Equus: Ray Tracing - The Internal Exterior (12 February 1993)

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This almost qualified as something of an oldie, given that it was released as part of 3 12-inch releases put out by Akin Fernandez under the Ray Tracing alias across 1990/91. Discogs make a point about the central conceit of Ray Tracing being that the tracks were a mixture of tempos and textures, all distilled from a single sample recorded off-air from the legendary pirate radio station, Centreforce, which was the co-ordinating power around the rave scene circa 1989.

When I listened to the range of Ray Tracing material which is currently shareable, my untrained ear wasn’t able to pick out the re-used sample. I think it may be something quite subtle, such as one of the hi-hat shucks. The Ray Tracing tracks covered quite a few different audio bases. My favourite is the chillout funk hybrid of Slodato. Fernandez also put out ambient tracks under the Ray Tracing name such as JP-8.88

The Internal Exterior belongs to the catchier end of Ray Tracing’s oeuvre. It’s twinkly and fun with the electronics made to sound like birdsong on a perfect summer’s day. There’s also a Didgeridoo sound across the majority of the track which taps into the environmentalism vibe of the time. The second half of the track loses its way slightly, by trying and failing to take the music in more ominous directions. The final cry of Oh my God! perhaps reflects Fernandez’s own sense of exasperation at how the ball has been dropped in the second half.  A curate’s egg of a track, but the good is very good indeed.

Video courtesy of Top Shelf Audio.

Equus: John Peel’s Music - Sunday 7 February 1993 (BFBS)

As I write this, I feel very much in tune with how John Peel was feeling as he opened this edition of his BFBS show. He warned listeners that he was not in perfect working order due to a heavy head cold, but that he hoped the music would make up for it.  Both my wife and I have been flattened by the same cold*, a week out from Christmas. I thought I was getting over mine, but an attempt to untangle some Christmas tree lights has left me dizzy and craving the balm of this blog.

I think that the cold which has affected my wife and I may have had its roots in the fact that we just spent a week with our niece, culminating in her fifth birthday party and an army of infants invading my in-laws house. Peel’s cold may have been caused by the filthy weather in which he had watched Ipswich and Sheffield Wednesday play out a 1-1 draw in a League Cup quarter final, a few days previously. Perhaps, it was penitence for him having spotted himself, together with Sheila and Thomas, on the televised highlights, sitting behind John Wark as he took a throw-in. Regardless, he had a higher opinion of this piece of crowd work than he did of most of his TV work, as he explained: I’m always rather poor at it to be honest, because all I do is  flutter my eyelids in a rather nervous fashion like some gentle woodland creature and just wish that it was over.

Having criticised himself as a TV performer, he also held up his hands to being a lousy interviewer, but while playing tracks from the new Frank Black album, he acknowledged Black as being a nice man because he had made an interview that they did together a much easier experience than Peel had feared it was going to be. He was also sympathetic to Black’s reasons for ending Pixies, with Black having expressed the wish to get off the roundabout of playing the same songs over and over again.

The postbag included a letter from Addis Sharma, who explained that during a visit to a department store in Alma Ata- now called Almaty -, Kazakhstan, they had looked at the music section. It contained 5 albums, one of which was by Billy Bragg. As Addis put it, This is a place where people queue for everything except Billy Bragg records, it seems.  Peel received two letters of thanks from people that he had managed to turn on to African music, through consistent exposure to it on the show.  One of the correspondents admitted that their girlfriend hadn’t been converted and would punch them whenever they listened to it. Peel responded by playing Sana by Kanda Bongo Man and repeating his standard complaint about the presence of synthesiser players on soukous records.  Finally, a prisoner from Berlin called Steve had written to Peel to request some records. We didn’t learn what these were, but he promised to play them next week.

I was able to include all the selections I wanted to include from this show.  I did not include, as I frequently never do, the two tracks by Babes in Toyland which Peel played.  Both Blood and Jungle Train were taken from a live album, which had been sent to Peel by an American friend who liberated a copy of the album from a radio station in Georgia. A bit of a collectors item, but you’re not getting my copy. This though was in a pre-YouTube world. For those who enjoy them, consider this an early Christmas gift.

Full tracklisting

*Turned out to be Covid.

Equus: Huggy Bear - T-Shirt Tucked In/Blow Dry (7 February 1993)

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Two of the three Huggy Bear tracks which John Peel played on this edition of John Peel’s Music on BFBS.  As with Moonshake, we get one of his and one of hers. “His” is obsessed with wanting sex and not getting it; “Hers” shows how to use sexuality to lure men in and then turn the tables on them in violent style.

My initial listen to T-Shirt Tucked In had me thinking that it was an attack on me, or people like me circa 1993.  The refrain of Ah, you’re so good/You got your T-shirt tucked in felt like a repudiation of those of us who could not bring themselves to rebel. After all, as the song seemed to sneer, I literally wore my conformity by having my T-shirt tucked in wherever I went. I also wore white socks until about 1998. I didn’t know any better, it felt smart and it kept draughts off my chest. I mean I’d made a stand in the late 80s when I refused (outgrew) wearing a vest. What did Huggy Bear want from me, for fucks sake!?  But it’s only in my dreams that they’re attacking me. 

On the surface, the song appears to be potentially targeting prick-teasing women who give off sexual vibes, but who wear clothes like armour. The tucked in t-shirts helping to accentuate curves of breasts and belly while remaining firmly locked away to lustful male eyes. A more likely reading may be that it’s a caricature of invasive male thinking, whereby Chris Rowley’s narrator sees sexual invitations in the woman’s dress and behaviour. It’s a curious and queasy mix which attempts to be sexy but makes Rowley’s character seem laughably pathetic with his second hand sex talk, Groovy little t-shirt thing etc. Given the full-on nature of the female backing vocals, I suspect that this was intentional.

Listening to the sass and swing of Blow Dry, I found myself thinking that someone really ought to make a musical out of the work of Huggy Bear. Both this and Her Jazz have the feel of big company production numbers. Pairing it up with T-Shirt Tucked In is interesting in that it switches the dynamics of the former track, so we get the female perspective and a concerted attempt to drive dumb men to distraction with shiny bouffant hair and swinging hips. And whereas Rowley is made to sound desperate, Jo Johnson sounds firmly in control of the scene that she’s setting and the game she is playing.  If you try to untuck her T-shirt and let down her hair, her reaction will be swift and devastating - I’ll blow you off the face of this earth/You’ll be as bloody as you were at birth. It’s those Abel Ferrara vibes again…  

In true Huggy Bear style, this kind of sexual honeytrap to violence could be sprung both in the meat markets of clubs and pubs as well as in more mundane settings. Johnson intends to make sure that every head turns when she next goes to the post office.

Imagine the amount of onstage sexual tension that could be wrung out of a dance routine on either of these tracks.  It’s a choreographer’s wet dream! The campaign for the work of Huggy Bear to be the next 90s jukebox musical starts here.  If nothing else, it would have to be better than Viva Forever!

Videos courtesy of random content.

All lyrics are copyright of their authors.