"The North Sea Scrolls" (2012)

If you have been paying close attention to my writings then you will know all about this already. It is a collaboration between musical superstars Cathal Coughlan and Luke Haines and Australian writer Andrew Mueller. It purports to describe the contents of the eponymous scrolls, documents found in a house in England that reveal the true history of that country during its period of foreign occupation. The album has two discs, but is not a double album. On one disc, each song is preceded by a discussion by Mr Mueller on the contents of the relevant scroll. On the other disc the same songs are repeated, mostly without the Mr Mueller's spoken pieces, the logic being presumably that people will want to re-listen to the music more than the talking.

The narration and the song lyrics cover areas that are familiar from Luke Haines' own songs - the fascinating world of minor celebrities of the 1970s and 1980s and the general rubbishness of England in the past. An Irish twist is added by the inclusion of references to Martin Cahill (whose murder site I pass every day on my way to work), now revealed to have spent several years as Proconsul in England. Several of the Cathal Coughlan songs also reference the Jerry Cornelius mythos of Michael Moorcock, which dovetails well with the 70s fascination of Old Haines.

When I saw the live show of these songs in early 2012, they began with the famous image of Jimmy Savile introducing Frank Bruno to Peter Sutcliffe projected behind them. This was before they opened with 'The Broadmoor Blues Delta'. This was before that Jimmy Savile stuff broke, but it all seems oddly prophetic of it all and to fit in perfectly with the subject matter of this record and other Luke Haines productions. I am curious now as to whether he is now dreaming of writing a concept album about Savile and his partners in crime - something that would be sure to storm its way to the top of the album charts.

On record, the stand-out track remains 'The Morris Man Cometh', a description of how during the occupation of England morris dancers were mobilised as a collaborationist militia. The song is done in a great faux-folkie style with Haines on lead vocals and Coughlan providing some great "hey nonny nonny" backing vocals. However, this should not be thought of as a one-song-album. As well as that track, there is a real beauty and sadness to some of the tunes on which Cathal Coughlan sings lead. I am thinking here of the likes of 'Ayatollah Cornelius' or 'Witches in the Water'. But the whole record is endlessly appealing.

Overall I suppose this record is a bit niche. If you like the same kind of things that I do then you will probably love it. If you are not so interested in peeling back the layers of obfuscation to reveal the truth then this might not be for you.


The North Sea Scrolls live

The True History of England

And we went to a performance of the North Sea Scrolls. Or a concert-lecture experience at which the contents of the North Sea Scrolls were discussed in words and song. These scrolls, discovered in the North Sea or thereabouts, reveal the true history of England in the recent past. They were revealed to us by Andrew Mueller (sometime music journalist, famous as the only one of his kind to like Toasted Heretic), Cathal Coughlan (formerly of Microdisney and the Fatima Mansions) and Luke Haines (formerly of the Auteurs, Baader Meinhof & Black Box Recorder), all clad in colonial garb and pith helmets. They also had a woman with them to play cello, but she wore normal clothes and may not have been a prophet in the same way they were.

The night went like this. Behind the musicians a photograph would be projected. These changed for each song. Examples of pictures featured included the following:
- Jimmy Saville introducing Frank Bruno to the Yorkshire Ripper.
- King Zog of the Albanians
- soldiers marching through a desert carrying a huge picture of some guy
- a Pearly King
- Emperor Jean Bedel Bokassa I
- many more (see my Flickr page for further details)

Andrew Mueller would then introduce each scroll, revealing the astonishing revelations it contained (who would have thought, for instance, that the last round of the Northern Ireland conflict had been kept since the early 1970s by Australian tribute acts? Or that Ireland conquered England in the 1950s, later installing Martin Cahill as proconsul?). One or other of Coughlan or Haines would then sing a song about the contents of said scroll. Our favourite tune was probably the one about how the occupiers of England recruited Morris dancers as a feared collaborationist militia, the song being called 'The Morris Men Cometh'.

For the encore Coughlan and Haines sang two of their own songs each. I found myself wondering if maybe I should investigate the work of Cathal Coughlan, as he has an attractive crooner's voice and an ironic yet heartfelt approach to lyrics. Haines himself did 'Leeds United', which made me happy, and one from his recent concept album on British wrestlers of the 1970s.

Someone at work asked me whether it all worked. I would have to say it did. The evening featured all new songs and lots of poncey spoken word stuff*, but there was a distinct lack of awkward audience shuffling and muttering or people shouting "Play 'Town to Town', you cunt". This suggests that people were enjoying the challenging nature of the evening, thought the fact that Coughlan and Haines have reputations as hard men may have put people off getting lippy.

pictures

An inuit panda production

*with an amusing and somewhat self-referential joke about the Captain Lockheed and the Starfighters record, too complicated to explain here.