RECORD TURNOVER 80s HITS #216
The Wake, one of my favourite groups of all time, formed in Glasgow in 1981 with a line-up of Caesar, Steven Allen and Joe Donnelly. They released their first single by themselves the following year, on a label they called Scan 45. Then they became the first crossover group between the Factory and Creation environments when Bobby Gillespie (before playing in The Jesus & Mary Chain) joined the band.
Caesar, whose real name is Gerard McNulty, had previously been the guitarist for Altered Images and wrote their excellent debut single. His sister Carolyn Allen soon joined the group and after their first album for Factory, Gillespie was replaced by Alex MacPherson. While they later went on to record and release for Sarah Records, the highlight of their tenure at Factory is in my mind the album Here Comes Everybody. It came out in 1985 and has been reissued several times.
It is the perfect mix of artful pop, coldwave and post-punk. While the group toured extensively with New Order and were often (unfairly) compared to them, I feel like this album is better any full-length record those legends produced.
“Here Comes Everybody was the first time I became fully involved in the writing and recording of an album. I remember being excited and anxious to do well, and on the whole it was great fun but hard work. The part I remember most though was the last day and night of mixing. We were struggling to finish when suddenly everything changed. We were tired. I lay down on the couch to listen with pieces of music echoing in and out of my half sleep. It was so dreamlike, then emotional, as I realised that making an album is a very private experience, but one you hope will be loved by others.”
Carolyn Allen for LTM
