Howl in the Typewriter - Primalore (2026)

 

If you enjoy sentences like, 'Take your cunt-looking face and shove it into your dad's syphilitic arsehole,' that is a fine line between entertainment and insanity. This is but one of many statements delivered by Primalore like prison kitchen slops down those waste chutes on either side of your head. In fact it's a direct quote from track thirteen, identified on the cover as Spilling Processed Peas, although the album is just over an hour of continuous pseudo-narrative barrage without breaks, without pause for breath, and its division into individual tracks seems arbitrary. Elsewhere, Frailty Assessment Area teaches us that:

The sunset's air pollution melts ovary morning celebrations in breast wax and hot labia solvents splashing in dusty socks at cocktail parties of ass-kicking mind-wanking faith denominating a thermoviscous cooling snail in the head from the pre-fright ungulates of mutilated spastics in buried bodies seeping concrete the tourist trap entangled with incomer fashion chasers splitting the G, a coop noob move up north, even if such drink decorations exist there.

As you might imagine, it's difficult to get your head around this one, or it would be if the noise allowed you just a couple of seconds in which to ask, what the fuck was that?!? which it doesn't.

The music is a cut-up soundtrack of DIY synthpop chopped into fragments, most shorter than a second, of which some passages may repeat but I've been thus far too disorientated to tell. I think the point of the music is mainly so we can call it music because it's probably a better fit than anything else. First impressions are of a distant, more scatological cousin to Nigel Ayers' recent spoken word efforts, The Pre-War Noise Encryption Standard and Excavations in Substation. As with Ayers' narratives, Primalore almost makes sense but never quite gets there, leaving the listener forever struggling to catch up. The voice draws us into an ever-shifting unreal environment because we feel it should make sense, or should at least try walking in a straight line for longer than a minute; and yet much of the monologue may seem weirdly familiar but for the proverbial leg bone being inexplicably connected to the analgesic cyclotron bone.

However, where Ayers' hallucinogenic narrative is at least as soothing as the mad stuff that goes through your head when you're unwell and consequently delirious, this is closer to the information overload of Consumer Electronics, albeit without being quite so harrowing. Conversely, Stan Batcow's delivery is often surprisingly amiable, almost conversational, regardless of the onslaught and despite the rapid fire battery of bizarre, jarring images. It sounds conversational in places.

The text comes from Primalore Four, a magazine produced by Mark Reeve and Dr. Adolf Steg (real name - Dr. Adolf Steg), a copy of which is currently going on eBay for ₤24.50 unless you live in Americaland, as I do. Retooled as what I suppose could be termed a fulminating book, I suspect information overload is the method of delivery more than the point in itself. It's not so much that meaning is scrambled and reduced to noise as that there's too much meaning, the ultimate thrust of which perhaps leaks through during the aforementioned Frailty Assessment Area:

Everything must be perfect down the years, so destroy all art, culture and music, blow up this fucking useless planet and remove us from existence. What has the human race really achieved? We have fucked up a beautiful planet and spent billions going to a dead moon as the two percent on the bottom rung of society cause so much harm to the rest, the good people of this world.

If I've given an impression of Primalore as an unlistenable racket, which it may well be to many, that isn't my intention. Rather it's a sort of primal scream, or howl, I suppose; and whatever the hell it's saying, it's hard to keep from getting swept along in its sheer bloody-minded dedication to doing whatever it's doing, and it leaves the listener strangely energised or invigorated in a glow of recovery such as might normally be encountered after a gut-wrenching hangover or a dose of the most powerful laxatives known to man, and also some women. I don't know what it is, or even that I like it, but it impresses the living shit out of me and I don't know why.

Procure thineself a copy yonder.

The Wurzels Are Scrumptious! (1975)

Following my reviewing a number of seventies novelty records a while back - and enjoying them - my famous friend Stan Batcow of Howl in the Typewriter dared me to tackle the Wurzels. I'll do it! I barked at the screen of my PC, partially because I'd been meaning to get around to the Wurzels for some time - not, as you might suspect, for the sake of sneering at The Combine Harvester or any of the others which regularly clogged the upper reaches of the charts in my youth, but because I remember my pal at junior school making me a tape of early Wurzels - or Wurzels rarities if you will, the Wurzels you were referring to when you told those other kids at the Blitz in Covent Garden in 1979, I only liked their first album. I'm talking about Down in Nempnett Thrubwell, Twice Daily, Cheddar Cheese and others - this had been a different Wurzels, a comedy turn for sure but with a softer, more wistful side to their music meaning even the inevitable numbers about rumpy-pumpy in the hay loft had a certain charm beyond the obligatory succession of cow pat gags. Subsequent research has revealed that I didn't imagine there having been a better Wurzels, and this line-up significantly featured one Adge Cutler who obviously left a massive hole in the group when he tragically lost his life in a road accident in 1974.

So I hunted around for anything featuring those songs I'd once loved, but a few of them didn't even seem to have been recorded by the Adge Cutler line-up, and the rest were scattered hither and thither across the back catalogue, and The Wurzels Are Scrumptious! seemed like the best bet given that I had no plans to buy more than one record. In its favour, the Wurzels play well and it sounds as though they had a shitload of fun; but really, I just fucking can't…

I'd forgotten about that seventies thing where albums purchased from your local WHSmith might turn out to be live albums if that's where the band were most at home, usually recorded in some working men's club complete with rambling introduction comprising gags and comic asides which were hopefully funnier at the time. I guess the whole point of the Wurzels was the live performance and how much cider you could knock back before passing out in someone else's field. I don't know if it's really fair for me to offer comment on this one, because even if it leaves me wishing to cancel the subscription to my own ears, this was the record they made after their most talented member had just pegged it, so it's arguably the Wurzels' equivalent of the first New Order album.

The problem is partially that this sort of thing is very much woven into my childhood mythology, and as NWA were to South Central Los Angeles, so the Wurzels were to the farms and villages of my youth; and it's significant that I moved to somewhere a bit less rustic as soon as I was able. Sometimes there's nothing funnier than comparing a cucumber to a penis, or the other way round, but the comparison is arguably funnier in the moment and probably doesn't work so well in song, and a song on an album which mostly seems to be about drinking, shagging, and then laughing about it at such length that the laughter ends up sounding a bit weird. It feels akin to an episode of Esther Rantzen's That's Life* but with accordion, and a hilarious chorus of ooh arr following each alleged zinger, and maybe with the more highbrow jokes left backstage so as not to confuse anyone from that neighbouring village with which we've had an amusing rivalry since 1687; until the music stops and we get another long-winded and deeply unfunny introduction reaffirming those rustic credentials, except one of them clearly isn't from Somerset, and another really doesn't have the accent of a man whose economic status ever obliged him to wade through cow shit at 5AM on a freezing November morning. Quibbling over authenticity is usually a mug's game, but it's nice to know that whatever you're getting at least has one foot in the paddock it's milking for chuckles, even if the chuckles aren't so great as they may have been on the evening.

Somehow, I expected better.

*: One for the kids there.

godspunk volume twenty-two (2021)

I should possibly open by declaring certain details which may suggest a lack of objectivity on my part. I've known Stan Batcow, the man behind both this compilation and the Pumf label which spawned it for a plurality of decades. He's appeared on things I've recorded, and I've appeared on stage with him back when he was blowing a jug for the Ceramic Hobs. I contributed to the first three volumes of godspunk, and have been a member of one of the bands who contribute to this collection. Anyway, Stan has been sending me the latest volume of this thing since way back whenever, usually with some disclaimer along the lines of I know you probably think this is a pile of shite, but it's free, so bollocks - you'll have it and like it, or words to that effect; and I always feel as though I should make the effort to review the thing, or at least spread the word in some way, but I never do.

It isn't that I think the godspunk compilations are a pile of shite, but I've often found them a bit of a mixed bag. There's been some great stuff on godspunk over the years - not least being the Las Vegas Mermaids and one of the Shend's rare solo outings - but there's usually a couple of tracks I'm not so keen on, and I always feel awkward about it. Actually there have been at least a couple I've actively hated.

The deal with godspunk is that the artist contributes to the cost of producing a fancy compact disc, essentially paying for time on the disc and a page in the accompanying booklet. So if you have sixty quid, or however much it costs, you can probably get yourself on one of these. Although this has meant the inclusion of an occasional splash of uninspiring or otherwise workmanlike pub rock over the years, that sort of thing has generally been in the minority, and the eclecticism of these compilations tend to reflect the mix of weirdos with whom Stan Batcow breaks virtual bread rather than who just happened to have sixty quid to spare. The godspunk discs therefore tend to present a bewildering selection of pop, punk, DIY, techno, house, country, noise, avant-garde, prog, metal, rockabilly, free jazz, and trad garage just for starters; which can be a bit overwhelming if you're not prepared for it, which is usually why I'm left speechless.

I tend to listen to this sort of thing on a Discman while I'm out on my bike, and I took a slightly different approach with this one because it's the first volume issued on two discs. Fearing sensory overload, I took the case with me so as to refer to the track list as I listened, and somehow it made a big difference, providing some kind of context to the anticipated barrage of random swerves. It still didn't mean I loved everything here, but it rendered the experience a little less like arbitrary twists of a radio dial and therefore a lot more interesting.

My favourite tracks came from the ever formidable Harsh Noise Movement - who directly big me up in the booklet for some reason; and Jeanie & the Kaprikorns who seem to be a country and western outfit, which may mean I've been in Texas too long, or not long enough depending on how you look at it. Also great are the Large Veiny Members, Taurus Board, and Nil by Nose - all godspunk regulars who can usually be relied upon to come up with something worth hearing; and Stan's own Howl in the Typewriter should probably have been mentioned in that sentence. There's also UNIT, of which I was a member back in the eighteenth century and concerning which my commentary might therefore constitute a conflict of interests, although I will say that it's probably the best stuff I've heard from UNIT in a long time, at least in so much as that a couple of their tracks feature none of the usual easy listening glockenspiel overload and are therefore almost listenable, if a little more clean cut than I like; having said which, I could have lived without the Apostles classic Anarchy, Peace & Freedom rewritten as a self-improvement anthem. Infected Youth banging on about H.P. Lovecraft didn't really do it for me either, but never mind - a couple of duds amongst what amounts to nearly fifty tracks isn't a bad average.

I suspect the mistake I've been making with these godspunk collections, aside from taking them along as I go out and about but leaving the track list at home, is listening to them as I might listen to, off the top of my head, Rising from the Red Sand or some compilation demonstrating a fairly specific focus; because godspunk is essentially a spigot. You turn the tap and weird shit gushes out in seemingly random sequence. The key to appreciation is therefore in riding the gusher, going with the flow, and expecting to be surprised - which you absolutely will be. With editorial policy being whoever happens to have sixty quid and something they want to share, one might be forgiven for certain assumptions regarding godspunk; but it's worth remembering that it's 2021 and the majority of talent free shitehawks will most likely be clogging up Bandcamp or similar download sites because they're free and easy, or at least easier than physical media has become. So rather than godspunk assembling an array of ageing pub rockers who just happen to have cheque books at the ready, it's probably closer in spirit to the tapes once issued by Music for Midgets and the like, by virtue of contributors having eschewed the path of least resistance, musically speaking; so check the fucker out, is what I'm saying here.

Pumf Records link up there on the left hand side of your screen.

Howl in the Typewriter - Manifesto (2018)

My impartiality is probably open to question where this one is concerned. Never mind that I know the bloke, but I actually contributed some vocals, as did my wife, and I know at least a couple of the other people who similarly responded to Stan Batcow's request for remotely recorded guest vocals. Please sing these words, he said, and send me the file so I can weave it into something I've been working on; and we did. Please feel free to grass me up to the trading standards authority if this is a problem.

Howl in the Typewriter is the organ of Stan Batcow, so to speak, former Ceramic Hob and punky DIY stalwart since at least back when I was still at school. He's been at it for a while and is yet to show any sign of reigning it in or, for that matter, giving too much of a shit about sales or catering for any specific audience. Musically he's always carved his own furrow, as does this album, and it's a furrow which still very much works for him and has come to sound more and more unique with each passing year as the part-timers fall by the wayside.

Manifesto is, perhaps typically, an H-bomb scale potshot taken at the commercialism against which Howl have been pitted all these years; and it's a single song lasting over an hour, or at least that's one way of looking at it. Another might be as Crass's Yes Sir, I Will with tunes, or even one of the more impenetrable Jethro Tull concept albums, A Passion Play or one of those; except this is better, or at least I like it more. Howl play a hybrid of punk rock and techno hung on some sort of vaguely proggy structure, themes repeat here and there morphing into reggae, thrash, power electronics, and just plain oddball without it seeming too much like a collage of disparate elements; and whilst its sheer scale and duration is a little demanding, it keeps moving, changing, and manages to never outstay its welcome. I seem to recall reading that Manifesto has been seven years in the making, which I can believe because of the elegance with which all the parts fit together to form a coherent whole, despite being born from a million random elements pulling in different directions. I'm very impressed.

Myself and the misses turn up at around the fourteen minute mark if anyone is interested.

Buy it here for a mere fiver.

Ray Reagan & the Rayguns (2009)

You may recall Stan Batcow from such acts as the Membranes, Howl in the Typewriter, Ceramic Hobs, Blunt Instrument, and the Def-A-Kators, but if not, here's another unfamiliar pie in which he's had fingers, a band which played gigs, garnered fancy-pants record company interest, and accordingly went into the studio at some point during the eighties; at which point the tale fizzles into either thin air or is absorbed into one of the other four-million bands in which the Batcow has been involved over the years. The story behind this collection is that it comprises those studio recordings, arguably those vintage studio recordings, dug out of a box in the attic and finally whipped into some sort of shape.

I have to admit, upon first listen it sounded a lot like just another Pumf record. Stan has a fairly distinctive sound and songwriting style, which I suppose can be a hindrance as much as a recommendation; but the strengths of the album really begin to come through after a couple of spins, once it's obvious that this isn't quite just another Pumf release. I think the point at which it clicked for me was where I suddenly realised how much Ray Reagan & the Rayguns remind me of Hawkwind - particularly on the chugging Dopamine, although a faintly crusty festival vibe informs the enterprise as a whole. I'd say it reminds me of the Levellers in places, except I never liked the Levellers, and this is better, and presumably predates them by a couple of years; which seems particularly pronounced on Salt And Pepper, a thoroughly breezy account of getting raided by the pigs, country tinged, and so fucking catchy you'd swear you'd heard it somewhere before.

After about the fifth play it occurs to me that this might even be the best thing ever released on the Pumf label. It seems to represent all the strengths of those involved, not least being Stan Batcow as Ray Reagan, woven into something much bigger than the sum of its bits, and which doesn't quite sound like anything else after all. It's of its time, I suppose, with touches of pub rock and maybe the Stranglers somewhere in there, and even passages of cod reggae which manage to not sound fucking ridiculous; and there's a wonderful Hammond organ, or something of that kind. With a bigger, more expensive production - maybe from Clive Langer or whoever it was used to work on those Elvis Costello albums - this could have been massive, which I suppose potentially makes it a lost classic.

I sometimes wonder if Stan Batcow doesn't release too much, spreading himself too thin in certain respects, so it's nice to be reminded of what he can come up with when he's firing on all four cylinders.

On sale here, although you may have to root around for a bit.