I wanted to do My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts, but I’m not sure if that’s available on any streaming sites, and then I thought about Will I Ever Be Inside Of You by Paul Quinn and the Independent Group, but I don’t think that’s anywhere online either, but I think this sits somewhere between the two, in a way. You can certainly hear an awful lot of what was to follow throughout the 1980s on both sides of the Atlantic and obviously you can hear plenty that had happened before (the Velvet Underground and Eno most notably, I think).
The Feelies were from New Jersey (I say ‘were’, I think they still exist), based in Hoboken, just across the water from Manhattan. They were around in 1976, played CBGB and all of that stuff, so were right there in the middle of that New York punk scene, which I love. But similar to Subway Sect over here, they never managed to get a record out during that initial burst and by the time this debut came out (1980), their sound had matured and taken on other influences. There’s a real cleanness and sharpness to the production. Their first singles and this album came out on Rough Trade and Stiff, so they were given quite a push over here, which is where I think the Scottish link comes in (ie you can draw a line from Byrne and Eno to Paul Quinn). A band like Josef K, always influenced by New York, must have been listening in. The Feelies singer Glenn Mercer really sounds like Paul Haigh in places, especially on Loveless Love, which is very, very Josef K. And you can hear an influence on a guitarist like Malcolm Ross, who then went on from JK to Orange Juice…
They were also clearly a big influence on REM and a lot of the US “college” bands. But I think that overlooks the way that they use rhythm, especially on this album, it feels very downtown New York, a bit Liquid Liquid, maybe even the Contortions and ZE Records, again stuff that I really love. It’s really interesting how they use that Velvets drone/rhythm guitar style (Forces At Work is very Velvets), they must have been fucking brilliant live around this time.
Good preppy look too, very Marie et Les Garcons/Talking Heads. Plus the album doesn’t hang around, I think there are extended versions kicking around now, but the original was only 30 minutes or so.