Oblique Saturdays

For the last three years I've had yearlong Saturday series running- last year was a year of film scores and soundtracks, Saturday Soundtrack, and before that Saturday Live (artists playing live) and VA Saturday (Various Artists compilations). I had a couple of ideas for 2026 and have settled on this- Oblique Saturdays.

In 1975 Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt came up with a set of cards designed to promote creativity and break moments of studio deadlock. Oblique Strategies were available for general sale on several occasions and in various editions The most recent was in 2013. Each card contains a gnomic suggestion which must be interpreted to break a deadlock or resolve a dilemma. Various artists have gone public about their use of the Oblique Strategies cards- Eno himself during  Bowie's Berlin triptych, The B- 52s, LCD Soundsystem, Blixa Bargeld (a similar system of cards called Dave), Bauhaus, MGMT, Phoenix and, um, Coldplay. 

I was thinking about the Oblique Strategies a few months ago while reading an article about Eno and the words strategy and Saturday merged, suggesting this as a series. At some point before each Saturday I will go to the Oblique Strategies website, click onto it and reveal a card- without much thought, I will then post the song that first came to mind. I've no idea how this will play out, it's being done on the hoof. The first Oblique Saturday suggestion card I turned over was this...

Reverse 

In 1988 The Stone Roses discovered the joy of reversing the tapes of songs they'd recorded in the studio and they played around with them. Eventually this resulted in Don't Stop, for me one of the highlights of the debut album, Waterfall reversed with a new drum track and Ian Brown singing new words (the lyrics were written by John Squire listening to the backwards vocals of Waterfall and writing down what they suggested). The first backwards track they released was a B-side to Elephant Stone, Full Fathom Five.

Full Fathom Five

The sucking sound The Roses managed to obtain from their backwards guitars and drums is a trip, the whoosh and rush of music, the feel of and energy of gigs and clubs. On Full Fathom Five Ian's backwards vocals sound like a new language, the drums thump and skitter and it's like being in a bubble. 

Ian and John gave an interview at some point in the late 80s where they described driving out to the roads on the edge of Wythenshawe late at night, parking as close to Manchester Airport's runway as they could and lying on the bonnet of the car. They said that the whoosh of jets taking off directly overhead was the sound they were trying to replicate with the backwards tracks. Full Fathom Five is noise but it's noise as psychedelic sound/ music. 

If you reverse Full Fathom Five you'll find it's an alternate version of Elephant Stone. John Leckie encouraged them to experiment with reversed tapes and this would lead to several more experiments- Simone, Guernica and Don't Stop. Full Fathom Five is named after a Jackson Pollock painting- Elephant Stone was the first single to be housed in one of Squire's Pollock style paintings. 

Feel free to drop your own Reverse suggestions into the comment box. It would be interesting to see how other people interpret the oblique strategy.