ALBUMCLASSIC PELICAN WEST HAIRCUT ONE HUNDRED A FRESH, DARING MILLION-SELLER. NOW THAT’S HOW YOU MAKE A DEBUT ALBUM. THE FACT THAT IT WAS NEVER PROPERLY FOLLOWED UP REMAINS FRUSTRATING EVEN 30 YEARS LATER. BUT THAT ALSO MAKES HAIRCUT ONE HUNDRED’S MAGNUM OPUS ALL THE MORE SPECIAL… IAN PEEL

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ack in 1982 there Haircut One Hundred wasn’t a self- weren’t together respecting dancefl oor for long enough, but Nick Heyward still – or even a front regularly plays live room – that didn’t Bhave a copy of Haircut One Hundred’s debut album on the turntable. It was a remarkable feat, given that these were the fi rst recordings by a group of teenagers who went from bedroom rehearsals to Top Ten in a matter of months. It was doubly remarkable given how undated this collection of songs remains after the decades that have passed. But Pelican West rarely gets mentioned in the media and has never been properly reissued. Here to correct that is this issue’s Classic Album spotlight, for which we sat down with Nick Heyward backstage at the Rewind North festival to trace the story of Pelican West from the man who was at the eye of the storm...

How much of Pelican West was already written when you fi rst got a record deal? Marc Pinder

TRACK BY TRACK Also released on , an early Backed with a non-album jam, , it Les Nemes shares a co-writing credit on this 1 FAVOURITE SHIRTS Pelican Dance Ski Club (BOY MEETS GIRL) four-track 12” club promo, with Kingsize, was the group’s last release to use Nick’s song, unlike the rest of the tracks which are The debut single, and one of two tracks on Baked Bean and Calling Captain Autumn. graphic style on sleeve and label. (The all Heyward compositions. Pelican West was group’s artwork and visual sense was profi led the pop end of a wave of real-life Brit-funk Pelican West to feature the group’s original 4 MARINE BOY in Issue 12). As for the video, the drummer, Patrick Hunt. He’d joined when Slap bass, a piano solo, Marc Fox’s timbales, Classic Pop that appeared in 1982. Released in the same Heyward, Nemes and Smith were still known Nick Heyward’s spontaneous lyrics and one less said about that the better. week alone were albums by Pigbag, Fun Boy as indie upstarts Moving England. Favourite Three and Spandau Ballet. of Phil Smith’s more raucous sax breaks 8 BAKED BEAN Shirts was in the Top Five within weeks of combine for the B-side of Love Plus One. If anything points the way to the second, lost 11 the group getting their record deal. You can SURPRISE ME AGAIN Check the 12” vinyl for a richer, darker Heyward & Haircut album, it’s this track. The see the bewilderment in their eyes when Less of a full-band jam and more of a extended version – that has yet to appear band started recording at Richard Branson’s performing the track on daytime TV – see rounded, Nick-focussed song. For more of on CD or iTunes – and which features the live Manor studios. A fourth single, Nobody’s the latter, a wealth of solo material followed The Big Picture, following page. rap that gave Pelican West its name. Fool, was the result but nothing more was Pelican West. And for more of the former, 2 LOVE PLUS ONE 5 MILK FILM issued and the project was shelved when there’s Favourite Shirts’ B-side, Boat Party, As a 7”, this song went one step higher than Shorter and simpler than anything else on Nick left. The Manor sessions did appear on a (Pat Hunt’s only other released session for Favourite Shirts in the singles chart, reaching the album, Milk Film is a song that strips semi-offi cial Noughties bootleg, Half-Baked. the band). No. 3 in January 1982. Head to YouTube to the Haircut sound back to its early, Moving (The appearance of baked beans on the 12 relive the near six-minute 12” version, which England-style essentials and points the way cover of Nick’s 1993 album From Monday to CALLING CAPTAIN is ridiculously hard to track down on CD (it’s to much of Nick Heyward’s later solo work. Sunday seems incidental... or is it?) AUTUMN on a 2009 Japanese compilation, 80s × 12” An album highlight, and a live highlight, Collection). This track was also the group’s 6 KINGSIZE (YOU’RE 9 SNOW GIRL Calling Captain Autumn could easily be 12 only hit in the US. It’s since popped up on MY LITTLE STEAM A fi xture – bizarrely – on Christmas minutes long rather than the four minutes Glee and in movies including Se7en, Edge of WHISTLE) compilation albums in mainland Europe, the that close out Side Two, a perfect Haircut One Seventeen and Knocked Up. The album’s biggest dance track. “I’ve been work of the album’s producer Bob Sargeant is Hundred jam where all the elements of the misinformed,” said Smash Hits. “I thought to the fore here. More of which can be found 3 LEMON FIREBRIGADE group combine to singular effect. As David these chaps were raw novices. From where on recent reissues such as The Beat’s A platform for the group’s dexterity: Les The Hepworth said at the time in Smash Hits, it’s did they get the poise, the confi dence, the Complete Studio Recordings, Joy Division’s all about “the winning vocals, the sturdy, Nemes’ wandering bass, Smith’s “Billy sheer class to fashion a debut this subtle?” Whizz guitar”, Phil Smith’s brass melodies... 1979 Radio Sessions and Gary Numan’s The fl exible rhythm section, creamy saxophone, No surprise that, as well as reforming, the 7 FANTASTIC DAY Complete John Peel Sessions. the poignant thoroughly British songs. I could original members have also talked of playing The third and fi nal single from the album, 10 LOVE’S GOT ME IN say you can dance to it; the fact is you simply under a new name: The Lemon Firebrigade. Fantastic Day reached No. 9 in April 1982. TRIANGLES will dance to it.”

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Nick Heyward talking to Classic Pop at the The Rewind North festival pLAYerS Nick Heyward leslie Nemes Pelican West’s lead singer and After Haircut One Hundred, chief songwriter. When group like Graham Jones, bassist life and their massive, instant Les briefly joined Boys success proved too much Wonder before vanishing, for all concerned, Nick embarked on a solo musically speaking, though he did pop up on career, delivering eight albums (so far), from Norwegian duo The Monroe’s 1985 album 1983’s North of a Miracle through to 2006’s Face Another Day and has appeared on The Mermaid and the Lighthouse Keeper. many of Nick Heyward’s solo releases. More In terms of critical and commercial success, prolific of late, Les has started sharing his Warning Sign and Laura – in 1984 and 1985 bass secrets on his own YouTube channel at respectively – were the peak of his singles. youtube.com/leslienemesbass

GraHam PHil smitH JoNes As a session saxophonist, Phil Graham jumped from the hasn’t had a dull moment, Haircuts into Boys Wonder post-Haircut One Hundred. and stayed with them for the He went straight from duration of their almost-career. “Success the group into sessions for Toyah and his could be but a leering wink away for these discography has taken in Paul Rutherford’s tacky, sub-glam revivalists,” Melody Maker cult classic 1989 album Oh World, various wrote of an early gig, but it was never to be. tracks for Transvision Vamp and ABC (on both Decamped to Cornwall, helping to set up the the Abracadabra and Up albums), Spinning first SAS (Surfers Against Sewage) festival The Wheel from George Michael’s Older and and working as a tree surgeon. tracks for Pixie Lott including Boys and Girls.

marc Fox blair Marc took on vocal duties cuNNiNGHam when Nick Heyward left, One of the most visible post- fronting the group for Paint Haircut players, Blair took and Paint. He then became up stints with The Pretenders So Favourite Shirts was Haircuts retreated firmly a session percussionist for some of the and then with Off The Ground-era Paul already fully-formed at back into Brit-funk for highlights of Eighties wonky pop (Hollywood McCartney. Nineties high points included that stage? Paint and Paint. Beyond, Breathe) as well as some if its Alison Moyet’s Hoodoo and Kevin Rowland’s Yeah, Favourite Shirts, Love Yeah, it went very funky. I kept stadium highlights (Paul McCartney, Depeche My Beauty. He’s also worked with synth Plus One, Marine Boy, going to see them live. It was Mode, Cher), before helping kick-start the pioneer Thomas Leer, as well as Blancmange Surprise Me Again... At that like a Spinal Tap moment. careers of both the Spice Girls and, equally and John Foxx. David Phoenix’s This is my particular point we didn’t Graham Ward joined important to Classic Pop, The Beloved. World marks his most recent appearance. have Fantastic Day, even because Blair had left. And though that was the song I Graham ended up coming learned to sing and play in with me on an American tour Well, we’d been lifted us and we played better. my bedroom in the punk days, with Kite. playing, we’d developed into It made us sound even more to learn to play guitar... a six-piece band, and when authentic and funkier. And so Listening to Pelican West, Blair joined – and Mark and we thought ‘wow, we’re really ...but it hadn’t yet my perception’s always phil – we became a proper getting good’. become a finished song? been that the songs live force and became really I was more into Talking It had, but only Les, Graham were jammed to life. good. We’d arrived at the heads and scratchy XTc and I knew it. The MD of the Well, yes, the backing tracks start of this Brit funk wave, stuff but it developed into record company said, ‘have were Les, Blair and myself though it was really small. But something like chic. even you got any other songs?’ funking. I knew what some of we were on the same wave as though I wasn’t into chic. I’m And we just sort of looked the songs were and would be, ABc, Funkopolitan... Though a better rhythm guitarist than at each other! Les hates the but with others I just used to they seemed to have better lead, I tend to play my lead song now, but he was the scat. Calling Captain Autumn, wetsuits, I must say. We were on piano. one that said ‘what about I was literally just scatting still in our pants. Scrags from We were rehearsing at Fantastic Day?’ So we played over them, funking. That’s why South London. easy hire or somewhere, it and you could see the MD the lyrics are straight out of And then gradually, when somewhere at London Bridge, just going, literally, ‘Get the the subconscious. Sometimes we got Blair, it was like and Arista came down and pen!’ That was the clincher. I people come up to me and ‘oh my God! It’s got that they wanted to sign us but talked to them afterwards and say ‘What are you singing?’ American feel’. We became they were still undecided they said when that song was But I don’t know, and I can’t really funky. What we’d because nobody had really played they knew we had even remember it now. But I aspired to be, we suddenly seen this band. ‘Who was this life beyond Brit-funk... Little used to love to free-form that became. And then Marc is a band that everyone wants to did they know! We were only one live. brilliant percussionist and then sign?’ They came down and together another 18 months. After we signed to Arista, suddenly them two together we played Favourite Shirts, it was a case of ‘these songs – Marc and Blair – we had a and we played them some Though when you left, have got to be demoed’ but fantastic rhythm section, it just funk stuff. after Pelican West, the I was still chipping away at

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kingsize Swap Shop, February 1982 Yes, they’re miming, but this – the only TV performance of Kingsize – is worth watching way more than any of the throwaway, comic book videos the group made for the three singles from Pelican West. Musically, it’s an unreleased edit which shuffles around Marc Fox’s fantastic timbale solo with Les Nemes’ slap bass breakdown. And where was this aired? The Tube, maybe? Or The Old Grey Whistle Test? No, Noel Edmonds’ Multi Coloured Swap Shop, believe it or not. https://www. youtube.com/ watch?v= GlweiYWhHUA

Favourite shirts Afternoon Plus, October 1981 One of the group’s earliest TV appearances, on the BBC’s Afternoon Plus. “When teenagers seem to have fewer prospects than ever before,” announces the presenter, “the success of three boys from Beckingham in Kent comes like a breath of fresh air.” The three boys the camera cuts to are Nick, Les and Graham, but Marc,

Marc Pinder Blair and Phil are also on set for a live rendition of Favourite Shirts, the week it hit No. 4. They also perform a live jam around Kingsize. https://www. “I was more into Talking Heads and scratchy youtube.com/ watch?v=HMKZm_ XTC stuff but it developed into something like IQrvo Chic. Even though I wasn’t into Chic. I’m a better caLLing caPtain autumn rhythm guitarist than lead, I tend to play my lead French TV, Summer 1982 on piano.” nick heyward The only footage of the band in concert, at the height of their success. A whole show at the Hammersmith Odeon was filmed in June 1982 and broadcast on French TV, from which two tracks have made it to YouTube. As David them. Then, when Pelican bootleg of out-takes released Hepworth later remembered, he and fellow writer Mark Ellen were there, and West was being properly a few years ago). Smash Hits literally the only men in the audience. From recorded, I thought ‘this has a well rehearsed Calling Captain Autumn, the got to be final’. SoCalling There were three non- group, with trumpet and trombone, go into a Captain Autumn’s lyrics album tracks that were speedy Love Plus One. became “Give it a rest/ released as B-sides: https://www. quarantine/ECG mapping Boat Party, Ski Club youtube.com/ my brain”, referencing Dustin and October is Orange. watch?v= Hoffman’s The Graduate, just Did you approach those A0xKcdDpo9s things that I loved, things that three as a chance to were of the time. I suppose show off a different side Love PLus one that’s where Haircut One of the band? Top Of The Pops, December 1982 Hundred came from, the Absolutely. We’d go into the The band reconvene for a second Top Of The Pops run-through of Love Plus One, this time for subconscious, that creative studio especially to do the the Christmas edition. Richard Skinner’s on the intro and John Peel’s on the outro, quipping nowhere land. B-side. Like with Ski Club, about them being covered in spots. But then they had only just left their teens and already it was again with Les, Blair scored two Top Ten hits and a No. 2 album. Is there much left and I – and Graham joined By far their most accomplished of many TOTP over from the album up on that one – and it felt appearances, sitting exactly mid-way between sessions? like it originated from the the fresh-faced naivety of Favourite Shirts, and Yeah, there’s a song we beginning: everyone looked the end-of-the-road blues played when we were a three- to me to come up with a riff, of Nobody’s Fool less than piece, or a four-piece, called so I’d start playing a riff. And a year later. Sunny Boy Sunny Girl. That’s Blair would – because he’s https://www. like a mixture of Favourite so natural, he’s gifted – just youtube.com/ Shirts and Love Plus One. It start to play in his drums. watch?v=5l2rL4JOl24 came out on Half Baked (a And there it was. I remember

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Marc plying the whole thing with mad stuff: he was into Kraftwerk and started putting Kraftwerk stuff over it... I mean Fantastic Day, Love Plus One and Favourite Shirts turned out to be the singles, but I didn’t pick the singles. Somebody else at Arista did that. We were just into the creative process. I’m sure if we’d carried on – if there wasn’t the pressure there was, chucking each other out and that kind of stuff – it would have carried on into a really good creative force.

How did the producer, Bob Sargeant, come into the picture? We loved The Beat and when we signed to Arista, he had just produced them. And he was John Peel’s producer at the Beeb. He’d produced The Beat’s sessions and Tears of a Clown, which was a BBC recording they loved so much they actually released. Then he got to do the album and on and go to another record that’s how he became well “I would love for us to go back to the beginning company (without me). They known. We loved Best Friend, wanted to carry on and then Mirror in the Bathroom and and start playing clubs like Ronnie Scott’s. To let it they sued for the name, even stuff like that. happen naturally, the people that were there would though it was my name and I started the band. But I was What do you think are be there because they love it, it would be nothing like ‘You know what? I don’t the chances of a full- to do with money.” NICK HEYWARD want to stop you working if scale Haircut reunion? you want to carry on ‘cos, I get the impression hey, I might be joining again certain ex-members Is there a particular It had a great title though, too, later’. That did happen won’t participate if track from Pelican West and they’re really important. eventually, but we couldn’t others do... that stands out to you as get together then and we still I know, I’m 53 and I can’t a lost gem? So you had Steambus haven’t got together... I’m still believe it either! We were 19, Well, I think the album was Junction, but how far the only one who’s not in the 20 back then... I think it’s a very much the sum of its parts. progressed were the band. I keep making these case of if anybody’s got any It worked as a record, it really sessions that followed gigs available for everybody issues, just get over them. But did. But Calling Captain Pelican West, before the to come and play and some there is, and if there is then Autumn, I felt like that was a time when you left? people do and some people there is. I haven’t got any very unique piece of music We’d gone into The Manor don’t, but it’s never all six issues. The way I look at it is, as a recording. It was that recording studios, but Marc of us. Also when people get I’m always up for it, always perfect happy accident, like and Phil weren’t there in the older... sometimes I don’t a yes from me. When we where the bird sounds went in beginning. We’d just come always feel like playing those played at Cadogan Hall a with the drum intro. back from America and that’s songs. They’re really hard to few years ago, I wanted it to when the band started to split play because they’re full of be all six of us, but it ended If I had my way Lemon up. Comments like ‘I don’t energy and exuberance and up being four. What I would Firebrigade would have want to do it if he’s in it’. If being 20. It can take a lot to love would be for us to go come out as a 12” only we’d had a manager, they do that! back to the beginning and or something... would have turned around start playing clubs like Ronnie Yeah, Calling Captain Autumn and said ‘You know what? Scott’s or somewhere like that. and Lemon Firebrigade, You’re in business together LISTEN UP! To let it happen naturally, the just for the titles alone. They guys’. Which I’m sure Check out the songs and videos from Haircut One people that were there would worked. We also had a song happened in Depeche Mode, Hundred’s Pelican West album be there because they love it, like that called Steambus or Duran Duran. But when it’s via the Classic it would be nothing to do with Junction planned for the left up to some kids, where Pop playlist. money. We’d just be there second album but it didn’t there is no manager of the Follow the link because we get on and we’re really work like those songs band, nobody could tell us. at http://bit. lovely guys. And we all do. worked. It might have worked So a second album was ly/1GqsMy4 It’s silly. but it never really developed. there but they wanted to carry

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