Call it paranoia, but do you ever get those days where you're sure everybody is getting together to wind you up.

THE SOUND?!!!

Someone's pissed off. The majority of post-punk bands today are just Sound-lites. Have you got a lot of their stuff? Maybe you got the shit one they did (Thunder Up or something?).

I actually listened to the Sound a fair amount back then, but I think the first 3 Echo & the Bunnymen albums walk all over them in terms of long term relevance. Birdland was just another NME/Melody Maker flavor of the week.

I don't know how they possibly could be since I've certainly never heard of them.

Please don't go out of your way to hear them. You'll be so disappointed.

You got it.

pookie - I can remember buying some very crappy records in the 80's (frankly, I'd have to be prety pissed to admit what they were). Probably like you, I ended up being very wary of anything that Melody Maker, NME or Sounds tried to thrust my way. I was very lucky however in living in South London, so picking up records wasn't difficult for me. I can only imagine what it must have been like without a local and reliable source for records.

Although the hunting was part of the fun. And using mailorder, getting records sent all the way from AMERICA!

I remember paying £16 for Double Nickels On The Dime (in 1985! a small fortune), which was only available on import for quite some time.

And I did buy some 'second choice' records because sometimes you wanted to just pop into your local Our Price and buy a record.

We used to have an Our Pirce in Croydon that sold records by Swans, Psychic TV, Loop etc amongst all the crap. Well, Psychic TV sucked, but at least it wasn't 80's chart fodder. These days, I really don't buy much from records shops at all, preferring to use either distros or E-bay.

We had an Our Price as well, which had the odd good record to be fair, and lots more good records when I started working there. We had quite a lot of say in what we stocked.

But it was still a very limited choice you had.

swa(y) - you're right. For instance, my 'best of 1987' would be a 3-way between 'Sister', 'Locust Abortion Technician' and 'Songs About Fucking'. However, then I think about hip-hop LPs that came out then, like "Yo! Bum Rush The Show" and "Criminally Minded". Then I start remembering albums like Napalm Death's "Scum" and Loop's "Heaven's End", and then give up trying to choose a best of for that year. I know a fair few people who woiuld vote for the Smiths, Happy Mondays and a whole bunch of acid house craziness just for '87.

I like Second Layer better than The Sound.

It's easy to forget what a fantastic and utterly breathtaking album Yo! Bum Rush The Show was. Definitely my favourite of theirs; a completely unique record.

Not particularly fair to say "Psychic TV sucked" as they are so different from record to record and phase to phase that such generalities can't possibly stick. Of course the opposite extreme is somewhat true to - you can't say "Psychic TV ruled" either because they attached their name to some not so memorable acid house one offs, but that was after the '80s.

Dreams Less Sweet, however, is a fucking brilliant piece of avant pop-culture folk that honestly stands among some of the best records ever made in my opinion. From the '60sish folk rock of "White Nights" to the scratching noises from a coffin that record really is an accomplishment that measures up to Genesis' best moments with TG. On another extreme "At the Berlin Wall" is a great live set of brutal rock satire that mocks (and at the same time pays tribute to) everyone from The Velvet Underground to De La Soul.

Oh, I get the joke. Birdland weren't good enough to last more than a few seasons, let alone influence other bands. Unless we're thinking about The Horrors, of course.