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Hey there Sorry Staters, I hope things are well with you and thanks for taking the time to catch up with us here. Daniel works ridiculously hard on getting the newsletter out to you and packing it with as much vital, cool, interesting and fun stuff as possible each week and all of us here are proud to contribute in any way possible. I look forward to reading my colleagues’ picks and reviews each week just as much as you all do. I hope that is not a vain assumption and is true. I must apologize for my lack of contribution last week (and even as I write potentially this week) as I have been going through some stuff and it just has made writing and thinking straight even more difficult than normal. I end up junking more “staff picks” than I end up finishing. I have a bad habit of writing what looks more like diary entries and self-examinations than reviews and opinions on records. No one wants to read my laundry list of woes and problems. We all got ‘em. So best just shut up and try to keep carrying on.
Easier said than done sometimes, as I can get trapped in the dark corners of my mind very easily and spiral ever deeper and darker if I dwell on things too much. What always brings me back from the edge though is the reminder that all around the world there are people and animals who have it much worse off than I do, and that I should be extremely thankful for what I have and for where I live, etc. Although news stories about bad things aren’t good for the mind and can make you sad, we need reminders that others have it much worse off. The situation in Ukraine and Gaza and the poor people there, especially the innocent children who are suffering is just awful. It’s always the children who suffer the most in these wars and such. Those who survive will carry the scars for the rest of their lives. The psychological impact is huge and will be a heavy weight on their backs as they proceed through life. Not the ideal way for anyone to enter adulthood.
Children suffering in times of war is not the best lead-in to a staff pick, but for this week this is how it is going down as I wanted to talk about the album Help, a charity album released in 1995 by Go! Discs to raise funds and awareness for War Child, a charity set up in 1993 to bring aid and relief to the children caught up in the then ongoing war in Bosnia and the former Yugoslavian countries.
The other week, whilst over at my DJ partner Matt’s house to do our radio show Worldy, I was flicking through some of his records and saw that he had a vinyl copy of the Help album. I didn’t realize that it had been reissued in 2020 to mark the 25th anniversary. The original 1995 vinyl pressing isn’t that hard to find nowadays with Discogs and the internet, but over the years I have rarely seen a copy in a shop, especially here in the States. I do still have my original CD copy that I bought with the track listing cut out from the NME, as at the time of producing the artwork the tracks and sequence had yet to be determined. More on that in a second.
I would argue that not only is Help the best charity album ever, but it is also one of the best documents of the musical landscape in Britain and Ireland during those heady Brit Pop years. Add the compilations made of the Later… With Jools Holland TV show where acts performed live and in the round with the other guests watching and one done for Radio One’s Evening Session with Steve Lamacq and Jo Wiley as prime sets of 90s UK Brit Pop bands.
In 1995, the British music scene was flying high, literally and metaphorically. Other than one or two older and established artists, notably Sir Paul McCartney, every artist and act that participated on Help were at their respective peaks and in their purple patches of creativity.
The idea was to have all the acts record their contributions on a Monday and have the album in the shops by Saturday. Inspired by John Lennon’s Instant Karma and the concept that music should be made and released quickly like newspapers. Easier said than done, of course, and to be successful, something that required many, many people to be on board and coordinated and working together. Back in 1995, this was even more difficult than it would be now. Electronic communication and advances in recording that we take for granted now simply didn’t exist then. It was all done the old-fashioned way, through phone calls and meetings, in recording studios, in art studios, in the press and on television. Not forgetting the manufacturing and distribution parts too. Quite the undertaking and that it happened at all is amazing, but that it turned out so good is down to the commitments from the artists and the incredible hard work and hustle from the people behind the scenes.
For the 25th anniversary of Help, a documentary podcast was made that detailed the whole process from idea to physical reality and interviews are done with the key players and most of the artists. It is a good listen and recommended. I learned so many interesting facts about who had a part in making it happen, who were the driving forces behind it and stuff like having to get the RAF involved to fly the albums to Europe to get them there on time. I mentioned having to cut the track listing out of the paper. That was because there wasn’t enough time to get the finished sequence printed on the artwork or even inserted after the fact. So, when you bought the CD on that Saturday, 9th of September 1995, it was a bit of a mystery listen. The music press and Daily Mirror gave free pages that following week to print the track listing for people to cut out. Seems so strange that that had to be considered and worked out, but back then graphic design and artwork was still done by hand and photographed. Modern computer apps could have that done in a second now. Talking of the artwork, the cover was done by John Squire of The Stone Roses and the back cover art provided by 3-D from Massive Attack. Liner notes were written by Nirvana’s Krist Novoselic.
Almost all the music for Help was indeed recorded that previous Monday at studios around Britain and other locations around the world, with just one or two exceptions. Finished tracks were then mixed and sequenced by Brian Eno. In conjunction with the album, there were also two single E.P.s that contained further tracks by additional artists like Black Grape and Dodgy and P J Harvey, who were not included on the original twenty track album.
There were lots of exciting and exclusive tracks on the record. Coming out after that summer where the news had gone silly over the Blur vs Oasis war, it was a big deal to have both bands on the same album together. The Oasis track was a reworking of a B-side that featured celeb friends Johnny Depp and Kate Moss on vocals.
The Manic Street Preachers covering Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head was the first fans had heard anything from them since the disappearance of band mate Richey Edwards and the death of their manager. Their Everything Must Go album would come out the following year.
Radiohead amazed everyone with their contribution. Their track Lucky was the first clue where they had gone sonically and would be central to OK Computer, the album they would release almost two years later. It said something about them that they would give away their best material at the time to a charity record. Regardless of whether or not you are a fan, this track blew people’s minds when they heard it here first.
I’ve always loved The Boo Radleys, and in 1995 they were riding high on the success of their hit Wake Up Boo. They wrote a great song especially for the record and apparently it was one of Brian Eno’s favorites.
Sinead O’Connor just made the deadline and fortunately so because her cover of Ode To Billy Joe is sublime. A definite highlight.
Bowie loving Suede do a nice job covering Shipbuilding, the Elvis Costello & Clive Langer song written about The Falklands War and released by Robert Wyatt originally.
Orbital named their song Adnan after an actual war refugee that returned to the area and was later killed.
The Charlatans and The Chemical Brothers mark their friendship with their first professional collaboration on Time For Livin’.
Stereo MCs sound just as cool and contemporary now as they did then. Their track Sweetest Truth is a marvelous modern soulful tune done only the way they could at their best.
The album also featured a new track from the great KLF under the guise of the One World Orchestra. They rework the theme to The Magnificent Seven and add samples including vocals from DJ Fleka from Serbian radio B92. Despite its creators not being that proud of the finished track in so far as musical quality, it was used as a jingle on Serbian radio and later a theme tune that became attached to the resistance as a protest anthem so went on to have a life of its own.
I was working on the ships during this time and was sailing around Italy and visiting Venice. It was hard to comprehend then that just hours from where I was, there was a war going on and so much terrible suffering happening to people. The world up to then had been almost ignoring the conflict. It seems shameful in retrospect that the media was more concerned about who was better between Oasis and Blur than the fact that children were being shot by snipers. Thankfully, through organizations like War Child and the success of the Help album things changed and much needed relief was provided. The Help album alone raised well over a million pounds. One note about that, the British Chart compilers wouldn’t include the album on the charts, as it was a compilation. It made number one on the compilations chart and would certainly have charted on the regular album chart if included, and probably would have made number one too. That decision to leave it off undoubtedly cost the charity thousands in lost sales.
As did also the inexplicable decision by Radio One not to play the single E.P., which caused it to stall at number 51. Nonetheless, the album was a huge success and not only raised money that was put to great use but put the conflict and suffering of the people there on to the front pages of the papers and into the TV news programs. Finally.
Subsequent albums have been released for War Child since then. In 2002, there was 1 Love released with the NME. That had various bands and singers cover their favorite songs. I would be lying if I said I liked everything on this one, but there are one or two good takes for sure. The follow up to Help called Heroes that came out in 2009 isn’t bad. That one has current artists covering songs by older classic artists. There are some nice versions on there. Beck doing Dylan. Lily Allen doing The Clash’s Straight To Hell with Mick Jones. Hot Chip taking on Joy Division and Yeah Yeah Yeahs covering The Ramones. All good takes in my opinion.
2003 saw the release of one called Hope, and in 2005 there was an album titled A Day In The Life. Again, these feature a variety of artists playing originals and doing covers. I admit that I am not familiar with these last two and don’t own them, but they both have artists that I like, so I’ll be checking out both collections in the future.
Regardless, they are all for a great cause, and if you can buy one or donate to the charity directly, you’ll be helping a child somewhere and that’s never a bad thing. For the vinyl lovers out there, it appears that all five of the War Child albums are available on wax, having all received recent pressings. I think I might pick up the Heroes one myself next.
Okay, I need to stop here and get this over to Daniel so that I don’t miss the deadline again. Thanks for reading and I hope someone might enjoy discovering or rediscovering some of this music. It seems crazy that almost thirty years have passed since the release of Help. Sadly, the world still has the same problems that needed addressing then. All we can do is stay informed and try to support good causes, whether they are local or global.
Before I go, I discovered a Channel Four TV documentary on Help which you can watch here.
Cheers- Dom