The Vaselines

This morn­ing I had to write a short piece on The Vase­lines, jus­ti­fy­ing their inclu­sion in a forth­com­ing list of the 50 Great­est Scot­tish Bands… Ever! (I don’t think it’ll be called that, but you get the idea.)

It was quite a tricky propo­si­tion. Sure, you can say things about their com­bi­na­tion of effort­lessly crafted pop songs and a sham­bling, inept, erm, sub-​pop style. Or go on for a bit about how much Kurt Cobain liked them. And I did. But - and bands like this are rarer than hen’s teeth - there’s no way you can per­suade some­one to love The Vase­lines by com­par­i­son to other bands, or lengthy eulo­gies to their short-​lived genius, or daft jour­nalese cant sugggest­ing that they sound like Lou Reed shag­ging all the Supremes at the same time. Nope, you have to play them Son Of A Gun. And then they will love The Vase­lines too.

So, on the offchance anyone read­ing hasn’t heard it before: The Vase­lines - Son Of A Gun (4.4MB MP3).

(The above file will only be avail­able for a lim­ited time, and is intended as an encour­age­ment to buy The Way Of The Vase­lines: A Com­plete His­tory, or sim­i­lar. Go on, what are you wait­ing for? And if any ex-​Vaselines, or their pals, are read­ing and don’t like this music shar­ing lark, let me know and I’ll take down the file.)

Posted at 4pm on 20/09/04 by Jack Mottram to the music category.
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Tags: fix, music