Small town girl (Tracey Thorn) (LP 4651 - 4655)

Tracey Thorn  A Distant Shore  (CD, Cherry Red Records, 1982) ***  

Tracey Thorn  Out of the Woods  (CD, Virgin Records, 2007) ****

Tracey Thorn  Love and the Opposite  (CD, Strange Feeling Records, 2010) ****

Tracey Thorn  Tinsel and Lights  (CD, Merge Records, 2012) ****

Tracey Thorn  Record  (CD, Merge Records, 2018) ****

Genre: Alt rock, Pop 

Places I remember: HMV, Real Groovy Records, FOPP

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: Long White Dress (Love and the Opposite)

Gear costume: It's All True (Out of the Woods) 

They loom large in his legend (The Album Collection playlists): Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5; Part 6; Part 7

Active compensatory factors: It will come as no surprise, by now, that I'm a big fan of anything Tracey Thorn does, whether it be her books, the two albums by The Marine Girls or her sublime work in Everything But The Girl. Clearly, she is a really talented writer (non-fiction and songs), singer and musician. Now my attention turns to her solo career.

That started in muted style with 1982's A Distant Shore - an acoustic album that came after The Marine Girls and before Everything But The Girl got going two years later. The understated nature of the album allows Tracey's voice to assume more importance. Her guitar work is also pretty impressive.

Solo album number 2 emerged in 2007, 25 years after her first (she'd been busy with EBTG and raising three children). It turned out to be a terrific pop album - full of great dance floor fillers.

She uses a wide range of collaborators on the album (none of which are her husband - Ben Watt) but the whole album sounds and feels like a Tracey Thorn solo album. What a remarkable and singular talent she has, and egoless!

Love and the Opposite again employs a lot of collaborators to great effect, as she pivots away from synth pop and embraces a more organic folk rock sound. That's appropriate, as it's definitely a more grown up record - as she said, it's "a record about the person I am now and the people around me ... about real life after forty". 

She succeeds brilliantly as she chronicles the changes life throws at us all, and that voice! Always brilliant.

Tinsel and Lights is her fourth solo album. It concentrates on Christmas songs by a range of modern songwriters, as well as one standard (Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas). Ben Watt appears on most tracks, and even their three children join in with some backing vocals on Tracey's song Joy.

Record is her latest solo album, as EBTG became active again in 2023. It's a return to the impressive  synth pop of Out of the Woods.

Where do they all belong? I'll always be there, thanks to Tracey Thorn's warm vocals, thoughtful lyrics and sympathetic collaborators.

A place in the sun (Marine Girls) (LP 3090)

Marine Girls  Lazy Ways (Vinyl, Music world/ Cherry Red Records, 1983) ****  

Genre: Indie-pop 

Places I remember: Hastings music shop, now gone burger.

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: Love To Know

Gear costume: A Place In The Sun

They loom large in his legend (The Album Collection playlists): Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5

Active compensatory factors: I have already written a post for the first Marine Girls album (1981's Beach Party), Lazy Ways is their second and final album. The band had already broken up by the time it came out with Tracey Thorn starting a solo career before starting Everything But The Girl.

The threesome (Thorn plus the Fox sisters) made a lot of progress in the two and a bit years between albums. The sound is light and breezy but not lo-fi. The guitars strum and the vocals are affective because they lack professionalism at this stage in their career.

It's indie-pop 1983 style to (almost) perfection. In NZ, a long way away, in Dunedin, a group called Look Blue Go Purple started up with a similar aesthetic. They'd last a little longer (1983 to 1987). If Marine Girls strike a chord you will want to also check out LBGP.

Where do they all belong? A lot more to read about my Tracey Thorn (when we get to T)/ Everything But The Girl obsession.

The future of the future (stay gold) (Everything But The Girl) (LP 317)

Everything But The Girl Temperamental (ipod/CD - Atlantic-Virgin, 1999) ***

Genre:  British pop/ dance/ electronica

Places I remember: A charity shop purchase in Caterham (no one apart from me wants to buy CDs anymore) 

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles/ Gear costume:  Temperamental




Active compensatory factors: All my CDs are in a mess - having moved they are in a jumble of boxes. Temperamental isn't among them as it's still coming via sea with our stuff from England.

So, as I was pootling school-ward today along State Highway 50 (riding the 50), and crested a ridge with the splendour of the Hawke's Bay coastline bathed in vivid red sunrise colours before me, this song came on and got me a-bopping and a-grooving.

Who needs a dancefloor?

Where do they all belong? More Ben Watt influenced than our Trace (beats, dance flavoured electronica) but as soon as the sublime vocals come in, she owns it!

Times we used to spend (Marine Girls) (LP 296)

Marine Girls Beach Party (Vinyl - Whaam/Cherry Red, 1981) ***

Genre: English pop/rock  

Places I remember: record stall in Greenwich Markets - 25 quid.  

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: All Dressed Up




Gear costume:  In Love, Fridays 

Active compensatory factors: Reading Tracey Thorn's Bedsit Disco Queen has been a delightful experience this week. That meant, as is my wont, a search for her recorded stuff.

Shazam - a trip to Greenwich Market saw me walking away with four Everything But The Girl albums and this one - her first tentative steps in what has become, against her better judgment, a music career.

I also managed to grab a signed copy of her third book, Another Planet from Waterstones in Canary Wharf. This will be joining my signed copy of The Language of Life when I get back to Nu Zild.

There are adjectival things about Tracey that strike a chord in people: genuine; self-deprecating; charming; funny; normal. Plus she's a hell of a singer with a unique style.

The Marine Girls album is yet to see her find her voice - instead it's lo-fi indie pop which is really catchy in a Violent Femmes sort of way. Easy to see why Kurt Cobain rated them in his diary!

Needless to say, my wife wasn't won over (can't you put some nice classical music on?).

I like the naive charm on offer here but, okay, I can't see it getting much airtime compared to EBTG albums.

Where do they all belong? Early doors. She was off to Hull University and a dramatic encounter with Ben Watts next.