ONE MAN CLAPPING REVIEWS

Q Magazine 4/89 by Mat Snow 3/5

Manchester's James are a four-piece who shun the tramlines on which most rock proceeds. Their music has something of the improvisatory, protean quality of small-group jazz; but born of the punk generation, they also shun the stoned meander of such as The Grateful Dead. Recorded live in Bath last October, this album unveils songs not to be found on their two studio offerings Stutter and Strip-Mine and considerably restructures hitherto familiar numbers. For a group whose sole modus operandi is to fly by the seat of their pants, they are extraordinarily assured, playing off yet with each other with a rare empathy. Given the restless nerve endings of their songs (a hybrid of high-life guitar and English folk chords) such teamwork is all the more amazing. Where One Man Clapping beats their studio albums is that it gives space to the idiosyncratic expostulations of singer Tim Booth, semi-free associations previously buried in the mix. In his agitated lyrics - half intellectual jester, half raving hypochondriac - one can hear why Morrissey has long championed him and his works, of which Really Hard, Burned (a lyrically and melodically brilliant gripe against the big-league rock machine which, in the shape of Sire Records, has just chewed them up and spat them out) and Leaking, contained here, stand as the summits to date.