Pat Fish

Pat Fish, the singer/ songwriter/ musician/ gentleman died suddenly this week aged sixty- four. He was best known as The Jazz Butcher and in the eighties and early nineties recorded seven albums for Creation records, which is where I first heard him. I think my first Jazz Butcher song might have been Lot 49 which was included on the legendary budget Creation compilation Doing It For The Kids. Lot 49 is breakneck, literate indie pop, guitars played at amphetamine pace, with the only pause coming for the line 'you make me want to carry on'.

Lot 49

One of the many gems in his back catalogue is this, Southern Mark Smith, from his 1984 album A Scandal In Bohemia (a few years before he moved to Creation), a perfect slice of mid- 80s indie- pop.

Southern Mark Smith

In 1990, fired up by the times and the technology and recording as J.B.C. Pat recorded an acid house cover version of The Rolling Stones '67 single We Love You. It's one of my favourite singles of that time, a huge sounding record with crunchy drums, acid squiggles firing on all cylinders, synths and samplers and a vocal line pinched from a Tears For Fears song that skewers the period instantly- 'DJs the man you love most'.

 We Love You (The Great Awakening)

There were many tributes to Pat in certain corners of the internet yesterday. He comes across as one of life's good guys, a genuine person, good friend to many and loved by those who knew him as well as a fine writer and musician. 

RIP Pat Fish. 

49

It's my birthday today- the number above.

Madness were a lot of fun on Friday night. I won precisely nothing betting on the horses. Suggs and saxophonist Lee Thompson are a great pair of frontmen (Chas Smash left a few years ago). The set was as you'd expect heavy on the hits, a run of songs pretty much unparalleled in British popular music plus a couple from their more recent albums, a mass singalong for It Must be Love and an encore of Madness (the song) and Night Boat To Cairo which saw outbreaks of pandemonium in the crowd. I was going to post this on Friday but didn't so here it is as a bonus, a deliciously skanking, dubby Andrew Weatherall remix of Madness from 2012. I'm sure that there was a second version of this, a dubbier one, that's never been released that Weatherall played on one of his radio shows.

Death Of A Rude Boy (Andrew Weatherall Remix)

Looking for songs with 49 in the title I fond this one from The Jazz Butcher, released on Creation in 1988, a spiky, ramshackle, catchy indie guitar song from Pat Fish that rattles along breathlessly, surfacing for the 'you make me want to carry on' line. This sort of thing seemed ten a penny in 1988 but like genuine moments of mini- greatness now. I first heard it on the Creation compilation Doing It For The Kids, a brilliant example of the art of the compilation album (The Jasmine Minks, The House Of Love, My Bloody Valentine, Felt, Primal Scream, Pacific, The Times, Nikki Sudden and The Weather Prophets plus several others showing Creation had an embarrassment of riches at the time). The Jazz Butcher's Lot 49 references a novel by Thomas Pynchon which I feel like I should have read but haven't.

Lot 49