CD-Wow it only stocks chart and "major artist" recent stuff. The last place I'd have expected The Triffids to get a mention.

[Snowy]

What he forgot to mention is that if the Bunnymen's Ocean Rain was "The Greatest Album Ever Made" then, of its grand orchestral kind, Calenture was better

I absolutely agree with this.  I gave Calenture a listen yesterday for the first time in a few months, and what struck me was how it shows how to make a record with a "big" sound without being bombastic (that, I suppose, is subjectively used as an insult.  I'm aware things can be bombastically good too), pompous or overblown.  I think there's a very thin line and that album pulls off the admirable and incredibly difficult trick of not only identifying the line, but also managing to walk it while never straying over to the dark side.

[Urpal]

Returning to Bill Drummond's piece for a moment. I found the date on which it was written noteworthy - 23 June 2006. That was the date of the first reunion gig in Hasselt wasn't it? Did Bill synchronise his watch? Or is there a routine explanation as to why he set pen to paper on that particular day?

The other issue I wanted to raise is Nick Drake. Bill draws parallels and I believe some past publicity for Bleddyn's book has in the past too. I have to admit I've not got bored with Nick Drake yet as I've never got interested in the first place. I remember prkl (I think?) and probably others speaking highly of Drake on here in the past. So who has an opinion on him? Should I be listening? Am I an ignoramus for not being familiar (and even bored apparently) already?

[KrieB]

Exciting lunchbreak... spent in the nearby press shop:
I almost put back a copy of french longstanding music magazine Rock & Folk because it was wrapped in plastic and therefore the content was not so clear. But I picked it up again cause the cover did mention a big Brian Jonestown article and that sounded promising. Only then i noticed that the included freebee cd had - as a last track - a Triffids song!!! It's the/a cover version of "She's sure the girl I love"

"Sorte de REM antipodique, le groupe de Perth n'a jamais vraiment connu le succès durant sa décennie d'activité (1981-1990). Extrait d'une réédition  d'un album de 1986, ce morceau plaintif piqué au répertoire des Crystals montre les Australiens oscillant entre ballade folk et minimalisme hérité du Velvet."
Extrait de l'album "In The Pines"

It's also exactly 20 years since mm (Marc Mijlemans) died, so I was on the lookout for some mentioning of it in Humo. There's a long interview with his daugther Marij (27) and yes, Triffids get mentioned but here it's of course the remembrance of the mileman that counts and what I was looking for...
... "mileman" I mean like sandman or like some of our local very existing comic characters. Tintin? No, I prefer the Franquin lot. I always thought that the Humo press office was like that Dupuis-magazine office that Franquin drew alive in the Flatersaga(s) / Gaston-era