spherical objects
boutique/ltm catalogue

The Boutique Label presents the first ever reissues by cult Manchester band Spherical Objects, active between 1978 and 1981 and the core group on the highly collectible Object Music label. Formed by singer, songwriter and dj Steve Solamar, Spherical Objects produced a unique brand of what early champion Paul Morley termed 'existentialist psychedelia'. Their first album, Past & Parcel, appeared in July 1978 and predated releases on other Manchester post-punk labels such as Factory. The group played only occasional live gigs, and preferred to concentrate on recording albums, releasing no less than four in as many years, and only two singles. To read sleevenote click here. To purchase CDs click here.


PAST & PARCEL/ELLIPTICAL OPTIMISM (BOUCD 6614) £10
Digital remaster of the first and second Spherical Objects albums, released in July 1978 and October 1979, both sets featuring Steve Solamar, John Bisset-Smith, Fred Burrows, Duncan Prestbury and Roger Hilton. Booklet includes archive images and detailed liner notes, with contributions from chief Object Steve Solamar. Full tracklist: Born to Pay, Situation Comedy, You Can Become, The Crystal Tree, If I Can Chose (Oh Babe), Lover Flow, Drama Queen, The Face I Want To See, What Goes On, Past & Parcel, Metropolis, Show Me, Comedians, Elliptical Optimism, Ten to Nine, Another Technique, I Should Have Left Him, It's So Good to be Alive (Tonight), Lying Again, I Don't Remember, Walk Away, Lucy, I Remember You.

Reviews: "The tightly structured music is hardly imitative or naive. By regulating distinctive influences - Love, Buckley, Reed are heavily discernible - alongside their own fully charged elegance the group achieves a music that is distinctly eclectic yet undeniably original and special. It is a very personal uncommon music, irregularly based with versatile, individual embellishments from Bisset-Smith's delicate introverted lead and Prestbury's subtle illuminative keyboards. The very curious Objects sound is totally unlike anything else anybody else is doing" (NME (Paul Morley), 1979)


FURTHER ELLIPSES/NO MAN'S LAND (BOUCD 6616) £10
Digital remaster of the third and fourth Spherical Objects albums, released in 1980 and October 1981, both sets featuring Steve Solamar joined by different musicians including Roger Blackburn and Roger Hilton. Booklet includes archive images and detailed liner notes, with contributions from chief Object Steve Solamar. Full tracklist: disc one: Regular Condition, Take a Chance, The Root, Don't Worry About Me, The Final Part, Buy It, Moving on the Run, Mama Tried, Places and Spaces, The Conductor, Set Free, One Way Out, Terminal Romance, Cruellest Twist, Jericho, Memories In Blue, Thirst, Don't Ask, Wipe, Resting Place, No Man's Land.

Reviews: "Further Ellipses sees something of a departure from Solamar's previously far rougher, DIY sound, and incorporates brash, honking sax and melodically-charged synth and guitar lines, which convene with especially favourable results on shorter, more aggressive cuts like Buy It, whose coarseness is an antidote to the slightly too smooth for its own good The Final Part. No Man's Land abandons much of the more electronic, jazzier touches in favour of a more rock-centric impetus, something brilliantly underlined by Wipe which shamelessly half-inches its chorus from Alice Cooper's No More Mr. Nice Guy" (Boomkat, October 2008)


AUTEUR LABELS: OBJECT MUSIC (LTMCD 2527) £10
This 26 track, 76 minute Object Music overview contains both non-album 7" singles by Spherical Objects (The Kill, The Knot, Seventies Romance and Sweet Tooth), as well as the Steve Solamar solo track Forewarned from 1981 along with material by Steve Miro, the Passage, Grow Up, Contact, IQ Zero, the Noyes Brothers, Alternomen Unlimited, Warriors and Manchester Mekon. To read Object label history click here.

Reviews: to follow


SHEEP FROM GOATS (BOUCD 6615) £12 (2xCD)
Extended digital remaster of the 1980 double album by Steve Solamar and Steve Miro, released as the Noyes Brothers. Recorded at Graveyard Studio between October 1979 and May 1980, the original double vinyl featured 100 minutes of experimental collaborations, and is now joined by the extended piece Good Question from the 1981 compilation Do The Maru. Booklet features archive images and sleevenote contributions from Solamar and Miro. To read sleevenote click here. Full tracklist: A Feeling of Impending Doom, Away We Go, Repercussion, Bo Scat Um I.D., Marlene, Night Sky Vision, Byte to Beat, Why Did It Fade, I Am You, On the Outside, Dream, It Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time; disc two: Archetypal Memory, It Must Be Vibration, Pointless, The Mutant, Ingmar The Dog, Some Times, Outnuendo, Decision Time, Pneumonia Bridge, Resurrection In Chaos Minor, Do End New Out, Good Question.

Reviews: "Recommended. This is all fairly uncategorizable stuff, harnessing the vitriol of new wave guitar and angular, Dick Dastardly-alike vocals and the 'brothers' unique take on electronics. The twenty-five minute drum machine overdose It Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time is a particular standout and a decent example of the duo's strangeness. Wildly detuned oscillations flail around the mix while piano noodlings take up space, all to the dogged accompaniment of coarse drum machine patterns. The appeal of the piece stems from just how bizarre and unnecessary it all seems. It has to be one of the least essential, yet most intriguing twenty-five minutes in all of electronic music. Interesting electroacoustic experiments arise on the second disc, with the like of Pneumonia Bridge making a link between Doctor Who-style Radiophonics and more conventional concrete sounds. Possibly weirdest of all, songwriting normalcy is in effect on the slightly hippyish sounding pseudo psych balladry of It Must Be Vibration, or the driving post-punk of Pointless" (Boomkat, September 2008)

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