Black Hole / Really Hard / Riders / Fairground / Stripmining / Bonjour (What For) / What In The World Are You Waiting For / Ripcord (Leaking) / Just Hip / Charlie Dance / Whoops / Hymn From A Village / Hup-Springs (Sandman) / Fire So Close
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Compilation of first two EPs that reached #1 in the UK Indie Charts.
What’s The World / Folklore / Fire So Close / If Things Were Perfect / Hymn From A Village
| Release Name: | Village Fire - Five Offerings From James EP |
| Artist Name: | |
| Release Date: | 1st June 1985 |
| Format: | Compilation EP |
| Catalogue: | FAC-138 |
With James negotiating with major labels and demand for the two singles JIMONE and James II far outstripping initial production runs, Factory decided to combine the two into the Village Fire EP. The EP went straight to number one in the indie charts, serving only to fuel the bidding war that was going on to secure James services and giving the band even more favourable press.
Artwork for the EP came from John Carroll.
Laboured five track EP of more concept than content.
Not found on Spotify.
Thank God then for James, a Factory band with the sort of talent that most headliners would struggle to find in a month of Blue Mondays. If regulation guitar, drums, bass and vocals are back in style then add to your list of potential hitmakers this magnificent four-piece band.
Beginning a well-constructed, well-received set with the patting of a cow-bell in ‘Hymn From A Village’, James build their sound around flurries of cascading vocals tacked onto the janglies of a post-Postcard guitar. Skipping from a chugging, almost Latin beat in ‘Withdrawn’ to the up-and-down, fast-and-slow motions of ‘What’s The World’, James not only make enjoyable music but actually look as though they enjoy making it. Throwing himself into spasms, lead-singer Tim Booth amazes the audience by singing full pelt “I-I-I-I-I-I” then modestly bouncing backstage and almost throwing away the lines “I wear an armour plated suit / You put your lips to helmet slits / You try to suck me out the tin / I can’t get out, I’m welded in”
The band’s debut release.
What’s The World / Folklore / Fire So Close
| Release Name: | Jimone EP |
| Artist Name: | |
| Release Date: | 1st November 1983 |
| Format: | Studio EP |
| Catalogue: | FAC78 |
JIMONE was conceived as a means of getting the band more gigs. Despite local support slots for Orange Juice, The Fall and New Order, James had struggled to get shows outside of Manchester without a record to their name.
Mike Pickering of Factory Records, and later M People, had picked up on the band’s demo tape and after having promoted several James shows at Factory’s Hacienda club, agreed to release the band’s debut single.
Factory wanted James to release Withdrawn and Hymn From A Village as the single, but the band, wary of going into the studio, wanted to record what they saw as three of their worst tracks so they wouldn’t blow their best songs through inexperience in the studio.
The single was recorded with Chris Nagle at Strawberry Studios in Stockport
The single’s distinctive artwork came about by mistake. Unable to decide upon a cover, Jim picked up a red pen and scrawled JIMONE on a green card. With just hours to go until the printer’s deadline, the band chose this childlike scrawl as the cover. The title was also a skit on Factory’s insistence on cataloguing their releases in chronological order, JIMONE being FAC78.
The single succeeded in bringing James to the attention of the national music press who were picking up on fellow Mancunians The Smiths and New Order. It was voted single of the week in all three major weekly music papers – NME, Melody Maker and Sounds.
The Smiths became champions of James, Morrissey describing them as “the best band in the world” and paying the band the ultimate compliment of covering What’s The World on their 1985 Scottish tour and releasing it on the I Started Something I Couldn’t Finish cassette single.
The Smiths and now a group called James – who’d have figured Manchester as the centre of a post-industrial semi-acoustic renaissance? This has more to do with the romantic side of Genesis P-Orridge than Dexy’s Po-Faced Runners and going by “Folklore” it might be as much tongue-in-chic as finger-in-ear. What might have been a perverse stab at being different, however, is already developing into an odd idiosyncratic vision on “What’s The World”.
Not found on Spotify.
None.
An early demo tape produced for Rob Gretton at Factory Records.
Stutter / Things Were Perfect / What’s The World / Vulture / Discipline / Announcement / Insect (aka Skullduggery) / Sea Song (aka Chain Mail) / Withdrawn / Fire So Close
| Release Name: | Side B |
| Artist Name: | |
| Release Date: | 23rd March 1983 |
| Format: | Promo Album |
| Catalogue: | n/a |
This is an early demo tape produced for Rob Gretton at Factory Records.
The note on the tape, which is addressed to Rob, says “Quality of the tape recorded in practise was really bad, so here’s a live tape.”
The exact date is unknown but it is likely that it was recorded the Liverpool State Ballroom gig on the 23rd March 1983 as the setlist is identical.
The track list includes a good number of early songs, some under early names; Insect was later released as Skullduggery and Sea Song as Chain Mail.
Fire So Close is a song from James’ debut EP Jimone released in 1983 and the Village Fire EP in 1985.
The song is an anti-nuclear tirade looking at Wayne (the US) and Ivan (Soviet Union) facing each other.
It was slowed down and renamed Why So Close for the Stutter LP three years later.
| Song: | Fire So Close |
| Released: | November 1983 |
| Main Associated Album (or Single): | Jimone EP |
| First Heard Live: | Unknown Venue – 22nd November 1982 |