The Mekons : 'Never Been In A Riot'

[indianland1000]

this song is great....yeahhhhhhhhhh.

[sumwhatparanoid]

thanks for uploading! wish i could find the devil at rest somewhere on youtube

[weewees1]

:-D

[RRaquello]

Wow, I have this on an old 7 inch EP. Hard to believe it's almost 35 years ago! Boy, we're all getting old. This kind of stuff was hard to find here in the US. "32 weeks" was really the big song on that record, not as far as a "hit" goes, but music & lyrics—"It takes 32 weeks of your life to get a car", etc. Good stuff was pretty obscure over here, but they sold at least one record—to me.

[sitwosaints]

Immaculate, eternal...cough

[concretejungle0720]

What a simple sound !

I'm amazed ...

[tatunkha]

This is Punk rock exemplified. I understand it's an answer to The Clash's "White riot"

I was there innit

[britsinsf]

real punk... love it

[jeffdeanable]

Such refreshing lyrics. Real good, real honest-you get bored of people bragging about fighting, it's so childish.

[mountainenergei1]

Always loved this, but to their credit they realised that 1.43 is probably enough....

[crazyreefer]

no bass tab on the mekons, what i expected, would this mean i shall try to learn it by actually LISTENING? hmm. to learn skill... xD

[ThePaLaDiP]

I think you'll find the drummer who played this song is called peter hunter, I would know because it was me.

[BigAndyK]

@ThePaLaDiP was Big John not in the Mekons at that time then. Also I thought you were with Fast records. Anyway brilliant song came just at the right time. I still have it somewhere.

[clash5j]

Having a little fun at the expense of the Clash

[ukdk123]

I have. It's fun

[seanyw89hotmailcom]

look for empire of the senseless, I think thats theyre best song

[dortyhoor]

And people call the Mekons 'post-punk, that stupid mid 80's term is so poncey.

[UltimateVenom]

the quality of mercy IS post-punk though, directly affected by punk, whereas this earlier stuff is just raw punk. i think post-punk is a good term to use when it's just after a band isn't completely 'punk' but before they create sell out new wave shit. take entertaintment by gang of four for example.

[dortyhoor]

@UltimateVenom The term 'post punk' is meaningless to me, all it denotes is the time when the music press became bored with punk and looked for another way to market music, why was it called 'post' when ggigs were at their largest and record sales were bigger than in 77 i dont know

[UltimateVenom]

yeah i know exactly what you're saying but for me i find it a useful term for bands like swell maps to put them into a 'genre' so i can tell my girlfriend and make her like them haha.

[dortyhoor]

Ha, I can sympathise with that reasoning.

I must be a really old git because I well remember when the Swell maps were also known of and called a punk band. What makes me question this term is knowing that those punk bands who did want to experiment with their sound have been victim to revisionism and written out of musical history because they didn't follow the "1.2.3.4" sound route, it also ignores punks inventiviness by restricting it to a single style of sound -or something like that

[tatunkha]

@dortyhoor correct thats what I tell em too.

[arkhangelsk]

"i'm always on the toilet"

this song is ace.

[bargainbassist]

@arkhangelsk the lyric is "i'm always *in* the toilet (bathroom) missing out the noise" ... singer is describing his absence during riots and other exciting stuff.

[arkhangelsk]

@bargainbassist yep, you're definitely right; don't know how i misheard it!

[Khultan]

Yikes.

[francisdimenno]

Somebody post the B side--please!

[Alphabex8]

those obscure mother fuckers.

[AndyFleming]

FUNKY mofos!

[Alphabex8]

I'm thinking funky AND obscure. never heard these guys before but i gotta love the underground punk

[lbgunit]

other stuff by mekons are different

[Alphabex8]

different like recording in an actual studio or different like introducing a synth and becoming art rock?