Song Of the Day: June 1, 2005
The Cleaners From Venus- The Secret Dreams of a Kitchen Porter
From the Secret Dreams of a Kitchen Porter Cassette, 1982
Martin Newell is a fascinating figure with an extensive discography, as his entry at the Trouser Press site attests. It has never been easy to find his Cleaners From Venus recordings, especially the homemade tapes they were issuing in the early 80s. In 1997 Jarmusic of Germany released Don't Step On My Rainbow, a box set consisting of 5 7" EPs with four songs each, that purported to be some of the best tracks from the Cleaners' cassette-only period. It's a pretty cool object really, there's a photo book and a postcard and some other odds and ends. The music is great too, recalling the Beatles, the Jam, XTC, and on a cover of Syd Barrett's "Late Night," the Cure.
A while back I received in the mail a package from my old pal Debby Vanderwall containing a book by Giles Smith called Lost In Music, and I think it's fair to say that if you're the sort who has ever had an argument with your significant other about how long you've been in the record store, you need to get your hands on this. It offers Smith's thoughts on some vital matters including his youthful obsession with Marc Bolan, the lies people tell about what the first record they ever bought was, and his tenure as a member of Cleaners From Venus. It is an absolute delight.
4 Comments:
I agree, Giles Smith's book is recommended.
Perfect early-summer song.
I've listened to maybe half of the Little Hits, and this is my favorite so far. I just got the Cleaners best of CD (which features four tracks of Giles Smith reading from his book, at least I assume that's what it is) and have been spinning it non-stop. It's great, but I don't know if I like anything on there as much as "Secret Dreams."
I seem to have thing for music that sounds like it should be in a John Hughes movie but was probably too obscure to be in an actual John Hughes movie.
I'm glad I got this far down. Giles Smith writes a column on cars in liberal daily newspaper The Guardian and is a big fan of Chelsea Football Club - he recently started writing a column for the club's website (www.chelseafc.co.uk). I bumped into him in the queue for tea a couple of seasons ago and he's a thoroughly nice bloke, very modest about his musical past, though happy to be recognised.
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