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KFD presents: Men at Quirk Volume 2. Quirk, Strangeness and Charm. An odyssey into the Afterword Musical Multiverse

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Here’s the sequel to my quest for all your more esoteric favourites which do not get mentioned so often here on the Afterword.

I must start by saying a big thankyou to everyone who has contributed to this discussion so far. You have treated us to an ear-opening cornucopia of new names. Not to mention reminding me of a lot of old favourites.

The whole thing started when Mr Saucecraft took on the Herculean task of producing a sampler which represented the kind of music that contributors to this site enjoy. For me that was Mission Impossible. More than that! Mission Completely Undesirable.

Why do I keep returning to this site? Because I love the enormous variety.

I know that there are contributors who will recommend songs that will become instant favourites.

And then, equally important, there are others who will wax lyrical about music, films, books which I do not understand at all and thereby drag me out of my comfort zone.

And then of course there are the stupendously idiosyncratic threads. Crocodiles in your swimming pool. Killer snakes in your loo. Beach towels stuck in the rear door of your Skoda. The survival skills that I have acquired here on the AW are not to be sneezed at!

In the original thread I wrote:

”I want to hear about those artists who you hold very dear but have a diminutive following here.

@Tiggerlion commented that “I struggle with this. I don’t think of them as being obscure if I know about them”

To which @fentonsteve replied ”I know what you mean, Tiggs. My offspring can name the members of The Dawn Chorus just as easily as they can the Fabs. I suspect most people would say “Dawn who?”

I certainly would!

It makes me think that the whole concept of a “household name” is so personal to each individual or each family. It only takes one single, one movie, one album track, one novel, one painting, one gig, one moment of hectic intimacy at the drive-in cinema …..and you have a household name for life!

But please continue to tell us about those artists that are household names for you.

And now it’s BIG APOLOGY TIME. On the original thread @H.P.Saucecraft dutifully produced a list of some of his older, slightly more obscure favourites. And charlatan that I am, I suggested that he’d made them all up.

Any true music lover would have instantly recognised the names of Aorta, Boffalongo, Affinity, Zumpano and Wilderness Road. I can only hope that one day he will find it in his heart to forgive me!

Please continue to tell us about your slightly lesser-known favourites. And if it turns into a discussion, all the better!

On the previous thread I ended up by meeting @fitterstoke in a Sheffield art gallery to enjoy the suggestive noodlings of an avant garde lady bassoonist. That”s what life is all about, eh?

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  2. And now, just to get you started, a few wonderfully idiosyncratic bands who do not fit into any easy categories.

    Was (Not was)
    Latin Quarter
    Sparks
    They might be giants
    Tiger Lilies
    The Bonzo Dog Band
    Kid Creole and the Coconuts
    Chumbawumba
    The Magnetic Fields
    The Fountains of Wayne
    Alberto y lost trios paranoias

    Finally, this magnificent treat. They Might be Giants cover Chumbawumba

    The Chumbas have done far more intersting stuff since this,

    But there’s no denying, It is a wonderful song,

      • I enjoyed a couple of pints in ‘The kings Head’ only yesterday. I said to the barman “I see the old til has gone”. He replied “About twelve years ago”! I thought I had seen it there just a few years ago. How time flies.

  4. It’s remarkable how a piece of music can suddenly become a “household name” for me. Often before I’ve even found out the name of the artist.

    Memories of my younger days, listening to the radio late at night and hearing a track which left me gobsmacked. And then trying desperately to catch the name of the song and the artist.

    I remember the first time I heard Kate Bush sing Wuthering Heights. It was in the middle of the night and I was (for some reason I can’t remember) up on a ladder painting the ceiling of the kitchen at the National Film Theatre. And this other-worldly sound came out of the radio.

    Hearing a piece of music in a film soundtrack can ensure it becomes a favourite.

    Also sprach Zarathustra in 2001 A Space Odyssey.

    Anton Karas’s theme music for The Third Man which became a mega international hit.

    “More than half a million copies of “The Third Man Theme” record were sold within weeks of the film’s release.[2]: 450  The tune was originally released in the UK in 1949, where it was known as “The Harry Lime Theme”. Following its release in the US in 1950, “The Third Man Theme” spent 11 weeks at number one on Billboard’s US Best Sellers in Stores chart, from April 29 to July 8.[7] According to Faber and Faber, the different versions of the theme have collectively sold an estimated forty million copies.” (Wikipedia)

    Karas also performed “The Third Man Theme” and other zither music for the 1951–1952 syndicated radio series The Adventures of Harry Lime, a Third Man prequel produced in London. Orson Welles reprised his role as Harry Lime.[9]: 409 [10] “Whenever he entered a restaurant in those years, the band would strike up Anton Karas’s “Third Man Theme”, wrote Welles biographer Joseph McBride.[11]: 1

    Talking of the NFT, that was where I saw Assault on Precinct Thirteen as part of the London Film Festival. Followed by a Q and A session with John Carpenter!

    That theme tune has been with me ever since!

    • The Third Man museum (unsurprisingly in Vienna) has a collection of the different versions of The Harry Lime Theme, (The Beatles and The Band to name two).
      I suggested the version by Martin Carthy which the curator didn’t know and he added that.

    • Thank you so much @Vulpes Vulpes. The thread was a delight and that clip quite made my day. Lovely to see the young Annie Nightingale

      They were each earning 15 quid a week!

      Did your jazz compilation ever see the light of day @Colin_H? I seem to remember you mentioning it at some point.

      The Saucemeister really came up trumps with Affinity.-

      Talking of quirky, here’s a “song review” of their Mr Joy.

      • The cover was shot using infra-red colour film which captures invisible infrared light from the red end of the spectrum, light that’s not visible to the naked eye and characteristically turning green vegetation a bright red.

        As also used by Zappa and of course Donovan.

      • No, I ultimately ‘passed’ on the projected 3CD British jazz comp for Cherry Red – a bit of angst with a previous project led to me not wanting a protracted involvement in other CR projects. But I occasionally help CR people informally with projects – sound-boarding their ideas, suggesting writers, supplying rare audio and the like.

  6. @Kaisfatdad: you mentioned on another thread about signing up to KCRW, the entity sending five new tunes into your inbox every week. As a direct consequence of your comment, I have now signed up! Very impressed with this morning’s batch – if this is the typical standard, then it’s a fine, fine service! And here’s one of them from today…

  7. G’Day From The Quirk Pit
    Taking up on the word QUIRK – have just discovered among my many CDs The Society Of The Angelic Potheads with “Behind 12 Bars” another mixture of blues/punk/cockney rock etc. Best description of the UK geezers is written in Blues Beat Magazine who tell it better than me.
    Another I have is Someone Still Loves You, Boris Yeltsin “Pershing” & “The High Country” been around for 8/10 yrs or even Quirkier – The Angry Foetus “Sgt. Lonely’s Pepper Corn Jam” very recently discovered. I see the looks now – “He’s such a Weirdo” – have just downloaded Hans Martin Storrosten’s “Primiticv Gitar” as it was recommended for fans of John Fahey/Leo Kottke – guess what!!

  8. As always when these things are discussed, here are The Nits:

    Their latest release is a bit moody – no wonder: their studio and archive burnt down recently, and this year it’s the 50th anniversary of the original line-up.
    Best band in the world, of course.

    • What a coincidence that you should mention the Nits @fatima Xberg.

      Their very haunting song, Radio Shoes, was one of my late night radio epiphanies when John Peel played it.

      They deserve a thread in their own right!

  10. I’ve just added Fundamentally Yours, a track by Stackridge, to my Quirky playlist.

    That should keep @Beany happy!

    I liked this comment by @Junior Wells on HP’s original thread.

    “Notwithstanding the banter, there is plenty of love for jazz .blues, funk, reggae artists – all largely black artists. Well populated in youtube posts, album and concert reviews.”

    That inspired me to actually browse through some of the reviews to start to try and see whether that claim could be substantiated. It did prove to me that there is a wonderful variety of artists being discussed.

    At this point I realise AI would be useful.

    I could order it to produce..

    a list of all reviews written by Tiggerlion/NialB/ Salwarpe/ Moseley Moles/

    all mentions of reggae on the site

    a list of all reviews of African artists

    I’ve been having a quick browse and even done manually, it is a fascinating experience. Lots of excellent articles!

    The Afterword is a ship without a captain.

    There is no editor at the helm who decides which CDs, books, films, gigs etc should be covered. For a normal magazine or newspaper, an editorial team decides which stories have to be covered. On the AW, if no one can be arsed, there is no coverage.

  11. Juana Molina is a shoo-in for ‘quirky’, if nothing else for her self-portrayal. As one critic observed, ‘It takes confidence to distort your own image into ugliness, as an act of promotion.’

    But her music of loops and found sound can be quirky too. I love it all.

  12. At risk at of blowing my own trumpet, here are some of my Cambridge-based chums who won’t be bothering daytime radio any time soon. They have all endured me engineering their recordings in a 18th century water mill, or a Fenlan Baptist chapel, for which some returned the favour by performing at my 50th.

    Model Village – Insufferable. The working title for this one was The Blondie Song.

    Tape Runs Out – Friends.

    Violet Woods – The Dancer.

    The Pony Collaboration – Model/Actress

    Pink Lemonade – Break Up Song

    Paul Goodwin – Sitting Out The Second Act

    Helen and the Neighbourhood Dogs – Harrogate

  14. When I was living in Melbourne in the late 80s, my housemate and I would scan the age of a Friday night, relishing the adventures in band nomenclature. Wild Pumpkins at Midnight! Rapunzel Gets Down! And I came back to the old country with some vinyl from Tassie folk rockers, The Fish John West Reject. I still rather like it, though the graphics are a little disturbing.

  15. Quirky stuff can acquire a very devoted fanbase.

    For example, Bohren & Der Club of Gore, a dark jazz band from Mülheim an der Ruhr.

    I’d never heard of them. You hadn’t either?

    “German all-instrumental “doom ridden jazz music” quartet Bohren & der Club of Gore was forged from a shared love of grindcore, hardcore, death, and doom metal. Originally called simply Bohren (German for drilling), the band expanded its moniker in 1993 to reflect one of its biggest inspirations, the Dutch instrumental band GORE.”

    Anyway @DuCo01 is a big fan and was over the moon to see they were coming to Fasching.

    But the gig sold out in a nano-second, cruelly crushing the Duke’s dreams.

    I felt so sorry for him. I tried to help him.

    “Try one of those ticker re-sale sites! Or why don’t you get a job as a kitchen boy or dishwasher at Fasching? Then you can sneak out and watch the gig.”

    In retrospect, I can see this wasn’t the most helpful suggestion.

    Something for all you Gorehounds……..

      • I laughed out loud when I read your comment @fitterstoke.

        I know the feeling,

        Mrs KFD wanted to know what was so funny. It was no problem to explain to her. She’s met DuCool and undertands that he tends to go his own way as regards his taste in music, films and books.

        I am NOT complaining,

        It was thanks to the Duke that I went to Kulturhuset yesterday evening to see the wonderful dub poet Roger Robinson. I could write a long list of the stuff he’s introduced me to.

  16. @elhombremalo, when you mentioned Brian Charles and his 2000 album Sadder Day Dreaming on the previous Quirky thread, you really aroused my curiosity. You wrote that he had a “low profile on the internet! And how!

    His album is available from various sellers. But he seemed to have just vanished off the face of the earth.

    Information about the album is there on AllMusic.

    https://www.allmusic.com/album/sadder-day-dreaming-mw0000619263#credits

    Discogs provides a tracklist and information on who played what.

    https://www.discogs.com/release/6227453-Brian-Charles-Sadderdaydreaming

    But what happened to him after that?

    I then found him and his band, Sidewalk Gallery, mentioned in this blogspot by Michael James who produced his album.

    https://michaeljamesproducer.wordpress.com/tag/brian-charles/

    And that led me to Zippah where his album was recorded and finally I tracked him down. He became an engineer and is now sole owner of Zippah Studios.

    http://zippah.com/

    Here’s an interview with him

    http://zippah.com/producerbriancharles-noise

    Hopefully that interested you! I do enjoy a “cold case” challenge!

    What a shame that there is not one single track of his on YouTube or Spotify!

    PS
    I’ve now discovered this page by Brian’s brother Dave Charles which reports that Zippah Studios was destroyed in a fire in 2021.

    https://www.davecharles.org/

    Dave wrote this song about his brother’s loss.

    “.

  17. Take two Northern lasses with a passion for Swedish folk dance (it’s no coincidence that Cori on the viola is a friend of the Rheingans Sisters) then mix that with yer actual Swede, who likes nothing more than to do jazz vocal improvisations. I think we have reached Quirky.’

    I saw these three last night. It was astounding and delightful.

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