| Author | Message | ||
     Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 9331 Registered: 05-2005 |
From Needle Mythology: Thank you so much for the response to our recent reissues of Robert Forster’s first two solo albums Danger In The Past and Calling From A Country Phone. We really were overwhelmed and, more importantly, so was Robert. So we’ve been working closely with Robert to ensure that we can do similar justice to his next two solo albums I Had A New York Girlfriend and Warm Nights. And, if anything, I think we might have surpassed what we did with those first two records. | ||
| Randy Adams Member Username: Randy_adams Post Number: 4401 Registered: 03-2005 |
These will be tougher for me. I consider them Robert's two weakest albums. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 9332 Registered: 05-2005 |
Me too, Randy. Some people see charms in Warm Nights that the album has never revealed to me. Maybe the remaster will be a revelation. New York Girlfriend is better, but is limited (for me) by being a covers album. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 1749 Registered: 10-2006 |
I seem to remember being a pretty big Warm Nights fan, I shall have to dig it out again and see exactly why. I think it was the first Robert solo album I ever got hold of, which might partly explain it, I felt glad that it held up against his work with the band, something I never really felt about Grant's solo work. I'll look forward to the remaster, though it would be good to have more than just a couple of extra songs on it. But RF is not the sort of chap to squirrel things away. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 1750 Registered: 10-2006 |
Andrew Mueller, a real critic, reviews Warm Nights: “A lesser man would have long since given up, got a job, or run wild in a shopping mall swathed in bandilleros with a beltful of pistols: Robert Forster embarked on the recording of Warm Nights as the co-author of six albums' worth of thundering genius with The Go-Betweens, the sole creator of two great solo albums and a further collection of engagingly peculiar cover versions, and yet had still produced less hit records than Switzerland has great naval commanders. On the evidence of Warm Nights, Forster appears to have decided that his revenge upon the world will be to carry on writing marvellous songs that nobody will ever hear. In front of a backing band including Edwyn Collins--who also produced, conjuring a keyboard-led surf-pop sound reminiscent of Jonathan Richman's Modern Lovers--Forster deadpans his way through another collection of wryly observed vignettes riddled with his trademark odd but strangely evocative one-liners ("She reminds me of Africa, though I've never been", "Later that year, my hair turned the colour of corn"). Another unimpeachable album by Robert Forster. He keeps churning them out, human civilisation as a whole keeps ignoring them. It is enough to make a chap think seriously about building an ark and waiting for God to do the decent thing.” Then I obviously got hold of the album in 2006 and was very excited about it: “Despite loving the Go-betweens, until recently I'd never paid much attention to their solo work, and lo and behold, what a terrible mistake, since Warm Nights turns out to be a delicious slithering groove of a creature, a sinuous collection of heartfelt, glistening songs with Forster at the top of his form and a spare, delicate backing band where producer Edwyn Collins manages to slip just the right instrument in at just the right moment to make the impact perfect - the keyboard ripple on Snake Skin Lady, the Dylanesque organ on Rock and Roll Friend (a rich, warm heartbreaking version of this Forster/McLennan composition), the brass that slides in here and there. Hell, the disc is worth five stars just for the way Forster sings "People high on grass" on Snake Skin Lady, but the vocals throughout are full of his drawled and passionate irony. Soul-nourishing music. Do not live without it.” I don’t think I’d ever actually heard the GBs version of R & R heart at that point, but I still prefer the WN/Street legal version. People tend to get uncomfortable about Jug of Wine, if I remember correctly, but I have to say I enjoy its easy, brassy, laconic, bucolic simplicity and the lines, “Well I woke up fully breathing/Beneath a blue childhood sky.” Other singer-songwriters should be so lucky to have this as one of their weakest works! | ||
| Ted Pilkington Unregistered guest |
Great post, Stuart. 'Warm Nights' has all the hallmarks of a Eureka moment for Robert. With 'I Had A New York Girlfriend' the result of an extended period of writer's block, WN was the beginning of phase II for Robert and, by extension, The Go-Betweens. Bringing it all back home/Highway 61/ Blonde on Blonde - Rubber Soul/Revolver/Sgt Pepper- The Rising/Devils & Dust/Magic; trilogies by accident or design, Warm Nights was, in my view, the first in a trilogy of albums that includes Rachel Worth & BYBO (Ocean's Apart being the first in another, never to be realised trio). It provides the blueprint for the second incarnation of The Go-Betweens. With Grant's solo career meandering towards something of a dead end, Robert by contrast was issuing a statement of bold, minimalist defiance. Touring as a 3 piece - the songs having been demoted with Glenn and Adele prior to recording with Edwyn Collins and his hired hands - the canary yellow suit, Fender Stratocaster/bass/drums combination was a tight set-up and an inspired move. I saw them in Dublin in 1996 and, with the official reunion still 4 years away, the feeling was that this was the beginning of a great new adventure not a nostalgia fest. I love the looseness of the arrangements on Warm Nights. In terms of the songs I Can Do, Warm Nights, Snake Skin Lady, Loneliness, On A Street Corner & I'll Jump are top drawer Forster. I struggled to accept the 1996 version of Rock and Roll Friend on account of my fondness for the original. Jug of Wine & Fortress were part of an experiment that only partly worked. Crying Love, I'm sorry to say, still leaves me cold. Which is to say, I am looking forward to the forthcoming Needle Mythology releases. | ||
| TROU Member Username: Trou Post Number: 497 Registered: 05-2005 |
The "Warm Nights" concert was one of the best I saw, Gobs ones included. I've never forgotten when the trio played Fortress, my fave song of the show. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 1752 Registered: 10-2006 |
Well then, a live CD from that tour in addition might be more interesting than a couple of B-sides... I wonder if such a thing exists? | ||
| fsh Member Username: Fsh Post Number: 353 Registered: 05-2005 |
I'm pretty certain that Robert Forster described 'I had a New York Girlfriend' as a mistake and being in over his head. I think the only song he ever played live from the album was "2541", a Grant Hart RIP ex Husker Du song. "I'm a big fan of "Warm nights". Then again, I'm a big fan of Edwyn Collin's ping pong production. Warm nights, On a street corner (very angry), Snakeskin lady, I can do (two chords), Jug of Wine (a groove). Didn't take to "rock 'n roll friend" part 2 (a bit pointless), took to "Crying love" - the single which had a great video shot in Madame Jojo's where the boys played a duet gig in 1999 if I remember correctly. There's a reference in a later Robert song to Grant taking a shine to the club's owner - Madame Jojo? | ||
| Ted Pilkington Unregistered guest |
Great and all as it is, I was a little surprised that RF's cover of Frisco Depot got the nod over 2541 for the Intermission compilation. Robert's misgivings aside, there is some decent stuff on IHANYG. Who knew, for instance, that Keith Richards's post-1975 output wasn't completely $hite? What was Robert playing at covering the Monkees at least 5 years before the taste police decided to look beyond the hit singles/tv show/session musician perception of the band? A Heart cover? Late 60's Dylan. Where's Old World by The Modern Lovers? Again, what was he thinking? Everything about the album was inscrutably unpredictable. A stopgap for sure but it still gets a regular spin on my stereo. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 9341 Registered: 05-2005 |
I’m wondering what the bonus tracks on I Had A New York Girlfriend will be. They weren’t contemporaneous, but three other covers Robert released in the 1990s were Tower Of Song (1991), Speed Of The Sound Of Loneliness (1997) and Sympathy For The Devil (as The Global Twins with Grant McLennan) in 1998. It would be good to have these on the remastered version of IHANYG. He also did some covers in the 2000s on a 10” that I’ve never heard (apart from one song released on iTunes) as it was part of a phenomenally expensive edition of his first book. And he did some covers live at the Four Ages Of Robert Forster shows in Brisbane in 2007. | ||
| Simon Withers Member Username: Sfwithers Post Number: 641 Registered: 08-2005 |
I'm bizarrely fond of his arch rendition of Echo Beach (I can see his raised eyebrows as I listen) and enjoy his version of 2541. In relation to that, I was at a Grant Hart gig a few years ago at a tiny venue in Bristol (attendance c75) and Grant gently mocked the fact that I was taking pictures and wondering whether I was with the CIA/FBI. He played 2541. I discovered Husker Du far too late (and can't be bothered to umlaut it) but Warehouse is fabulous, especially Ice Cold Ice, She Floated Away and Bed of Nails. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 9342 Registered: 05-2005 |
Simon, I saw Grant Hart in Dublin in the 90s. It was a wonderful show. Less than half full, maybe about 300 people I think. It was wonderful, and he had made my night before even playing a note as he smiled and said hello to me as I watched in awe as he walked across the venue to the backstage area. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 1753 Registered: 10-2006 |
Took me a long time to realise that it was a Keith Richards song. Talk is cheap routinely comes in at number one in those Top 20 Stones solo album lists that sometimes pop up, which is, of course, not saying very much. I think I have it somewhere, probably bought on the strength of Locked away. | ||
| Andrew Kerr Member Username: Andrew_k Post Number: 1356 Registered: 04-2005 |
I saw the « Warm Nights » tour, with Adele and Glenn backing, in Glasgow’s 13 Note back in 1996…I guess that was the year but doesn’t seem to feature in the gigography ? I remember that they said that were playing in Dublin a couple of days later before flying to the States. It was quite bizarre as it was free to get in, which I thought a bit sad given Robert’s links with the city. Never mind it was well hoaching by the time that the band hit the stage ! A wonderful gig. I think that it was at this one that a friend coined the phrase « RF is the campest hetrosexual man alive ». We arrived early and even got to see the sound-check, which was in front of almost the whole audience. When the band started the gig properly Robert said « Just pretend you haven’t seen us before ». I think that Isobel Campbell (of Belle and Sebastian at the time) was standing just in front of me, gazing up adoringly at Robert. I read years later in an interview that she said that it was one of the best gigs she had ever seen. A friend that I went with spent ages chatting to Adele (at the t-shirt stand) about her beloved Bury FC. For the record I adore the « Warm Nights » recording. And the radio session with Mark Radcliffe is great too (with Claire Kenny and Dave Ruffy backing) featuring the first ever performance of « She Sang About Angels ». | ||
| Burgers Member Username: Burgers Post Number: 159 Registered: 05-2005 |
The 13th Note date was 15th October 1996. | ||
| Burgers Member Username: Burgers Post Number: 160 Registered: 05-2005 |
This explains why it was free https://archive.list.co.uk/the-list/1996 -10-04/20/ | ||
| Burgers Member Username: Burgers Post Number: 161 Registered: 05-2005 |
This website gives you an idea of what unreleased material is around. I was astonished by it. The Sex God CD looks like the one of Robert’s that many would want if you don’t have it (I don’t). http://australianmusictrade.50webs.com/i ndex.htm The 10 Rules EP is okay but no better than that | ||
| Dusty Member Username: Dusty Post Number: 82 Registered: 05-2005 |
Andrew - assuming the '96 radio session will not be released on the upcoming remasters, would it be possible to make available a copy or link of it as I have always wanted to listen. I remember seeing Robert on the '96 tour in London and it probably remains my favourite gig. I also remember hearing 'When she sang about angels' on said gig - from memory, it had quite a different arrangement to the FORW version. | ||
| Andrew Kerr Member Username: Andrew_k Post Number: 1357 Registered: 04-2005 |
Cheers Burgers ! Truly impressive detective work  Dusty...no problem...I'll do that in the next couple of days. Think that "When she sang about angels" from the radio session might be just Robert by himself though. The patter between Mark Radcliffe, Lard and the musicians is hilarious. | ||
| Andrew Kerr Member Username: Andrew_k Post Number: 1358 Registered: 04-2005 |
Link (OneDrive) is https://1drv.ms/u/s!Arna34WaMf26j3xaVVpjDiVCWb0n?e=74k2VS (don't know why it loses the formatting, so you will have to copy and paste the whole URL) Robert Forster - Radio 1 session (17.8.96) Interview (Pt 1)/I Can Do/Interview (Pt 2)/Rock and Roll Friend/Interview (Pt 3)/She Sang About Angels/Interview (Pt 4) And I've put a couple of Grant ones too 2 solo radio sessions from Radio Scotland's "Bite the Wax" with Mark Percival. First from 1991... You Can't Have Everything/Interview (1)/Black Mule/Interview (2) And then from 1993... Interview (1)/Dark Side of Town/Interview (2)/Horsebreaker Star | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 1767 Registered: 10-2006 |
Ah, the wonders of technology! Brilliant, Mr Kerr! | ||
| Dusty Member Username: Dusty Post Number: 83 Registered: 05-2005 |
Thanks so much Andrew - really appreciated. It's great to hear those versions. | ||
| John Arvanitis Unregistered guest |
This November Warm Nights and Beautiful Hearts will be released as the next two remasters. The LP versions will have a bonus single of unreleased material. Track listing Needle Solution. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 2207 Registered: 10-2006 |
Dear lord, for one thrilling moment I thought I'd missed out on a whole new RF album... why the change of title? | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10439 Registered: 05-2005 |
Here's a link https://shop.season-of-mist.com/robert-f orster-beautiful-hearts-lp-gatefold-7 | ||
| Andrew Kerr Member Username: Andrew_k Post Number: 1527 Registered: 04-2005 |
"We love breakfast and Australian bands. Fans of The Go-Betweens may follow the musings of erudite singer-songwriter Robert Forster on Facebook. What’s on his mind? Often muesli, and the problems finding a decent one while touring. Needle Mythology, the record label co-founded by music journalist and Go-Between’s superfan Pete Paphides, re-issued Forster’s first two solo albums, and has now collaborated with him (and London organic food pioneer Alara) to make his perfect breakfast cereal: oats, sultanas, brazil nuts, coconut, puffed amaranth; unsweetened; in 100% biodegradable packaging and net-zero carbon. It’s called Spring Grain, a nod to one of the Go-Between’s best loved songs, Spring Rain, so a bowlful will set you up for the day, not only nourished but with an absolutely joyous earworm. Robert Forster’s Spring Grain, £6, will launch on August 8th – bookmark this link: https://robertforsterspringgrain.tmstor. es/" Unfortunately his muesli doesn't seem to be available in France  Nice T-shirt though ! | ||
| Simon Withers Member Username: Sfwithers Post Number: 756 Registered: 08-2005 |
Andrew, that's brilliant! | ||
| Andrew Kerr Member Username: Andrew_k Post Number: 1529 Registered: 04-2005 |
All is revealed some 50 mins in. RF spent the first day working on Vol 3 https://www.mixcloud.com/sohoradio/pete- paphides-17072023 | ||
| Burgers Member Username: Burgers Post Number: 214 Registered: 05-2005 |
Still nothing on Needle Mythology’s website about the 3rd and 4th reissues. However, from various retailers I’ve pieced together that Beautiful Hearts vinyl will come with a 7” featuring Freddy Fender's Sohn (I presume from the 2541 single) and a cover of Talking Heads’ The Lady Don’t Mind which didn’t make the original album. For reasons why, read this https://www.hotpress.com/music/together- again-together-again-483057 Warm Nights vinyl has a different version of Fortress and drops Rock N Roll Friend in favour of Half the Way Home from the Cryin’ Love single. It also has a 7” featuring Did You End Up With the One You Love, the original album version of Fortress, Hypnotised (from the Cryin’ Love single) and Rock N Roll Friend from the original album. | ||
| Dusty Member Username: Dusty Post Number: 89 Registered: 05-2005 |
Thanks Burgers for the link re: why 'Lady Don't Mind' didn't come out originally. Grant's withering put down quite amusing Curiously, the Rough Trade site lists Beautiful Hearts as a double CD. This could be an error later to be corrected, but offers the possibility of more tracks being released. Warm Nights is listed there as a single disc. | ||
| Dusty Member Username: Dusty Post Number: 90 Registered: 05-2005 |
Also, I'm intrigued by Fortress (Brass Version) replacing the album version. I mean the album version is already pretty 'brassy' as things go. | ||
| Dusty Member Username: Dusty Post Number: 91 Registered: 05-2005 |
According to most websites offering pre-orders, I've noticed the release dates have been pushed back to September 2024, which is quite some delay. | ||
| Andrew Kerr Member Username: Andrew_k Post Number: 1536 Registered: 04-2005 |
"How a pop star and his adoring fan made beautiful muesli together" Nice article from Pete Paphides ! You need to copy and paste the whole address as The Times has a paywall https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/02f89 f58-8fb4-487f-9078-3f3b2b431308?shareTok en=55627c705416f398bd14c5bdbf986396&fbcl id=IwAR1X2YpGP4m2gs2-R_8QDRZ-R1WBp1jhuXv Q16ezpN3TT_T-qxNUuFRON6Q | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10570 Registered: 05-2005 |
Thanks for the link,Andrew. | ||
| Burgers Unregistered guest |
Release date now revised to 2nd February. Needlemythology’s webshop has coloured vinyl versions which I haven’t yet seen for sale elsewhere. | ||
| Andrew Kerr Member Username: Andrew_k Post Number: 1541 Registered: 04-2005 |
Message from Pete Paphides of Needle Mythology : Dear friends, It’s taken a long time to get to this momentous announcement, but I’m so happy to share with you news of Robert Forster and Needle Mythology’s expanded, reconfigured reissues of his third and fourth solo albums, “Beautiful Hearts” (formerly “I Had A New York Girlfriend”) and “Warm Nights”. Originally entitled “I Had A New York Girlfriend”, “Beautiful Hearts” was Robert’s first and, to date, only album of other people’s songs. Originally released in 1994, many of you will remember that the album saw Robert tackle a diverse array of favourite songs – among them Mickey Newbury’s “Frisco Depot”, Martha & The Muffins’ “Echo Beach”, “Alone” by Heart and Guy Clark’s “Broken-Hearted People”. The album has never seen a vinyl release until now. Having had three decades to reflect on the record, Robert took this chance to revisit the album’s title and artwork. “I Had A New York Girlfriend” had been an eleventh-hour decision, a line taken from the Modern Lovers song “Old World”. The working title had always been “Beautiful Hearts”, a phrase borrowed from another song, “For Those” by Tindersticks. With the old title gone, the artwork – a New York street scene – no longer made sense. “So, in its place,” explains Robert, “comes a contemporaneous photograph of me conducting a set of musicians crashing into the album’s opening cut ‘Nature’s Way’. Well… that’s the fantasy.” “Beautiful Hearts” was a decision partly undertaken by Robert, back in 1994, to buy him time. He had found himself in a song drought, but he had read enough about the travails of songwriters in trouble to know that, sometimes, an album of other people’s material can often move artists to a place where the songs start to come again. And so, it came to be. Recorded a year later, Warm Nights repositioned Robert’s standing as one of the great songwriters of the post-punk era. Robert recalls that producer Edwyn Collins “got the [intended] sound of the album completely: a dry low-end groove pitched somewhere between Creedence Clearwater Revival and Willie Mitchell’s early ’70s Hi Records work.” It was only towards the end of the sessions that some complications arose – and it’s these complications that Robert has seized the chance to remedy for this new release of Warm Nights. “It was Edwyn’s idea,” explains Robert, “to bring in a three-piece brass section – it fitted some of the songs beautifully, but it was in the mixing of the brass and the effect it had on the running order that things got complicated, [resulting in] two changes to the album that have been bugging me for 25 years.” Finally, Robert can sleep easy. The horns removed from “Fortress” have now been restored – brass that’s also present on "Half The Way Home”, a song that Robert rashly demoted from the album, making it a bonus track on the “Cryin’ Love” single. Finally, "Half The Way Home” assumes its rightful place on Warm Nights, replacing “Rock ’n’ Roll Friend” – itself a Go-Betweens b-side that had slipped onto Warm Nights on account of its presence in the Australian live shows that had immediately preceded the album’s recording sessions. As with the Robert Forster reissues on Needle Mythology that preceded these expanded releases, the vinyl versions of “Beautiful Hearts” and “Warm Nights” will come with bonus seven-inch singles. “Beautiful Hearts” is completed by a single that features Robert’s versions of “The Lady Don’t Mind” (Talking Heads) and “Freddy Fender’s Sohn” (F.S.K.). Complementing the revised iteration of “Warm Nights” is an EP featuring the original album version of “Fortress”, “Rock ’n’ Roll Friend”, “Hypnotized” (originally the second extra track on the “Cryin’ Love” CD single) and “Did You End Up With The One You Love", a beautiful, hitherto forgotten song which only surfaced when Needle Mythology’s Pete Paphides and Craig Caukill listened back to the original reels from the West Heath recording sessions. As you can imagine, for two long-time fans of Robert and The Go-Betweens, this moment was truly the stuff of dreams. In keeping with all Needle Mythology’s releases, the exceptional attention to detail is sure to make these the definitive iterations of “Beautiful Hearts” and “Warm Nights”. Both titles come in gatefold sleeves with printed inners and feature newly-written liner notes by Robert Forster. Now a celebrated artist in her native Germany, Leni Hoffman flew to the UK to personally oversee the printing of the original artwork she created for Warm Nights back in 1995. The new artwork for Beautiful Hearts was created by Matthew Cooper, who has worked closely with Robert on the continuing G Is For Go-Betweens series of archival box sets. For the mastering of “Beautiful Hearts” and “Warm Nights” by Abbey Road’s Sean Magee (Beatles, Rolling Stones, Sex Pistols), Robert got to realise a long-held ambition and attended the session at the legendary studios. “Beautiful Hearts” and “Warm Nights” will be released by Needle Mythology in strictly limited runs of 1500 vinyl copies. One thousand of each will be available on black vinyl, while 500 more copies of “Beautiful Hearts” and “Warm Nights” will be available, respectively, on aubergine and nectarine coloured vinyl discs to match their cover art. There will also be 1250 CDs of each title. “Beautiful Hearts” and “Warm Nights” are released on Needle Mythology on February 2nd, 2024. | ||
| Stuart Wilson Member Username: Stuart Post Number: 2243 Registered: 10-2006 |
Thanks, Andrew. Blocked from here on my laptop by a phishing alert, will that pass, or what? Hate this fingery phone business. Well, glad to see the releases have bounced forward again, will be pleased to hear the properly brassed up Warm nights, but will not be throwing away the r & r friend version, a favourite song of mine. Couldn't the singles have been added on to the CDs? I haven't owned a turntable for decades. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10662 Registered: 05-2005 |
The cover of Talking Heads' The Lady Don't Mind on Beautiful Hearts is great. | ||
| Pádraig Collins Member Username: Pádraig_collins Post Number: 10663 Registered: 05-2005 |
Listening to Did You End Up With The One You Love? now. What a song to discover lost in the archives. |