LITTLE RED RECORD

"How long can I pretend that music's more relevant than fighting for a socialist world?" (Gloria Gloom)

In spite of Robert Wyatt's ideological doubts about musical activity, LITTLE RED RECORD is far better than its predecessor. This time it clearly sounds as if Matching Mole care about what they are playing. On 'Marchides' and 'Flora Fidgit', for example, Phil Miller shines on electric guitar, and Dave McRae produces some memorable phrases on electric piano. 'Righteous rhumba' equally features a superb guitar solo accompanied on organ. On 'Brandy as in Benj' McRae gets another chance to shine on piano; his playing is far more subtle than David Sinclair's was on the band's first album, and Miller accompanies him by strumming jazzy chords on guitar: premonitions of Hatfield and the North!

Judging from the album's cover, Matching Mole were firmly in thrall to Maoist ideology. I assume they were blissfully unaware that, had they lived in China, their music and lifestyle would have landed them in a re-education camp in the countryside. Maybe the Maoist posturing was intended as a joke? I just don't know what to make of lyrics such as: "My radical cheek is soft and meek / but I'll kill if I must. / I'd rather have the Chinese here than Europe on me thrust"... And then there is the fact that, in the early 1980s, Wyatt started recording songs that were close, at times, to old-fashioned agitprop... Oh well, to tell you the truth, I never really knew Matching Mole's lyrics until I found them on the Calyx website. (Apart from 'God Song', Phil Miller's lovely anti-religious diatribe.) And all their playing, at least, is first-rate. Recommended!