Reissues: The Shop Assistants Return To Their Posts

reissues

The Shop Assistants Return To Their Posts

The Scottish twee band the Shop Assistants are one of those bands that have been semi-lost to time, and the Internet hasn't been much help; their semi-official Web site has a Comic Sans header and links to a dead board and a (gasp!) negative NME review of their career retrospective. Perhaps that will change now that the British reissue outfit Cherry Red is putting out a new edition of Will Anything Happen, which collects the shambolic, sweet tracks that the band put out on the Chrysalis Records offshoot Blue Guitar. "I Don't Wanna Be Friends With You," which pretty much sums up its overall thesis in its title, is above, and will be on the reissue; tracks not included on the reissue are actually available on the aforementioned site's audio page, although be warned: They're in RealAudio format. Backwards compatibility ahoy! [Indie MP3 / via offnotesnotes / YouTube via No Rock And Roll Fun]

5:00 PM on Tue Oct 7 2008
By Maura Johnston
164 views
8 comments

Comments

by MayhemintheHood at 05:58 PM on 10/07/08
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What does "twee" mean? Pop music? I looked up the wikipedia page about it and that just confused me more.
by mike a at 07:20 PM on 10/07/08
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AWESOME. This appears to be the same CD as Overground released in '97, but given that it's been out of print for years, there's nothing to do but cheer.

I do hope someone puts the "Safety Net" and "All That Ever Mattered" singles on CD someday. They're both great. Not to mention the "Here It Comes" and "Big E Power" releases - both released after lead singer Alex split for Motorcycle Boy, and both great. (I'm enough of a fan that I actually have the "Here It Comes" box set - a prize from my first trip to Edinburgh.)

Side note: those of you who've recently discovered the Vivian Girls would probably like this.
by Lapinot at 07:35 PM on 10/07/08
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I know someone who'll be very pleased about this.

Me, I've been sans internet for a few days and while catching up on what I've missed have just realised that I missed the split of Dirty Pretty Things. So I'm very unpleased.
by fakehardcore at 10:09 PM on 10/07/08
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@mike a:
am i the only one who thinks the vivian girls are just a sftri/garagy version of tiger trap?
by Dick Laurent is dead. at 10:26 PM on 10/07/08
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@Lapinot: You missed out, it was great. We even had cake.
by mike a at 09:11 AM on 10/08/08
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@fakehardcore: Sort of, but that's hardly a dealbreaker for me if it results in gems like "Where Do You Run To."
by twenty-four hour priapism at 09:25 AM on 10/08/08
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"it's up to you" is a still a great song after all these years. c86 foreva!
by fakehardcore at 03:54 PM on 10/08/08
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@mike a: definitely not a dealbreaker. i dig it, and actually, "where do you run to" is my fav track on the record. tiger trap was just the first thing that popped into my head when i heard them.