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The Mighty Lemon Drops: Inside Out 1985-1990 – boxset review

The Mighty Lemon Drops: Inside Out 1985-1990 (Cherry Red) CD Boxset Released 25th November Buy Here   The Mighty Lemon Drops boxset anthology celebrating the recordings made between 1985 and 1990 for Chrysalis Records imprint Blue Raincoat is out on 25th November via Cherry Red. Maybe once or twice in your life a band will […]

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The Mighty Lemon Drops: Inside Out 1985-1990 - boxset reviewThe Mighty Lemon Drops: Inside Out 1985-1990

(Cherry Red)

CD Boxset

Released 25th November

Buy Here

The Mighty Lemon Drops boxset anthology celebrating the recordings made between 1985 and 1990 for Chrysalis Records imprint Blue Raincoat is out on 25th November via Cherry Red.

Maybe once or twice in your life a band will come along and release a track that genuinely blows your mind. It may live with you for a period, on repeat for a few months; or it may have such an impact that it influences your musical tastes for years to come.

The first time I heard the original 12” of The Mighty Lemon Drops track Like An Angel it set me on a different path. I was 15, listening to The Beatles, punk, post-punk along with more contemporary artists such as Billy Bragg; The Smiths; The Style Council and New Order, aware that this wasn’t ‘Chart Music’ but unaware that there was an ‘Indie Scene’ in its ascendancy. The howl of feedback with drums and guitar breaking through blew my mind, I wanted to turn it up loud (which I did and still do to this day). These were the days (yeah, old man me again) when music news, as I discovered was only really found by reading the unholy trinity of the NME, Melody Maker and Sounds (and occasionally Record Mirror) or by listening to evening Radio 1.

By 1986 I was scouring the pages for news of the latest releases by my favourite new bands, The Primitives, The Soup Dragons and of course the Lemon Drops (familiarity by this stage allowing the dropping of the Mighty). Obviously C86 loomed large that year, the band swiftly followed their contribution with the single The Other Side Of You and Happy Head album. Listening to Inside Out : 1985-1990 none of those tracks have lost any of the power with the trademark chiming Rickenbacker sound. The debut album still sounds as fresh as it did 30 something years ago.

They were ‘indie’ but The Mighty Lemon Drops always stood apart from the rest, a little difficult to categorise. Guitar-driven, probably post-punk, maybe neo-psychedelic, with comparisons to The Velvet Underground, Love and at the time Echo And the Bunnymen. The band were touring extensively and it would be early 1988 before the next album, the more polished World Without End would be released (although the double 7” / 12” Ep Out Of Hand acted as a welcome stop gap). It peaked at No. 34 on the UK chart (which was very respectable) and at No. 1 on the US College chart.

As the band continued to tour their sound continued to evolve, with well-crafted vocal arrangements and increasingly more sophisticated musicianship, but above all instantly memorable melodies. The band were keen to shake off the ‘doom and gloom’ tag and thus named their 1989 album, Laughter. I’d not played this album for a very long time. When it was released I was listening to all things Madchester, with the infamous Stone Roses/Happy Mondays Top Of the Pops being only a couple of months away. Revisiting it again now, with a horn section in place it’s something of a hidden gem.

For me, the highlights of the five-disc retrospective are the demos, sessions and live tracks; many previously unreleased. The recordings are split between 1985-1986 and 1987-1989. Amongst the highlights are the first demo recordings; early live performances; a session for Manchester Piccadilly Radio in 1987 which David Newton only found when helping Cherry Red compile this release and a smattering of cover versions.

While there have been a couple of reissues from the Mighty Lemon Drops archive over the years this is the definitive collection of the band’s essential releases and a must for fans of Indie or music in general.

Listen to Iain Key in conversation with David Newton here

For more information on The Mighty Lemon Drops head to Facebook or  Twitter

The Mighty Lemon Drops: Inside Out 1985-1990 - boxset review

All words by Iain Key. See his author profile here or find him on Twitter as @iainkey

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