Cardiacs: Classic or Dud?

Man, they need a singer.

Wow that dude

That (the T&F cover) is amazing yeah

Some Cardiacs family business streaming live on YouTube right now, Admiral's Hard (Sea Shanty band with some Stars In Battledress and Monsoon Bassoon peeps) plus later on some of Lost Crowns playing 'the songs of Tim Smith'.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FL9hcWgcsK8

ah nice ty! have put it on, albeit overlaid by the new Kesha album until something actually happens ;)

Maybe this was on the thread years ago but I was searching this site for podcast interviews with fantasy writers and found this
https://kittysneezes.com/painful-threshold-dark-william-d-drake-tells-us-television-organ/

There is, of course, no such thing, It's actually a pretty common analog synth like a Juno or something, wish I could recall the exact name. My band once supported The Sea Nymphs and we asked Bill.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4zyJneR_gI

This concert, I was at it.

Finished with Spratleys + those three playing Is This The Life / Leader Of The Starry Skies.

I also happen to have been at the other one you mention but the time span between the two is vertiginous and also this makes me seem like a mental obsessive.

A balmy day at the Falcon IIRC.

I'm hearing that Tim has passed away, I'm crushed, does anyone have any details?

All over Twitter, but can't find the source.

I'm seeing FoaF messages saying similar but nothing concrete.

RIP :(

The great one is gone.

It's in The Mirror now

https://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/breaking-tim-smith-dead-frontman-22395892.amp

RIP :'(

RIP Tim

As you've probably noticed from my Facebook feed. Yes, I got (got back into, actually, just never talked about it here) into Cardiacs in a big, big way recently. Yes, I am devastated. My condolences to his family and friends (and you imago, since you actually met him.)

Best thing gone did ever have

what the actual heck? terrible news

Oh crap. I have been listening to and thinking about Cardiacs quite a bit this last couple of weeks, from the earliest four-track Canterbury / Zappa infused Piffol instrumentals Tim and Dominic Luckman recorded as teenagers to the prog pop majesty of STG and marvelling yet again (when not simply in a condition of pure joy) at what a thing they were and are, and at why they are not more widely recognised as one of (I mean, THE, really) greatest bands ever, even though of course I know it is the very definition of not for everyone and wouldn't have it any other way.

Kavus Torabi once said or wrote a thing about how with Tim's songs there was never a single part where he wished Tim had done something different. Such audacious, individual but seemingly effortless composition and not once an error of judgment or anything out of balance. That by itself might be worthy of the highest laudation, but there was more even than that to Cardiacs.

Fucking bummed.

Every time I saw this thread, or heard "Is this the life?" on the radio, I'd think...

(as opposed to any other Cardiacs track, which I'd assume meant it hadn't happened...)

On the one level, it's great he managed to supervise the last album and even give a spirited interview (via adapted keyboard) about it.

On the other, glad he did have enough time and spirit to live etc....

sorry, babbling now I know. I'm out.

you mean the last Sea Nymphs album? doubtful whether his true final message to a world that barely deserves him will ever be heard now

Our consolation is all the other messages he did leave. Play 'em loud

awww rip genius :( I was sooooo obsessed. for years.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbBuvhuZO8c

Absolutely devastated, that's all I can really say.

RIP Tim

gutted right now. admittedly I've had some trouble listening to them lately because the whole story with Tim has just been so fucking sad. but I did play StG just last week and had the same reaction I always do, the music is just too good to be true. like "Manhoo", just an unbelievable tune. idk what else to say. this sucks. but its also kind of a relief. I hope he was happy in his final years.

RIP man. Lots of Brighton friends affected right now, very sad.

from one of the obits:

In 2017, Smith described his condition: “Imagine if you were wearing a skintight bodysuit made of fishnet all around you, with electrical pulses going all the time. This is what my body feels like unless I fall asleep.”

jesus, it's all so sad. what a terrible fate. I guess it's a little relief that he's no longer suffering.

Tim was around after a Spratleys Japs reunion gig about three years ago and me and imago blurted out some things about how important his music was, and he managed to give us a thumbs up. I felt guilty in retrospect wondering what kind of effort that might have required, but it still meant a lot, and his being there (and at other such gigs, despite the assumed difficulty) was testament to his unwavering commitment to the Cardiacs universe.

He was truly visionary in the way he stitched songs together (and unstitched them, and sewed them back together again in the wrong order) and in those beautifully lysergic lyrics that dissolve and reform in different interpretations no matter how many hundreds of times you hear them.

I wrote a bit here

https://critterjams.wordpress.com/2020/07/22/the-leader-of-the-starry-skies/

I agree there is something utterly unique about the way he wrote songs. Like geniuses in other fields the more you study him the more you feel like his brain was just wired a different way. He's influenced so many people but nobody can really write the way he does. The only thing that comes close is Magma, or maybe Zappa at his absolute best. You feel like you're listening to pop music from an advanced civilization or something. And I'm still amused that for all his boundless creativity he still decided end the first disc of StG by ripping off Faust, one of the few tunes in existence with that same tilted sensibility

Sad to hear all this. I didn't really know much about the nature of his condition.

It's so fucking weird, after all these years I'm still having conversations about Cardiacs all the time and I'm still foisting various tunes onto friends and colleagues whom I think/hope might be receptive.

Only yesterday I was chatting with a mate about Jon Poole/Bob Leith's pre-Cardiacs band 'Ad Nauseum' who were one of a small tribe that appeared to be beholden to that early Cardiacs sound and how great their record, 4 Little Boys is.

its weird for me too, as I wrote about up there I really haven't listened to a Cardiacs LP in full for a long time, I'd hear bits and pieces here and there but it made me feel too sad to actually listen to one of their albums. at least until a few days ago, when I put on StG and figured, "okay now's the time to get into all this stuff again"

frogbs, I nearly posted something earlier about how I don't usually think of In A City Lining as a favourite Cardiacs tune but it has the unfailing ability to make me forget about any silly fug I may be dallying with, often to the point of actual laughter.

I've been deep in a Spratley's Japs phase recently and only a few days ago was frantically scribbling out the notes and timings for the solo to 'Don't You Aill...' because I'm making a little lockdown cover versions EP and fancied having a go.

listening to A Little Man right now, god this is brilliant....DA-DA-DA-DA-DA-DA-DIVE!!!

16 of us cared enough to post something. That isn't enough, but it's better than zero I suppose

I think, for ILM at least, it's about what I would expect, spent the whole day yesterday talking/thinking about Tim and listening to his music.

Oh of course (and me too!) - nothing against anyone here or really anyone not here. Just the eternal anguish towards a largely unfeeling world

Everyone posting here probably knows but the board recordings of three songs from the Panixphere / Japs concert in December might not be available to download indefinitely.

https://theconfinementtapes.bandcamp.com/album/confinement-release6

XXXXXXXXXXP - There's a nice, long interview with Kavus on YT, filmed only two weeks ago in which he talks about LSD with a 'never say never' attitude, ideas of another singer and getting Craig Fortnum in to orchestrate and so on.

Obviously, Tim's estate is now to be curated and considered in the past tense more definitively once Jim or whoever decides what is best.

yeah I always held out hope that we'd eventually hear it

Aside from that, the fight to ensure his music gets its rightful dues goes on

I bounced back and forth between Facebook and the discord server yesterday, since I was working a double and wasn't busy at all.

the more you study him the more you feel like his brain was just wired a different way

This is pretty much what I come away thinking whenever I listen to Cardiacs. Sometimes I wonder why more bands haven't tried to copy their style, and I think it's mainly just that no one else can write like that. Always loved those Special Garage Concerts rehearsal videos where it's like seeing actual people playing this stuff in this setting somehow makes it even harder to understand how these songs can exist:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxhuQWKwbqY

RIP Tim

Do you think that the lack of clear spatial positions in the shed was always the idea? I know Tim didn't finish the editing. But if course it's easy to say it's totally in keeping with the concept.

The first three things mentioned here that Carl Dreyer does 'wrong' in The Passion of Joan of Arc apply to the Rotten Shed I think.

https://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/news-bfi/features/passion-joan-arc-carl-dreyer-style

Kav's interview explains that they wanted it to be uncomfortable, full of junk and sweaty, loud.