ALAN VEGA - ALAN VEGA

Have a cracking Christmas...At Woolworths.

Over a year after I first googled 'Woolworths Christmas advert' the images, especially now haunt me like the hastily buried corpse of a young boy might. No, even that doesn't quite go to explain the sheer horror and sickness I felt when I first watched a combined cast of The Goodies, It Ain't Half Hot Mum, Russian dancers, Ballerinas and that woman with the bowl cut present their Yuletide extravaganza. I really don't want to go into too much detail because I need to do anything I possibly can to stop the images coming to life in my head so all I will do is post a link so that if you really do feel like you must see the above ensemble attempt to sell you Maxell C90 Cassettes and the like all to the sound of some ABBA meets Brotherhood of Man evil supergroup you can. Link and article continue after the break.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8m9OCkoCV3I

It's like some strange circus of death like nightmare, all big shoes, fake moustaches and high pitched festive singing. I imagine a man in a beak mask and green tights to appear covered in blood and just start stabbing in time to the music. The Abomindable Dr Phibes complete with organ to come up from the ground playing along with his fantastical clockwork band. To say it's the the thing of fucking nightmares is putting it mildly.

This of course has absolutely nothing at all to do with Alan Vega's first solo outing, the imaginitively titled 'Alan Vega'. Alan doesn't give a shit about this creepy ass advert, it doesn't scare him one bit. He thinks I'm a pussy for even mentioning it.

'Ghost Rider! Ghost Rider! Whooooooooa!'

Thanks Alan.

This was, at least for me something of an undiscovered gem. My mate Dylan told me about it over a pint of Guinness and salt and vinegar crisps at the start of the year. I finally, courtesy of Ebay Germany got a copy for the very reasonable price of ten euros including postage.

What Alan gives us is space aged rock n' roll. He asks the question, what if Elvis was a Jewish guy from New York with a couple of analogue synths? And then goes to answer his own question. The track names, 'Juke Box Baby', 'Speedway' bring to mind the flotsam of late fifties a subject matter that Alan sticks to almost throughout.

I imagine he succeeded in upsetting just as many people with this as Suicide (His previous band) did with their first self-titled outing. Maybe he liked getting beat up as he tried to play live? Still history proved the playa haters wrong. Suicide reformed and the output of Vega and his partner in whateverthefuck Martin Rev both had their back catalogues reassesed by the masses. Have we finally caught up with the music of this electronic prophet or are we just more tollerant of crazy people making music in what is now known as 'the key of Z'.

Don't get me wrong, I like this, just don't ask me why?

Oh and fuck a Woolworths Christmas advert from 1981.