Search and Destroy : Factory Records

Search: _The Key of Dreams_ is lurvly, but I'll pick either _LC_ by Durutti (if only for "The Missing Boy" alone) or Crispy Ambulance's _The Plateau Phase_.

Destroy: _Yes Please_ *was* terrible...but not as bad as anything by Revenge. ;-)

Northside, fookin 'ell! They were almost universally slagged off as the bottom of the 'baggy' barrel, but I remember getting the album for a couple of quid, and I agree it wasn't bad. Don't have it anymore, though, so I can't check.

Crispy Ambulance -I remember the Dave McCullough review in Sounds - he gave it five stars and said this it what The Doors would have sounded like had they continued into the early '80s! Dunno about that, but a fine record.

Other 'Searches' - Section 25 - "From the Hip" (proto doom-techo) 52nd Street - "Cool as Ice" (electro-phunk single) The Distractions - "Time goes by so Slow" (great beat-pop single) Happy Mondays - "The Egg" (on the 'Freaky Dancing' 12 inch. A street gang kraut-funkin' in a disused warehouse in Hulme. Their greatest moment.)

On the subject of The Mondays, I don't reckon 'Yes Please' is THAT bad actually. 'Angel' and 'Sunshine and Love' are good, and there's nothing dire on it. A let down after 'Pills' - yes.

Destroy - Any New Order records after 1985.

The Wake - sadly they haven't worn well in my eyes. "Harmony" has one GREAT track "An Immaculate Conception" which is by far the best thing they ever did. I'm afraid the rest of that album (and Here Comes...) sounds like every inept student Joy Div copy band did in 1982/3. I should know, I was in several!

Another Factory Search - The first two A Certain Ratio albums, especially "Sextet"

Destroy : All of Kalima (ACR's horribly bad sophisto-jazz alter egos). Crap.

Anyway after you've searched for that one you can probably destroy it too.

Destroy: the time for a Northside revival is not now. Incidentally the glorious art of we-hate-this-band-let's-make-the-sleeve-as-shit- as-possible design sabotage LIVES AGAIN with the new Terrorvision record, a Chicken Rhythms for the 00s I believe.

Destroy: The Adventure Babies - "Laugh" (1992 album) [Wilson: "I've never been wrong about a band". I'll go and see the film if Coogan says *that line* over *this record*].

My affection for the Wake may be because they soundtracked a particular part of my life and it suited me at the time. "Harmony" sounded more dated than "Here comes..." and I prefer the latter, but I have to admit that the stuff that came after it - "Something that no-one else could bring" EP and the first Sarah 45 and LP were far better, then they got all bitter and twisted and crap again.

Also, there are two albums before "Sextet", "To each" and the cassette only "The graveyard and the ballroom", which is a great record.

As to reissuing "Alma Mater", Factory Once were going to reissue "Alma Mater", "Here comes everybody" and "Pigs and battleships" (Quando Quango LP - great singles, shite album) around 1997, but the deal with London fell through just after the second Durutti re-issues so it was not to be. Shame.

Search: Take 5 by Northside. A great single which no one seems to remember.

Northside were pretty crap apart from that though. I saw them five years later playing at an Acid House/Indie-Dance retro-night to a small bunch of students in the upstairs room of the Arena in Middlesbrough. They had no new songs and after the show the singer, Dermo I think he was called, was skulking about trying to score some speed off the students (who were all kitted out in their older siblings cast-off baggy tops and Reni hats). If that's not "the bottom of the 'baggy' barrel" I don't know what is.

I do remember it. In retrospect it was mainly notable for ripping off Boston's 'More than a Feeling' yet somehow failing to ignite the world's disaffected youth with the results, in the way a certain other band did a year or two later.

Taking sides Northside vs. Nirvana - now there's a battle.

Nirvana never had an album cover as embarrassingly awful as Chicken Rhythms, although Incesticide's is pretty bad.

Search: OMD - "Electricity" - fantastic! "Electricity / Nuclear and HEP / Carbon fuels from the sea" It's a fourth-form geography lesson set to a Casio!

OH YES!!!!!! ESP. W/GLOSS BLACK WRITING ON MATT BLACK SLEEVE - THEE ULTIMATE FACTORY STATEMENT!!!!

(oh and FWIW my favourite of The Hits is "Souvenir")

A Certain Ratio search: FACT16C, FACBN1-004, FACTUS4, FAC22, FACT35, FAC52, FACT55, FAC62-7, FAC62-12, "Saturn" from FACT65, FAC168

ACR destroy: the rest of FACT65, FAC72

Durutti Column search: FACT14, FBN2, FBN10, FACT24, FACT44, FACT74 (or FACDO74), FACT84, FAC114, FACT244 (and there are probably loads of Vini gems after this too, but I lost track of Factory about this time)

Other searches: FAC2 (for Cabaret Voltaire, mainly) FAC6 (OMD), FAC212 (Happy Mondays - "Wrote for Luck"), FACT256 (Rolf Hind), FAC257 and FAC287 (Electronic)

Destroy: FACT266 (Steve Martland)

Section 25 kept copies of their own mastertapes, apparently. That LTM comp came with a free CD of Section 25 live tracks and outtakes, by the way.

Surely such a silly tune can't fit into all your "The Wake were dead miserable an' that" rhetoric?

Jim - yes, I have (re) bought Alma Mater and the other two Monsters reissues. Life will never be the same again.

Also coming on LTM - Minny Pops, Cath Carroll and Miaow.

The Distractions-Time Goes By So Slow

best single of all time.

Search: LC, Another Setting, Pills 'n' Thrills, The Plateau Phase, half of ACR's output, Here Comes Everybody, Something That No-One Else Could Bring, too much else to think of right now...

Not sure what's the best thread for this, but some people might be interested...

http://www.lefantastique.net/factory/files/factory-yellow.jpg

And the full details are here: http://www.lefantastique.net/factory/index-en.htm

You probably seen it all already, but just recently posted on YouTube:

FACT 125 Bessy talks Turkey
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S57QF9fCB44

I want!!!

http://www.cerysmaticfactory.info/factory_records_communications_1978-92_box_set.html

This has already been delayed twice. Looks like it may finally be happening come January. The tracklisting is different than Palatine and in my opinion better. Complied by Jon Savage, essay by Paul Morley, and artwork by Peter Saville. I hope it comes with lots of extra goodies.

anyone following the cerysmatic factory board is probably aware now that tony's son found a bunch of factory master tapes in their house while clearing stuff out.. including section 25 and stockholm monsters (though apparently not the wake)

http://www.cerysmaticfactory.info/forum/view_post.php?thread=49756

Young Detroiters dancing to "Cool as Ice" at 1:20 or so (do not miss the choreographed routine from the women in red and white tights):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RMY99H70Ac

"Start a Search and Destroy: Factory Benelux thread," I know.

bunch of old tapes dug up, even the grouchy 80s kids can't help but get excited

sorry if there's a thread for this already. those early furs tapes, Jesus Christ I'd like to hear those.

mentioned on the martin hannett thread

i heard The Wake for the first time the other day! pretty cool. on cd. i have never ever seen wake vinyl in my life. they really didn't get over here. i see crispy ambulance and lots of other factory stuff too. maybe i just wasn't looking that hard...

minny pops album i have was another late discovery for me. never saw their stuff either. lucked into a copy. now i just need to find their other 3 impossible to find non-Factory albums.

which ones you need Scott, I may know a guy

oh wait misread, minny pops. don't have those, never mind

So I had fun writing this up

https://theshfl.com/guide/factory-records

So I had fun writing this up

https://theshfl.com/guide/factory-records🕸

"not bad"

Haha

great overview — also some "new" things to check out!

Thanks!