shut up and listen

A novel way to start a rock song – the first eight bars have a distant sound. After a strange tape starting sound, there’s a shouted but very distant count in and then the electric guitar riff starts. It is so ‘far away’ sounding it is almost sounds like a bad recording. Then the glockenspiel comes in, all up front and sparkling, with some percussion hits and then the pounding toms with big reverb making them sound distant – all reminiscent of the ‘underground carpark’ sound of the Stone Roses – see my I Wanna Be Adored post.

A spoken word introduction and then the bass and drums kick in and everything switches to an upfront, clear and present sound. The lead guitar is slightly to the left and the drums are slightly to the right. Vocals and bass dead centre.

The lead vocal has a little reverb on it – you can hear it on the sibilant words. The chorus vocal is doubled, as is the end of the first verse ‘Oh why?’

There’s definitely a second electric guitar part in there but it is so well mixed with the lead guitar it is hard to differentiate at times.

There’s an acoustic guitar panned hard left that appears in the middle section. The middle section features sound effects – bicycle wheels spinning with cutlery in the spokes, glass bottles bouncing and breaking. Some of these sound effects return for the final section. There is a big reverb on the lead vocal for this part and the final part of the middle section vocal is layered and reverbed to drift off. The chiming electric guitar, reverbed vocal and sound effects make for a very atmospheric sound for this part and breaks the song nicely, leading to the return of the riff for the big climax.

There is a strange synth sound that throbs in the final section and is very noticeable as the final sound in the short fade out. (It is actually there in the very first distant 8 bars …)

Overall a very involved production with a lot added to the simple guitar/bass/drums/vocal line up of the band. The glockenspiel in particular is a major part of this production. It is still totally reliant on the guitar riff, the forceful drumming and the pleading vocal but the distant sound at the start, which emphasises the entry of the full band, and the glock and sound effects throughout add so much interest and colour to the song. When played live this song has none of those details mentioned above. It still works but it relies totally on force. This recording has more light and shade and even delicacy – who would’ve thought of adding a glockenspiel to such a violent post-punk riff?