Dick And Jane Eat God

This "Blue Piano"

Cemental Health Records EEG11

STEPHEN LAMONT: guitar, vocals, V-flat  harmonica
KEN ASHDOWN: bass guitar, backing vocals, percussion
COLIN CAHILL: drums
with Ian Shuttleworth: synthesizer on Arriving At The Bridge and City Of Tears

Recorded at Duffy’s Tavern/Radio Free Botswana, 
August 1983.  Originally released in North America on 
Waste Island Records WASTE 001.
Bonus tracks recorded 1983–1985.  (Post-Modern Love S.L. solo.)
Bonus versions of I Before E and Summertime originally released on 
The John The Baptist EP, Waste Island Records WASTE 002.

All songs written by Stephen Lamont, except 
Breakfast In Bed, October, Chivalry, Watching Lamont/Ashdown; 
Refuge In The Sun Lamont/Rapagna; Acute Myopia Cahill. 
© control through PRO-Canada.
Produced by This “Blue Piano”.
Red Capital Letters and bonus version of City Of Tears restored by Ken Ashdown, 2003 for the Komrad Communications release Only The Good Live On.
All tracks digitally remastered October 2004.

This title (P) 1983, 2004 Cemental Health Records.

NOTES BY STEPHEN LAMONT:
This, TBP’s first album proper (the title, roughly translated, means “our first album”),  contains only 11 songs out of our vast repertoire (of 25).  Mark E. Smith of The Fall once said, “The conventional is now experimental”; I haven’t a clue what he was going on about at the time, but it will serve as an excuse for our being on Cemental Health Records.  Anyway, art is about life and life is about 2’57”, right?
 
 

TRACK LISTING

ORIGINAL
    • I Before E (3:06): The song that Mickey was trying to be.  “About a girl whose name was spelt in this way.”  (I have to wring this out of my soul, you know...)  The big single, beat your friends to it etc. etc.  I can see the day when we’ll refuse to play it.
    • Breakfast In Bed (4:34): Ah, the one only the band members like.  The ending may be a bit over the top, but I’m awfully proud of the second half of the chorus.  “About girls, and summer, and Orange Juice...”
    • Refuge In The Sun (3:20): OK, OK, maybe it does sound a bit like All My Loving.  Elizabeth Rapagna used to sing with us: a nice girl, but just a wee bit incompatible with the rest of the group.  Her words are pretty self-explanatory (unlike mine, which can only be explained by myself).  My finest guitar solo.  (“Steve Lamont is God”, anyone?)
    • Red Capital Letters (3:46): “About another girl.”  Words are a bit of a mouthful, but it was my first big lyrical breakthrough.  Not to mention my very first hook.  Great title, huh?  “Always a solid indicator of when a band’s really burning” – Dave McCullough.
    • October (3:59): The big live funk-out.  Ken wrote the words about Québec’s October Crisis of 1970 when the FLQ kidnapped two... Look, it was in all the papers.  Not, we stress not about Northern Ireland.  About 3’59”, to be exact.
    • Michael (4:07): No, not about a girl called Michael.  Or even a boy called Michael.  My theme song for 1982.  And probably every year from now on.  Took me long enough.
    • Chivalry (4:22): Lyrics made to deadline and it shows.  Very dodgy views about love & lust, now getting harder to distinguish as I leave puberty.  But a monumental riff and allis redeemed by “There are girls that I saw in films”.  (Whoever whispered “Duran Duran” at the back there, wash your mouth out with soap.)
    • Arriving At The Bridge (4:33): Originally about a drumstick, made slightly more general in application.  Covers everything from Fall members to nuclear war.  The break is my tribute to the late, lamented Edinburgh band Josef K.
    • City Of Tears (6:38): The epic.  Just never could cut out a verse.  Very superior type of tirade against unfeeling people (alright, “about another girl”).  But we’re all a bit of both victim and Übermensch, aren’t we?
    • Watching (1:59): Sorry about the harp; couldn’t resist it.  The first song Ken and I ever wrote together and by far the tightest.  His lyrics once again are perfectly self-explanatory (jammy bastard).
    • Summertime (5:08): Newest of the new.  The same girl as City... Has a look-in here, but it’s more a present-state-of-mind thang.  I guess this shows maturity and all that, but I’m still obviously a sucker for the big chorus hook, ain’t I?
 BONUS
  • Acute Myopia (3:56): Colin writes better than a drummer should, though his open chord folky style isn’t quite up my street.  This one has a lot going for it (though the bitchy lyrics aren’t really fair).
  • Henna Fire (4:52): Slow and oozy; I like it but it doesn’t make it into our 35-minute set.
  • Swinging (4:33): Real Kafkaesque dignity-in-struggle stuff.  Music not so hot, slow and melodic.
  • Post-Modern Love (4:26)
  • City Of Tears [1985 re-recording] (4:41): cut out a verse after all, didn't you, you hypocritical bastard? – Ian S.
  • I Before E [JTB version] (2:56)
  • Summertime [JTB version] (4:37)