32. The Parrots - The Parrots E.P.

1. Photography Song
2. Home Sweet Home
3. Breaking Up New Ground
4. Serious Thing

Another band from the "famous" Attrix record label, here. Perhaps, Piranhas obviously exempt, they're also the best. All of these songs have ska undertones, most obvious in the best song here, Breaking Up New Ground. Well, while not actually groundbreaking, it's certainly a pleasant way to spend ten minutes, listening to this EP. Rick Blair, the man behind The Parrots, died in 1999 and a CD dedicated to him featuring The Parrots and Vol Sec is available through the ridiculously good PunkBrighton website.

Apart from this, The Parrots did a couple of songs, Larger Than Life and Vicious Circle, on Vaultage 78, available here on Youtube. In fact, listen to that whole album, it's got Nicky & The Dots, The Dodgems, Peter & The Test Tube Babies and The Piranhas besides, and what more could you want, you ungrateful swines?

1980, Attrix

31. The Flatmates - Happy All The Time

1. Happy All The Time
2. Thinking Of You

I spent the weekend in Brighton with hundreds of balding, portly men in Morrissey t-shirts. That's right, it was the "At The Edge Of The Sea" mini-festival at Concorde 2, curated by and starring David Gedge and his Wedding Present.

I didn't get to see any of the support on the first day - I was watching Enfield Town's thrilling 3-2 win over Hendon, and I regret nothing. The Wedding Present came out and did all of George Best plus a new song (which I nicked the lyrics too if anyone's interested - send me an e-mail). And it was sensational. Then on Sunday, amid all the boring acoustic folk and overrated Gedge side-projects, The Flatmates came on stage and loudly jangled away, much to the delight of one mohican and a New Order t-shirt. They opened with Happy All The Time and then did some new stuff which, surprisingly, was quite good. I'd have bought some of their stuff if I hadn't wasted all my money on a disappointing burger. Anyway, here's their site. Enjoy!

1987, The Subway Organization

30. Spooky Cabaret

1. Cheap Shoes
2. Electro Toys
3. Homicide
4. I Was There In The 60's Man
5. I'm An Actor Baby
6. Phantom Rain
7. Pictures Of Food
8. Poison Kiss
9. Season Of Regret
10. The Ancient Mariner
11. The Badger And The World Below
12. The Bus Fare Home

There is no good reason why I've not written anything in five months. I'm simply incredibly prone to not being arsed. To make up for it, there's a link at the bottom of this post to download the album. I think that's acceptable, because I've never ever seen anywhere you can listen to this anywhere else. Spooky Cabaret were based in Stoke Newington, a vegan- and communist-heavy bit of Hackney, where I live. I first heard the album in 2008, but the tracks are from all throughout the decade. The band was fronted by Mortimer Ribbons (pictured), who died a few years ago of pancreatic cancer, playing increasingly personal gigs right up to the end. I've always really liked this album, but had never thought to put it up here until a couple of weeks ago, when I was playing it in the charity shop I was working in, and people started coming up and asking who it was, asking me to send them the files. I've not put it up on Youtube because it would take ages and I'm sensationally "busy", and besides, I think you ought to download and share it. There is one video I found of them online, a short movie with an alternative version of The Bus Fare Home playing over the top. Anyway, do download the album and let me know what you think on Twitter. A warning: the file is quite large, due to track ten being a half-hour re-telling of The Ancient Mariner.

2008, Independent
Download

29. Lime Headed Dog - Ronnie O'Sullivan

1. Ronnie O'Sullivan

Poor old Mick Price, the Nuneaton snooker player who never accomplished anything. Best known for sitting down, and watching Ronnie O'Sullivan clear the table in the quickest maximum of all time. This is an incredible break, one which only Ronnie could produce (good quality video here), and it was only a matter of time before it was set to an avant-garde, and oddly moving soundtrack. If you're not a fan of snooker, it might be useful to know a bit about Ronnie O'Sullivan: perhaps the most talented snooker player ever, he accomplished far less than he should have. He was a major championship winner at 17, and could play with the speed and flair that made Jimmy White so popular. Crucially, though, Ronnie wasn't a bottler and went on to win four World Championships, playing right-handed and left-handed. He is, of course, completely mad, a perfectionist and highly self-critical. His dad was five years into an 18 year stretch for murder when he made this break, which I'm sure didn't help. Ronnie threatened to give up the game every year, before finally doing so in June. He suffers from clinical depression and has had problems with drugs. The song only works with the video, so set aside seven minutes and listen to it - don't just put it on in the background. I don't know anything else about Lime Headed Dog, but I love them for producing this masterpiece.

Thanks to @HodgkinsonJohn for the suggestion

28. Attempted Moustache - Superman

1. Superman
2. No Way Out

The kids of today will find this difficult to comprehend, but there was, in the early 80s, a time before Half Man Half Biscuit. I mean, they literally didn't exist. It was mostly darkness. They would later explode into existence, like the universe itself, forming from the remnants of other short-lived New Wave bands based in Birkenhead (here my analogy falls down). Attempted Moustache (along with Venom, Split Gut and North of Watford) were one of these bands. This single, their only one, was released in 1980. Simon Blackwell (Biscuits guitarist 1984-94) and Paul Wright (drummer 1984-93) were both members of this excellently-named band, but with the lyrical genius of Blackwell's brother, Nigel, missing, this is a pretty ordinary release. However, it is an interesting piece of history, if you're me or very like me.

1980, Skeleton Records

27. Swell Maps - Read About Seymour

1. Read About Seymour
2. Ripped & Torn
3. Black Velvet

Read About Seymour was the first single by Swell Maps, one of those influential yet widely ignored groups. I'd only ever heard of them through Television Personalities' Part-Time Punks, which mentions this single - three songs and five minutes later and I'm already in love with this band. Given that this single was recorded and released before Shot By Both Sides, you could say it was proto-post-punk, and Swell Maps went on to do some weirder, more avant-garde stuff. All three of their Peel sessions are on Youtube, here, here and here, as well as their entire second album, here. The brothers who formed Swell Maps (Epic Soundtracks and Nikki Sudden - not their real names) are both dead, but bassist Jowe Head continues to release solo material and joined Television Personalities for a while in the eighties. That's all I got, enjoy your 90 second art punk.

1977, Rather Records

Thanks to @HodgkinsonJohn for the suggestion

26. Angelic Upstarts - The Murder Of Liddle Towers

1. The Murder Of Liddle Towers
2. Police Oppression

This is, I promise, a rare foray into Oi! territory. Liddle Towers was an amateur boxer from Durham who was beaten to death by the police ("justifiable homicide"). Angelic Upstarts are a socialist punk rock band, still going, defying the Oi! stereotype of racist skinheads. I'm of the opinion that just before Punk died, it gave birth to the intelligent, charming Post-punk and its evil twin Oi!, and that the latter ought to be ignored or derided. Especially the Skrewdriver contingent. However, this single is the exception; angry lyrics ("he was drunk and disorderly and now he's dead"), an important message and adequately imaginative music combining to produce a surprisingly powerful song. Police Oppression is just not as good, nowhere near as intelligent or interesting, and by now Angelic Upstarts have more than made their point. Anti-fascism and leftist politics aside, I don't think the band ever did anything else worth praising.

1978, Dead Records

Best of 2012

In a year without a Fall album, what could there possibly be to celebrate?

KENNEDY (TOQUIWA)
I saw Toquiwa support The Wedding Present in Camden about a month ago. I preferred them to Gedge's popular beat combo, who all look a bit too old and decrepid to still be singing about one girl. Toquiwa's album, which I bought at the gig, ends with this cover of one of the aformentioned indie miserablists masterpieces, Kennedy, which I've probably listened to every day since. Irritatingly, that was their last UK tour date, but if they return I recommend seeing them and their crazy stage antics.

HUSBANDS (SAVAGES)

Savages are more traditional post-punk, Husbands sounds like it could've been released in 1980. Which is obviously what we all want. Savages have clearly listened to Holiday In Cambodia and a bit of the Banshees. They did a set for that lickspittle Jools Holland earlier this year, on Youtube here.

SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE (PERFECT HAIR FOREVER)

This is a bit more left-field. I just stumbled across Perfect Hair Forever on the internet somewhere. Research suggests that it's one anonymous bloke in Auckland who needs to get out more. There's some more stuff from PHF on Bandcamp, but this is the best one out there.

IT'S OK JOHN-JOE (DEXYS)
The first Dexys Midnight Runners (now simply Dexys) album in nearly 30 years came out in June. There's nothing great on there, but this is good. If you ignore the bits where he's whinging and bullshitting, which admittedly comprise a fairly large section of the song, the singing is beautiful. Then there's an upbeat and unnecessary bit at the end, which is mildly catchy but irrelevant. Jesus, though, it's an improvement on the ending to this early version (from 6:20).

THE BURSTER (THE NIGHTINGALES)
I wish I knew why The Nightingales aren't celebrated in the same way as The Fall. Pigs on Purpose, released in the same year as Hex Enduction Hour, is as good as anything Mark E Smith ever did or said (except when he said this). Their latest album, No Love Lost, has no amazing stand-out tracks but works brilliantly as a whole. Starting with the line "I was as dry as a dead girl's cunt in the desert", it's not an easy listen, but by track five you're in prog-punk heaven. Buy it.

SPITFIRE (PUBLIC SERVICE BROADCASTING)
I really really love this song. This is my favourite song of the year, and with a cool video to boot. Spitfire appears on The War Room EP, and is the only reason for buying it. That bit where the guitar comes in at about 1:20 is so great. Lovely music goodness.

25. Les Cox Sportifs - Total Straightness

1. The Hand & The Heed (The Heel, The Teat, The Hair & The Beak Grew)
2. Wrong Side
3. It Gave Back

"We party to distract from the pointlessness of life, and to remind ourselves of the optimism of living. Viva autonomia!" Les Cox Sportifs, "a politically correct band from the North East", play a punk, folk, rock 'n' roll blend. To date they've done two albums (Never Heed and Scheiß Mit Reis). I've not heard the second but the first is excellent. This EP was released between the two, and you can download it for a very reasonable £2 here. Although, weirdly, the tracks are only 50p individually. It's been two years since their last album, but their Facebook page tells me that they will soon "unearth a keech load of new sh*t". The links I've put up are just to their Bandcamp page, because I couldn't be arsed to upload them to Youtube. Enjoy!

2009, Clunk Click Records.

24. Pere Ubu - 30 Seconds Over Tokyo

1. 30 Seconds Over Tokyo
2. Heart Of Darkness

It was about time I acquainted myself with Pere Ubu, founders of "avant-garage" and influential art-rockers; so that's just what I did, working my way through their entire singles discography in one sitting (I don't have a job). They started 37 years ago, in Cleveland, and have never had any actual success. Only David Thomas remains from the original line-up, while 12 others have left - impressive, but obviously not a patch on The Fall. I tend to pride myself on my enjoyment of tiring, attritional music, but even I found this lot tough to handle. 30 Seconds Over Tokyo I've always known and had a soft spot for - it's about six minutes of noise, although you can discern a melody if you listen hard - and the rest of their output is well worth a listen to as well. Incredible to think that this came out a year before New Rose and punk rock. The b-side, Heart Of Darkness, is just as "fun" - if you like the same thing done over and over again, or The Fall, then the commercially nonviable Pere Ubu are definitely for you. I'm no expert but I'd also recommend Non-alignment Pact from The Modern Dance (1977). I have so much catching up to do with this band, I hope the neighbours like experimental art-punk. Watch out for their new album, Lady From Shanghai, due out in January. "No-one can come close to matching our loss to longevity ratio."

1975, Hearthan
Thanks to @ackleite for the suggestion

23. Half Man Half Biscuit - Look Dad No Tunes

1. Look Dad No Tunes
2. Ecclesiastical Perks
3. Lock Up Your Mountain Bikes

Nigel Blackwell is the greatest poet of the 20th century and Half Man Half Biscuit are better than The Smiths. They're a funny band, but don't make the mistake of thinking they're a naff comedy band - "No disrespect to the Grumbleweeds, but I think there's a bit more to us", as Blackwell puts it. Although Look Dad No Tunes did not even make it through the group stages in 2011's Lux Familiar Cup, it's wonderful and brilliant. The other songs, admittedly, are below par for our Birkenhead pals. Lock Up Your Mountain Bikes is fairly conventional observational comedy, and as such worthless. Their masterpieces, or some of them, are A Country Practice, A Lilac Harry Quinn, National Shite Day and the Fall-esque Thy Damnation Slumbereth Not. There's a whole army of dedicated Biscuit fans out there - have a look at the Half Man Half Biscuit Lyrics Project, which has grown into so much more (best site on the internet?). God, I love this band. And now you shall too. Lyrics

1999, Probe Plus

22. Vic Godard - Better Not Turn On

1. Better Not Turn On (Vic Godard)
2. Entre Les Marolles Et St Gilles (Georgio 'The Dove' Valentino)

Vic Godard was, along with Perry, Devoto and Lydon, one of the four great figures of the punk era. You definitely ought to get acquainted with their second single, Ambition. Thirty five years later and he's still plugging away, sometimes still under the Subway Sect moniker. Vic very rarely indulges us with any new material, so a new a new single should be cherished - Better Not Turn On, this year's offering, is fine. Not great, but fine. As usual, you can't hear a word he's saying, but as with Mark E Smith that somehow barely matters. The b-side is not Godard, but Georgio 'The Dove' Valentino. How is it? Meh. More mellow, and less good. I only paid £1 for the single of their website, so it was just about worth it. Also listen to Vic's 6Music session with The Sexual Objects here. We can expect a new album next year, 1979 Now! which I think is a re-recording of the album which got lost in a flood back in 1979.

21. Public Service Broadcasting - Everest

1. Everest

Spitfire (reviewed here), which came out in March, is probably the best song of the year. The EP it was on, The War Room, was new and interesting - I actually paid money for it. By now you'd hope the band would've evolved a bit, but Everest follows the format of its predecessor far too closely, to the point where it sounds like a parody of itself. The music is very good - I won't pretend that PSB aren't very good at making music - but J Willgoose, Esq. and Wrigglesworth haven't really taken the band in a new direction. Also, they look like twats. I wondered what the point of the song was, what it was trying to communicate to me. It might just be that it's a bloke from the fifties talking over some admittedly fairly catchy melodies. And that's been done. I'm pretty disappointed with this single (three irritating remixes are also available), but I'll buy the album when it comes out. I just hope that it's different somehow.

2012, Public Service Broadcasting

20. The Wedding Present - Why Are You Being So Reasonable Now?

1. Why Are You Being So Reasonable Now?
2. Not From Where I'm Standing
3. Give My Love To Kevin (Acoustic Version)
4. Getting Better

The Wedding Present have been doing one thing for nearly 30 years now, but they do it well. Like all Wedding Present songs, Why Are You Being So Reasonable Now? is about a domestic argument with jangly guitar noises in the background. It's ace. The EP also contains the one of the best Beatles covers in Getting Better (perhaps second only to Laibach's One After 909). This was recorded during the golden period of The Wedding Present, in the middle of their wonderful trilogy of George Best (1987), Bizarro (1989) and Seamonsters (1991). The band are often mocked - and in fact, I did it above - for always sounding the same, for having easy-to-parody song titles, but some of what they write is genuinely moving. As one Youtube commenter puts it, "If he'd spent the last 24 years disappearing up his own a***hole like Morrissey he'd no doubt be lauded as one of this country's best artists." I find it hard to disagree. For further listening, My Favourite Dress, Brassneck and the much later Interstate 5.

1988, Reception

19. Dot Dash - The Past Is Another Country

1. The Past Is Another Country
2. Shouting In The Rain

Dot Dash contacted me a week ago with information on their latest album, Winter Garden Light. Luckily, I was saved the embarrassment of politely ignoring them, because it's actually rather good (and you can listen to, then buy it here). The Past Is Another Country is catchy and poppy, and certainly doesn't outstay its welcome at one and a half minutes. I chose Shouting In The Rain as the second song from the album, but it's best if you listen to whole ten tracks in one go. Dot Dash are made up of guitarist/singer Terry Banks, bassist Hunter Bennett, guitarist Bill Crandall and drummer Danny Ingram, and they've played with, among others, The Drums and Hugh Cornwell. You can also read an interview with the band, and watch Learn How To Fly from their previous album if you like what you hear. And if you still live in the 1940s you can buy Winter Garden Light as a CD (remember CDs, folks?) here. This is good, fun, stuff. Post-punk with a human face.

2012, The Beautiful Music

Download

18. The Monochrome Set - The Ruling Class

1. The Ruling Class
2. Espresso

I'll come clean right away - this isn't a proper single. I just googled singles by The Monochrome Set and hit upon this promotional affair, which had two of my favourites. They formed in 1978 from the ruins of The B-Sides, and Wikipedia describes them better than I could - "The band is notable for its witty lyrics, the laconic delivery of lead singer Bid, and the idiosyncratically retrogressive playing style of original lead guitarist Lester Square." Morrissey picked up on them in the ludicrous Mackie letters in 1980 ("Did I tell you that I'm presently having a sexual relationship with the Monochrome Set? Yummy!"). Anyway, these songs are fairly accessible, but for some reason TMS never made it past 81 on the singles chart. The Ruling Class is a two-and-a-half-minute song, full of lovely words - "My young fag's an MP's son, and he warms my toilet seat" - and a catchy five-note jingle in the chorus. Espresso is very catchy, light indie,  and equally cheerful and amusing. The Ruling Class is on Eligible Bachelors, and Espresso is on Strange Boutique (no. 62 in albums chart). Because of this new thing called 'Youtube', you can hear the last two of their three Peel sessions here and here.

1984, PDI

17. Public Service Broadcasting - The War Room

1.  If War Should Come

2.  London Can Take It

3.  Spitfire

4.  Dig For Victory

5.  Waltz For George

Hold on to your hats, this one's contemporary. The band's shtick is that they take old public service broadcasts and propaganda videos, while playing cool music over the top. They describe themselves as "learning the lessons of the past through the music of the future". Spitfire is the pick of the tracks here (and rightly won BBC 6 Music's Rebel Playlist), but you really ought to listen to the EP all the way through. Their website allows you to download their first EP for free here, though please do donate. And you can get all the songs from this EP on Youtube if you're unsure about downloading. In fact, why are you even reading this? There's a far better review here.

2012, Test Card Recording

16. The Hitchers - You Can Only Love Someone

1. You Can Only Love Someone
2. Strachan

You Can Only Love Someone So Much, But You Can Hate Them All The Way To Hell (to give it its full name) is a slightly above-par, fairly ignorable two-and-a-half-minute pop song. Strachan, however, is one of the greatest songs - no, things - anyone has ever done or thought of or thought about thinking of. The Hitchers call Half Man Half Biscuit an inspiration, but this, as far as I know, is the only Hitchers song worthy of our Birkenhead pals. It is the greatest song about football. Let there be no further debate about it. The lyrics are wonderful - She said what's that you're watching? It's a programme about art. She said a programme about art? I said a programme about art - and the inevitable descent into a wall of noise is pleasing. There's some more Hitchers stuff out on that Youtube website (all of it approximately 6/10), a Peel session you can no doubt download from a dubious Russian torrent site somewhere, and a couple of albums and irritatingly-titled EPs.

1997, Murgatroid Independent Recording Company

15. Nicky & The Dots - Never Been So Stuck

1. Never Been So Stuck
2. Linoleum Walk

Some upbeat, two-and-a-half-minute pop-punk that apparently did quite well in the Indie Charts. The band was formed in 1977 in Brighton by Nick Dwyer and Chris D'Ouseley (art students, naturally) - they released this one single, had three tracks on Vaultage 78, did one Peel session and presumably split up. Honestly that's all I can find on this band, the internet is massively overrated. I think what I like most is that the band name follows the wildly underused "x & the y" formula, but the songs are alright too. Superior b-side, actually. Nicky and at least one other dot were also in a band called Louder Animal Group, who independently released a record I don't own and probably won't buy.

1979, Small Wonder Records

14. The Dodgems - Lord Lucan Is Missing

1. Lord Lucan Is Missing
2. Gotta Give It Up

Richard John Bingham, 7th Earl of Lucan, went missing in 1974 after having killed his childrens' nanny. He was officially declared dead in 1999 (which seems arbitrary), although plenty of loonies and fanatics have sighted him since. Some people are obsessed with him. The Dodgems, who began as "Jet-Slag", wrote this song four years later (a far superior version to this appears on Vaultage 78, and can be found on that Youtube here. Also, a weird cover version by Black Box Recorder), and made it their second and final single. Drummer Charlie Zuber said the song was about "how irrelevant the news is to our lives. It really doesn't matter whether Lord Lucan is missing or not." I was surprised by the strength of the b-side here, a song about smoking, but it's nothing on Lucan. There might be a few crackles on the track, because it came straight from the ol' vinyl (remember that, folks?).

1980, Criminal Records