Sometimes it’s only too easy to see how the careers of some bands were doomed from day one – you only need to consider the name choice of Bjork’s first band “Cork the Bitches Arse” to realise that the fame game probably wasn’t high on their list of priorities. Then of course there’s the acts that employ manic time changes, literate lyrics and jarring dischords, then name themselves after a Dublin housing estate – so The Fatima Mansions were ultimately never going to be pick of the pops. The harder things are to “understand” in one sitting, the more there’s a reduced likelihood that a large audience awaits.

With Animals That Swim, it’s not so much their music or their choice of name that pointed towards obscurity, but their wilful attitudes. Firstly, they had a “singing drummer” in Hank Starrs, which has never generally been an acceptable concept for most live audiences. Indeed, it flies in the face of rock convention. Secondly, their original line up contained a New Yorker and a Kiwi, until they were deported (in the case of the New Yorker, forcibly and at the hands of immigration). Thirdly, they began their haphazard career by organising gigs where they would book poets and cabaret artists as well as bands, which was neither a credible nor orthodox thing to do on the London circuit at the time. Fourthly, and perhaps finally, they had a “thing” for peppering the brassy guitar pop they produced with awkward lyrics that almost mimicked modern prose poetry. In fact, one of their tracks “Sway With Me” is literally a Charles Bukowski poem twisted into song form, ignoring entirely the fact that Bukowski’s use of rhythm in poetry was never exactly pronounced.

What’s so astonishing, then, is that the whole bizarre cocktail worked. It may have meant that they were always just on the wrong side of commercial acceptability, but it did also mean that what they created was unique and genuinely beautiful.

Their first album “Workshy” was a little rough round the edges, but had endless charm. The guitars rattled and jangled whilst Hank Starrs half-sang his pithy observations on modern urban life over the top, and perhaps most notably a trumpet periodically hollered out bold, flourishing poppy riffs behind him. “Roy” explored the idea of meeting Roy Orbison in a bar, and finding him sulking about his reduced status in the Encyclopaedia of Rock. “I could have been bigger than Elvis/ I sung like a bird/ wrote my own words”, he groans, “but missed my chance cos I’m too damn ugly”. The gorgeous “Silent Film” takes in the lives and activities of numerous people in a locality, with a chorus proudly proclaiming “But this would best be seen from a great height/ or on silent film”. Then there’s the epic “King Beer”, a celebratory yet almost mournful piece of work about drunkenness.

The real tour-de-force, however, came with the follow up album “I Was The King, I Really Was The King”. Housed in a sleeve showing a decrepit man in late middle age stripped to the waist and seemingly cheering (or possibly yawning?), the artwork and title may or may not have been a comment on judging on surface values. Whatever, the first track off the bat, “Faded Glamour”, is the band’s finest moment. An exemplary and anthemic track celebrating small town England, it is in concept somewhere between Morrissey’s “Everyday is Like Sunday” and the Go Betweens “Streets Of Your Town”, except it’s far better than either of those tracks. Yes, really. Whereas both those singles sneered, savaged and sighed at the nowheresvilles of the world, and showed them to be beyond redemption or praise, the Animals That Swim track is about being held by the magnetic force of the history and the very aura of the places. “There’s been markets, garbage riots, maydays and meteors in the street” sings Hank, “But today it’s just a place where we meet”. The chorus soars in with a slightly sneering “This faded glamour is a stupid art school idea”, but by the time the song is halfway through the lyrics and melody shift irrepressibly upwards, and he instead begins celebrating the place. The melody builds and builds until it can take no more, then drops out with a whimper. It’s marvellous, drenched in an almost Celtic melancholy, and like most of the rest of the album, finds lyrical beauty in the unexpected, and things to celebrate in the most mundane and depressing of subject matters. Somewhere along the way, it also manages to be a superb pop song as well.





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Faded Glamour:

http://s6.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=1PEBLGUOKHR5Z2X1SZPT74VWX8

East St O'Neill:

http://s12.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=2Z6OTRFMXRE6705QMYD9BO8N83

The Longest Road:

http://s14.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=14MPEEUVDAIJ72O5BLO2ZH81L0

Near The Moon:

http://s19.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=3JMS3Q70X7OG91O19Q9G2TXOV7