Let The Day Begin...Let The Day Start!: Day 341 - Big Country

Through A Big Country: Greatest Hits - Big Country

Mercury

Released April 1990

UK Chart #2

CD Version with Bonus Tracks

Original Vinyl Tracklist

 

A1 Save Me    
A2 In A Big Country    
A3 Fields Of Fire    
A4 Chance    
A5 Wonderland    
A6 Where The Rose Is Sown    
A7 Just A Shadow

    
B1 Look Away    
B2 King Of Emotion    
B3 East Of Eden    
B4 One Great Thing    
B5 The Teacher    
B6 Broken Hearts (Thirteen Valleys)    
B7 Peace In Our Time

CD Version includes three extra tracks
15 Eiledon    
16 The Seer    
17 Harvest Home

Single Taken from Through A Big Country

Save Me / Pass Me By / World On Fire

April 1990

UK Charts #41

Notes on Singles 

Links in this section are Live, TV or Promo Vids

Harvest Home / Balcony / Flag of Nations (Swimming)

17th September 1982

UK Chart #91

Fields Of Fire / Angle Park

18th February 1983

UK Chart #10

US Chart #52

In A Big Country / All Of Us

20th May 1983

UK Chart #17

US Chart #17

Chance / Tracks Of My Tears

26th August 1983

UK Chart #9 

Wonderland / Giant

13th January 1984

UK Chart #8

US Chart #86

East Of Eden / Prairie Rose

21st September 1984
UK Chart #17

Where The Rose Is Sown / Belief In The Small Man

23rd November 1984

UK Chart #29

Just A Shadow / Winter Sky

18th January 1985

UK Chart #26

Look Away / Restless Natives

April 1986

UK Chart #7

The Teacher / Home Came The Angels

6th June 1986

UK Chart #28

One Great Thing / Song Of The South

September 1986

UK Chart #19

King Of Emotion / The Travellers

 August 1988

UK Chart #16

Broken Heart (Thirteen Valleys) / Soapy Souter Strikes Back

October 1988

UK Chart #47

 Peace In Our Time / Promised Land (The R.E.L. Tapes)

January 1989

UK Chart #39

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Through A Big Country was the first of a number of Best of/Greatest Hits of Big Country. Over the years pretty much most of the Singles released by Big Country charted in the UK and a few also in other countries around the world.

Most of the singles had been drawn from their first four albums: The Crossing (1983), Steeltown (1984), The Seer (1986) and Peace In Our Time (1988).

I was never a huge Big Country fan myself. I really took note of them because I had always like Stuart Adamson as a guitarist when he was in The Skids and was quite interested as to what he would do next especially being the frontman and main songwriter. I did buy a good number of the early singles that are featured on this Greatest Hits album. They did actually make a few really brilliant singles in their time.

The only single missing from the Album is Hold The Heart (November 1986, UK Chart #55) which they could have added to the CD along with the debut single Harvest Home instead of including The Seer and Elledon. That's really the only negative point regarding the album for me.

Let The Day Begin...Let The Day Start!

The Soundtrack4Life Concert Series: Stiff Little Fingers Down Under

I'm always quite fascinated seeing how bands from the UK are received in other lands and I hadn't seen this concert footage before so a big thanks to the appropriately named Boot Leg for filming the show from earlier this year all the way down in Sydney, Australia.

It's great hearing the crowd singing along with every song and the place looked like it was bouncing.

Australia of course has it's own tradition of Punk Rock bands having seen the likes of The Saints and Radio Birdman gain some success in other places than their own. So I guess it shouldn't be too much of a surprise to see a band like SLF embraced so warmly.

A good strong set over almost an hour and half including three from the latest album No Going Back and all those classic singles like Suspect Device, Alternative Ulster, Gotta Getaway, At The Edge, Nobody's Hero, Tin Soldiers Just Fade Away and Silver Lining. Still sound great by the way. I'm going to see them next year at the Barrowlands on St Patrick's Day. Now that will be a real blast!

Stiff Little Fingers 

 Live @ Metro Theatre, Sydney Australia 

1 April 2016

Setlist
01 Wasted Life
02 Just Fade Away
03 Roots, Radicals, Rockers & Reggae
04 Guitar and Drum
05 Nobody's Hero
06 Barbed Wire Love
07 Listen
08 Doesn't Make It Alright
09 Silver Lining
10 Liar's Club
11 At the Edge
12 Strummerville
13 Fly the Flag
14 My Dark Places
15 When We Were Young
16 Tin Soldiers
17 Suspect Device
18 Johnny Was (filmer had some battery issues on this one)

19 Gotta Gettaway
20 Alternative Ulster

Let The Day Begin...Let The Day Start!: Day 340 - Stiff Little Fingers

All The Best - Stiff Little Fingers

Chrysalis Records

Released 4th February 1983

UK Chart #19

 Tracklist for Original Vinyl Version

 

A1 Suspect Device    
A2  Wasted Life    
A3 Alternative Ulster    
A4 78 RPM    
A5 Gotta Gettaway    
A6  Bloody Sunday    
A7  Straw Dogs    
A8 You Can't Say Crap On The Radio

   
B1 At The Edge    
B2 Running Bear (Live)    
B3 White Christmas (Live)    
B4 Nobody's Hero    
B5 Tin Soldiers    
B6  Back To Front    
B7 Mr Fire Coal Man 

   
C1 Just Fade Away    
C2 Go For It    
C3 Doesn't Make It All Right (Live)    
C4 Silver Lining    
C5 Safe As Houses    
C6 Sad-Eyed People    
C7 Two Guitars Clash  

  
D1 Listen    
D2 That's When Your Blood Bumps    
D3 Good For Nothing    
D4 Talkback    
D5 Stands To Reason    
D6 Bits Of Kids    
D7 Touch And Go    
D8 The Price Of Admission

Notes on Singles & EPs

(Links here are for live, TV or alternative versions)

"Suspect Device" (B-side: "Wasted Life"), 4 February 1978 (Re-released: 17 March 1979)

Released on Rigid Digits label

"Alternative Ulster" (B-side: "78 RPM"), 17 October 1978

Released on Rough Trade/Rigid Digits

 

"Gotta Gettaway" (B-side: "Bloody Sunday"), 8 May 1979

Released on Rough Trade/Rigid Digits

 The Chrysalis Years

"Straw Dogs" (B-side: "You Can't Say Crap on the Radio"), 21 September 1979 (UK No. 44)

"At the Edge" (B-side: "Running Bear (live)" and "White Christmas (live)"), 9 February 1980, (UK No. 15)

The opening line of At The Edge turns up in When We Were Young from their excellent No Going Back (2014) album.

"Nobody's Hero"/"Tin Soldiers" (Double A-side), 16 May 1980, (UK No. 36)

 The 3rd September 1979 Peel Session is worth having a listen to as it contained three songs that would be issued as singles (Nobodys Hero, At The Edge and Straw Dogs)

"Back to Front"/"Mr. Coal Fire Man" (Double A-side), 18 July 1980, (UK No. 49)

"Just Fade Away" (B-side: "Go For It" and "Doesn't Make It Alright (live)"), 20 March 1981, (UK No. 47)

"Silver Lining" (B-side: "Safe as Houses"), 5 May 1981, (UK No. 68)

"Talkback" (B-side: "Good For Nothing"), 1 April 1982

"Bits of Kids" (B-side: "Stands to Reason"), 23 August 1982, (UK No. 73)

 £1.10 Or Less ("Listen"/"That's When Your Blood Bumps"/"Sad-Eyed People"/"Two Guitars Clash"), 6 January 1982, (UK No. 33)

"Price of Admission" (B-side: "Touch and Go"), 4 February 1983

The single was released on the same day as All The Best and was the final single from the band until their return in 1987.

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After spotlighting a couple of compilations from Welsh bands over the weekend it seems fitting to turn our attention to Northern Ireland and one of the best bands to hail from Belfast - Stiff Little Fingers.

All The Best is one of my favourite compilations and it gathers in one place all of the singles from 1978's independent classic Suspect Device on Rigid Digits right the way through to their years at Chrysalis Records and the eventual break up in 1983 with The Price of Admission.

You tend to forget what a great singles band SLF were and so when you get the chance to hear them one after the after on this album it's an absolutely delightful listening experience.

It's hard to pin down what my absolute favourite is - it kind of wavers between Straw Dogs, Gotta Getaway and Silver Lining. But pretty much all of them were good singles.

Many of the songs represented on All The Best are still played live by the band today that features only Jake Burns and Ali McMoride from the original line-up of 1977. Ian McCallum plays guitar for the current line-up and has done so since 1993. Steve Grantley is on the drums and has been since 1996.

Let The Day Begin...Let The Day Start!

Let The Day Begin...Let The Day Start!: Day 339 - Manic Street Preachers

Forever Delayed - The Greatest Hits - Manic Street Preachers

Epic

Released 28th October 2002

UK Chart #4

The Remixes

Single Released from Forever Delayed

There By The Grace Of God / Automatik Teknicolour / It's All Gone

October 2002

UK Chart #6

There By The Grace Of God / Unstoppable Salvation / Happy Ending

The album was released in various formats:

2 x LP

1 CD

2 CD

2 CD + DVD

DVD

**********************

Following on from yesterday's post of The Alarm, we turn our attention toward another Welsh band and probably the most successful to come out of Wales, the Manic Street Preachers.

Forever Delayed is the first of three compilations from the band (Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of Manic Street Preachers - 2003 B-Sides & Covers Compilation and National Treasures - The Complete Singles - 2011 being the other two).

The album came in for a bit of stick because of spotlighting their biggest hit singles - which seeing it is a Greatest Hits album seemed almost laughable that people should be complaining about it!

The collection was not well received by NME that stated: "So here it is, The Album That Should Not Exist. To the slogan-smothered, soul-bruised, scarred-for-the-cause skunkpunk heroes of 1991 - the scary/beautiful freaks claiming they'll self-destruct after one six million-selling album - this greatest hits would be musical treachery." I think the NME liked to act like spoiled drama queens and the music police from time to time and clearly were upset that a band they had championed had actually gone on to have some success!

Now, dismissing the naysayers doesn't mean that the album is without fault because one of the most glaring issues is that several songs were edited for length ("Motorcycle Emptiness" - 1 minute and 3 seconds cut, "You Love Us" - 1 minute and 13 seconds cut, "Australia" - 23 seconds cut, "Everything Must Go" - 34 seconds cut, and "The Everlasting" - 2 minutes and 4 seconds cut! "Little Baby Nothing" as well was edited but as it was only 1 second I don't think that was enough to change to song too much!) so that more tracks could fit onto the CD (though not listed as edits in the liner notes).

The band had also written a song called 4 Ever Delayed which had intended to be used for this album but due to time constraints it was withheld and released on Lipstick Traces a year later. Two "newer" songs were included "There By The Grace Of God", which was released as a single and "Door To The River" which had originally been recorded during the Know Your Enemy sessions but had been deemed as unfitting for the album.

The album entered the UK Album Chart at #4 and has sold enough to be awarded Double Platinum status.

I actually quite like this collection despite those dodgy editing issues but I enjoyed Lipstick Traces a lot more mainly because of the second disc of cover versions. The Compilation does contain one of my favourite Manic Street Preachers songs: You Stole The Sun From Heart.

Let The Day Begin...Let The Day Start!

Let The Day Begin...Let The Day Start!: Day 338 - The Alarm

Standards - The Alarm

I.R.S. Records

Released November 1990

UK Chart #47

US Chart #177

Single Released from Standards

Released October 1990

UK Chart #54

A-Side: Unsafe Building 1990

B-Side: Up For Murder 1990.

It was also released on two CD singles featuring both tracks and had the original 1981 versions of Unsafe Building/Up For Murder as a bonus track on each CD.

There is also in existence a 6 x 7" Promotional Box Set

Tracklisting

A Marching On    
B The Stand

    
C Sixty Eight Guns    
D Where Were You Hiding When The Storm Broke? 

   
E Absolute Reality    
F Spirit Of '76  

  
G Rain In The Summertime    
H Rescue Me   

 
I A New South Wales    
J Sold Me Down The River 

   
K Unsafe Building 1990    
L Up For Murder 1990

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Standards was the first sort of "Best of" from The Alarm and was released in 1990.

Throw in some hit singles, a couple of album tracks, a "Classic Christmas" cover version and a reworking of the debut single and you have a 15 track smash hit...well I guess that was plan by I.R.S. Records!

In April the following year they released what turned out to be the final album (at least with the original line-up) - Raw and by the end of June they were no more!

Let The Day Begin...Let The Day Start!