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Broken By A Heart

by Monoplane

supported by
Alan Graham
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1.
House A Home 04:36
2.
Not Sorry You're Gone 04:00
3.
Deeply 02:44
4.
Sleeping 03:48
5.
December 95 01:25
6.
Happy Song 02:36
info
7.
1000 Times 04:56
8.
Gravity Well 05:12
9.
Water 02:48
10.
Trust 02:24
11.
Now It's Over 05:04
12.
I Won't Regret It 03:24
13.
Made For You (Elevator To Hell) 03:06
info
14.
First Floor Window 05:16

about

There’s the myth of the ‘lost album’, the album a musician has made that’s never seen the light of day. Often these are made by bands people care about, but sometimes they’re made by bands you’ve never heard of. This is one of those albums.

In 1996 Peter, Anna, Phil, and I got together to write and record some songs. We wanted to be tuneful but with a bit of bite and wrote a pretty good set of tunes. We used my Tascam 424 mk 3 to capture the sound of the band live in the rehearsal room, adding vocals in various bedrooms and spare rooms later. Almost a quarter of a century later, I’m surprised at how good the recording sounds.

The songs are split into two parts - a small number were worked up from demos Phil brought in, with ‘Happy Song’ written entirely by him. He’d just married his sweetheart Sylvie and was very much in love and his songs are upbeat, positive, happy. I was also in love, but not with the woman I had married. Listening back now to the lyrics I wrote, I can hear a young man who was desperately conflicted while trying to be as overt about his love for a woman who wasn’t his wife as he could be without being noticed. Even the songs that seem to be about betrayal weren’t about the person you’d have thought I should feel guilty about betraying. Not going to lie, it was a fucked-up time.

We completed the recordings, got excited when listening back to them, and even sent a demo tape to ‘Holly’s Demo Hell’ in Melody Maker. She described the guitar playing as ‘inspired’ which was nice but also said the singing was ‘dull’, which wasn’t as nice.

The band broke up when my wife found out about the other woman. Why? Because Anna was my sister-in-law and understandably didn’t want to continue playing music with the man who had cheated on her sister. The songs we’d recorded no longer mattered as my life collapsed around my ears and the master tape got shoved into a box and forgotten about.

Now I’ve dug it out, digitised it, selected the best mixes where more than one existed and made a cover. I did a tiny bit of mastering, but it didn’t need much. I’ve called it ‘Broken by a Heart’ because that’s what happened to the band.

24 years later, I’m rather proud of these songs. There are some nice melodies, some stuff that I’d not be able to play today, and the singing isn’t as dull as Holly in her Demo Hell said. A couple of them made their way forward into other bands - ‘December 95’ seems to be unkillable and is still in my live set today, ‘Gravity Well’ resurfaced (along with Peter) in my next band, Kosmische, and ‘Sleeping’ appeared in a newly recorded form on the Maps of Jupiter ‘Six Stereo Recordings’ 7” on Earworm Records a handful of years later. The rest sunk into the memories of a time that was hard to live through.

Highlights for me? ‘First Floor Window’ is rather great, and likely to be something I’ll be bringing into the present day for my current band Rainbow Skull. ‘I Won’t Regret It’ is good, even if it is a straight-up Afghan Whigs rip, and I’m rather fond of the version of ‘Made For You’ (by Elevator to Hell). Hopefully, you’ll enjoy something from it as well.

Alex Botten, Netherton, 22nd of February, 2020

credits

released January 1, 1996

Alex Botten - guitar and voice
Anna Appleyard - guitar and voice
Phil Newman - bass (and guitar?)
Peter Jones - drums


2020 cover drawn by Alex Botten

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all rights reserved

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about

Thee Alex image

Thee Alex Northampton, UK

Musician & visual artist with vast back catalogue.

also at -

theemoths.bandcamp.com

theemothsarchive.bandcamp.com

alexcharles.bandcamp.com

rainbowskull.bandcamp.com

disquietblackcountry.bandcamp.com

buttongarten.bandcamp.com

asmallglassghost.bandcamp.com

jazztown.bandcamp.com ... more

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