Ladies and gentlemen,

The wait is almost over, as this coming Wednesday (Aug 6th) sees the long awaited release of the Specialized Mad Not Cancer album.

To whet your appetite we’ve got a mass of track reviews from the one and only Graham Yates as well as a dash through a selection of tunes on the album from our resident Jonathan Young.

Elsewhere, and we have details of the latest competition currently running over on the Madchat Facebook group. There are some amazing prizes to be won, including Madness artwork, an Embarassment T-Shirt and Suggs bookmarks.

Alongside that we have the latest rundown of forthcoming gigs, interesting Tweets from The Twittersphere, gig reviews and more.

So, sit back, enjoy what remains of the weekend, and get stuck into this week’s issue.

Jonathan Young, Rob Hazelby, Simon Roberts, Paul Williams

SHOWTIMES

See below for all forthcoming Madness and Madness related gigs and events. If there’s something we’ve missed off or you feel should be added then please let us know.

Madness

August 2014

August 12th Mallorca Rocks
August 13th Ibiza Rocks
August 18th, Kubana Festival, Krasnodar, Vesolovka

November 2014

November 21st – 24th 2014 – Minehead – Earlybird tickets can be ordered here: http://www.bigweekends.com/splash-pages/madness2014.aspx

December 2014

All for the M.A.D.H.E.A.D Tour

Thursday 4th, Capital FM Arena, Nottingham
Friday 5th, Motorpoint Arena, Cardiff
Saturday 6th, Brighton Centre, Brighton, Matinee
Saturday 6th, Brighton Centre, Brighton * SOLD OUT *
Monday 8th, Plymouth Pavillions, Plymouth
Tuesday 9th, Bournemouth International Centre, Bournemouth Thursday 11th, First Direct Arena, Leeds
Friday 12th, Newcastle Metro Radio Arena, Newcastle
Saturday 13th, LG Arena, The NEC, Birmingham
Monday 15th, Odyssey Arena, Belfast
Tuesday 16th, The O2 Dublin, Dublin
Thursday 18th, The SSE Hydro, Glasgow
Friday 19th, Phones 4u Arena, Manchester
Saturday 20th, The O2 Arena, London

Links to purchase tickets for the above tour can be found at: http://madness.seetickets.com/tour/madness/?pre=premad&src=madnesspre

For tickets also see links via: www.madness.co.uk

The Magic Brothers

November 1st. Blakes @ The Custard House – Birmingham
Magic Brother Friday Headline set:
November 14th.  The Big One 3.  Park Dean, Sandford Dorset.

The Lee Thompson Ska Orchestra

August 2014

August 31st, The Big Feastival, Alex James’ Farm, Cotswolds

October 2014

October 2nd, The Jazz Café, Camden Town

More festival dates to follow.

Ska Orchestra web site: www.ltso.mis-online.net

The Lee Thompson Ska Band – (The Nutty Boy – A Crunch! Set of Songs)

August 3rd – The Fidler’s Elbow.  Kentish Town.  8pm –  (Crunch! Songs Set)

https://www.facebook.com/events/648549731907550/?fref=ts7

(The warm up gig for Boom Town appearance.)

August 7th – 10th An appearance at the Boom town festival, Hampshire’s pop up city four day event begins on August 7th into the weekend. Chinatown district is full of Ska and more bands this year, but we can confirm that this won’t be playing host to the Ska Orchestra. Yes we’ve hinted for weeks at something different for Boom Town. It’s A Crunch! set of Songs. See MIS feature below.

http://www.boomtownfair.co.uk/news/chinatown-district-line-up-released-199

The Silencerz (Featuring Lee Thompson)

November 2014

16th November – Confirmed in the Sunday Lineup of bands at Specialized The Big One 3. In Dorset.

Lee will be doing a photo signing session too.

Near Jazz Experience

*** New *** September 21st – Support slot before Dave Formula and The Finks, Brighton, Prince Albert

Deaf School

August

8th, The Islington, North London
9th, The Islington, North London (SOLD OUT)
10th, Rebellion Festival, Blackpool (SOLD OUT)

For details of future gigs keep an eye on http://deafschoolmusic.com for more information.

November

Thursday 20 – Borderline, London
Friday 21 – Trades Club, Hebden Bridge
Saturday 22 – Academy, Manchester
Sunday 23 – Floral Pavilion, New Brighton

BUY IT

If money’s currently burning a hole in your pocket then perhaps we can help with your dilemma.

New Madness T-shirts.

Over on the Madstore, at  http://madness.sandbaghq.com/left-menu-madness/clothing/t-shirts.html/ a selection of new official T-shirts for you to buy, have been unveiled.

The most mentionable among the new designs is a summer white palms t-shirt, depicting a tropical sunset beach seen through an outlined Madness crowned M. Very Nice. It has a very Nassau Madness Seven mode we feel.

Other New Shirts include a ringer, showing a crowned M with a laurel ring around it, and an orange Madness London Logo on grey. See below for details of the tour T-shirt which can be bought on its on separately.

The M.A.D.H.E.A.D Tour T-shirt – Get it now.

What does any self respecting Madhead wear? The only true fan clothing of choice right now is surely the brand new Madhead T-shirt. Available now at least five months ahead of the tour, this T-shirt is so NOW!

The brand new 2014 picture of all seven of the band next to their happiness machine and ready to bring joy. You can look stylish in it in a range of sizes, you can promote this summer, the forthcoming tour and help your heroes and of course in this day and age by buying the bands official clothing you are putting your money into the future new album project pot etc of the band who exist these days on their own self produced record label.

We’re very happy with this move to give out the T-shirt ahead of the tour as it makes so much sense to us. The T-shirt is relevant and current for a longer period of time for the fan.  Steer clear of knock off clothing and get the official Madhead T-shirt. Support your favourite band directly, like a true Madhead.

Available here… Via See Tickets and Madness.co.uk

http://tinyurl.com/nzy6ybm

SPECIALIZED: Mad Not Cancer. 4CD covers album for Teenage Cancer Trust – Pre-Order Now

Over 70 tracks. 4 CDs.  Cover versions of Madness by not just Ska bands but lots of young up and coming acts of many genres including a few famous pop stars and Bedders on one track, too. All for Teenage Cancer.

http://www.specialized-project.co.uk/#!shop/c1atu (remove hyphen from URL)

The Suggs Selection.

The new compilation album of tunes chosen especially by Suggs.

It features one Madness track It must be love, and one solo track – So Tired. Alongside one self produced track The Farm’s – Stepping Stone.

The rest of the 60 track 3 CD album contains his own personal music joys.

Signed copies are available from record store.

http://www.recordstore.co.uk/recordstore/Signed/The-Suggs-Selection-Signed/3C6C02BP000

LTSO, Bangarang, Featuring Dawn Penn & Sharon Shannon

Out now.

itunes  http://tinyurl.com/p2bquak

Amazon http://tinyurl.com/pwg6du2

LIVE AND INTENSIFIED

Near Jazz Experience Radio Episode

Last night’s Resonance104.4fm Clear Spot. The NJE with special guest Emma Bennett…

https://soundcloud.com/resonance-fm/20-00-00-clear-spot-jazz

Chat includes discussion about art school influence on music.

The LTSO at The Wickerman Festival

Well what can I say ! This was my first time at Wickerman and the first time I’d seen LTSO, and so near to where I live, made possible by Darren Fordham (Thanks again). I took my eldest daughter Nikki with me.

When we got in we were given VIP wristbands which let us into the VIP tent where we met Keith Allen who was really nice. Later on as it was getting dark we headed for the Scooter Tent where LTSO were the headline band. We got right to the front in the middle and waited patiently for the band to come on. As they were setting up the tent began to fill up and it was nice to see some young kids at the front.

They were pipped on to the stage at about 10.15 to a rousing reception, which was nice. Lee was dressed in a binbag, 2 pair of glasses, binbags wrapped round his legs and a set of silver teeth. Mad!!!!!!.The rest of the band were all smartly dressed and ready to go.

They kicked off with Guns Fever and went on to play an wonderful set There was a false start to one of the songs, it may have been Ali Baba(old age is catching up). Enjoyed the 2 newer songs Tunnel One and in the encore Cry to Me. The highlight for me was hearing No No No. Superb. Darren makes an ideal foil for Lee’s well, em, nuttyness. Nice voice and nice moves.

Between songs there was a shout for Night Boat and later on One Step Beyond which Lee jokingly said F#*k off a few times and asked for the bloke that shouted it to be removed from the tent.

Forgive me for not providing a set list.

The show finished at about 11.30 and what a show it was. My daughter Nikki danced away as did I. We both had a great day, great atmosphere, great full stop.

Everyone made their way over to see the burning of the Wickerman.

A perfect end to a perfect day.

As we say here “Haste Ye Back” Lee and the boys.

Stephen Sturrock

Reggae Sun Ska Splash set list

Night Boat To Cairo

Embarrassment

The Prince

NW5

My Girl

My Girl II

Take it Or Leave it

Dust Devil

Iron Shirt

Shame and Scandal

Bed and breakfast man

House Of Fun

Baggy Trousers

Our House

It Must be Love

One Step Beyond

Madness

(The sun and the rain/Shut up  was dropped from the list)

Jean Peirre Boutellier/French MIS

TWEETS OF A DOVE

Various posts from Facebook and Twitter that have caught our eye over the past week or so.

Chrissy Boy @CBoyForeman

“Here’s a card: 38d.gs/beescard. Now please do all you can do protect our precious #bees.

CBeeForeman”

Mark Bedford @I_be_MarkB

“On the way home I, once again, saw the Tambourine busker. No songs; no singing. Just rattling tambourine. Melancholy but utterly compelling.Bass-tastic!”

“During my post-gig morning stroll, managed to take two different tourist pics for two different people. Young Japanese guy who looked whistfully into the distance. Next  a pose sitting on a monument. Then an athlete running passed two different landmarks. Pressure!”

SPECIALIZED 3 – MAD NOT CANCER – A REVIEW

So to set the scene: It’s Monday evening about 9pm, I’m sat in a restaurant in Central London keeping two colleagues, who are over from the States, company, when I get a Facebook instant message from Willo that includes a link to download a copy of Specialized 3 – Mad Not Cancer for review purposes. After a few quick calculations in my head, I reckon with luck and a following wind I can be home by 1030pm to download it and have a listen to at least some of it before bed time, as well as set it up on my iPod for my commute on Tuesday. Needless to say I made my excuses and left, with two somewhat confused Americans trailing in my wake after I’d explained I had to get home to download some Madness covers!!

The journey home was mercifully uneventful, save for the rising anticipation at the thought of actually getting to hear the album I’d been looking forward to hearing since it was announced that Madness were to be this years recipients of the Specialized treatment, and which I’d leant a minor assistance to by sending countless Tweets from the Specialized Twitter account (@specializeduk1).

Now I don’t know how many of you have ever sat and watched the download bar on approximately 500Mb of data coming in, but let me tell you it takes forever, or at least seems to when you desperately want it to be done quickly!! Finally, the download completed and a few mouse clicks later I was ready for a listen – trouble then was, with 74 tracks to listen to, some of which I’d already heard the full version of, some of which a snippet had been heard via the samplers, and others not at all, which to listen to first? In the end I took a leaf out of Julie Andrews’ book and started at the very beginning, which is a very good place to start apparently!!

The album kicks off in fine style with five blistering tracks – King Hammond leads the way with his very own take on Bed & Breakfast Man, which then makes way for Rude Boy George’s pimped up version of Driving In My Car, LTSO’s very own Darren “Fordie” Fordham then treats us to an almost jazzy Burning The Boats, before Matt Neil (assisted by The Specials’ very own Horace Panter) puts some Mod swagger into My Girl 2,  a nicely skanked up version of You’ll Lose A Good Thing by The Originals (a loose collective of original ska artists) kicks in, and so the album continues, with surprises at every corner. Some of the tracks will be instantly recognisable for what they are, others have you trying to work out what the track is until a familiar hook or lyric kicks in. I’m not going to review individual tracks within this piece, as it wouldn’t do them justice and would make for a very long article which would have you reaching for the delete button, however do keep an eye out for individual track reviews over the coming issues of MIS (and in fact that have appeared in the last two issues also).

Two things I love about the Specialized project (aside of course from the fantastic work it does to raise money for Teenage Cancer Trust) is firstly that the songs, chosen by the numerous artists who throw their support behind the project, aren’t always the obvious ones, and secondly the diversity of genres that are represented. In other words, it’s not just about recreating the Greatest Hits in a “ska/Two Tone/nutty” style. On Specialized 3 – Mad Not Cancer you have tracks from every Madness album covered, and whilst there are covers of One Step Beyond, Night Boat To Cairo, House Of Fun, Shut Up and most of the rest of the singles, for every one of those there is a Burning The Boats, Sarah’s Song, 1978 or Crying Shame – so something to satisfy both the fans that tend to sway towards the Greatest Hits, as well as the purists amongst us who know every album track and B-side inside out and backwards!! In terms of styles, you have everything from straight covers of the original, to Folk, to Soul Diva-esque vocals, to Heavy Rock and Chap Hop (check the excellent E.R.N.I.E by Mr B whose “Genre” in iTunes I stole that from!!). So you get to hear songs you know and love performed in a way you would never have expected. Never thought I’d hear myself say I like a heavy rock cover of a Madness song, but The Servers’ cover of “Lovestruck” has had me saying exactly that and more!!

There are too many stand out tracks to mention them all here, and at a whopping 4 hours or so running time, there really is something for everyone in this album – each and every artist is to be congratulated for the time and effort they have put into making Specialized 3 – Mad Not Cancer what it is.  The production quality is superb, the artwork ingenious. If you’ve not ordered it already and want the hard copy CD version then I suggest you head here fast: http://www.specialized-project.co.uk/#!shop/c1atu (remove the hyphen from URL) as this has been the biggest pre-order run of any of the Specialized projects and copies are selling like hot cakes. So to those of you that have pre-ordered, thank you, each and every penny counts and goes to a fantastic cause. To Paul “Willo” Williams, I salute you Sir, what you have achieved over the past three years is to be applauded and treated with the utmost respect. To those of you who’ve yet to buy the album – you really don’t know what you’re going to be missing come August 6th when it’s released!!

Graham Yates

I REMEMBER WAY BACK WHEN

This week, MIS co-editor Rob Hazelby, goes back in time to report on what was going on in the world of Madness 5 years, 10 and 15 years ago this week.

5 years ago…

Issue 535 – Sunday 2nd August – Saturday 8th  August 2009

The issue got underway with the news that the band has recently appeared on ITV’s daytime breakfast show, GMTV for a performance of new single, Sugar and Spice and a brief interview on the GMTV sofa. The band were missing Carl, who was apparently was in Ibiza.

The boys talked about the filming of the video for the new single, which was completed the previous day.  They answered questions on the new album, Madstock and their fans and Lee revealed that his two grandchildren appeared in the new video.

Moving on, and digitalspy reported that Suggs’ daughters were close to signing their very own record deal. According to the web site the duo were planning to start their own pop careers.

Suggs commented “They’re on the verge of getting a record deal. They’re starting to take it seriously and are getting some notice. They had a song in the film Adulthood.”

In our big gig review of the issue subscriber Stuart Wright gave us a detailed write-up of the recent Los Palmas 6 gig at the Splash FM Festival, held on the 25th of July.

Stuart finished his review by telling us; “If you’re looking for an instant Madness fix while the real deal are resting, then check out the LP6 gig guide and get yerself down to see em if they’re in your neck of the woods. A truly tasty outfit who give their all.”

Bargain news now, and for those who had yet to splash out on the Liberty of Norton Folgate album, iTunes were selling it for a mere £4.49! It had the 15 tracks from the standard release of the album, plus a bonus of the Radio Edit of Dust Devil and ‘Suggs and Bedders track by track’ weighing in at 13 minutes 45.

On to Blackpool news, and we reported that Madness would be switching the lights on at this year’s Blackpool Illuminations, which this year would take place on Friday 4th September. The gig was open to all, but on a strictly first come, first served basis.

Suggs news now, and this week we learned that our favourite frontman was set to take over Digital Radio station 6 Music for a month of Sundays from the 2nd of August.

Suggs said: “The holidays are upon us and I’m coming to 6 Music to bring listeners the summer that hasn’t really happened yet…”

Following this, we passed the MIS baton over to Paul Rodgers for yet another one of his legendary Chart Lowdowns. This week Paul covered chart info for Norton Folgate, which was still suffering chart-wise, due to the fact that a massive 9 Michael Jackson albums were also riding high in the charts following his recent passing.

We brought this issue to a close with a selection of photo and video links provided by fans who recently attended the Madstock 5 concert.

10 years ago…

Issue number 273 – Sunday 1st August – Saturday 7th August 2004

With the MIS list server still experiencing problems, the only way for the majority of subscribers to get hold of this issue was to download it from the MIS web site.

At the time the MIS list server was located in Canada, and although we’d been trying to contact the server maintainer we were still waiting to hear back.

With the technical info out of the way, we started off the articles with an article from subscriber Andy Thomas, who had been to see tribute band ‘One Step Below’ a week or so back, and had contacted us with a full lowdown of proceedings.

Next-up, we had news in from the official Madness web site revealing that the Our House musical would appear on DVD later in the year, and was now available to purchase from the now defunct Woolworths web site.

Moving on, and co-maintainer Jon Young regaled us with a detailed write-up of his recent visit to The Dublin Castle, and the latest performance of The Dangermen, which saw Jon rush straight from work to get down there in time. So much of a rush, that Jon actually turned up to the gig in his work clothing. Now that’s dedication for you!

The full set list for the night (possibly not in this order!) was:

Dangermen

It Mek

Shame & Scandal

Girl

Keep Me Hanging on

Skylarking

Taller Than You

Lose a Good Thing

Wonderful World Beautiful People

The Prince

So Much Trouble

Israelites

John Jones

Iron Shirt

Dreader Than Dread

Madness

Pappas Got a brand new Pig Bag

The gig may have been over, but Jon still had more rushing around to come;

“Nearing midnight the reality of having to be at work for 8am ( & north of London) hits me. I crash at the Camden Lock Hotel but only for 5 hours.

Then it was the cold light of day and the tube at 5am. Finally making it to work for 9am with yesterday’s paint barely dry on the walls.

Office boredom is no longer a problem though as I still had trumpet sounds happily ringing in my brain”.

Elsewhere in the issue we had news in from Andy Thomas, who reported that a Christmas tour was looking likely. How did he know? It turned out that a friend of his had been booked to work at The Cardiff International Arena on the 18th of December, as Madness would be playing there.

Keen to get Crunch! back together for another live performance, fans Becky Lane and Graham Hewson started to look into a way of getting them on stage for one night only. After working things out, it was decided that they would need 100 fans paying a very reasonable fiver.

Not only would they get Crunch!, but support would come from the one and only MOT.

Before Bex and Graham continued to push this forward they wanted your thoughts and opinions to see if this was worth investigating.

We finished off this week’s issue with a heads-up of MOT’s next gig, which was due to take place at The Underworld, Camden Town, on Friday the 14th of August.

15 years ago…

Issue number 11 – Sunday 1st August – Saturday 7th August 1999

It’d been a fortnight since `Lovestruck` hit the UK music stores, and this week saw Madness fans from further afield pick up their copies (albeit on import) and justifiably praise or criticise the new Madness single. The general opinion seemed to be continuing, that this was one great track which boded well for the forthcoming album which had a pencilled-in release date of October 11th.

Still on the subject of `Lovestruck`, it seemed the expected climb from the previous week’s position of number 10 was not to be. Just before this issue went to press, Simon Roberts of `Not The Madness Mailing List` website reported that the single has dropped to number 20.

This was still a highly commendable chart position, and we felt that the band should be congratulated for making such an impact on today’s largely un-interesting charts.

News in from Madness fan Alan Redpath revealed that his web site had just been updated, and now spanned a staggering 664 pages of Madness related material! (I believe that much of the material from the In Print sections have since been absorbed into the Madness Central web site).

Moving on, and a posting from music365.com announced that Madness had just announced their UK tour dates for December 1999. Announced dates were as follows:

Cardiff International Arena (December 15), Brighton Centre (16), Bournemouth (17), Manchester Evening News Arena (18), Birmingham N.E.C (19), Newcastle Arena (20) and London Wembley Arena (22 & 23).

With the album due for release in October, this tour would be the first place that many people would hear the new songs played live.

We finished off this week’s issue with a post from subscriber Elizabeth Raskin, who had kindly put herself forward to help Stateside Maddies get hold of recordings of VH1’s Madness Day. With 4 hours of PAL to NTSC conversion and two tapes per order, it would set US fans back a very reasonable (considering the work required!) $12, with postage and packing taking it up to $16.

The post from Elizabeth announced the deadline for American Madness fans to get their orders in. Once the deadline was up, the orders would go in.

Rob Hazelby

SPECIALIZED 3 MAD NOT CANCER SONG REVIEWS

Graham Yates returns with a mass of track reviews from the Specialized 3, Mad Not Cancer album.

Rude Boy George – Driving In My Car

Those Madness fans that know me will know the original is one that I’ll generally skip if ever it comes on, or will use as an excuse to go to the bar, or visit the loo when it’s played live – have always found it to be a bit too nursery rhyme compared to the rest of the Madness catalogue. So when I heard that it was going to be covered for Specialized 3 – Mad Not Cancer it wasn’t one of the tracks I necessarily looked forward to hearing. Well now I’ve heard it I’ve had to adjust how I feel about that!! Rude Boy George hail from New York City and are known for their ska, rocksteady, and reggae covers of New Wave classics. Bassist Marc Wasserman is probably best known to most fans as ska blogger extraordinaire Marco On The Bass. The band’s cover of Driving In My Car starts to a background of traffic noise with a neat guitar riff plucked over it before the vocal kicks in. The track immediately transports you to the band’s home town of New York (or perhaps that should be Noo Yoick!!) and images of yellow taxis and tall buildings. It’s a lazy comparison to make but there are traces of Gwen Stefani in singer Megg Howe’s vocal, ably assisted by Steve Shafer on backing vocals. The song rhythmically takes on a new life from the original, and stomps it’s way through to a final crescendo ending. For me this is one edition of Pimp My Ride  that has been a success!!

Darren “Fordie” Fordham & UpforitNess – Burning The Boats

This is the third track on the album, and the first of two covers of Burning The Boats that appear (both of them different from each other – more of the version by Indeed from France in another edition). Fordie is probably best known to most fans as backing singer, dancer and percussionist with The Lee Thompson Ska Orchestra, and he’s borrowed a number of members from that band to accompany him here. Burning The Boats, with it’s subtext of protest against Government cut backs and sell offs in the 80’s is one of my favourite Madness songs, so I was looking forward to hearing what Fordie (and indeed Indeed!!) had done to it and I can honestly say I’ve not been disappointed on either count. Fordie and the band deliver a mellowed down version of the original with a real jazz vibe that invokes visions of smoky clubs of that ilk. The vocal is pitched just right, the melody drifts lazily along with some nice keys and a beautiful trumpet solo mid-track, and the tricky “megaphone” verse is handled neatly while the outro is a continual repeat to fade of the chorus accompanied by some soft brass, drums and keys. Round of applause for Mr Fordham and team!!

Matt Neal ft.Horace Panter – My Girl 2

Matt Neal is the former lead singer of This Modern Youth, and Horace Panter is of course known to everyone as a wonderful and gifted artist (as well as having a part-time role as the bassist with The Specials!!) – seriously though, the match is perfect as between them and the backing band, Matt and Horace deliver a cover of My Girl 2 (with its original’s roots firmly in the Motown camp) that is infused with a Mod swagger that the Modfather himself Paul Weller would be proud of. The song kicks off with a bass riff that actually reminds me of the start of These Boots Are Made For Walking for some reason, and then bursts into life with the vocal and an impeccable sound from the backing band (who I sadly can’t namecheck here aside from The Specials bassman!!) that compliments the vocal perfectly. Another winner that helps set the tone for the remaining 70 tracks on the album.

The Servers – Lovestruck

And so from Mod the obvious next stop is Rockers – and these ones come in the shape of The Servers from South Yorkshire. Now, when I heard a few months back that 1999’s first new single from Madness in over a decade was to be done as a Heavy Rock/Metal song for Specialized 3 – Mad Not Cancer, I was somewhat intrigued as to how that would work given Madness’ roots in a somewhat different genre; couple that with the fact I’m not a huge fan of heavy rock music, and I wasn’t sure what to make of it. That said one of the things I love about Specialized is that it doesn’t conform to one particular genre and is open to all comers, regardless of their musical “type”. Well having heard The Servers cover four times now, all I can say is wow!! It’s one of the stand out tracks on the album, and has proved my fears for the tale of late night drunken treks across London as being totally unwarranted. The Servers’ cover grabs you from the first chord and doesn’t let go until the last. There are touches of Foo Fighters and Biffy Clyro in there, and those are two bands I bet you thought you’d never hear mentioned in a review of a cover of a Madness song!! The onslaught of guitars is relentless and drives the song from start to finish, the vocal is everything you’d expect from a rock cover and the whole may well have just opened my eyes to a genre of music I’ve usually steered clear of!!

Billy Brown – Blue Skinned Beast

As I’ve mentioned above, one of the joys of Specialized is the diversity of styles across the albums and here we take another turn – this time towards acoustic Folk. Billy has taken the original, with it’s reference to cadavas used for bodies during the Falklands War (or as a reference to Maggie Thatcher’s depending on which version of the song’s meaning you prefer!!), stripped it down completely to just a guitar and vocal so it becomes a classic storyteller style folk song. It works beautifully, the result is both stunning and haunting and would be the perfect soundtrack to any protest video from the various conflicts that continue to rage around the world today. Billy’s plaintiff call for “three cheers to the Blue Skinned Beast” is both moving and thought provoking at the same time and coupled with a simple melody picked out on his guitar works perfectly.

Parallax Faction – Land Of Hope & Glory

Parallax Faction hail from Glasgow, and are one of many bands from Scotland who have given the “Yes” vote to Specialized 3 – Mad Not Cancer!! They describe themselves as having a wide range of influences including Electronic, Punk and Post-Punk, and also Prog. Which led to the definition ‘Electro Prog Punk.’!! Here they deliver a sinister (but excellent!!) cover of the Lee Thompson penned tale of life, in what would now be called a Young Offenders Institute but is known to most of us as Borstal. The song kicks off in traditional form with the drum intro, but then takes another direction from the original with a dark and brooding bass beat before singer Ani kicks in with the familiar roll call – the song is then driven by the lead guitar, while the vocals interplay between various band members. There is one moment of lightness which is the “As the evening drags on you can watch a bit of telly…” refrain which is delivered almost acapella, before guitar and drums spring to life again to take the song to a repeat to fade “dream of how life could have been” line.

Sumudu – Sarah’s Song

This song, specially written for “Our House: The Musical”, is one that falls into the sub-category of Madness’ songs that can be described as beautiful – and that is exactly what Sumudu delivers – a thing of beauty!! The song is performed with just a piano for accompaniment and starts off with a lulled vocal that sounds almost angelic, and moves effortlessly into the song proper.  Sumudu’s voice is pitched perfectly drawing you in to want to hear more, almost like a Siren’s call, and holds you there to the very last note. I’ve always thought this song was best when performed by a female vocal (after all it was written for a female part in the musical) and Sumudu more than adequately proves that point here.

Mr B – The Gentleman Rhymer – E.R.N.I.E.

The “genre” in iTunes labels this track as “Chap Hop” and having listened to the track, it’s the perfect description, but how to describe it in words?!! Fortunately a quick Google comes to my rescue in the form of Mr. B’s Wikipedia page which describes the style as “hip-hop delivered in a Received Pronunciation accent”, and that is exactly what it is!! For those of you unsure as to what Received Pronunciation is, it’s that plum in the mouth accent much favoured by the BBC for it’s presenters until the 70s. This vocal is set to a backing track that’s not unlike the theme to Inspector Gadget, and you know what? It’s eccentrically brilliant!! What you end up with is a familiar track in a totally different style, that conjures perfectly images of this wonderous Caractacus Potts type machine that is going to change our lives forever.

Sarah Graham – Shadow Of Fear

The original version of this is fast paced and drives up the tension of someone’s paranoia at a rate of knots – Australian Sarah Graham takes things in the opposite direction, slows the song right down, and adds a Soul diva-esque vocal that is sublime. With just an acoustic guitar for company, it’s the vocal that really carries the song right to the closing door sound effect that ends it. It’s delivered in a style that wouldn’t be out of place in the smoky jazz club that I had Fordie sat in earlier, and for me is yet another highlight in an album full of highlights.

Kingsize – (Waiting For) The Ghost Train

Kingsize, from Leicester, boast a sizeable brass section (including Jon Read who has in recent years been The Specials’ trumpet player) – so it’s no surprise that this cover is very much brass driven and boy does it drive! Madness’ last single of the 80’s gets a Latin overhaul, and goes Bossa Nova in some style which wouldn’t see it out of place in many a ballroom or Salsa class. The brass as you’d expect is exemplary and swirls and builds into the consciousness to such an extent that I had to stop and think how the original went and where there was brass on it. Perfect, summery, feel good music, that’s just made for putting the top down and turning the volume up high!!

The Humanitarians – Grey Day

The Humanitarians, from Devon, are another band to have turned the guitars up to maximum throttle on their cover, and to great effect too. What they’ve ended up with here is a guitar and drum driven track that actually bears comparison to something like Funeral Pyre by The Jam in places, coupled in with some heavier rock, all of which perfectly underpins singer John Matthew’s unpretentious vocal. Add in just the right hint of trombone from Rich Mills and you have a very solid cover that treats the original with respect, whilst giving it a slightly different perspective and direction.

The Iconics – You Said

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, across Specialized 3 – Mad Not Cancer, you find bands that have gone for a radically different version of the original, others who’ve done pretty much a straight cover with perhaps a few little tweaks in between, and then those that fall somewhere in between the two. Well long time Specialized supporters The Iconics (who’ve raised thousands in their collecting buckets at gigs) fall into the latter category. They’ve gone for pretty much a straight cover of the Absolutely album track, but have given it a change of context from the original’s tale of teenage love gone wrong, by adding a final verse that flips the tone of the song completely and turning it into a tale of a marriage on the verge of complete meltdown and lack of understanding on both parts. It works brilliantly and certainly relates to my own personal experiences of having been in that situation, and am sure I’ll not be alone!!

Ed Rome – The Prince

Ed Rome provided one of the highlights of Specialized 2 – Beat Cancer with his cover of The Beat’s “I Confess” and he well and truly delivers again here with his cover of Madness’ debut single. Bella Edmunds once again lends her distinctive vocal to the track, which has more of a ska feel than the original, the backbeat being very much to the fore. The track is driven by Bella’s voice and the keyboards, with all other instruments being toned down a little whilst still adding to the overall feel of the track, which ends up very much as an old school ska song that may well have stepped right off of Orange Street!

The Simmertones – Drip Fed Fred

I hesitated to review this one, as it’s a well known fact that I’m a big fan of The Simmertones, and their bright and brassy summery ska, so didn’t want to come across as having a biased opinion – but here goes. The band have gone for pretty much a straight cover of the original with their excellent brass section giving an understated performance that compliments the keyboards perfectly. What really comes to the fore here though is just how much fun the band had recording the track, including hamming it up completely with Mockney accents for the various vocal parts, you can even hear lead singer Glyn Wilcox laugh into the vocal at one point. Another good solid performance from The Simmertones that screams fun from start to finish.

Graham Yates

MIS FEATURE –  MAD NOT CANCER – SHUT UP, FIRST LISTEN AND DANCE

It’s rather like getting a brilliant chocolate box (but for your ears). Opening it up. Scoffing a variety of delights and then realising there is a another couple of layers in the box.  4CD’s 74 tracks, All Madness reworked. As I begin a few weeks writing on this album, with just those ones that hit me right in the musical adoration spot straight away, it would be this top 10 i’m instantly in love with like green triangles. (With a handful of cameral barrels noted that i’m gravitating closely too also, on a just a first listen through to the full album in preview.)

1.  Sumudu – Sarah’s Song

The sweet jazz of a talented pianist vocalist, takes the our house musical’s female lead take on the bittersweet baby loss love song, (and sequel to Embarrassment), to definitive new heights that excels it beyond the band and into the soul deep sighs of true parentally pathos. Sublime. Play. Repeat.  Back in my ears again, and again.

2.  Servers  – Lovestruck

Balls out drinking song get’s the iron maiden, yes you F**king well can play with Madness, Treatment.

(devil horns fingers sign)

3.  Auto – Prospects

Brilliant Madness track, would be so easy to ruin then, so how the hell did a bit of FX dub reggae treatment not crush it’s delicate beauty, but instead add on a pop sensibility and variety to the arrangement that works so well. Genius.

4.  Swagga – Dont Quote Me On That

Boldly chuck out the baby and the bath water, but keep some of the central concept, title, and fried slice catchphrase. Invent a new song, yet sax, piano and vibe still capture something of an east end parent band vibe, and then modern comedic rap slap the media. A missing theme tune to 80’s sitcom Hot Metal, Surely. It swagga’s all the way to the same café and takes the next seat along to a classic nutty all day breakfast menu.

5.  Martin Black –  The Wizard

Pearl Jam like vocal solo guitar magic.  Wonderful strummed simple and spell binding.

6.  The Iconics – You said

Almost seems to be going down the too similar route, that cover versions should avoid, in sounding like The Absolutely album did, until after the duration of the original is nearly over. Then in jumps an entirely new set of talked “you said sayings”, turning up spoken like in parklife style meets missing andy’s powerful speech trick, adding humorous and bitter effect, giving a justified last word. Seemless modernising, within the genre sound. Well said.

7.  Spahni Dub Dancers Ft.Dennis Bovell  – Death of a Rude Boy

Carl’s most recent penned track, death of a rude boy, involved dub dredd reggae inspirations and even a passioned rap, stretching Madness sound to one side of their song playing range. That this version has The Dangermen sessions producer Dennis Bovell’s deeper tones on the rap and a dub band more centrally used to the genre this was written in is a boon. Here it finds a groove befitting of its thrust.

8.  Indeed (France)  – Burning The Boats

Returning Champions from the last Madness covers’ album, bring beauty and light piano sounds once again, this time to work an obscure end of 80s career album track .  Added thoughts have taken place after the Butlins Live Arrangement last House of Fun weekend, which now brings a woozy synth addition to the vocals, and light key pushes known to be the sound of Indeed, the seaside towns and lighthouses therefore breezily rush past cinematically , just in time for the ever flowing Thames to be alight once again to scrutiny of phone tap tap taping after all.  These questions still burn. This is the new soundtrack.

9.  The Values (ft.Neil Innes & Bedders) –  Madness ( Unlimited Mix )

Light but just the pure joy of a Madness Man, united with a Rutle Monty Python Man, within this band, the blessing can be heard all the way back to the bonzo dog do dah band black and white days.  Star Quality, If you are a fan. I mean even if you only like the raggy dolls theme tune before now!

10. Ska’Lett – Crying Shame

The youth of a young Hollie Cooke – Ami Winehouse neighbouring sassy character sticks her flag in a much beloved B side, and gives it a sweet kiss of life, imagine this the female reply version of the original bloke singing about the heartache, and the hurt of such a split deepens. Vibe and voice. Destined for radio play.

Those are my Loopers so far. I adore playing over and over. I’m smitten. Depsite not yet hearing all the album in full to do it all justice, only a bit of most tracks, or full tracks some only once, as I dip through and check out the contents list of this delightful sweet box.  Closely following into this top table of my own choices (and do buy this and send us yours), are Erin Bardwell Collective – Wings of a Dove, strips gospel back to island reggae and loses none of the sing-a-long  ability whilst pacing down to a lilt advert beats per minute.  The Resonations  – 1978  matches Ska’letts youth and approach above, it’s a joy to hear such a new song covered too however straight this is done.  Sarah Graham – Shadow Of Fear – Is Worthily spooky.  The Bighead  – Embarrasssment – twisted alteration of a classic isn’t embarrassing at all.  While of the most more pedestrian or straight ska covers, i like the subtle twists, and accent moods of Big Fats Domino Panda  – Johnny The Horse and Esperanza – On The Town, like a changed setting of towns for a known song.

There are friends bands, I will have more to say on soon too, Darren Fordham’s Upforitness Swing, and The Inflatables Bounce on Believe me,  through to Irish tempo changing Rise and Falls from The Service, and onto French tiptoes from Mad Iky’s French Boutik.  Judge Fredd’s second appearance has to take the obscurity chocolate award though, like finding a pomegranate truffle in the box unlisted. Thierry Arnold ft. Judge Fredd ( France ) – Patience takes a hardly heard b side from a spin off The Madnes and researches unreleased bootleg leaked tapes to add back the vocal try outs originally rejected, whilst turning the music to electronic minimalist robotic programming. The very definition of obscure approach

Unless it’s topped by The powerful, heartfelt pronounced, terrible, performance art. ( So has to be heard once to be believed), of Porky Poet (Phil Jupitus) Ft. Terry Edwards – Keep Moving.

I’m full. I cant take it all in, in one sitting. I’ll be back for seconds soon.

Mad not cancer is shipping from this Wednesday. (Or when the postman can carry them all)

Jonathan young

HELP PROMOTE MADCHAT AND WIN PRIZES

That’s just about it for this week’s issue of the MIS.

Here’s your chance to do your bit & promote the Madness Community at Mad Chat & win some great prizes

The prizes are as follows :

1 x Madness Artwork by Katarzyna Rolbiecka

1 x Madness Embarrassment T-Shirt (Size XL)

10 x SUGGS ‘That Close Ltd Edition Bookmarks

How to enter –

Step 1. Click ‘Like & Share’ on this image –http://on.fb.me/1kqqJmT orhttp://on.fb.me/1pvOfhl (MAD CHAT Wants You)

Step 2. Choose which top prize you would like to be entered for by posting below –

Baggy Trousers = Madness Artwork

Dirty Shirt = Embarrassment T-Shirt

All members that participate will automatically be entered into a random draw for the 10 x Limited Edition SUGGS ‘That Close’ bookmarks produced by book publisher Quercus.

Members can enter on a daily basis to increase your chances of winning by completing the tasks set out in Step 1 & Step 2.

All winners profiles will be verified to ensure all tasks have been fulfilled having liked & shared the image ‘MAD CHAT Wants You’.

Good Luck & Get Sharing !!

(Promo Ends Sept 1st)

Mad Chat Group Admin.

www.madchat.co.uk

TIME…

That’s just about it for this week’s issue of the MIS.

With Jonathan attending tonight’s Crunch! gig next weekend’s bulletin will no doubt contain a lengthy and detailed lowdown of just what went on. If you also attended the gig then please send in your thoughts as we’d love to print them.

Also, don’t forget that the Mad Not Cancer album is released this coming Wednesday (6th Aug), so check out http://www.specialized-project.co.uk/ (remove hyphen from URL) and get your copy ordered.

As always, if you have anything you feel would be of interest to the rest of the MIS readership, please send it in and we’ll include it in a subsequent issue.

Until next week, thanks for reading,

Jon Young, Rob Hazelby, Simon Roberts, Paul Williams

(With thanks to Graham Yates, Stephen Sturrock,
Jean Pierre Boutellier/French MIS)