The Stranglers - Here & There: The Epic B-Sides Collection 1983-1991 (2014) 2CDs

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The Stranglers - Here & There: The Epic B-Sides Collection 1983-1991 (2014) 2CDs

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As part of The Stranglers' celebration of their Ruby Anniversary, the definitive collection of the B-side recordings they made whilst signed to Epic is released for the first time, via their own label. Appropriately, as befits a band marking forty years together, Here & There: The Epic B-sides Collection 1983-1991 gathers 40 tracks across 2CDs and is also released as a 40 track digital package. The Stranglers released no less than 13 singles in the UK during this period, which saw them produce five albums: four studio and one live. The Stranglers signed to Epic Records in 1982 having been with United Artists / Liberty since 1977. The change of label coincided with changes in marketing policy across the UK industry - often dubbed ""the Frankie Goes To Hollywood effect"". Previously, The Stranglers' had released only one 12"" single - an extended version of Bear Cage in 1980 - but from 2nd Epic single, Midnight Summer Dream until 1990, each release had a 12"" version which required extra studio or, increasingly, live tracks to ""add value"" to the package. Other formats such as picture discs (shaped and standard) were also released, followed by CD singles, 7"" EPs and, occasionally, the much unloved cassette single. Fortunately, this was a fertile period for the band and their creative output was more than able to satisfy the demands of their label's marketing department. Consequently, there is a rich crop of tracks from which this compilation has been gathered. CD1 comprises 20 studio tracks. It contains a large number of songs which could have graced any of their albums or, indeed, potentially been A-sides themselves. As ever with The Stranglers, the songs from this time feature either Jean-Jacques Burnel or Hugh Cornwell as the lead vocalist and draw from intriguing and typically broad subject matter, such as faltering relationships (Instead of This, In One Door), girls (You, Since You Went Away), vulnerability (Achilles Heel), a post-Golden Brown anti-drugs stance (Head On The Line), the French CRS riot police (Permission), Paris (Hot Club, Place de Victoires), word play (Savage Breast, Poisonality), the then-new scourge of Aids (Dry Day), homosexuality (Norman Normal), photographers (Hit Man), psychedelia (Pawsher) self-mocking (Motorbike), tongue-in-cheek (Aural Sculpture Manifesto) the birth of a child (Something) and Europe, in the track which gives the album it's sub-title, Here & There - although their lyrics were never quite that straightforward and are often wrapped in double meaning…

CD2 includes eleven top-notch live tracks sequenced in order of their recording between 1985 and 1990, rather than the order in which they were originally released. This clearly demonstrates the progression of the band's live sound from the acoustic guitar-driven era of the mid-80s on cuts like Midnight Summer Dream/European Female, and Souls, (all recorded in France; always a key market), whilst documenting this as the period when they recorded and toured with a brass section, heard here on songs including Uptown and Peaches and cataloguing landmark headline shows at the 1987 Reading Festival (Strange Little Girl & Who Wants The World) and London's Alexandra Palace in August, 1990 (Always The Sun, Nuclear Device, All Day & All of The Night, Punch & Judy), where the latter track holds the dubious disctinction of being the last song Hugh Cornwell performed live with the original band line-up. Four of the B-sides from the 13 singles revolved around a fictional character known as Vladimir Andropyournosin, a lecturer in sub-nucleonic particle physics in Moscow, which, at that time, was still deep within communist USSR. Conceived in the style of a cartoon and effectively 'stories put to music', The Complete Chronicles of Vladimir are released together here in sequence for the first time. The six-track saga, which takes the listener to Odessa, the Urals, Siberia, Afghanistan, the GDR, Cuba and Mexico is completed by the second installment, Vladimir & Sergei, originally an album track from Dave Greenfield & JJ Burnel's 1983 side-project, Fire & Water and a final part - for the moment, at least - Vladimir & The Pearl, which is previously unreleased either on CD or digitally.

Whilst the flip sides of many artists' singles from that period were throw-away and instantly forgettable, Here & There: The Epic B-sides Collection 1983-1991 provides a timely opportunity to both re-visit and re-evaluate one of Britain's most prolific, undervalued and important bands. It may be a surprise to some as to just how strong a body of work this is; possibly helping to give some insight as to why they have been the most unlikely of survivors. As such, there will be something for everyone here. As the band mark their 40th, it is appropriate that Here & There: The Epic B-sides Collection 1983-1991 comes now, as it falls on another anniversary: 20 years after its release was originally ""confirmed"" in the pages of the band's own in-house magazine, Strangled, (Vol 2, No 40, Nov 1993). ""It will definitely be out in 1994…"" promised the editorial. So to say it is ""eagerly anticipated"" is probably an understatement to anyone who hadn't given up all hope. The album was re-mastered from the original source tapes in London in early February, 2014.

Let's be honest: the single started to die in the late 80s, when CD sales started creeping upwards and the format became predominant. CD singles never seemed the same as a 7" - we knew they could hold a lot more tracks, the insert design and iconography of the times couldn't match that of the late 70s, when picture sleeves became the norm in the wake of Punk Rock and you didn't have to flip the disc over to play the B side. And that's what made a great single, not just an incisive, exciting hit on the A side, but something equally as great on the flip. Initially on the UA label, The Stranglers' first half dozen or so singles were double A sides and we loved the titular B sides as much as whichever cut was played on the radio. And being the best rock band ever, The Stranglers never let us down with bad, throwaway B sides - they experimented, they thrilled us, they fascinated us with esoteric ideas. Eventually, the band left UA/Liberty when EMI acquired the label and the contract was up and they emigrated to CBS on the Epic imprint. It was the end of an era; as the band had grown more daring and esoteric, the guaranteed smashes faded away for a while before the soft commercial renaissance of the band with the success of "Golden Brown" and "Strange Little Girl".

One track pointed the way to the Stranglers' aural future : "Cruel Garden", the B side of "Strange Little Girl", the final EMI single. Featuring a prominent acoustic guitar, this was a taste of the album to follow ('Feline'), an album that meshed cool, Germanic, North European synthesizers and electronic drum sounds with plangent Spanish, Southern European acoustic guitar and bass. The bleak, harsh, grating scientific era of 'Black and White' and 'The Raven' and 'The Meninblack' was over, 'La Folie' had been the bridge and a new era was with us.

I've long believed that the B sides of the Epic era are, as a body of work, better than any of the four actual albums the band recorded for Epic. All of the albums would have benefitted by the inclusion of many of the b sides here, while some album tracks would have been better as flips on 7" platters. To my way of thinking, 'Aural Sculpture' (for example) would have been much better without 'Mad Hatter' and 'Punch and Judy' left off, but with 'In One Door' and 'Achilles heel' left on. I could go on and on with this theory, but if you're a fan, you'll have your own ideas. One thing is certain - The Stranglers understood how important a strong flip side was and never short changed record buyers with mere filler.

For the more casual listener who has enjoyed the band but who is unfamiliar with the cuts here, I'd say one thing: buy this 2 CD set, as it is generally very, very string indeed - there are some weak tracks (I'd say these are 'Something' and 'Motorbike', while other weaker cuts like 'Norman Normal' and 'Hitman' have really grown on me over the years. Other than these cuts, I regard the rest of the songs on disc 1 of the set as amongst the very best the band recorded in the Epic era and it's a great shame that hardly any of them have ever been played by the band live. One gripe though is the sequencing, which is a tad shapeless. The ideal opening cut would have been "Aural Sculpture" as it is a spoken manifesto with a huge fanfare at the end that used to open Stranglers gigs back in the day. Then, the best policy would have been to sequence the tracks in the order of release - I burned my own CD of Epic B sides many, many years ago (they initially appeared on CD as bonus tracks on Japanese imports circa 99-2000) and in order of release, they sound perfect. However, it is great to finally hear all these cuts on an official release and I can't rave enough about classic songs like 'In one Door', 'Since You Went Away', 'Instead of This', 'Savage Breast', 'Permission' and 'Dry Day' -these are fabulous songs.

A few more words about the songs themselves: 'Here and There' is cracking JJ, a classic Eurocentric-flavoured number of the continental kind that many of us in Blackland have always enjoyed. I've personally always relished the fact that The Strangs always aimed to explore the Western tradition of European culture, history and ideas in all their glory, be its legacy shameful or laudable - unlike so many bands who simply ape American cock and roll iconography, The Stranglers openly embraced the weight and complexity of the Eurocentric. 'Achilles Heel' and 'In One Door' are exciting Hugh-led cuts, with Greenfield also on very fine form - these songs, like 'Head on the Line' are massively melodic, dynamic and colourful, the band at their incisive best. 'Permission' is restrained in its pulsing reggae menace, all the more chilling for its warm held-back quality, rueful and claustrophobic. 'Savage Breast' really should have made it onto "Feline", as it is achingly gorgeous, with one of Hugh's most gentle and hearrending vocals and lovely, delicate guitar, keyboards and drums - though it is actually a lot more electronic sounding than most of "Feline" due to the electric guitar. 'Instead of This' is a drawling bit of Burnelian disapproval, premiered live on the short tour that followed the release of 'All Day and All of the Night' and prior to the "10" tour. This was a live highlight then, sinuous and fine, arguably more serpentine than its wonderfully female-baiting 'Poisonality' (also played in concert on the same tour), a full-on, intense rocking yet fun number about beings educed by woman, that ultimate eternal reptile. Sexist? Who cares? Let's just say that all men can relate to this song and that to often feel at odds with the female sex isn't itself sexist, just a reflection of reality as it often is.

'Dry Day' is arguably the most underrated song here, a finely meshed concotion of multiple keyboard lines of great elegance and cinematic flair, overdubbed guitar lines, some of them very unCornwell-like, plus some fabulous soaring sax. This has long been one of my favourite tracks by the band in the 80s. Contrary to some opinions (Cornwell's and Nik Yeoman's), I love the production on this - yes, it's very rich, but never seems crowded…nothing is fuzzy or indistinct. It's a moody, mordant track that lingers in the mind. More direct is Burnel's wistful yet impassioned 'Since You Went Away', which is iced with a downcast keyboard motif from Dave. No-one does romantic agony like Dave and JJ! Similarly, no-one does psychedelic wonder like Hugh.

Disc 2 is all live B sides from 12" versions and the like and makes up a kind of alternative to 'Live X Certs' and 'All Live and All of the Night'. There are some great performances here, but the highlight is 'Souls', in a far superior sax-led version that culimates in a fabulously entrancing coda from Alex Gifford (supernally played, that man!), than the one on "Aural Sculpture". Jet's drumming is typically direct and burning with life on this cut in particular, illustrating why his no-nonsense, subtle and nuaced style was the perfect foil for the maverick individuality of the instrumental genisu of Hugh, Dave and JJ. Lots of the other live cuts here are near-definitive versions, not mere filler. The truth, however, is that neither of the official live albums captured how great the band were in concert between 79 and 84 (their live peak), before the sets became overly dominated by hit singles. I'd like to have heard an alternative version of disc two that didn't fade out between cuts, but that ran the crowd noises together to simulate a live album -now that would have been interesting. Also included on disc 2 are the complete chronicles of Vladimir, 6 tracks about an unfortunate Russian that are spoken-word over music pieces. These are fun, but not deathless (unlike the amazing songs on disc 1), but hardcore fans will be delighted by the inclusion of 'Vladimir and the Pearl', which is previously unreleased.

This compilation is complete in that it does feature all the B sides from the Epic period save 12" remixes, the vast majority of which appeared on 'All 12 Inches' many years ago. The mastering is good too, everything sounding punchy and clear, with none of the softer moments lost through over-compression.

To sum up, this is the first Stranglers compilation since the complete UA singles some years ago (which belongs in every serious rock music collection, representing as it does the most impressive run of singles by any British band ever) that all fans of the band will want and need. For those of you who know the A sides and love them, but not the Bs, buy this and you'll be very pleasantly surprised.

Review by Euromancer, Amazon.co.uk

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The Stranglers - Here & There: The Epic B-Sides Collection 1983-1991 (2014) 2CDs

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The Stranglers - Here & There: The Epic B-Sides Collection 1983-1991 (2014) 2CDs

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The Stranglers - Here & There: The Epic B-Sides Collection 1983-1991 (2014) 2CDs

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