My First: Wedding Present
Watusi wasn’t the first Wedding Present album that I bought for myself – that was Mini – but it was the first one I was really aware of. The Wedding Present, like Yo La Tengo, are one of my favourite bands and one I owe entirely to my friend Strath who played them constantly over the space of about four years, despite a constant hail of abuse from my good self, until such time as I finally gave in an admitted that they were brilliant. I think Yo La Tengo required more persistence.
The Wedding Present, brilliant as they are, are rarely what you would describe as musically or lyrically inventive. Lyrically strong, yes, but not all that varied. This album might in fact be their most creatively arranged effort by some distance. The hiss and crackle of Click Click and the three-songs-in-one craziness of the superb opener So Long, Baby are both amongst the best The Weddoes have ever produced, but the overall rise and fall of the album really is perfectly judged. Seamonsters and Bizarro and, I suppose, George Best may take most of the plaudits, but Watusi is chock full of great songs and is perhaps, as a whole album, better assembled.
I’ve never quite understood how it can take so long to get into a group you come to love, but sometimes things just don’t sink in. Strath really tried his best to open my eyes but for some reason I persistently failed to twig. I remember hearing this album repeatedly from student halls in Maryhill to a damp, cold basement flat in Arlington Street, to the flat on Great Western Road that was occupied by an ever-changing cast of our cronies for nigh on six years.
That flat was a pit, but it seemed brilliant at the time; a massive Victorian tenement building, with two huge bedrooms with massive bay windows. Strath and I would do our own thing most of the time – play Championship Manager, watch telly, important stuff like that – and when we got bored we’d wander into one another’s room for a chat. I would invariably make some comment about ‘the latest selection from Strath’s Shit Music collection’. It never failed to irritate the poor fella, and it still does, despite the fact that three quarters of it is now in my very own Shit Music Collection.
Most definitely including The bloody Wedding Present.
The Wedding Present – So Long, Baby
The Wedding Present – Spangle
The Wedding Present – Big Rat
a great album from a great band and the only one that’s currently out of print. i must admit i could do without the trombone solo on “big rat.” spangle is genius, though.
Huzzah. Spangle Genius. I think I would add it to the contenders for ‘Best Wedding Present Song Ever, At All, Ever’ award.
I don’t mind the trombone solo actually. But what a great album this is. Spangle is unbelievably good. There’s so much Strath stuff in my collection actually, I sometimes forget how much I owe him. Despite the Strath’s Shit Music Collection remarks.
And how does anyone let a record like this go out of print. The Weddoes are one of those groups whose back catalogue will keep on giving forever, surely?
Thanks for posting these -have been trying to find this album over the last few months without success at all. Sigh. I’ve recently come across a lot of blogs that post a lot of out of print material, and it’s no flipping wonder when so much stuff people might actually like to buy isn;t available!
Ed
[...] is less straightforward than the Wedding Present post the other day. Getting into Yo La Tengo was a longer and more uncertain process than getting into [...]