12. Orange JuiceYou Can’t Hide Your Love Forever
That was definitely a revisiting. I was aware of Orange Juice and ‘Rip It Up’, ‘Felicity’ was a dancefloor favourite, but like with Felt, it wasn’t until I had all this time to really think about them that they became the titans of indie for me.
I realised they were the ones, but in a different way from Felt. They were more energetic, they were about living. And I wanted to live. Like Orange Juice! And they were from Glasgow, there was this palpable thing where I knew they lived there, I knew Postcard Records started in that house, I knew these songs emerged from these streets. I had held onto these fanzines from when I worked in this shop in the 80s, and they were so influential for me, they were from 1979-80, and crammed full of Orange Juice interviews, Aztec Camera, The Go-Betweens, and they would talk about their favourite records. I tracked down every single one that was mentioned in these magazines.
I also felt – I can use a biblical metaphor for this, maybe I shouldn’t. But with Orange Juice I felt like Paul from the Bible, because I wasn’t there when Jesus, ie Orange Juice, was around, but the legend seemed to be all around the place. I had built it up and up in my own mind and to a great extent I became this real disciple, someone who talks about Orange Juice and builds up the legend.
Some people in Glasgow now will have the same feelings about Belle And Sebastian, and know where the church where you lived was and so on. Is that mind-blowing?
The most I will say is that it is absolutely fine and I absolutely understand it. That is why if a kid comes up to me on the street and shows me a Belle And Sebastian line tattooed on their forearm, then it doesn’t freak me out at all. I understand because of the way I felt about Orange Juice. But the two things are separate – the magic that I felt for that band is a separate thing and it still exists. I know them a bit, I’ve met Edwyn Collins a few times, corresponded with him a bit, and James Kirk goes out with a friend of mine. He is a great guy. Particularly with that record, You Can’t Hide Your Love Forever, what I love is that it is ramshackle and so ambitious. It is a record that fails gloriously, with the accent on gloriously.
