Tired of this game? Still wanna play? Cool.. go and get this, then. Or this. Either will do -- and either way it's one of the greatest albums ever released in this country. (New Zealand, I mean.)Sneaky Feelings - Waiting for Touchdown (2.60 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)It's the Sneaky Feelings' debut album Send You, the one which is oft-ignored and underrated and so on, and scarce as all buggery as well. Apparently it was reissued on CD at some point, but.. well.. nearly 20 years of scouring the New Zealand section and the used bins and ain't never seen it.
To be honest I'm not a particular fan of the Sneaky Feelings -- they did well enough, but they were always more Byrds than Bailterspace. They impressed alright, but never excited like a Verlaines or a Gordons or a Doublehappies would excite. "Poise over Noise" (-- M. Bannister.) But be that as it may, this album is special. I don't think it's unreasonable to say that, in 1983, this was some way ahead of it's time. And I don't know if it's a commonly-held opinion, or even one of those things which everyone knows but which must Never. Be. Said. Aloud... or not... but it seems to predict awfully the sound of the much more highly-vaunted Straitjacket Fits -- especially their incarnation about 10 years later, around the time of the Fits' Melt. I'm blowing smoke out my ass? Well, let's see... the guitar sound, the guitar playing, the guitar figures and motifs, the vocal delivery, the harmony vocals, the compositions -- the key changes, modulations, middle-eights -- (and I could go on) are all heavily reminiscent of the Fits in their prime.
Ah.. well.. but so what. That's not important, and only serves to distract. Nothing should take away from the fact that in terms of progressive power-pop perfection, in this country -- or in any country, frankly -- Send You has rarely been bested.
4 comments:
I've got this on CD. And no, you'll never see it in the second hand bin.
...and, thanks to you, I'm listening to it now. P.I.T. Song still does it for me.
What are Matthew Bannister and David Pine up to these days, I wonder.
OMG, I totally obeyed and did the buy-now on Trade Me.
Actually, it was the MP3 that did it for me. What a beautiful, evocative song.
Wow I thought everyone i knew hated this band with a passion - yup yup great album. The CD had liner notes from Tony Green (of the Haemogoblins and Bilders) and three bonus tracks from the reunion (which don't quite fit with the original album to my ears).
David Pine is the NZ ambassador to the Philippines and did a solo album a few years back. Bannister is an academic and I saw in Slowboat yesterday they he has a new solo album too.
-HN
Post a Comment