Today would have been John Pyle’s 40th birthday.

I owe him an awful lot and I wish he was still around. The link is to a zip file of songs that always remind me of John in one way or another. Whether you knew him or not, it's still a groovy little playlist.

01 - Dave Brubeck Quartet - Unsquare Dance
(This was played every week at The Dial when we'd go out on a Friday night, sit on the steps and drink Holsten Pils)
02 - BOB - Esmerelda Brooklyn
(We went to see BOB in Leicester and John shouted for this track incessantly until they played it..slightly reluctantly)
03 - The The – Uncertain Smile [12’’ Version]
(I bought this from Selectadisc for his birthday one year not realising it was different to the LP version. “listen to the sax solo!”)
04 - Elvis Costello – Home Is Anywhere You Hang Your Head
(“Here comes Mr Misery”)
05 - Iggy Pop – Shades
(vivid memory of me saying I didn’t know the song and him trying to sing the chorus to me)
06 - New Order – Lonesome Tonight
(hard to pick one New Order song, but this was a favourite b-side from his pile of 12’’s)
07 - OMD – 4 Neu
(Stoz told me years later that this was John’s favourite OMD song)
08 - Happy Mondays – Freaky Dancin’
(this one reminds me of drinking Taboo and fighting in a caravan somewhere in Yorkshire)
09 - The Jesus & Mary Chain - Tast Of Cindy [Acoustic]
(We played the Some Candy Talking 12" to death and this was on the b-side)
10 - Orange Juice – My Dying Day
(“i hear your bugle playing”)
11 - The Rolling Stones - You Can't Always Get What You Want
(I remember John being insistent that I listen to this Stones track. Even though we weren't Stones fans he said it was amazing and he knew I'd love it. He was right.)
12 - The Wedding Present – Nothing Comes Easy
(one of the first CD singles I bought – he had this track on repeat for 2 hours at least)
13 - Tom Waits - Small Change (Got Rained On With His Own .38)
(The theme tune to Alex Cox's Moviedrome series of cult films on BBC2. Essential viewing)
14 - The Weather Prophets – Naked As The Day You Were Born
(John was quite fanatical about The Weather Prophets despite their leather trousers)
15 - Natalie Merchant – I May Know The Word
(no dry eyes)

John Pyle Mix

Best Gig I Ever Done See #3 - The Wedding Present

The Wedding Present
The Duchess Of York, Leeds 1989

I mentioned previously in The Edsel Auctioneer post how the lure of bands like The Wedding Present led me to choose Leeds Poly as my seat of learning at the tail end of the 1980's, and yet again one of my bestest gigs EVER was at the legendary Duchess Of York.

By the autumn of 1989 The Wedding Present were one of the biggest indie bands in the UK (having filled the almighty vacuum created by the demise of The Smiths) and were about to release their major label debut album "Bizarro" on RCA. Having already seen them play some pretty large venues such as Notts Trent Poly and Confetti's, a nightclub in Derby, it's hard to explain how incredible it was to see them in a tiny venue like The Duchess - particularly as we only stumbled upon the gig by accident.

Me and my mate Woody from back home had inexplicably decided to go see Sarah Records also-rans St Christopher play. I don't think I'd even heard them at this point (I'm sure if I had then I wouldn't have gone along - they were pretty ordinary. The singer's voice was like a proto-Coner Oberst doing Larry The Lamb impressions plus he was damn ugly). It must have been a quiet night and the boredom got the better of us.

Upon arriving at The Duchess, we paid our couple of quid and were promptly informed by the guy on the door that The Wedding Present were doing a secret warm-up gig and St Christopher were just the support act.

And so it was we found ourselves a few feet from the stage, packed like Sardines, bouncing around to an all-new Wedding Present set. I mostly remember Grapper grinning like a lunatic through the whole thing, clearly having the time of his life, and then walking back to the bus shivering as the sweat started to freeze in our clothes.

I guess at this point I could bleat on like Old-Man Indiepop about how they were a much better band back then and post something from Bizarro, but whilst I DO still think of the Gedge/Grapper/Gregory/Smith line-up as THE Wedding Present they are still going (albeit David Gedge and the Session Cats) and I ought to give them their due - so it's the latest BBC Session that I'll go for. Four cover versions, all great songs that seem to work well when Gedged. Take it away...er...Terri

Wedding Present 2006 BBC Covers Session

Buy Bizarro at Amazon

Oh and also the following year we saw them play at The Coliseum in Leeds - a much bigger venue where they filmed the live video "*Punk" - another memorable gig if only because they had to leave the lights on for all the cameras and that made it so ludicrously hot that they had to keep throwing water on the crowd. So (as I said I wouldn't do it) here is the obligatory Bizarro track "Bewitched" on YouTube

Look out for the floppy-haired mong who appears shoulder-high in the crowd after 10 seconds - that's me!