This is one of those tracks which I've been listening to for over three decades now and when it plays I always get a rush of excitement, almost like hearing it for the first time again. Fluke were a Buckinghamshire based group, Mike Bryant, Jon Fugler and Mike Tournier, who were into the industrial/ electronic sounds of Cabaret Voltaire and were then fired up by acid house. In 1990 they found their way to Creation Records, who were at that point setting up a dance music division, the Creation office's enthusiasm for all things dance music having few limits at that point.
In 1991 Alan McGee rounded up a killer selection of Creation's dance records and put them together on a compilation called Keeping The Faith. As well as Creation mainstays Primal Scream and My Bloody Valentine (both in remixed form courtesy of Hypnotone, Terry Farley and Andrew Weatherall) Keeping The Faith had Ed Ball in his Love Corporation guise, superb singles from World Unite and Sheer Taft, J.B.C. aka The Jazz Butcher covering The Rolling Stones in classic 1990 style, Hypnotone remixed by Danny Rampling, The Sound Of Shoom and Crazy Eddie and Q.Q. Freestyle. Opening the record was this...
The sci fi whooshes, juddering synths, twinkling sounds, cymbal crashes, keyboard runs and sirens all kicked in within seconds of my then housemate Al dropping the needle on side one, the rush of the track instantly dragging us aboard. The vocal comes in, 'Put your hands up high... got to try to find a way to liberate our hearts', and it's wide smiles on faces. There are sweeping synth strings and a throbbing beat, more string stabs (borrowed from Philly soul in the 70s), bursts of electric guitar, more strings and the ever pulsing rhythms. More and more, strings, whooshes, chanted vocals, trying to find a way to put your arms around the world'. Four minutes in a tumbling drum break leads to the briefest pause and then we're straight back in for the final three minutes. Everything that was in the air in1990 is in this track- the sense of freedom and possibility, the technology of samplers, synths, drum machines spliced with singers and guitars, influences dragged from record collections and nights out and put into a giant, technicoloured stew.
Creation had released Philly as a single the year before, a three track 12" with the Jamorphous Mix on the A-side along with the Jamoeba Mix and the Jamateur Mix. Jamorphous is still the pick of the bunch without doubt but the Jamateur mix has its moments, less song, more rave, more piano and no vocals except for a chanting crowd just about audible.
Still my go-to track on that album
ReplyDeleteSeems funny to think that it could be when Cascades, World Unite, Soon and Come Together are all on there but you could be right
ReplyDeleteThis is such a good track. Remember hearing it when it first came out, loved it then, still love it now. Thanks for posting this 👍
ReplyDeleteAlso thanks for reminder about Cascades - hadnt listened to that in years but it’s also a great track - instantly back in 1990 - which is no bad thing 😃
ReplyDeleteCascades is one of my favourite tracks from that whole period
ReplyDeleteI once owned a white label of this, purchased from a basement vinyl shop in Cambridge and remember feeling so ahead of the curve by comparison with my mates who were mostly into T'Pau and Bon Jovi. This was just so fresh and exotic and still is. As you say, also later a highlight on the wonderful 'Keeping the Faith' compilation.
ReplyDeleteThe track that kicked off my love of all things Fluke. Philly is a highlight of both Keeping The Faith and their own catalogue and proof - then as now - that there was nobody really coming close to the music that Fluke was producing. An absolute classic.
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