Welcome to the Wetherbeat Scene. This is high school in Leeds. My high school resembled this not at all. Were there bands in my high school? Yes. My classmates had well coiffured parents to purchase for them very expensive guitars and designer shoes and shag haircuts for their Volvo's rear view mirrors. Do I sound bitter? No, they played Rush and Black Sabbath and the Who at talent shows. I did not much care for my high school classmates. I attended a posh high school with the Dart children, with Dennis Deconcini's son, with other assorted famous sorts-Selma Beitner. I didn't know any of them. I wasn't in a band with any of them. Stewart Anderson would have started a band with all of them. He started one with nearly every one in Leeds. Fun fact, Richard Adams was once in Boyracer, I was completely unaware of this. Fun fact, again, Hood somehow sounded a lot like the New Zealand band Trash surely even before they were aware of New Zealand and Mr Blucher and Killing Kapitalism with Kindness. Stewart Anderson is a cowboy now. First track is by The Liddles. i don't own the book that accompanied this release so I am not sure if Stewart was in the band, the vocals bear a striking similarity but it could be a Leeds/Gedge wannabe thing in general. It's buzzy, fast, the vocals are distorted and they are urgent. It's marvelous. It could be a soundtrack to Stewart and Richard running loose in a cemetery with swords drawn and battling to the death over a copy of the latest Sha La La flexi-disc. A slashing curve through the air, a whiff of menace, a tunic turned inward and a boom box in the corner playing the House of Love's Destroy the Heart. Second track, a casual mumble along, a bit Beat Happening-ish-ness. He's having a conversation with his friends, instead of writing meaningless aphorisms in a yearbook he's written a song and put it down "on tape". It's terrific. Next track, number three, more pace, more punkish attitude, snotty vocals, incompetence, dreaded cool. Oh, it's hood, it is very Bruce Blusher, it picks up in pace as it goes along. Were they listening to Boogie Down Productions before they recorded this? Was it technical limitations that kept them from their love of hip-hop and experimentation back then? How did they come to know nearly all of the most tedious backpack rappers? Next track, this sounds a bit more serious, like when they were ripping their jean jackets they intentionally left heart shaped holes in the breast to safety pin a set list from the Shop Assistants to? This is definitely Stewart Anderson. Was he the pivot around with the world rotated in Leeds? he is a cowboy now. I've said that already. There was a heartbreaking story about his family in a local Arizona paper with Stewart and his wife and their Autistic children and their struggle to get their children to speak before the age of 5. I've never done anything worthwhile and here's Stewart who displays passion and heart and earnestness in nearly everything he has ever done and this sadness is visited upon him. The Paisley Springtime is next. Sounds like the Hood stuff. Was there competing factions in Leeds? The Hood faction and the Boyracer faction? It is Joy Division for kids. They make splendid noises with guitars and it is surprisingly well recorded for kids allegedly between the ages of 14 and 17. When I was 14 I was playing ice hockey and delivering newspapers and taking standardized tests that convinced everyone that I was special and then I spent the rest of my life convincing them otherwise. I did not have swords or passion to wear on a scabbard around my waist. Next track, a female singer, Baby Doll Lounge. A girlfriend? A cover of Primal Scream now. There are two types of people in the world, those who believe Velocity Girl is the climax of Primal Scream's career and those who do not. I sued to, but now I've become one of those other people. Can you really believe that this is better than Higher Than the Sun? But Jim Beattie means a great deal to a great many people, possibly the majority of people in Leeds. Hood, again, sounding like Trash. Trash, the band, not the commodity. Boyracer now, sounding more listenable than they were apt to have been as they matured. It's wonderful. Boyracer only made one great album and one great single. The rest, I don't like as much. It's hard to say unkind things but one doesn't need to like everything, how to decide what you truly love if you don't mind everything. Even me, the king of low standards, can stand back and in a pseudo-objective manner evaluate the Boyracer canon and find it wanting. It was about productivity. It was Robert Pollard versus Paddy McAloon. But that Boyracer that just finished was ace. Now to another Baby Doll Lounge number, more sophisticated arrangement, the girl voice, the David Gedge in the song title, the Sarah Records nod, the implied socialism. What is the Hood reaction to the riots in England? Do they approve. Their politics are always murky, they focused their energy on the sound of England, the smell of England, the leaves and sand and abandoned air strips and stale lager. The Harbour Pilots Mr Magoo now, I mentioned Trash and this does have a whiff of kiwi compilations. Xpressway records, a sympathetic access shared across a commonwealth. This would be part of the Hood sounding bits. The two factions were the more kraut-rawkin' elements and the more sugary fuzz pop action. Hood now. Tacoma Narrows Bridge Collapse. Inaudible voice. Their first album was released a few years after these were recorded, there wasn't a great amount of growth from then to there but since then of course their evolution has been immense. Currently they are making dreadful records on their own. One day, soon, the Adams brothers will reunite and we will be spared future Bracken and Long Declining Winter records. Sunlight will banish the shadows. Bastard Postman, mumbly nonsense. Now to another Boyracer track. Why was it that he was seemingly so concerned with melody and tenderness in these days? Were all of these songs written to impress the Wetherbeat music faculty? Did all of the bands here attend music class together, play Ave Maria on the recorder, move into the private practice rooms and trade mix tapes of the Velvet Underground and Mighty Mighty? Dream of having Amelia Fletcher as the date to the prom? This is really terrific. Better than anything on their first few albums. Apparently Stewart's fellow cowboys have had a great deal of mirth shared over his photos of him with pink hair. He is in New Mexico now. Amy Linton came from New Mexico. She used to drive to Denver for Wax Trax records, still boggles my mind, but now she's living as a man and she would probably appreciate a cowboy in Sweden with pink hair. Baby Doll Lounge again, another lovely number. I think it is Stewart and someone else. It's almost sophisticated, it's almost Carousel to Boyracer's Heavenly. It would have been even more marvelous if they wrote songs about the other bands. If the lead singer of Baby Doll Lounge was seen out with the singer from the Liddles then the singer from The Paisley Springtime could write a song about how dreadful the new Liddles song is. There could be comic books, a full length movie starring Michael Cera could be in the works. Michael Cera as Stewart Anderson. Canada on the River Aire. Another Baby Doll Lounge number, they were clearly the stars. They would have had the full page foldout in the center of the annual. Where did they go? Was Stewart in the band? This singer is very nasal and flat and wants desperately to be the new Lou Reed and can't stand Doug Yule. Who keep the archives? Were there more bands in the scene? Maybe there was the Brian Howard of the bunch, the most talented of the lot, but who posterity will never have a chance to judge because of their lack of proximity to a four track recorder? There was one band in my high school that everyone was impressed with. I looked them up on Facebook when I was searching to see how far my colleagues from high school had lapped me in the quest for life's greatest prizes and discovered that they are still playing bars in the same corner of the world. At least I have moved to Denver. At least my novel respiratory infection that has infected my spine is from the other end of the continental divide. of course, I am the end of the family line, the Denver lineage will be as barren as the infertile hypoxic soil beneath my feet. The Spires now, sounds a lot like a more primitive version of Boyracer. Was this young Stewart? I could drive to Arizona. I could stalk his ranch. I could drive the new friend that I met this week that has spent nearly 17 years in bed. She was awoke to the world anew, filled only with the sarcastic worldview of John Stewart and in spite of a lifetime beneath the sheets a pretty healthy outlook on life and probably more interaction with the world than I have when I am not forced into it by my job. But I made another new friend this week, a former literary agent who is reading my book and I admitted to people that I work with that I am writing a book, and I attended parties and was intoxicated and clever and charming and there may be hope for me. But then there was Sunday, and my respiratory affection settled in my feet and my feet settled in concrete and fear. A hood song finished. Now the Liddles, it's a bit Sea Urchins. It's a heartache/lament. Baby Doll Lounge again. Flat voiced singer. he may have gone on to Exeter university, studied urban planning, married a good looking girl who gets on well with her family and spends his time looking up his friends on Facebook seeing if they have lapped him as well. I am not unique. My pathos are not extraordinary but they leave me hollowed out. That track was not a William Shatner song. Hood Tractor now, haven't I heard this? Isn't this a rarity? I can see all of the members of Hood being big into Urban Planning, with backpacks and their ipods and large can headphones filled with the new Kanye album and filled out prescriptions to codeine in their wallets chained to their belt loops. Were they the pretentious kids? Were they listening to Radio Ethiopia and Fifty Foot Hose and did they have a mentor who worked in a Leeds record store and excoriated them when they made anything approaching melodic? A Talulah Gosh moment now. Baby Doll Lounge again. Sounds like a demo. But then these are all likely demos. But then there is this, there is Apricot crumble and apart from the lyrical conceits it sounds almost sophisticated in its recording quality. It sounds like Stewart, before he was winded by too many years of smoking, too many times he had skipped cross country practice. Spent his afternoons in the library reading William S. Burroughs and Salinger. Would he read Catcher in the Rye, reading might seem a bit too static for Stewart Anderson, he is a man of action, he might read for action, the same as John Milton, but for enjoyment? He doesn't visit the English Literary canon a great deal in his musical corpus. When he is riding horses I imagine he has an ipod on and he's listening to Joy Division and Ace Frehley's solo album and his horse is more sympathetic to the latter. The equine fever. Orchid Sunrise by the Harbour Pilots. It doesn't sound much like Sarah Records, any of this, it is clear that Gedge was the dominant influence. And Bruce Blucher, newly arrived from the future. This is a bit more motorik, dexterous drumming, a bit of a Loz from Ride fan, and some artsy guitar and monotone vocals. I like this. Maybe top 10. There are 36 tracks here. I am running out of steam. I've never been to Leeds or else I might compare the songs to the geographical signposts of the surrounding countryside. I could compare the youth of this, my generation, to today. Now instead of creating fuzzy pop bands kids burn down cities. An improvement? but you can understand why the Guardian horde would cheer on the mindless looters and rioters because they mistake nihilism for passion. In a world where everything is met with mild indignation for fear of offense causing it is nice to see primal emotion on display. This is the essence of the human experience, selfishness. I had a long discussion in Chicago with someone over the motivation for altruistic acts and my contention was they are always self motivated, that people are not moved by the greatness of the cause but by the emotional reward. This person disagreed with me and he has 19 service companies and employs over 800 people and has his personal assistant sleep in the same hotel room as he does. The Liddles are a more Smiths-y Boyracer. Was Stewart's favorite band before his favorite band was the Wedding Present the Smiths? Does that last sentence make sense? i don't think so. this track is about the existential angst of expectation. Surely being a cowboy in Arizona was never part of the equation. Surely a group with this prolific attitude towards recording had also the same industriousness when it came to recording happenings on video? But then video cameras were very expensive then. Telephones still had cords and John Major was beloved. Or not. Sympathy by the Special Guests, sounds like Boyracer, martial drumming, distorted anarcho-guitars and ethereal voices floating in the mix. Now the voice is double tracked. A deeper voice in the foreground, clever. I think maybe Stewart Anderson was the most popular boy in school. I have typed his name more than one dozen times. He deserves the acclaim, I am attempting to entrap all of his Leeds friends who are using Facebook to see if he lapped them in life's great pursuits. He has. Hood She's Caught in Sunshine, this is rather good. All of their tracks were pretty samey for the first few years. Leeds then not known for diversity. Which are the great bands from Leeds? Aye, Gang of Four, that seems obvious now. Oh and Chumbawumba. The kings. But of course towering above them all is the Ian Saints or the Pale Saints. Ian isn't a cowboy. He's in Japan. Did he go to this high school? He is probably slightly older than these kids. What did his high school recordings sound like? Was he the most popular kid in high school? Who signed his annual? Boyracer My Town. Another great Boyracer track. As curator did Stewart craft this compilation to put himself in the better light? Unlikely. Maybe he's just a genius. Maybe he's just shy about displaying it. There are a lot of Boyracer songs and most of them are not great. Each of these Boyracer songs is great. A conundrum. I am back to work tomorrow morning. I haven't been to the office in nearly two weeks. I haven't missed it. This is the beginning of my period of misery, between now and Christmas. I turn into a dreadful person, curmudgeonly, like Gedge, without the benefit of a tribute album such as this. I used to love Christmas. Another small Baby Doll Lounge song. A bit Red Sleeping Beauty. Racing acoustic guitar, the passion of the moment, the need for struggle, the age of rioting for a cause greater than self enrichment. The Liddles now with the last official track, a bit Spacemen 3? Not really, maybe, slightly. maybe more House of Love, maybe there was a photograph of Terry Bickers hanging on the wall in young Stewart Anderson's bedroom and when he left to form Levitation there was great excitement and joy and then crushing despair and ultimate defeat when Coterie and Need for Not were officially released. Why hasn't there been a Levitation resurgence? Shouldn't LTm be reissuing them any day now? Terry Bickers later rejoined House of Love, did anyone care? I'd rather see angelo Bruschini back in the Blue Aeroplanes actually. This track is a bit more ambitious. It's like the prog numbers on that greek compilation that was released a few years ago. It's like the Bilders. it's like Boyracer gone progressive. Morrissey would frown. Last track now, the hidden track, a live track, from the talent show? Sounds like at least 53 people in the audience, drums, a Run DMC cover, ah youth.