(Wo)men Next Door

For the three of you still following these, sorry for the absence! I'll be trying to catch up a little this week.

A request: Even if you are pretty sure that a group of white, British (and German?), punk rock women doing noisy covers of classic reggae songs could not possibly be your thing, give this one a chance. If any of you enjoy it, we could go some interesting new directions with this little music exchange...

The Slits ‎– Man Next Door
Human Records ‎– YUS 1
Vinyl, 12", 45 RPM, US, 1980

A1 Man Next Door
A2 In The Beginning There Was Rhythm
B Animal Space

The Slits ‎– Man Next Door
Y Records ‎– Y4, Rough Trade ‎– RT 044
Vinyl, 7", 45 RPM, UK, 1980

A Man Next Door
B Man Next Door (Version)

The women who formed the Slits as part of the original 1976-77 wave of London punk bands stood out in the decidedly male dominated scene. There were some lineup changes along the way, but the band remained almost entirely women until they broke up in late 1981. In those few years, the Slits rapidly evolved, moving faster than most of the boys around them to abandon punk's nihilism and violence to explore new ideas and musical styles. They played their first show opening for the Clash, but within a couple years they were performing with jazz legend Don Cherry and reggae stars including Prince Far I, Bim Sherman and Creation Rebel. They held onto some of the punk anger and their feminism while embracing reggae, dub production and finding space for fun, dance and experimentation.

In 1980, the Slits twice recorded a cover of John Holt and the Paragons' excellent "Man Next Door," a Jamaican classic. When Massive Attack covered the same tune (with vocals by the great Horace Andy), they slowed down the tempo and brought a dark paranoia along with window rattling bass. The Slits went a very different direction, turning up the volume and piling on bells, spaghetti western guitar lines, and warbling vocals into a wild dub mix. They rewrote John Holt's lyrics about a man needing to take his family to find some peace in "a quiet place" to escape the late night music, noise, fights and banging pots and pans of the neighbors. Instead, Ari and the Slits are leaving for "a noisier place," ditching the man next door and his complaints about their music and nighttime chaos.

The Slits released Man Next Door in 1980 as a 7" single, with a 12" version following later in the year. The second record is actually a different recording altogether though, and the two singles had different producers as well, with the UK's two most important dub innovators each taking a shift.

The 7" version was produced by Adrian Sherwood of On-U Sound. My noisy copy has seen a lot of play, but what sounds like a sudden, mid-song cut off on the A side isn't a flaw in the record or my recording- it's just the type of production weirdness that Sherwood was experimenting with in those days. I love those times when musical genres and cultures crash into each other, struggle, and occasionally come up with something new. Even through the clicks and pops, a listen to the dub version on side B might give you an idea of why I have such a musical obsession with this era in early 80s London and New York, when the lines between reggae, post-punk, funk, dance music and hip-hop were pretty damn blurry.

The 12" single was produced by Dennis Bovell, who also produced both of the proper LPs that were released while the band was active. In the 70s Bovell had played with British reggae group Matumbi, but by the early 80s he was producing his own dub albums (sometimes as "Blackbeard") and collaborating with some of the post-punk groups starting to incorporating reggae, dance music and electronics. Bovell may have delivered a more restrained mix than Sherwood's, but listen to the guitar sounding like like it was imported from a punk rock Ennio Morricone soundtrack and you'll see this is hardly your typical "extended dance mix" for the discotheque... Strangely, I think the original vinyl remains the only way to hear this version, as far as I know never appearing on CD or compilations. The record also has two Slits originals, including the great "In The Beginning There Was Rhythm." (That said, by the time they're all doing farm animal impersonations on the B side, "Animal Space" get a little too weird even for me.)

Also: This 1981 video of the Slits performing "Man Next Door" is worth a peek. And not only because it features backing vocals from a teenage Neneh Cherry... But especially because of her! Yes, that Neneh Cherry. Coolest person ever? If I haven't scared people off yet, there may have to be a Neneh Cherry feature in our future...