Look what we found in the messy drawer! Another mixtape of indie classics featuring Gemma Hayes, The Hours, The breeders, Doves, Stereolab, The Thrills, The Field Mice et. al. And this time with a couple of phone numbers…what have some of these wonderful people been up to since they made an indie classic? We’ll find out…
For a period, which included most of the 90s and early noughties, indie ruled supreme. It branched out in any number of sub-genres, from Britpop to US slacker lo-fi indie (which began in the 80s and was comprehensively covered by Jules Gray here). Britpop was so big it had its own spin-off scenes - nicely rejuvenated by the Cherry Red records compilation Martin Green Presents: Super Sonics: “40 Junkshop Britpop Greats”. That compilation perfectly captures just how vast (and ridiculous) indie became. If you could play guitar and find bandmates, you could get in on the scene - in fact you might even find yourself landing a label deal. Just like Menswear did. Or Gay Dad. Indie got so big as to be rather absurd and ‘one hit wonder’ bands such as The Boo Radley’s and their US equivalents New Radicals could tell a tale or two about what could happen when you could get a big indie hit in the 90s. But we’ll get to that later. All this is merely context for what we present here.
Some of what came out of indie’s golden period became well-known hits and anthems, but a lot of it was simply great songs that have faded away in the fog of the current music scene - with its endless pop, Rap & Hip Hop, Latin and now Country dominating the airwaves and the bandwidth. What went into ‘indie landfill’ remains there forever, but the gems must be resurfaced and resuscitated.
In many cases of course, the bands who made great indie tracks back then have reformed to make music again today. On this Lost Indie Classics Vol. 2 that includes Doves (yes, they are back!), Idlewild, The Breeders and Supergrass (who at least reformed for a recent successful tour before everything was shut down). Some are long gone for good it seems: The Stills, Athlete, The Field Mice, The Sundays, The Thrills, The Dandy Warhols, Acetone. For some, existence is more equivocal - will they or won’t they make music again? If only we had time to track them all down and write them up!
The Hours has come (nearly)
The Hours were Antony Genn and Martin Slattery. Antony or ‘Ant’ was a member of indie legends Pulp (and went on to play with Elastica and Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros) while Martin had previously played with Black Grape, KT Tunstall and again, Joe Strummer. Martin Slattery can play a lot of instruments extremely well, while Genn also had musicality in abundance and stepped up as a compelling and loveable ‘frontman’ (even if a few people laughed at the idea). He was also - as I’ve told him myself more than once - the best swearer in pop music.
Together they made a debut album as The Hours that is itself a lost indie classic. Narcissus Road contains two bona fide great singles (who cares about chart numbers for now): Ali In The Jungle and Back When You Were Good (see vol. 1 folks!). But it was choc full of decent songs as well. The title track is driven by a two chord piano riff that is all killer (and contains the lyric “she reminds me of that replicant that did not know who she was”, which is one of the greatest ‘in joke’ lyrics you are likely to come across (clue: her name was Rachel folks!). It goes on. There is the ‘northern’ anthem People Say and a number of heartfelt slower numbers that grab you by the guts. The Hours were like that - they set out to make music that was real - they meant it. In the words of Indie god Jarvis Cocker on The Hours: “They understand what music is for—it's for human beings to communicate with other human beings”.
When I took a friend to see them at The Shepherds Bush Empire, Ant Genn gave my friend a massive hug after the show because he had recently lost his father. Now that is human connection for you, through the medium of music. The Hours were on radio, featured in games, talked about in the media, and were the support act for U2 on their 360 Tour in 2009. They were on the road alright, but was Narcissus driving too fast?
Narcissus Road built a promising platform, but it slowly came apart for The Hours on album two. The sophomore syndrome struck. The band had released the first album on the Polydor label, but were true indie pioneers at heart. Their second album was to be an independent production (but done on a major label budget thanks to the band’s friend and benefactor - the artist Damien Hirst). Indeed, with Hirst at the helm, the band created its own label ‘Is Good’ records. Entitled See the Light, the album was produced by Flood (U2, Depeche Mode, Smashing Pumpkins) and the title track had a video featuring actress Sienna Miller. A string section was hired (no expense was spared).
I was given a preview copy on ‘Damien Hirst Skull USB stick’ (for a short time in the industry around 2009, the USB album was the new format) and I can remember being beside myself with excitement at the prospect of getting home, plugging in my USB, transferring the files to my iTunes library, and hitting the park to listen (oh the joys of the pre streaming era). The album starts with the single ‘Big Black Hole’ which is killer, and then ‘These Days’ which is an anthem we could with right now, never mind 2009. It has a waterfall effect piano riff verse and a soaring chorus that was the best of The Hours, a perfect combo of Martin’s piano genius and Ant Genn’s heart on sleeve vocal style. I was on cloud nine listening to it. And then it went very slowly but surely downhill. Somehow, the songs got laboured and the record overproduced. I guess the songs were never really finished before the band overwhelmed themselves with the recording process with a big shot producer.
I’ve never wanted to like a record more than ‘See The Light’ and, never been more disappointed (well, maybe Joe Jackson’s ‘Laughter & Lust’, but that was ancient history - and a future post). With See The Light, The Hours had imagined themselves playing to arenas with grandiose songs with big life affirming singalongs - they were striving for maximum connection, but had forgotten to bring the tunes.
Genn and Slattery still work closely together and have made original score music for Peaky Blinders, written and produced a ballet The Comedy of Error(z) and made The Third Law of Motion’s album Strangest Of Times. Genn has been producing indie wonderkids Inhaler’s new album. I gave Ant a friendly call while he was in his London studio, probably as he tends to - sitting at his Steinway piano. Follow the conversation on the blog.
Whatever happened to Gemma Hayes?
The indie boom years may have been choc full of bands, but female solo artists were a much rarer species (though Norah Jones and KT Tunstall opened up the field somewhat). I first came across Gemma Hayes when her debut album Night On My Side received a Mercury Awards nomination - back when the Mercury’s was at the height of its significance. Hayes didn’t win it (Ms Dynamite did and whatever happened to Ms Dynamite?) but the promotion helped raise the record’s profile (it was a top ten hit in Ireland, though only brushed the outside edges of the UK album chart) along with a couple of good singles including ‘Back Of My Hand’. I had read somewhere that Gemma was influenced by Sparklehorse and that was enough to draw me in (more on Sparklehorse when the time is right).
It took three years before Gemma released her follow-up album The Roads Don’t Love You. Having toured extensively for two years following the release of the debut and getting to the point of burn out, she reset and went back to the drawing board. With great results as far as I’m concerned. Roads didn’t sound like the notorious ‘difficult second album’ (it remains my personal favourite) and established her at least in her home territory of Ireland, where she won Best Irish Female at the 2006 Music Awards. The album was recorded in LA and sounded influenced by that - more expansive, with production by from Joey Waronker (Beck, R.E.M) and Nigel Godrich (Radiohead of course). It may not of advanced her chart position but looked set to help Gemma Hayes become an Irish artist of international standing. However, after that album she left her label Source, and it may have felt by the time of her third, self-released record The Hollow Of The Morning, she was starting from the beginning all over again.
Maybe because of the time between records and the endless rush of music, I would forget how much I liked Gemma Hayes’ music. She made three more albums between 2008 and 2014, her last outing being the excellent Bones + Longing, much more an indie record in fact than her previous four. Every time I discovered Gemma’s records it was a year or so after release, after she’d popped into mind as one of those artists you liked but couldn’t quite keep track of. Every six months or so I would ask myself “whatever happened to Gemma Hayes?”.
Best way to check in on someone these days is to give them a call, so I did. I had a lovely chat with Gemma who was residing in her country home in West Cork, where I was very pleased to discover she has been making good use of her music room. The conversation is on the blog.