Gorgeous Blue Flower

I'm sitting here with Th' Faith Healers blaring out of the speakers, after eating a large amount of roast garlic. I have a cold, but I don't care, because there ain't no cold in the world that can withstand the awesome power of garlic. Especially when the special garlic powers are enhanced by a borderline vitamin c overdose and copious amounts of Syndol (the painkiller which turns you into a weeble). Later I shall eat a fantastically huge amount of chicken jalfrezi and drink brandy. This combination (Faith Healers records optional) is guaranteed to knock the shit out of any cold.

The reason I mention Th' Faith Healers is cos although I always loved 'em, I haven't listened to them in fucking ages. Normally, unless I have some perverse reason for hanging on to it, a record not listened to is a record that gets flogged or exchanged for one that's not just adding to the immense amount of crap that fills my flat. Th' Faith Healers stuff though, I've never been able to part with, even though I haven't listened to L' for 5 years or so. Till yesterday when I was gripped with a desperate urge to listen to it.

Don't get me wrong, this is not a nostalgia trip, I'd just forgotten how damn good, and original, Th' Faith Healers were. I'd also forgotten that I can't stay still when their music is playing, it's got an electric momentum that wires itself straight into yr central nervous system and makes it move.

No one quite sounded like 'em either. It took some group to meld a sound that at times could give Skullflower or Terminal Cheesecake a run for its money with a sublime melodic krautpop sensibilty without diluting either. Joe Dilwoth's drumming in Stereolab was functional at best, but when he played with this lot his loping motorik grooves were just Right, lauching what could have been just another noisy Camden band into an altogether more psychedelically irresitible place. Makes me want to fucking dance anyway.