THE BEAT GOES ON

Brightness On The Edge Of Derry

THE BEAT GOES ON

NEW YORK—A SHORT HISTORY OF DERRY, IRELAND: 1688—Britain lay siege to Derry City for 105 days.

1976—The Undertones are formed.

“Back in Derry, our earliest concerts, the situation that we found ourselves playing in, was for really small groups of friends in really small bars.” The Undertones’ lead singer Feargal Sharkey is explaining why there is so much friendliness between the Undertones and their fans, until he veers wildly off the subject, “But there was a lot of resentment from other bands, in that we were playing for nothing, and we were dandies, and fairly obnoxious.

“You see, bands at that stage, there were basically two types pf bands—you had the show bands, cabaret bands, playing large selections of the Top 20 in local discos. And there were the rock bands, doing Led Zeppelin covers. Nobody wrote their own songs. We didn’t care if we were a good group or nothing, we were happy just to be up there doing John [O’Neill’s songs; we were happy just to be playing.”

Obviously, Derry isn’t Manhattan, and although the year Feargal must be speaking of is 1977, the difficulties of playing were mammoth. When the Undertones first formed from the nucleus of a school band, there was only one place in town to play, the Casbah. And while the Clash were taking taxis to the dividing line betweeen Catholic and Protestant Derry for a photo session (and not playing the city), the Undertones were giving their stressfilled audience a healthy dose of fun.

No, they didn’t sing about the political situation, not at all. Their theme song was “Teenage Kicks,” their music was exuberant rock—tough, fast, fun. Almost cathartic for kids with all of Britain’s financial hardships, plus, a civil war on their doorstep.

JOE STRUMMER IS BACK! AGAIN 11

‘I'll show you morons," crows dapper Joe Strummer who—in a fit of pique over recent snotty CREEM captions about his appearance—has now become handsomer than ever and "the person America loves best" 11 It’s hard to believe but, says Joe, “First it was the teeth, so I changed me teeth. Then you dummies started in with the ears, so I did me Mohawk just to alarm you! But now, since you aren't alarmed In the least and In fact seem to not care about me one lota even to the point of printing pictures of Joan Collins and saying they're me—well, uh, who cares?" Obviously not us, Joel

Five years, three albums later: the Undertones have been in and out of fashion. They’ve gotten married, grown up, sold out concerts in Manhattan, built a recording studio, gave the world producer Roger Bechirian, switched record companies, and Feargal and guitarist/sometime co-writer Damian O’Neil are sitting in EMI’s offices explaining themselves to me. “Some people probably thought it was good that we didn’t write about politics when we first came out,” Damian thinks aloud, “especially since the other half of it was everybody singing political songs. Like Stiff Little Fingers. And basically our songs were better.” There is a longstanding feud between the bands, after the atrocious SLF made catty comments about “cute, nothing pop bands” to the press.

Feargal: “At the end of the day, though, there probably is room for people who want to express political viewpoints in rock music.”

Damian: “Yes, but there are no views on the troubles in Ireland in our songs. We don’t have to write so directly about what we feel; our actions speak for themselves. We still live in Derry; Stiff Little Fingers moved to London the first chance they got.”

Early Undertones reminded me of the Beach Boys. Feargal laughs loud at this, “We were definitely influenced by that type of sound. That sort of very happy, disposable sound; trying to work a close harmony above a melody line...”

Damian: “Now we’ve graduated, now we’re on Pet Sounds.” v

Feargal: “But now we’re more confident in ourselves; we’re working on our own ideas.”

The Undertones recorded a four track EP for the small indie Good Vibrations. Without the financial resources to promote it, they had the big idea of sending a copy to eclectic arbitrator of good taste, BBC Radio One DJ John Peel, where to their surprise he plugged it regularly. Suddenly the Undertones were in London, bombarded with offers from record companies and publishers. “We signed with Sire before we even had a manager,” Feargal informed me.

“For a bag of peanuts,” Damian adds, “when we did get a manager, he had to renegotiate the contract.” They released their self-titled album, a ragged, wonderful collection, reflecting their live set at the time, and a string of hit singles.

Market Grows As Fish Doze

TOKYO—Sleeping fish may soon be available on supermarket shelves.

Are they bored or what? Japanese researcher Dr. Hisateru Mitsuda has no answer to that, but does claim that the dozing finheads stay fresh longer. All you need to do is have them breath a mixture of oxygen and carbon dioxide and it’s goodnight chinook.

Mitsuda’s main problem? It’s very difficult to tell when fish are actually asleep. The solution? Brain scans, of course.

One other slight drawback has been the finny fellows’ tendency to suddenly awaken inside microwave ovens, turn off the timer, roll over and go back to sleep.

Rick Johnson

They also began an association with John Peel in a number of legendary sessions, with which they’d introduce new songs to the British public.

Then came Hypnotised—an even better LP, including the superb “More Songs About Chocolate And Girls,” a wry reply to the insults slung at them. By this time the Undertones were a first league pop band, so of course things started to go wrong. Their last album, The Positive Touch, was difficult, complicated, worrying, and their first real flop in Britain—partially because of the changes in fashion. But also because of a personality conflict with them and producer Roger Bechirian.

Damian: “It wasn’t just the production, we were none too pleased with Roger. He was just asking for more money and seemed to be doing less work; seemed to be taking too many nights off. We were at a studio in Holland and the owners of the studio took him out for dinner—trying to become friends so he’ll throw them some business.

Feargal: “The main thing that bothered us was that when we recorded the first LP and batch of singles, nobody had heard of Roger, but things worked out real well. And then later, because he got a good reputation through his work with us, he started working with other people.” Roger co-produced East Side Story for Squeeze and did the balancing on Costello’s New Amsterdam EP. “He was on a fairly big ego trip during the recording of Positive Touch," says Feargal. The Undertones were so displeased with his work that they rerecorded several of the tracks.

SWEET BABY JAMES SAVES THE DAY!

James Taylor, everybody's handy man, got the Linda Ronstadt Revue out of a big "jam" at Madison Square Gardens. Linda, still in the early stages of her no*frills world tour, failed to properly anticipate the problems of performing totally accapella for 10,000 screaming fans. Just as the rowdier elements were about to storm the stage, who should appear but James Taylor with two Mr. Microphones i The pair o' tweets did one quick number (Donny and Marie's Hawaiian Punch jingle) and then scrammed only moments before the audience realized the mikes weren’t plugged Into anything l

And they went into semihibernation. “We wanted to play with the songs, ’til we got them right.” So rather than spend the money on studio time, they made their own studio in Derry, which’ll be open to local groups at a reasonable rate; though Damian denies the philanthropistic qualities, “we didn’t want the equipment to rust when we’re away.”

In Manhattan on a mini-tour to work out the new songs in a live setting, I saw their overlong, rather ordinary set at the Peppermint Lounge. But my disappointment was clouded by memories of superior sets. They were very good, not great.

Why D’ya Think They Call It Soap?

HOLLYWOOD—If you’re one of the many millions of television viewers addicted to soap operas, there’s a new product that can clean up your act.

It’s Daytime Soap, an obnoxiously fragranced bar that comes in a box resembling a TV set. The screen features a poke ’n’ stroke scene of a handsome doctor smooching a beautiful amnesiac.

However, no amount of Daytime or any other soap (this includes Tone) can erase Phoebe Tyler’s ugly face from your mind. Rick Johnson

The Undertones haven’t remained the same with the passing of the years, but they’ve remained true to the spirit of the pop. They’ve still got the positive touch, and they won’t lose it.

Iman Lababedi

Swiss Miss Vs. Yello Snow!

NEW YORK-The disco boom of the mid-’70s was the first place to prove that club play was a viable alternative route for “breaking” a record. The clubs allowed disco to bypass radio and go straight to the consumers.

Today the proliferation of “dance rock” clubs provides the same opportunity for a wider range of music, including rock, pop and especially that synthesized rhythmic fusion that’s been labeled electro-pop. The trend that began with Hurrah in New York has now spread to the point where almost every city in the country has at least one “dance rock” hangout, and the list of records that became club hits before becoming radio and chart hits is steadily growing. The Human League, the Clash, Yaz, Flock of Seagulls and Yello are among those who have benefitted...

Yello? You may not know the name but if you’ve been inside a club in the last few months you know the song “Bostich.” “Bostich” is a gem of the dance genre, devilishly catchy and completely silly. It’s foundation is a simple and steady dance beat colored with synthesized touches of odd sound. Over this is laid a repetitious, almost monotone vocal chant, almost ridiculous in its insistence, a kind of electro-pop version of “They’re Coming To Take Me Away.” But “Bostich” is more than a novelty number. Its easy recognition factor, high mixibility and danceability quickly made it a national d.j. favorite.

Yello are a trio from Zurich, Switzerland, who create their records in a home studio. One of the partners is silent. Boris Blank, who composes and plays the music on a variety of synthesizers, doesn’t say anything but “I can’t speak very well English.” Dieter Meier, who does the vocals (you wouldn’t quite call it singing) and writes the lyrics, is therefore spokesman by default.

In his dark suit and tie, Dieter looks more like a Zurich banker on the loose for a wild weekend than a pop musician. I ask him what he thinks Yello is all about.

“I think what we’re trying to do is very danceable craziness. I mean the rhythm aspect makes it available for everyone. And within this rhythm concept we try to create ourselves. We don’t compromise. Even the rhythm thing isn’t a compromise. We believe very much in the importance of this whole dance movement.

“I think it would work well anywhere. It’s not done for an avant-garde hip New York audience. And it did very well in the black community in New York, the black stations played it very much. Which is a very good sign for me. Because in our concept of our sound, it’s not just consumed by arty-farty intellectuals.”

The third member of Yello, not present, is Carlos Peron.

“He’s our professional afic•. ionado. He comes into the studio once a month and tells us what sounds good and what doesn’t. I think it’s very important. If you’re in the middle of something you lose control, and you need contact with the outside world. Especially now that we have our own studio and unlimited time, you really don’t know anymore what a good mix is. If you can change it and change it. If you’re in a studio at 200 dollars a day you better finish it, so it makes the decisions easier. We had to learn to live with the freedom of our own studio.

“I don’t consider myself a serious musician. I’m a serious gambler, a serious player of games.”

The dance movement Dieter mentions has thrown up some wonderful new sounds, but it has also given rise to a lot of Copy-Cat records and a general “sound” that make a lot of records fuse into a meaningless blur.

“Of course there is always good music and bad music. In the Renaissance also there was good and bad dance music. We are trying in our sounds to be very original and fresh in ourselves. This whole dance music creates a lot of shit, I agree. But this tendency you have in every area. You have g6od and bad thriller novels, but the thriller as such is neither good nor bad. The thriller story is a construction.”

Okay, but being in a movement creates a need to distinguish yourself from it. And for me “You Gotta Say Yes To Another Excess,” the single Yello have just released as a follow-up to “Bostich,” doesn’t do it. “Bostich” sounded different. The new one, heard in a club, sounds like everything else being played.

“Yeah, that is easily possible too, because there is a certain fashion for this music, I agree. But if I like this tie here and this tie becomes fashionable, that’s not a reason not to wear it. You have to be yourself. And even with classical music, if you know the music you can listen to a piece of music and immediately identify what period it was written in. So it’s the same thing today.”

Dieter is also a filmmaker, and his innovative promo films for Yello have led to invitations to make promos for ABC, who are known for dazzling videos.

“1 work with film, not video tape. It’s more adventurous material. You can do more interesting things with the light, for example.

“I’m not having any theories about what looks catchy or what sells. I like to play around, be very loose and free with the material.”

I left thinking Dieter and Boris were an interesting pair who could again come up with something surprising, At the end, Dieter said something very strange.

“Don’t you think Boris doesn’t look Swiss?”

What does Swiss look like?

“They have something in their eyes that knows they are servants.”

Richard Grabel

5 Years Aoo

No More Mr. Nice GuyfeRoad To Ruin

Alice Cooper, who took leave of the N.Y. hospital where he committed himself for alcohol rehabilitation to fly back to L.A. to play his part in the Sgt. Pepper movie, returned promptly upon its completion* How does he look? Fifteen pounds heavier, sporting Pancho Villa hair, and guzzling straight ginger ale.