{"id":27837,"date":"2024-07-20T05:30:50","date_gmt":"2024-07-20T09:30:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=27837"},"modified":"2024-07-20T14:41:34","modified_gmt":"2024-07-20T18:41:34","slug":"album-review-apb-the-radio-1-sessions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2024\/07\/20\/album-review-apb-the-radio-1-sessions\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review: APB \u2013 The Radio 1 Sessions"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-27838\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/apb_radio1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"350\" height=\"310\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/apb_radio1.jpg 350w, https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/apb_radio1-300x266.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/>A postpunk band from rural Scotland near Aberdeen, APB never quite hit the big time. The band released but two albums during its time in the spotlight, though the group \u2013 with often-shifting lineups \u2013 endures to this day. But despite their comparatively slim official output, APB was one of those bands that found itself invited onto BBC Radio many times. Legendary tastemaking deejay John Peel had the group on his program(me) at leas twice (in 1982 and \u201883). David Jensen also brought APB on his show at least twice !982 and 1984), and there exists at least one other BBC set by the band for the Peter Powell Show in 1983.<\/p>\n<p>As is often the case \u2013 especially with punk, postpunk and new wave acts \u2013 the BBC performances often have a verve and spark that \u201cproper\u201d studio recordings lack. There\u2019s something about the immediacy of cutting live-in-the-studio (or close to that approach) that has yielded superb performances from groups like the Beatles on down.<\/p>\n<p>In 2006, a small and relatively unknown label called Young American Recordings compiled and released <i>The Radio 1 Sessions<\/i>, a 19-track collection of the aforementioned sessions. Copies of that long out-of-print are not the easiest to source, so this new 2024 reissue by Liberation Hall is a welcome one.<\/p>\n<p>This new release doesn&#8217;t make any substantial changes to the 2006 set: same tracks, same cover art. But ultimately it\u2019s about the music, and APB is in fine form here. There are no song repeats in this collection; the group had plenty of material and would do a good job of showcasing it for the various Radio 1 programs.<\/p>\n<p>APB\u2019s lineup was stable in these days: bassist Iain Slater, guitarist Glenn Roberts, drummer George Cheyne and \u2013 depending on which session \u2013 either Mikey Craighead or Nick Jones on additional percussion. I\u2019ve read that APB influenced Red Hot Chili Peppers, but you\u2019d do well not to hold that against them; this music is vital, sinewy and strong. APB had a storng pop sensibility, wedded to a funk-flavored sound that suggests what The Police might have sounded like had they drawn inspiration from a different set of sources.<\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s a strong dance-oriented character to the tunes, and the band could play. At times APB sounds a bit like Big Audio Dynamite or a much (<i>much, much<\/i>) more commercial PiL. <i>The Radio 1 Sessions<\/i> is solid stuff from an era when Britain seemed absolutely overrun with great and original bands.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A postpunk band from rural Scotland near Aberdeen, APB never quite hit the big time. The band released but two albums during its time in the spotlight, though the group [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27838,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,53,62,64,65],"tags":[5088],"class_list":["post-27837","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-compilation","category-post-punk","category-rawk","category-reissue","category-review","tag-apb","cat-19-id","cat-53-id","cat-62-id","cat-64-id","cat-65-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27837","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27837"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27837\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27839,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27837\/revisions\/27839"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27838"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}