FEATURE:
A Buyer’s Guide
Part Forty-Two: The Beautiful South
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FOR the next part of this feature…
I am going to select a band/artist who is still going - as I realise the past couple have concerned artists no longer in operation. The same can be said for The Beautiful South. They are one of my favourite bands ever and, in my view, they are underrated and do not get the credit they deserve. If you are a bit new to The Beautiful South then here is a bit of information:
“The Beautiful South were an English pop rock group formed in 1988 by Paul Heaton and Dave Hemingway, two former members of the Hull group The Housemartins, both of whom performed lead and backing vocals. Other members throughout the band's existence were former Housemartins roadie Sean Welch (bass), Dave Stead (drums) and Dave Rotheray (guitar). The band's original material was written by the team of Heaton and Rotheray.
After the band's first album (recorded as a quintet), they were joined by a succession of female vocalists. All of the following artists performed lead and backing vocals alongside Heaton and Hemingway – Briana Corrigan for albums two and three after appearing as a guest vocalist on one, followed by Jacqui Abbott for the fourth to seventh albums, and finally Alison Wheeler for the final three Beautiful South albums”.
In recommending The Beautiful South, I have selected four of their albums that you should get involved with; one that is underrated and warrants new inspection, in addition to their final studio album – I also list a book that makes for helpful reading. Here are the must-own albums from…
THE amazing The Beautiful South.
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The Four Essential Albums
Welcome to the Beautiful South
Release Date: October 1989
Labels: Go! Discs/Elektra
Producers: Mike Hedges/The Beautiful South
Standout Tracks: I'll Sail This Ship Alone/You Keep It All In/Oh Blackpool
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/the-beautiful-south/welcome-to-the-beautiful-south
Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/0YcVvB5MOlk3QLH5wcNpn4?si=UsJyCMsYS3OP7lpsysj4_A
Review:
“The Beautiful South's 1989 debut would be important if only to mark the partial continuance of the Housemartins' legacy. But when vocalist Paul Heaton and drummer Dave Hemmingway greeted the world with Welcome to the Beautiful South, the handshake came with a Cheshire grin. Nothing in the Beautiful South was as it seemed. Where there was jaunty, jazzy pop, crossed fingers warned of murderous lyrics. If a single featured a fluttering flute, it was filled with familial terror. "Woman in the Wall," featuring one of the year's most memorable melodies and Heaton's plaintive lead vocal, also featured lines like "He'd enjoyed the thought of killing her before" and "when the rotting flesh began to stink." But even in the album's most gruesome moments, the streak of cynical, caustic sarcasm running through it was as clear as crop circles. This fact only made Welcome's twee goodness that much more fun, for with each well-placed barb it further proved what the Housemartins had started: pop didn't have to be stupid” – AllMusic
Choice Cut: Song for Whoever
Choke
Release Date: 13th November, 1990
Label: Go! Discs
Producers: Mike Hedges/The Beautiful South
Standout Tracks: My Book/Let Love Speak Up Itself/I Hate You (But You're Interesting)
Buy: https://www.discogs.com/sell/list?master_id=36201&ev=mb
Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/2F8dMI1DLUSc8bOh3pj594?si=hONA8sBqTWCQ5ZVpNCSaOg
Review:
“And with that ends the template for the album, an album which seems determined to give Morrissey a run for his money. 'My Book'’s instrumental work might be refreshingly jazzy for an indie fan, but again the lyrics stand out, with “there was going to be a film but the camera person slipped”, “we've had some ugly babies but none were quite like you” and “it looks as if the nose and chin are definitely here to stay” being the highlights. The video’s worth checking out, too. 'I Think The Answer’s Yes's beautiful trumpet melodies and piano harmonies show that the band has more than one creative avenue, and their ability to compliment yet not distract from…
“I'm walking through these pastures
I'm picking up sweet fruit
I'm shaking hands with people
That previously I'd shoot”
…is a brilliant display of restraint mixed with creativity. But this album isn’t all about grumpy-old-man English sarcasm.
The Beautiful South’s only number 1 hit in the UK, and possibly the best example of Heaton’s strong storylines, 'A Little Time' tells the story of the end of a relationship, perfectly presenting feelings of anger, indecision, hate and despair, all to the background of lush keyboard and guitar arrangements, with no clichés whatsoever. Seemingly written for Briana’s voice, the pair pull off a heart-achingly emotional performance, creating the best track on the album by far, and possibly the band’s best song.
Moving away from ruined lives and relationships, 'I’ve Come For My Award' enters the world of business and dodgy-dealings. The guitar lines sound very much like they were lifted from a Smiths album, and then given some of the band’s trademark jazzy swagger, and the lyrics, as ever, are exemplary; “I took on your free enterprise and your pretty little shops; walked in with empty bags, and walked out with the lot”.
Choke was a reference to the number of bands who put out a promising debut, only to follow with an absolute disaster. Perhaps this album was titled with a degree of irony in mind; The Beautiful South’s second offering does nothing of the sort. Three tracks from this album made the band’s first best of, Carry on up the Charts, and the album itself hit number 2 in England. A must for any fan, but also a great starting point too” – Sputnikmusic
Choice Cut: A Little Time
0898 Beautiful South
Release Date: 30th March, 1992
Label: Go! Discs
Producers: Jon Kelly/The Beautiful South
Standout Tracks: We Are Each Other/36D/Bell Bottomed Tear
Buy: https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/the-beautiful-south/0898
Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/1I1mX0fymdB9SWCGAhLETr?si=par87RHGQmCB-0IMntP_ww
Review:
“Mr. Heaton and Dave Rotheray, the co-composer and guitarist, use songs as a format for dialogue between singers. The approach worked in the group's biggest British hit, the 1990 single "A Little Time," which featured Mr. Hemingway and Ms. Corrigan as former lovers exchanging their regrets. The finest moment on the new album may be "Bell Bottomed Tear," in which the same pair again portray vulnerable lovers. The recurring lines "There's a tear, there's a tear, not through confusion, through fear" give drama to romantic angst. The dialogue format further emphasizes the democratic mix of voices within the group, a technique Mr. Heaton learned from American rhythm-and-blues, in which men and women talk back to each other while in musical harmony.
Using Ms. Corrigan's chirpy passion, Mr. Hemingway's boyish murmur and his own torchy voice, Mr. Heaton has perfected the sort of vocal arrangements he had experimented with on the group's two previous albums. The vocalists don't sound like soul singers, but they do sing soulfully. The Beautiful South is now able to present emotional contrasts throughout the album's various pop styles, ranging from 50's dance beat to British music-hall patter.
In this nonconformist pop, old conventions are twisted into new shapes, as suggested by the album's first cut, "Old Red Eyes Is Back," a play on the title of a Frank Sinatra album from the 1960's. The group's quirky and political sensibility enables it to address emotions and nuances often oversimplified in rock. The Beautiful South succeeds by emphasizing the pop group as a collective of individual eccentricities. Its name is evocative of an idealized place; a fitting notion for a group whose music charts new territory in pop” – The New York Times
Choice Cut: Old Red Eyes Is Back
Blue Is the Colour
Release Date: 21st October, 1996
Labels: Go! Discs/Ark 21
Producer: Jon Kelly
Standout Tracks: Don't Marry Her/Blackbird on the Wire/Liars' Bar
Buy: https://www.discogs.com/sell/list?master_id=36217&ev=mb
Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/14CFxfus4QKYtVW8oQkbp2?si=fSXZLy78TZapngjHy60jCg
Review:
“"Don't marry her... f**k me." Light, dreamy pop that includes lines like this may knock the listener over. An added feature is the various ways vocal duties are shared by Jacqueline Abbot, Dave Hemingway, and Paul Heaton. Finely produced, it should be noted that the knob-twiddler here was Jon Kelly (Bob Dylan, Paul McCartney, Tori Amos, Kate Bush). Beautiful South reminds one of the blunt simplicity of some of the Ann Magnuson-sung Bongwater, but much more accessible. Dulcet harmonies with casual bar talk rewritten as poetry. "Have fun/And if you can't have fun/Have someone else's fun." The songs here transform spite and hurt into tuneful gems. "The whole place is pickled/The people are pickles for sure/And no one knows if they've done more here/Than they would do in a jar." Yes, yes, yes. Next time your significant other does you significant pain, just put Blue Is the Colour on for a few spins. It will be more healing than a public drunk and save you any day-after embarrassment” – AllMusic
Choice Cut: Rotterdam (Or Anywhere)
The Underrated Gem
Quench
Release Date: 12th October, 1998
Label: Go! Discs
Producers: Paul Heaton/Jon Kelly
Standout Tracks: How Long's a Tear Take to Dry?/Perfect 10/The Table
Buy: https://www.discogs.com/sell/list?master_id=36281&ev=mb
Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/4z0lsUMEXG9X7cT2YPzmjg?si=OYBXLS1fRxy0a9fNNgRIMQ
Review:
“In what has become a familiar pattern, Quench, the Beautiful South's sixth regular album release (not counting the singles compilation Carry on Up the Charts), entered the British charts at number one in October 1998, following the number two success of its single, "Perfect 10," while in the U.S. its release was delayed until July 1999, when it made no commercial impression at all. As usual, Paul Heaton and his comrades take a jaundiced look at the world while crooning melodically over pop, rock, and cocktail jazz tracks. The CD booklet contains only one photograph, an out-of-focus shot of a barroom, and as the album's title implies, Quench is awash in alcohol. Its most telling self-portrait may be "Look What I Found in My Beer," in which Heaton views his musical career as his salvation from alcoholism and self-loathing. "Look what I found in the mic," he sings, "An end to screwed-up drinking and a Paul I actually like." But he often uses metaphors to get across his viewpoint, notably on such songs as "The Slide," "The Table," and "Window Shopping for Blinds." Singer Jacqueline Abbott serves as his foil and expands the dramatic possibilities, especially on the album-closing "Your Father and I," in which parents tell conflicting stories about a child's conception and birth, only to conclude, "Your father and I won't tell the truth." If the Beautiful South's early work mixed biting sarcasm with pop riffs, Quench finds the group playing in less of a pop style, while Heaton's lyrics have become more bitter and self-pitying, but no less witty. Still, American recognition continues to seem unlikely for a writer who likes to make puns involving Peter Lorre and a lorry (that's a truck to us Yankees)” – AllMusic
Choice Cut: Dumb
The Final Album
Superbi
Release Date: 15th May, 2006
Label: SonyBMG
Producer: Ian Stanley
Standout Tracks: The Rose of My Cologne/When Romance Is Dead/Bed of Nails
Buy: https://www.discogs.com/sell/list?master_id=148012&ev=mb
Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/5AFcQ40OOmpX0pKzNb0t0o?si=_x793fggR1yFYgik44LN_Q
Review:
“Heaton has always been that most British of songwriters, and that tradition continues here, from the celebration of that famously rain sodden city of Manchester (“If rain makes Britain great, then Manchester is greater”), or the vicious disillusionment on the duet of The Cat Loves The Mouse, those very English emotions of disappointment and melancholy are fully on display.
Best of all is the pithily accurate ballad When Romance Is Dead. Although anyone who’s just embarked on married life should probably not listen to the song, Heaton’s tale of a couple growing apart will be recognised by more than a few people – “you know when romance is dead, that deathly cold blast from his side of the bed”. It’s an excellent song, superbly sung by both Wheeler and Hemingway.
Other nice touches include the brass band on The Next Verse and the country jamboree feel of From Now On, just two examples of the revitalising effect that producer Ian Stanley (former member of Tears For Fears and producer of Tori Amos‘ finest moment Little Earthquakes) has obviously had on the album. The lovely ballad Bed Of Nails is another example of Heaton at his finest, the gorgeous melody hiding some typically clever lyrics.
Obviously, the Beautiful South are never going to be the most fashionable group in the world, and there’s a good chance that Superbi will sell to their fanbase without making any big splashes in the chart. Yet Paul Heaton and company have never been particularly bothered about being hip, and Superbi is another example of this most resolutely British of bands quietly getting on with what they do best” – MusicOMH
Choice Cut: Manchester
The Beautiful South Book
Last Orders at the Liars Bar: the Official Story of The Beautiful South
Author: Mike Pattenden
Publication Date: 8th April, 1999
Publisher: Orion
Synopsis:
“Since they formed in 1989, The Beautiful South have become on of the biggest selling acts in the UK. Their greatest hits album compilation was, for a while, the fastest selling release in the UK , and their album "Blue is the Colour" sold 1.5 million copies. They have also run up 17 hit singles. This book is the authorized story of The Beautiful South. Mike Pattenden, of "The Times", "Vox" and "Arena", has been granted access behind the scenes to the band themselves and their associates, both past and present, in order to tell the story of the last decade. From the early days of Norman Cook and The Housemartins, right up to the released of the new album in the autumn of of 1998; from Paul Heaton's outspoken left-wing politics with attitude to his twin obsessions of Sheffield United and Italian football; from the acrimonious split from Go! Discs to a profile of the city of Hull, its pubs, and its influence on the several members of the and who were born and bred there, "The Liar's Bar" is a definitive book about The Beautiful South” – Amazon.co.uk