When I agreed to review James’ ‘Hey Ma’, I was excited to do it. James were one of those bands that was compulsively likeable when I was growing up and, despite not having paid much attention since their ‘Best of...’ compilation came out a few years back, I couldn’t wait to hear it. And then, I could. The minutiae of life piled up between overtime, home improvements and requests to pitch for other projects. My iPod stayed firmly, resolutely on the recently reacquired ‘Throwing Copper’ and ‘Vs.’ (a couple of all-time favourites) and ‘Hey Ma’ got pushed back a little, despite a promise not to dilly-dally. Then last week, during a brief quiet period in work, I pressed play on track one. And I smiled.
James for a while looked like being the also-ran of the Manchester music scene in the 80s and 90s. Formed in 1981, the band were part of a scene that exploded in the wake of Ian Curtis’ suicide. The Stone Roses, The Happy Mondays, New Order and later Oasis became household names; James almost didn’t until 1990’s ‘Sit Down’ became über popular in student and indie rock clubs, and one of the first chart hits for the band (a stint on a Heineken commercial didn’t hurt either). Despite a relative lack (and it really was just relative to their peers) of commercial success, they remained critical favourites; a lynchpin of Factory Records and a fixture at the legendary Haçienda club. Oh, and Nirvana (yes, that Nirvana) once supported them. This is not bad going for a band whose frontman would turn out to be a little off his rocker.
Tim Booth was the platonic ideal of a frontman at the time. Floppy haired, boyish and energetic he was initially hired for the band as a dancer before being promoted to singer. Booth always had ideas of the band being something bigger than the sum of their parts and as this ideology increasingly failed to take root, he started to explore side projects, most notably Booth and the Bad Angel, a musical experiment with composer Angelo Badalamenti. Acting stints later followed, notably in ‘Batman Begins’ (Booth also played Judas Iscariot in a version of the Passion set in contemporary Manchester for the BBC), but observers were remarking well before this on Booth’s and the band’s waning commitment to each other.
The band’s last previous studio album was seven years ago, and despite numerous interviews in which various members claimed that they were ‘all but’, there was never an official breakup. Rumours swirled about bad blood and creative differences, but when the band began (tentatively and sporadically at first) touring, and new material started popping up, there seemed to be some hope for reconciliation.
Present and immediately apparent on ‘Hey Ma’ are the jangly melodies and late 80s / Early 90s alterna-rock guitar sound – If you’ve heard James before it’s instantly recognizable as one of their albums; although rather than it being the sound of a band that hasn’t moved on, it’s a band that has taken everything they have learned over the years and applying it to what they do best. Lyrically, it’s clever, knowing and as naughty as ever (although if you want to know just how naughty they can get, track down the song ‘Laid’). Most of the songs are pared down, alliterative and it has to be said, more simple than before but there are still some gems ("I may as well try semaphore, As words no longer work" and about all of ‘Of Monsters and Heroes and Men’). I don’t know if you can ask more of a pop album than for it to stick in your head and make you wish you came up with the lines yourself.
2008 is when when I’ve been introduced to the sound of one of the few critical darlings I’ve felt has lived up to the hype (The National), three of my favourite bands have released new material (REM, Death Cab and The Hold Steady) and I’ve heard at least a dozen by bands and artists I’d never heard previously but now love dearly and staunchly advocate (The Pack AD and yes, Sam Phillips.) Even so ‘Hey Ma’ is now all but a certainty to stay in the top two or three albums I’ve heard this year.
As always, here’s the Track Listing:
Bubbles
Hey Ma
Waterfall
Oh My Heart
Boom Boom
Semaphore
Upside Down
White Boy
72
Of Monsters and Heroes and Men
I Want To Go Home
And Michael Goldberg is streaming ‘Bubbles’ here.
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Interesting. I love much of what has come out of Manchester (the Stone Roses foremost, of course) but I've always done precisely that: written James off as also-rans. The only thing about them that stuck was "Laid" - as clever, funny, and naughty as you said, but tragically overplayed. Perhaps this will change my mind. Thanks for posting.