The Alarm – Stream (Hurricane of Change) (review)

The Alarm were bothering the charts long before the triumphant one-two combination of Equals and Sigma. Between 1987 and 1989 they released a trio of seminal albums beginning with Eye of the Hurricane and ending with Change, with the live mini-album Electric Folklore sandwiched in between. The late eighties were turbulent times, not just for the band, who despite arguably being at their commercial and creative peak were beginning to be torn apart by internal politics and squabbling, but also in a wider social context. This was the aftermath of the Miner’s strikes, and when the Berlin Wall fell shortly afterwards it catapulted Europe and the rest of the world into a period of seismic change. While all this was going on, lead singer Mike Peters travelled extensively through his homeland of Wales in a bid to rediscover his roots. During that period of intense retrospection he wrote extensively, many of the lyrics eventually being incorporated into the songs which appeared on the original albums while others fell by the wayside and still others remained unfinished or in some cases even unwritten.

Though it was their third official release (fourth if you count the debut EP) the original Eye of the Hurricane was the first Alarm record I ever bought, and I soon busied myself filling out my collection. The fact that I ended up with some of that collection on vinyl, some on cassette, and some on CD was perhaps indicative of the uncertainty of the times. The thing that resonated with me most wasn’t the anthemic, fist-pumping choruses or impassioned musicianship, though those things definitely played a part, but more the lyrics. In a landscape consisting mostly of Bon Jovi and Guns N Roses clones, it was refreshing to hear someone singing about the place where I was from, and about the things that mattered to me, especially at that stage in my life. I was 13 or 14, and things are especially confusing then. You begin to ask questions and seek meaning, and it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to say that the Alarm’s music helped me find answers to some of those questions.

Thirty years later, Peters has revisited that period and put all the material in a modern context, recently commenting:

“I have always thought of these three albums as an Alarm trilogy. A lot happened to the band and the world, during the writing and recording sessions from 1987-1990. As one decade bled into another, the themes of response and resolve to contend with uncertain times are running through the core of each and every album. Played together, these songs tell their own story and, with the tumultuous times Europe and the USA can expect to face in the coming months and years, are still as relevant today as when they were first written.”

The original tracks have been re-recorded or even re-imagined, those unfinished or unwritten songs have finally been laid down, and the whole thing adapted into a sprawling double album called Hurricane of Change tied together with segments of poetry and spoken-word narratives. Mike Peters has adopted a similar approach in recent years with re-recordings of earlier Alarm albums Declaration and Strength which, though critically and commercially well received, split much of the fanbase with some appreciating the new interpretations and others maintaining that the original recordings should be left as they are. My stance has always been firmly in the former camp. I enjoy hearing different versions of my favourite songs. Always have. Remixes, remasters, covers, demos, acoustic or live versions, bring them on. Music, like life, is always progressing and evolving whether we like it or not. If your favourite flavour ice cream is strawberry, it doesn’t mean you can’t also enjoy the occasional scoop of mint choc chip as well. Besides, the hardcore traditionalists will always have the original recordings by the original line-up. It’s not like anyone is forcing them to surrender their record collection at gunpoint.

This is an ambitious project, told in chronological order with the emotive autobiographical spoken-word parts delivered by Peters, with a supporting cast of members including his wife Jules, and other members of the band, all adding depth and a theatrical quality that was missing from the originals. Most of the re-imagined songs, slower-paced and piano-heavy, bear little relation to the original versions. Rain in the Summertime and Rescue Me, two of the band’s biggest hits, are virtually unrecognisable. Of the new songs, for me Ghosts of Rebecca and The Ballad of Randolph Turpin stand out both lyrically and sonically dealing, as they do, with folk heroes and uprisings, and really do sound at home in this setting. The first disc (dubbed Downstream) presents the Eye of the Hurricane album, where the new songs serve as missing pieces. The second disc (Upstream) is comprised of tracks originally found on the Change album, including Where a Town Once Stood which I tactfully re-purposed as the title of one of my stories recently, as well as a few b-sides recorded around the same time and another new song, A New Day. The whole package makes a worthy addition to any Alarm fan’s collection, serving to put the original albums in context and take the songs down a different, lyrically-focused route where there is more of an impetus on mood, atmosphere, and storytelling rather than eighties radio-friendly pomp.

Watch the official trailer for Hurricane of Change HERE.

Peters describes the recording process thus:

“By looking at the lyrics afresh, I have now been able to fully realise what I was grasping for as a songwriter and lyricist in 1987-1989. Back then, my confidence had been blunted by a difficult creative process, and I had always privately felt that there was a lot more left to be discovered within the original body of music. With these new recordings, I have been able to realise a torrent of new possibilities and emotions and, in turn, draw them out of the very same songs. By recording Hurricane of Change in this new way, I feel that I have been able to liberate my original lyrical vision and re-present the music in a way that I believe, is just as relevant, if not more vital than ever before.”

Go HERE for merchandise, tickets, and Alarm/Mike Peters recordings.

 

A Royal Pain in the Backside

This post was originally published in the Huffington Post (UK).

Media Coverage of the royal birth

I inadvertently started an international shitstorm on Facebook recently. The status update that sparked it all read, “When poor people who have never worked have a kid, they are called benefit cheats. When rich people who have never worked have a kid, they are called royalty.”

Justified, I thought. And topical. There has been a lot in the British press recently about benefits scroungers cheating the system. And, in case you missed it, Prince William and Kate Middleton have just had a baby. Like a lot of other people, I am tired of hearing about it. It’s on every TV channel, every news website, and when I get my morning newspaper, I have to flick past 18 pages of coverage and a 16-page ‘souvenir’ supplement just to get to the sports section.

Private Eye magazine got it right with their front-page headline, ‘WOMAN HAS BABY.’ Does anything more really need to be said? How much more can you say, really? Sure, tell us how big or heavy it was if you must. What time it arrived, maybe. Tell us what they are going to call it. But anything else is superfluous.

The status update got 29 ‘likes.’ But I managed to ruffle the feathers of a couple of people who were quick to jump to the Royal’s defence. They informed me that, apparently, most of the Royal family do have ‘real world jobs.’ These jobs include (or have included) admirals, helicopter pilots, and ‘working for Jaguar.’

Not ‘real world jobs,’ in my book. I don’t know any admirals or helicopter pilots. They are generally regarded as jobs for the privileged. Those from a certain stock. And if they do count as real jobs, which one would assume, come complete with a legitimate (as in, earned), and quite substantial salary, then why do the Royal family as a whole skim around £36 million in additional funds per year from the British taxpayer? And that’s not even including policing costs, which add another few million. I can’t imagine many of them ever putting their hands in their pocket to get the beers in, either.

So what’s my problem? I want to live in a fair society, that’s what. Is that so unreasonable? That is the crux of my argument. Why should a select group of people be entitled to the best quality of life our modern existence can offer, while the vast majority of others have to scrimp and save? These are times of austerity, as we are constantly being told; yet the Royal family and their legion of cohorts and hangers-on fly around in helicopters and dine at the most exclusive establishments at the nation’s expense. And now we have another mouth to feed.

It’s not accumulating wealth that I’m against, per se. If someone gets rich through hard work and endeavor, good for them. But the Royal family just sit back and live off the sweat, blood and tears of others. They have done for centuries. One reason the working classes in Britain struggle so much financially is because of the high taxes, which is where that £36 million-plus a year that keeps the Royals living in luxury comes from.

Many people claim that the Royals pay for themselves because they encourage tourism. Sorry, that argument doesn’t hold any water. Do you think people only come here specifically to see the Crown Jewels? At best, it would just be another thing to cross off a checklist. Britain is the 8th most popular tourist destination in the world, just ahead of Russia and far behind Turkey, China and the US. None of which have a Royal family. France is the number 1 tourist destination worldwide. They don’t have a Royal family, either.

I am from Wales, but I am lucky enough to have lived in several different countries and forged good relationships with people from all four corners of the globe (*I don’t know where that saying came from. Globes don’t even have corners). Interestingly, all the people who took issue with my comment shared the same demographic: white, middle class, university-educated English guys. In my experience, most middle class, V-neck wearing, Volvo-driving English people adore the Royal family. Other Europeans are indifferent, people from farther afield, like the US and China, are baffled by it all. One American friend recently summed up his impression of last year’s Royal wedding by saying, “All the hoo-hah is ridiculous, but fascinating!”

Welsh, Scots and Irish are usually hostile toward the Royal family. Or, more accurately, what it represents. Why? There are many reasons. A particularly pertinent one for us is that the current Prince of Wales is not Welsh. It’s a stolen title, used as a tool to force the will of the establishment upon the Welsh people. The last real Prince of Wales, Owain Glyndwr, went into hiding after leading a revolt against enforced English rule in the 15th century and was never seen again. Every ‘Prince of Wales’ since has been about as Welsh as Pol Pot. They visit Wales a couple of times a year, to open hospitals or ceramic factories, then swiftly leg it back across the border. And for that, we are supposed to be grateful.

Maybe this makes me anti-monarchist, I don’t know. Call me what you want, I don’t care. The irony of it all is that Britain is keen to market itself as a democracy, a jolly nice place where everyone is equal. But I sure as hell didn’t vote for the Royals. Did you? I say put them to work for a few weeks on minimum wage, let them get a taste of how the other half live.

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/chris-saunders/royal-baby-pain_b_3663059.html