Factory records: overrated toss?

Looking From A Hilltop was superb (from what i recall. havent heard it since 1984)

Alma Mater by Stockholm Monsters is a good album (no longer own a copy ,mind.will have to track one down)

Cath Caroll's Moves Like You i still like to listen to now and then.

And Durutti Column did some great stuff.heard a dance track recently on Pete Tong that sampled one of his better known tracks which i can't remember the name of.Has a soulful singer wailing "no more sleep for me" or something.great guitar work on it.It featured on the Palatine box set.what's it called!!!!! arggghhhhhh

Has a soulful singer wailing "no more sleep for me" or something.great guitar work on it.

You're likely referring to "Otis."

steinomite wrote:

Has a soulful singer wailing "no more sleep for me" or something.great guitar work on it.

You're likely referring to "Otis."

Otis.That would be it.Thanks steinomite.

Yeah there was a dance track recently that sampled the vocals and/or guitar from that track

Factory was and is utterly great. Where else can you find the art, the style, the wit and the aesthetics of the philosopher and the football scally rolled into one? As ever it's pointless trying to debate whether it's over-rated or under-rated (by who?, how can you measure?). Of course it was obviously hit and miss at times, but it tried and succeeded to be something more than just a run of the mill record label, and that's important. The music was 90% spectacularly great - none of the other bands were as consistently brilliant as JD/NO, but many other artists had work which touched the same heights : Durutti Column (Obey The Time, Without Mercy), Stockhom Monsters (Alma Mater, various singles), Cath Carroll (England Made Me LP, The Mondays (Freaky Dancin'/The Egg, Bummed, Hallelujah,), Section 25 (From The Hip, Hilltop megamix), Swamp Children (So Hot LP, Boy 12"), ACR (everything really) great tracks from Shark Vegas, Quando Quango, The Wake, The Names, Crispy Ambulance, Northside, Marcel King, Cabaret Voltaire, The Distractions....and so on. All totally different, but bound together by the unique vision of Wilson, Saville and countless others. If only they could have been together enough to actually get some of these records in the shops, they would have been bloody perfect!

4AD - some very good music on there (Cocteaus, Throwing Muses, Pixies) but often too much style and not enough substance.

Would we expect every release from any label to be consistently good? Many of us will point to below-par/crap releases by NO/JD (1963 for me) - so if a band can't manage excellence all the time, why should we expect a label to be any different? Factory tried to be different - and as some others have pointed out- it was a lifestyle - nightclub and attitude as well as the music.

The Swamp Children 12" I referred to was 'Little Voices' not 'Boy', which was one of the 3 trax. Whatever....it's fantastic!

Other superb records (everything from jangle-pop to electro-phunk with a touch of Northern angst):

Minny Pops - Secret Smile 7" 52nd Street - Cool As Ice and Can't Afford To Let You Go singles James - Jimone and Hymn From A Village Durutti Column - Say What You Mean mini-LP Abecedarians - Smiling Monarchs 12" Miaow - When It All Comes Down and Break The Code singles Anna Domino - Summer The Wake - Harmony LP

Personally, I quite like those artists on Factory that I've heard (and people won't agree with me on this):

• New Order/Joy Division/Electronic/The Other Two/Revenge (obviously)
• Happy Mondays
• Durutti Column
• Crispy Ambulance
• Biting Tongues (yeah, I know... :) )
• James (Hymn From A Village)
• Cath Carrol (I do like "Moves Like You")
• Northside
• Section 25 (one of the first use of a 303 in an acid house record?)

etc

Maybe some of it is over-rated, but what isn't over-rated these days,

reading through the first page i was going to complain that nobody had mentioned james yet, but that's been done now.

factory was pretentious but that's one of the things i like about it

cooperman did make some very valid points mind

I don't like many ot the bands on FACTORY.And a lot that went on was so LONG ago i can't really remember what was SO GOOD about it all.Suffice to say i like some of the ARTWORK.But there is a lof of BULLSHIT.And i thrive on BULLSHIT.Bring back YES and ELP though.Them were days.......

Steve Lea wrote:

But how many of the FAC catalogue are musical releases

Didn't the factory cat have a FAC number? What has s/he done lately? More than some of those other bands mentioned? Has any completist succeeded in collecting him/her? And is s/he in a better state than Sean Ryder?

I remember getting very excited when 'Palantine' came out; then as I read thru' the tracklisting I realised that I had no idea who 90% of the bands were, so I very gingerly placed in back on the shelf and crept away.

The Bemusic CD's are interesting thou' and well worth a flutter; sort of around 75% decent stuff on them two, but quite a few stinkers as well.

I think the world is a more interesting place though, thanks to the brief and chaotic life of the Fac ethos.

Rocket Mick wrote: I don't like many ot the bands on FACTORY.And a lot that went on was so LONG ago i can't really remember what was SO GOOD about it all.Suffice to say i like some of the ARTWORK.But there is a lof of BULLSHIT.And i thrive on BULLSHIT.Bring back YES and ELP though.Them were days.......

This post needs some brain salad surgery done to it.

It probably was overrated however just because New Order were on it made me examine a few of the bands which have remained some of my favourites like ACR, Section 25 and Durutti Column. The artwork always grabbed my attention too. You could always spot a Factory sleeve a mile off.

Outside of NO and the side-projects, I've only heard Happy Mondays, and while I like it, I think Primal Scream did the same thing a bit better on Screamadelica...

404 error wrote:

Steve Lea wrote:

But how many of the FAC catalogue are musical releases

Didn't the factory cat have a FAC number? What has s/he done lately? More than some of those other bands mentioned? Has any completist succeeded in collecting him/her? And is s/he in a better state than Sean Ryder?

Everyone's in a better state than Shaun Ryder.

Aww...factory was the best record label ever. And how can you dis the Happy Mondays?

a couple of points:

1. Factory Records were great. Wilson lost the plot towards the end though, signing acts like Northside, who were terrible.

2. The Wake were good. Not trash at all. Harmony/Here Comes Everybody are as good as New Order's output at that time. Their later releases on Sarah are nowhere as good as their early material.

3. Section 25's From the Hip is also every bit as good as, if not better than New Order's work up until that point.

4. A Certain Ratio from 1980-85 were untouchable, and possibly the best band on the label between these years.

5. Happy Mondays have contributed nothing of any value to music except for heaps of plagiarized funk riffs, sloppy guitar playing, gravelly, incoherent vocals, lyrics that alternate between arrested adolescent sexuality and a lot of drug-induced blather, and a seriously overrated rhythm section. Furthermore their boorish antics and thuggish anti-intellectualism went against Factory's refined aesthetic.

dave soligo wrote:

5. Happy Mondays have contributed nothing of any value to music except for heaps of plagiarized funk riffs, sloppy guitar playing, gravelly, incoherent vocals, lyrics that alternate between arrested adolescent sexuality and a lot of drug-induced blather, and a seriously overrated rhythm section. Furthermore their boorish antics and thuggish anti-intellectualism went against Factory's refined aesthetic.

Nice sleeves though.

This blue-eyed boy that wants to be wrote:

404 error wrote:

Steve Lea wrote:

But how many of the FAC catalogue are musical releases

Didn't the factory cat have a FAC number?

The factory cat wouldn't have a Fac number, surely it would be a Cat(alogue) number? H

404 error wrote:

Steve Lea wrote:

But how many of the FAC catalogue are musical releases

Didn't the factory cat have a FAC number? What has s/he done lately?

If it was found or was still alive before the Hac closed down and converted into luxoflats it would've presumably become part of London Record's attempted buyout of Factory and it's back-(cat)alogue. Which never really occurred so the story goes on 24HPP because Wilson supposedly never really owned anything that was ever produced by "the workers" in Wilson's Factory(the legendary "bloody napkin" contract) and as London's boss pointed out, meant that any deals that London had to do had absolutely nowt to do with Wilson, Erasmus, etc.

The Palatine compilation starts with JD and ends with NO. Nuff said. Oh and Tony Wilson's a pretentious tossbag. He thinks he's Malcolm McLaren who's also a tossbag.

I'm a Fac fetishist to an extent. I don't have any insecurities in saying that, either. I acknowledge what arrogance and pompousity and outright creative theivery went down, and the amount of BS that was mythologicalized and STILL think it's a great story and an exciting label overall.

I like to be entertained. The 'history' and the makeup of the label, the bands, the interconnections, the failures, the pointless table buying, the victories and the sum of it all amuse and move me. It's a sight better read than a lot of other labels I've stuied about. It's a vivid little blip in the whole of the timeline of music.

Overrated, sure, why not. What isn't? Overrated yet quality entertainment on some front, that's a better title.

Like any label - there was great stuff and dire stuff on Factory Records. I used to have quite a sad fascination with the record sleeves likewise (being an art teacher probably has summat to do with it as well), and true enough quite a lot of the best sleeves usually hid some of the worst records.

However around the post-Acid House era Tony Wilson really did spread the talent rather thin - I mean those dreadful amateurish bunch of chancers he signed like Northside, Wendys and Adventure Babies really killed off any little cred the label still had left. And when it went under I have to say that I wasn't too sad cos I'd gone past caring. And what was he thinking lavishing a kings ransom on that Cath Carroll album that probably led directly to the bankrupting of the label anyway? And didn't she give him the finger in a manner of speaking in return for all his efforts anyway - that'll teach the silly bastard.

To recap, my fave Factory records OTHER THAN NO / JD include these:

Flight - ACR Knife Slits Water - ACR To Each - ACR Sextet - ACR You're No Good - ESG Girls Don't Count - Section 25 Always Now - Section 25 Crazy Wisdom - Section 25 Looking From A Hilltop - Section 25 (a seminal record!) From The Hip - Section 25 Bad News Week - Section 25 The Guitar And Other Machines - Durutti Column Promo Flexi - Durutti Column Electricity - OMD Jimone and James 2 (aka Village Fire) - James Talk About The Past - The Wake Of The Matter - The Wake Something That No One Else Could Bring - The Wake (long forgotten and wonderful swansong from this unfairly-maligned band - the four songs on this EP sound NOTHING like the New Order wannabes that they were often accused of being) Reunion Wilderness - Railway Children Delightful - Happy Mondays Tart Tart - Happy Mondays Squirrel and G-Man - Happy Mondays

The question was:- factory records overrated toss.YES.