Unsung Podcast

by Unsung Podcast

Episode 165 - Come Away with ESG by ESG

ESG are without a doubt one of the most unsung bands we’ve covered on this podcast. You may never have heard of them, but you have definitely heard them. Particularly if you like hip hop, dance or house music. There’s an absolute ton of literature devoted to sampling in music, including the ethics of it and the affect it has had on many artists. We won’t go into that here, but suffice to say some of the most well known beats in hip hop coming from this band’s first EP and their first album Come Away with ESG. Dave brings this to the table with the full weight of that in mind, leaving both Chris and Mark shocked at the sheer influence this album has had on people even though the band are little known. Not only did they have a massive impact on sample culture, but their sound inspired any number of post-punk and indie bands, including everything from Gang of Four to LCD Soundsystem and beyond. This band of four black women from the South Bronx originally began as a group that simply wanted to turn the vibe you get from a James Brown bass and drum breakdown into full songs. They largely achieve this, weaving spares funk in alongside snippets of Motown and of course post punk. On this episode we go deep on the band’s back catalogue and discuss the importance of this album, their career afterwards and exactly where they’re at today. You decide: Come Away with ESG by ESG – is this truly unsung?

Episode 164 - Jersey's Best Dancers by Lifetime w/ Anna Goldthorp

There’s a bunch of bands from the late 90s punk and emo scene that are hugely influential. Of them though, one could argue that Lifetime are the least well known. Which is odd given that many huge bands are on record as stating that they were directly influenced by this album in particular. Everyone from Saves the Day to Fall Out Boy, Thursday and Taking Back Sunday have all voiced their appreciation for this album over the years. Which until we did this episode, was news to Mark as he had always thought of them as more of a melodic hardcore band. This week we dive into the band’s rather short back catalogue. We talk about their beginnings, their break up, their reunion ten years later and their subsequent silence after releasing a “comeback” album in 2007. Resident punker Anna Goldthorp joins us this week to give her take on this album too, so we get a variety of opinions on here also. Jersey’s Best Dancers came out in 1997, which was an important year for emo as a whole, so we take some time to dig into this and talk about the other bands that were floating around the emo scene at the same time. Mark also gives us a potted history of Lifetime guitars Dan Yemin, his influence, the bands he formed after Lifetime and the way he helped shape an entirely new genre of hardcore on the back of Lifetime, Kid Dynamite and Paint in Black. But as ever folks, you have to decide the key thing here: is this an unsung classic? You decide. Vote below.

Episode 163 - The ABBA Mixtape (Side B)

The ABBA-geddon comes to an end this week in part two of our ABBA mixtape. If you missed part one, listen here. We listened to everything ABBA ever wrote in order to devise a comprehensive list of the best, most unsung ABBA songs and yes, it was a complete joy, before you ask. Over the course of 8 albums, ABBA explored pretty much every facet of 70s pop music. They swung from stomping glam rock to disco floor fillers, and from mad prog rock excursions into weird baroque pop. They even experimented by pan pipes and shit. In the 80s the began to incorporate synth pop into their sound, and their final album (to date?) The Visitors is truly ahead of its time. It seemed to predict the sound of pop music in the 80s before the decade had truly begun and had we known just how great of an album it was before we did this mixtape, we might very well have did an episode on itself it is truly an unsung classic. Absolutely worth spending time with, in our view. Listening to their discography is pretty fascinating. Many people don’t think ABBA are terribly eclectic, but they are, and we’ve tried to demonstrate a fair amount of that with our selections. We also asked a few regular contributors for their choices, so we hope you enjoy hearing Ferrucio Quarcetti, Crag Carrick and Hazel Burgess giving us the lowdown on their favourite ABBA songs and why they chose them. Also, after doing the AXIS OF ABBA last week, we thought we’d include our version of it below. We hope you managed to get close to it!

Episode 162 - The ABBA Mixtape (Side A)

Oh lord it’s another two parter. However, you should rejoice as it is our long promised ABBA mixtape and boy is it a TRIP. First of all, thanks to Tommy Smith for first suggesting that we should do an ABBA episode. Initially we scoffed at the idea - ABBA? They’re not unsung! - but Chris suggested they could be ripe for a mixtape. Eventually, we said we would do it but only if we got ten new subs. Well folks, we got them in the end and here we are. Once we’d dived deep into ABBA’s catalogue - which is, by the weird, a truly strange collection of music in places - we realised that their final album, The Visitors, could actually have qualified for this show as it is brilliant and very unsung. Alas, we’d already committed and thus agreed that each of us would pick three tunes each for a playlist. We then added in some friends in the form of Ferrucio Quarcetti, Crag Carrick and Hazel Burgess. Which is a little bit of a spoiler for what will come next week. This week, we have a game. Observe the graphic below: This is the AXIS OF ABBA. We each took turns at placing one of the 18 songs at either side of the screen somewhere on this axis. It generated some good banter and some nice thoughtful discussion too. Particularly about the pan pipes and shit. Yes, that was a thing. Sometimes it’s great, other times it’s a big WTF but that, as you will come to learn (if you weren’t already aware of course) is ABBA. Next week - our picks, some words from friends and more.

Episode 161 - King for a Day... Fool for a Lifetime by Faith No More (Side B)

Last week was part one of our Faith No More two parter and it is, as it turns out, quite easy to dedicate the best part of three hours to Faith No More and their music. We did try to keep it brief but how many times have we said that and failed miserably (AHEM XMAS SPECIAL AHEM)? To wit, this week we’re covering the band’s output from 1995 to this very day. As is our wont, we dive into Album of the Year and Sol Invictus before swinging back around to King for a Day, giving that album the usual unsung once over. You may have heard, in this and the last episode, that we have resurrected our tip jar! If you’re not a fan of longer term subscription (and we don’t blame you!) then you can now make a one off donation to us. Go to www.unsungpod.net/donate to chuck us so some cash. Or if you are a fan of commitment, you can also find our Patreon there too! Anyway, back to the point - is King for a Day…Fool for a Lifetime Faith No More’s unsung classic? Vote below. Next week - ABBA MIXTAPE.

Episode 160 - King for a Day... Fool for a Lifetime by Faith No More (Side A)

Mike Patton is now officially the first ever artist to have been nominated twice for this podcast. His previous inclusion was in the guise of Tomahawk, and their second album Mit Gas. The public rightfully decided that this was worthy of inclusion in our discography. Now it's time to see if Faith No More's fifth album, King for a Day… Fool for a Lifetime, will join it. Chris has been talking about doing this album for bloody ages. Him and Mark are huge FNM fans and Chris has a very compelling case as to why this album is their unsung classic. Similarly, Dave has dabbled with the band in his past - enjoying The Real Thing and Angel Dust in particular - so for him it was something of a trip down memory lane. We talk very extensively about this band, as you'd expect. Which means we're gracing you with another two parter. That's right, we're over a month and a half into 2021 and we've yet to do a single album in one episode. Whoops. We talk about the band's history and give their albums a good going over here. As usual it is replete with interesting facts, questionable patter and snippets of banging tunes. Enjoy!

Episode 159 - Madvillainy by Madvillain (Side B)

All good things must come to an end. This week we finish our round up of DOOM’s career and cover the wonderful, influential and (so far) only Madvillain album, Madvillainy. If you’re familiar with DOOM you’ll no doubt have seen scores of articles about his influence and legacy, about how he remains a rapper’s rapper. There is, of course, not much more we can add to that but my god to we try. So tune in for Mark and Weaver getting geeky over the album, Chris being somewhat of a bystander and some enlightened discussion on the many face of Daniel Dumile. Is Madvillainy worth of a place in our discography? Vote below.

In Session 4 - KatieJane Garside (Daisy Chainsaw, Queenadreena, Ruby Throat and Liar, Flower)

Surprise! Here’s another interview for ya’ll. We’re delighted to bring you this interview with the wonderful KateJane Garside. Well known for her staggering voice and stunning stage presence, KatieJane has been involved in a number of musical projects since the late 80s, most notably the garage punk outfit Daisy Chainsaw in the early 90s and ferocious noise rockers Queenadreena from 99 to 2010. She subsequently went on to form Ruby Throat with her life partner Chris Whittingham, a much more subtle neofolk affair, before marrying the noise and the folk together with their latest album under the name Liar, Flower, called Geiger Counter. We were lucky enough to catch KatieJane as she was on dry land, and she was kind enough to lend us a generous amount of her time so we could talk about her life and career. We cover everything from Daisy Chainsaw to the present day, digging into her life story, some of the things that make her tick as a musician and getting some pretty great tales in the process. This is one for the books so we hope you folk enjoy listening to it as much as we enjoyed recording it. We’re back next week with Mark’s choice of The Ugly Organ by Cursive.

Episode 158 - Madvillainy by Madvillain (Side A)

We’d always planned to do a hip hop episode after the Cocteau Twins, but after the sad passing of MF DOOM was announced on December 31st 2020, we decided to switch focus from The Cold Vein by Cannibal Ox to one of DOOM’s finest hours - Madvillainy by Madvillain. Madvillain is one of many collaborative projects that MF DOOM embarked upon throughout his career, with this particular one being his first collaboration with legendary undergroun hip hop producer/DJ/MC Madlib. One of Daniel Dumile’s many personas, DOOM was born out of frustration with the music industry, ad Dumile sought to “destroy that which had created him” following the death of his brother and the unceremonial dismissal of his first project, KMD by then label Elektra records. Until Madvillainy, we had only properly been seen on the first MF DOOM album Operation: Doomsday in 1999. After creating albums under the names King Geedorah and Viktor Vaughn in the period leading up to this record, Madvillain saw DOOM bring his “main” persona back into the spotlight, and there it remained until his untimely death last year. In this episode we cover DOOM’s career right up until 2004, whilst also waxing lyrical on the tendency of some journalists to project their own ideas onto art in order to cack-handedly “legitimatize” something that is already very legit. Part two is next week, and we’ll cover his career from DANGERDOOM onwards, and then get torn into Madvillainy.

Episode 157 - Heaven or Las Vegas by Cocteau Twins (Side B)

We feel that, by this point, you’re aware of everyone’s positions on this band so far, but there’s still a little twist at the end that you’ll want to stay tuned for as we take some (a lot of) time to chat about the legendary Heaven or Las Vegas by Cocteau Twins. A lot has been said about this album of the years. It’s highly lauded by just about anyone that has an affection for shoegaze, dreampop, 80s goth and even goth-grandad himself Robert Smith. Their influence is huge at this point, even if upon reflection they had a rather cantankerous relationship with the media and their fans. But the fact remains, is any artist beyond reproach? We look at it from all angles - someone who loves it, someone who hates it and someone who’s indifferent. The truth for some may be in the middle. Or maybe at least one of us is talking absolute tosh. Either way, it’s an entertaining listening so join us as we say hello, and goodbye, to Heaven or Las Vegas.

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