Creation-11

Creation Records

Albums 101-110

Rating Key

••••••

CRE 101
Various Artists - Creation Soup Volume One

1) The Legend - 73 in 83
2) The Legend - You Were Glamorous
3) The Legend - Melt The Guns
4) Revolving Paint Dream - Flowers In The Sky
5) Revolving Paint Dream - In The Afternoon
6) Biff Bang Pow! - Fifty Years Of Fun
7) Biff Bang Pow! - Then When I Scream
8) Jasmine Minks - Think!
9) Jasmine Minks - Work For Nothing
10) The Pastels - Something's Going On
11) The Pastels - Stay With Me Til Morning
12) X-Men - Do The Ghost
13) X-Men - Talk

•••

14) Biff Bang Pow! - There Must Be A Better Life
15) Biff Bang Pow! - Chocolate Elephant Man
16) Jasmine Minks - Where The Traffic Goes
17) Jasmine Minks - Mr Magic
18) The Loft - Why Does The Rain
19) The Loft - Like
20) The Legend - Sings The Blues
21) The Legend - Arrogant Bastards

The first of the five compilations released to celebrate the reaching of 100 albums featured the first ten Creation singles and it was the only one of the five to be complete, with all of the a-sides and b-sides included. Virtually all of the tracks had seen a release on one compilation or another over the years, so even if you had not bought the limited-run seven inch singles when they were first released, there was little here to surprise you. The tracks most likely to have caught you out were the recordings by The Legend (deprived of his ! on this record) which had not all been included on previous compilation releases, and for good reason as they really are terrible. The releases by bands that did not go on to record much for the label had not been heavily featured before either, and the songs by the X-Men are quite enjoyable in a raw punkabilly kind of way. The Revolving Paint Dream numbers are also well worth a listen and have passed the test of time very nicely. Most of the other tracks are thoroughly embedded in Creation history and would not have been new to anybody with even a moderate interest in the label. As these albums were released to bring in quick funds in the needy days of 1991, the label sadly did not invest very heavily in the packaging, which is a shame as they could have made a very nice job of it with a little more time, thought and money.

CRE 102
Various Artists - Creation Soup Volume Two

1) The Pastels - Million Tears
2) The Pastels - Surprise Me
3) The Pastels - Baby Honey
4) X-Men - Spiral Girl
5) X-Men - Bad Girl
6) Les Zarjaz - One Charming Nyte
7) Les Zarjaz - My Baby Owns A Fallout Zone
8) The Loft - Up The Hill And Down The Slope
9) The Loft - Your Door Shines Like Gold
10) The Bodines - God Bless
11) The Bodines - Paradise
12) Primal Scream - All Fall Down
13) Primal Scream - It Happens

•••

14) Jasmine Minks - What's Happening
15) Jasmine Minks - Black And Blue
16) Slaughter Joe - I'll Follow You Down
17) Slaughter Joe - Napalm Girl
18) Meat Whiplash - Don't Slip Up
19) Meat Whiplash - Here It Comes
20) The Loft - Lonely Street
21) The Loft - Time
22) Slaughter Joe - Surely Some of Slaughter's Blues
23) Slaughter Joe - Fall Apart

The second compilation in the series, featuring singles 11-20, was notable for one very apparent absence, The Jesus & Mary Chain's 'Upside Down' (single 12). Of course, the rights to these tracks had moved to their new label Blanco Y Negro following the band's move to that major after their initial Creation release, but as this was the most famous record the label had put out at the time, it was a major loss. The disappointing packaging took a new twist with this release as no care at all was taken over the track listings. Track 6 is listed as 'One Charming Night' and track 9 is noted as 'Tuesday', obviously intending to mean The Loft's 'On A Tuesday', though the song actually included (correctly) is 'Your Door Shines Like Gold'. The Loft suffer again as track 20 is simply listed as 'Lonely' and track 22 from Slaughter Joe has been written down as 'Surely Some of Joe's Blues'. Of the tracks not previously found before on Creation compilations, the X-Men numbers are lighter and more tuneful than on their first single, but still very listenable. The story behind the tracks by Les Zarjaz can be found here. It seems probable that Alan McGee was looking for some street credibility in offering a two-record deal, but the first single turned into a commercial disaster and any thoughts of a follow-up were quickly ditched. There are disagreements as to whether or not McGee really did back down on a firm promise to release two records by the band, but his reticence is understandable given that the numbers are certainly not inspiring, delivered in medieval style and sounding ludicrously out of time and place. On the whole, the twenty-three tracks on Volume Two represent pretty good value for money and the quality is pretty decent.

CRE 103
Various Artists - Creation Soup Volume Three

1) 5 Go Down To The Sea - Aunt Nelly
2) 5 Go Down To The Sea - Silk Brain Worm
3) 5 Go Down To The Sea - Women
4) The Pastels - I'm Alright With You
5) The Pastels - For What It's Worth
6) The Pastels - Couldn't Care Less
7) The Moodists - Justice And Money Too
8) The Moodists - You've Got Your Story
9) The Moodists - Take Us All Home
10) Biff Bang Pow! - Love's Going Out of Fashion
11) Biff Bang Pow! - It Happens All The Time
12) Jasmine Minks - Cold Heart
13) Jasmine Minks - World's No Place

••••

14) Primal Scream - Crystal Crescent
15) Primal Scream - Velocity Girl
16) Felt - Ballad Of The Band
17) Felt - I Didn't Mean To Hurt You
18) The Weather Prophets - Almost Prayed
19) The Weather Prophets - Your Heartbeat Breathes The Life Into Me
20) The Bodines - William Shatner
21) Biff Bang Pow! - Inside The Mushroom
22) Jasmine Minks - Black And Blue
23) Primal Scream - Spirea X
24) Felt - Ferdinand
25) The Weather Prophets - Frankie Lymon
26) The Weather Prophets - Wide Open

In many ways Volume Three of the Creation Soup series is the most interesting as it includes a number of tracks that had never previously featured on any compilation and had only been available in 12-inch vinyl form. These include the three songs from 5 Go Down To The Sea, which are Birthday Party-influenced storms of noise; three terrific deconstructed slabs of mayhem that it is well worth getting your hands on. For a band who were also compared heavily with the Birthday Party, The Moodists always offered a more controlled sound and they also have three tracks on a Creation album for the first time. Though often, like their fellow Australians, their songs were built around the bass and a sparse drumbeat, they lacked the crazed guitars and vocals of that band, but always produced a weighty, meaningful sound. Absences from singles 21-30 include The Bodines' 'Therese' (single 28) and 'Heard It All' (single 30), which had been taken by the band to their new Pop label. 'Candles In A Church' by Felt, 'In The Afternoon' by Biff Bang Pow! and 'Forces Network' and 'You Got Me Wrong' by Jasmine Minks are also absent as Creation obviously struggled to get all of the tracks originally released on 12-inch EPs on to one album. One of the Minks' tracks should have been there, but for some reason the label included 'Black And Blue' once again, the b-side of single 18. It had already appeared on Volume Two in its correct place. There were the usual collection of mistakes on the sleeve, tracks 5, 24, 25 and 26 being given amended song titles. Additionally, The Pastels and The Moodists were included the wrong way round chronologically.

CRE 104
Various Artists - Creation Soup Volume Four

1) Weather Prophets - Naked As The Day You Were Born
2) Weather Prophets - In My Room
3) Felt - Rain Of Crystal Spires
4) Felt - I Will Die With My Head In Flames
5) Nikki Sudden - Jangle Town
6) Nikki Sudden - The Last Bandit
7) Biff Bang Pow! - Someone Stole My Wheels
8) Biff Bang Pow! - It Makes You Scared
9) Slaughter - She's Out Of Touch
10) Slaughter - See My Rider
11) Phil Wilson - Waiting For A Change
12) Phil Wilson - Even Now
13) Momus - Murderers, The Hope Of Women

•••

14) Momus - Eleven Executioners
15) Momus - What Will Death Be Like
16) Biff Bang Pow! - Everything's Turning Brouchard!
17) Biff Bang Pow! - The Death Of England
18) Bill Drummond - King Of Joy
19) Nikki Sudden & Rowland S Howard - Wedding Hotel
20) Nikki Sudden & Rowland S Howard - Girl With No Name
21) Nikki Sudden & Rowland S Howard - Hello Wolf

Again the label struggled to fit everything on Volume Four and eleven of the tracks that appeared on singles 31-40 were omitted. They included 'Worst Friend I've Ever Had' from The Weather Prophets (single 31), 'Sandman's On The Rise Again' from Felt (single 32), 'When You're Alone' and 'Captain Kennedy' from Nikki Sudden (single 33), 'Sunny Days' from Biff Bang Pow! (single 34), 'The Lonely Death Of Thurston Moore' from Slaughter (single 35), 'Love In Vain', 'Down In The Valley' and 'A Cowboy's Lament' from Phil Wilson (single 36) and 'I Want That Girl' and 'The Manager' from Bill Drummond (single 39). Tracks 9, 10 and 16 were listed incorrectly on the sleeve of a compilation on which there was little to thrill the Creation supporter. Most of the tracks had been done before in one way or another; the most obscure were probably the Phil Wilson numbers from the first of two singles the former June Brides singer released for Creation. These are worth a go if country music appeals to you. Though reduced to only one track from his only single for the label, Bill Drummond's 'King Of Joy' is a fine listen and by far the best track on his The Man album. There may be one or two further obscure b-sides featured here, but nothing that is going to set the world alight.

CRE 105
Various Artists - Creation Soup Volume Five

1) Baby Amphetamine - Chernobyl Baby
2) Baby Amphetamine - Cheque It Out
3) House Of Love - Shine On
4) House Of Love - Love
5) House Of Love - Flow
6) House Of Love - Real Animal
7) House Of Love - Plastic
8) House Of Love - Nothing To Me
9) Blow Up - Good To Me
10) Blow Up - To You
11) Phil Wilson - Ten Miles
12) Phil Wilson - A Jingle
13) Felt - The Final Resting Of The Ark

••••

14) Felt - Autumn
15) Blow Up - Pool Valley
16) Blow Up - Smile
17) Emily - Mad Dogs
18) Emily - Reflect On Rye
19) Emily - What The Fool Said
20) Emily - The Old Stone Bridge
21) Baby Amphetamine - Chernobyl Baby (Meltdown Mix)
22) Blow Up - 125
23) Blow Up - I Won't Hurt You
24) Phil Wilson - Jackson
25) Felt - There's No Such Thing As Victory
26) Felt - Buried While Blind
27) Blow Up - When You Smile
28) Blow Up - Wish

The final compilation in the series ran to a whopping twenty-eight tracks (or twenty-nine) and yet still missed out two from the singles numbered 41-50, with no place at all for the Clive Langer release 'Even Though' (single 42). As with the other four releases in the series, Volume Five is a total balls-up, there being twenty-nine tracks included with the correct running order being: 25) Felt - 'Fire Circle', 26) Felt - 'There's No Such Thing As Victory', 27) Felt - 'Buried Wild Blind' (not "while" as listed), 28) Blow Up - 'When You Smile', 29) Blow Up - 'Wish'. Track 28 from Blow Up's Pool Valley EP is exactly the same as track 16, which for some reason is listed as simply 'Smile'. The writing credits in the list of songs are also inaccurate. An obvious omission was the aborted single 47, 'Don't Shilly Shally' by Edwyn Collins which was released eventually on the WEA Creation offshoot, Elevation. Volume Five is, again, one of the more interesting compilations, featuring plenty of material that had not made its way on to other Creation collections. Baby Amphetamine were famously three record shop workers who Alan McGee got together to release a record and he certainly succeeded in achieving a lot of publicity for the release which was in a rap style and is quite appealing in its amateurism. The b-sides from the House Of Love's first two singles are also worth catching. 'Love' and 'Flow' are reverby numbers that pale in comparison to the classic 'Shine On', but 'Plastic' and 'Nothing To Me' have some neat guitar work from Terry Bickers in one of his more reflective moods. The Blow Up tracks are all pretty decent and it is surprising the band did not take off in a bigger way, and the four tracks from Emily's Reflect On Rye EP are all charmingly downbeat. With some nice material from Phil Wilson and Felt in one of their better moments, there isn't really much to complain about. Apart from the shoddy work of the compilers.

CRE 106
Teenage Fanclub - Bandwagonesque

1) The Concept
2) Satan
3) December
4) What You Do To Me
5) I Don't Know
6) Star Sign
7) Metal Baby
8) Pet Rock
9) Sidewinder
10) Alcoholiday
11) Guiding Star
12) Is This Music?

•••••

Quickly following on from their light-hearted album of instrumentals, Teenage Fanclub uncovered their first major work for their new label with Bandwagonesque, a beautifully crafted homage to their hero Alex Chilton. This album was very well received and, unusually for Creation, they took the opportunity of releasing three singles from it, 'Star Sign' (single 105), 'The Concept' (single 111) and 'What You Do To Me' (single 115). The choice of the first single was possibly not the best as 'Star Sign' is one of the more straightforward numbers on the album, faster and riffy with occasional waily guitar parts, and it doesn't stand up as well as some of the more musical compositions. It was second time lucky as 'The Concept' is blinding: chugging guitars matched with neat lyrics, an eloquent solo and a prolonged choral outro merging into a splendid electric conclusion. The third offering 'What You Do To Me' is lively and bouncy, but rather short and a little repetitive. Of the rest, the honours must fall to 'I Don't Know'. Though most of the tracks were composed by Norman Blake or Gerard Love, this number was the sole composition from Raymond McGinley and it is a stormer with deep vocal harmonies sung out over dancing guitars embellished by the occasional rock 'n' roll flourish. Not that there is much wrong with any of this, though 'Satan' sounds like a leftover from 'The King' sessions and doesn't really add much to the whole. Certainly a record from a top band fulfilling every expectation.

CRE 107
Unused
The first Creation album number not to be used.

CRE 108
Dave Kusworth - All The Heartbreak Stories

1) Next Tuesday
2) Always Be There
3) Lost Words
4) The Most Beautiful Girl In Town
5) One Sunny Morning
6) That Girl
7) You Never Told Me
8) The Last Drop Of Wine
9) What Time Blows Away
10) All The Heartbreak Stories

••••

Extra tracks on CD release
11) I'll Be Your Angel Again

The final offering from Dave Kusworth on Creation marked the end of another era as it was the last release of this particular brand of wasted rock 'n' roll that the label had promoted, if not really thrown its weight behind, since the early days of Nikki Sudden. Billed as a solo album, Kusworth had waved goodbye to The Bounty Hunters, though his long time colleague, bassist Glenn Tranter, remained. Again this is a largely acoustic album dealing with the fallout from relationships and the only conclusion you can come to is that Kusworth should not be allowed anywhere near girls as his fragile emotions clearly cannot cope with them. Sensitively produced by Joe Foster, Kusworth unburdens his woes and some of the musical arrangement and playing is quite breathtaking; surely nobody combines an acoustic and electric as nicely as this man. Jeremy Thirlby plays electric lead on 'That Girl' and the break with Kusworth's acoustic is simply lovely. 'The Last Drop Of Wine' is carried along by a terrific flute melody from The Jazz Butcher, Pat Fish, and this is the best and most uplifting number, telling of a struggling releationship that is too strong to let fade away. The guitar work on 'One Sunny Morning' is very fine with the vocal taken by Susan Dillane; though the title may suggest a happy number, it is a tale of suicide and guilt. It's not all great, but certainly has some top moments.

CRE 109
Velvet Crush - In The Presence Of Greatness

1) Window To The World
2) Drive Me Down
3) Ash And Earth
4) White Soul
5) Superstar
6) Blind Faith
7) Speedway Baby
8) Stop
9) Asshole
10) Die A Little Every Day

••••

With their third foray into American music, Creation finally hit paydirt. Bassist and vocalist Paul Chastain and drummer Ric Menck had released two very good EPs on the Subway label in 1988 as Choo Choo Train and, with the recruitment of guitarist Jeffrey Borchardt, the band had become Velvet Crush with Creation taking up the option of releasing their first album in the UK. This is an interesting record, full of variety, taking up where Choo Choo Train left off with clever, melodic pop with a raw and dynamic edge and again showed the Creation label returning to its roots. There are no real stand out tracks, as the quality is pretty uniform, though 'Superstar' with its fast, shuddering beat and buried vocals is the least successful number, and 'Die A Little Every Day' is quite an unadventurous track with which to end an album. Otherwise, it's all good. 'Window To The World' is gentle pop with some decent riffing and a nice, exploring solo, and the single 'Drive Me Down' (single 139) a faster number with a raw edge that dominates the vocal. 'Ash And Earth' plays to a rumbling bassline with occasional wailing guitar, whilst the not very soulful 'White Soul' has singing guitars over a pounding rhythm. 'Asshole' is a slow, acoustic ballad with concealed menace and 'Stop' twists and turns but doesn't quite know how to end. A good start from the Rhode Islanders.

CRE 110
The Jazz Butcher - Condition Blue

1) Girls Say Yes
2) Our Friends The Filth
3) Harlan
4) Still And All
5) Monkeyface
6) She's A Yo-Yo
7) Honey
8) Shirley Maclaine
9) Racheland

•••

There had been a few changes to The Jazz Butcher's line-up since the last album, with the departures of Laurence O'Keefe and Kizzy O'Callaghan, and Joe Allen coming in on bass and Alex Lee, who had helped out on Cult Of The Basement, becoming more of a permanent fixture on guitar. Condition Blue is a very coherent sounding record; it is not raucous and it is not exciting, but it sounds like a proper album, holding together in all the right places. Musically, at times, it harks back to the easy listening style of Fishcotheque; the opener 'Girls Say Yes' is very middle of the road with saxophones and Fish crooning. 'Monkeyface', again, is just Spanish-tinged lounge music. At the other end of the scale 'Honey' is really good with the best vocal performance and fine guitar and sax solos. 'Racheland' as well does its job as a slow, achey finale and The Jazz Butcher at their best can be very decent indeed. 'Still And All' is atmospheric with its keyboard drone, and 'Our Friends The Filth' is a vaguely dancy six-minute rumble with a female choir and chiming guitars. 'Shirley Maclaine' speeds over seven minutes with a huge outro and 'She's A Yo-Yo' also shows a bit of life with some raucous guitars. Certainly has its moments.

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