The underground U.K. music scene of the early '80s was dominated by post-punk and new wave, but percolating below the surface were several scenes that looked back to the past for inspiration. Loads of bands were besotted by the garage punk sound of the mid-'60s, the rockabilly sound of the '50s, and the '60s mod scene, and when they filtered it through punk it came out sounding trashy more often than not. Cherry Red's
Just a Bad Dream: Sixty British Garage & Trash Nuggets 1981-1989 gathers up the various threads of this very loosely defined scene, and over three discs does a fine job of capturing the raucous sounds of the era. Chief early movers on the scene were the raw beat group lovers Thee Milkshakes, jumped-up mods
the Prisoners, the garage-meets-surf Stingrays, and psychobilly wildmen
the Meteors, and they are all represented. All the sounds that were scuttling through the underbelly are represented nicely by well-chosen tracks. There are loads of psychobilly, mod, and garage rock with some truly inspired revivalists behind the mikes. Anything with Lenny Helsing involved is sure to be great -- tracks here by the Green Telescope ("A Glimpse") and
the Thanes ("Don't Let Her Dark Your Door") are highlights. The same with the man who is the poster child for the scene,
Billy Childish. Along with Thee Milkshakes, there are plenty of
Childish-related bands on hand, including
the Delmonas with their great early girl group-inspired "He Tells Me He Loves Me" and
Thee Mighty Caesars' "Little by Little." During this early part of the era covered by the set, Alan McGee's Creation Records dipped into psych and garage in their early days, with
the Jesus and Mary Chain's brilliant cover of
Syd Barrett's "Vegetable Man" and
the Jasmine Minks' rollicking "What's Happening" on hand to inject some noise pop into the proceedings. The three discs are filled with fun romps like Ug and the Cavemen's silly "Go Gorilla," slick rockers like
the Tall Boys' "Ride This Torpedo," swirling psych-pop like
the Delmontes' "So It's Not to Be," and
the Wolfhounds' howling punk blast "LA Juice." The wide scope of the bands gives an idea of how wide-ranging and diverse the scene was, even within its narrow confines. Only a few duds here and there as well as some dodgy moments of misogyny that could have been skipped keep this from being a classic box set. As it stands, it's merely great, which should be enough to inspire some serious revisitation of an era that was unique and produced a lot of wild and swinging sounds. ~ Tim Sendra