Great Irish Bands Part 20 - Virgin Prunes / Gavin Friday
Feb 25th, 2008 by Sean Baite
It may be due to having recently lost my highly influential position as very minor management in the French prune industry but I’m often led to muse on prunes in musical history these days. On the famed ‘Nuggets’ compilation, we were treated to the garage abrasiveness of the Electric Prunes, you’ll all recall. Frank Zappa also gave us a track ‘The Duke of Prunes’ at some point in the 70s inspired by the little black wrinkled items. Dublin too has played its part with an ensemble that could hardly be missed in the late 70s/early 80s - the Virgin Prunes. Their moniker managing to marry Catholic neurosis and effective bowel movement management in the one succinct phrase.
I foresee that mention of the Prunes and their frontman Gavin Friday here will lead to a plethora of comments on what a pile of wank they were/he is, as seems always to be the case when they are mentioned - but to hell with it ! I’ll plough on anyway. Finding their genesis in the same ‘Lipton Village’ scene that spawned U2, they were probably the most striking band operating in Dublin from ‘77 onwards. I will admit that in looking over clips by them on the web
for inclusion here, it was more by sense of duty than through enjoyment that I kept watching. However, when pitching what they were doing against my vague memories of Ireland/Dublin at the time, I can’t help but admire their sheer balls for doing what they did. We’re talking about a Dublin/Ireland that had hardly had a major internationally recognised rock band (Skid Row ? / Thin Lizzy in the process of breaking through / The Radiators ?? ) and where the showband scene was still the major one and virtually the only one. (Of course, I’m talking here of ‘amplified’ music as the 70s was somewhat of a golden decade for trad acts.) The Prunes appearance on the scene is also in the couple of years preceding/coinciding with the pope’s visit in ‘79 - a visit where the auld Pole was arriving on ‘conquered ground’. They were of Ireland and of the holy land of Ireland, or were they ?
Fittingly enough, the Virgin Prunes profile on the continent seems to be a much higher one than in their own native Dublin. They still appear to have a cult status in Holland, Germany and France. On my first visits to France in the early 90s, people would often mention them to me, hearing I was from Dublin (at one point, I think because a Friday-less incarnation of the band had shambolically played in Toulouse shortly before my arrival there). Their approach, and even more pronouncedly that of Friday in his solo incarnation, was always more ‘European’ than ‘Anglo’. The Virgin Prunes themselves were the sonic equivalent of ‘art brut’ - selftaught musicians playing and screaming whatever seemed to come into their heads. It seems no co-incidence that both Guggi and Friday have since gone on to be exhibited painters, (no less ‘brut’). Just take a look at this fascinating clip from the Late Late in ‘79 (musically not great, but fascinating as a document of the Ireland of the time) :
First off, don’t they just fit right in on the show ?? (possibly the infamous ‘Youth’ show). God, and Colette, only knows what Dave-id is giving out at the end - however, I think it’s a priceless clip. Friday, logically enough, managed to guest vocal on an album by fellow inyerface ‘artiste brut’ Mark E Smith in the early 80s but the Prunes were predestined for implosion and were never going to conquer the world like their fellow Liptoners.
Friday himself has had a fairly interesting solo career since. One feels he would have had a far more interesting one had his best friend not been one of the richest men in rock. While I have time for his own writing, it’s especially as an ‘interprète’ that he excels. This first surfaced in the immediate aftermath of his leaving the Prunes when he organised the ‘Blue Jaysus Club’ in the bar at the National Stadium on the South Circular. Reflect on how seedy the Stadium is now - multiply it by a factor of 10 and you’ll get somewhat of an idea of how seedy it was then. In this ambiance, Friday did wonderful versions of Brel, Weill/Brecht and other louche classics from the continent. In my drink-addled opinion, there are few who surpass him in singing this sort of material in English translation. Here, from the end of the 80s, is his version of Brel’s ‘Au suivant’ (Next) that some charitable person seems to have recorded on a mobile phone from a VCR playback and put up on You Tube - the picture quality is shite but I think the quality of the performance shines through :
We can take some comfort from the fact that the German presenters at the end seem almost as out of synch with what has gone before as Gaybo in the clip from 10 years previously. Friday is still doing great versions of others material - on a recent album funded by Johnny Depp, of shanties and sea songs (tying in with that bloody film) Friday’s version of the well sleazy ‘Baltimore Whores’ is a standout where versions by better known names leave this landlubber, well, a bit sea-sick (mentioning no-one, Jarvis).
Over, then, to you the reader, for the couple of dozen begrudging comments, although I must ask you to formulate them without use of the word ‘wank’ and its derivatives…. shit, that’s gonna get us a few more sickos through Google…
Good stuff, Seán. Love the clip from Friday. A great version of Brel. and as for the Late Late clip.. I had come across that before, and bloody hell! all I could think while watching it was “Andy Kaufman was hailed a genius for this kind of thing.” They had balls alright. I mean, they were hardly thinking of a career when they made THAT appearance.
It´s funny, I saw a clip of an interview with Kevin Shields of My Bloody Valentine recently, when he said that when they started out as a band they lived up in Finglas and they used to see Gavin Friday all the time. One day they walked up to him and said that they were in a band and, you know, had he any advice. He told them to get the fuck out of Dublin for a start. This was the 1980s, they took his advice and sure, we know the rest. For that alone, man, he´s got to be praised. Also, he backed Aiden Walsh as well - without doubt, one of Ireland´s true originals.
*applause* I don’t often see a good (and positive) Prunes/Friday write up coming out of Ireland. Didn’t know this site before, will bookmark.
All you’ve said is true. It would be typical of the parocial small mindedness of the Irish to say that Gavin is just too full of himself to be of any worth. Better to say fair dues to him for trying, and often much of what he did was great for what it was and for when it was being done.
Of course how much of it is ego though. If you think you’re simply fab you’re also going to think that everything you produce is simply wonderful. But I’ve alway thought that Friday was alright, probably because of the Fall connection, and especially like the cabaret panache of the Brel stuff which seems to suit his theatrical nature, but its just a pity that some of it is a great steaming pile of ….
Love the Late Late clip, and last word on this, I have the Peter and the Wolf CD, which Hannah listens to all the time. The style of it suits him perfectly and Maurice Seezer’s arrangment is brilliant.
I’m not Glen Hansard’s biggest fan, but he was talking about playing live gigs abroad and getting really into it and there’d always be someone shouting ‘wanker!’ and they’d always be Irish, whereever you played in the world. He called it ‘Being Irished’. Perhaps with his recent Oscar win he won’t have to suffer that anymore.
re: Ego… everybody has one. You couldn’t be a singer and have a 30 year career and not have an ego. Having an ego is the reason to get up on a stage, whether you’re a shoegazer or an extrovert maverick like Gav.
Ego… everybody has one
Fair enough and I think extrovert maverick does describe him well. So point taken. I suppose I’m reacting, following on from your point above about Hansard, mainly because these days he’s better known in Ireland as the flamboyant satellite of the richest man in rock.
I’ve always liked this quote, from Mr Friday himself, in an interview in The Face in 1990:
“Irish people are into a more communal thing. They love the idea of community, communal music. That’s why everyone wants to be The Waterboys and nobody wants to be the Virgin Prunes. Community and confrontation don’t go well together, which is fair enough but a bit cosy.”
[…] Harvest Ministers are a far more discreet outfit than my own last choice for this series GIB 20 - Virgin Prunes / Gavin Friday but they don’t escape from the beautiful losers label, I suppose. The founding preacher goes […]
@donagh A lot of the aggro towards GF is definitely the result of the company he keeps. Most Irish people that slag him off don’t know his work at all and have never seen him play live. The criticism is a little unfair as the friendship is older than the fame. Should he have stopped being Bono’s friend just because the guy went mega? I think it’s interesting that three childhood friends, Gav, Guggi and Bono, have managed to remain just that for such a long time. Such a hard thing to do in their line of work. The dynamic is fascinating. I think it’s something to celebrate, rather than begrudge. But I guess as a fan, I would say that.
Caroline, that’s an excellent point. The fact that they are all still friends, still in touch, should be celebrated, not derided. Having said that, I have seen Gavin Friday live, I enjoy some of his work - not all, though - and I cannot listen to the Virgin Prunes for more than 30 seconds at a time. I think they’re awful. but, it’s more the fact that I’m not a fan of the type of music/performance they made, along with a series of other similar bands in the 1980s.
Seems this post is garnering responses at about my average reaction time :-> Hydragenic - hadn’t heard that quote from GF - but I seem to remember that the period when everyone in Ireland wanted to be the Waterboys went on for an agonisingly long time… Caroline, thanks for linking to my humble post - I have to disappoint you in telling you that I didn’t post from Ireland (although it is an Irish blog) and have been undergoing begrudgery management therapy since I left Ireland 10 years ago - not sure I’m getting value for my money.
It’s ironic they should have chosen Lipton ‘VILLAGE’ as the name for their teenage confraternity for it seems to me that it’s Ireland’s (and esp. Dublin’s) village mentality that generates the sort of kneejerk begrudgery you mention.
In even the largest village, it doesn’t pay to stand out too much (or even at all).