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Musical Janeens - The Psalter Lane Tapes 1980

by sheffieldtapearchive

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1.

about

These tracks were on an old cassette titled just "Musical Janeens". It is a copy of a recording session at Psalter Lane Art College in 1980, where Ian Burden was studying for his Fine Art degree. As usual other people were drafted in, Helen Ryall for vocals on one of the sections and Rob Bolton and Mick Glaisher for the drums. As for the Musical Janeens themselves, it is difficult to remember who played what during the session. Whilst each played their normal instruments, there was a lot of switching around and the addition of a borrowed Sax. Whilst there are distinct sections, they've been edited together to run into each other and so it was decided to leave it as just one long piece. The tape was digitised by Martin Rootes, but due to the age of the tape the sound quality was not the best and so Ian Burden did some post processing to correct as best as possible the tonal balance..

The Musical Janeens; Ian Elliott, Ian Burden and Martin Rootes
- Vocals and Various Instruments.
with:
Helen Ryall - Backing Vocals
Mick Glaisher - Drums
and Rob Bolton - Drums

Ian Elliott, Ian Burden and Martin Rootes met at school in Peterborough where they started making music together. Whilst both the Ians could play instruments, Martin, or Did as he was known, used to create sounds from a collection of electronic devices, sound effects records and tape machines. When they finished school they initially went their separate ways, but due to a chance meeting on a train they came back together and used to meet up in Sheffield to make music utilising the equipment at Lady Mabel College where Ian Elliott was doing teacher training. The music they were doing at this point was experimental and mainly improvised. Ian Burden then moved to Sheffield to Psalter Lane Art College, and a year later Martin Rootes came up after finishing his degree at UEA. It was at this point that the three decided to call themselves Graph and instead of experimental improvisations set out to do songs written by Ian Elliott. For a time they remained a trio, but unlike other drumerless trios in Sheffield they didn't have a drum machine and instead of a bass guitar Ian Burden used a normal electric guitar. Martin had started playing an organ that he'd push through various effects units, Ian Elliott also used to use various effects to give his distinctive guitar sound. Through John Turner, who at the time was Artistic Director at Rotherham Arts Centre, a recording session was arranged at the Yorkshire Arts Studio in Bradford. The first five songs were recorded there in June 1978, the next two in a later session, the date of which is lost from memory.
After this initial period as a trio they added a drummer Nik Allday and recorded one of their best known songs: Drowning. This got the interest of Bob Last of Fast Products who included it on Earcom 1. Later they had a change of line-up replacing Nik Allday with Rod Siddall and adding Pam Young on backing vocals. They also changed their name to "Salon Graph". The record company Pinnacle had got interested by "Drowning" and paid for a recording session in London, however nothing actually came of it and the two songs that were done there were never released.
The final change was another name change to the "Musical Janeens (And Other Party Games)" and a shift back to improvisation with the three core members being joined by various other musicians. The change happened just before a mini tour of the Netherlands that had been arranged by Wally Van Middendorp of Plurex records, but they still went borrowing Ze Popes drummer Orpheus Rovers. The four gigs they did were recorded on a ghetto blaster which then ended up being released as a live album "The Musical Janeens Sell Out". As well as the sometimes rather chaotic live gigs they also did this recording session at Psalter Lane Art College. One tracks from this session, "Glen Miller And His Contemporary Intimacies Meets The Musical Janeens Uptown With A Packet Of Jellies And A Caribbean Monolith", ended up on the "Bouquet Of Steel" Compilation Album. The rest of the recording here has not been previously heard except by members of The Musical Janeens themselves.
Eventually the three went their separate ways, Ian Burden joining the Human League, Ian Elliott going solo and Martin Rootes playing with the "Wealthy Texans".

Many thanks to Martin Rootes, Ian Burden and Ian Elliott for permission to include this excellent recording on Sheffield Tape Archive, and for providing the extensive information above.

Check out the Graph and Wealthy Texans recordings elsewhere on Sheffield Tape Archive.

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released July 28, 2021

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sheffieldtapearchive Sheffield, UK

A series of archive recordings from around 1980 onwards: sheffield bands, demos, concerts and rarities..

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