Tag Archives: Captain Sensible

Feb 07 2023
Leave a comment
12" single, reissue, vinyl

Captain Sensible • This Is Your Captain Speaking [12″ EP]

Captain Sensible - This Is Your Captain SpeakingI took almost a year off from this website (or is it a “blog”?) for a number of reasons, many of them lost to the mists of time… Okay, yeah, it wasn’t really all that long ago but some of the reasons I have forgotten. Then I read of this lovely reissue, CAPTAIN SENSIBLE’s This Is Your Captain Speaking, and figured maybe it was time to revisit things. Let’s move on from questions of who’s to blame and finger pointing to more, uhhh, sensible things, shall we?

First released as a 7″ back in 1981, This Is Your Captain Speaking is a 3-song solo record that The Damned’s guitarist put together for the good lil’ anarchists at Crass Records. It was super hard to find here in the States (I didn’t actually learn of it until late ’82 or so) and the one I ended up with was pretty worn out already. It didn’t help that the record was cut at 33 rpm. What must have been at least somewhat interesting to the person who owned it before me was how Sensible combined his love of punk rock with his then not-so-documented love of psychedelic rock, pop rock and liberal politics. The A-side, “The Russians Are Coming,” is a diatribe about how big superpowers continually use scare tactics (like blame and finger pointing) to prime the pistons of their war machines. The backing vocalists sing “the Russians are coming” and Captain screams “it’s all I’ve ever heard!” and then again with “the Russians are coming” and Sensible’s retort, “I don’t believe a word.” Whether you believe it or not, folks, you may at least be old enough to remember hearing that refrain as a warning/threat/etc. when you were young. Here it’s set to a catchy melody that makes for a good political pop song.

On the EP’s B-side were two songs, not as strong but still quite good, starting with “(What D’Ya Give) The Man Who’s Gotten Everything?” a tune Sensible would re-record for his first A&M album, Women and Captains First, a year later. That tune could’ve just as well been recorded by The Damned, with its punkily humorous refrain. Then there’s “Oursouls to You” – an anti-religious hymn sung by an all-Captain choir – which starts and ends with found-sound dialog clearly nabbed from some radio or television program aimed at whatever kind of Christians were likely to be tuned in.

In one fell swoop – errrr, uhhh, 3-song volley – Captain Sensible took swipes at a trio of his biggest bugaboos: war, greed and religion. Or is that just one collective bugaboo? Whatever, the indie single was hard to find for years until last summer when Crass Records reissued it as a 12″ single via the much larger One Little Independent label. Being the kind of guy who’s usually tuned in to these kinds of releases, you’d think I would have been right on top of ordering this baby. Well… hey! Even I miss one now and again. Nevertheless, this 12″ was entirely worth the wait, as these tracks have not only never come out on CD but have never sounded this good. Cut at 45 rpm and wisely pressed on a big 12-inch, This Is Your Captain Speaking is available for purchase. Pass on it at your own peril. – Marsh Gooch

4.5/5 (Crass/One Little Independent 321984/SR, 2023)

Tagged ,
Jul 30 2020
Leave a comment
7" vinyl, colored vinyl, punk, vinyl

The Sensible Gray Cells • So Long (7″)

Being a huge fan of The Damned and its longtime guitarist Captain Sensible, I was pretty excited to see that the man’s originally one-off side project, THE SENSIBLE GRAY CELLS, was making a new record. “So Long” (b/w “What’s the Point of Andrew?”) is the lead single from the upcoming longplayer (called Get Back Into the World on the back of this single), and it’s a respectable 45.

The group, made up of Sensible, ex-/current-Damned bassplayer Paul Gray and Marty Parrott on drums, put out an album in 2013 called A Postcard from Britain (with a different drummer, Ant Thickett), and it was pretty good. Not great – in fact, I really wanted it to be much better. I wanted it to rock with punk exuberance like the best of The Damned, and to have the sense of humor and fun that the best of Captain Sensible’s solo records had. It was marginally close, but no cigar. This new single, a teaser for another LP, is again, pretty good. Not great – it does showcase the Captain’s standard political stance, which I generally agree with, but it just feels not quite finished. The song itself is a rockin’ number with a serviceable arrangement, but the lead vocal seems buried a bit and lacking what I’d call doneness (not sure it’s a word, but it is a button on my microwave oven). It’s lacking that exuberance and in-your-face delivery that makes a great single.

As this is a 7″ and I am likely to be reviewing its attendant LP, I’m keeping this short. “So Long” is enjoyable but I’d be inclined to play it a lot more if they give it a better mix for the album. I am asking, Sensible Gray Cells, for a better mix. As John Lennon (who was great, both dead and alive) once sang, “Don’t let me down!” – Marsh Gooch

2.5/5 (Damaged Goods DAMGOOD538 [UK], 2020)

Tagged , ,
Jan 13 2018
Leave a comment
CD, reissue, Skratchdisc

Captain Sensible • Women And Captains First, The Power of Love [CD]

[Originally published 1/18/2010 on Skratchdisc]

FINALLY two of the greatest albums that mix rock and “synth pop” in a way that dumbs down neither have been issued on CD. CAPTAIN SENSIBLE, sometime guitarist for my favorite band of all time, The Damned, put these two out in the early ’80s, on the heels of his surprise hit “Happy Talk” (yes, from South Pacific!), as he took his turn at becoming a pop star. He had more than his 15 minutes, at least in Britain, and of course he’s been back with his punk chums for longer than a decade now, but these A&M elpees were never put out on CD until the 2000s, first as limited edition Japanese issues (with uncharacteristically mediocre mastering), and now these superb versions on Cherry Red. Women And Captains First came out in 1982 and featured not only the aforementioned hit, but the further single “Croydon” (a sublime tune about his childhood and growing up “cleaning toilets”), “Brenda,” and my personal fave, “Wot!” (which also charted). Tony Mansfield gets the producer credit for both albums, and on the first one especially he really did a fantastic job… great pop songs bolstered by production and arrangements that really bring out the uniqueness of Captain’s take on rock ’n’ roll. The Power of Love followed in 1984 with real great singles “Stop the World” and “I’m a Spider,” though the hits kinda trailed off. Whatever… this was another good one, though not quite as.

Cap’n went on to do more solo stuff, and eventually rejoined The Damned after former drummer Rat Scabies departed, and the band returned to former glories with 2001’s Grave Disorder. Sensible has slowed down on the release front, but hell, he did run for political office in the Blah! Party he formed in the UK, and he has been an active campaigner for animal rights and a lot more. These two slabs of early ’80s pop are proof that not everything that had a synth back then sucked.
5/5 (Women And Captains First), 3/5 (The Power of Love)
(Cherry Red CDMRED 408, 409)

Tagged ,
May 05 2015
Leave a comment
CD, digital download

Dead Men Walking • Easy Piracy

deadmenwalking_band_400pxwideI’m not gonna start this by trying to persuade you that Dead Men Walking are a supergroup, because they’re not—the last group that fit that description hasn’t made a record in over 25 years, and two of the guys aren’t even available to record again even if they wanted to. Besides, calling any group of musicians made up of people already known for other bands they’ve been in is just plain lazy. The only reason you read me using the term is because it’s already been used to describe these guys.

Made up of Captain Sensible from The Damned, Mike Peters of The Alarm, Slim Jim Phantom of Stray Cats, and Chris Cheney of The Living End, Dead Men Walking sound like a rock band with a lot of rockabilly and punk edges. And that’s what you’d expect considering the bands that got them to where they are today. There are a slew of great songs among the fifteen on Easy Piracy, the group’s first actual release. “The Weather Song” sounds like a rockin’ acoustic Damned song (it’s one of the few sung by Sensible), deadmenwalking_300pxwhile “Damned Damned Damned” starts off sounding like a take on Ramones’ “Teenage Lobotomy” until the melody kicks in. The lead off track “Rock and Roll Kills” has some great lyrics, like many of the songs here, while “Whatever Turns You On (Will Turn on You)” isn’t too shabby and wins the Best Song Title award for the album. I can go for “Dr. Henry,” too, but I need to do a little more research to tell you what it’s about. “Song for Eddie,” though, is definitely about rockabilly rebel Eddie Cochran (not the Heinz hit of yesteryear).

You can definitely hear each Dead Men Walking guy’s contribution to the band’s sound (especially if you already know their other bands), and that’s actually a good thing. Too often these “bands made up of dudes you know from other bands” suffer from trying to sound like “Triumph meets April Wine in an alley while Chilliwack channels Loverboy and Bryan Adams gets high.” (A big hello going out to all of my Canadian readers!)

I think this is an album I’ll listen to more than a handful of times. Let’s face it—how often can you say that these days?

3/5 (Slimstyle)

Tagged , , , ,
%d bloggers like this: