Picture the scene, Manchester, autumn 1988; a scruffy kid, clad in denim and a bad shirt strolls awkwardly into the Piccadilly Records Box Office and asks for a ticket; “The Wedding Present, at the Ritz, please” he hands over £4 of his hard earned paper round money, shoves the pale blue ticket into his pocket and heads off down Market Street to H.M.V. It’s here that he searches out a copy of The Wedding Presents debut long player ‘George Best’, he looks at the cover, reads all the writing, puts it down, picks it up again, he fucking hates Manchester United with a vengeance, fucking hates them. “George fuckin’ Best” he mutters to himself, “whats wrong wi’ Dennis Tueart?” He looks around just to see if any of his mates are about, no, it’s clear, he picks up this bloody record, God knows why, and makes his way hurriedly to the checkout. The girl on the checkout is pretty, a little older than him, nice long hair and sharp eyes, she takes more of his paper round money, puts the record in a bag and hands it over. He gives a cheeky wink and is gone.

A couple of hours later this kid runs up the stairs of his house and into his bedroom, he carefully slides the precious vinyl from its crisp paper sleeve, and places it carefully on the dansette, lifts the needle over and drops it into the groove. There’s a crackle, a pause, and then a sharp intake of breath surges through his speakers...”Oh why do you...”. From that point on he is smitten, desperate to skip the needle back a quarter of an inch to hear again the delight that has just swamped his room, but eager to witness what new delights spew forth with each new track, it’s manic, it’s heartfelt, it replicates his teenage dreams, desires and defeats. There’s one thing for sure, there is no looking back now.

Seventeen years later The Wedding Present are back, although they never really went away. ‘Take Fountain’ is a canon of songs that seemingly brings together all that is good about David Gedge and the last twenty years of his song writing career. All the influences are there, from the rough and ready George Best and Tommy days, the melodic harmony of Bizarro, the dark, austere intensity of Seamonsters, the subverted pop of Watusi and Saturnalia, and more pertinently, and recent returnees to the fold may not wish to hear this, but there are definite elements of Gedges most recent project ‘Cinerama’.

‘Take Fountain’ is, without exception a wholly magnificent record. From it’s first desperate, isolated murmuring groans of tragically disparate feedback during ‘On Ramp’ through the blatant pop of ‘I’m From Further North Than You’, the insistent thrash of ‘Ringway to SeaTac’ and the self-loathing melancholia of ‘Larry’s’ the quality never drops below ‘exceptionally high’. Many of the songs meld into one, making for a gut wrenching soundscape of broken hearts, failure, desolation and desertion. Listening to this record should be all or nothing, you wouldn’t pick up a book and read a few pages here and a few pages there, you wouldn’t sit down with a film and watch a scene from the middle, then a scene form the end, and then a scene for the start would you? In the same way ‘Take Fountain’ reads like a book from start to finish, with prologue, foundations, story, denouement, and epilogue.

‘On Ramp’ neatly fades into the eight minute epic that is ‘Interstate 5’, a thrilling guitar based tale of a girl who wanted a fling, and a man who wanted more, roles reversed from the norm, but tellingly just as painful. The extended outro brings forth an Ennio Morricone-esque plateau of sound – Gedge’s love of film scores is well documented – and it’s not for the last time on this record that these influences will surface.

‘Always The Quiet One’ and ‘I’m From Further North Than You’ provide a brace of up tempo pop songs in typical Gedge mould. However, scratch the surface and there is a wealth more sound than you may at first recognise, there are layers upon layers of fills and flutters that add a certain spice to these tracks without making either feel cluttered or over laden with unnecessary baggage, a commendation to the production employed should be made. ‘Mars Sparkles Down on Me’ sparkles down like a heaven sent gift. Lyrically it is dark and brooding, menacing and full of loathing, but musically it is a sheer delight; the warm, soothing guitar lines that drip like honey from Simon Cleaves Stratocaster, the haunting cello runs, the sweet, homely backing vocals and the tempting, teasing tacets make this one of the high points of a high point littered set of songs. For those of you who missed out on Cinerama, ‘Mars Sparkles Down on Me’ is as close as a direct lift from their ‘Health and Efficiency’ that you will ever come across. A must.

Previously aired as part of The Wedding Presents last Peel Session just weeks before John Peel passed on ‘Ringway to SeaTac’ is a dizzy romp of scuzzball guitar interspersed with a substantial vocal and drum break before  crashing into an apocalyptic climax. It’s just the sort of thing that you would hear on Peel, and quite fittingly the album is dedicated to his memory, a damn fine tribute, and a dedication that I am sure he would appreciate.

‘Don’t Touch That Dial’ has previously been released as a Cinerama single, and this version remains similar in nature, if a little more anguished; whilst ‘It’s For You’ is the real bad boy from the good family of the album. It riffs and it rocks, it kicks and screams and it fights dirty and stands out like a rock and roll beacon. Terry de Castro riffs the sweet merry hell out of her bass in a manner last seen swung low between the legs of Joy Division and New Order bass mucker Peter Hook. If any song on this record can be described as ‘no nonsense’ then this is it. Musically it’s brash and brazen, lyrically it’s tense and aggressive, no more lying down, no more giving up, it’s a pertinent ‘fuck you’, it’s a slap in the face ultimatum. There is no debate, no discussion; it literally is, for you.

Bringing the happy listener back down to terra firma is the deliciously fluffy yet grandiose ‘Larry’s’ – of course it’s a tale of heartbreak, of course it’s a tear stained litany of despair, but it’s simply perfect, it really is.

Closing the album are two epic productions, ‘Queen Anne’ and ‘Perfect Blue’. The former is a mid tempo loud/soft/loud/soft arrangement with luscious backing vocals and searing, scorching guitar breaks that literally take you by the scruff of the neck and spit in your face, you cannot ignore this song, it isn’t background music and it’s not for the faint hearted. It’s special, it’s forceful, it’s delicate and it’s honest. That’s it, that is the thing, it’s pure and simple honesty. And when in ‘Perfect Blue’ Gedge sings “when I turn round to glance at you, you’re staring, your eyes are such a perfect blue that I can’t look away...” we know that we have all been there, we’ve all been so transfixed by beauty that we don’t know where to put ourselves.

“...the more I have, the more I want you...”

Again, backing vocals boost the performance, they are simply perfect, and combined with the spine tinglingly erotic cello break we are given perhaps the most perfect song of the decade. I challenge anyone to listen to this and not be moved, the man who this song fails to melt has a heart of stone. Close your eyes over the string laden outro and let all the emotions drift away, you’re there, you’re almost there, it’s utter perfection.

With this record David Gedge has re-established himself as perhaps the greatest, single most important song writer of recent years. Never mind the Stings, never mind the Eltons; they are not in the same league. To that scruffy kid who wondered into Piccadilly records all those years ago to buy a gig ticket, David Lewis Gedge is the modern day Hemmingway, Steinbeck or Williams. Yeah, that’s who he is, Tennessee Williams, he is the Indie kids Tennessee Williams. It’s a gift, it’s The Wedding Present, it's for you.

Johnny Mac

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