Workers' Days / Makes Me Want To Holler
Working Week – Inner City Blues
Virgin – VSX 1273
Vinyl, 12", 45 RPM, Canada, 1985
Info
I would have felt clever if I'd gotten my act together to post a Working Week record for May Day. International Workers' Day and Mothers' Day just came and I wasn't able to keep up here, but better late than never... I hope they were good for everyone.
Today: The 12" single of Working Week's 1985 take on a Marvin Gaye classic. The band had it's roots in Weekend, a group fronted by singer Alison Statton after her time in Young Marble Giants. Some of YMG's quirky, minimalist, indie pop snuck through to the earliest Weekend recordings, but Weekend's lounge and jazz leanings took the lead during their brief 1981-83 run. By the time of their last record, they were joined by pianist Keith Tippett for a live album recorded at the famous London jazz club Ronnie Scott's.
Weekend called it quits in 1983, but guitarist Simon Booth and saxophonist Larry Stabbins decide to keep going, naming their new group... Working Week. (Is it stupid that I actually think that's kind of brilliant?) Their interests in jazz, bossa nova, and soul positioned them on the front end of the UK soul, acid jazz and dance scenes that were about to take off.
The group had a rotating cast of members with Booth and Stabbins at the center, but by the time of the first LP Juliet Roberts had settled in for a few years as Working Week's lead singer. Covering Marvin Gaye always seems like a risky move to me, but I enjoy their take on Inner City Blues. The original has a powerful, minimal arrangement- lots of space for the weight of Gaye's vocals and lyrics. Working Week go the other way, jamming the track full of pop-soul vocals, playful horn breakdowns, jazz bass riffs and more. And in the 12" mix, it's not hard to hear a little of the house and dance music productions that lay ahead later in their careers. Maybe it's a slightly corny and dated take on a song that is pretty timeless, but I've been enjoying it the last few days.
The stereo mix on the track 1 percussion was pretty nice on a good pair of headphones. And it's possible that No Cure No Pay is exactly the 8+ minute Latin jazz instrumental jam from a group of Brits that you never knew you needed. This extended mix wasn't included in the double CD reissues of early Working Week albums a few years back, so here's your chance. It was a nice one to play out loud this week with the sun shining and some signs of a little less isolation in our world. I hope you enjoy.
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