111 for 30 #005 - Melys 'Chinese Whispers'

Overlooked and undersung dark pop genius from Eryri.

PLEASE NOTE: This isn’t an official BBC / BBC Wales post. All words / opinions expressed here are my own.

Key link: http://melysmusic.com

He was the main singer / songwriter of the most influential ‘alternative’ band of all time and he was in our studio in Mold, north Wales. Quite what chain of events led Frank Black (or Charles Michael Kittridge Thompson IV a.k.a Black Francis) to our humble doorstep is lost to the mists of time. Charles was probably on a promo tour for his second solo album ‘Teenager of the Year’. After the initial dissolution of Pixies, and given the high speed fickleness of music in the 90’s, his star was probably deemed by some to be in the descendant. You’d never have known. He was as enthusiastic, friendly, charismatic and eccentric as I - a diehard Pixies fan - could have hoped he’d be. He didn’t even complain when I spilt an entire pint of Guinness on his pristine white jeans at The We Three Loggerheads pub just outside Mold. There’s a blue plaque there to commemorate this event, right?

Charles recorded an acoustic session for us in double quick time. Just him, his guitar, our erstwhile engineer and good egg, Alan Daulby, and a 1/4” tape machine. The session still sounds fantastic. Of course it does. Who has ever written songs - or sung them - like Charles? A one-man Area 51 Husker Du with Jonathan Richman leanings.

Producer Jane (Morris) has also managed to persuade Charles to review a selection of demo tapes from local bands. Actual demo cassette tapes, too… Scotch / TDK / BASF et al. We’d seeded the selection with some of our favourites: Girohead, Five Darrens (I think), my band (The Immediate), maybe Fourth Egg…

Charles listened patiently, half his intellect no doubt elsewhere greeting aliens with unvarnished chord sequences and surf-burnished guitar riffs.

One tape really impressed him. “I like that.” He wasn’t being polite, I could see it in his sparking eyes. “Nice tune”.

Or words to that effect.

It was a band called Meringue from Llanrwst.

Here’s where history becomes a thatch of cables behind the TV. I think I first saw Meringue play live at Gwydir Castle in Llanrwst. My band had been there recording a single with Gordon Linfoot, usually of Blaenau Ffestiniog. Gordon had shifted his mixing desk and tape machine to Gwydir to capture some ghostly vibes and peacocks.

We were invited to play a gig at the castle by Meringue’s frontman and main writer, Paul Adams. I liked Paul immediately. No bullshit or coke-fuelled braggadocio - which was rare for the times. The gig was one of the strangest we ever played. Gwydir Castle also played host to mediaeval role-playing weekends… all mead, roustabout mock battles with blunt axes battering shields, and harp music.

We - in our Burtons suits with chewy faces and Jam riffs - couldn’t have been more incongruous.

I remember looking out at the audience and being entirely weirded out by the experience. It was brilliant fun, of course. Especially seeing Simon Dudfield - who had been in the NME-approved (and managed) hype band of a previous year, Fabulous - stood there watching us in his tights and doublet.

Dudfield and I had had an altercation at The Krazyhouse in Liverpool a couple of years previously (it could have been a couple of weeks… no one bothered to carbon date the memory). He and his manager - James Brown, who went on to found Loaded - had been swaggering around the venue and they’d deliberately bumped into my friend Simon Morris. Simon Morris is 8th Dan karate, or something like that. The altercation lasted about as long as Dudfield’s musical career.

And there he was in front of me. In tights. Beautiful.

Paul from Meringue also promoted gigs at the Swallow Falls Hotel in Capel Curig. These were brilliant nights of booze and music. I imagine every Welsh band of note persuaded their van up the windy roads to Capel Curig and loved every minute of the experience.

Paul worked at Swallow Falls Hotel as - I think - a chef. He hadn’t been born with a silver spoon in his mouth but he knew how to put a tasty spoon into other people’s. That grounding in reality, and particularly the reality of being young, from a rural part of Wales, and trying to forge a living in tandem with an artistic existence - with all of the dedication that that necessitates - very much characterised Paul, Meringue and his next band. Who we’ll get to in due course, I promise.

One more stop off on time’s carousel. It’s sort of necessary.

The last time I saw Meringue we supported them at Conwy Civic Hall, at Paul’s invitation. We live in a time when musical artists seem to collaborate and support each other without division, rancour, ego or narcissism. Back in the 90’s, minus the omnipresent, ever-updating fossil record of social media, every music scene was like Coriolanus with guitars. We all fucking hated each other and resented anyone else’s ability and - especially - success. All of this was mostly unsaid and unwritten. Nodding acquaintance was the diplomatic way we earthed our insecurities long enough to benefit from other bands’ invitations of support slots. Invitations we’d mostly maybe reciprocate.

I sloughed off a lot of this insecurity and bitterness as my commitment and focus turned to my radio show. Gradually my attitude changed. I had reason to celebrate other peoples’ excellence. But back in Conwy in, I dunno, 1995, maybe? All of the chips were present and correct on my Burtons-clad shoulders.

I’d got it into my head that any band from north Wales that wasn’t my band was a shit band. I thought that believing it would power me through to genius without the bother of having to actually be any good. We’d managed to contrive missing the Britpop bandwagon by making ragged, Kinks (and, ironically, Pixies) infused indie pop songs a couple of years before that became fashionable. I remember being more excited by Blur’s Modern Life Is Rubbish than I was by Nevermind because it spoke to me and sounded like a template for what I wanted us to be doing.

We holed ourselves up in Blaenau Ffestiniog and contrived to bury our sharply-cut heads in the encroaching slate heaps.

By the time of that Meringue gig in Conwy I was bitterness incarnate. We were - I think - pretty great that day, windmilling and Jam-jumping around the stage, but the audience were utterly unimpressed, and then some.

The atmosphere I generated around me was corrosive. My bandmates - Duncan and Richard - were being worn down by it, but - also, thankfully, for the sake of our ongoing friendships - ultimately forgiving. Dave Clark, however, our roadie… mod to the max, until he volte-faced overnight into a traveller after we split up… seethed with me.

While Meringue were on stage being pretty great, Paul broke a guitar string and asked me if he could borrow my beloved blond Rickenbacker. I said ‘yes’ because I didn’t want anyone to know about the brown waves turbulent inside me.

Except the guitar strap broke during their set and my guitar fell onto the stage. I don’t think any permanent damage was done but it was enough to set Clarky off on a rampage.

By the time Meringue got back to their dressing room, he’d chucked all of their belongings out the window and onto the quaint roofs below. Clarky and I were living out some low-rent Quadrophenia fantasy, little Mold vandals on cheap amphetamines and a wrap of petty resentments.

We scarpered before anyone noticed. Eventually we were banned from ever playing Conwy Civic Hall again, but it was very unlikely that we’d have been asked back anyway. Maybe if we’d been the only band to survive a musician-culling pandemic? Even then we’d have had to change our names and attire, I think.

I’m embarrassed now but at the time I didn’t think I’d see Paul again or any of the other flagrantly talented bastards who were ruining my life by being better than me.

I was wrong.

Melys are the most undersung band of the late 90’s and 00’s from Wales. It’s a perennial problem, and one I’m disinclined to pull out — all cramped and wild-eyed - from the wardrobe after all this time, but excellence from north Wales is serially overlooked and undervalued by Wales’ (and let’s be forensically honest, here: south Wales’) cultural commentariat.

I wrote a piece for the BBC about the North South divide over twenty years ago. Nothing has changed. Nothing will ever change. Good intentions can’t lay a better road between the north and south, or incline heads with vested interests to look elsewhere when they feel there’s enough of interest already in front of them.

Listening back through Melys’ releases (most of them are available on streaming platforms), there really wasn’t anyone like them then, or now. There was something of the electronic experimentation of Bjork or Portishead allied to great indie pop songwriting, a dark matter Dubstar, if you like. With more Nine Inch Nails and Leonard Cohen in their DNA than the majority of their contemporaries.

And their independence, their indie credentials, were of paramount importance. I don’t want to be one of those old farts trying to reclaim terminology that has evolved beyond their halcyon understanding, but here I go anyway…

‘Indie’ meant more than an ghost approximation of non-conformity back then. These days ‘indie’ feels like a wishy washy label for a wishy washy sound that wants to flirt with the underground just long enough to be considered for a synch deal for an IPA advert or faux arthouse film. Back then, ‘indie’ meant ‘independent’. It signalled an actual philosophy and belief system. An empowerment and freedom to make, record and release music with as little A&R or commercial interference as possible.

It meant speeding the whole process of making singles and albums up so that they weren’t held in limbo until promotional campaigns had been put in place.

The music could be almost anything it wanted to be. Most times it was rough round the edges, produced instinctively rather than expensively. In thrall to a moment rather than executive decisions.

Of course it didn’t really last for long like that and I’m looking back through rose-tinted spectacles that wouldn’t have looked out of place on Bobby Gillespie’s nose. Suffice to say that ‘indie’-ness was an important part of Melys’ ethic and machinery, whether releasing via the truly legendary Recordiau Ankst or via Pinnacle or on their own Sylem label. The nothing-more-than-ballpark reference points I mentioned above - Bjork and Portishead - were sonically achieved on their own terms and - often - in their own studio working in tandem with a couple of Wales’ great engineers and producers: Gorwel Owen and Geraint ‘Gez’ Jones.

I remember that they spent the advance from Pinnacle on equipping their own studio, nothing wasted on excess or rock ’n’ roll baubles. I’m guessing that this pragmatic approach was a result of their upbringings and the values of the community they grew up in.

Sylem Studios were also hugely important to my radio show, as one of the de facto studios in which we recorded proper sessions.

For just one example of how brilliant Melys were in those early days, dial up ‘Hope You Cry Yourself To Sleep’ from their debut album Rumours and Curses. It bristles with psychodrama and a European cinematic sensibility, drawn along on beautifully arranged strings… a darker and more serrated echo of what Mazzy Star had been recording or REM in plaintive balladeer mode.

It’s properly breathtaking, but it’s likely you haven’t heard it. These brilliant, original and uncompromising songs are not as canon as they really should be. The streaming figures for ‘Hope You Cry Yourself to Sleep’ don’t even register, which depresses the breath out of me.

They had their champion, though. And what a champion. John Peel’s love for the band was deep enough for him to invite them to record eleven sessions for his show. Peel, one of the last bastion of new music presenters authoring their own shows with little - if any - interference or influence from radio pluggers / promotions people and station management trying to interfere with his philosophies, opened up more doors for independent Welsh music than anyone else. Bar none.

John Peel’s audience voted Melys’ signature song ‘Chinese Whispers’ to the top of the Festive Fifty in 2001. Is there any better vindication for an artist than to have their work recognised by such a music savvy audience?

Peel supported them right up until his end and the end of their first incarnation (their last album release was in the same year as his death, 2005).

That wasn’t - and isn’t - the end.

The cottage industry they set up in an and around Betws Y Coed / Capel Curig in Eryri employed and enabled some good people who’ve gone on to make their own contributions to Welsh music: the likes of Dan Amor (former guitar tech for the band, who runs the excellent Recordiau Cae Gwyn… have you listened to Ffenest, yet?); or inspiring Emma Ross and the sadly-missed James McHardy to set up Petrified Records; or their bass player, Rich Eardley, who recorded great music as Peakz and Colossous), or Gary Husband their drummer, or Gez, their engineer.

And as Paul and Andrea moved away from music and into catering, the restaurants and bistros they ran - in Conwy, Betws Y Coed and Llanfairfechan - have provided really valuable jobs for young people in the area. Not what anyone would call a traditionally rock ’n’ roll legacy but one that has much more value to the communities into which Melys are so embedded. That’s more punk rock than punk rock; certainly more punk rock than - say - Jesus and Mary Chain coming back and sounding exactly like the Jesus and Mary Chain of 1985, disenfranchised drug-baked teenagers, at odds with the world. In their 60’s.

Pet peeve poking out. Sorry.

I saw Melys live numerous times before their 2005 sabbatical. They did a live outside broadcast for me from Central Station in Wrexham in 2003 that had a beautiful industrial malice to it (beer kegs and their legendary ‘Llif’ warning sign having eighteen shades battered out of them by Big Rich and his hammer) that drove the beguiling melodies deep. They came to Telford’s Warehouse in Chester a few times, on nights I was the resident DJ, and were proper, undiluted great. No pantomime, just obsidian black hooks to tear the skin and embed into our hearts.

One of the truly special nights of my musical existence was DJ’ing at Melys’ comeback gig at Hendre Hall in Tal-Y-Bont, Bangor in 2009. The warmth and expectation in the room were palpable and the songs were greeted like dear friends returning from an unjust stint at Her Majesty’s pleasure.

If any rust had gathered in their music playing limbs and larynxes, none was detectable. They sounded magnificent and assured. And given their songs always dealt with life and emotion, as opposed to teenaged posturing or flights of fancy, they also sounded relevant despite the years that had passed.

And that has proved to be the case on each of the subsequent occasions that I’ve seen them… including a magical set in 2010 at the bistro they ran in the heart of Betws Y Coed. I DJ’d  a set of entirely Welsh sounds from a couple of decks set up in the corner, with not a single soul bothering me for ‘Mr Brightside’.

There have been a couple of new (and fine) singles since the last album in 2005. And they’ve toured sporadically following that night in Betws Y Coed, most often at the behest of their great friends - and other Peel favourites - The Wedding Present.

What they’ve mostly done is live their lives, bringing us the substantial fruit of their musical labours in downtime from the real world.

Last week they announced a series of headline dates in the Spring and further dates with The Wedding Present. There might even be new new music too.

And if you’re ever in Llanfairfechan and feeling hungry, park up on the front and seek out their current eatery, Seagrass. The food is homely and excellent. Not only that, but the music on the stereo is great too. I heard Y Niwl’s album when I was in there. I’m sure if I’d had the time to sit there long enough, for another of those fantastic white chocolate and raspberry brownies, there would have been some Pixies too.