Between 1981 and 1988, the venerable British music magazine NME released a staggering thirty-six cassette compilations. These were created as giveaways, intended to be promotional items rather than artifacts of lasting cultural value. Somewhere along the line, though, the C81 and C86 tapes became part of the unofficial indie-rock canon. This week C86 is even getting a lavish, three-disc reissue this week to commemorate its enduring influence—not to mention the surprising timelessness of a scene, and a format, that once always seemed strictly ephemeral.
But what about the other 34 tapes? Taken as a whole, the NME cassette series captures the erratic scope of 80s indie, and each individual tape comprises a well-curated playlist of Northern soul, reggae, boogaloo, blues, jazz, punk, garage rock, and country music (thanks to music journalist Roy Carr, who oversaw the series and personally compiled most of them). Aside from C81 and C86, though, these tapes have been largely forgotten. To fix that, I've compiled some highlights from the lesser-known volumes of the NME’s cassette series. If you want to investigate further, the blog NME Cassettes Redux is a fantastic resource.
Dancin’ Master (NME 001, 1981)
Due to its inclusion of Scritti Politti, the Raincoats, Josef K, and Orange Juice, C81 (which bears the catalog number COPY 001; the “NME” numbering began immediately after) feels like a mash note to Rough Trade and Postcard Records. That’s always been part of both its appeal and its importance—but the NME followed C81 with Dancin’ Master, also released in 1981 but sporting a slightly funkier caliber of bands. Tom Browne’s “Funkin’ for Jamaica” is packed with brass and bounce, while Grace Jones’ “Feel Up” is more abstractly sultry. Sugarhill Records gets a plug in the form of Funky 4 + 1’s “That’s the Joint” and Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five’s “The Birthday Party”. The soul of CBGB is evoked on James White and the Blacks’ “Contort Yourself” and Talking Heads’ “Cities”, but the comp’s New York standout is Kid Creole and the Coconut’s limber, bubbling version of Machine’s disco classic “There But For the Grace of God Go I” (which was co-written by the mastermind behind Kid Creole, August Darnell). Granted, the comp also includes less dancefloor-friendly artists like Elvis Costello, U2, and the Polecats (featuring Boz Boorer, years before he’d become Morrissey’s longtime guitarist). For the most part, though, Dancin’ Master crackles with eclectic electricity.
Department of Enjoyment (NME 011, 1984)
A large percentage of the NME’s cassettes from the 80s are seemingly random mixes of tracks by established and up-and-coming indie artists—and in that sense, Department of Enjoymentis no different. But what a random mix it is. Nick Cave and the Cavemen’s deconstructed take on Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ “I Put a Spell on You” (recorded before Cave had settled on the Bad Seeds as the name of his new esnemble), rubs elbows with the Smiths, Billy Bragg, the Cocteau Twins, and C81 alumni Orange Juice. Hüsker Dü’s welt-raising “Real World” might seem like the most jarring choice of all, but it’s worth remembering just how many emerging British and Irish musicians at the time—from Swervedriver to My Bloody Valentine—would one day cite Hüsker Dü as an inspiration on their own pioneering guitar explorations.
Straight No Chaser (NME 018, 1985)
Many NME tapes are patchworks of genres; others benefit from strong, cohesive themes. The latter is the case with Straight No Chaser— a collection of post-bop jazz from the ’50s and ’60s, all of it drawn from Blue Note’s legendary catalog. Focusing on the deeply swung pulse of tracks like Herbie Hancock’s “Watermelon Man”, Lee Morgan’s “The Sidewinder”, and a host of lesser-known cuts (“Brownie Speaks” by Clifford Brown, whose death in 1956 at the age of 25 didn’t lessen his impact on a generation of trumpeters), Straight No Chaser is topped off by the Thelonious Monk standard that gives it its name. Acid jazz had yet to grip Britain, but an early hint of grooves to come can be found here.
All Africa Radio (NME 019, 1985)
Compilations of African funk and pop have proliferated over the past thirty years, but one of the best ones is actually hidden within the NME cassette series. All Africa Radio spotlights heavyweights such as Felu Kuti (with his haunting “Cross Examination”), King Sunny Ade, Youssou N’Dour and Ladysmith Black Mambazo—a year before Mambazo’s rich contribution to Paul Simon’s Graceland would send hordes of musical tourists flocking to the sounds of the continent. But the comp as a whole reveals a broad, meticulously selected range of artists and styles, from Touré Kunda’s hypnotic, Senegalese drone to “Le Best Ambience” by Congo’s Bibi Den’s Tshibaye, a frolicsome Afropop romp that Vampire Weekend either knows by heart or ought to.
Feet Start Dancin’ (NME 020, 1986)
With the rise of the British R&B scene in the 80s, there came a renewed interest in Northern soul. Those vintage, up-tempo soul singles so favored by Nothern DJs also began being compiled into many excellent vinyl compilations by labels like Kent and Charly—and the NME got in on the fun many times, most notably on Feet Start Dancin’. Titans in Northern soul like Chuck Jackson, Carl Carlton, and Jackie Wilson are well represented; Carlton’s 1968 cut “Competition Ain’t Nothin’” is a particularly punchy specimen of the stomping Northern sound. But the comp also features relentlessly danceable gems by future stars like Thelma Houston and Patti Austin, not to mention the Shirelles’ “Last Minute Miracle”, a Motown-indebted tearjerker made when the legendary girl group was struggling to reconnect with audiences in the mid-60s. History has redeemed it.
Pogo a Go Go! (NME 021, 1986)
The Damned and the Sex Pistols issued the first British punk singles in 1976; accordingly, those two groups appear on Pogo a Go Go!, the NME’s celebration of the tenth anniversary of the snot heard ’round the world. That said, there’s some thrilling variety to the tape’s sequencing. The Slits’ twitchy “Typical Girls” and the Fall’s fractured “Bingo Master’s Breakout” point toward post-punk; Sham 69’s “Borstal Breakout” and the Nipple Erectors’ “King of the Bop” (the latter fronted by a pre-Pogues Shane MacGowan) lunge straight for the jugular. The Clash’s bleeding-raw demo for “1977” is included, as are relative obscurities like Victim’s stinging “Strange Thing by Night”—and it’s bookended by the punk song to end all punk songs, Television Personalities’ 1978 anthem “Part Time Punks”. Television Personalities—along with many other groups on the tape such as Swell Maps and Subway Sect—would become a huge influence on the British indie scene in the 80s, which makes it all the more fitting that Pogo a Go Go! is the installment of the series that immediately precedes C86.
We Have Come for Your Children (NME 024, 1986)
Having dispensed with 70s punk on Pogo a Go Go!, the NME twisted the dial back one more decade.We Have Come for Your Childrencompiles twenty tracks of 60s garage rock, and it manages to dig just as deeply as any of the decade’s many Nuggets-inspiredcomps. The almost obligatory “Psychotic Reaction” by the Count Five makes an appearance, and the Kingman’s “Louie Louie” seems included more to orient the uninitiated. From there, though, the list goes haywire, in the best possible way. A heavy dose of Texas psychedelia is administered, from the Stereo Shoestrings’ proto-metallic “On the Road South” to the Moving Sidewalk’s head-rushing “Need Me” (boasting guitarist Billy Gibbons, just months before he’d form ZZ Top). And on the Lollipop Shoppe’s “You Must Be a Witch”, Fred Cole—later of Dead Moon and currently Pierced Arrows—serves up his first blast of brain-frying fuzz.
Hi-Voltage (NME 028, 1987)
In 1987, acid house was just starting to take hold in the UK; it would spark a vast new subculture and have a magnetic pull on indie music as the 90s drew nearer. Perhaps sensing that imminent EDM sea change, the NME’s Hi-Voltage cassette pulled together a kaleidoscopic set of electronic tracks from the fifteen years prior. On the plate are darkwave pioneers (Soft Cell’s “Memorabilia”), electro-pop swooners (Erasure’s “Senseless”), and proto-industrial assaults (Cabaret Voltaire’s “Baader Meinhoff”). Proud to acknowledge the synthesizer-wielding ancestors of them all, Hi-Voltage mindfully gives top billing to Suicide’s icy, epochal “Ghost Rider” and a small yet vital sampling of krautrock landmarks by the likes of Neu! and Can.
The Tape with No Name (NME 034, 1987)
Country music had been tackled before in the NME’s cassette series, but 1984’s Neon West was a compilation of oldies. The Tape with No Nametapped into the loose-knit yet undeniable wave of insurgent country artists circa 1987. With the blow-dried Nashville of the 70s and 80s looking less relevant than ever, the likes of Dwight Yoakam, Lyle Lovett, and Patty Loveless—all of whom are highlighted on The Tape with No Name—looked to their gritty, stripped-down roots for inspiration. Those roots are themselves included; Johnny Cash, Emmylou Harris, and John Prine share the comp with their spiritual offspring, with Cash’s “The Night Hank Williams Came to Town” only adding to the canonical feel. The tape leads off with Steve Earle’s “Guitar Town”, though, and it couldn’t have been a better choice; a Nashville veteran who had only just begun to strike off on his own idiosyncratic, neo-traditionalist path, Earle straddled the crux of the new and the old in late-80s country. The seeds of alt-country may as well have been planted here.
Indie City 1 (NME 036, 1988)
The next-to-last installment of the NME’s 80s cassettes, Indie City 1, brings the series full circle. Three of the bands featured on C81— Orange Juice, Josef K, and Aztec Camera— are brought out of cold storage for another indie smorgasbord; giving them even more substance are contemporaries that didn’t make it on C81, like Joy Division and Gang of Four. But the tape isn’t just a trip down NME lane. From the shimmering splendor of the Cocteau Twins’ “The Spangle Maker” to the sludgy murk of Sonic Youth’s “Death Valley '69”, the compilation veers between bands that belong to the decade and others that barely started to exert their influence on the world at large. Standing on the precipice of the 80s, Indie City 1gazed at the panorama that stretched out before: a frontier called the 90s, where shoegaze, Britpop, grunge, and alternative rock were destined to stalk the land.