DEAD MEN TELL NO TALES

I could rave on about the brilliance of NIKKI SUDDEN and how each of his numerous albums are classics, especially the ones he recorded with Dave Kusworth as The Jacobites, but I'll try not to. Nikki's songs are pure poetry, shear beauty; images of revolutionary France, kings, queens and castles; romantic tales of heartbreak, that can touch the soul of even the most hardened hardcore listener, depending on your mood. Not the best singer or guitar player but the most passionate. His death last year robbed the world of a genuine, humble roving minstrel. Never hugely 'popular' in Britain, but massive in Europe, in America he recorded with REM. His cult status was already assured from his work in the Swell Maps, loved by everyone from Sonic Youth to Graham Coxon. His solo work has been applauded by the likes of Bobby Gillespie and Simon Ratcliffe from Basement Jaxx, who described Nikki as "A singer songwriter, a kind of smacked out English Bob Dylan...he needs a good meal inside him...he can't really play guitar...it's all a bit messy, but its got charm." Saw Nikki a good few times live, from Camden Palace to Bay 63 where he was supporting My Bloody Valentine (who were crap, audience was full of students with pudding bowl haircuts), each time he was great, but of all the times the best was when I got him to play in Stevenage and he charmed an audience who'd never heard of him. This is recording of some of that night back in '93 : http://www.sendspace.com/file/pg27rr