Forty Five Minutes Of Bunnymen

I've been thinking about an Echo And The Bunnymen mix for ages without committing. Part of me just wanted to do the first four albums, the original line up of McCulloch, Sergeant, Pattinson and De Freitas, from Eric's to Ocean Rain. Part of me wanted to just sling together my favourite Bunnymen songs (more or less the same thing actually). Part of me wanted to do just B-sides and album songs. These things may still happen. But I enjoyed the pair of New Order mixes I did earlier this year where I started with a New Order song and went where it suggested, taking in solo songs, remixes, covers, edits and songs that sounded New Order- esque- so I used that as a guide and started a Bunnymen mix in a similar vein. There are edits and solo songs, B-sides and singles, outliers in the Bunnymen world. 

Forty Five Minutes Of Bunnymen

• Into The Seventies
• Bedbugs And Ballyhoo (Single Version)
• Never Stop (Discoteque)
• BOTDH Peza Edit
• Thorn Of Crowns (Go Home Productions Remix)
• Lover Lover Lover (Indian Dawn Remix)
• The Killing Moon (T- Rek's Desert Disco Dub)
• Weird Gear

William Alfred Sergeant is Echo And The Bunnymen's guitarist, a sometime solo artist, memoir writer and all round good egg. In 2020 he released an an album of instrumentals called Things Inside. Into The Seventies was the opening track, a three minutes of finger picking and drones that sounds like the soundtrack to a late night TV programme. His side project with Les Pattinson, Poltergeist, released a fine album too, Your Mind Is A Box (Let Us Fill It With Wonder), which I should have included in this mix. 

Bedbugs And Ballyhoo was originally a B-side to Bring On The Dancing Horses, a shimmering Bunnymen pop song with a jazzy, groovy B-side. It was re- recorded for the so- called Grey album, their fifth and self- titled album in 1987 (and then released as a single by WEA but I think everyone had pretty much given up on that album by that point). Ray Manzarek of The Doors plays keyboards. Bedbugs And Ballyhoo (along with The Game, Lips Like Sugar and one or two others) are proof that they could have made a really good album out of those songs if they'd not been falling out, had been more arsed and not smothered the songs in late 80s sheen. 

Never Stop is a 1983 single, a massive Bunnymen moment, released to coincide with gigs at the Royal Albert Hall- 'lay down thy raincoat and groove' they instructed. Strings, Ian doing his best Henry Fonda 'Good Gawd' impression and lyrics attacking Thatcherism. Will's bursts of guitar are pretty good too. Discoteque is the 12" mix and the rhythm section really could lay down their raincoats and groove. 

Peza is a DJ, producer and remixer/ edit artist. His version of Bring On The Dancing Horses is a 2019 nu- disco edit that doesn't too anything too radical but keep the song streamlined for the dancefloor. Dancing Horses is brilliant, shimmering 80s alt- pop.

Go Home Productions is/ was the name of Mark Vidler's remix/ edit/ mash up outfit- I featured quite a lot of his stuff back in the early days of this blog and he's been doing his thing since 2002. His unofficial version of Ocean Rain's Crown Of Thorns found its way to the band who liked it so much they put it out themselves. By contrast with Peza, Go Home Productions does monkey around with Thorn Of Crowns, completely reconstructing it, leaving Ian's C- C- C- cucumber, C- C- C- cabbage C- C- C- cauliflower malarkey on top. 

Ian left the Bunnymen and went solo in 1989. Hi first solo lp was Candleland, a low key and somewhat out of step album for 1989 but it's rather wonderful in its own way. His second solo album was 1992's Mysterio which was lead by a cover of Leonard Cohen's Lover Lover Lover. This remix, the Indian Dawn Remix, was by Mark 'Spike' Stent and is very 1992. He went on to work with the reformed Bunnymen on 1999's What Are You Going To Do With Your Life?, the Bunnymen reduced to just Ian and Will. Les left after realising that the things he grew frustrated about with Mac in the 80s were still frustrating and causing arguments in the 90s. 

The Killing Moon is perhaps their best known song- I'm sure it's their most streamed. It gained a whole new life after being included on the soundtrack to Donnie Darko in 2001. It is a superb song,both Ian's timeshifting, romantic lyrics and the swooning 80s post- punk/ psychedelic music. Something For Kate's cover and this dub disco remix came to me via its appearance at an ALFOS. Both Something For Kate and T- Rek are Australian and this cover/ remix is a bassline led, thumping nine minute gloom romp. Lovely. 

Weird Gear is from Everyman And Woman Is A Star, the 1991 album by Ultramarine with lyrics from a Kevin Ayres song, sung by Brendan Staunton and with strings sampled from The Cutter, a 1983 Bunnymen single/ highlight, high drama and urgency, happy losses and drops in the ocean. 

Twenty One Minutes Of Two Minute Tracks

I had an idea that I would do a Sunday mix of all those short electronic/ ambient tracks that appear on albums, the intros and outros, the bridging tracks, found sounds, brief ambient pieces and short one minute ideas that never got worked up into a full track but that the artist clearly liked. I realised that to make it forty minutes long would require at least twenty tracks and time constraints this week meant that I started the mix but haven't got anywhere near forty minutes- it's just shy of twenty one minutes, fourteen tracks from a variety of sources. I need to give it more thought really and gather together some more and either do a part two or expand this one out but in the meantime, here it is...

Twenty One Minutes Of Two Minute Tracks

I decided early on that two minutes was the cut off (although there are a couple here which just tip over that time). I was going to go totally beatless but that didn't work out. It's almost completely without vocals too. I wasn't sure it all worked but playing it back last night I was pretty happy with it. An expanded edition/ part two is definitely on the cards. 

• A Man Called Adam: Easter Song (Gospel Oak FX)
• Two Lone Swordsmen: Tiny Reminder No. 1
• Four Tet: This Is For You
• Sewell And The Gong: MYND
• The Orb: Snowbow
• Ultramarine: A Year From Monday
• A Man Called Adam: Easter Song (Hi- Tech)
• M- Paths: Calm
• Polypores: Mystery Energy Score
• Aphex Twin: Avril 14th (reversed music not audio)
• Pandit Pam Pam: Interludio
• Daniel Avery: First Light
• Sydney Minsky Sargeant: Intro
• Andrew Weatherall: Intro

A Man Called Adam's Easter Song is one of their best, a triumphant piece of optimsitc, life affirming Balearica. In 2017 the duo put out a special edition on Bandcamp to celebrate the song's 20th birthday which came with two new very short versions, the found sound intro of Gospel Oak FX and the ambient with beats of Hi- Tech. Both appear on this mix. 

In 2000 Two Lone Swordsmen released their electronic triple disc opus Tiny Reminders, Weatherall and Tenniswood's pursuit of  techno/ bass purism followed through to its end. Each of the three disc opened with a burst of static/ quiet noise called Tiny Reminder and numbered 1, 2 and 3. 

Four Tet's Sixteen Ocean's was a 2020 highlight, three sides of vinyl that soundtracked those early days of lockdown in March/ April 2020 of that year. This Is For You is one of five short tracks on it- the others are Hi Hello, ISTM, 1993 Band Practice and Bubbles At Overlook 25th March 2019- any/ all of which I was going to include here and didn't.

Sewell And The Gong's Patron Saint Of Elswhere is one of my favourite albums of 2025, a Balearic  folk/ motorik beauty with MYND a short one minute fourteen seconds of sound sandwiched between much longer excursions. 

The Orb tend to do long tracks. Snowbow is from 2005's Okie Dokie It's The Orb On Kompakt, an album I only found recently and have been enjoying. Snowbow is the closing track, two minutes and fourteen seconds.

A Year From Monday gave me the idea for this mix. It's on an album of Ultramarine recordings from 1997/ 8 that sat unreleased until this year. I posted it a few Monday's ago and listening to it in the car I wondered how it would work with a load of other very short tracks around it. 

M- Paths' Calm was on their album Hope, released on Mighty Force in 2023, a rippling melody line and drums. 

Polypores released an album in June, Cosmically A Shambles. I posted a song from it on Friday. The slightly hyperactive and bleepy Mystery Energy Score is in the middle of the album and this mix. I couldn't decide if its energy was a good change of pace or not and nearly took it out. In the end I thought it just about worked.

Aphex Twin's Avril 14th is his most streamed track, a Satie like piano piece smothered in reverb. THis version, the music reversed not audio version, is from user18081971's Soundcloud page, widely acknowledged to be Richard D James' outlet for all manner of unreleased music. 

Pandit Pam Pam is from Sao Paulo, Brazil. Interludio is from Dot, an EP from January this year, six tracks recorded while caring for a young baby, Diogo. 

First Light is the opening track on Daniel Avery's Song For Alpha, a 2018 album that was the start of a run of outstanding albums that isn't over yet. One minute and forty seconds of wodnerful ambient drones. 

Sydney Minsky Sargeant's album Lunga came out last week, an autumn 2025 highlight. Intro is the opening track (obviously), a short ambient piece that eases us into Lunga. And out of this mix.

Andrew Weatherall's Intro was the very short first track on Convenanza. 'I seem to have got in with the wrong crowd', the voice says, setting Andrew's stall out. 

Monday's Short Song

Thought I'd twist the traditional Monday long song slot for today's August bank holiday with something under two minutes long but one that also contains the word Monday in its title- Ultramarine's A Year From Monday (from the re-issue earlier this year of 1998's A User's Guide), a collection of thirteen tracks recorded by the Essex duo in 1996/7. Nothing from the album sounds like it was recorded the best part of three decades ago. As for the song title, a year from Monday? Anything could happen by then... 

A Year From Monday

Weird Gear

My recent trip back to Ultramarine's 90s albums and the recent re- issue of some unreleased recordings from 1996 led me to Weird Gear, the second track on 1991's Every Man And Woman Is A Star, a song with vocals by Brendan Staunton and a very well deployed string sample from 1983...

Weird Gear

The bouncy folk/ techno groove and Brendan's soulful vocal are a dream. The lyrics are from a Kevin Ayres song, There Is Loving Among Us from 1972 and Kevin's Whatevershebringswesing album. 

The swirling strings sample is of course from The Cutter, the second single from Echo And The Bunnymen's third album Porcupine- the Bunnymen and producer Kingbird (Ian Broudie) pulled out all the stops with The Cutter, Eastern strings, scouse psychedelia growing from their post- punk dread and some of Ian's best lyrics, lines about the seventh floor, hurdles approaching, drops in the ocean, Sellotape and knives and being the happy loss. What's it all about? I don't know. It's exhilarating and anthemic stuff though. 

The Cutter

This earlier demo version saw the light of day on the Never Stop 12", also from 1983, a wonderfully rattly version with trebly guitars courtesy of Will Sergeant but lacking those distinctive strings. 

The Original Cutter- A Drop In The Ocean

Forty Five Minutes Of Ultramarine

A few weeks ago an email arrived promising a new album from the duo Ultramarine- it is in fact a new old album, thirteen previously unheard and unreleased recordings from 1996- 7 about to be compiled as Routine and released by Blackford Hill. A single, Sunrise, came out on Friday as a taster and it's been part of my commuting playlist for the past fortnight, three and a half minutes of sunlit synths, keys and a hissy drum machine, and very nice indeed.

Ultramarine were/ are London and Essex duo Paul Hammond and Ian Cooper and back in the early 90s their fusion of ambient/ ambient house and folk was a refreshing and very English pastoral sound. Their best known song, Kingdom, saw them recruit Robert Wyatt on vocals and over the course of several albums they refined their sound and always stayed interesting- 1990's Folk, 1991's Every Man And Woman Is A Star and 1993's United Kingdoms were all essential early 90s electronic/ ambient/ folk and they've made four in the 2010s that have kept the standard high. Routine is available at Bandcamp for pre- order ahead of its release in July. Some of the track titles- Avebury, Crop Circle 5am, Runic Calibration and Astro Navigation- are pure Ultramarine. 

I thought a Sunday mix to accompany the new single was in order and revisiting their music this week has been a joy. The tracks below are all from the duo's 90s recordings and are perfect for a Sunday in May even if the weather isn't doing quite what it should be. 

Forty Five Minutes Of Ultramarine

• Kingdom (Extended Mix)
• Hymn (Kevin Ayres Version)
• The Badger (Remixed By Richard H. Kirk)
• Goldcrest
• British Summertime
• Stella
• Interstella (Stella)
• Sunrise

Kingdom came out in 1993 with Robert Wyatt on vocals, the nearest they got to a hit. Wyatt's doleful, haunting, double tracked voice singing words of Medieval suffering and protest- 'We're low, we're low, we're rabble we know, mere rabble we know' and 'We're not too low the cloth to weave/ Too low the cloth to wear'. The folky/ Medieval pipes and 90s electronic squelch sound superb together. Goldcrest was the B-side of the Kingdom 12". The album United Kingdoms followed complete Incredible String Band sample. The Badger was also on United Kingdoms, one of several tracks remixed by among others Carl Craig and Fila Brazillia, and the one here by Cabaret Voltaire's Richard H. Kirk. 

Hymn is a cover of a 1974 Kevin Ayres song, and came out in 1994, the sumptuous Ultramarine electronic sound and traditional instruments- accordion, clarinet- plus the voice of David McAlmont. The version I've included here has Kevin singing and came out on a remixes EP. 

British Summertime was on 1991's Every Man And Woman Is A Star album, an ambient techno/ house classic, the folk influences seamlessly stitched in with early 90s technology, an ambient hippy/ folk crossover. The word pastoral was used a lot in reviews and the folky/ jazzy sound of the late 60s Canterbury scene, John Martyn and Rob Harper, that gentle English psychedelia, was a very strong presence on the album's dozen tracks. 

Stella and Interstella were a 1990 single recorded for Belgian Le Disques Du Crepuscule in 1989 (a Factory sister label). They are always together for me, Stella and Interstella, and separating them seems wrong. They were added to the group's first album Folk, also released by Le Disques Du Crepuscule in 1990, an album that crosses boundaries from psyche to house to Balearic and back again, breakbeats and folk. Stella bounces around, bleeps and bass and warm synth chords, the 'You and me together' sample at its heart. Interstella (Stella) in particular is a dream record, ambient house, acoustic guitar and vocal samples, a voice saying 'I can do anything' perfectly encapsulating the feel of the times, when music was infused with the sense of endless possibility. 

Sunrise is from the forthcoming Routine album, which is where this post started. 

Fate's Faithful Punchline

A few weeks ago Nina Walsh rediscovered and shared a YouTube playlist made my Andrew Weatherall when he and Nina were doing Moine Dubh (the record label they formed to put out weird, off kilter folk music based in Crystal Palace). Nina said Andrew often forgot his usernames and passwords for YouTube and was constantly having to create new accounts- it's nice to know that's something that affects top DJs and producers as well as the rest of us. The playlist, Dubh Drops, is here and features an array of acts including Cheval Sombre, The Shadow Project, Hungry Ghosts, Amanda Palmer and Edward Ka- Spel, The Black Ryder, Dean Wareham, Rose City Band, The Carpenters and Negative Lovers. It also includes this gem by The Legendary Pink Dots...

Fate's Faithful Punchline

Led by finger picked acoustic guitar and Edward Ka- Spel's echo- drenched voice and eventually some strings, Fate's Faithful Punchline is moving, gorgeous and elegiac psychedelic folk. The Legendary Pink Dots are an Anglo- Dutch group, formed in London in 1980 and have since then released forty- seven albums, twenty- six live albums and forty- eight  compilations. And you thought The Fall were prolific. 

I included Fate's Faithful Punchline on my latest mix for Tak Tent Radio which went live at the weekend, an hour of songs that you can listen to here at Tak Tent or here at Mixcloud. Andrew Weatherall's fingerprints are to be found elsewhere in the mix in the form of his remix of The Impossibles from 1991 and a Beth Orton song he produced that was a B-side on the Someone's Daughter CD single. 

• Alex Kassian: Spirit Of Eden
• Martin Duffy: Promenading
• Eden Ahbez: Full Moon
• 10:40: Ninety- Now
• Coyote: Nothing Rests
• David Holmes: No- One Is Smarter Than History
• Gal Costa: Baby
• The Impossibles: The Drum (Andrew Weatherall Remix)
• A Certain Ratio: Houses In Motion (Version 1)
• Ultramarine: Stella
• Beth Orton: It’s This I Find I Am
• The Legendary Pink Dots: Fate’s Faithful Punchline

Isolation Mix Thirteen

Lockdown ends today- at least, that's how the government and the media have been portraying it with occasional reminders that social distancing and a 2 metre gap might be important. The government have largely dropped the daily infection figures and death toll from their bulletins. You don't want to be depressing people at this stage of proceedings with doom and gloom, not when there are pints to be drunk! The media have been splashing stories about Super Saturday, Independence Day and the End Of Hibernation. It does look like they deliberately chose July 4th so they could call it an Independence Day. Meanwhile, Leicester is in lockdown, the R rate in London is apparently creeping above 1, there are Covid hotspots around the country, the deaths are still well over one hundred every day, and lots of people are talking about a second wave and a second spike without the people in charge actually wanting to do anything about it. We are still shielding, the medical advice we received this week is that due to our son Isaac being in the extremely vulnerable category we should stay in isolation until August 1st. Despite a few minor changes to our lockdown lives, we are still very much in isolation.

This mix is an hour and eight minutes of music with a folky, ambient, pastoral tinge with some Balearica and guitars thrown in, some old stuff and some brand new- some birdsong and synth ambience to start and finish, blissed out tracks from Seahawks, Apiento and Ultramarine, Green Gartside solo and as Scritti Politti, acoustic guitars courtesy of Nancy Noise, Michael Head and Barry Woolnough, some understated brilliance from The Clash and Sandinista!, Julian Cope covering Roky Erickson, Thurston Moore covering New Order and Jane Weaver's cosmic/folky weirdness.

Tracklist-
Stubbleman: 4am Conversation

Seahawks: Islands

Nancy Noise: Kaia

Green Gartside: Tangled Man

Barry Woolnough: Great Spirit Father In The Sky

The Clash: Rebel Waltz

Thurston Moore: Leave Me Alone

Julian Cope: I Have Always Been Here Before

Jane Weaver: Slow Motion (Loops Variation)

Michael Head and the Red Elastic Band: Picasso

Scritti Pollitti: The Boom Boom Bap

Apiento: Things You Do For Love

Ultramarine: Stella (Stella Connects)

Stubbleman: 6am Chorus

Signals Into Space

First album to purchase of 2019 comes from Essex and Ultramarine who have been making ambient dance music since 1990. Signals Into Space doesn't really break any new ground but does what it does very nicely indeed. Some of the tracks, especially those with singer Anna Domino, have a jazzy edge to them to go alongside the pastoral psychedelia, the sunrise soundtracks and the outward looking ambience. This is an eleven minute sampler for the whole album.

British Summertime

At least from today onwards until October the clock in my car will be telling the right time. British summertime starts today- you did remember to put your clocks forward didn't you? Yesterday's sunshine made it feel like the seasons had changed at a stroke. Everything feels a little better with some sun on your face.

It gives me a good excuse to post this Ultramarine song from 1991.

British Summertime

British Summertime

Whatever its official start date to me the May day bank holiday is the real signal of the start of British summertime. Appropriately today's forecast is for rain with occasional sunny spell and a temperature around ten degrees, to follow the snow, ice and sleet we had last week. Unbelievably we were camping this weekend last year. But an extra day off is an extra day off whatever the weather.

Ultramarine's Every Man And Woman Is A Star album from 1991 is well worth getting hold of if you don't have a copy, a very English kind of post-acid house record that brings in a folky ambience and a dash of dub. The phrase pastoral techno gets bandied about which seems silly but hits the spot.

I transferred a load of photos from an old memory card over to the new computer recently and found a load from a day I clearly went a little nuts at Jodrell Bank Observatory, shot after shot of the Lovell telescope. There are enough to accompany blogposts until July.

British Summertime

I Can Do Anything

A month or two ago I posted Stella by Ultramarine, a beautiful acid-house moment from the Essex pair. There are a multitude of different versions of Stella. The one I shared with you previously was the album version from their Every Man And Woman Is A Star lp (every home should have one). This one is a Balearic beauty too- squiggly synths, lazy beat, acoustic guitar strums and that feeling of endless possibility that the best music from this period had.

Interstellar

Stella

The MA 1 bomber jacket seems to be having a fashion moment- I've seen a few young people in them recently and Gallagher Senior wore one on stage with Johnny Marr last month (it's on Youtube, they're doing Lust For Life). It got me wishing I still had mine (from donkey's years ago). I had a black MA 2 in the mid-90s as well, which I loved (which went missing/was borrowed). This pair of photographs were from a fashion shoot in the 100th issue of The Face (September 1988). I think the model was called Alex. You can run the risk of looking like either you're on your way to a neo-Nazi meeting or you're a bouncer, but they are a great jacket.

Ultramarine's Stella was posted at another blog this week, the 12" with the Stella Breathes and Stella Connects versions. Ultramarine made acid house inspired music, with a dash of something English and pastoral. Stella, from 1991, is tailor made for listening to while enjoying a lazy afternoon in the sun, lying in long grass. Unfortunately it is late December but that shouldn't take away the beauty of this.

Stella (Album Version)

Augustus

The National Portrait Gallery contains this painting of Augustus John (by William Orpen). I like Augustus John- the most technically gifted painter of Edwardian England, generally thought to have wasted his talent or not fulfilled it, and a man with an interesting life, some of it scandalising the Edwardians with his bohemian lifestyle, boozing and unconventional living arrangements. The National Portrait Gallery is a fantastic gallery, not at all stuffy or staid, well laid out and full of interesting art- it even held the interest of some of my 6th form students for a while. And it's free. There's a Man Ray exhibition opening next week as well which I want to get back dahn sarf for before the end of May.

I posted a song by 90s folktronic outfit Ultramarine a couple of weeks ago. This one features the vocals of David McAlmont (what happened to him?). There was a version with Kevin Ayres singing it too which I think I've got somewhere, lying around on a hardrive.

Hymn

Kingdom

More early 90s ambient sounds to sooth the January blues- this time from Ultramarine who did a kind of pastoral ambient techno thing with echoes of old English folk music, although Discogs tells me this is Future Jazz, Downtempo. So what do I know? Featuring Louth's own Robert Wyatt on vocals.

Kingdom (Extended Mix)