nikki sudden

I Am Time - Jeremy Gluck (Glass Modern)

This is one of the few times I cannot quantify a musical release. I cannot answer the question: “How many bottles?”

Really? For this? No, you may as well say “I Am Time” is as high as that thing over there, or as round as it is long. 

“I Am Time” is a rather startling career overview of the tempting output of one Jeremy Gluck - and, yes, we're all aware of the sniggerment possibilities of Jeremy's surname, so if you quit cackling at the back there we might be able to get to the meat of the matter at hand.

The more art I make, the more persuaded I become that there is no other art than mine, and no other artist than I. - Jeremy S Gluck

Currently Artist-in-Residence at Eltham Hill School (Greenwich, London), ex-Barrcudas member Jeremy S. Gluck is piloting a pioneering new digital art project, "Game of Memes". The first exhibition opens in London on Saturday November 11. The Barman owes me a huge backlog of wages so I’ll be there too. 

Now cast your eye over this pin-up, a centrefold from "Smash Hits" (one of those dubious teenage mags which proliferated in the late 1970s and early '80s). Observe the mop-top hair, the sharp shirts with snappy lines and the aw-shucks expressions. Not to mention that banana-coloured surfboard.

Not quite as dangerous as the gang in The Archies. Never mind the Barracudas being squeaky enough to take them home to meet Mum, you could take these boys to meet Granny.

She’d chuck them under the chin, pinch their cheeks and call them "lovely" before making them all nice cups of tea (from a teapot in a home-made tea-cosy) with a digestive biscuit.

Here’s the two-part hypothesis: (1.) No schtick in rock and roll works as well as premature death and; (2.) the Japanese have a particularly deep interest in musicians who have checked out early – especially those terminally doomed through their own vices. 

The latter probably has a lot to do with the strict Japanese drug laws and the populace's deeply rooted respect for authority. Remember the Macca bust? Did you hear the one about the Australian band that wouldn't tour there because the singer liked his pot so much and was worried he wouldn't find a connection? I digress. 

The laws of science say that any hypothesis should be disprovable. While you’re trying, I’m spinning this album.

"Jesus Loves My Heroin II" is  a Japanese tribute to Nikki Sudden and Kevin Junior Now, I have familiarity with some of the works of the late Mr Sudden; I’m less up-to-speed with the output of the late Mr Junior.