Graham Parker and the Rumour

I had a brief R&B (e.g Feelgoods, Inmates etc.) and pub rock period.

Graham Parker & the Rumour was amongst the bands that I picked up on. Very good live, saw them at Reading Festival c. 1978 I think.

Haven't played their albums for years, must dig them out again...

Hi
Saw them live loads of times, "Howling wind" is a great album listened to it recently and still enjoy it immensely.
Regards
Jim

Great band. If you haven't got it then you must hunt an 'official bootleg' live album from approx '76. Great sweaty pub blues at its best. Might be Live At Marble Arch....can't quite remember right now and I'm away from my records.....Heat Treatment and Stick To Me are excellent as well.

Rich

I currently have a GP retrospective in my car comprising Howling Wind, Heat Treatment, Squeezing Out Sparks, The Mona Lisa's Sister, Human Soul and 12 Haunted Episodes.

Quite a shock to see the most "recent" of these was released in 1995.

I won't bore you with observations on Howling Wind and Heat Treatment, as for Squeezing Out Sparks suffice to say I was 17 when it was released and it is one of THE albums of my teenage years.

GP's post Rumour work is rather more patchy but of those I have, I think Mona Lisa's Sister is the best. Sharp observation, wry humour and some great hooks - always a real mood lifter.

Must go out and get something he's done in the last 9 years!

Olly

Is he still alive?

Try to obtain a copy of GP's "The Up Escalator"

It's worth it for one track ("Endless Night") which contains a vocal contribution from Mr Springsteen.

Bye for now


Ron

Hi
Yes he is still alive, and would you believe turning out country music.
Regards
Jim

'kin 'ell. I'm amazed at him being alive. I'm sure I thought he was dead.
I used to play him so much during the Squeezing Out Sparks / Parkerilla era, I should see if I like it still. I suppose this is when downloading off the net is useful - just to try it.
I suppose I can see how the progression to Country happened - he had that quality even then somehow.

GP toured here (UK) in 2002 (or was it 2001?), saw him at Dingwalls in Camden , plays solo mostly due to cost of touring Europe with a band. Great show his voice has matured and he does a wonderful acapella "A Change Is Gonna' Come"! Go see him next time he's here, He managed to pack out Dingwalls. No sign of country music in his set then, the last CD I have is "Acid Bubblegum" from 1997 worth getting just for the track "Obsessed with Aretha". The USA issue of Squeezing Out Sparks has live versions of all the songs as a bonus, all taped in USA at the time as a promo. Deserves a much bigger audience.

Chris

Live! Alone in America, from 1988, one of my all time faves. Malcolm Steward used to rave about it in whatever magazine he wrote for at the time. He was right.

Soul corruption - great track and the 3 martini lunch - good too!

One of the joys of this forum is meeting like minds. I used to adore GP and the Rumour and still play them occasionally. It's not hi-fi but it certainly is great music!!!

What do people think of Struck By Lightning? I's one of my fave post Rumour albums and, IMHO, far better than Mona Lisa's sister, which probably has more extremes (some excellent tracks and plenty of filler).

GP has his own web site in which he actively participates. Easy to find via Google and well worth a visit.

Mike

I just ordered a live CD (not Parkerilla) from amazon as I don't have any live stuff on CD - really looking forward to it, I do love the music - I'm not a musician but I would guess that the Rumour were good musicians - the bass lines are certainly funky!

You silly thing hay hay!

Worth getting the Parkerilla for the 12" version of Hey Lord that made up the original fourth side of the double album. Anyone interested can now get Live at Marble Arch as part of a two CD compilation that also includes Squeezing Out Sparks and loads of others. Have to say that Live at is a notch or two up from the Parkerilla but both are great.

The Rumour were a chuffin' great band live. Saw them at a double hander with Southside Johnny many years ago. The best double hander I ever went to bar Throwing Muses and Pixies.

Mike

Let's join in the nostalgia here. I got into Parker when he was more or less house band for ZigZag magazine. Saw them 4 -5 times. The most memorable, if not the best, was in summer 1978. In the afternoon we'd been on the Rock Against Racism march in London and had seen The Clash plying at Victoria Park. Then hoped the tube to Camden where Parker was supported by The Count Bishops and, in one of the most mismatched bills ever, Pere Ubu. The Bishops were pretty much standard pub are. Pere Ubu turned in what is still the best live set I've seen. It emptied the Roundhouse except for 40 or so of us who stood there with our mouths hanging open. David Thomas, huge in a black suit, came on , stared at the audience banging a hammer against a small anvil. He went silent, stared and in a slow, deadpan voice said "Any Questions". Hermann started a raw bluesy riff, the old fella on Synth, who said in an interview that he wanted to make sounds like the inside of the brain, did just that. For an hour or so they played the most wonderful avant rock that constantly threatened to teeter into chaos but just held its shape and structure. Awesome.

Then Parker, who as I said we'd seen several times. A great set - I think this was just after Shooting Out Sparks. A fabulous band, at the time likened to an English Springsteen and seen as a rival to Costello, also at the time a pub rock refugee. I saw Costello a few times early on and thought Parker and his band just pipped them on points. He was also a regular on Charlie Gillet's radio London sow, "Honky Tonk" which single handedly introduced me to half the music I now love.By the time of the Roundhouse Parker was getting more established and confident as a performed. A year or so earlier I saw him at the Rainbow, supported by Clover who had been Costello's backing band on My Aim is True. Here there was a real sense of a band with something to prove. Great songs, mainly from Heat Treatment and Stick to Me, with a version of Fools Gold that was bursting with passion and beauty, like The Band and The Stones rolled into one.

The sad thing is that when I revisit these records the magic isn't there any more. They were great moments but haven't really made the transition to now. I think the same is true of Costello. There are some good songs and The Rumour were a great band but the excitement has worn off. This isn't true of Patti Smith or Television or The Clash or Pere Ubu, come to that, who still give a thrill when I put them on. But back then, Parker, Pere Ubu and The Clash in one day was pretty magical.....


Kevin

Graham Parker played a "a stark and beautiful acoustic version of Comfortably Numb " on last years AFFOPF. Always looking to get a floyd plug in

Denis