STACK #223 May 2023

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There’s nothing quite like taking home some fresh vinyl and putting it on the turntable for the first time. It’s a total experience. Each month we pull together a collection of reissues, JB-exclusives of just straight-up classic long-players to add to any burgeoning collection. Words Paul Jones, Zoë Radas & Amy Flower

LED ZEPPELIN LED ZEPPELIN (1969, 2014 VINYL REISSUE)

Amongst an eventful month in UK history – protests in Northern Ireland tipping into violence, Murdoch’s purchase of the News of the World , The Beatles’ final public show – four young, long-haired Englishmen released a self-titled debut which would send jaws to the floor like televisions plummeting from windows, and became one of the most

BLACK SABBATH SABBATH BLOODY SABBATH (1973) 180GM VINYL Record sales were not the problem.

revered LPs of all time. Marked by guitarist/producer Jimmy Page’s ”distance makes depth” approach to ambience within production, Led Zeppelin ’s tracks radiate anew on this remastered vinyl. Irresistibly rollicking opener Good Times Bad Times makes it clear Page, vocalist Robert Plant, drummer John Bonham and bassist-keyboardist John Paul Jones can marry their singular talents into astoundingly sleek cohesion. Babe I’m Gonna Leave You is slash-hatted dynamism personified; Plant wheels and groans alongside guitar on cover of Muddy Waters’ ’62 track You Shook Me ; and the wailing, splintering masterpiece Dazed and Confused closes out Side One. Side Two gives us wack-Beatles licked Your Time is Gonna Come , tabla-punctuated instrumental Black Mountain Side ; masterclass in the power of a simple, well-crafted riff Communication Breakdown ; sauntering blues gem I Can’t Quit You Baby ; and finally, the diamonds-on-a-string anthem of sprawling closer How Many More Times . TOP TRACK: Good Times Bad Times FAST FACT: The album’s cover image – of the 1937 Hindenburg zeppelin disaster – resulted in a legal threat from a descendent of the aircraft’s designer, in 1970. As a result, the band played just one show under the pseudonym ’The Nobs’.

For Black Sabbath, the transition from playing disinterested half-empty pubs and clubs in Birmingham to selling out shows on both sides of the

Atlantic was feverishly fast. An underground audience, hypnotised by the band’s supercharged live performances, embraced their dark, riff-driven brand of rock 'n' roll. The problem was reputation. The music

press largely ridiculed the four Brummies at the time, and guitarist and chief songwriter Tony Iommi desperately sought the respect afforded to his contemporaries, Led Zeppelin and The Who. With one eye on the emergence of new musical visionaries like Bowie, Iommi relocated the band to Clearwell Castle, intent on transforming Sabbath’s sound. With the axeman behind the mixing desk, what surfaced from these drug-fuelled sessions for the fifth album was a sonic pivot from convention to an experimental future. Enlisting Yes keyboardist Rick Wakeman and exploring a diverse range of recording techniques and musical styles, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath was indeed the metamorphosis Iommi was seeking. The band’s signature remains through the chord-wrenching opening title track, A National Acrobat , the stampeding Sabbra Cadabra , and the autobiographical track Killing Yourself to Live . However, the experimentation is evident in the synth-driven Who Are You? and Looking for Today – which even features a flute in the chorus! Fluff , a beautiful acoustic instrumental, is a switch in tempo and tone from the fervour running through the record. And the boldest, bravest, and most ambitious of Sabbath’s compositions, Spiral Architect , ends the album with verve. The dynamic Sabbath Bloody Sabbath was both the creative swing the band desired and the apex of the fertile yet chaotic Ozzy Osbourne era. TOP TRACK: Sabbath Bloody Sabbath FAST FACT: Eight dates in Australia in November ’74 concluded the Sabbath Bloody Sabbath tour. In support was a young and upcoming Australian band called AC/DC.

ARCTIC MONKEYS FAVOURITE LAST NIGHTMARE (2007)

How do you answer the critics casting doubt on the follow-up album to 2006’s globally triumphant Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not? If you’re this four-piece street-smart Sheffield outfit, you probably punch them in the face. Well, that’s what the first three blistering songs – Brianstorm , Teddy Picker, and D Is for Danger – on Favourite Worst Nightmare deliver, perhaps without the bruised chin. Just. Trading working-class fizz for sophisticated

songwriting, Favourite Last Nightmare landed just under 15 months after Whatever , and the step up in artistic maturity is astounding. The band, as tight live as they are in the studio, still turn up the energy dial here; never more evident than in the volcanic This House Is a Circus . But when effervescence is pared back, emotive songs like Only Ones Who Know and the anthemic Fluorescent Adolescent light a prescient path to the band’s evolution. In the shadow of Whatever , it’s easy to forget what a bloody good album this is. TOP TRACK: Fluorescent Adolescent FAST FACT: Fluorescent Adolescent was co-written with Alex Turner’s then girlfriend, Johanna Bennet, holed up in a hotel room on a Mediterranean holiday.

52 MAY 2023

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