Silent Street is the new collaborative label project of Blackest Ever Black boss Kiran Sande and Bristol-based Idle Hands record shop and label owner Chris Farrell, as well as the name of a 1981 single by Bristol post-punkers Maximum Joy.
For the label’s first release, they will present a compilation of singles from Maximum Joy called I Can’t Stand It Here On Quiet Nights. "As a name, Maximum Joy couldn’t be more apt: theirs is music of uncommon passion, a giddy celebration of music and of life itself (is there a difference?)," the label says. "With a youthful confidence and energy that leaps out at you even now, they took their diverse influences – punk, modern jazz, disco, dub, funk, soul, early hip-hop, Afrobeat and chansons – and distilled them into what is, we don’t mind saying, some of the greatest, most intoxicating pop music ever made."
Above, you can stream ‘Silent Street / Silent Dub’ which opens the compilation, originally released just one year after the band formed in 1980. The compilation is centred around the three singles the band released on Dick O’Dell’s Y Records between 1981 and 1982, and Sande and Farrell describe the track streaming above as a shared personal favourite.
I Can’t Stand It Here On Quiet Nights marks the first official UK vinyl reissue of Maximum Joy material and will be released in a double vinyl edition next month, with sleevenotes by the band’s Janine Rainforth, Tony Wrafter and Kevin Pearce. You can pre-order the record here.
