This playlist is 79% vinyl friendly. Not bad. 

What sort of witchcraft is the Mag-Lev ML1? With no moving parts inside, no belt and no motor, its magnets that keep the platter hovering in place and rotating. Balancing on its feet when not in use, once the tonearm is moved into position, the feet retract, leaving the ABS plastic and glass fibre platter suspended in mid-air. £2500 and the magic is yours, though that ‘keeping in place’ thing would worry me.

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Any track marked * has been given either a tiny or a slightly larger 41 Rooms ‘tweak’/edit/chop and the occasional tune might sound a bit dodgy, quality-wise. On top of that, the switch between different decades and production values never helps in the mix here. 🙂

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Lyric of Playlist 123…

‘From where I stand, I see a broken land… ‘ Take your pick.

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00.00

(Intro) THE FLAMINGOS – Stars (Edit) – Unreleased demo – 1983. Episode #1 for info.

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00.41

NEW ORDER – 586 * – Power, Corruption & Lies, LP – Factory – 1983

Video 586 made it to the very first 41 Rooms show and here the album take becomes the fourth version of the trackl to get playlisted. As with all original ‘back in the day’ New Order, it’s also most recently available in the Definitive boxsets series of their albums the band are making their way through. As I’ve mentioned before, beyond their debut, Movement, for a few years after, I far preferred hearing most of the new material live (especially the electronic driven tracks), rather than on the subsequently released albums, having very often already heard the tracks live a few times and then played any live tape I had a bunch more. So, having ‘lived’ those moments they were the versions that ‘registered’ with me way more and as such it took me a few decades to grow more accustomed to the album version of 586… but here we are! 🙂

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06.26

JOHN GRANT – Pale Green Ghosts – 2LP – Bella Union – 2013

Maybe a signpost to his later hooking up with the Wrangler lads as Creep Show. 

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12.24

LES AMAZONES d’AFRIQUE – Kuma Fo (What They Want) – Streaming only, for now – ? – 2023

But part of their Musow Danse vinyl LP, available in Feb 2024. I’m a sucker for this sort of mixing and matching of cultures and technology and great voices are everywhere.

15.49

DEMOCRATIQUE ET POPULAIRE DE SAUVAGE (SAVAGE REPUBLIC) – Jamahiriya – Jamahiriya, LP – Fundamental – 1988

Industrial sounds out of Los Angeles and given the era I’m surprised I didn’t hear this at the time.

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20.15

DOJOJI – Additief – Meets The Fungle, cassette only – D.J.J. – 1984

Re the cassette’s title, I guess you had to be there… and it’s unlikely a copy will be appearing for sale any time soon.

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28.49

POWERMAN – Lost Tribe * – Lost Tribe, 12″ EP – Battery Sound – 1983

With the much lauded Arthur Russell on cello, a bit of a New York no wave type of thing going on. Also, you got lucky with the edit on the show, as the full track is thirteen plus minutes.

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36.02

LCD SOUNDSYSTEM – 45:33 – Part 3 – 45:33, 2×12″/LP – DFA/EMI – 2007

Funky electronica from Mr. Murphy.

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42.49

SIMPLE MINDS – The American – 7″ – Virgin – 1981

This could easily have been included in any of the ‘Winkles hours’ in those early 41 Rooms’ shows that captured the sounds of our Bedford ‘alternative’ club nights in the first half of the ’80s and somewhere around 1980 I actually sounded out (through their agents) getting the band to Bedford. Sadly, the fee guarantees for them, the Bunnymen and (I think) U2 were all around £100 beyond my comfort zone. Tears and laughing emoji.

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46.23

THE HUMAN LEAGUE – Seconds – 7″ b-side – 1981

Avoiding the A-side – which I always thought was complete pants – but from the same era and vague ‘style’ as the above, though for no reason I can remember, I hardly spun Seconds on the decks. Should have… could have… but don’t think I did. Someone once mentioned as we were driving by Phil Oakey’s house in Sheffield that at one point you could see a bank of televisions in one room, something maybe akin to Bowie in The Man Who Fell To Earth?

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51.08

THE FALLOUT CLUB – Pedestrian Walkway – 7″ b-side – Happy Birthday Records – 1981

With Thomas Dolby in their ranks at this point, and if there had been any video of the band performing either this or its A-side, Dream Soldiers, I reckon they may well have had a very ‘earnest’ look about them… that maybe wouldn’t now have dated too well. A great couple of tracks but I could have seen Midge Ure in his early days fronting Ultravox hamming it up to the cameras on this.

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54.02

DAVID BOWIE – Young Americans – 7″ – RCA – 1975

His best era… if you’re me. And yep, he did his fair share of pouting to the camera too but in these times at least he could maybe blame the drugs.

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58.51

FOX – Imagine Me Imagine You – 7″ – GTO – 1975

‘Doo lang doo da lang a lang doo lang‘, indeed. Or maybe not, in 2023. Still, it’s Noosha Fox and I was a fan of her kookie style back then.

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01.02.13

MARU & MIKAEL – Portrait Of Sorrow * – Destination Nowhere, LP – Hi-Hat – 1975

Finland calling… with a bit of a Karen Carpenter thing going on in vocalist, Maru. Noticing that there are a handful of guitar solos littering this show I tried editing out this one but there’s only one verse – and it’s repeated(!), so it sort of had to stay in to break up the obvious lacking in the words department. 🙂 Maybe that’s why Mikael got on the case with his guitar, coz some slacker couldn’t be bothered to write a second verse. Too chilled out in Finland…

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01.05.29

PMXPER – Lavender Milk * – Self-titled 😆 LP – Smalltown Supersound -2023

And coincidentally, we’re still in the Nordic part of the world. A bit hypnotic, it’s Norway calling!

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01.09.44

TIRZAH – No Limit – Trip9love…??? LP – Domino – 2023

Uneasy and jittery wonderfulness from the English artist’s fourth album – all of them on the solid as a rock, Domino label – but to ram home the fact there’s just too much music out there to keep track of, I’d never heard of her. Must do better in 2024.

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01.12.41

COSTUME – There Is Only To Live – Unus Spiritus, Vol II, download only – ? – 2020

And another ‘uneasy’ sound, this time with a slow leftfield jazzy backdrop, from the returning to 41 Rooms Italian duo.

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01.15.12

MOUNT KIMBIE – Dumb Guitar – 7″ – Warp – 2023

No doubt there’s a strong mailing list with the well established MK, as this 500 run 7″ is already done and sold out before its late Jan ’24 release.

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01.19.29

KAETO – No Body – Download only – ? – 2023

Or ‘katieeyo’ if you catch her on Instagram.

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01.21.50

CAMPBELL MALLINDER BENGE – Condition Collapsing – Clinker, LP – Les Disques Du Crépuscule – 2021

With both Julie ‘ Lonelady’ Campbell and Stephen ‘Mal’, ex Cabaret Voltaire, Mallinder on vocals.

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01.26.41

LAMB – Gold – 12″ promo – Fontana – 1996

‘This track lacks the immediate appeal of the Manchester duo’s debut single Cottinwool but it turns out to be a real grower. The jerky offbeat vibes-based jazz sound of the Original Mix sounds like the Modern Jazz Quartet conducted by Jarvis Cocker. Mr. Scruff takes the song a step forward with his smoother remix which has classical strings, vibes, hip hop snatches and Louise Rhodes’ delightfully distinctive vocals riding on waves of double bass. The Hipoptimist’s remis is a tougher hotchpotch of drum and bass, hip hop and acid twitches that tries a bit too hard at the start but settles into a nice techno-tinged groove in the second half‘. – Andy Beevers, Record Mirror (Music Week), 16.3.96

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01.31.27

JOSÉE (HURLOCK) – U Should Be – Lost Souls Dancing, CD only – Inertia – 2004

I’d be confident in saying very few peeps bought this album but it’s one of my faves in having more great tracks (to these ears) than most albums I’ve ever heard. In the world of leftfield soul/jazz/beats that her previous ‘band’ Hefner moved she was gloriously suited and she carried things on well to this album.

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01.34.24

HORN – 3 Minutes – Naked @ Westminster, v/artists, promo CD only – 1998-’99’ish

Not often you see a CD visual on 41 Rooms but in being its only evidence of this stylish track (and there are no photos either) this is the second on this show. Students within the Commercial Music course at the Uni of Westminster, Harrow, London getting together for a collective promotion of their talents.

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01.38.30

SEAWIND – Free – Light The Light, LP – Horizon -1978

I only first heard this and the following Brainstorm track in more recent years, or if I did hear them back at the time (unlikely, given the radio I was listening to) they could easily have passed me by – as there was too often just too much ‘musicianship’ involved in the ‘fusion’ world for the young me. Front it with a sympathetic vocal, though and you might have me…

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01.42.49

BRAINSTORM – Journey To The Light – Journey To The Light, LP – Tabu – 1978

Sea… wind… brain… storm… and from a Light The Light album to a Journey To The Light… in the same genre and year. Who followed who here, I wonder. Everyone’s looking for the light, it seems – and a 7 minutes plus version can actually be grabbed split over two sides of a 2017 7″ ‘re-release’ out of Japan.

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01.47.41

DIONNE WARWICK – Much Too Much – Friends Can Be Lovers, LP – Arista – 1995

She was never an ‘Aretha’ but she’s always been class… and she just seems to glide over this. Astoundingly, this wasn’t one of the three singles taken from the album and if you were ever to listen to what Arista decided were those singles you’d be forgiven for thinking someone was in the wrong job.

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01.51.24

SYBIL – Make It Easy On Me – 7″ – PWL – 1990

Yep, PWL tunes are unsurprisingly rare at 41 Rooms (second ever, I think), and this one’s itching to get to its belting, ‘size of a planet’ and hands in the air chorus like few do. 🙂

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01.55.17

THE ADVENTURES – Broken Land * – 7″ – Elektra – 1988

‘The most played song on BBC Radio 1 in 1988’ is a startling fact, but its anthemic feel maybe never graced the festival stages it might have seemed destined for. Broken lands? Ten a penny, these days.

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With a bit of luck – Feb 4, 2024 for show 124. 🙂

Dec