Thursday, July 14, 2011

Because Vile Evils Are Vile Evils...


In early 1978 Subway Sect went into the studio to record their debut album with Mickey Foote. Unfortunately the tapes were lost and the album remained unreleased. However in 2007 Vic Godard decided that it was time to record the songs with their original spirit and sound so that they could be properly heard so he re-grouped Subway Sect and put them back into the studio to record the "legendary" album that should have came out in 1978.

They may not have been the most competent musicians around at the time - but that was hardly the point really was it ? The urgency and delivery of this music makes it an essential listen if you're interested in the late 70's time period.

Although the album was never released at the time they did release one of the tracks from the sessions as a single. Ambition is one of the best songs of that era. My own personal introduction to the song was via one of the many great NME tapes called Pogo A GoGo. It just seemed to stand out from the crowd when I heard it - you get the trademark scratchy guitars of the time tied to an inane keyboard sound, Goddard's seemingly sarcastic vocals and what appears to be some sort of arcade game playing in the background. It really shouldn't work but does brilliantly. They only released 2 singles in the 70's but in Ambition they produced one of the defining songs of the punk era.

Subway Sect - Ambition

2 comments:

  1. Thanks Adam, just one of those tracks that still sounds as good today as it did on that wonderful N.M.E. cassette back in the day...

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