1. I Are Becoming Instinct 3:18
2. The Push Button Deities 1:53
3. Psychic Vampire Supply Teacher 2:03
4. Coming Up On The Inside 1:35
5. Night Gallery Emissions (After Lights Out) 0:55
6. Carry On, Darkly 5:30
7. Dry-Eyed Ballad Of A Fink 1:33
8. All Over The Place 1:47
9. Grandmother’s Steps 3:13
10. Gadfly Adolescence 2:18
11. The Spring Heel Penny Dreadful (Theme) 1:34

A summer’s day in an English country garden. Birds and insects chirp and chirrup. A cuckoo cuckoos. ‘Calling All Workers’ plays on a portable radio. Demonic laughter rings out. An electric guitar plays a few descending arpeggios. A sharp intake of breath and – drums and power chords crash in, a voice accentuating the minor to major chords. Harsh scouse vocals sing in two octaves at once that ‘the weathervane has spoken.’ of Arrowe Hill have set out their stall, and they are selling ‘the sour milk of the cosmos’.

Not enough has been written about of Arrowe Hill and their three albums to date (a fourth is on its way), but when setting out to recommend their classic debut album I feel I am already in the shadow of cleverer writers than I could ever hope to be. My favourite description, ‘M R James meets Elmore James’, manages to be so neat and so spot on that it is hard not to wonder if the band’s approach was tailored to this specification rather than the other way round. One Amazon reviewer describes this album as ‘a product that will be appreciated by people with an exquisitely refined artistic sense, like someone who can tell butter from “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter” ‘, which may smack of elitism, but makes a useful point. oAH are a band whose originality isn’t necessarily obvious on the first listen. I remember seeing them live a full two years before this album came out and being disappointed that their unexpectedly heavy sound didn’t seem to fulfil the promise of their intriguing name. In fact, all too often comparisons are made to a heart-sinkingly successful band whose name also begins with O, probably due to the loud guitars and abrasive Northern accent (although there is obviously quite a difference between the Scouse and Mancunian voice). But a more accurate comparison would be with Guided By Voices, for whom oAH used to frequently open. Unlike N Gallagher, songwriter Adam Easterbrook understands the virtues of brevity, his songs often being little more than vignettes and all the better for it. And not for him the trite sub-Lennonisms of the average NG lyric; oAH trade almost exclusively in ghost stories, to which the occasional appropriations from the blues seem wholly fitting. Julian Cope himself managed to pinpoint what makes oAH albums so individual, describing the ‘disconcerting’ way that they ‘heft several vats of raw Faust in the direction of post-Oasis Beatlemania’, creating an effect which is psychedelic without resorting to any of the usual clichés. oAH cleverly retool the whole notion of psychedelia by re-terming it ‘acid expressionism’. The Faust comparison hinges on the superb editing by which a witty use of sound effects is woven into the spaces between the songs, creating a series of albums which feel satisfyingly complete despite their 30 minute running times. There is also an admirable consistency in the way the band present themselves and their music, with a well judged use of puns (e.g. ‘Exorcise Book’ on the cover of this album) scattered throughout the messages sent via their myspace page, which is carefully maintained so that they always have exactly 666 friends.

Anyway, back to the album and that opening song, the anti-grammatical ‘I Are Becoming Instinct’, which is made up of many familiar ingredients, but is so ingeniously structured that it emerges as something original. A standard drums, bass, guitar and vocals set-up is made to sound totally fresh (despite the fetid lyrical themes), thanks to well deployed dynamics and harmonies. Track 2, the none-more GBV ‘The Push-Button Deities’, starts off with another descending guitar arpeggio, before switching to an echoey piano and back to guitar again. Almost as soon as the drums have joined in and a more ordinary rock band sound is achieved the song falls down a deep well, and for the last third the listener is left with nothing but the muffled sound of what appears to be a ghost trying to play the piano. If Oasis comparisons must be made then ‘Psychic Vampire Supply Teacher’ sounds like them covering The Apples In Stereo, with thankfully more of the latter than the former. Again it is done and dusted quickly and efficiently and only reaches the two minute mark thanks to the reverbed ectoplasm which fills out the dying moments. ‘Coming Up On The Inside’ also demonstrates how good the Gallaghers could have been if they’d set a 1’30 time limit on their songs. It is extremely catchy and has the urgency that comes from having only a short time in which to get a point across. No wonder John Peel was a big fan. A creaking door leads to the sparse and brief ‘Night Gallery Emissions’ which has the superb opening line ‘Bromide in my Ovaltine again’, and is sung over little more than an organ and strange backward squeals. Somebody coughs and we’re into the huge centrepiece of the album. ‘Carry On Darkly’ is the one song allowed space to be expansive, and its 5 minutes plus running time is well justified. It is heavy psychedelic rock of the highest order. It leads perfectly into ‘Dry-Eyed Ballad Of A Fink’, a strong one-minute melody with spikey piano accompaniment that concludes with the sound of knives being sharpened. ‘All Over The Place’ is back to the catchy guitar pop template, again with a strong suggestion of early Apples In Stereo (more on the Elephant 6 influence later). Rain on a window and a distantly chiming clock can be heard as ‘Grandmother’s Steps’ fades into view. Acoustic guitar and plangent slide guitar make this melodic song the warmest moment on the album. As an old clock ticks away at the conclusion a door is opened on squeaky hinges and the sound of someone singing is just about audible from another room. Descending power chords take us into a re-recorded version of early single ‘Gadfly Adolescence’, which, with its references to ‘a sticky wicket’ and ‘deep in the gloaming’, is an excellent example of Easterbrook’s tendency to throw new words into the rock and roll vocabulary. Title track ‘The Spring-Heel Penny Dreadful (Theme)’ is little more than strange, unmusical tones followed by a low quality field recording of a performer meekly responding to a small round of applause in the back room of a pub.

This is where the album finishes. But the CD is far from over. 5 minutes of silence follows to divide the main programme from a 23 minute bonus track made up of various songs taken from early singles (mastered directly from the vinyl) and contributions to tribute albums. The titles (not given on the CD sleeve) are as follows: Cuckoo Spit (b‑side of Gadfly Adolescence 7″)/ A Dull Today Is Darker Yesterday’s Bright Tomorrow (debut 7″ single)/ The Sound Of Free Speech (b‑side of latter — ‘cover’ of silent track by Crass)/ Sally (Minders cover, from Elephant 6 tribute album)/ Deathtrot And Warlock Riding A Rooster (Guided By Voices cover, from GBV tribute album)/ I’ve Been Waiting (Secret Square cover, from Elephant 6 tribute album).

This album completed of Arrowe Hill’s tenure with Must Destroy, a label that around the same time found unexpected commercial success with another of its acts, The Darkness. All subsequent releases have been on the band’s own Ouija Board label, starting off with follow-up album Hexadelica And The Speed Of Darkness which contains some of the band’s best songs (e.g. ‘Cursing The Seasons’ and ‘Blake On A Bad Day’), but is almost impossible to find as it was limited to a pressing of just 69 copies per format (CD and vinyl). Third album Dulce Domum took a cue from Pink Floyd’s debut and named itself after a chapter from The Wind In The Willows. Released on CD, it is still easily available. And just to annoy those of us who like to see a complete set of a band’s output sat side by side on the shelf, next album A Few Minutes In The Absolute Elsewhere is vinyl and download only. They don’t do things like other bands, of Arrowe Hill.