Plush/Liam Hayes

[Boxer Monkey]

Am I the only one around these parts who loves Plush? Liam Hayes -- the main Plush guy -- makes a brief cameo in "High Fidelity," playing songs from his excellent piano/vocal album "More You Becomes You." The other Plush albums, "Fed" and "Underfed" are different versions of the same batch of songs, with the former being a lush, richly arranged song cycle and the latter the demos that served as the genesis of "Fed."


Here's a good overview of the band, via dustedmagazine.com:



Plush: "Underfed"

Reviewed by By Jon Dale


We music fanatics love our historical revisionism; the ceaseless Dylan and Grateful Dead bootlegs, the masterpiece followed by the emotionally cracked anti-masterpiece, alternate versions of classic records, off-hand studio recordings… The artists in question, reaching the point at which exposure of their unreleased documentation should reveal them as all-too-human and open to slingshots, find themselves conversely masked yet again as beyond-human. An edifice of aura builds around the trials and tribulations of that lost recording. And for anyone horrified by the way reissue culture repeatedly steals away their ability to imagine the great lost album that never was, or the missing cut that placed the whole album in a new context, well, there’s always Smile… Or, uh, rather, was, given that most green of mytho-poetic pastures was recently sculpted into final shape.


In an Invisible Jukebox session with Biba Kopf in The Wire No. 170, David Thomas of Pere Ubu concluded that Smile was “the only perfect record that was ever made, because it only existed in the imaginations of Brian Wilson’s fans… you would listen to all of the working tapes and you would assemble the perfect track from all these incomplete views of it in your head. And therefore it was perfect because it never existed.” And although I have no desire to continue harping on about Brian Wilson (here’s a parlor game for you: find a Plush review or article that doesn’t mention Wilson in some way…), Thomas touches upon the crux of the matter vis-à-vis the collected works of Plush, a.k.a. Renaissance man Liam Hayes. The devoted Plush fan (is there any other kind?) compulsively holds onto each Plush record - two 7”s, two CD-EPs, two albums, 26 songs in total - because Hayes repeatedly disappears back into his music. On his first single, “Found A Little Baby/Three-Quarters Blind Eyes,” he sounds so sleepy that he drops off in-between lush orchestration; the recording of “No Education,” his second single, was so ghosted and evacuated that the entire band appeared as apparitions, with Hayes whispering his vocals down a tin-can-and-twine studio set-up.


The first Plush album, More You Becomes You - recorded after a first, failed pass at the songs that comprise Underfed and its father recording Fed - is stripped bare, a man at a piano in a red wine haze, sending cold smoke reels from keys, hammers and strings. The appearance of a lone French horn ringing through “Save the People” was unsettling because it sounded even more subtracted than Hayes’ solo performances. All throughout More You Becomes You, you’re wondering if Hayes is going to make it to the end of the album, or whether he’ll slip quietly between the velvet-red curtained backdrop, without you noticing…gone, forever. And if you run with Thomas’ theory, More You Becomes You comes close to being the perfect album. In various interviews, Hayes intimated at full orchestral arrangements for the album, suggesting the listener imagine an ‘invisible orchestra’ on the record. Talk about a metaphysics of presence…


When Hayes’ second album, Fed, appeared in 2002, released only in Japan after protracted periods of recording, arrangement, scoring, re-recording, re-re-recording, and heavy financial burden, its excessive, voluptuous arrangements and bold, brassy songs felt like the antithesis of More You Becomes You. The mythology built around the recording process led some to believe that Hayes was a misfit genius: there’s a kernel of truth in there, although he’s far from a slacker in the studio - Fed attests to hard labor and long hours - and the two times I met Hayes, he was courteous and charming, if not exactly forthcoming. Fed’s expense denied it release in America and England (where both Domino and Drag City, perhaps understandably, baulked at the album’s licensing fee) and for those unwilling to search the album out it became something of a legend - not so much the ‘album that never was,’ as Hayes was always working away at the record, but the ‘album that’s never been heard.’ But mystique is only so useful: you try paying the bills on aura alone.


Underfed is the clutch notes for Fed. Compiled from the extensive recordings that constituted Fed’s second pass, overdubbed with mellotron and keyboards for arrangement purposes, it sheds light on the process behind the final album without surrendering one iota of its power or mystery. Underfed is more notable for what it’s not. It’s not a completely different version of Fed, and it’s not a particularly revelatory experience, but it is a comforting one. (The pocketbook psychoanalysts among us will be left proclaiming ‘there was method behind the madness.’) If anything, it’s a simple pleasure: hearing one of the past decade’s most inspiring song suites before Hayes laid on the brass and strings. A few songs gathered sweeter flourishes on Fed, and Underfed contains a nine-minute extrapolation of the introduction to the title track (called, with delightful appositeness, “Fed Intro”); that’s all the ‘extra’ you’ll be getting.


There are surreal moments on this record that bring the real world to bear on Hayes’ vision. At one point, either Steve Albini or Bob Weston (the album’s engineers) comments on a flubbed lyric, and the perfectionist Hayes is quietly, humorously, hung out to dry. A drowsy performance of “No Education” is accompanied, somewhat inexplicably, by radio interference broadcasting Destiny’s Child’s “Bug-A-Boo” through one channel. The only startling change comes with “Blown Away”, which is peeled back to an acoustic guitar, piano, and thick harmonies from Hayes, who sounds closer to the walled-in cry of Lennon’s few good solo recordings than ever before. Hayes’ side-men, Rian Murphy and Matt Lux, bring an intuitive intelligence to bear on the songs, coasting over one of the few minor failings of the final Fed recording, an occasional stiffness in performance. And the songs… well, they’re as good as ever: Hayes is revealed again as one of the few songwriters who can evoke a certain period and genre of music without reducing the songs to mere period pieces, who is able to reclaim some notional mantle of ‘classic songwriting’ while acknowledging the infinite flexibility of the pursuit, whose vocal and lyrical emotional tenor continually quavers between stridency and devastating melancholy.

[Boxer Monkey]

More on "Fed," with pics

http://www.angelfire.com/music6/archiveslp/fed.html

[Fantastico!]

i've done a couple interviews with him.

PM Me for details!

[Nick T.]

Don't think you guys are alone: I love Liam Hayes too.  Sorry didn't post earlier but didn't have time.  In fact he was the act I named in the "one live act I would like to see before I die" thread.  Doesn't seem like too many others have heard his stuff--or they just don't care for it.  Everything he's put out is top notch but I really think Fed is his best so far.  It really lived up to my expectations.

Any news on him?  I know he played NYC not too long ago...

A dumb question: Do either of you have the No Education/Soaring... 7" and if you do are the songs different from the other versions (esp. No education)??

[Fantastico!]

the No Education/Soaring 45 is a "More You" version of "No Education" that is simply that.  It's nothing compared to the classic "Fed " version--and it's the same old "No Education" from "More You"  I'll try to get you a copy of that, PM me.

As for what he's doing, a new album I understand.  A friend attended the NY show and I believe that's the word.  Knowing Liam though, we should just lay back and see what happens.

Interesting note about Liam, some of his favorite music growing up he told me was "13th Floor Elevators" and "Manfred Mann"

[harveyw]

He played a solo show in London last year, almost entirely consisting of new songs. His previous London date consisted of full band (including a guy on Chamberlin!) takes of the "More You Becomes You" songs, played in exactly the same order as they appeared on the LP, with barely a gap for applause. Sounded like a pop operetta.

I find his work quite frustrating. He has really great ideas and knows how to arrange, but the songs themselves often seem to run out of steam after the first verse. There's a lethargy about it, an "I can't be bothered to finish writing this, so this'll have to do" which belies the apparent amount of work gone into his music. Some of the songs from last year's show seemed to address this problem & actually sounded better than either LP.

An interesting character, for sure. I'd love to read yr interviews, Jonathan.

In answer to Nick T's question re "No Education", it's actually a full band version with rhythm section but no bells-n-whistles. "Soaring" is the same recording as "MYBY".

[Fantastico!]

He played a solo show in London last year, almost entirely consisting of new songs. His previous London date consisted of full band (including a guy on Chamberlin!) takes of the "More You Becomes You" songs, played in exactly the same order as they appeared on the LP, with barely a gap for applause. Sounded like a pop operetta.

I find his work quite frustrating. He has really great ideas and knows how to arrange, but the songs themselves often seem to run out of steam after the first verse. There's a lethargy about it, an "I can't be bothered to finish writing this, so this'll have to do" which belies the apparent amount of work gone into his music. Some of the songs from last year's show seemed to address this problem & actually sounded better than either LP.

An interesting character, for sure. I'd love to read yr interviews, Jonathan.

In answer to Nick T's question re "No Education", it's actually a full band version with rhythm section but no bells-n-whistles. "Soaring" is the same recording as "MYBY".

I guess I kind of like the open-endedness of it.  It's better than everything ending with 'Shave-and-a-Haircut--six bits!"
He's trying things, and I like that. 

The first single "Found A Little Baby/3/4 Blind Eyes" is as good as anything from any of the 1960s demi-gods.  "More You" was kind of a punt, but Fed was about 1/2 way there of making a completely mindbogglingly brilliant album.  Especially, you can't deny "No Education," "Fed," and "Born Together."  I think he was going for a "what's going on" type of affair--and not every song is brilliant on that album but works more as a whole.  I think because of the way he made the record, Liam failed ultimately in that regard, but not by much.

[harveyw]

"Open-ended" is *exactly* the phrase. The lack of traditional song structure is I guess what I find most frustrating about what he does. Maybe I'm just a "shave & a haircut" guy.
Having said that, "Found A Little Baby" is an extraordinary recording, completely out of step with just about everything else released at that time. Was a joy to hear that for the first time...."ah, so someone else *gets it*..."

[Fantastico!]

"Open-ended" is *exactly* the phrase. The lack of traditional song structure is I guess what I find most frustrating about what he does. Maybe I'm just a "shave & a haircut" guy.
Having said that, "Found A Little Baby" is an extraordinary recording, completely out of step with just about everything else released at that time. Was a joy to hear that for the first time...."ah, so someone else *gets it*..."

Harvey, I am with you.
I think the three songs I mentioned from Fed are at that level.  The other songs work at that level too but try to create a song cycle so can't really be listened too as coherantly as stand alone tracks.

Have you heard "Happy Go Unlucky" by John Cunningham?  I find that to be an incredibly ambitious and well executed rock album of a similar ilk from recent times.

[harveyw]

Have you heard "Happy Go Unlucky" by John Cunningham?  I find that to be an incredibly ambitious and well executed rock album of a similar ilk from recent times.

Oh yes! Love it.

[Fantastico!]

Have you heard "Happy Go Unlucky" by John Cunningham?  I find that to be an incredibly ambitious and well executed rock album of a similar ilk from recent times.

Oh yes! Love it.

cool.

[Nick T.]

Thank you both for answering my question--I have only one other friend who likes Plush but we neither of us had been able to get our hands on that 7".

the No Education/Soaring 45 is a "More You" version of "No Education" that is simply that.  It's nothing compared to the classic "Fed " version--and it's the same old "No Education" from "More You"

re "No Education", it's actually a full band version with rhythm section but no bells-n-whistles. "Soaring" is the same recording as "MYBY".

So a different, earlier(?), recording and worth the effort of hunting down, excellent.

He played a solo show in London last year, almost entirely consisting of new songs. His previous London date consisted of full band (including a guy on Chamberlin!) takes of the "More You Becomes You" songs, played in exactly the same order as they appeared on the LP, with barely a gap for applause. Sounded like a pop operetta.

Oh man!  All new songs, that’s good to hear.  I was worried he was getting hung up on the songs off of Fed.  Again, might possibly kill to see him live.

The lethargy mentioned I've felt more as a meditative feel. There's certainly a "stretching out" as opposed to maybe a falling off in songs like Fed (the Underfed version is really long huh?) and if you look at More You as one piece you get it there too.  Maybe even mantra like--I dunno, I like it but can see the reasoning behind the puzzlement.

More You...could have been considered a punt (bunt?) if you knew that was just a stop gap measure in lieu of a full band LP but I didn't know that when I got it.  It was the first recording that I heard and it was a big breath of fresh air and "out of step".  And under it all great songwriting.  Some people just can't get past the voice or the hype! 

I had some trepidation about Fed but it really surpassed my expectations.  The trio of Whose Blues Anyway-What'll We Do-Having It All is an amazing sequence.  I also like So Blind and Sound of San Fran...I mean I like it all I guess.  If he keeps putting them out I'll keep buying them that's for certain.

On Fed's cover art who's the woman on the button on his lapel?  And thanks for the tip on John Cunningham, I have not heard of him.

[harveyw]

One thing I just noticed (in the dusted review):

"two 7”s, two CD-EPs, two albums,"

Two CDEPs? Anyone know anything about these?

[Nick T.]

I did a double take on that as well but I know of nothing else.  Maybe the reviewer is counting the 3/4 Blind CD single as an EP because they added the instrumental of Found A Little Baby? 

This is what I know of:


3/4 Blind/Found A Little Baby 7" (Drag City?)
3/4 Blind/Found A Little Baby/""(Instrumental) CD Single (Drag City)
No Education/Soaring And Boring 7" (Flydaddy)
More You Becomes You LP, CD, special CD in a bag and paper sleeve (Drag City)
Fed CD (After Hours)
Underfed CD (Seanote)

That makes 2 7", one CD "EP" and 3 albums.

[Fantastico!]

Nick - 'Greyhound Bus Station" single too (P-vine)

there's nothing that you haven't heard except the earlier "No Education"

Yes, seek that John Cunningham album I mentioned.  He is another guy who is willing to go the full distance.

When I asked Liam, he didn't know who the woman on his pin was.  That's what he said anyway.
I'll try to post those interviews.

JD

[Nick T.]

Nick - 'Greyhound Bus Station" single too (P-vine)

Right-I totally forgot about that one--so that's the other CD EP right there.

When I asked Liam, he didn't know who the woman on his pin was.

Classic.

Keep me posted about the interviews--I look forward to them!

[harveyw]

New Liam Hayes & Plush music is up on his myspace page. The first fruits from the imminent "Bright Penny" LP, due in September. I direct you all in particular to "I Sing Silence" which has been circulating for awhile in demo form, but is substantially expanded on here. Best thing I've heard all year. By a mile.

http://www.myspace.com/liamhayesandplushmusic

[The Heartical Don]

He played a solo show in London last year, almost entirely consisting of new songs. His previous London date consisted of full band (including a guy on Chamberlin!) takes of the "More You Becomes You" songs, played in exactly the same order as they appeared on the LP, with barely a gap for applause. Sounded like a pop operetta.

I find his work quite frustrating. He has really great ideas and knows how to arrange, but the songs themselves often seem to run out of steam after the first verse. There's a lethargy about it, an "I can't be bothered to finish writing this, so this'll have to do" which belies the apparent amount of work gone into his music. Some of the songs from last year's show seemed to address this problem & actually sounded better than either LP.

An interesting character, for sure. I'd love to read yr interviews, Jonathan.

In answer to Nick T's question re "No Education", it's actually a full band version with rhythm section but no bells-n-whistles. "Soaring" is the same recording as "MYBY".

I guess I kind of like the open-endedness of it.  It's better than everything ending with 'Shave-and-a-Haircut--six bits!"
He's trying things, and I like that. 

The first single "Found A Little Baby/3/4 Blind Eyes" is as good as anything from any of the 1960s demi-gods.  "More You" was kind of a punt, but Fed was about 1/2 way there of making a completely mindbogglingly brilliant album.  Especially, you can't deny "No Education," "Fed," and "Born Together."  I think he was going for a "what's going on" type of affair--and not every song is brilliant on that album but works more as a whole.  I think because of the way he made the record, Liam failed ultimately in that regard, but not by much.

Yup, the single is great. I have it somewhere, on Drag City if memory serves. For me, he didn't quite live up to his talent, so far.