In Magnus Mills‘ The Forensic Records Society (Bloomsbury, 2017) two blokes decide to “form a society for the express purpose of listening to records closely and in detail. Forensically if you like, without any interruption or distraction. With a code of conduct … ” What could possibly go wrong? “Obviously there will be no comments or judgement of other people’s taste. We’ll be here simply to listen,” says instigator James, whose increasingly puritanical approach in the back room of the Half Moon pub quickly leads to division, as three more societies emerge in The Forensic Records Society’s wake.
What we have here is an allegory for any kind of grouping – religious, political, listening to vinyl singles – designed to bring about some kind of change in society:
Was it really beyond human capacity, I pondered, to create a society which didn’t ultimately disintegrate through internal strife? Or collapse under the weight of its own laws? Or suffer damaging rivalries with other societies? Because there was no question that all these fates awaited us if we carried on as we were.
With accounts of various meetings of the societies there are many references to the music played, which is wide-ranging, adventurous and of a pretty high standard; a couple had me purring with joy. The 45 rpm single is king. Only the song titles are cited; no performer attributions are made, which had me diving for YouTube on occasion, but it’s an astute look at blokedom, with much humour to be had, in particular from the meetings. There is a nice running joke about the perfect length for a pop single: three minutes, says the one obsessed by it. (Wrong!)
Of course the Kinks get a mention:
… then James completed the opening round by playing ‘Waterloo Sunset’. We listened closely until the final notes dwindled into oblivion and the record ceased turning. Eventually, Chris broke our silent reverie:
‘Terry and Julie cross over the river, where they feel safe and sound.’
James nodded his head but said nothing, and it struck me as rather odd that he allowed Chris these weekly utterances. The rules clearly stated that there were to be no comments or judgements, yet Chris regularly flouted the convention without censure. On the other hand, I suppose it could be argued that quoting directly from a song infringed neither category, and I have to admit that personally I harboured no objection to the practise. Chris had a very gentle voice and his delivery was barely intrusive. Moreover, he had an extraordinary ability to distil the essence of a song into a single line. Whenever he spoke, we all understood exactly what he meant. Well, most of us did anyway.
Mike pondered the words for a moment or two, and then asked, ‘Who’s Terry and Julie?’
Nobody even tried to explain.
‘If you weren’t there,’ said Barry, ‘you wouldn’t know’.
‘Well, I wasn’t,’ replied Mike, ‘so I don’t.’
It was time for the next round of music, and Rupert’s second contribution was ‘Pressure Drop’.
We could tell them, couldn’t we, Kinks fans. Dave Davies’ solo work gets a cursory mention. The narrator (James’s mate, and co-founder of the FRS) is on a second reconnaissance to a splinter group:
My previous foray to the Perceptive Records Society had been a partial success, but I knew it would be folly to pursue a similar approach on my second visit. They’d merely assume I was trying to be clever, so this time I chose a much simpler course of action. It was based on the concept of a blank canvas. Rather than spending hours selecting records according to some vague criterion of ‘perceptivity’, I would pick them at random from my collection. The other members of the society could then make of them what they wished. So it transpired that the following evening I arrived with copies of ‘All My Ghosts’, Death of a Clown’ and ‘Hurry Up Harry’.
No, I had to look up the first one too: Frank Black & the Catholics. I’m not sure of the relevance of this last passage, but I’ll give it the benefit of the doubt as tribute to the recently late Mark E.Smith (who covered Victoria, after all). Mike announces that he’s going to play “How I wrote Plastic Man” (by the Fall):
‘Sorry Mike,’ he [James] said, ‘but you must try and remember this is primarily a listening society. We don’t allow comments or judgement, especially while records are playing.’ […]
‘By the way,’ he [Barry] said. ‘It’s Elastic Man.’
‘Well it sounds like “Plastic Man” to me,’ said Mike.
‘That’s deliberate,’ said Dave. ‘He sings “Plastic Man” to be controversial, but it’s actually “Elastic Man”.’
‘What’s it say on the label?’
‘”Elastic Man”.’
‘Can we please proceed!’ snapped James.
Anyone know any of these characters? I enjoyed The Forensic Records Society a lot, even though I was puzzled by the ending. Here’s a link to my full review (with a couple of added musical delights) elsewhere in this blog: quavid.wordpress.com/2018/04/13/the-forensic-records-society/
And here’s a link to the main Kinks in Literature page, which I intend to re-format at some time soon to create links from the index: quavid.wordpress.com/kinks-stuff/the-kinks-in-literature/